Instead, he leaned forward and set me on the table, tugging my arms and legs free from his body and then opening the robe and spreading me like I was his favorite meal.
Distantly, I heard the boxes and silverware hit the floor, the glug of a glass overturning and water dripping from the table and onto the tile. But that was very distantly because I’d propped myself up on my elbows and was much more focused on Damon.
On his scalding gaze.
On the fact that he’d dropped to his knees.
On him bending forward and his mouth pressing to my pussy.
Even knowing it was coming, I still gasped at the first touch of his tongue. Then my elbows gave way and I slumped back onto the table. He wasn’t slow or gentle or coaxing.
He demanded.
And I was happy to oblige.
My hands dropped to my sides, nails trying and failing to find purchase on the wood as he worked me with his tongue. Long, slow strokes were interspersed with short, quick flicks against my clit. He sucked at my labia, used a finger to press inside. In seconds, my nerves were firing, heat and moisture and desire spiraling up and out of control. He used the flat of his tongue then the tip, alternating the movements, twisting that pleasure higher and higher as he slid his finger in and out, in and out.
Haze filled my vision, my hips bucked, my spine arched against the table. My orgasm was there, so fucking close that I could almost reach out and touch it and—
“Damon!” I shouted, fingers gripping his head and almost tearing at his hair as I tugged him back.
He stopped, leaned away, chest heaving, face severe, eyes burning.
“Inside me,” I gasped, tugging him up. He was already on his feet by the time I finished the request, knocking my hands away effortlessly, fingers reaching for the button of his jeans.
“Eden?” he asked, pausing there, hands trembling.
I sat up, undid the button, tugged down the zipper.
He pushed them down. “Baby?”
I nodded.
One stroke filled me.
I didn’t think about protection. I should have, but I didn’t.
Instead, I just felt. His hard cock inside me, the table beneath me, the pleasure spiraling in my stomach, making my head spine. The way he looked at me and how it made my heart skip a beat, the way his hand found my hip, fingers opening and closing as though I were making him slowly lose control.
And maybe I was.
Because he’d definitely done the same to me.
My hips met his stroke for stroke, my fingers clenched his forearms, my pussy squeezed the hard intrusion of his cock.
Over and over, higher and higher. Until . . .
Thank fuck.
I catapulted over the edge.
One stroke. Another. And Damon’s forehead dropped to my shoulder as he came with a long, deep groan.
I closed my eyes.
Pleasure had deadened my limbs, made my mind fuzzy. But not for long. Pretty soon reality began to creep back in, fear licking at my fingertips, eating away at the lovely after effects.
Fuck.
I’d never be able to eat at this table again.
In for a penny.
I didn’t protest when Damon lifted me from the table and carried me down the hall and into the bathroom. Nor did I protest when he turned on the shower, stripped his clothes and my robe away, then put us both under the hot spray.
I didn’t protest as he washed my body, nor as he dried me off afterward and brushed my hair.
I didn’t protest when he tucked me under the covers and then went back into the hall.
I just listened to his footsteps enter the kitchen, listened as he cleaned up the mess we’d made there.
I should have helped.
I didn’t.
Instead, I just lay there, trying to figure out how to fix this.
I couldn’t fix this. I didn’t know how.
The last time I hadn’t kept my interactions to one night had ended up with me wearing a ring on my left hand and a cast on my other.
The last time had taken my independence.
The last time had broken me.
“Shit,” I muttered, tears welling in my eyes, terror making my heart skip a beat. I needed to get out of bed, get dressed, and make sure Damon left.
And yet, I just continued to lie there. Paralyzed, weak, fucking stupid as hell. All I could think of was his face, the dark slashes of brows drawing together, the hand lifting before it made contact with my face. The need to layer on extra foundation for days. The way I’d had to move cautiously and carefully because he’d also struck my ribs repeatedly.
No.
No.
I was never going to be that person again.
I was strong. I was independent. I was—
Damon walked back into the room, a dish towel tossed over one shoulder, carrying a plate in one hand with a sheepish smile on his face. He extended it toward me, but when I didn’t move to accept it, he set it on the nightstand.
“Because I ruined the first one,” he murmured. “I’m sorry it’s a poor substitute.” He turned and left the room again.
My eyes flicked to the plate.
Toast, though not French-style this time.
Instead he’d placed two slices of toasted bread on a plate, slathered them with butter, and covered them both in cinnamon and sugar.
And though the past faded and the angry face of my ex-husband disappeared from my mind’s eye, my heartbeat didn’t slow, and the terror didn’t fade. Because there was a plate of toast on my nightstand and Damon had been in my kitchen making me said toast.
He’d made me toast.
He’d cooked for me because we’d fucked each other senseless on the kitchen table, knocking our breakfast to the floor in the process.
He’d tried to fix something that he’d broken.
Th-that didn’t happen. It just wasn’t possible—
Damon strolled back in, a glass of orange juice in one hand, a bowl in the other. Syrup. The bowl contained syrup, I realized when he set both on the nightstand.
If I was keeping things in perspective, syrup shouldn’t have been my breaking point. But he’d cooked, he’d fixed, he’d brought me fucking toast and syrup. I shook my head, sitting up at the same time and tossing the covers to the side. This couldn’t be happening. I couldn’t let this happen.
I jumped up from bed, looking for . . . hell, I didn’t know what. I just had to get away, and I had to do it right in that moment.
“Eden?” Damon asked, probably shocked by my whack-a-mole tendencies. “What’s wrong?”
I shook my head. “I can’t do this.” I took a jerky step forward, starting to run . . . somewhere, but I was tugged to an abrupt halt.
Not a rough grip, not a jolting or harsh movement, but suddenly finding myself tugged to a stop, my back against a hard chest, a firm arm banded around my waist, hot breath in my ear . . . and I freaked. I didn’t hear the gentle words, the soft “Baby? What is it?”
My past swarmed forward.
The darkness swamped my mind and in one heartbeat I was back there, on the opposite coast, in that apartment with him, the fists and kicks coming my way and—
I snapped.
Syrup had made me snap.
“Let go of me!” I screamed and tore at Damon’s arm, my nails scratching at the bare skin, creating bright red lines at first and then when he didn’t let go, cutting into his flesh.
Everything happened in both fast-forward and slow motion.