“But I can’t do this anymore.”
He staggered forward a step when I released him but didn’t follow me when I continued to his room for my clothes.
My lungs screamed and my chest burned as I fought to breathe. As I choked on tears.
I bent to grab my shirt and was hauled back with a muscled arm around my waist until I was pressed to the wall and Hunter was caging me in.
Blue eyes searching, begging. Body trembling.
“You can’t leave,” he said roughly.
“I’ll be back for work on Monday.”
The muscle in his jaw feathered, and his head shook as he reached for me. His hand tenderly wrapping around my neck and sliding up until it was curled around my jaw in a familiar and heartbreaking position.
“If this is about the sex—”
“It isn’t,” he said gravely.
“—there are plenty of women in this town who want to fuck you.”
I would know. More than a handful of the women of Amber had stopped by over the years to drop off pies or casseroles or to hand-deliver Christmas cards. Thinly-veiled attempts at hiding their true reasons for stopping by: A chance to snag a date with Hunter Dixon, to which he always refused.
At first, I’d been given a lot of suspicious glares when I answered the door if Hunter was in the orchard. After the first couple of years, I’d been dismissed completely.
I had never cared . . . until about five minutes ago.
Hunter tilted my head up, and I waited for it. For when he would turn it to the side.
But then my legs went weak and my stomach burst into a flurry of wings when his thumb faintly brushed across my bottom lip instead.
His chest rose and fell in sharp bursts. His brows drew low over his eyes as his stare fell to my mouth.
“They aren’t you,” was all he said before crushing his lips to mine.
A sound of surprise raced up my throat and got lost in the kiss as his mouth moved against mine in a way that was so entirely Hunter.
Firm and gentle. Hungry and relaxed.
He teased the seam of my lips, seeking entrance and groaning when I opened for him. His fingers flexing against my jaw in response and tilting my head back a little more. Deepening the kiss and demanding more that I readily gave.
Then his hands were racing down my body. The moment they hit my thighs, he lifted and pressed me harder against the wall as he pulled my bottom lip between his teeth. A wolfish grin darted across his face at the breathy whimper that left me in response.
“I need you,” I whispered as I arched to kiss him again, but he leaned back just enough for me to stop. For ice-cold fear to encase my stomach.
But then I looked into his eyes and everything in me warmed. The world around us stopped.
Hunter didn’t say a word, but it was there, written all over his face.
I had him.
I had him in an entirely new way than before.
I let the tips of my fingers trail along his jaw and over his lips before moving back to grip his dark hair. Every touch deliberate. Every touch fueled by my love for him.
I love you, I love you.
Leaning forward, I captured his mouth again in a kiss infinitely slower than the one before, but it left me just as breathless.
He turned from the wall and walked us toward the bed. Setting me on the edge and slowly running his hands up my body, taking his shirt that I was wearing as he went until we had to break apart so he could pull it over my head. As soon as the material was falling to the floor with his boxer briefs, he gently laid me on the bed as he gave me one last searing kiss before his mouth moved to my jaw and then my throat.
My fingers curled in his hair as he continued the path to my breast. My body writhing on the bed and soft moans leaving me as he pulled my nipple into his mouth. Sucking on the hardened bud and delivering swift, teasing bites while he tortured the other with his fingers.
“Hunter,” I breathed.
Begged.
Those eyes flashed to me as he settled between my thighs. His thick cock pressing against me. Teasing where I was aching for him.
With one last sensual bite to my nipple, he moved back up my chest and neck until his mouth was hovering over mine.
And then he paused.
The corner of his mouth ticked up, and I trembled.
It was such a Hunter thing, but this . . . this was different. The carnal need and desire held a possessive edge. They mixed with the love pouring from him as he looked at me.
I knew I would never forget that look or that moment.
Hitching my leg around his narrow hip, he slowly slid inside me. Letting me feel every inch as he claimed me. His breaths came sharper as he moved inside me, finding a rhythm we’d never had before.
Slower, deeper strokes. And more passionate than anything we’d ever shared.
I love you, I love you.
His stare met mine as if he’d heard my thoughts. “Izzy,” he said softly, my name filled with a lethal combination of fear and love and needs and unknowns.
The hand that had been holding my leg moved to cradle my cheek. His eyes shifting over my face again and again as if he was afraid to miss something. And then his mouth fell to mine again as his hips moved a little harder, a little faster.
The muscles in his back bunched and relaxed beneath my fingers. His long, sure strokes bringing me higher and higher and making my head light in an intoxicating way.
With one last slow kiss, he pulled back just enough that our lips continued to brush with each ragged breath and each thrust as his movements came faster and more unruly as he barreled toward his release.
When he came, our eyes were locked, and we were holding each other like we were afraid to let go. As if this moment might disappear the instant we did.
For the first time in ten years, I didn’t leave to go clean up and do something else in the house when Hunter eased out of me.
He grabbed the comforter and pulled it back, effortlessly lifting my body off of it and setting me higher up on the bed.
When he joined me at his pillows and had the comforter draped over us, he pulled me onto my side so I was facing him and brought my body as close to his as possible.
Sliding one of his legs between mine and hooking them at the calves for good measure . . . as if there might be a possibility that I’d try to leave.
“Is this weird?” I asked as I traced random patterns on his chest.
“Isn’t the first time you’ve slept here,” he said with a ghost of a smirk.
I sent him a dry look but couldn’t hold it for long. I felt exhilarated and energized. But at the same time, I was utterly relaxed and sure I would pass out the moment I closed my eyes. “That isn’t what I meant.”
“No,” he said in a low, grave tone. A line formed between his eyebrows as his hand curled around mine. “But, Izzy, I’m absolutely fucking terrified I’m going to hurt you, and I don’t think I can stop now that we crossed that line.”
“Stop from hurting me?” I asked softly, doubtfully.
“Stop this,” he answered meaningfully as he gave my hand a little squeeze.
“I’m not asking you to stop, and I know you won’t hurt me.”
“Izzy . . .” He passed his mouth across mine. Then did it again before leaning back to search me with pained eyes. “I hurt you tonight. I almost lost you tonight. You can’t know that.”
We could go around and around on this, and I knew it would end in me yelling because yelling was what I did when trying to prove a point—not that he wasn’t painfully aware of that fault of mine. But I didn’t want to yell anymore.