Page 9 of The Don
The shivering stops, and I hold my breath. She holds hers as well for a few long counts before releasing a loud shuddering whoosh of air.
I swallow a groan as she lifts her t-shirt slowly up her torso. Her movements are jerky at first, slow, teasing even. Her smooth skin looks even softer than I remember, and I ball my hands into fists to keep from touching her. The distance between us is not insignificant, but it’s nothing. It’s no longer an ocean, which means anything is possible.
She bares her small stomach to me, holding her shirt under her breasts for a few seconds before pulling it over her head.
My mouth is dry, and I lick my lips, but there isn’t enough water in the world to quench this thirst. “Your pants next,” I demand.
A delicious shudder moves through her as she complies, pulling a sharp inhale through her pursed lips. I feel that sound traveling across the patch of skin from my belly button into my groin and down the length of my shaft. I’m already hard for her. I’m already drooling from the tip of my cock.
“Do you need to eat?” I ask, my jaw so tight it’ll start to ache soon enough.
“I missed you,” she says, reaching behind her back to unclasp her bra.
“Are you tired?”
She shakes her head quickly, and the fabric hiding her breasts from my gaze loosens.
“Are you sore from traveling?” I rasp.
Her delicate fingers pull her bra straps over her shoulders. They fall to the crooks of her elbows. She stops. Waits.
Waits for me to lift my eyes from the soft flesh of her cleavage.
I move my gaze over her chest. I see her throat move as she swallows. Her pink tongue wets her lips. Her wide nostrils flare. And her eyes widen as she steels herself to face me.
I cannot help but smile at this display, enjoying every word, every breath, every new inch of naked skin. “Bella. Are you sore?”
“No,” she whispers, her eyes meeting mine. She releases her bra and bares herself to me. “Not yet.”
There’s a challenge in her eyes. I’m used to women looking at me in this way — I’m certain Flavia never looked at me otherwise — but I never let it get to me because I never cared. But this is Shae, and seeing this look on her face feels like throwing gasoline on the fire she lit inside me months ago. She’s shivering, and her breaths have become reedy pants. But when her back straightens, and her chin moves ever so slightly toward the ceiling, I can see that at least some of the challenge in her eyes is for herself.
She wants me to take control, and I will, very soon, but I can wait just a little bit longer. I can give her the space to rise to the occasion for herself, knowing that I will follow her anywhere.
I feel as if the weeks we’ve been apart have wound me up, stretching my skin taut over my body, preparing me for something I wanted but couldn’t hope for, but now it’s here.
“You shouldn’t have let me leave,” she says in a shaky voice.
“I didn’t want to.”
She gasps softly again and moves her fingers to the top of her jeans, tracing the outline of her lower belly. “Show me.” Her voice is the most fragile, unyielding command.
I rip my hands from my pockets and take two quick steps forward. Shae jumps at my sudden movement, but she doesn’t flee. She should, but the moment for that has passed as far as I’m concerned. I wonder, though, if Shae even considered leaving because she stands in the middle of the room, shaking, waiting for me to descend upon her. She gasps when I grab her roughly and pull her to me, both of our mouths falling open on a shared, desperate, relieved moan.
I take full advantage of her parted lips with my hungry tongue and taste her for the first time in too long. I dig my fingers into her hair, tip her head back, and suck her tongue into my mouth.
I don’t have to wonder if she wants this when she presses her shivering body against mine, wraps her arms around me, and pulls me into her as tight as she can, as close as we can get. For now.
And that’s the thing about the lies we tell ourselves. I’ve spent weeks pining for Shae, only coping with her absence because I knew that were she here, she would be in danger. She returns — pregnant, no less — and someone tries to kill me again, but do I send her away? No. I hardly even entertain the idea. I wanted to be someone who would choose her safety over my desire, but all it takes is a few moments alone with her to shatter that pretense. I am exactly who I have always been. Greedy. Selfish. Demanding. But now I am also hers.
I find myself without any of my masks in this kiss. I taste her with everything I have, everything I am, all the roughness of my life before, and all the softness that I have stored up just for her. And Shae meets me as my equal. Her nails scrape over my shirt before yanking the cloth from my pants to scratch at my bare back as if only nothing between us will give her relief.
And I agree.
When I know we are on the same page, I don’t bother to hold back, however little I have been.
I keep kissing her and walk her into the sitting room. I break our kiss for only a few seconds so I can turn her around in my arms. I pull her back against me, and the air rushes from her lungs.
“God, yes,” she groans. Shae grinds her ass against my cock, cranes her neck to kiss me over her shoulder. She lifts her hands and grabs the back of my head, pulling my mouth back down to her waiting lips.