Unraveled (Undone) (17 page)

My heart swells and my chest grows tight. “I don’t. I know I did for a long time, but I don’t. You’ve conquered me.”

“I know that here.” He touches his temple. “But sometimes I still worry about it. Or I worry something will happen to me and you’ll leave again.”

I gulp, and swallow down my emotions. “I worry every day something will happen to you, but I don’t let it stop me. I’m all in. Both feet and my whole body. I can’t live without you, how can I leave?”

He opens his mouth to speak, but then stops, shakes his head and starts again. “Here’s what I need.”

I pin my gaze on him. “I’m listening.”

He steps toward me and his hand curls behind my neck. As always the chemistry that burns between us flares to greedy life. It’s a hot tangible thing, stronger today than that night I first met him. It’s a bond so strong, and so deep it’s exclusive only to him.

His fingers tangle in my hair. “I need to be your rock. I need to be that one person in your life you cling to.”

I nod, some of my rigid muscles loosening.

“I need you to push me past my patience sometimes.”

“Mission accomplished.” I smile.

He smiles back. “Indeed. Believe it or not, I need your messiness because how boring would I be without it?”

I put my hand on his arm. “There’s not a woman alive that would think you were boring.”

“I don’t care about them, I care about you.”

We move a little, closing the inches that still separate us.

“What else?” I ask.

“I need your submission. And your devotion.”

“You have those.”

He swallows and the cords in his neck work and I know he’s struggling with something he doesn’t want to say.

I squeeze his arm. “Tell me, please.”

His expression twists. “I don’t know how to communicate to you how much I love you, how much I need you. I wish you could see inside me so you would understand. I have never even come close to loving anyone the way I love you and I know I have to share that with John and I accept that, but…” He trails off and looks away.

Suddenly, I get it. The fog clears and I understand. That feeling I get, that he’s holding back, it’s not about sex as I assumed. It’s about fearing that if he pushes me the wrong way he won’t be able to live up to the expectations set by a dead man.

And just like that I know what needs to be done.

“Michael, sit down.” I step away from him and point to the bed. “Please.”

His face is pinched with worry and I can tell he thinks he’s said the wrong thing. With a wary glance he sits.

I straddle him, and his arms go around me, his big hands settling on my hips.

“Look at me,” I say, using words he’s said to me a thousand times.

He does, and I can tell he wants to protest the sudden shift of power but he remains silent.

I cup his cheek. “I’m going to tell you something, and I’m only going to say it once, so I hope you’re really listening.”

“I am. But—”

I cut him off. “No, just listen.”

“All right.”

My throat is tight and I clear it. “I don’t feel the same way about you that I felt about John.”

“Layla, this isn’t necessary. I understand. I don’t want—”

I kiss him. “Just listen to me.”

“I—” he begins again.

I shake my head. “Listen. You don’t have to justify your feelings to me. I loved him. He was comfort to me. Like a safe, warm blanket I could wrap around myself. We had a great relationship, and we had so much fun together. If he were alive I’m positive we’d be living a nice, happy life.” Michael’s shoulders bunch and flex under my fingers and I can feel his stress. I press my mouth to his in a soothing gesture before I continue. “But the truth is, as much as I loved him, it wasn’t like it is with you. Not better or worse, but different. You and I have something unique. The way I want you is unmatched. It’s like the second I laid eyes on you every cell in my body woke up.”

“You don’t have to do this,” he says and his voice is strained.

I don’t stop. Because I understand him, he doesn’t want to feel competitive with John, but he is showing me he’s human. I owe him this peace, because it’s true.
This
is what I need to do for him. It’s something I can give him, after everything he’s given me. And he deserves to know how important he is to me, how essential.

I run my thumb over his strong jaw. “I know I don’t have to but I want to. I think the difference is, I loved him with the heart of a girl. And I love you with the heart of a woman. The way it is between us, sometimes I’m afraid it will swallow me whole. That I’ll burn up with it. Sometimes when we’re out, and we’re with our friends, all I can think about is when I can have your cock. How soon you’ll fuck me and make me whole. It’s like a preoccupation. When we’re sitting on the couch in our sweatpants, eating takeout, it should be comfortable. And it is. But it’s also like there’s electricity sparking the air between us. It wasn’t like that with John.”

His muscles relax under my hands. “So you’re obsessed with me?”

I rock against his erection that will be in me soon enough. “Totally.”

“You know I’m just as obsessed.” His fingers squeeze my hips.

“Are you?”

He yanks me down, grinding his hard cock against my soft, swollen center. “What do you think?”

I lean down and whisper in his ear, “I think I’m the luckiest woman in the world.”

He groans, hot against my skin. Before he stills me. “I’m sorry.”

“I’m sorry too.” My mouth settles on his and our tongues entwine, but before I get lost, I pull away because I want to make sure he understands. “You’re not sharing me. I am all yours.”

He looks guilty. Conflicted. Because, at his core, he’s a good guy with a hero complex that doesn’t want to feel anything as petty as jealousy over a dead man.

I know just the thing to ease his mind about that one. I grin and lean back. “You do know you’re a better person than me, don’t you?”

“No, I’m not.”

“Ha. Trust me, you’re a lot more understanding than I am. Because believe me, if you had a dead fiancée, it wouldn’t matter how good she was to you, I’d hate her. I’d annoy you with questions and make you do a compare and contrast between us. Even then I still wouldn’t be satisfied, and I’d make you tell me all sorts of terrible things about her.”

He laughs before shrugging. “That doesn’t sound unreasonable.”

I tilt my head as though pondering. “All right, let me think.”

“Not necessary. I don’t want you to say anything bad about him.”

“No, no, I want to.” I can think of John now and it’s not a big gaping hole. I can remember the good things about him, and the bad with fondness, instead of grief. I wrinkle my nose. “Well, he was kind of a slob. He used to leave his socks on the floor, like right next to the hamper.”

His muscles relax under me. “That is annoying.”

“It was. And he would somehow manage never to empty the dishwasher.”

“That’s not so bad.”

“That’s because you hate emptying the dishwasher too.”

“Yeah, I do.”

I give him a sly look and glance back and forth, as though someone might be watching us. “And he let me top from the bottom, like, all the time.”

Michael laughs. “Now
that
is a crime.”

“It was.” I give him a pout. “You never let me. Not even once.”

“You wouldn’t like it if I did.”

“You’re right. I wouldn’t. Now. You have certainly refined my perception of dominance.”

“Is that good?” His expression turns curious.

“Very good.” I rock against him. “The best.”

His gaze locks with mine, and everything inside me stills. He runs his hands up and down my back. “Thank you, Layla.”

“You’re welcome.”

“I think you’re right, we needed to have the conversation.” He shakes his head. “I didn’t know. And I’ll try, okay.”

“That’s all I ask. I’m not asking you to change your personality. But it’s okay to get mad at me.” I grip his jaw in my hand. “I promise, I’m not going anywhere.”

“You promise?”

“You have my word.”

Our lips meet, and our mouths turn instantly frantic, taking on a desperate edge that fuels our interactions. The insatiable desire he evokes in me. A gnawing hunger. His tongue sweeps inside, filling me, claiming me.

He lowers us to the bed and I tumble on top of him before he turns me over and I’m trapped under him. He pulls away and brushes my hair back before staring down at me. “So beautiful.”

I touch my fingers to his face. “You too.”

“I know you have a hard time believing this, but you are the best thing that ever happened to me. My most precious possession.”

He means it. I know this deep down in the pit of my stomach. “And you’re mine.”

“Now I’m going to fuck you. Own your body.”

My thighs tighten around his hips and I arch. “Yes.”

He moves, levering up and kneeling before reaching for the straps of my dress and peeling them down my body. I lift up, and he rids me of the silky fabric before stripping off his shirt, and unbuckling his belt. Slowly he pulls it from the loops, like he’s giving me my own private show. With deliberate movements he unbuttons and unzips his pants and they slip down, displaying the magnificent cut of his lean hips and flat stomach.

My mouth waters. I can barely believe he’s mine.

He settles on top of me, and I run my hands down his muscled back, loving the tense and flex as I touch him. He kisses me, slow and deep, unrestrained. The ghost of my dead fiancé evaporates, leaving nothing but Michael and me.

As it should be. As I want it to be. But most important, as I need it to be.

Michael is my life now. My priority. My love.

His mouth slants, and our kiss grows hungry.

He strums over my nipple, plucking at the hard peak, rolling and pinching and pulling until I moan into him.

He groans and rears back. “I want to take this slow.” He shucks his pants the rest of the way down, taking his underwear along with him until he’s blissfully naked. “But I need you too much right now.”

My body keens at his words. Because I want him to need me as much as I need him, and tonight, it finally sinks in that he truly does. That he is as lost without me as I am without him. I lift my hips in offering. “Please.”

He growls and climbs up my body, kissing a trail in his wake. “I’m going to fuck your throat.”

I shudder. I love when he just takes what he wants. When he uses me for his pleasure.

I part my lips, and wait. He straddles my head, and braces himself on the headboard before pushing his straining cock past my lips.

His thick erection presses deep into my mouth and I lie there, letting him do what he will. He doesn’t want performance. He wants surrender. And I’ll give him nothing less. He fills my throat, cutting off my air supply before he stills. I relax my throat around him, fighting against my gag reflex. I rest my fingers on his thighs, and close my eyes, willing and accepting.

He pulls back and then thrusts forward, stretching me to maximum capacity.

He lets loose a low, guttural curse, and retreats, only to advance once again.

Over and over.

I surrender to him, completely, letting my mouth and throat communicate the depth of my love for him.

He pulls back, and pops from my lips before he moves down my body to look at me. I shiver with lust, recognizing that feral look in his eyes.

He moves between my legs, grips my hips, and slams into me, leaving me gasping and panting. He covers me. Takes my wrists and clasps them in his strong hands, squeezing until I’m confined under him. Unable to do anything, but take his hard, brutal thrusting.

I’m captured. And there’s nowhere else I’d rather be in this world.

He growls, low in my ear. “Nothing feels as good as you tight around me.”

“Yes.” My body catches fire as he moves ruthlessly inside me.

“Mine.” The word is harsh.

“Always,” I pant back.

The orgasm barrels fast upon me. I clench my fingers, fighting the release, not ready for it to end. Because I feel it. It finally sinks in that there’s no barrier between us.

He’s fucking me like I’m his salvation.

“Michael, god, Michael.” I want to claw at his back, but I can’t because he’s restrained me so completely I can only move my hips in a hard, rocking rhythm that matches his own.

“That’s right, sugar, I want you to come hard on my cock.” His voice is a low rumble that breaks me.

The climax explodes through me, shaking my whole body, stunning me silent. It rolls and crashes over me, going on and on and on.

I never want it to end. And I work my hips harder and harder into him. Wanting somehow to meld him to me.

Another orgasm crests and I cry out, arching as my muscles clamp around him, ripping his own shuddering climax from him.