Warmth and belonging and contentment grip me, but that doesn’t stop my cock from flaring rock-hard, as though my solid length wants to make up for lost time.
“Ryland….” She folds her arms, taking a step away. “Let’s be honest with each other.”
“Honest?” I growl.
Slow. Down.
But I’m done with that.
I’m not letting her slip away again.
“If you want honest, here you go.” I grab her again, pulling her to me. “The first time I saw you, Rachel, when I saw your photo, I knew I had to have you. Not that I knew I had to have sex with you. I knew I needed to own you. I knew you belonged to me. I knew that you would have my children, that we were – are – going to spend the rest of our lives together.”
She blinks with tears beading in her eyes, staring up as her mouth falls open.
Distantly, a voice tells me I’m ruining this. I need to stop.
But it’s too late for that.
“I know how it sounds,” I tell her, reaching up and brushing my thumb along her tear stained cheek. “How could I possibly know all that just by seeing your picture? I’m not sure how, but it’s the truth. Maybe….”
“What?”
She touches my chest, digging her nails in. The contact makes my body tighten and pulse and throb.
She’s so real when she’s been a dream for what feels like years, even if it’s only been a few days. Even an hour without my woman is way too damn long.
“Ryland?”
I sigh, letting my hand rest on her shoulder. Rusty sits beside us, watching the exchange.
“I never talked about my childhood, did I?”
“No,” she says softly. “It’s my fault. I didn’t ask.”
“No, no.” I shake my head. “Nothing’s your fault, Rachel. You haven’t done anything wrong.”
We pause, and then wordlessly, we hold each other’s hand. We do it naturally, without needing to discuss it. Walking around the pond, Rusty pads beside us.
“My uncle raised me after my mom died from a drug overdose. I never knew my dad. I found out years later that he passed as well from cancer. Anyway, my uncle was a mean motherfucker, a criminal, and from the age of twelve, he forced me to fight in these underground tournaments. We called it ‘the pits.’”
She gasps, stopping and turning on me. “Jesus, Ryland.”
I shrug. “I came to terms with it a long time ago. All that blood and pain. That’s not the point.”
“No?”
“The point is, I think it might’ve shattered something in me. It made it harder for me to feel what other people feel. It made me more distant. That’s what I used to think – that’s why I couldn’t ever date. But now I see. I was waiting for you, Rachel. You broke down my walls in two seconds flat. You’re the only woman I ever want.”
I stop, swallowing a big ball of emotion.
“I guess you’ll need time to think about this,” I say. “It’s a lot to take on –”
She lurches forward, standing on her tiptoes and kissing me firmly. I grin like a crazed wolf at her confidence, returning her kiss, my hands drawn to her lower back and her hips.
The temptation to move lower is strong, but we’re in public, and nobody gets to see my woman that way, but me.
I wouldn’t be able to control myself if anybody ever did.
“I feel the same,” she whispers, holding her lips close to mine.
I flinch, holding her in my embrace, and lean back so I can get a good look at her. “What?”
“I feel the same,” she says again, voice rising, becoming almost giddy. “Everything you said, about having children together, about having a future…I know it’s crazy. I know we shouldn’t be able to feel that so quickly. But I do. I feel it all the way down to my freaking soul. I want you, Ryland. I didn’t think you wanted me.”
“Of course I do,” I snarl. “You’re all I want. I was trying to tell you before…your virginity, Rachel. It only makes me want you more. It means you belong completely to me. It means nobody else is ever going to touch you. Ever.”
She moves toward me, looking up with her red cheeks and wide eyes. “So why didn’t you call?”
Tucking a gorgeously disobedient strand of hair behind her ear, I say, “I didn’t have your cell phone number. I had no way to find you. I even tried hiring a PI. And I’ve been using the online chat system for hours every day.”
“I gave your security guy my number,” she says shocked. “Didn’t he pass it on?”
I groan, shaking my head. “No, he didn’t. But that’s my fault. I went looking for you when you left. When I came back, he tried to talk to me. I snapped at him. I guess he didn’t feel comfortable sharing after that, even after I apologized. Goddamn it.”