Chapter 70
Chapter Seventy
As I fall back onto the giant stack of hotel pillows, I sigh. “They are a lot.”
Scout, standing next to the bed, leans over me, planting his hands on either side of my head. When he looks down at me with serious eyes, my heart doubles its pace.
“Hi,” I whisper.
He continues to search my face and when I place my hand against his scruffy jaw he leans into my touch.
Scout is shockingly gorgeous. Rugged, but so handsome my brain can hardly process him. Maybe it all did start with the eyes.
I’ve never seen eyes like his, just a shade bluer than diamond. But the depth in them now rocks me .
The man before me is a different animal than when we met.
Loving. Open with his admission of his feelings. Like we’ve cracked the seal on our dark secrets and now we both can finally breathe.
“I couldn’t wait for them to leave.” There’s a sexy rasp to his tone.
It feels so good to touch him, to show him the affection he’s deserved his whole life and never gotten.
“I’m glad they came though. It felt right.”
Without looking away from my eyes, he lifts my hand and brushes the softest touch of his lips across my knuckles. “This feels right.”
I feel happy tears beginning to press at the back of my eyes. But a tendril of doubt chases them like a wisp of smoke. “Are you sure you want to get married? I mean we can feel this out if…”
He presses my hand over his heart. Heat from his body melts into me through the thin cotton of his t-shirt. “Feel that?”
“Yes.”
“It’s never felt so strong.”
Only by sheer will can I swallow. “It’s all been so fast.”
“You can’t stand in the way of a force of nature.”
Those little tears squeeze out of my eyes when I smile. “God, and you are one.”
But I need to get something off my chest. Worried, I lower my gaze to Scout’s chest, feeling bad that I need this right now. “I need to ask you something.”
Keeping my hand over his heart, he’s quick to reply, “Ask away.”
Tracing the fingers of my other hand over his thigh, a worry line forms between my brows.
“Talk to me, beautiful.”
“What happened between you and Griff that made him so…angry with you?”
Scout tenses, his heart speeds below my hand. But he quietly answers me. “Look at me, please.”
Without hesitation, I do.
“When the fire happened, I didn’t want to live. Griff was the one who got me out of that shit show and when he and I were alone, I asked him to end me.”
My world screeches, tilting on its axis. “Oh god. I’m so?—”
He shakes his head once. “It was bad, but here I am. I’ll never regret any of it now. But there’s something else you need to know and I feel like I’m treading on telling you something that’s your brother’s private business.”
Nervous energy skates along my nerve endings. I pull my lip between my teeth and force myself to hold his gaze. “Then don’t tell me.”
“No. I think this will help you understand why he thinks I’m not suitable for his baby sister.”
“O-okay,” I reply feeling very unsure.
“Griff knows what kind of sex I like.”
Swallow.
“How?”
“We ran into each other...”
I feel that frown line deepen—the one that could be a canyon one day. “Where?”
Scout clears his throat. “I’d rather not say.”
Realization hits me. “Oh my god. At a sex club?”
“I plead the fifth.”
Closing my eyes I shake my head. “Please don’t tell him I know this. I do not want to ever have that conversation with my brother. ”
He laughs softly, holding my hand more tightly to his chest as if letting go even a little could let me slip away. There’s something in his expression…
The need to be reassured.
“Scout, I do not judge you for what you’ve done. I’m glad you found a way to…have pleasure.”
This time his vulnerability shows in full force. “You sure about that?”
“I’m so sure. And who knows, maybe one day we can go somewhere sexy together. Don’t couples do that sometimes?”
“NO one is seeing you naked. Ever. ” A growl forms in his throat as his hands tighten on me. “This is for me only. But yeah, we could definitely go somewhere that we could play in the private cosplay rooms.”
My pulse quickens with as my imagination kicks in. “Like dress up?”
He brushes a thumb over the rise of my cheek, speeding my heart rate even more. “I need a second. I’m letting my mind entertain all the kinky ways we could get dirty together. Role playing. Other things.”
A little thrill races through me and he studies me as my tongue quickly slips across my lips. “I’d like to do that with you. I’d like to do everything with you and only you.”
“Aria Kane, you never cease to surprise me.”
A heartbeat later, he’s crushing my mouth with hungry, searching lips. When he pulls back, it’s only long enough to whisper, “Fuck, I love you.”
Yes. This. All of this.
My happy meter blows completely apart as the needle pegs so far to the right it’s never going to be the same.
Then he’s delving both hands into my hair, climbing on the bed, to crouch over me with his thighs on either side of mine.
As he deepens the kiss, my hands seek him out, shaking with the need to touch his skin.
He groans into my mouth when I find the tight muscles of his abs. Heat scorches my fingertips, making my body sing in response.
I’ve never felt that response to touching a man before. He elicits so many first time responses, I’ve lost count. Like the bone deep need to make him mine, to love him, hold him, show him how special he is. Have his back. Take his pain.
These realizations tighten my insides, starving me for air. No, not air. Him.
I need him skin-to-skin on me. Deep inside. Fusing us from head to toe and everywhere in between.
When I drag his shirt up his back, he reaches up and tears it off and over his head in one violent move. Then he’s gloriously naked from the waist up for me to see.
I saw him only hours ago, but I already forgot how much I love his body.
“It’s yours.” His rough reply rumbles in the quiet space between us.
“I love all of this. I love you.”
He trails a finger down my neck, across a sensitive spot on my collarbone, pushing the neckline of the t-shirt down. Every place he touches goosebumps. “I love you in my shirt.”
“Except that first time.” Grinning, I tease as my pulse flies.
“Oh, I loved the way you looked, all warm and sexy as fuck, but I was furious I didn’t remember touching you. And goddamn, I wanted to touch you in the most…” His pa lm slides under the fabric, stretching the neckline as he finds my throbbing nipple.
Voice low, he finishes, “Dirty ways.”
And my shirt vanishes in some magic trick that involves hot hands all over me.
“On your back.” It’s a grunted command.
“I am on my back.”
He knocks the pillows off both sides of the bed. “No sweetheart, that was not on your back. “This—” he leans down and devours my nipple until his lips are damp and dark red. “Is on your back.”
Then he trails that mind wrecking tongue of his down the centerline of my stomach. When I start to arch, he flattens his hand over my lower tummy, spanning all of me with the width of his palm. “No, this is on your back. My feast. My playground to enjoy.”
“ Oh. Scout.” I latch my fingers on the corded muscles of his shoulders as he breathes on my bare skin. No panties under that shirt, the entire time his team was here.
Just bare wet pussy that’s now below his gaze. I’m so aroused I can smell my own scent perfuming the space around us.
For a few seconds he inhales me like I’m fine wine, then he brushes his mouth over one hipbone, then the other. “I want you to have a baby with me.”
Wait! What?
I’m pretty sure I heard something screech to a halt.
I’m stunned speechless, my fingers digging into his shoulders, but apparently he’s not out of words.
“I want our child to grow here.” The warm ridge of his nose nuzzles across the soft spot below my navel and I can’t stop the clenching of my heart.
“ Memphis … ”
He pulls his eyes away from my skin, looking up from where he’s resting between my legs and sears me to my marrow.
Hope. Raw, unabashed hope brightens those diamonds to a shine so powerful it lights up my whole world.
With my throat aching from all the love that’s trying to squeeze out of me at once, I say, “I really want that.”
A family with Memphis.
I was always one of those girls…the kind that loved kids. But after what happened I shelved those dreams. I was going to be a great aunt—if Griff ever finds a woman that will put up with him.
But this… would be a beautiful new chapter for us both.
Nipping my inner thigh lightly, Scout’s voice dips to a husky whisper. “I’m going to worship you now, fiancée.” He flashes a hot, proud grin.
“I’m so ready.”
He very carefully lifts my legs until my knees are over his shoulders and settles between my spread thighs, pushing me open wide to fit his massive width. “Keep your feet on my back so we don’t make them worse.”
I shake my head once. So darned sweet to me. The big badass SEAL with the ice eyes and the heart of a lion.
My protector.
“Babe, I’m good. Really good. I don’t even have feet right now. But I do need?—”