Chapter 36
Lovelyn
The intimate, low-lit dining room at the castle hotel had to be Kane’s worst nightmare. Though the building was huge with turret corners and ivy climbing the walls, their restaurant was cramped and closed in.
I was half-ready to suggest we grab room service, but Kane didn’t seem bothered.
The ma?tre d’ greeted us with a professional smile and checked our booking. “Follow me.”
To one side of the restaurant, a doorway gave a glimpse through to a covered outdoors area, rain drumming down on the white tarpaulin roof. It was also empty from what I could see.
But when we got out there, I realised I was wrong.
A single table was made up, white cloth, silver cutlery, and with heaters and candlelight casting a warm glow.
And flowers. Stands of them around the table.
The woman dipped her head. “Your table, Mr and Mrs Ryan. Happy anniversary. I’ll return with the champagne you ordered.”
We settled in the cosy booth, the gentle sound of rain falling overhead. Kane watched me.
I swallowed. “Did I hallucinate and miss our wedding?”
“It felt like a good idea to get them to agree to what I wanted.” His steady gaze held on me. “Do you like it?”
“It’s perfect.” I couldn’t have imagined anything better. Space for him, the flowers for me, a castle, and his soft smile. It melted my heart for good. “We can probably consider your boyfriend training complete.”
“Don’t say that. We have the night to come yet.”
I shivered. Kane had me order for us both, complimenting every choice like I’d personally cooked it.
We drank wine with a three-course dinner and talked, not about anything challenging, but making a connection.
He told me more about the mission with Tyler.
How he’d enjoyed the work. How he’d thought about me.
I let him in on why I’d started selling information to the skeleton crew. The mortgage I’d taken on my mother’s house that needed paying so I didn’t lose it. The way my father had made that easier by having me deliver information to Arran, giving me a path to follow in his footsteps.
Kane listened to every word like he wanted to know me. The romance of the night took my breath away.
One more day.
That’s all it would take to fall in love with him.
I was so close but had guarded my heart.
While I’d been grieving, opening up to anyone hadn’t been a good idea.
I’d dated Lyle without the slightest concern that it would get serious.
Kane’s closed-off nature had made that easier, but each tiny degree of letting me in had shoved bricks out of that wall.
After a year, maybe I was ready to move on. The thought had me giddy. The wine gave me other ideas.
When we were done, Kane took me to the reception area to check us in, getting the keys for a bedroom, a turret room with windows surrounding a four-poster bed, gauzy curtains open to the night.
A fairy tale.
He locked the door, and I kicked off my heels and peeked in the open door of the dressing room. So fancy. In a few long strides, Kane caught me by the waist, turning me to face him.
I tilted my head, trying to hide the emotion from my eyes or from forming on my lips. “As distraction techniques go, how has your evening been?”
He braced himself over me with his hand to the frame above my head, his big body blocking mine. With his free hand, he took my ponytail and twisted it around his fist. “Distracting.”
He lowered his mouth to mine.
I pushed up on my toes to map my lips to his, drowning in an all-encompassing kiss. I adored his kiss. Warm, giving, demanding. He was learning to communicate with me, not just through words, but in his actions, too.
Kane stole my thoughts then broke away. “Clothes off unless ye want to do the walk of shame tomorrow in a ruined gown.”
As if I didn’t have a change of clothes in my bag. “Not going to chase me down the corridors?”
He stepped back. Swallowed. Then reached to crack open a window, the sweet scent of the rain coming in on a breeze that stirred the curtains. “Not tonight.”
God, the intimacy. That’s what was going to kill me. Sex after being chased down was thrilling, or feeling him moving in me when I could do nothing but take it, but this was something else.
Just him and me and a bed.
“Then you take my clothes off.”
He backed me into the carved post. “Turn around.”
I did, bracing my hands on the cool wood while the rain drummed its steady beat.
He gathered my hair off my neck and breathed me in, then slid down my zip so my dress pooled at my feet.
When his palm flattened over my belly and pulled me back into him, the heat of him stole my balance, and I let it.
He unclipped my bra, and I moaned at his touch on my breasts. He kissed my jaw, my throat, shedding his clothes between soft touches.
“On the bed.”
I crawled on the mattress, and Kane caught the side of my underwear, drawing them off me to leave us both naked. Then he was on me, flipping me over.
“Slow,” I ordered.
“I can’t.”
“Then let me.”
On his knees, Kane inflated his huge chest with a heavy breath.
I set a shaking hand to the centre and pushed him back onto the white pillows and brocaded quilt, careful not to touch his wound.
He let me, giving up a sound of need when I threw my leg over him.
I’d never ridden a man before, scared of how I’d look.
At how unflattering the angle might be. Kane stroked me with reverential touches, nothing in his eyes but how turned on I made him.
This wasn’t sex. It was lovemaking. I took my time over kissing him, neglecting his heavy dick that throbbed under me. I tormented him until he growled, lifting me to thrust inside, releasing me to settle once more with a moan that could wake the neighbours.
Capturing his wrists, I guided them above his head with an unspoken instruction to keep them there so I could play.
This, he couldn’t do, his hands had to be on me.
Touching me, taking handfuls. He let me ride him for a minute until his control broke and he took over, slamming into me with urgency that boosted how I felt.
Adored. Beautiful.
It hurt my heart and healed me at the same time.
When he came, I did, too. Both of us tumbling together, but far from the only time it would happen over the course of the evening.
Driving into me for a second time, he muttered words that thrilled. “I want it all, Lovelyn.”
I did, too. Everything he had to give. I knew it was more than he showed.
Later, when the room was all shadows and the rainstorm softened to a hush, he brushed his mouth over mine. My hands fisted the sheets for a kiss that didn’t end. The connection I sought was right there in that touch, the insistent demand to stay with him, to be there.
No words. Only the kind of quiet that resembled trust, and a happiness that I could hardly contain.
When I drifted against him, the window still open and the air cold on our skin, he tucked my head under his chin and held me.
He didn’t sleep at first. His fingers traced shapes on my hip.
I imagined they were letters, making words to say what he couldn’t.
It was that hug, that tight hold that nearly broke my one-more-day rule.
Tomorrow, I told myself, and tried not to fall.
Morning came with a sharp ringtone and Kane startled awake, pulled from my arms and leaving me cold. Naked, he searched his pile of clothes for his phone, his expression strange when he answered.
I didn’t know the ringtone. It wasn’t his typical one.
“What? No. That isn’t right. We need more time.” He listened, his free hand bracing his neck. That odd expression twisted darker. “I’ll be there.”
He ended the call. I sat up in bed, my heart squeezing, because whatever he’d just heard was hurting him.
“I need to drive north. My mother’s care home.”
I could let him go. Get a taxi home to Deadwater. I chose different. “I’ll be ready in five.”
If it wasn’t for the pit of worry in my stomach, I could’ve thought this another step on. Meeting the family and supporting him through the coming crisis. But that sense of dread only grew on our early morning journey where he took the corners fast and didn’t reach for me once.
It told me that one more day wouldn’t come, and every one of my fears was about to be realised.