Chapter 46
Roxy
I open the door to find Damien in the hallway, talking with Vasili.
He's wearing a simple black T-shirt, jeans, and boots.
That earring catches the light, and those dimples soften his face, making him look almost boyish.
The moment his eyes land on my tear-stained cheeks and ragged breathing, he moves toward me.
My heart stutters with every step that closes the distance between us, and I have to force my hands to stay still, to not reach for him, to not shake.
"Give me a name," he says, quick as lightning, his hands framing my face.
I stare at this man who's picked me up off the floor every single time. Who put my heart back together, piece by broken piece, after my father's absence. Who pulled me close every time I tried to push him away. Who never gave up on me.
The entire drive here, I planned how to start this conversation. How to put everything into words without sounding insane, without seeming like I'd lost my mind. But when the car pulled up outside my office building, something settled in my chest, and I knew I had to run to him.
"I remember," I whisper, unable to look away.
His brow furrows. I probably do look crazy, smiling through tears, my hands trembling violently.
"You remember," he echoes softly.
"You."
"Me," he murmurs, his eyes widening with something like wonder.
His body goes rigid beside mine, but I force myself to continue.
"The reason you smile—" I start, but he cuts me off.
"It's you." His voice cracks. "It's always been you. You really remember?" His eyes glisten.
I pull him down until my forehead meets his, searching for the courage and words to tell him everything weighing on my heart.
"I love you. I think I've loved you since the first moment I saw you, when I was six.
I loved you from the first time you smiled at me.
I loved your laugh, I loved your bandaged hand, the way I knew even then that you'd protect me.
That you'd be my husband one day." I have to swallow past the knot forming in my throat.
"I loved you when every relationship failed because none of them were you.
I loved you when you said 'I love you' in that leather factory, and I love you now. " I take a deep breath.
I watch the emotions flood his eyes, tears and something so fierce it sends a shiver through my entire body.
Because even though my mind forgot him for reasons I don't understand, my soul always felt safe with him. My soul never forgot the promise made that night.
His hands tighten slightly on my cheeks.
"I love you because you saved me that night.
Because that night, a ray of sunshine chose me to be her husband, forever.
Because you didn't see the filth and blood on my hands, you saw something worth kissing, worth a kiss on a white bandage.
I'll never have the words to describe what I feel for you, and hell, I wouldn't even try to explain it to anyone else.
But you're every breath I take. You're every cell moving through my body.
You're everything. You always have been," he whispers at the end.
How could I have forgotten him? How could my mind erase him so completely? How?
When even my skin recognized him from the first moment. When I finally understand why I flirted with him from the beginning. Because he'd been mine for so many years. All those years I waited for him to appear, to come and stop this emptiness from bleeding so painfully.
"You didn't get on one knee that night," he whispers, almost laughing against my lips.
I roll my eyes, but with his hands still on my face, I try to lower myself down. His eyes widen in surprise.
"Don't you dare," he growls. "If anyone's ever getting on their knees, it'll be me, never you." His mouth crashes against mine, and I feel my heart flip with joy.
At his scent of musk, amber, and leather. At his firm lips. At the way I open my eyes to see a tear trailing down his cheek.
My hands rise to his neck, deepening the kiss that somehow feels like our first official kiss. A kiss twenty-two years in the making.
In one motion, his palms lift me by the hips, and instinctively, I wrap my legs around his waist as he starts climbing the stairs.
"Your wound," I whisper between kisses.
"Fuck it," he answers.
"Damien—" But the next second his lips move to the base of my throat, and he bites down.
"You owe me days, months, years I've lost." His tongue presses lightly where he bit, leaving goosebumps in its wake.
With my hands in his hair, I rest my head against his as we reach the bedroom door.
"I promise I'll get right on that after I strangle you for hiding this from me. Why didn't you tell me anything?" I ask softly because as much as I want to be angrier, I can't be.
Not when this moment—my body pressed against his—feels like the definition of Heaven. My Heaven.
After we enter the room, he sets me on the bed and kneels at my feet.
"I didn't want to mess with your mind, Roxanne. I'm selfish with every piece of you, but I'd go through the agony of you not knowing who I am a thousand times rather than know I caused something up here"—he touches my head gently—"to hurt you."
God, why does he say all these perfect things?
My hands lift his shirt, and his throat works.
The fabric doesn't hit the floor before he's on me, and I can't hide the laugh that escapes. His hands strip every piece of clothing from me until I'm completely naked beneath him, then he sits back on his heels, looking at me.
His hand goes to his jeans, pulling down the zipper, and I can't help how my eyes fixate on his erection straining against the fabric covering it.
"I changed my mind," he says, and it takes me a few seconds to tear my gaze from the sight of his tattooed fingers pushing down his jeans and boxers.
"About what?" The words come out hoarse, so I clear my throat.
"You don't owe me years. You owe me centuries. You owe me a millennium of this. Of the way you look at me right now, baby. Like you'd let me do anything I want to you, like you know everything you see is yours."
His hand reaches for mine, positioning both over his heart.
"Especially this."
"Damien," I whisper softly because I've had too many emotions for one day and can't handle them anymore.
I know he sees it in my eyes, because the next second he's on top of me, kissing me.
"But especially this is yours, baby." He takes my hand and guides it to his cock, which I feel pulsing in my palm.
Rolling my eyes, I slide my hand from base to tip, squirming beneath him when I feel the wetness at the tip. I run my finger over it several times, fascinated by my husband’s face. Awe and control hanging by a thread.
His hands move to my ass, lifting me slightly so his cock brushes against my core. A guttural moan escapes me when it almost slides inside, and I know he's just torturing me now.
I try to make my body move closer to him, but his hands are there to stop me.
"Want something, baby?" he asks, laughing.
He doesn't understand how desperate I am to feel him inside me, but he deserves a taste of his own medicine, so I stop trying to pull him closer.
His eyes find my face, and I know he feels the moment my fingers leave his cock to move to where I need him.
The instant my fingers make contact with my core, I don't hesitate.
Two fingers slide inside, and the relief is immediate, a gasp escaping my lips as my head falls back against the pillow.
My eyes flutter closed, and I let myself get lost in the sensation for just a moment, knowing exactly what this will do to him.
"Roxanne." His voice cuts through the haze, rough and strained. "What the hell are you doing?"
His hand wraps around my wrist, stopping my movements entirely. The loss makes me whimper, and I open my eyes to find him staring at me with an expression caught somewhere between fury and hunger.
"What my husband won't," I tell him, pushing out my bottom lip in a pout I know drives him insane. I watch his face, waiting for the exact moment the restraint snaps. And there it is.
His eyes flash dangerously when they land on my mouth, pupils blown wide with want.
In one swift motion, my fingers are replaced by his, and God, the difference is staggering.
Thicker, longer, more demanding. He knows exactly where to touch, how much pressure to apply, and my back arches off the bed as pleasure shoots through me.
I know I'm clenching around him by the way his jaw tightens, by the sharp intake of breath he tries to hide. Heat pools low in my belly, building and building until I really do feel like I'll catch fire if he doesn't give me what I need.
"Say it again," he orders, his voice barely more than a growl.
And because I'm an obedient wife, at least when it suits me, I give him what he wants.
"My husband better get inside me before I get my toys out and handle this myself—"
I don't get to finish because I feel him align with my entrance, the thick head of him pressing against me. Then in one powerful thrust, he's inside, filling me completely.
We both gasp at the intrusion. Me at the delicious stretch, him at the tight heat enveloping him.
My hands fly to his back on instinct, nails digging into muscle as I try to anchor myself to something solid.
He stills for a moment, letting me adjust, and I take the opportunity to press my lips close to his ear.
"I love you," I whisper, the words tumbling out before I can stop them.
I don't know why I keep saying these words, why they feel so urgent, so necessary.
But I can't stop myself. Not when I know how long he's been part of my life.
Not when I know that from the first moment, he's done nothing but take care of me even when I didn't deserve it.
Not when he's given me all his attention and love without me ever having to ask for it, without conditions or expectations.
The words hang between us, vulnerable and raw, and I feel him shudder against me.
His eyes find mine, and for a split second I want to turn my head because I feel uncomfortable with all the emotions hanging in the air around us.
He kisses one cheek, then the other, and says, "I've loved you for twenty-one years, nine months, and fourteen days."
And he doesn't need to say anything else, because I feel it. For the first time since that cursed night, I feel loved, truly and completely loved. I pull him closer, wrapping myself around him while our bodies are physically one, trying to eliminate any space between us.
I can't stop watching him. Every line of his body, every flex of muscle as he moves above me, the way the tendons in his neck strain with restraint. I love all of it. The sheer power he holds back, the control he maintains even when I know he wants to let go.
"Fuck..." he pants, his breath hot against my skin.
His pace is punishing, almost brutal in its intensity, but his hands contradict the force of his thrusts. They soothe over my skin, gentle and reverent, helping me adjust to the stretch and fullness. "You feel too fucking good," he groans, his voice strained. "Look how perfectly you take me, baby."
And maybe it's all the emotions swirling through me, maybe it's the praise falling from his lips, maybe it's the way he makes those delicious sounds that drive me insane. But my hips start to roll, meeting his thrusts, matching his rhythm, and suddenly I'm there. The pleasure crests, and I come.
I gasp as my entire world erupts into a million pieces, shattering and reforming all at once.
For a second, I think I black out, my vision going white at the edges. But Damien keeps thrusting inside me like his life depends on it, like he doesn't know when he'll get to do this again, like he needs to memorize the feeling of me clenching around him.
"I'm coming..." he groans, the words ragged and desperate. He pushes my knees to my chest, the angle allowing him to get impossibly deeper inside me, and I feel him pulse. His hot cum coats my inner walls, filling me completely, and the sensation makes me shudder beneath him.
I kiss him until we’re fully spent, but somewhere in my mind, a whisper tells me I've put a target on his back and that, sooner or later, the Universe will rip him from my arms.
Try it, I whisper back. I dare you to take him from me.