Chapter 25 Regan #2
“It’s good of Mac to do this. I’ll thank him later.”
“It’s not a hardship for him,” Arro said defensively.
I nodded. “I know. He loves the kids.”
She smirked. “Right.”
“Eh?”
“Nothing.” She pulled me into her arms and gave me a squeeze. “Go. Enjoy your free night. Have a whisky with Lachlan or something.”
As I got into my car a few seconds later and drove back toward Caelmore, I was agitated but knew leaving the children with Arro was the right thing for them. We had to keep acting normal, or they would think there was still something to be worried about.
A distraction, I mused. I needed a distraction.
And I knew exactly what kind of distraction that was.
For the first time since our affair started, Regan and I had the house to ourselves. We could be loud. And I planned on giving Regan many, many reasons to be very loud indeed.
Letting my mind wander to the woman in my life, to the frustrations of having to curb his instinct to reach for her throughout the day, to the worries that we had less than two months left before her visa was up, I became focused on one thing: making tonight a night she’d never forget.
An almost savage possessiveness gripped me.
“Hey.” Regan turned to me from the dining table when I strode into the house. “I’m just setting the table—” Her next words were swallowed in my kiss.
She tasted of chocolate. Sometimes I saw her sneak a piece before dinner but never in front of Eilidh and Lewis.
She wanted to be a good example. Always thinking about them, loving them, protecting them.
Me too. And in less than eight weeks, she’d be gone.
And I would feel her loss more deeply than I could admit to myself most days.
Throwing the painful inevitability of the future out of my mind, I kissed her harder and Regan whimpered, her tongue stroking mine in return.
And I was lost.
My kiss turned hungry as desperation came over me, and I pressed my body down the length of hers.
I gripped her ass, urging her closer, my arousal straining against her belly.
My hand slid down the back of her thigh, and I hiked up one leg against my hip so I could be where I needed to be, snugly between her legs.
Fuck, I loved her little dresses, but I hated the goddamn tights she wore with them.
“Thane,” she panted, breaking the kiss. Her head fell back and her eyes fluttered with the sensation of me thrusting against her. Her cheeks were flushed as she moaned and dug her hands into my shoulders. She flexed her hips against mine, and my nerve endings caught fire.
I needed inside her. Now.
Knowing how wildly she responded to me when I was rough, I stepped back but only to spin her around and bend her over my kitchen table.
Lust was a haze across my mind as she cried out.
I gripped her nape and pressed her down into the table while my other hand pushed up her dress and ripped at her tights.
She pushed against me as if to get up.
“Stay down,” I panted as I unzipped myself.
Regan trembled beneath me, whimpering. She pushed up again, and I assumed she was arching into me, ready to take me.
Remembering how hotly she reacted to me holding her wrists down in bed, I pressed her back down and shoved my way between her legs.
“No!” she suddenly cried out, pushing forcefully against me. “No!” This time the word broke on a sob.
Her panic was the equivalent of ten buckets of ice over my head and body. I released but gently reached for her, her sobs scoring through me. I felt like I had razor blades in my throat as I choked out an anxious, “Mo leannan.”
But Regan shoved at my hands, crying, her face red and streaked with tears.
I retreated completely. Regan pushed off the table and ran past me upstairs.
Chest heaving as I attempted to catch my breath, pulse racing, I tried to figure out what the hell had gone wrong so quickly. I’d been rough with her before—she’d told me she loved it when I lost control. I’d taken her on her hands and knees many times … I’d even held her down.
I looked at the table.
Always in bed.
We’d never had sex anywhere but in bed.
Fear churned in my gut.
I’d triggered her.
And someone was going to fucking die if it was for the reason I feared it might be.
REGAN
Panic clawed at my throat, and I couldn’t catch my breath.
The memory had hit like a lightning bolt as soon as Thane pushed me onto the table and told me to stay down.
Then the terror was all I felt. It didn’t matter that it was Thane and that I loved him and knew he’d never hurt me.
All I could remember was that night in Ho Chi Minh City a year ago.
A night I’d buried so deep inside, I’d forgotten about it.
Sobbing in the guest-room bathroom, I couldn’t get a handle on the violent heaving of my chest, and while no more tears fell, I couldn’t catch my breath. The more I panicked about it, the worse it got. Oh my God, I was going to die.
I’m going to die, I’m going to die, I’m going to die. Tears blurred my vision.
“Regan, breathe.” Suddenly Thane was on his knees before me. “You’re hyperventilating, mo leannan. Cup your hands.”
I heaved for breath, staring at him, unfocused, confused.
He cupped his hands around his mouth. “Like this. Try to concentrate on breathing slowly into your hands. Look at me.”
Hands shaking, I watched him as he took slow breaths in and out. A calm filtered through the chaos in my head, and I mimicked him. Eventually my breathing calmed, and the terror dissipated.
But the reality remained.
All that I’d buried, deep, deep within … it wasn’t buried anymore. And there was no escaping it because I could tell looking into Thane’s sad, worried eyes that he knew. Exhausted, I crawled toward him and rested my head on his chest.
His arms came around me as he sighed with relief.
He then lifted me off the bathroom floor. Looping my arms around his neck, I let him carry me into the bedroom.
“Okay?” he asked before settling us on it.
Tormented that he felt he had to ask, I sucked back more tears and nodded.
He laid back against the pillows and pulled me into his arms, and I snuggled into his chest. “I’m sorry.” His words were rough with emotion. “I didn’t mean to frighten you.”
I shook my head as I met his eyes. “Don’t. You did nothing differently from what we’ve done before.”
Thane’s eyes narrowed. “It was the table, wasn’t it?”
I flinched as an image hit, my face pressed to the sideboard in that hotel room in Vietnam. Focusing on Thane’s eyes, I admitted, “Yes.”
Distress ravaged his features and he choked out, “Did someone rape you, Regan?”
A tear slipped down my cheek as I curled a fist into his shirt. “Almost.”
Thane’s eyes brightened with sadness, but rage too. “Was it him?”
I nodded, and every time I blinked, another tear fell.