Chapter 3
Everywhere he touches, I burn. His feverish skin brushing my nipples. The frame of his arms caging me. The press of one knee against my pussy. The way his hand tangles in my hair as his lips trail down my shoulder.
This is really happening.
I mourned him, but now he’s solid against me, on the cusp of claiming my virginity after months of aching for it.
After months of waiting and yearning, all stacked atop a mountain of desolation and pain.
Every beat of my heart screams that this stolen moment is ours alone.
Sebastian shifts, easing his knee away, then runs a warm palm down my belly. His gaze stays on mine, those blue irises deepening to a storm-tossed sea.
That stare pulls me under just as his callused thumb scrapes over my clit. Pushing a finger deep inside me, he hisses in a breath.
“You’re soaked, princess.”
I let out a sigh, yielding to the claim of his hand. He adds another finger, and the fullness spreads through me as I bare my throat.
His attention catches on the bruise at my collarbone. “Did Oliver do this?”
“Yes,” I groan, shame roiling through me even as my hips tilt.
“Does it hurt?” His lips follow the question, brushing a kiss over the mark.
The tenderness of it cuts straight through my guilt. “No, it doesn’t hurt. Nothing hurt as much as losing you.”
“I’m here,” he whispers, ghosting his lips across the mark again as he adds a third finger.
No one’s ever made me feel so wanted and worthy, as if almost losing everything makes risking it even more sacred.
“What about this?” he asks, those wicked digits sliding in and out of me. “Does this hurt?”
“A little.” The sting is there, but I’ve stood on the edge of a cliff, unable to face losing him forever, and this…
This is the kind of pain that breathes life into me.
“I need you,” I whisper, angling my hips, chasing the ache.
He flips us in a seamless motion and settles me astride his lap. Holding me by the nape, he draws our foreheads together as his thick erection pulses between us.
“Move against me. Find what feels good. Take it from me.”
Instinctively, I drag my pussy up and down his length, teasing his tip on each pass.
“Fuck, baby,” he groans. “That feels incredible.”
He pulls me into kiss after desperate kiss, our hot breaths mingling, growing shallow the faster we grind against each other.
“You feel so good,” I moan.
“So do you, and I’m not even inside you yet.” He sucks his bottom lip between his teeth, watching as I climb higher.
“I’m so close,” I whine, riding him with abandon, the friction yanking me right to the edge. “I need you inside me.”
“Not yet.” His voice is pure gravel, thick with restraint. “Come for me first.” He guides me into a frantic rhythm, the head of his cock seeking entrance with every tilt of my hips.
The orgasm hits hard. I bite back my cries, the effort to stay quiet a metallic tang on my tongue. Before the last wave shudders through me, he flips us and centers me on his jacket, and then he’s pressing against the barrier of my innocence.
A heavy moment hangs.
I fail to breathe.
I think he does, too.
So we suck in a breath together.
In one swift move, he drives into me fully.
White-hot pain tears through me as I stretch to accept him, and a shrieking cry rips free.
One he catches with his kiss.
But he doesn’t pull out.
Not even an inch.
“Breathe, baby,” he whispers, keeping himself buried deep. “Just breathe.”
A tremor runs through him.
Runs through us both.
His heartbeat pounds against my chest, matching the throb of him inside me—the only place he’ll ever belong.
Mine.
It’s a possessive affirmation, a truth no one can take from me.
He withdraws then surges forward again, this time hooking my leg high on his hip. I grit my teeth through the burn, yielding to the pressure, my body transforming his sharp intrusion into acceptance.
Because he fills me so completely there’s no space left for doubt, or fear, or anything but him.
“Are you okay? How does it feel?”
“Painful, but…” I grip him by the hair, staring at him in awe. “You’re inside me.”
“Is it too much?”
“No, keep going.”
He thrusts into me again, and my world fractures as he hits a spot that dissolves the ache into…something else.
I want to tell him so much and nothing at all. Want to laugh and cry at the same time. It’s a feeling beyond understanding. I have no words for it—only the certainty that I’ll spend the rest of my life reaching for it.
“Sebastian, please…” A needy whimper escapes. Tears blur my vision. “You feel so…”
“I know, baby.” He laces our fingers together, giving me something to hang on to as he bucks in earnest. “Being inside you is everything. Fucking everything.”
“I love you,” I gasp. “So much.”
“Fuck,” he groans against my mouth. “You own me, baby.” He stills for a beat, turning reverent as he pins our hands together in the narrow space between us. “I’m so fucking in love with you.”
Each deep slide that follows syncs the rhythm of our hearts, pulsing against our joined knuckles.
“Come for me again,” he says, voice unraveling, same as the threads of his control. “You’re right there, baby. I can feel it.” He rolls his hips in a measured grind that sends my back into a continuous arch.
“Oh God, Sebastian…” I turn my head and smother my moans into the pillow.
“That’s it. Let go for me.”
The world narrows to friction and heat, to his skin against mine, the way he moves inside me, how his breath hitches as I clench.
I can’t form syllables.
Can’t catch a swirling thought.
All I can do is surrender.
Digging my nails into his shoulder, I willingly drown, my cries lost in the pillow as I convulse around him. He pumps harder, faster, prolonging the waves, his sweat-slicked thighs slapping against mine, angling for more.
And he finds it.
“Novalee.” His voice breaks on my name, his breath hot on my throat as he slams to a halt. A raw groan tears out of him, more unguarded than anything I’ve ever heard, and it’s enough to make me seize around him once more.
“Fuck, yes, baby.”
His lips crush mine, and I hold on to him with everything I am, refusing to exist anywhere else but in this moment with him.
Because outside these walls, the world is waiting to tear us apart again, but right now, with his weight on me and him still deep inside, none of that matters.