47. Avery #2
“I want to kiss every place you let me.” His fingers close on the quilt.
“I want my mouth between your legs. I want to be inside you. I want to hear you say my name because you know exactly who is touching you.” He keeps his eyes on mine.
“I don’t want any of it if you have to force yourself past something to give it to me. ”
“I don’t have to get past the affair to want you.
It happened. It comes into this room with us.
” I let the dress fall from my shoulders, and Declan’s gaze drops over the bra that stopped fitting a month ago and the underwear June called ambitious when I bought it.
“You may remove those. Nothing else yet.”
He lifts one hand and waits until I nod again before sliding the strap from my shoulder.
His knuckles brush my skin as he unfastens the bra, quick and sure with the hooks, and when it drops, the hunger on his face sends a sharp ache through me.
He once looked at Sasha with this body waiting at home.
The thought is ugly enough to deserve the truth.
“Did you want her like this?” I ask, catching his wrist before he touches me.
Declan takes the question straight. “Yes. You lacked nothing, and it was a different want than this one. I wanted her, and I chose it.”
The answer hurts. It also leaves no lie between my naked body and his hand. I guide his fingers to my breast, keeping them away from the tender center until I adjust to the touch. “You may want me now.”
His mouth closes around the place above my breast after I pull him there, and I brace one hand on his shoulder while pleasure rises through the anger.
Declan kisses where I point, his beard rough against skin pregnancy has made too sensitive, and every time his hand moves he waits for my body or my voice to permit it.
When I push his head lower, he follows the curve of my stomach and lets it stay a body instead of a tender moment about the baby.
He kisses me because I asked. I thread my fingers through his hair because I want more.
“Bed,” I tell him, and he shifts backward while I climb onto the green quilt.
He reaches for the pillows only after I ask, arranging them until I can lie on my side without the weight pulling against my back.
Then he kneels beside me in jeans and nothing else, so painfully familiar that I drag him down by the belt before memory can make me cautious for the wrong reason.
His mouth moves over mine, then my neck. The first breath I take against his hair carries the jasmine shampoo from the guest shower.
The conference room opens around me. A white bottle waits on the maintenance cart.
Sasha stands near Nadia’s desk with jasmine in her hair and a gun aimed at the baby.
The safehouse follows: jasmine on my pillow, two toothbrushes in the cup, my sheets pulled against another woman’s chest while Declan stands beside her.
“Stop.” My hand shoves once against Declan’s shoulder before I know where I am.
He moves off the bed so fast the mattress lifts beneath me.
Both hands remain visible while he backs to the wall, jeans half unfastened and desire abandoned without argument.
He says nothing. Sasha is dead, I am safe, this is my room, he would never hurt me, and every one of those facts would ask me to recover quickly enough for him.
Declan keeps them behind his teeth. He waits where I can see him and lets me find the lemon soap on my nightstand, the green quilt beneath my hand, and the locked bedroom door I opened for him.
The baby moves against the pillow. I press my fingers there, then reach for the water beside the bed with a hand that does not cooperate. Declan watches the bottle slip and keeps his back against the wall.
“You used the guest shower,” I say after the room becomes mine again. “The bottle in there is jasmine.”
He looks toward the hall, turning his head just far enough to keep me at the edge of his eye. “Yes.”
“I forgot it was beneath the sink.” My breathing sounds too loud.
Anger follows the fear because I replaced every bottle in this house except the unopened travel shampoo June put in the guest bathroom after the storm.
Sasha does not get to hide inside a cupboard forever, and tonight I can wash her out of his hair.
“Go wash it out. Use the lemon soap in my shower. Put on clean jeans from your bag, then come back and sit on the floor outside the door until I call you.”
“I will.” Declan fastens his jeans with his eyes on mine until I nod toward the bathroom. He takes his shirt from the floor, enters the shower, and closes that door. Water begins. No apology crosses it.
I remain on the bed with the quilt pulled around my body and ask the question I would rather avoid: do I want him to return, or do I want to prove Sasha cannot stop me?
If the answer were only spite, I could dress and send him home.
My body is frightened, angry, and still aching for the man who moved away at one word.
I do not owe Declan continuation because he stopped.
Basic consent is the minimum requirement.
But he stopped immediately and gave me time to decide instead of letting panic decide for me. I get to choose again.