Chapter 10 Declan #2
“Declan,” she whispers. “You can’t blame yourself. If you’d tried to stop him, he would only have resented you for it.”
My lips brush hers. I want to kiss her long and hard.
I want to lay her down on the grass and fuck her right here by the lake, but I won’t pressure her.
I want her to know that this is about far more than sex.
For me anyway. I want her trust. I want her heart, and I know that I need to earn these things.
“You’re very kind, Amelia York, do you know that?”
She sucks on her top lip like she’s about to tell me something that will change my mind. Then she releases a breath and kisses me back. “I just don’t think that you should spend the rest of your life blaming yourself. There comes a point when you have to set your children free.”
“Is that what your mom did, set you free?”
“I didn’t give her a choice.” She chuckles, and I feel the tension between us visibly evaporating, one tiny speck at a time. “My roots are here. Stopping me would’ve only delayed the inevitable.”
I’d forgotten about Michael Morran. Now, the fear seeps back through my skin, reminding me that Amelia still needs protection from her own flesh and blood.
“How did you get so wise?”
“I learned from the best.”
I seem to recall saying the same thing to Ruairi the last time I spoke to him.
That evening, we curl up underneath a cozy blanket by the log burner in the living room. Orla retired to her room after dinner. Eoghan hasn’t been home since the funeral.
A movie plays on the TV that neither of us watches. We open a bottle of wine. The conversation is easy—friends, family, the approaching holidays, and Thanksgiving celebrations in New York, which Amelia will miss this year. And when we go upstairs, I take her hand and lead her towards my room.
“Are you sure, Declan?” Her cheeks are flushed from the flames.
She doesn’t pull away. She doesn’t avert her eyes, or glance along the landing towards Orla’s room. She’s simply checking that I’m ready for this.
“Surer than I’ve ever been.”
Her smile is the most beautiful thing that I’ve ever seen. I cup her face in both hands outside the door to my room and kiss her. She leans in, reaching up and wrapping her arms around my neck.
“I want this too,” she whispers.
I scoop her into my arms and carry her over the threshold. Inside my room, with the door closed, adrenaline pumps through my veins. It feels like the first time all over again, but calmer. Less frantic, more right.
I set her down on my bed and undress her slowly. Her body is even more beautiful than I remember. When we’re both naked, and she’s lying on my bed with her arms touching the headboard, and her legs open, I kiss her all over.
Starting with her lips, I work my way down, nibbling her earlobes and her neck where the bite mark has completely faded. I feel the same explosion of lust in my loins, my erection is rock-solid between my legs, but I’m more in control now that I know what I want from this.
What I want from Amelia.
Which is everything.
I want all that she has to offer, but I want to give her everything in return.
I pay special attention to her nipples, licking them gently to begin with, then gradually sucking them into hard pink points. Amelia squirms, thrusting her nipples into my mouth and arching her back.
“Tell me how it feels, Amelia.”
I watch her watching me. I could never get bored with seeing everything she feels dancing across her face.
“Like I missed this.” She licks her lips. “More than I realized.”
I slide down the bed and spread her legs wider, dipping a finger between her folds. “Is that why you’re so wet? Did you save it up for me, Amelia?”
“I left my vibrator in New York,” she teases.
“Lucky for me.” I dip my head, open her with my thumbs to expose her clit, and smile. “Lie back and enjoy the ride.”
The pink nub throbs between my lips almost immediately.
“Slowly,” I murmur, relinquishing it temporarily. “I haven’t even started yet.”
“What are you waiting for?” Breathless.
I slide a finger inside her, her wet walls clenching around me. A second finger. She arches her spine, pushing against me. She wants this as much as I do, and that is the biggest thrill there is.
I lick her clit, dragging my tongue flat across it, slowly, enjoying the raggedy sounds of her shallow breaths. I lick and suck, working inside her with my fingers, sliding them all the way out and coating her clit with her slick.
“So fucking sexy, Amelia, I could eat you all night.”
“I… won’t last… all night.”
Her words send a thrill straight to my pulsing cock. “How long will you last?”
“Not long…”
“Should I let you come now?”
“Yes!” She’s panting.
“Beg me, Amelia.”
“I… Please…”
“You’ll have to do better than that.” I sit back and work her softened clit with my thumb. Enough to keep her on the tipping point, but not enough to send her flying over the edge.
“I’m going to come…”
“I don’t hear you begging. I can’t let you come until I know how much you want it.”
“Please, Declan, please let me come.”
I smile and drag my tongue across her swollen clit again. “Go for it, my sweet baby. Come all over my face.”
I lick until my jaw aches, and Amelia’s orgasm keeps right on coming. Her pleasure is all I need. I grip her hips while she writhes across the bed, her body shuddering, her cum oozing out from between her legs. And I lap it up. Every last fucking drop of it, until she goes limp.
Then I cover her body with mine, supporting my weight on my elbows, and tease her opening with my erection.
I smooth her hair away from her flushed face. “I want you, Amelia.” My voice is husky.
“I know.” She peers into my eyes, languid and floppy from her orgasm.
“No, I don’t think you do. I don’t just want to fuck you. I want you in my life.”
She blinks, studying my face as if waiting for the punchline. “Do you mean that?”
“Every word.”
I slide my cock inside her, all the way, and she wraps her legs around my waist to accommodate me. “I…” Her eyes grow large with tears.
“You don’t have to say anything right now.”
I grind my erection into her, and she moves with me. Then I kiss her, filling her mouth with my tongue, filling her pussy with my cock, and taking it slowly until I can no longer tell where my body ends and hers begins.
When I explode inside her, she clings to me, holding me so tightly, that I know she wants it too. When the time is right. When she is ready.
With little effort and zero manipulation from either of us, our lives fall into a pattern of spending the evenings together, either in front of the log burner in the living room or conservatory, sitting out on the decking with cozy blankets, or at a quiet inn in the countryside.
If Orla notices us growing closer—we don’t flaunt our relationship in front of her—she doesn’t mention it. Eoghan is preoccupied with Emily. And I’m biding my time before I strike out at Ruairi’s killer.
I feel like a youth again. I bring flowers home for Amelia whenever I’ve been out of the house on business.
I buy warm sweaters and jackets for her when I notice her shivering on the decking.
And when she’s feeling unwell, I leave her in my bed and make breakfast for her, ignoring her assurances that she’s well enough to get up and work.
I want to take care of her. I would swaddle her in cotton wool if I could. I would rewrite our histories so that she would never have to discover either of our mafia legacies.
And Amelia seems to bloom in front of my eyes like a rare flower.
Then, when I’m finally starting to believe that we might have a future together, Eoghan calls me from New York. He doesn’t believe that the Murrays—Emily’s family—were responsible for Ruairi’s death and he’s going to prove it. With their help.
And I have to stop him before I lose both my sons.