Chapter 24
Carli
‘Wee Cass,’ Niall stroked the soft baby hair at Carli’s hairline as they lay tangled in the formerly pristine bedsheets. ‘Move to Sydney to be with me.’
Carli laughed, but it was a dry, empty laugh. He was joking, surely.
‘I’m serious. I need to be with you. We’ll go back to Oz together and be like this for the rest of our days. What do you reckon?’ He trailed his fingers over the sensitive skin between her legs.
‘Um… I’d love that, but… Oh shit! That feels good… Maybe we should have this conversation when you aren’t touching me like this. You know I’ll agree to anything because it feels so bloody good.’
‘Exactly why we are talking about this now.’ He winked, hoisted himself up on those ridged arms of steel and nudged his once again erect cock to her entrance.
‘Oh mmm!’
‘You like that? I’ll raise you a move to Melbourne if you say you’ll be my woman. You can have this on tap any time you like.’
‘But there’s no surf in Melbourne?’ Carli somehow managed to reason.
‘Down the coast then.’ Niall rubbed his blunt tip over her swollen heat before grabbing a condom and sinking back into her, slowly at first, with measured precision so he was pressing into a place inside Carli that made her lose all sentience.
‘We have to be together, Cass. You know it, I know it. We’ve been given another chance and we’d be idiots not to take it. ’
She pulled his head down to her face, that soft hair that was more mussed up than ever threaded between her fingers. ‘As long as this is happening, I don’t care where we live. Melbourne, Sydney, Timbuktu. I just need this. I need you, Niall.’
‘Glad to hear it.’ He brought his hot bulk down onto Carli, the heat of him covering her, expanding her, moving everywhere inside her. Everything about this man filled her, literally and metaphorically. And the way he looked at her like she was his world too, it was almost too much to take.
‘Oh, Niall, please.’ Carli tilted her hips, wrapping her legs around his broad, muscular back, trying to bring him deeper, although she sensed nothing would be deep enough.
‘We’re doing this, then? Feel us together like this, Cass. It feels so right.’
It was talk in the heat of the moment, easy to say when she was being filled by him, but it was also the truth and it would remain so, even when they had tumbled down, ragged and breathless, from their climaxes and she was lying in his arms again.
Niall Butler had been the first man Carli had let into her body and into her heart and she couldn’t imagine ever wanting anyone else again.
He would absolutely be her last. That had been the truth from the very first day they met.
The rain outside had diminished to a light pattering on the windowpane, and the bedroom seemed to glow warmer than ever.
Maybe it was the beautiful man radiating heat next to her.
How long had she and Niall been gazing into each other’s eyes like lovelorn teenagers?
Who knew? And who cared because what else mattered?
Not time, not the outside world. Only her and Niall.
‘Hey,’ he said, soft blinks punctuating the hold his hypnotic face had on her.
‘Hey,’ she murmured.
‘Can I ask you something.’
‘Uh-oh. Go ahead.’
‘It’s nothing bad. How’d you fancy a trip to Edinburgh to visit Cal and Bea? They had to rush off after the party and I said I’d go down and visit them. I’d love for you to come with me.’
Okay, so during sex they’d talked about moving to Timbuktu, but visiting his brother and fiancée seemed like a far bigger deal. ‘Are you sure?’ she asked. ‘They won’t mind?’
‘Cass, they’d love to see you. And there’s nothing I want more than to walk in there and show them that my girl is now my woman. Because you are, right?’
Being Niall’s girl at school had been a badge Carli wore with pride. Graduating to the grown-up version was as much of an honour and did things to her body that she hadn’t experienced back then.
‘Aye, Butler.’ She squeezed his gorgeous arm. ‘I’m your woman.’
‘Good. I meant all that about moving to be with you, by the way.’
‘But you were planning on moving back here, to be with your family. One root and you’re a goner.’
‘Two roots… And I’m a goner for you, even without the rooting.’
‘Are you sure? You can say you got carried away in the madness of the moment. I mean, I’m not quite ready to move to Timbuktu, as enthusiastic as I might have sounded.’
Niall laughed. ‘Aye, I meant it. Anywhere with you, besides Timbuktu – unless they have epic surf there, in which case I’ll consider it. The main thing is we’re together, right?’
‘Absolutely.’ It was like Carli had finally reached home after seventeen years of being lost. No way was she giving up the keys to the castle now.