Chapter 22
Skylar
His kiss is soft and slow, and I feel it all the way to my feet.
My scalp tingles. My fingers quiver. I hold onto his shoulders and shiver from the intimacy of how he holds me.
How he cups my face with his massive hands.
How he begins to massage his cum into my cheeks.
How he stares into my eyes as he continues to kiss me.
It’s more erotic than having him come on my face.
More personal than anything I’ve ever experienced.
More moving. More everything. He’s marking his claim on me, and it feels so right.
Tears slide down my cheeks. He wipes them off with his thumb, then slides his hand down to curve his fingers around my throat.
His lips touch mine, and we share breath.
He swipes his other palm down to the space above the neckline of my blouse.
He proceeds to rub in his cum, and I can’t stop the shiver that grips me.
“You’re mine, baby. You’ve been mine since the first time I kissed you.”
“I’m yours,” I whisper against his lips.
“I tried not to want you. Tried to keep away from you. Tried to tell myself it was wrong to need you. To take you in my dreams with such intensity, it felt like I didn’t know where my skin ended and yours began. I tried to keep away.” He leans his forehead against mine. “God knows, I tried.”
“I’m glad you stopped.”
He chuckles. “Not sure I agree.”
What? I begin to pull away, but he wraps his massive arm about my waist and holds me. “Sorry, that came out wrong. I mean,”—he searches my features—"I’m not sorry I stopped resisting the pull between us. Only, it doesn’t negate the fact that I feel like I’m being disloyal to Ben.”
“Or maybe, he’ll be happy? Maybe, he’ll be overjoyed that his sister and his best friend, the two most important people in his life, are together.”
“Maybe.” For a second, hope lights up his features.
His heterochromatic eyes blaze with unbridled joy...
Which fades away, leaving a tortured look in its place.
“Maybe not.” He scans my features with a hunger that sends little tingling sensations zipping under my skin.
He looks at me like he can’t resist me, and almost hates me for that.
And I hate that he can’t accept what I knew was inevitable from the first time we kissed.
That we’re meant to be together. Once again, I try to pull away; once again, he doesn’t let me go.
“No, don’t be angry. I know I’m being an asshole at the moment for not throwing you down and fucking you right now—"
“You can say that again,” I huff.
“But you have to understand, after years of dreaming of you, to have you in my arms is something I’m still trying to get my head around.
” His expression turns almost reverent. He presses his thumb into the hollow of my throat where my pulse drums. “It feels almost too real, too enormous, too everything. I’m holding you, my fiancée, close to me, and it’s everything I ever wanted.
I wish—" He hesitates, and it’s so uncharacteristic of him.
As are his words of the last few seconds, the tenderness he’s displaying, the way he’s looking at me with an almost fearful look in his eyes…
It’s all so not very Nate that my heart stutters. A shiver of apprehension squeezes my spine. I stare into his gorgeous mismatched eyes and see the fear there. For him, me? For Ben?
Yes, that must be it. Ben hasn’t been himself, and Nate must have sensed it, like I did. Of course, he’s worried about my brother. “Ben’s going to be okay. I know he’s going to come back to us. He has to come back to us.”
Nate’s gaze widens. There’s a flash of what looks like panic in them, then that shutter drops over his eyes. The one he uses to hide his feelings from the world… From me.
“Don’t do that,” I snap.
“Do what?” His forehead furrows.
“You know what,” I hiss.
“No, I don’t.”
I pull away, and this time, he releases me. “Don’t lock yourself away behind that impenetrable shield you like to throw over your emotions so nothing and no one can get through to you.”
He seems taken aback, then a softness penetrates his gaze. “It’s because I’m vulnerable to you, because I can never say no to you, because I worry you can read what I’m thinking too easily, that I hide from you.”
I shake my head. “I want to believe you—"
“Believe me.” He steps forward, taking my hand in his. “Believe me, Starling. You can see through me. Only you have the power to read me. It’s why I must guard my true self from you.”
“What? Why? I don’t understand. If you know there’s a connection between us, that you’re compelled to share yourself with me, why stop yourself?”
“Because—" He swallows “Because it’s for the best.”
I laugh. “You’re joking, right?”
He drags his fingers through his hair. “I wish I were.”
I stare at him in frustration. “This is not helping at all. In fact, this is pissing me off.”
“Me too, more than you can imagine, but can you trust me on this?”
I bite the inside of my cheek. Should I?
What he’s saying makes no sense… And yet…
He seems so sincere. There’s no mistaking the plea in his voice, the coaxing expression in his eyes.
There’s almost a hint of desperation in how he draws circles with his thumb over the pulse at my wrist. A gentleness in how he cradles my palm between his giant ones.
And when he brings the back of my palm to his mouth and kisses the skin there without taking his gaze off mine, my bones melt in surrender.
“Okay,” I whisper, already hating myself for giving in. Knowing I’m going to regret this later. But also knowing, I don’t have a choice. “Okay.” I nod.
“Okay.” He exhales, and his lips curve.
I tip up my chin. “On one condition.”