Chapter Fourteen
Tulya
No matter how many walls, shields, or emotional boundaries I tried to stick up, I couldn’t prevent myself from falling for Donovan Malachite. He was knocking down every obstacle like a bulldozer destroying a building.
“Would you like another drink?” he asked me once we were tucked inside the common area of our suite.
I was going to miss this small cocoon we’d burrowed ourselves in. When our task was successfully checked off, we would go our separate ways. I shook my head. “I don’t think so. I’m too full…”
Truth was, I’d had enough alcohol and needed to be able to think clearly when it came to this green-eyed man. My pulse was beating a drum inside my body with uncapitulated need, and I had to get myself under control. It wasn’t even because of the earrings, only him.
Donovan’s bed was mere footsteps away from mine, and the greater amount of time I spent with the man of my dreams, the more I wanted to find myself tucked in there—in his arms, next to his strong chest and six-pack. Tangled in the sheets for hours, sweaty and spent.
Luckily, he poured two waters, handing me one before walking back toward the bar and taking his own glass of clarity.
“I hope it was a content start to Christmas.” He spoke gruffly, picking up on our discussion while waiting for the elevator.
“It was.” My voice came out breathless. “It was the best Christmas Eve ever.” My finger came to touch an earring, sending chills up and back down my spine.
These hearts would always transport me back to this moment.
“It wasn’t the expensive gift that made this the greatest day, but rather the thought you put into it,” I blurted out.
He smiled and nodded, not acknowledging my confession.
Maybe thought was my language of love? I thought back to my research for writing several lovers in my books, and the theory came to mind.
I missed writing at my desk. The quiet and solitude enveloping me, yet I felt my feet taking me toward Donovan, my hand placing my water on the end table.
“I can’t stop thinking about Blake. Mostly, I hope Cinder likes Blake. That she is kind to her, welcoming to her, or whatever everyone back in Rubia is expecting. She’s just a kid. Poor Blake has no idea what she is mixed up in.” I rambled on, searching for something to fill the silence.
“I don’t want to talk about them now,” Donovan said, pure authority dripping in his tone.
I looked up at him, our gazes crashing.
“Don’t mistake me. I care about Blake, and I know she’s only a child,” he said, “but it’s not a subject for now. Once all that shit starts, the spell will be broken. All hell will break loose.”
This man had a way with words. He was right, there was something magical happening at the moment and I knew it would be over all too soon.
“I want to kiss you,” he said, his palm coming to rest on my cheek.
I felt myself nod.
His lips hovered near mine. “If I’m honest, I want to do more, much more, Tulya.” He spoke at a level only for me, even though I was the only one in the room.
Again, my head nodded on its own.
Our mouths crashed into one another. His hand traveled up my back, coming to settle gently at the base of my neck, keeping me in place—as if I would move.
I breathed out a sigh and his tongue found entrance into my mouth. To think it had been a week since we flirted innocently at my mother’s party. I couldn’t believe this was happening.
Yet my own tongue danced with his as my hand found purchase on his hip.
He dug his length into me, and it was a delicious friction. One I suspected I could never tire of.
“Tulya,” he moaned. “I’m pretty sure I’ve wanted you all my life. There are decades of pent-up desire running through my veins.” He didn’t wait for me to respond, only swooped me into his arms and carried me toward his bedroom. “Is this okay?”
Struck speechless for the third time, I signaled with a nod, yet again. Nodding was becoming my official language.
Once inside, he set me on the bed and hovered over me. He began the kiss all over again. This time he held his weight up on his elbow, but my hips kept reaching for more pressure, all of Donovan. I wanted to supersize this—my guilty pleasure.
His other hand roamed my side, lifting my dress with it, allowing his palm to singe my skin.
A low moan funneled out from my mouth, filling the air around me.
“Tulya,” he said again. As far as I was concerned, he could say it a million times and I wouldn’t tire of hearing it. “All of this is against our better judgment, but I can’t stop.”
He was right, but I didn’t want him to pull the plug… “Don’t,” I replied.
Except he pulled away, and I felt barren.
“Sit up,” he demanded, and I acquiesced.
Thankfully, this was all a dance for him to yank my dress over my head, revealing my evergreen silk bra and panties.
Donovan stopped and stared, a low hum emanating from him. “Christmas colors, I see,” he said and winked for the second time this evening. Something else he could do a bazillion times and I wouldn’t complain.
“I couldn’t resist. Do you like?”
“Taunting me?”
There was something about the way we spoke honestly and it all flowed so easily from serious to joking that set this man apart for me.
Now, he gently encouraged me to lie back, and he didn’t take his eyes off me as he stood and ripped off his shirt and pants, leaving him in a pair of black boxer briefs. He’d lost his blazer and shoes somewhere in the living area.
Still wearing my heels, I kicked them off at the edge of the bed and slid up toward the pillows. Donovan prowled after me, the hunger rippling off him.
Finally, his mouth hit my nipple in a whoosh of hot air, and it pebbled underneath the now damp silky fabric.
“It’s a very happy Christmas for me,” he teased.
I found a boldness I didn’t know my soul embodied and guided his lips back to mine with my pointer finger under his chin. He obliged, kissing me into oblivion.
We stayed like that a long while, our lower halves moving, seeking friction until Don murmured, “I need you.”
I responded with, “I want you.” I’d never been so daring, but Donovan brought out the raw woman in me.
He rolled onto his back and shrugged off his underwear, immediately coming back and sealing his mouth over my other nipple, leaving my bra on before traversing down south, shoving my panties to the side and making me squeal with his tongue.
My entire pelvis rocked. It was shameful, but he had me in such a state of need.
I should’ve felt embarrassment at how I let go, but I couldn’t bring myself to do so because Don kept whispering, “That’s it, let go.”
“Oh…I can’t, I can’t take, I’m going to…” I rambled on right before I exploded, my world in three-dimensional color at the moment.
I think he said “Beautiful” and then found his way to the nightstand for a condom. Clearly, I’d been a sure thing—also couldn’t bring myself to care.
He slipped it on, and I watched with what I only assumed were hungry eyes.
In a matter of moments, he was back on top of me, his weight on his elbow once again, but this time his free hand helped to guide himself inside me.
“Fucking decadent,” he whispered as he slid deep, and I couldn’t have agreed more.
We moved slowly at first, picking up pace until we were both on the precipice, lips and tongues and teeth biting, nipping, licking anywhere we could find a spot. And then we went over the edge, riding out the cascade until all the moans and shivers subsided, collapsing in a heap.
Which is exactly how we woke up on Christmas Day, twenty-four hours from Magnum arriving, and no clue what we had just started…or ended.
“Good morning” rang in the room before I’d opened my eyes.
Finally doing so, I took in my surroundings. I was still in Donovan’s bed, the sheets a twisted mess, and he stood before me in a hotel robe, holding what appeared to be a latte.
“Merry Christmas to me,” I said, sitting up and taking the mug from his hand.
He turned around, and I worried for a hot minute before he returned holding his own mug.
Sitting down next to me, he clinked his cup with mine. “I don’t have any more gifts,” he declared before taking a gulp of his java.
“I didn’t have any…at all.”
Leaning forward, he gently pressed a kiss to my forehead, careful so that neither of us spilled.
I’d never imagined this tender side of Donovan, yet here it was on full display. For the first time since I’d been here, I thought about calling Prim. Except I didn’t really want to share this half of Donovan. The one I’d been fortunate to spend one night with.
“Last night was a gift,” he said, his declaration hitting me like a bullet in the chest.
It was a one-time thing, I feared. In reality, I knew that the moment we started. I didn’t know why I was hurt. This was why I’d shut him down at the party over a week ago.
Prim would say I was a goner. She’d look me square in the face, her lips pursed, eyebrows raised, and wait for me to admit how far into Donovan I was… So I decided not to call her after all.
“Do you want breakfast?” he asked while gazing straight at me, his gorgeous green eyes a myriad of emotions—lust, want, sadness, and potentially something close to like or adoration.
I was hungry. Sadly, I didn’t think what I wanted was on the room service menu.