Chapter 30
Rae braced herself against the dizzying wave of nausea that always came with this feeling. A panic attack. She’d known that’s what they were, but she hadn’t been willing to admit it to herself until Struan had said the words.
She burrowed deeper into him, feeling him everywhere: her thighs straddling his, his breath grazing her ear lobe, his sturdy arms keeping her upright while also pinning her somewhere still and steady.
He smelled like rain, grass, soap, and at his neck, fresh, tangy spices.
She nuzzled into it like it would save her, the sensation sending relief through her achingly taut muscles.
She’d felt seasick a moment ago, but he anchored her to a place she knew, a place where she was safe, like he’d promised.
‘I was worried about you,’ she admitted when the world stopped spinning and the words would finally come. ‘I thought something had happened.’
‘I’m fine.’ His low voice reverberated against her. She wanted him to keep talking so he would drown out the uneven thumps of her heart. ‘It just took a lot longer than expected, that’s all. I’m here now.’
‘Are the family okay?’
‘Aye, they’re getting the treatment they need. They should make a full recovery.’
‘Was it hard?’ she dared whisper. She couldn’t quite imagine how difficult that responsibility must be: to stand outside in the rain and the wind and the heat, not knowing when you’ll next get to come home, or if the people you’re trying to reach will still be alive when you do.
He hummed, pressing a soft kiss into her hair. ‘Exhausting. Scary, for a minute.’
She held him tighter – for him, this time. It felt selfish to need him like this when he’d been through so much, and as the worst of her panic ebbed, she felt silly for being the one to break down. Whatever she’d been through today, he’d endured far worse.
Just as she was about to pull away, she heard her name being called. The hallway’s rickety floorboards creaked as Martha sang out, ‘Where are you?’
Rae shook her head slowly. Martha couldn’t find them here like this, even if they hadn’t done anything. She didn’t want to have to explain that, when she was falling apart, Struan was the only one who seemed to know how to tape her back together.
Her entire body stiffened with alertness when Martha’s footfalls neared the cupboard. Rae held her breath, too aware of Struan’s heavy hands on her thighs, the calm challenge in his eyes.
Perhaps he wanted them to be found.
In the end, he brushed his nose against hers, a reassurance more than a temptation. Rae’s lids fluttered closed when want pierced through all of the terrible sensations stored on rickety shelves in her body, a reminder that she wasn’t all the way broken. She could still feel pleasure.
With him. Only with him.
An impatient huff gusted through the hall, and then Martha’s heavy steps retreated down the stairs as she muttered something about a disappearing woman.
Rae slumped in relief. Her fingers feathered through the damp hair curling at the nape of Struan’s neck as he stroked up her spine, vertebrae by vertebrae, brow still puckered with concern.
‘I’m going to get you some water,’ he said.
She pressed against him so he couldn’t rise without taking her with him, the fire in her core stoked when she brushed against his thigh with a delicious amount of friction. ‘Please. Not yet.’
The tender pads of his thumbs brushed her cheeks, collecting damp flecks of mascara. ‘You should rest, sweetheart. I can tell them you’re not well.’
Her hands journeyed down his chest, fingers slipping between the gaps of his shirt buttons, where soft hair curled like satin. He tucked his bottom lip between his teeth, back sinking against the lavender-painted wall.
‘Rae.’
She didn’t know if it was a plea to keep going or to stop, but with the way she throbbed against his hard muscle, she hoped it was the latter.
She needed him, more than she needed water or rest or quiet.
She needed his strength to trickle through her frail body, needed him to fill her until there was nothing else.
When her touch sloped down his belly to his crotch, she found his cock already standing for her. His breath turned shallow as she traced the thick outline, teasing him through the zipper of his trousers.
‘We can’t do this now,’ he said.
‘I want to. Please. I need to.’
‘Rae, you’re not well—’
‘You make me feel good and safe,’ she cut in, ‘and I need to feel good and safe.’
‘Are you sure?’
‘I managed to go without decent sex for twenty-eight years. I wouldn’t be begging if I wasn’t sure.’
A soft smile as he traced the dimple of her chin like the very structure of her mesmerised him. ‘Here?’
‘Here.’
His kisses peppered her neck, still chary – until she unfastened his trousers and they turned unrelenting, mixed with teeth and tongue.
A long sigh rose from her deepest recesses, tension dissipating from her muscles all at once.
She pumped his cock, relishing in the groan that resonated against her skin.
She didn’t wait for him to tear down her drawstring pants, instead arching off him to roll them to her knees.
He pushed her underwear with them, swearing under his breath when he found her wet.
She could hardly feel her legs, and she didn’t know if it was because of her panic or because she wanted him so badly.
‘Do you have a condom?’
‘In my wallet.’ He was already reaching into the inside pocket of his blazer.
‘You came prepared this time.’
He flashed his teeth. ‘I learn from my mistakes.’
She tore the foil from him while he took off his blazer, ripping open the packet and sliding the condom on with as much restraint as she could muster.
‘Fuck,’ he breathed as he watched.
He rolled over her clit, spreading her arousal over her folds until she was whimpering. ‘Going to make you feel good again,’ he promised. ‘More than good.’
As much as she would have liked to let him take his time, it wasn’t enough. Wouldn’t be until she had all of him. She rose to her knees, waiting for him to line himself up, then sank onto his length, inch by glorious inch.
In this position, the sensation was completely different from the first time, stretching her so intensely that she could only close her eyes and gasp. She was afraid to take him completely, afraid it would feel so good she wouldn’t be able to keep quiet.
‘God, you’re perfect. So perfect for me. Feels like coming home.’ His grip dug into the meat of her thighs, all trembling restraint. One day, she hoped to see him lose control completely.
Her heart fluttered, giving her the courage to slide all the way down. Her fingers knotted tight in his hair as their pelvises kissed, but he didn’t complain, gaze fixed on their moulding bodies.
‘You’re okay?’ he asked.
‘I am now.’ A tear rolled down her cheek without permission.
All of that time she’d spent trying to keep her head above water, holding back her emotions so that she could just get through the day, it had only stacked into a tower that wouldn’t – couldn’t – hold.
If Struan hadn’t been here, she wasn’t sure she’d have ever stopped collapsing.
Maybe she wouldn’t ever really be fixed until she started facing the truth – and the first truth was that she didn’t want to go back to working in a restaurant as long as her nervous system fought her every step of the way. She didn’t want to spend her days in survival mode.
The second: she was falling in love for the first time, and it terrified her.
Struan’s tongue chased the curve of her neck as she began to roll her hips, his length hitting her G-spot until every thrust sent a sharp burst of pleasure through her.
She watched that same pleasure contort his features, watched fierce lust war with fiercer tenderness as he let her follow her own rhythm.
‘Is this enough for you?’ For once, she wasn’t worried about her own release – it was already building at an alarming intensity. Between the new position and the fact she’d never felt less sexy, she was afraid he wouldn’t be able to come with her. ‘I can’t feel better if you don’t.’
But he was barely trapping his own keens as she sped up, a hiss falling through clenched teeth. ‘As long as I’m inside you, I’m perfect. This is where I belong. Buried inside this gorgeous pussy. Fuck, Rae—’
The floorboards keened in protest when he pitched to meet her. She didn’t care who heard, not now, chasing that addictive rise and fall until she crested against him all at once. ‘I’m coming,’ she gasped.
‘Good girl. I’ve got you.’
She rode him through her convulsions, barely able to keep upright. Just when the pleasure began to abate, he toyed with her clit, and she realised that first orgasm had been nothing compared to this.
‘Struan!’ She whimpered into his shoulder as everything inside of her pulsed in time with his motions. This climax didn’t tug tight, but rather unfurled, stretched its limbs, forcing her to let go until she was at his mercy.
‘Rae.’ He was saying her name over and over as he drove harder, faster, face burying into her chest. He squeezed her tits with his free hand.
‘I want to be inside you all the fucking time. I want to make you come like this every single day. I want—’ He grunted, cock pulsating inside her as his release finally followed – ‘I want to go out there and tell everyone that you’re my sweet girl. That I belong to you.’
‘You do,’ she promised, rasping as she rode out every aftershock, every spasm. Sweat rolled down her back, thighs quivering, mind quiet. ‘You’re mine,’ she murmured, voice thick with exhaustion.
His final thrusts were so unrestrained that she had to use the wall to steady herself, spent body collapsing. She didn’t mind; wanted him to do whatever he needed to feel as electric as she did.
‘I’m yours,’ was the last thing he uttered. Breathless, he threw his head back only for his skull to crack against the plaster.
‘Fuck. Who put that wall there?’ He rubbed the sore spot, laughing quietly.
She cradled his head with equal amounts concern and amusement. ‘Are you okay?’
He echoed her earlier words with reverential tenderness: ‘I am now.’
She pushed his hair from his eyes, relishing the wild lust still guttering there. She’d done that to him. She’d made him lose control.
Because he was hers, and she was his. Because, no matter how hard they tried to fight it, they were good together. Right together.
She rested her forehead against his and tried to accept that, sooner or later, she would have to stop running from the fact.