23. Jamison #2
I moved carefully, one arm under her thighs, one around her back. She gasped when I lifted her, arms flying around my neck. Pain shot through my cut palm.
I ignored it.
Her body pressed close against mine, cold and shaking. I had nearly lost her. To one wet rock and my own bad timing. My arms tightened around her, she made a small sound.
I loosened instantly. “Sorry.”
Her face turned slightly against my throat.
“That’s new,” she whispered.
“What?”
“You saying sorry.”
I looked down at her, and kissed her wet hair before I could think better of it.
By the time I reached House Alder, I had developed proof of my sainthood.
Actual, documented proof.
Sienna Bellemere was half naked in my arms, shaking against my chest, wearing my jacket. Her thighs were tucked over one of my arms. Her cheek rested against my throat. Her fingers kept clenching in the wet fabric of my shirt every time the path dipped.
And I did not fuck her.
I deserved a chapel.
A statue.
At minimum, a commemorative plaque.
JAMISON CROW: DID NOT TAKE HIS FIANCéE AGAINST A WALL AFTER SHE ALMOST DIED AND SHE LOOKED FUCKING BEAUTIFUL IN HIS ARMS.
Heroic.
Entirely underappreciated.
Sienna shivered again. My arm tightened carefully beneath her thighs. Her face tucked closer to my neck.
“Sorry,” I muttered, loosening at once.
Her head lifted a fraction. “You keep saying that.”
“Don’t make it strange.”
“It is strange.”
“Then stop noticing.”
She was topless, her sweet little body pressed in to me. I wanted to put her against the nearest tree.
Which was why I kept walking.
Saint.
House Alder appeared through the trees a few minutes later, and I understood immediately why Sienna had been placed there.
It was the prettiest cage on the estate. Modern wealth pretending to be simple.
Glass doors opening onto a wide terrace that overlooked the lake through a break in the trees. Expensive outdoor furniture arranged beneath linen umbrellas. A private plunge pool along one side, because apparently one body of water trying to kill her wasn’t enough.
The whole place was elegant, obscene in that Bellemere way where money didn’t shout because shouting was for people still trying to prove they had it.
And flowers.
Christ.
Flowers covered the terrace.
The entire stone path from terrace to patio had been swallowed by pale roses, blush peonies, white orchids, and soft pink hydrangeas arranged in ridiculous abundance. Buckets, urns, low ceramic bowls, trailing garlands wound through the railings.
One of the vans had beaten me here.
Sienna lifted her head fully, her eyes widened.
“What is that?”
“Flowers.”
“I can see they’re flowers.”
“Then why ask?”
Her gaze shifted from the terrace to me. “Jamison.”
The way she said my name had changed since the pool, less cold than before. Dangerous. I could become addicted to that.
“I bought them,” I said.
“All of them?”
“No, the estate happened to be suffering a floral invasion at the same time I arrived.”
“There are so many.” She stared at the terrace.
“They multiply when unsupervised.”
Her brows drew together, trying to decide if I was joking. I was. Unfortunately.
“Why?”
Because I don’t know how to apologize without humiliating myself. Instead, I didn’t answer her. I reached the patio doors and found them unlocked.
My mood darkened instantly.
“Sienna.”
“What?”
“Your doors were unlocked.”
“It’s a private family retreat.”
“Jesus Christ,” My girl had no fucking sense of security. I stepped inside, water dripping onto pale oak floors that probably cost more than several people deserved to inherit.
The interior was worse than the outside.
High ceilings, enormous glass walls, a sunken lounge facing the lake, soft ivory couches. A black marble fireplace. A curved staircase led to a loft bedroom above, partially screened by slatted oak.
The kitchen was sleek with cream cabinetry, and a ridiculous vase of flowers on the island.
More flowers from me, judging by the scale.
I kicked the door shut behind me. Sienna startled at the sound. I looked down at her instantly. “Sorry.”
Her eyes searched mine again.
That word was going to become a problem if she kept looking surprised every time I used it. I carried her across the living room toward the couch.
She stiffened. “I’m going to get everything wet.”
“I’ll replace it.”
I sat first, keeping her in my lap. Her knees ended up on either side of my hips again, straddling me on the wide cream couch. I should have moved her beside me.
I did not.
Again: sainthood had limits.
Sienna’s cheeks turned pink. “Jamison.”
“Yes?”
“I can sit on the couch.”
“You are sitting on the couch.”
“I’m sitting on you.” Her blush deepened.
That blush, only made my cock harder.
I stared at the ceiling for one second.
Absolutely fucking not.
This was a rescue. Me proving I could be near her body without turning into every bad thing she had learned to expect from powerful men.
My hands went to her waist, holding her steady.
Her torn bikini top had shifted again beneath the jacket. I could see the upper curve of one breast where the wet fabric gaped. The jacket moved half an inch, and I saw one tight, pretty nipple through the ruined blue fabric.
Begging for my mouth.
My brain stopped.
Entirely.
A clean system failure.
I had seen women naked before. Hundreds, if I was counting with honesty and no one religious nearby. Clubs made confession unnecessary.
My life had been filled with velvet restraints, dark rooms, open mouths, obedient knees. I knew nipples hard from cold, fear, pleasure, all three.
None of that prepared me for Sienna Bellemere sitting wet and shaken in my lap with one of the most beautiful fucking nipples I had ever seen barely hidden under a torn scrap of blue.
My mouth watered, actually watered.
Like a fucking animal.
I dragged my gaze back to her face.
“Baby,” My hand tightened at her waist. “I am trying very hard to be decent.”
Her eyes went wider.
“I know,” I said. “You can’t help it. I’m aware. This is not your fault. I am simply telling you, for the sake of honesty, that I deserve recognition for not putting my mouth on those beautiful fucking nipples.”
A tiny sound escaped her... embarrassed maybe. My fingers flexed, then forced themselves still.
“I would suck them,” I said, lower. “Slow. Thorough. Until your hands were in my hair and you stopped shaking for the right reason.”
Her whole body shivered.
My attention sharpened. A soft little response she could not hide because her body told truth faster than her mouth. I reached for the edge of the jacket and pulled it higher over her chest.
Covered her.
“Why did you say that?” she whispered.
“Because I’m a bastard.”
Her gaze held mine. “Jamison.”
I exhaled through my nose. “Because I want you. I’m done pretending I don’t. You deserve warning before I start looking at you like that in rooms.”
“Since when?”
Since you called me Jamjam and made a monster sound almost human. You told me about ballet and I pretended not to listen while remembering every word. Then you stopped trying and I discovered silence could gut a man.
“Longer than I handled well,” I said.
She gave a tiny laugh with no humor in it. “That is a very Jamison answer.”
I slid one hand up her back, until my palm rested at the base of her neck again. Her pulse fluttered beneath my thumb. She responded instantly, easing by a fraction, like the touch anchored her despite everything.
That did things to me I had no business allowing.
My life had been domination long before I had words for it. In clubs, women knelt because I understood consent and rules. A good dom built a room where surrender could happen without fear destroying it.
I had always known how to command.
I had rarely cared whether the person beneath the command felt safe after. But in the clubs, I did. That was the point. Boundaries. Signals. Permission. Aftercare. Want negotiated before it became need.
Outside those rooms, I was worse.
Harlan bent because I made it bend.
And Sienna—
God.
Sienna had been given to me by law.
A life already pointed in my direction before she could decide if she wanted it.
That would make me her husband one day if I didn’t destroy everything first.
But that wasn’t enough anymore.
If I was going to be her dom in any real sense, it would not be because dynasty paperwork handed me her body. It would be because she chose me.
Law could make her mine in public.
Only consent could make me hers in private.
She was still watching me, almost too closely.
“Did you hurt yourself?
“Your near-death experience has made you mouthy.”
“I fell off a ledge Jamison.” She shook her head.
I brushed my thumb along the side of her neck. “We need to get you warm.”
“I can shower.”
“No.”
Her brows drew together. “No?”
“You’re not locking yourself in a shower alone while I stand outside imagining every possible way this estate can continue to offend me.”
“I have showered without you before.”
“Yes. A system I am now reviewing.”
Her mouth pressed together, fighting something that looked dangerously close to amusement.
I shifted her carefully, lifting her off my lap and onto the couch beside me. She clutched my jacket closed with both hands, and I stood before I could change my mind and put her back where I wanted her.
Another medal for me.
Possibly two.
I found a folded throw on the back of a chair. And wrapped it around her shoulders over my jacket.
She stayed sitting, I went upstairs to find a towel.I found the bathroom in the main bedroom floor was open.
The bedroom itself made my mood worse. Huge bed, unmade from her morning, white sheets, a pale blue robe dropped over the edge of a chair, a book open facedown on the nightstand.
I stood there for one second, absorbing the fact Sienna slept here alone. With unlocked doors, and windows that covered half a wall.
I was going to have a stroke.
The bathroom was modern luxury like the rest of the cottage. Cream stone. Walk-in shower behind smoked glass. A huge oval tub beneath a window that looked toward trees because apparently Bellemeres enjoyed bathing in sniper-friendly architecture.