Chapter 32
AMELIA
“Okay,” Tim says, scandalized during our FaceTime call on the fourth day of my honeymoon. “Let me get this straight. You are four—four—days into your honeymoon, and you’re telling me that the man you married has not dicked you into another dimension yet?”
“Yes.”
“Yes?”
“Yes, Tim. That is correct.”
There’s a gasp, followed by some sort of dramatic thud. Probably him collapsing onto his couch.
“Are you dead?” I ask.
“Emotionally,” he breathes. “I’m emotionally deceased.”
“He’s being respectful.”
“HE’S BEING WHAT?”
I roll onto my back and stare up at the ceiling.
“He knows I don’t want sex while I’m on my period.”
“Wait. Don’t tell me he’s gone all this time with nothing.”
I roll my eyes. Seriously, the way some men carry on. Like four days is such a long time.
“I didn’t say nothing.”
“Oh my GOD. You throated the beast and then left him to die? This is abuse. Marital abuse. Is he okay? Like—medically? Do we need to send electrolytes?”
“He’s fine.”
“He’s not fine. That man’s balls are probably registered as small volcanic pressure zones right now.”
“Jesus.”
“I’m serious. Gage Black—CEO of Edge-Lord Enterprises, Breaker of Spines, King of Ferality, King of the Thrust, First of His Name—is just out here . . . what? Meditating through it? Drinking tea and vibing?”
“Mostly he’s been cooking.”
“COOKING?”
“Yes.”
“Oh no. No no no. If that man is out there roasting root vegetables instead of railing his legally bound soulmate, something is deeply fucking broken. I swear to God, if he starts journaling, I’m calling the FBI.”
“He made pancakes shaped like Iceland yesterday.”
Tim makes a noise I can only describe as spiritual distress. “Oh my God. He’s edging himself into domesticity. This is worse than I thought.”
I try not to laugh but fail. “You’re being dramatic.”
“No, Amelia. You’re being dramatic. You married the human embodiment of sexual tension, and then immediately put him on a one-week no-fuck cleanse. This is psychological warfare. Geneva Convention–level shit.”
“He’s fine.”
“Is he though?” Tim lowers his voice. “Is he in the shower right now?”
“Yes.”
“You know what he’s doing in there.”
“Tim—”
“He is absolutely, one thousand percent, in that shower stress-jerking while trying to manifest divine patience.”
“Timothy. Lee. Sinclair. Stop.”
“I’m picturing him bracing one hand on the wall,” he continues, on a roll now, “steam rising, jaw clenched, trying to remember his vows while aggressively avoiding eye contact with the conditioner bottle.”
“Oh my God.”
“Babe. Babe. Be honest. Is the water pressure suffering from the sheer force of his suppressed desire?”
“I am hanging up.”
“You are not! You called me. You knew what this would be.”
I sigh loudly. “I called to check on Sarah.”
“She’s fine. She’s living her best life. I’m the one in distress. I just needed to know that your husband hasn’t exploded from restraint. Or worse—imploded.”
“He hasn’t.”
“Yet.”
“I’m really hanging up now.”
“You’re welcome for the marital pep talk.”
I laugh because seriously, how can anyone not with Tim’s theatrics.
I jab the screen and toss the phone face down on the blanket just as I hear the bathroom door open. Steam rolls into the room like a warning. Then Gage follows, towel slung low on his hips, a second one in his hands as he dries his hair.
His eyes find mine immediately. They stay there. Intense. Dark.
“Did you just say I was stress-jerking?”
The laugh dies in my throat.
Because holy feral husband.
The look in his eyes is that intense filthy calm look that always comes right before he breaks me open.
What he asked is not really a question.
It’s a line in the sand.
And my body already knows what’s coming next.
He continues towel-drying his hair, slow and easy, his eyes never leaving mine. Shoulders gleaming. That towel still low, revealing the sharp cut of his hips. That perfect fucking V that I barely survive, but that’s all mine now.
That look in his eyes says he’s already undressing me with his mind. And building a very specific plan for what comes next.
My thighs squeeze together.
I’m practically squirming and Gage doesn’t miss a beat of it.
He finishes with the towel, drops it onto the chair without looking.
Doesn’t speak again until he’s close enough for the air between us to feel heavy.
His eyes drag down my body, making decisions with the certainty of a man who’s already read my answers in the way I breathe.
“Tell me something.” His voice drops lower. Rougher. “Are we still waiting?”
A beat passes.
“Or can I finally touch what’s mine?”
Every thought flies out of my head.
Every inch of me goes hot.
Tension tightens in my belly, low and unbearable, my body already arching toward his.
Suddenly, all I can think about is his hands. His mouth. His body pinning me down so he can remind me exactly who I married.
“Princess.” His eyes bore into me. “Don’t make me ask twice. Because if we’re not waiting anymore, I’m not stopping until you forget what day it is.”
“No,” I breathe. “We’re not—”
But he’s already moving.
Because he knows.
Because he’s been reading every shift in my body, every flicker of heat in my eyes.
Because I didn’t even have to say it.
I never have to.
And when he reaches me, he doesn’t hesitate. One hand fists in my hair. The other claims my neck and he pulls me into him with the determination of a man who’s been starving for me.
“Good,” he growls, mouth a breath from mine. “Because I’m fucking done waiting.”
Then his mouth crashes down onto mine and everything unravels.
His kiss is all tongue and hunger.
There’s no patience. No teasing. Just days of restraint snapping in his hands.
I moan into his mouth, and he makes a sound that says he’s been waiting too fucking long to hear that noise.
He breaks the kiss only long enough to rasp, “Lie back. Now.”
I scramble back without thinking.
Because I can’t think.
My brain’s gone. My body’s gone. I’m just one throbbing pulse of need, and every inch of me is screaming yes.
He follows like he’s stalking prey, towel dropping from his hips. And when he kneels on the mattress, it dips under the weight of everything he is.
And then my legs are parted, and I don’t even know when that happened. I just know Gage’s hand is already there, under my dress, spreading me wider, pulling my panties down in a single sharp jerk that leaves me gasping.
“Everything,” he growls. “Off.”
I scramble to obey, because of course I do, because I’d crawl for this man. But he’s faster. Tugging, stripping, tossing fabric aside until I’m bare and under him, panting, desperate, needy.
He kneels between my legs, palms rough on my thighs. “Legs up, Princess. Let me see what’s mine.”
My heart races as I lift my legs up over his shoulders where he wants them.
He grips my thighs instantly. Firm and possessive. Then hauls me closer like he can’t fucking wait.
“Fuck,” he grits out when he sees how wet I am. “Look at you.” He drags a single finger through the mess he’s made of me. “Fucking soaked for me. You were ready the second I walked out of that shower.”
My pussy clenches and my back arches up off the mattress. I grip the sheet and whimper, breathing through my unrelenting need for him.
“You want me to take it slow?”
He circles my clit, and it’s not enough. Nowhere near enough.
“Or do you want it the way I’ve been dreaming about for too many goddamn days?”
I nod, fast. Desperate. And grind myself up against his hand. “That one,” I pant.
His eyes darken. “Good girl.”
But he doesn’t move. Not yet. Because he’s savoring this. The view. The power. The fucking privilege of being here.
“Gage,” I moan, pushing myself up toward him again. “Please.”
And that’s when he goes feral.
His mouth is pure bliss and I cry out from his first taste. He kisses and licks every inch of my pussy over and over before sealing his lips over my clit in a rhythm that ruins thought. His fingers dig into my hips, holding me where he wants me.
I grind against his face, moaning through the pleasure wrecking me. And when he groans, when the sound vibrates against me, I edge closer to release.
Not fully. Not yet.
But I’m close.
And Gage knows it.
“Don’t hold back,” he rasps, voice thick and dark between my thighs. “You fucking give it to me, Princess. I’ve earned this.”
My legs shake. My hips buck.
And still, he holds me down, mouth locked to my clit as if he might never stop.
“Fuck, that’s it,” he growls against me. “Give it to me, Amelia. I want all of it.”
He slides two fingers deep, reaching the spot he knows I need him to, and my cry echoes off the walls.
“Fuck,” he growls. “This fucking pussy.”
I sob his name as the pleasure rolls through me.
I’m so close.
So fucking close.
“You gonna come for me, baby? You gonna fall apart on my mouth?”
I nod frantically, breath ragged, thighs trembling around his head.
“Then do it. Fucking make a mess on me, Princess.”
He sucks my clit harder. Flicks his tongue just right. And when he growls again—deep, possessive, starving—I come.
My hands go to his hair and I grip it hard, trying to keep his head exactly where it is as my hips grind desperately against his face. My orgasm tears through me. All-consuming.
And still, he doesn’t stop.
He keeps his mouth right where it is, allowing me to hold him in place where I want him, and just keeps sucking and licking.
And then it’s too much for me. I’m coming, and it’s too intense and it’s not enough and I want him to stop and I want him to never take his hands or mouth off me and I want it all now and oh my god . . .
I let go of his hair and cry out his name.
And that’s it.
That’s the moment he snaps. The moment I know his brain and his dick have moved into pure filth mode.
He shoves up onto his knees, his big hands gripping my thighs to put them where he wants them. One lands over his shoulder. He spreads the other wide, using his weight to press me open as he lines up and thrusts inside me in a single, brutal stroke.
“Fuck.”
The sound rips from his chest as he sinks into me, deep and hard and all the way.
“Jesus, Amelia,” he growls, already fucking moving. “You’re so fucking wet. So fucking tight. You missed this cock, didn’t you?”
The sound I make says I’ve lost control of my body. Because I have. All that’s left is this man inside me and the way he’s pounding into me like he needs this to breathe.
“Say it,” he rasps. “Tell me you missed the way I stretch you.”
“Fuck, Gage.” I pant through every rough thrust. “I fucking missed you.”
He slams deeper, harder, as he braces one hand on the bed beside my head, the other gripping my thigh as he drives into me.
“You’re mine,” he grits, jaw clenched, eyes on mine like he’s burning this moment into memory. “All fucking mine. No one gets this pussy but me. No one gets this body. This mouth. This fucking heart.”
“Yours,” I whimper. “Yours. Always.”
He lets out a growl that sounds more animal than human, then grabs both my wrists and pins them above my head with one hand.
“Keep them there,” he orders, voice thick with authority and need.
He grabs my thigh and hauls it higher, so he can drive into me at a different angle.
Then he fucks me like he’s lost his goddamn mind.
Every thrust is brutal.
He’s deeper than I’ve ever felt him. Relentless.
The sound of skin slapping skin fills the room, filthy and perfect.
He’s gritting curses through his teeth, panting against my neck, slamming his cock in so hard that each thrust rips a sound from my throat.
He’s everywhere. Consuming me. Filling me.
And I want more.
I want all of it.
The pace. The pressure. The desperate, growled filth that tells me just how far gone he is.
I moan his name on repeat, fingers gripping, body trembling.
I can’t speak. I can’t think.
I’m just his.
There’s no gentleness in him now. No control. Just raw, unfiltered need.
The kind that’s been building.
The kind that’s only for me.
“Look at me, Princess,” he demands. “Look at me while I ruin you.”
My eyes meet his.
And god, I shatter all over again.
He sees everything.
How desperate I am.
How wet I am.
How much I love it when he fucks me like he owns me.
My hands clutch uselessly at the sheets. My breath comes in broken gasps. My skin’s slick with sweat.
He’s fucking me like he’d tear the whole fucking world apart just to keep going.
And I let him.
I want him to.
Because I’ve never felt more his than I do right now.
“Gage—” I choke out, thighs shaking, vision going hazy. “I—fuck—I’m gonna—”
“I know.” He slams into me harder. “Come on, baby. Give it to me.”
And I do.
My body arches, shudders, clenches so hard, feels so fucking good I can’t breathe.
My scream gets caught in my throat, strangled and messy, and I come so hard it feels like I’m unraveling from the inside out.
My pussy pulses around him, dragging him deeper, tighter, wetter.
“Fuck, Princess. That’s it. That’s fucking it—”
He surges forward, drives in hard, and holds there as he lets go.
A guttural sound tears out of him as he comes, every muscle in his body locked tight.
His grip bruises. His jaw clenches. And he buries himself as deep as I’ll take him, cock throbbing inside me as he spills everything he’s got.
Our bodies locked.
Our breaths shattered.
His come leaking out of me before he’s even done.
He groans against my skin.
Then drops his forehead to mine, breath ragged. “Mine,” he rasps. “All fucking mine.”
I don’t know how long we stay like this, but when I come up for air, I’m sprawled on the bed, boneless, the air thick with heat and sweat and satisfaction.
Gage hasn’t moved far. He’s still on top of me, head buried in my neck, one hand splayed wide on my thigh.
He’s still catching his breath.
So am I.
Eventually, he shifts. Just enough to look at me. Just enough to let me see what’s still in his eyes.
The fire. The love. The absolute ruin of days without touching me.
“You good?” he asks.
I nod, unable to form real words.
He smiles and drops a quick kiss to my mouth.
“I’m not moving, though,” I say. “Ever again. I think you really did break me this time.”
He kisses my neck, then my collarbone. “I’ll allow it. On one condition.”
“What?”
“That you marry me again next weekend. Just so I can fuck you like this in another country.”
I roll my eyes. “You are unwell.”
His eyes turn that intense shade of dark I live for. “No. I’m in love.”
And there it is.
The full, raw weight of it.
Of him.
Of us.
Of what it means to be chosen like this.
Gage doesn’t just love me.
He claims me.
Every time.
Every breath.
Every look.
And I claim him too.
Every time.
Completely. Fiercely. His.
Now and always.