CHAPTER 23

“I can’t believe I actually screamed.” Kelsey laughed, her entire body brimming with joy. With ecstasy. With love. “Twice.”

Ares chest rose and fell beneath her ear as he cuddled her close. He’d pulled the covers over them, and his body was deliciously warm and hard against hers.

“You did scream. And I loved it. My fantasy finally came true.”

Kelsey knew what that meant, that Whitney had never screamed. Likely because her sister was always so worried about looking and

sounding good, even during sex.

No. Kelsey wouldn’t let Keira intrude on this precious moment. Wouldn’t ruin everything by comparing herself to her sister.

He pushed the tangled hair back from her face. “I want to hear you scream my name again.” He rolled her beneath him. “I want to

exhaust you so that you fall asleep in my arms, and then I get to wake you up in the middle of the night and do it all over again.”

Her heart melted like a chocolate bar in the sun, and she felt positively gooey inside. For nine years, she’d dreamed of hearing Ares

say words like these. Dreamed of finally telling him her feelings for just as long.

I love you.

For the first time, she thought it might almost be possible to say it.

“I want you to do that,” she said in a low voice, “but first I want to do it to you.”

Surprise had only just registered on his gorgeous face when she pushed at his chest. “Lie back.” She shoved the covers aside, and in

the city lights through the window, he was so magnificent, it was hard to draw breath. “I can hardly believe it,” she found herself

whispering. “That you’re here with me. That I’m here with you.”

He was already aroused again, and as she stroked his body, gliding her palm lightly over his skin from chest to abdomen, then

skimming down to his thighs, he grew harder still.

“Look what you do to me.” His voice was rough. Raw. As full of need as she was.

She reveled in her joy. In the knowledge that he wanted her, really wanted her. She wasn’t just a fill-in for someone else.

He wanted her for herself.

“I want to lick you like an ice cream cone.”

His breath rushed out. “Jesus, Kelsey. Just hearing you say that…” She trailed her fingers up his thighs. “Have me. I’m yours.” The

need—the emotion—threading through his voice was another miracle.

They’d had friendship, common interests, and like minds. Now they had this aching desire too…and a connection that ran so deep

she swore it touched not just her heart, but her soul too.

His words—I’m yours—resonated through every part of her as she put her mouth on him.

“Kelsey.” Then he swore, and even those four letters were music.

She took all of him then, and his body quaked, his groans growing hoarse and guttural. His hips rose to meet her as she took him

deeper.

Then he tangled his hands in her hair, his body moving to meet her lips as he called out her name. Shouted it. Her name, no one

else’s by mistake. She was the only woman in this room with him, the only one he wanted.

And he was the only man she’d ever needed like this.

After, she climbed his body, felt his arms close around her. Then he raised a hand to take her chin in his fingers and kissed her so

deeply that the room spun around her.

She smiled against his lips. “I made you shout.”

“Hell yes, you did.” He pulled the covers over their cooling bodies and drew her closer against him.

She’d never seen him this relaxed. This satisfied. And, oh, was she ever satisfied too.

“I’ve dreamed of this,” he murmured in a low voice. “Needed this. Needed you.”

“It’s all I’ve ever wanted,” she said, but when he didn’t respond, she wondered if he’d spoken from near-sleep. A place where the

truth could finally come out, where his subconscious mind could finally take control for a few hours.

“You’re so sweet in my arms. So soft. So warm. I don’t want you to go.”

“I won’t.” Leaving was the very last thing she wanted.

“Just a little while longer.”

Kelsey was almost asleep now too. She tried to rouse, to listen to what he was saying, but it was impossible when she was exhausted

not only from their beautiful lovemaking, but from the emotional angst of the preceding week.

“Just until morning.”

Morning. He was saying something about the morning. But she refused to allow real life to steal so much as one moment of the

night’s fantasy. Instead, there was only this, his body against hers as he moved to his side, shifting her until her back was to his chest,

one hand over her heart.

A heart that beat only for him.

* * *

He was doing it again, making her wild and crazy with his large, talented hands roaming over her body.

The morning sun tapped at her eyelids, but she didn’t want to know what time it was. Didn’t want to face what “morning” might mean.

She wanted this. His hands on her, his lips, his warmth. Wanted all the beautiful, heartfelt things he’d said last night.

I’m yours.

He skimmed his fingers across her breasts, exciting the peaks to tight buds, then down her belly and over her sex. Gently—hungrily

—he pulled her leg up over his, opening her to his touch.

It was pure instinct to put her hand over his, guiding him. She loved the feel of their linked fingers, the combination of both his

caress and her own.

He pressed a hot kiss to her neck. “Good morning.”

“So good,” she said. More like moaned as he nipped at her neck, sending tantalizing shivers through her body.

A kernel of fear tried to bubble up, worry that this would be the last time, and she needed everything before it all went away. But she

knew better. Lovemaking based on fear held no love at all. So she shoved that darkness away as she turned in his arms, wrapped hers

around his neck, and kissed him deeply.

They rolled together on the bed, a passionate tangle of arms and legs, until he was sitting up in bed and her legs were wrapped

around him, her arms curled at his neck.

She looked deep into his eyes and then, holding his heated gaze, she took him inside. All of him in one gloriously slick, hot thrust

that stole her breath. And made everything inside her melt again.

Together they began to move, her body slowly rising on him, stroking all the nerves on the inside. His tongue entered her mouth as

his body plundered hers, the pace deliciously, agonizingly slow. They rocked and rolled together, their mouths feasting on each other,

arms tight, bodies fitting together like a hand and glove.

She rode him, and he took her, her breath quick as they writhed and undulated sinuously, their bodies growing slippery. Until finally

the pleasure was too great, and she had to move faster, matching the rhythm of her hips to the rapid beat of her heart.

She threw her head back, dragging in air, and he bit down lightly on the soft skin between her shoulder and neck, marking her.

“Ares.” His name falling from her lips sounded wild, sexy, sultry, crazy, and so unlike her. So unlike the woman she used to be,

before the greatest pleasure she’d ever known.

She heard him cry out her name, and he sounded just as raw, just as desperate as she had. Then she was beyond thinking, could feel

only a million bursts of pleasure multiplying, spreading, shooting throughout her body until they became a wondrous cataclysm of

ecstasy.

Until the only sound she could make was the three words she’d been holding back for what seemed like forever. They could no

longer stay locked inside as she leaped from the peak and tumbled down into bliss.

“I love you.”