Total pages in book: 17
Estimated words: 15404 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 77(@200wpm)___ 62(@250wpm)___ 51(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 15404 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 77(@200wpm)___ 62(@250wpm)___ 51(@300wpm)
"You really care about my potential?” I ask. "Maybe I’ve got this place all wrong, but I never thought...I mean, I didn’t think men like you would care much about potential..."
He shakes his head, and his eyes soften, growing distant as though reminded of some memory he has tried to put aside for longer than he’d care to admit.
"My mother," he confesses. "I saw all the smarts she had. All the brains. All the things she could have done, if she wasn’t tied down to my father and to us. She loved us, don’t get me wrong, and she lived a good life, but she...she never got to do the things that she could have. Never got to write and travel and adventure. She always thought her life began and ended at the threshold of this house, and it didn’t matter how much we tried to convince her she was more than that. She could never see it."
He draws in a long, slightly shaky breath.
"But if you stay here, if you start teaching these girls," he goes on. "You might free a few of them from the same thing. From the same beliefs. They might have a better chance out there. And if you think I’m going to kick you out of my house to make that happen..."
He grins.
"You’ve got a whole hell of a lot of other things coming."
And, with that, he kisses me again, and I know that the time for conversation is well and truly over.
CHAPTER 7
Cade
Ilift her from the ground and back her against the door behind us, the desire I have tried to keep pinned down for so long suddenly impossible to ignore.
She’s staying. And she’s not just staying, she’s finding purpose here. Making changes here. Helping to make this place into the kind of home that people can thrive in, not just survive in. Putting down roots, right here, where I can hold her and have her and make her mine. I can still remember standing there on the day my niece was born, staring down at the family my brother had made and wondering when it would happen for me. But here, now, I know – it's her.
She’s finally made it. And now that I have her right where I want her, I am not going to let her slip through my fingers.
I tuck one arm beneath her hips to hold her in place as I move between her legs, pressing myself into her, letting her feel the ache of my manhood for her warmth. Her fingernails dig into my skin slightly as she draws me around to look at her, and her clear eyes search mine as though finding something there they never had before.
She kisses me again, a slow, soft, almost teasing kiss, like she is coaxing out something in me that she has been waiting to lay eyes on all along.
With my other hand, I bunch her dress at her hips, exposing her entirely – her mound, the dark puff of hair atop her sex, the glistening slickness of it, even by the low candlelight.
Her teeth rest on her lip for a moment as though waiting for my approval, as though I would ever look upon her like this with anything other than all-consuming lust, and I kiss her once more in silent assurance that she has me, that she has never lost me.
I shift my pants down far enough that I can pull myself loose. There isn’t time for a slow undressing of one another, not in these circumstances, no. The sensual exploration can come later. All that I care about is her, having her, marking her, showing her that I want her in all the ways that matter.
And, as she shifts her hips slightly, pinned between me and the door, I know she understands that entirely. I bring myself to her entrance, and, not taking my eyes off of hers for an instant, I buck myself inside her in one long stroke.
She gasps, her entire body tensing for a moment as though growing used to the sensation of me inside of me. It’s not like the first time, when I knew that I needed to hold something back, to keep myself from getting lost entirely to the welcoming warmth of her body – no, now, I can give her everything I want to, and I intend to make sure she never forgets it.
Burying my face into her neck, I slam myself into her, her thighs clamping around me as a gasping moan escapes her lips. I can feel her body reacting to me, deep inside, the response of her pleasure enough to drive me to new levels of passion.
I can’t hold back, even if I wanted to, find myself unable to do anything other than give myself to her, to take from her everything I need and return it in kind.