Total pages in book: 120
Estimated words: 120240 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 601(@200wpm)___ 481(@250wpm)___ 401(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 120240 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 601(@200wpm)___ 481(@250wpm)___ 401(@300wpm)
“There’s a little room for you,” he says, and I can hear the uncertainty creeping into his voice. “Set up a little table for puzzles and the like. Thought you could… knit or some such.”
I turn to look at him, and he’s rubbing the back of his neck, not quite meeting my eyes.
“Figured you’d need a space that’s just yours. To think, or read, or whatever it is you do. Maybe retreat or whatever.”
My throat tightens. “Cavin…”
“If it’s shite, we can change it,” he says quickly. “Paint it different, move things around. Whatever you want.”
“It’s not shite,” I manage. “It’s… you made me a space. For me.”
“Aye, well.” He shifts his weight and winks. “Can’t have you cluttering up the whole house with your bits and bobs, can I?”
But I can see through the gruffness. He’s given me a room of my own in a house that’s supposed to be ours. A place to retreat, to breathe, to be myself.
I step into him, wrapping my arms around his waist. “Thank you.”
His arms come around me, solid and warm. “It’s nothing.”
“It’s not nothing,” I insist, pulling back to look at him. “It’s everything.”
He didn’t.
“And this…” He opens a door, and I gasp. “This is ours.”
Chapter Twenty-Three
Erin
“So after all your carrying on about your bedroom being mine,” I say, which earns me a teasing smack to the arse.
The primary bedroom is breathtaking. A massive four-poster bed dominates the space, piled with soft linens and thick pillows. There are candles everywhere, lit and glowing softly, and the windows overlook the dark expanse of trees outside. It’s intimate and romantic and exactly what I didn’t know I needed.
“Cavin.” I turn to him, my eyes stinging again.
He brushes his lips against mine and kisses me. “Do you have any idea how hard I’ve been holding myself back?” he says, his eyes growing heated and possessive. “Any idea?”
The kiss deepens, then turns hungry.
“Cavin.” I breathe against his mouth.
“Aye?”
“I want this. I want you.”
He pulls back just enough to look at me, his eyes dark and searching. “You’re sure?”
“I’ve never been more sure of anything.”
His control snaps. He kisses me like he’s starving, and I’m fumbling with the buttons of his shirt, desperate to feel his skin against mine. His hands are everywhere—tangling in my hair, gripping my waist, sliding up my ribs, over my breasts with reverence.
“Fuck this,” he growls and rips his shirt open. Buttons scatter across the floor.
I gasp, staring at the expanse of golden skin, the hard planes of muscle, the black ink winding over his shoulder and down his ribs. The scars that map out his history.
He’s gorgeous. Dangerous. Mine.
His hands find the zipper of my dress. The sound of it sliding down is obscenely loud in the quiet room. Cool air hits my heated skin as the fabric pools at my feet.
I’m standing there in my white lace bra and knickers, and the way he looks at me—
“Christ, Erin.” He sighs. “Look at you. You’re gorgeous.”
I reach for him and pull him close, then kiss the small tattoo of a rose on his shoulder. “Thank you.”
My hands stroke down the length of his chest. His abs contract under my touch. His cock is a hard, thick ridge against my hip, straining against his trousers.
“My fuckin’ god,” he growls. “Keep touching me like that and this’ll be over before it starts.”
I do it again. Deliberately. My thumbs graze over his nipples.
He makes a rough sound—something between a curse and a prayer—and his hips jerk forward involuntarily.
Power surges through me. I did that. I made him lose control.
He lifts me effortlessly and lays me on the bed like I’m something precious and breakable, even though his eyes are wild and hungry.
“You’re so beautiful,” he murmurs, crawling over me. His mouth finds my throat. My collarbone. Lower. “So fucking beautiful, Erin.”
He unclasps my bra, slides it off my shoulders, then tosses it aside. Cool air hits my nipples, and they tighten into hard peaks.
His eyes darken. “Fuck me, lass, you’re perfect.”
I arch into his touch, every nerve ending on fire. He’s maddeningly patient, taking his time, and I want to urge him to hurry, but I can’t form words because his mouth is doing things that make my brain shut down entirely.
He kisses my shoulder. “Mine,” he whispers, and the constant chatter of anxiety in my mind—the voices that never stop—becomes blissfully, deliciously quiet. “Mine.”
His rough fingers skate down the length of my arm, then back up, tracing my collarbone. They come to rest on my hip, his thumb stroking the sensitive skin there.
“Do you like that, Erin? Does that feel good?”
I close my eyes, then breathe out on an exhale. “Yes. I love it when you touch me. Don’t stop, please.”
“Good lass.” He wraps his hand in my hair and claims my mouth. His tongue sweeps against mine. Demanding. Possessive.