“Don’t go,” she begged, her eyelashes suddenly soaking with tears as they blinked open to look up at him.
His eyes remained closed, a small frown line growing between his brows. “I’m doing it for you, baby.”
“I don’t want anything from you but for you to stay right here. I’m sorry, Gage.”
“I’m not trying to punish you.” His thumbs stroked her cheeks as he reclaimed her eyes. “I’m taking the job at the cruise line because my family’s gone too far. I’m going to find out who’s behind this if it’s the last thing I do.”
“Do you really think your family was behind my attack?”
He pressed his lips together. “I’m not convinced they weren’t. Let’s just say that. Somebody will pay for this, and they’re not excluded from suspicion just because they’re my parents. I’ll do anything to prove to you that you can feel safe with me. Even if it means destroying them.”
She nibbled her bottom lip as emotion snatched at her insides, unable to stop herself from being fully honest after the bulldozer he’d just blasted her with. “I was wrong that day on the balcony. I do feel safe with you, Gage. I feel safer with you than anyone else in the world. Those voicemails you left me? I listened to them every night. I fell asleep to them. It was the only way I could sleep. I really needed those words, and you gave them to me without me even having to ask. They always dried my tears. They calmed my heart. In your own way, you did make me feel safe, even if you weren’t next to me. And…” She blushed. “If you still want me to come and stay with you…”
His mouth fell open. He stepped back with a frown, keeping her jaw cupped in his hands.
Veda noted his retreat, an embarrassed smile crossing her face. “Or not…?”
“No…” He released her face completely to clap both hands over his heart. “I’d love nothing more than for you to come stay with me. For you to let me protect you.” He paused. “But… if I’m really going to find out who’s at the bottom of your attack… if my parents really had a hand in it…” He motioned to her. “Well, they need to believe you and I are over. They need to believe we detest each other, actually. It’s the only way they’ll trust me.”
Her eyebrows pinched. She crossed her arms.
“This isn’t how I imagined telling you this. How do I even say this?” Gage ran a hand down his face, taking his skin with him as he did before clapping his hand back over his heart, feeling it trying to shatter his rib cage. “The investment deal they lost out on when I fell for you is still on the table and, in exchange for the job, they want a guarantee from me that I’ll rekindle my engagement with Scarlett Covington.”
Veda felt her heart grind to a jagged stop. “Holy shit.”
He stepped closer, laying his forehead back against hers.
She cringed. “Holy shit.”
He cupped her cheeks again. “You know it doesn’t mean anything, baby. I’ll go along with it to get the job and get inside… but you know there’s nothing between Scarlett and I. I feel nothing for her nor does she for me. She probably threw a party when our engagement ended, and she was free to continue her rendezvous with the Spanish pool boy she’s really in love with. Once she gets news of my ‘change of heart’, she’ll surely have a nervous breakdown.”
Veda stepped out of his hold.
He took her arm to stop her.
She heaved out a breath. “How could you agree to this without telling me?”
“You weren’t even speaking to me, Veda.” He took a moment when his voice rose, waiting until he was sure it would be calm before he spoke again. “You weren’t answering my calls and texts. You looked me in the eye and told me you felt safer with another man. I did what I had to do. Linc won’t close this. My family is too powerful. There isn’t a man on this island that can find out the truth but me. And this is the only way.”
“Wow…” Veda’s face fell. “So… what? This is it? After you leave the hospital, this is the last time we see each other?”
He pulled her back in, catching her shoulders as she stumbled forward, trailing the tips of his fingers up and down her arms, slowly—a flash of agony zooming across his face at her words. “For now. Yes.”
She gave another sharp exhale.
A lump moved down his throat. “I’m fighting for you.”
She lifted her eyes back to his.
“I’m fighting because I want this…” He shook her softly. “I want you. Every single day of my life. And I want you to know, even when I’m angry, behaving reprehensibly, or saying hurtful things, that there’s nothing I won’t do to protect you. I want you—no,” he paused, “I need you to know that. I won’t ask you to believe the words. I’ll show you. I’ll do whatever it takes to prove it to you.”
Veda blinked rapidly, her lashes drenched, bubbles of tears threatening to fall over the rims.
“You deserve better than me,” she whispered.
“Veda, there is no one else, and there never will be.” His brows jumped, and he squeezed her arms. “Will you wait for me?”
Cupping the back of his biceps under her trembling hands, she clutched them to help find her center. To help find peace. It didn’t ease the storm in her heart completely, but it helped.
At her touch, he drew closer, wrapping one arm around her waist and pulling her closer, sealing their bodies together.
She gasped as his hard abdominal muscles seemed to punch their way through the fabric of his suit and stroke her heaving ribcage. Their gasping breath came closer, mouths a whisper apart.
She released her hold on the back of his arms and laid her hands on his chest. It swelled under her touch as she dragged it slowly up until she was cupping his chiseled jaw. The muscle there rolled under the beds of her fingers before she moved her caress into the silky strands of his hair, dragging her nails down his scalp until his eyes had slammed closed once more. One hand left his hair to run over his body, fingers trickling over every hard muscle and sharp line they’d been deprived of since the last time they’d had each other.
She lifted her head, eyes lowering when he let his own head fall, angling his nose alongside hers to get as close as he could.
He nuzzled her nose with his, neck bent down as far as he could get it. “Tell me you’ll wait for me.”
Veda came to her toes, closing the space that he refused to—or perhaps didn’t have the strength to—until her lips were one bounce on her tiptoes away from meeting his.
He took a deep breath but still didn’t close the space.
“I’ll wait for you.” The whisper that left her lips was barely audible. “I miss you.”
Gage’s face grew pained, tortured, jaw rolling once more before he finally gave in, lowering his head to hers.
Their lips brushed in a graze they barely felt, just enough to light a fire in both of them before they finally locked into a gentle kiss. Neither made a move to pull back from the softness, their lips living together for several moments before Gage pulled away, just a whisper, eyes closed tight. He didn’t stay gone for long, however, just long enough to draw a deep breath before he dove in once more, taking her bottom lip between his.
A moan rose up Veda’s throat, letting him taste her for as long as he needed, slowly sinking into the taste of him as well until she felt her skin prickling with a ravenous need for more. He released her lip with a plop, but she zeroed back in with her own spread wide, moving on direct orders from her pussy, which pulsed for him, offering him all of her.
He accepted with vigor, parting his mouth against hers as well. Their tongues dashed out, the tips lashing softly before they tilted their heads and deepened the kiss, groaning into each other’s mouths. In moments, Gage took control, bringing the kiss to a level so fast and intense that Veda found herself gasping to keep up, digging her fingers deeper into his hair and gripping the strands for leverage.
Their gasping lips parted but their hands kept them connected, caressing each other’s bodies, touching every inch, reintroducing themse
lves to every dip and curve.
Gage’s hooded eyes followed his hand as he ran it over her shoulders, her arms, and her waist. His splayed fingers ran her back slowly, down to the curve of her ass.
Knowing it was one of his favorite parts of her body, she waited for him to grab each globe and squeeze. A part of her yearned for it, hoping the tips of his smooth fingers might accidentally stroke her aching entry in the process—but he didn’t. He moved his touch back up and sank his fingers into her curls, their gasping breath meeting between each other’s lips, still swollen from their fervent kiss.
Veda’s body fell apart for him. Her heartbeat doubled, making it hard to breathe. Her veins pumped like they might burst right through her skin. Her knees shook, making her worry she might crumble to the ground. Some part of her wondered if her body was punishing her for depriving it for so long. If her body was warning her that if she didn’t give it what it really needed—him—it would finish her on the spot.
But she had no plans on letting her body down, slipping her trembling hands along his broad collarbone and into the flaps of his jacket.
He gasped and ripped it off his shoulders, keeping his forehead sealed to hers, their eyes locked as he tore the jacket down his arms.
As he tossed it across the room, she’d already seized the neckline of his white button-down shirt, yanking at it with such fury the first few buttons came undone with little effort, unveiling a hint of his golden chest and the deep lines that seemed like they’d been chiseled by an Italian sculptor. Her greedy eyes widened for more of the gorgeous sight.
Gage heeded the blind need in her eyes and finished the job, tearing his shirt open the rest of the way and ripping it down his arms as well.
Her hands were on his chest, and she moaned at the warmth of his skin under her fingers. Her nails dug in, making sink holes in his heaving pecs as her hungry eyes followed his every move. Followed every line in his arms that deepened as he snatched at the fabric of his shirt, and every flex of his muscles as he peeled it off, one arm at a time. She drank in every detail of the solid body she’d damn near memorized. Every detail that had infiltrated her dreams and attacked her senses for as long as she’d been robbing herself of them. She dragged the beds of her fingers over his olive skin, always finding herself sinking into a place of wonder at how it could be so hard and so soft at the same time. She watched his body come alive under her zealous touch, every piece of his skin pulsing under her fingers as if begging for a few seconds more of her attention.
When she looked up and caught his darkened eyes locked to hers, his neck bent forward, just as desperate for more of her as she was for him, she couldn’t take another moment, cradling the back of his head with one hand while taking hold of his jaw with the other and coming to her toes.
Gage spread his lips wide to receive her passionate kiss, his soft tongue slipping deep into her warm mouth while fisting a handful of her curls in his hand.
This time, the kiss didn’t end. Neither moved to break it but only to drive it deeper, parting ways just long enough to gasp in strangled breath before they were joined once more.
The blood pumping through her veins surged straight from her hammering heart to her pounding center, leaving everything else a blur. A haze. So blinded with need, Veda was barely aware of each new article of their clothing being ripped off and thrown away. As they stumbled toward the bed, all she could think about was getting him inside her, and by the time they made it to the bed, they were both completely naked.
Bending his knees, Gage swept her off her feet, lying her down on the bed and climbing on right after her, cradling his fisted hands on either side of her body as he came between her splaying legs. He gave her all of his weight, his hardness pressing against her stomach, begging for entry into the body that now owned him—the body that had owned him since the moment he’d sampled it for the first time.
Veda wanted nothing more than to be filled by the body that owned hers, nearly purring with need as he cupped her chin—licking and kissing her top and bottom lip, trapping them between his teeth before releasing them with a plop. He used his hold on her chin to force her head back, exposing her shapely neck.
Veda cried out as he licked and suckled the skin on the underside of her chin, taking his time on what he knew was the most sensitive part of her body, lapping at it until it was gleaming with his attentions and she was writhing beneath him.
Her chest was heaving by the time he made it to her hard brown nipples, and her back arched up from the bed when the left one found itself suckled into the wet warmth of his mouth as his soft fingers squeezed and twirled the right.
A new flash of pleasure lit a fire in her as he trapped each hard nub between his lips, over and over, as if he couldn’t decide which was his favorite, swirling them around his soft tongue and nipping them gently with his teeth. Veda dragged her nails down the back of his scalp, and his neck, her head thrown back and lips parted, gasping for more.
He released her nipple from his own heaving lips and immediately cupped one in his hands as he reclaimed her lips in a passionate kiss. They sank into each other for another long moment, the strong kiss leaving them panting and breathless, lips still locked as Veda rolled them so they were both lying on their sides. His strong arm encircled her, splaying fingers traveling down her back and cupping her ass in his hand, his strangled moan floating between their lips as he squeezed tight. For a moment, the kiss reigned supreme, both of them so deeply immersed in the battle of their lips and tongues that they were frozen in place.
Veda was the first to break, her center too slippery and needy to wait another moment. Holding his heavy gaze with a heated one of her own, biting her bottom lip, she rolled Gage onto his back. He dropped down onto the white bedding, his eyes shining up at her. Her bare breasts bobbed in the cool air as she straddled him, bending down to gasp into another kiss as she sat on his hardness, her body begging to be entered.
He cupped either side of her face, his biceps flexing like two softballs under his skin, the veins bulging in his arms betraying his own need, almost as much as his hard shaft, already slippery with her juices, mere inches from her entry.
They shared a smile before he caught her lips in another kiss.
Veda nearly screamed, and he wasn’t even inside her yet. It had been way too long. How had she managed to convince herself she could live without this? She had no idea, but as she reached between her splayed legs and seized his hardness, guiding the tip to her arching center, her pussy bellowed its approval, desperate to be filled.
A passion-fueled frown took over Gage’s face as Veda sank down, and he sat up, just as overwhelmed with breathless pleasure as she was, wrapping his arms around her waist and crying out into her neck as he filled her to the brim.
Neither were able to make a noise outside of their choked grunts and moans as she began to ride him, finding a rhythm in record time, clawing her nails down his back with such ferocity that long red marks lingered in their wake.
Keeping one hand locked tight around her waist, Gage cupped her cheek with the other as he matched her stroke for stroke. The bed squeaked under their weight every time his hips left the bed, slamming into hers before plopping back down, both so overwhelmed with desire that they couldn’t even manage a kiss of their gasping lips, keeping them just inches apart as they worked toward the spine-tingling precipice that beckoned them.
“Oh.” Gage collapsed back on the bed when that precipice came, locking Veda’s ass under his quaking fingers.
She didn’t miss a beat in his retreat, and his eyes shone up at her as she ground her hips against his. She lost her breath when she realized she saw in his eyes exactly what she was feeling inside. She saw the warmth wrapping itself into a knot in her belly, a knot that quickly went from warm to blazing hot. She saw him approaching completion. She saw how desperate he was to escape it. To make this last longer.
She saw that, just like her, if he could, he’d make it last forever.
>
But neither of them could do that, and Veda found herself leaning back, finding leverage as she covered his pulsating thigh with her hand, letting it’s hardness balance her as her strokes became so fierce, so blind, she worried she might fall right off the bed.
But he wouldn’t let her fall.
He held her around the waist, steadying her as they came together, and even as his eyes fell shut and his head collapsed back against his pillow, his neck arching as he finished, he didn’t release her.
He didn’t let her fall.
As Veda followed him over the edge, whimpering as she finished as well, her center clenching and twitching as her orgasm rocked through her, she knew he never would.
20
With so much time having passed without having each other, and so many words unspoken over the weeks, Veda and Gage’s lovemaking had been fast, hard, and powerful.
So powerful they found themselves still breathless, staring up at the LED lamp of the hospital room long after they’d both reached the point of fruition. Veda, curled up under the weight of Gage’s arm, which was wrapped around her waist, had draped her naked thigh across his hips, where she’d worked his dick to the bone, now soft and spent between his strong thighs. Cuddling her cheek into his shoulder, she ran the tip of her damask nail along his heaving, sweat-slickened body, tracing his eight pack abs, his solid pecs, his strong collarbones and the freckles that dusted them like a connect the dots puzzle.
Gage’s fingers took voyage of her body too, trickling down the curve of her waist, more lucid with each second. His touch moved down her waist and up over her hip, lingering on a random bone at it’s highest peak. He poked that bone softly with his index finger.
Recognizing one of his favorite games, one they’d often played over the course of their relationship, usually when they found themselves bored in bed together, Veda grinned.
Pulse (Revenge Book 5) Page 18
