“Eve.” He wrapped her in his arms and she clung to him, sobbing against his chest. “I’m sorry. I’m so damn sorry. Nothing in the world would have made me walk away from you except that one thing. My obligation to my wife, yes, but I also didn’t want it to start that way with you. My marriage felt over, but Eve, it was still there in my life. I wasn’t a clean slate for you. I didn’t want it to feel wrong, because it’s so fucking right between us. It’s so easy and comfortable but there’s need and lust, too, and... I’ve never felt that before. I didn’t want it to be something either of us would regret. I’m sorry.”
Her fists tightened in his shirt. Her back trembled under hands.
“I’m sorry,” he repeated. “Please give me another chance. Please. I swear, I won’t hurt you again. It’s right this time, Eve. I swear it.”
She drew in a shaky breath. And then another. But she didn’t say a word.
“I know you built a life for yourself while I was gone. I just want to see if you can fit me into it. If you can’t, if you decide it’s not worth forgiving me, then...”
Then what? He had no idea. He breathed in her scent and tried to imagine what he’d do with himself if he had to let her go again. It would be so much harder this time. This time, he’d be chained by the memory of her body, of knowing how good it was between them. Knowing he’d never have that even one more time, and that he’d never find it with anyone else.
Her back rose against his hands as she took a deep breath. “I know you’ll hurt me again.”
“I won’t. I—”
“Stop. You will. Loving someone...that means feeling things that will hurt sometimes, in small ways, at least. And in big ways when things go wrong.”
“Eve...” He shook his head.
“But I learned how to be strong when you left. Stronger than I thought I was. I got through it.”
He nodded. “I know. You’re amazing. You always have been.”
“So, even though it will hurt, I think I can get through it. Even if it ends. I don’t need to be so scared.”
Brian held his breath, waiting to see what she meant.
“Yes,” she finally whispered, face still hidden against his chest.
“What?” he breathed.
“You’re worth the risk. And I’m worth taking the chance. I still love you, Brian.” The words broke, rough with tears. “I never stopped. I tried, but I couldn’t make it stop. I didn’t know how.”
He wasn’t the kind of man who cried easily. In fact, he couldn’t remember the last time he had. At his father’s funeral, probably, five years before. But now his eyes burned, and he had to squeeze them shut to stop the tears.
“I love you,” she said again, as if she were making herself face it.
“Thank God, Eve. Thank God. I’ve missed you so much.” He tipped her chin up and kissed her. He didn’t stop kissing her for a long time, not until he’d maneuvered her into her bedroom and onto the bed. He reached past her to switch on the bedside lamp and Eve squeaked.
“Turn that off!”
“Are you kidding me? I have to make up for all these years of not seeing you naked.”
She gave a huff of incredulous laughter and strained toward the light. “No way.”
“Come on.” He eased her sweater up and pressed a kiss to her ribs. “Please. I want to see you. All of you. Naked and turned on and open to me.” He pressed a kiss to her belly, then lower, just above her navel. He unbuttoned her jeans. “Please?”
Eve groaned and dropped her head to the mattress. “Why didn’t you tell me you were coming back? I could have hired a personal trainer.”
“You’re gorgeous,” he murmured as he tugged down her jeans. “Perfect.” She was. She always had been. Soft and natural and sweet. He reached for her panties and pulled them down before he could stop her.
“Hey!” She kicked at him with a bare foot, but he just grabbed her ankle and kissed the inside of her knee.
“Stop!” She pulled her ankle out of his grasp and squeezed her thighs together, but she was laughing.
“I’m going to see all of you. A lot. Every day. Give in gracefully.”
She smiled up at him, looking beautiful and decadent, her hair spread across the bed, sweater shoved up beneath her breasts, her thighs naked. She looked like a picture of every evening in his foreseeable future. His heart shook.
“And...” He slid a hand up her thigh. “I’m going to taste you. Now. And then again later. And tomorrow morning, too.”
Her gaze softened and swept down his body. “Yeah?”
“Hell yeah.”
She bit her lip. Her thighs relaxed and eased the tiniest bit apart.
He tightened his grip on her leg, and slowly, slowly eased her open.
He’d thought he was hard already, but now his cock was straining. She was so gorgeous and wet and pink.
“Yes,” she finally whispered. “Do that.”
He did.
The taste of her arousal filled his mouth and made his cock throb. He teased her and licked her, sucked at her clit and tongued her pussy, figuring out exactly what she liked by the way her hips bucked against him and her cries filled his ears. She came with his fingers buried deep inside her. On another day, he’d insist on one more orgasm, but today... Today, he wanted inside her. He needed it like he’d never needed anything. And when he slid his cock slowly into her wet heat, her whispered words filled his ears. I love you. I love you.
It was everything.
CHAPTER SIX
“HOLD STILL!” Eve ordered, lining him up in her sights again. She watched his shoulders rise and fall on an impatient sigh as she snapped away.
“Come on, Eve.”
“Just a few pictures.”
She angled the camera so that he was at the corner of the frame, but still in focus, his own camera raised to his eye and trained on the herd of deer in a faraway field. Even as she clicked, she knew one of these photos would be her new favorite. Brian, and the mountains beyond him, and the first buds of bright green aspen leaves just braving the spring on the tree to his left.
“Okay,” she said, but when he turned toward her, she snapped one last picture.
“Hey!”
She snorted with laughter at the outrage that creased his forehead. She didn’t know even one photographer who liked being in front of the lens.
“Okay, we’re done,” he groused, dropping his camera to glare at her.
“Be nice, or I’ll make you strip down and pose for me the way I really want you to.”
“You wish.” She saw the way pink crept over his cheekbones, and suddenly all she wanted was to be in bed with him, naked and sweaty and tangled in his limbs. She couldn’t believe the way he turned her on with the barest of glances. As painful as that had been two years ago, now it was a wonder.
“You’re so sexy,” she murmured as she moved close to his body.
“I’m beginning to think the beauty of your favorite male model has damaged your corneas. You’re half blind.”
“No.” His arms snuck around her and she looked up at him, brushing her thumb over the line of his jaw. “You’re gorgeous.”
“Eve...”
She leaned up to taste the spot she’d just touched. “I want you all the time,” she whispered. “It’s embarrassing.”
“It’s a miracle,” he responded.
He was right. It was a miracle. Not just the way their bodies fit together, but the way the loose edges of their lives had stitched together perfectly. He was managing the gallery now, and she’d expanded her studio space into a back room she’d been using for storage. She’d never been good at spotting new potential and bringing in outside work. Brian, on the other hand, had a passion for that. He sold her photography better than she could, and no
w the walls were filled with gorgeous work by local artists. Sales were already up, and the busy season hadn’t even started yet.
But none of that mattered as much as the way he looked at her when she touched him. As if she were the miracle. God, he was ridiculous. And so wonderful it hurt.
She kissed him one last time. “Do you want to move in with me?” she asked.
Brian pulled his head back as his eyebrows rose. “Really?”
“Yes.”
He smiled. “God, Eve. This is all moving a little fast.”
She shoved him hard enough that he had to take two steps backward. “You’ve asked me three times already!” she complained. “Always after you’ve made me come, I notice.”
“I know when you’re at your weakest,” he drawled. He reached for her and tugged her close again. “Yes, I want to move in with you. Now. Today. This minute.”
“This minute?” she repeated, sliding her hands behind his neck and into his hair to tug him down for a kiss. She moaned as his tongue slid against hers.
“Well...” he murmured, breaking the kiss to taste her neck. “In thirty minutes, maybe.” He backed her toward his truck, then growled when she dropped to her knees beside it. “Or ten. Ten minutes.”
“I think you’re overestimating your stamina, big guy.”
“I think...you’re right.”
Five minutes later, they were speeding back toward town, windows open to the cold and her laughter chasing away on the breeze. But Brian was still complaining.
“Because,” she answered his latest plea, “I’m pickier than you, and I’d rather come in a cozy bed than in a cold truck.”
“I said I’d turn the heater on.”
“I want to stretch out. I want you to kiss me. Everywhere. For an hour or so.”
He shot her a scorching look. The truck surged forward as he pressed the pedal harder. “All right. Deal. I guess I’ll just have to make it worth the wait.”
She drew his hand up to her mouth and kissed his knuckles. “You always do,” she whispered.
“What?” he asked over the wind.
But she just shook her head and turned to watch the trees slide by. The wind whipped her silly tears away. And Eve smiled.
* * * * *
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About the Author
Victoria Dahl lives with her family in a small town high in the mountains. She’s been reading romance since the age of twelve and started her first manuscript at the tender age of twenty. Occasionally, on dark and stormy nights, she bravely posts excerpts of that original story on her blog for the entertainment of her readers. Her first published novel won a Golden Heart award. Since then, she’s published over seventeen books and novellas, including three USA TODAY bestsellers, and several of her books have been nominated for the prestigious RITA® Award for excellence in the romance genre.
Find out more about Victoria and her books at www.VictoriaDahl.com or write to her at [email protected].
Also available from Victoria Dahl and Harlequin HQN
Too Hot to Handle
“Too Fast to Fall” (Be Mine anthology)
Close Enough to Touch
Real Men Will
Bad Boys Do
Good Girls Don’t
Crazy for Love
Lead Me On
Start Me Up
Talk Me Down
ISBN: 9781459250796
STRONG ENOUGH TO LOVE
Copyright © 2013 by Victoria Dahl
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This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events or locales is entirely coincidental. This edition published by arrangement with Harlequin Books S.A.
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