by Sarra Cannon
“You're perfect,” he breathed, as his gaze swept over her body. Her heart stuttered. This wasn’t a spontaneous expression—he was telling her. Making sure she knew. Wanting her to believe him. “All of you, just—perfect.”
She swallowed, her heart in her throat, because for all of her insecurities, in looking at him now… She finally heard him. She knew exactly what he meant. It wasn't his golden skin, his radiant eyes, or his devastating smile that brought her to her knees... It was the beautiful, broken, passionately earnest man that they contained. And this, she realized, was how he must see her too. Maybe he loved her body, with all its flaws and imperfections, all the more because it was hers. Maybe—maybe he loved her, with all of her flaws and imperfections, too… like no one else ever had.
And in that moment, loving him—letting him love her—became easy. So ridiculously easy. When he kissed his way up her leg, sucked and nibbled his way up her inner thigh, she whimpered and gasped with abandon; when stroked his palms over her thighs and hips, caressing the soft swell of her belly and massaging her swollen breasts, she relished the attention, the feel of his strong, skilled hands against her skin. And when he lowered his lips to the crease of her thighs, her only thought was of how close his tongue was to her center… of how much she needed him to kiss her there, to pleasure her the way she’d pleasured him. She spread her legs wider, urging him closer.
But he hadn’t forgotten his mantra—to take his time.
He kept her legs hooked over his shoulders as worked her body slowly, with long strokes and gentle massage, loving caresses and teasing kisses that made her shiver and gasp and moan. In this position, with her legs over his shoulders, each forward press of his body exposed her core to him, until finally, with his gaze locked on hers, he slid his fingers inside her, stroking for a while in a slow, steady rhythm before settling on his stomach and spreading her thighs. He dipped his tongue between her folds lightly, and she gasped, arching, unable to get close enough, unable to spread her legs any wider, her knees hitting the walls of the car.
“Matthew,” she gasped again. “Please.”
With a smile, he obliged, spreading her folds and fluttering his tongue against her clit. She cried out, fisting the blankets. He thrust his fingers back inside her, first one, then a second, curling them with each stroke, alternating with gentle pulls of his lips on her clit. It was so much, too good, and shivery goosebumps sprouted all over her skin. She pressed her head into the pillows, arching against his patient ministrations, and it was quiet, but for the sound of her whimpers and the wash of the sea. And it was dark, but for the sliver of moonlight that illuminated them, glinting off Matthew’s hair, where his head was nestled between her legs.
He twisted his fingers inside, stretching her, and she squirmed, hot and cold all over. But he kept up his slow and steady pace, driving her higher, bringing her close to release and then easing off, over and over until she was hovering at the edge. “Matthew,” she whispered again, her throat aching. “Please.”
"Shh," he murmured, "You're small." He kissed her thigh. "Tight. I don't want to hurt you… I want you soft and wet and ready for me.”
He added a third finger and she groaned, fisting the blanket.
He was slow, tantalizingly patient. He knew her body, inside and out. How to work her into a slow, sweaty state of desperate sensation. It could only be like this with him. Only him. He brought her to the very edge, working his fingers and tongue faster and faster, then stopping to massage her legs, her bottom, to stroke her belly and knead her breasts. She was close, so close - shivery with need, swollen and wet for him. For his hands, which were warm and dry and knew her body, her sensitive spots, too well. That's what she got for going to bed with a man who'd lived 175 years—the raw end of some superhuman patience and focus.
Another whimper died in her throat as his lips latched to her clit once more, sucking lightly enough to bring pained tears to her eyes. She needed more, just a little more—she couldn't take this another second—
"Matthew—stop!"
He froze at her outburst and glanced up at her, his face so full of genuine concern that she didn't know whether to slap or kiss him.
"I just—I need you," she whispered, her confidence as shaky as her knees. "I need you.”
“Hallie…” He breathed a low laugh and kissed the crease of her thigh tenderly, which sent warmth skittering through her belly. He crawled back up and over her, a contented hum rumbling low in his chest. She slid her arms around his neck, drawing him close. His chest touched hers and the feel of his hot skin on hers made her hiss.
He kissed her, and her taste on his lips sent another wave of heat through her.
"I'm not sorry,” he said. "I love making you feel good... Making you a little crazy. Torturing you with pleasure, not pain." He ran his palm along her side soothingly.
"For us, I think pleasure always comes with a little pain," she replied, shivering at his touch, her whole body raw and sensitive with impending orgasm. She was only half joking. But his expression grew clouded, so she cupped his jaw. “That's what makes us real."
At that, he bent his head and kissed her deeply, thoroughly, then pulled back and looked down at her.
"Christ, I love you."
Her breath caught. Her body ached with the scratch of the blankets, the slide of his palm, the tickle of his chest hairs against her breasts. She tried to focus, to push those things aside. His blue eyes were dark, searching. Her cheeks heated as her heart began to ache, each beat absorbing the agonizing, wonderful force of those three words.
She tried to respond, but to her horror, her mouth wouldn't open, wouldn't form the words. They were such big words. Enormous. Dangerous. Somewhere far deep inside her she imagined how much it would hurt if she admitted she loved him… and then someday he left. She knew that pain well. It echoed inside her, was the shadow to every beat of her heart.
“I—”
But he didn’t let her finish. Instead, he slid his hand beneath her hips, angled her upward, and slid inside her, so deep that she cried out and dug her nails into his shoulders—the feeling of invasion so total, so wonderful that she tears slid down her temples and into her hair. He kissed her slowly, tenderly. Brushed away her tears and stroked her cheek, her neck, her shoulder, his hand trembling as he tried to soothe her.
"Does it hurt?"
She nodded. "A little." But he looked devastated, so she clarified. "A good hurt."
"A good hurt?"
She shifted, pulling him deeper, and he groaned.
"The best kind.”
He slid out and thrust again, shallower this time, and then picked up a rhythm of deep and short strokes. He hooked his arms beneath her knees and pressed forward; she wrapped her arms around his neck so they were close, bundled tightly together as he dragged his cock in and out of her sensitive folds.
Slowly, her arousal built. Her foot found purchase on the wall of the Westie, which exposed her clit to the friction of his rocking, swiveling pelvis, spreading her so he sank deeper with each thrust. Her simmering arousal burst to life once more, each stroke of his cock stoking the flames higher and higher. He groaned, quickening that delicious swirling rhythm, and she shuddered, a slow shudder that trickled from her head to her toes.
He cradled her head as he thrust inside her. “Look at me.” As if she could look anywhere else but at him, at his beautiful kind eyes or the sheen of sweat on his brow that was evidence of how close he was to breaking, how tightly he focused on her.
She leaned up, pressing her forehead to his. Her hips ached but she didn’t care. His thrusts grew shaky. Uneven. She slipped her hand between them and her fingers found where their bodies were joined. She rubbed herself, chasing her orgasm, and she was close, so close—
When she broke, it was all at once: a rush of heat that licked at her like fire from within, molten pleasure that flooded her core as her muscles tried to clamp down around him, then filled her chest, then trickled out to her
limbs, leaving her shivering, trembling. She tried to control it, tried to come down but she couldn’t—not with his cock still thrusting inside her, his hips rubbing against her. Like all those times before, he was determined to draw every last ounce of pleasure from her first, leaving her limp and sated.
She pressed fumbling kisses to his brow as his thrusts slowed; he wanted her pleasure, not her pain, but she was so sensitive now that they were one and the same. And he couldn’t last much longer, not like this—his breath came in hard pants, and he was shaking all over. But Hallie was determined, too. She wanted to see him fall apart, too. Wanted to hold him together the way he held her. She slid her fingers into his hair and tightened her sex in time with his thrusts, relaxing as he entered, contracting as he slid out. He groaned, hips jerking harder, faster, before finally sinking deep, filling her up as he broke, gasping her name. She watched his face both soften and tighten in delicious agony, and she held him, stroking him, whispering his name too, as he came apart in her arms.
She ran her fingers through his hair. He ran his palm up and down her side. The waves washed against the shore: closer, now, to the Westie. The tide was moving in, reaching for them as they reached for each other, the rush of the waves soothing them as they soothed each other; the ocean so close to overtaking them, swallowing them up the way she had been swallowed up by his touch, his love, this moment.
Chapter 25
For a long time, they didn’t move.
It didn’t really seem necessary—where did they have to go? Hallie closed her eyes, stroking Matthew’s hair. He was still holding her, his face nestled in the crook of her neck while they waited for their labored breathing to steady. After a few minutes, she withdrew her foot from its spot on the wall, and he sat up a little to release her legs from over his shoulders. Her hips ached and he rubbed at them as he slipped out of her, softening. Her heart stumbled at the loss. She didn’t want to break from him yet, didn’t want this to be over. There was something transcendent about being connected to him like this, tangled with him, so sweaty and sticky, dazed and sated, as though there was no way to tell where Matthew ended and Hallie began.
He rolled slightly to the side, so that his weight no longer crushed her. Again, her heart stumbled. More loss. She rolled too, reaching for him, and he reached back, brushing away the mess of her hair that had stuck to her cheek.
“You okay, angel?”
She nodded, staring over his shoulder at the little window behind him, with its checkered curtains drawn shut. She sat up and leaned over him, pinning the curtain back so she could see the stars. She repeated this with each window, opening them up to the moonlight and the clear navy sky. Still, the Westie felt claustrophobic, and her stomach churned with the need to get up, to walk away, to run until there was nothing else around but the ocean and the wind in her hair.
Instead, she settled on her back and stared up at the ceiling.
Beneath the blanket, the parts of her body he had branded with his fingers, lips, and tongue were still raw and tender. She could run into the ocean right now, and it wouldn't wash away the invisible marks of his posession, the places in and on her body that remembered him with yearning.
No, there would be no erasing the marks he’d left on her body—or her heart. They’d arrived somewhere you couldn't come back from. Someplace permanent. She'd given him the last bit of herself, and he'd wanted all of her… had cracked open her heart and reached inside. So how was she ever supposed to forget loving this man who so clearly loved her? Who thought she was good and funny and pretty and smart, who defended her, who laughed with her, who put up with her weird quirks like her crappy family or her panic attacks or her insecurities? How was she supposed to go from that back to sleeping alone, living alone, traveling alone, like she always did—when the inevitable end came? How was she supposed to recover from loving him, or being loved by him?
Just thinking about it was enough to make her throat close up.
His fingers touched her forearm, then he slid them down and took her hand.
"I can hear you freaking out, you know."
Her thrumming heart seized for an instant, and she squeezed his hand tight.
"I don't know how to do this," she said.
He propped himself up on his elbow and looked down at her, but she kept her gaze glued to the ceiling.
"You're everywhere," she said. "You're everything." She swallowed hard, and in her peripheral vision he frowned. "And I'm afraid," she whispered, so quietly that she couldn't hear herself speak.
"Afraid of me?" he asked softly, brushing her hair back from her forehead.
"Afraid of everything. Of how you make me feel. How you want me. Everything I've let you see about me and my life. I've been… indiscreet. Careless. And now you're…"
She trailed off, fighting the burning sensation in the corners of her eyes. Matthew sighed.
"Is it so bad that I see so much of you, Hallie? If I love you more because of it?"
Her stomach tightened against his words—and how easily they fell from his lips.
"Yes," she said, knowing she sounded stubborn but also knowing it was the truth.
"Why?"
"Because," she said. “I don’t want to need you. It will hurt that much more when you're gone."
He exhaled, a long exhale, and then bent down to kiss her temple.
"I'm not going anywhere, Hallie." He lifted her hand to his lips and kissed her fingertips. “I promise. You can count on me."
She sucked in a breath, the lump in her throat hardening. He had intuited the exact words she needed to hear. He knew what she was afraid of. And somehow, that hurt even more than if he'd been completely clueless. When had she become so transparent?
Because he was right: how desperately, how so very desperately, she wanted to be able to count on him.
— —
Eventually, Matthew dozed, but Hallie couldn’t sleep. And she couldn’t think—not with him lying there beside her. He loomed so large in her heart that it was hard to clear her mind of him, to think logically about her life, her future, or even the days ahead. They’d spent three long days together on the road, and in that short time they’d grown closer than in all the weeks she had known him. But three days were still only three days… and she had other goals, other parts of her life that needed tending.
With this in mind, with the sky lightening ever so slightly, Hallie climbed out of the Westie and tugged her dress and panties back on. The long walk back to the hotel would help her clear her mind. She didn’t want to wake Matthew, so she sent him a text instead, telling him that she’d be back at the hotel. His phone buzzed and pinged in his discarded jeans, but he didn’t stir. That was fine; she’d call him before the sun rose and the beach started to fill with early-morning tourists.
The walk to the hotel wasn’t short, but it passed quickly because she was so distracted, trying to piece together all of the things she’d learned in the last couple of days: about her father, about Matthew’s past, about Louisa’s illness. She plied her brain for memories—not of her childhood with her father, because what was the use of revisiting that, but of her time with Louisa. Were there places they had frequented? Did she have any kind of permanent residence? She had suppressed those memories for so long that they’d rusted. She would have to dust them off to find anything useful.
Before she knew it she was walking up the hotel driveway, suddenly hyperaware of her need to pee and shower and rest her aching feet. The concierge at the front desk gave her a look of alarm when she walked in, which he quickly rearranged into a pleasant smile. She probably looked like hell.
When she arrived at her room, however, the door was ajar. She checked the number on the wall again to make sure she had the right room. It was. Had they left it open on their way out? She couldn’t remember. And if they hadn’t… then she knew who might want to break into their room. Her heart beat faster, harder. She backed away from the door as quietly as possible, listening, waiting to s
ee if she heard someone moving inside. Her hand felt inside her purse; her fingers closed around her phone.
The door swung open. Out stepped a tall, clean-cut, handsome man, with dark hair and a well-trimmed beard. He was dressed impeccably, in tailored slacks and a light-blue button-down. But something else stirred in her—not fear, exactly, but a heightened awareness of his presence, the same awareness that might make a deer freeze in the woods, knowing it was being watched by a hunter. And yet he looked so… plain. In any other context she’d have thought he was a young, well-dressed thirty-something, but in this context… she knew he was a killer. That this, unquestionably, was the invincible man who had made Matthew’s life a living hell for over a century.
“Hallie,” he said pleasantly, as if she hadn’t just caught him breaking into her room. As though they’d known each other for years. “It’s nice to meet you properly. My name is Jacob, and as usual, it’s a pleasure.”
“What do you want?” she demanded, trying to keep her voice from rising hysterically. She had to play it cool. Calm. There was no way he’d kill her in the middle of a hallway, in a public hotel. She glanced around frantically for surveillance cameras, but couldn’t find any.
A slow smile spread across his face. “Well,” he said, “since you asked… I came to leave you something. A gift, from an associate of mine to you. ”
“I don’t want anything from you. Whatever it is, you can keep it.”
He shrugged. “I figured you would say that, which is why I just decided to leave it in your room. Your curiosity will get the better of you, when you see it. Shall I run back in and get it?”
“No. Leave.”
But he pretended he hadn’t heard her—and went back into her room.
Hallie pulled out her phone and sent Matthew a series of brief text messages.
