Page 50 of Hidden Heir, Italian Wife

He nodded.

“I’m glad.” Her smile faltered as she took in the gravity in his expression. “Are you?”

“Very. I’ve ordered champagne.”

She wiped at a trickle of water that was leaking down the side of her neck onto her bare shoulder.

“I was being possessive,” he admitted with a grimace. “Your past with him didn’t matter to me until I saw you with him today and realized how much history you had with him. History that I don’t have.”

“Because I didn’t try to find you when I was pregnant. You still haven’t forgiven me for that. I know.” Would he ever?

“I’m trying,” he said bluntly, making her heart lurch. “Because what’s done is done. It’s not productive to hang on to it. I know that.”

“I’m trying, too. I’m trying really hard to believe all of this is going to work out.” Her mouth trembled with uncertainty, though. “Fighting with you doesn’t help.”

“I know.” He leaned forward and grabbed a handful of the towel.

She clutched at it, keeping it from falling, but his grip pulled her into the space he made as he opened his feet.

“Kiss and make up?” he suggested.

There was noI’m sorry. NoI love you. NoI’ll do better next time.

She nodded, though, needing the approximation of remorse and acceptance and promise. She needed more than a kiss, too.

He must have as well. The moment his mouth touched hers, it was as though a match lit. A flame burst to life between them.

His kiss turned hungry and he spun her, then lifted her to sit next to the sink. He dragged the towel open so it pooled around her hips.

She opened her thighs and reached for the buckle on his belt, pulling him closer. Needing connection. Needing his need of her.

He took over, jerking open his fly, hitching his trousers down and freeing his erection.

He gripped the towel beneath her, sliding her hips right to the edge of the counter while he guided himself to part her folds, seeking the damp heat.

They were kissing again, grasping at each other, bordering on frantic. This wasn’t make-up sex. It was an extension of their fight. It wasn’t anger, though. It was more an expression of the hurt they were causing each other. She wasn’t quite ready so it stung as he entered her. She nipped at his bottom lip and he pulled back to give her a glittering glare through his narrowed eyes.

They pulled each other closer, grappling, provoking each other with all the secret things they knew each other liked. She dipped her head to suck hard on his nipple. He swept his hands beneath her thighs, planting his palms on her hips so she was tipped back and had to catch her balance on her hands. She was constrained, but the angle stroked places that made her eyelids flutter.

He whispered flagrantly sexual things. He told her how beautiful her breasts were and how much he liked her heat clamped around him. He watched as he made love to her with steady precision, driving her arousal relentlessly up the scale until she was one humming nerve. All her awareness was centered in the place where he claimed her. The sweet burn and the coiling tension.

“No one else will ever give you this, Bree. No one else will see you like this and feel you—” He gritted his teeth, barely hanging on. “Only me. Say it.”

“Only you,” she moaned obediently, arching so the top of her head was against the mirror behind her, the ceiling light in her eyes. “I only want you. Only you.”

It was true. So profoundly true, it shook her to the center of her being. She couldn’t imagine her life if he wasn’t in it. She hadn’t loved Kabir. She had loved the idea of love. She had wanted the potential for stability and a secure future and had been devastated when he denied her that.

Thiswas love. It was the delicious agony of feeling deeply connected and utterly defenseless. Of knowing her husband’s flaws and being angry with him and wanting to make love with him and share her life with him anyway. Wanting to shareherself.

“I’m yours. Always. Never stop, never stop.”

The fingers digging into her hips pulled her a fraction of an inch closer so the slam of his hips struck where she needed it most.

Climax hit, detonating a sting of pleasure through her, one followed by wave after wave of pure pleasure. He bit back his own groans, throat flexing, muscles straining as he locked himself to her and pulsed with glorious, powerful throbs inside her.

Then, with both of them still shaking, he gathered her close, cradling her so tenderly against his damp chest, she wept a little.

Because she loved him. She was so fathoms-deep in love with him, it compressed her lungs. She couldn’t breathe.

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