Page 73 of Falling Into Forever
And I’m not a masochist.
Swirls of blue color her eyes until I see nothing but the truth, and my body hums with electric awareness. The room is so charged that I expect lights to flicker off our skin.
“Be sure about this.” The warning bears repeating because she needs to understand how deadly serious I am. “If this happens, there’s no going back. This is it, Sayls. I’ll fight until my final breath to make sure you’re mine. If we fall into bed right now, it might as well be falling into forever, because that’s what it’ll be. Our forever.” My words break on the last few syllables, and it intensifies the painful weight trying to crush my lungs.
If she pushes me away, I’m not sure I’ll survive it. She’s staring at me like a wounded puppy, but I want her words almost as much as I need her love. It’s an acknowledgment that we’ll be a team and navigate this shitstorm together—no matter what life throws at us.
“Mio amato.” She says it on a whisper of a breath, and a single tear slips down her face.
I press my fist against my breastbone hard enough to bruise, but it does nothing to calm the riot inside me that’s fighting every pore for release.
Mio amato. My love. She took Italian in college so one day we could visit the village where my mother was born. She refused to say it the day she sent me away. Instead, she called me Dante with a cold, detached tone, and it sliced me open. The way she said it hurt almost as much as the words themselves.
“Say it again,” I command through clenched teeth. It’s the only way to keep my body from vibrating right off the bed. I’m a hair’s breadth away from hitting the limits of what I can handle, and a grateful, choked sound gurgles in my throat when she opens her mouth.
“Mio amato.” Saylor’s lashes flutter slowly, and her expression flips back and forth between terrified and content faster than I can blink.
I keep my focus on her as I step off the bed and remove my shirt, then toss it to the floor. My shorts and boxer briefs drop to my feet. The sound of my belt hitting wood cracks through the silence of the moment. And then I’m standing before her, bare, wanting, and so full of love I fear I might actually implode.
“My love,” I whisper huskily, then crawl up her body. She’s lying on her back with her torso propped up on her elbows, watching me, memorizing me, fucking loving me.
She swallows noisily, and it lightens the moment. She’s so beautiful, and funny, and caring, even if she hides it behind a prickly exterior. And she’s mine. After six long years, Saylor Greer is mine once more.
I place my hands on her hips and slip them beneath her T-shirt. Her skin is soft against my rough fingers as I lift the fabric. She falls back onto the bed when I remove it completely, and I sit on my knees, staring at her creamy skin with a dusting of freckles crossing her chest and shoulders.
“Dante.” She shifts and tries to press her thighs together, but she can’t get the friction she seeks because I’m straddling one leg.
It makes me deliriously happy. She’s on the verge of combusting too, and I can’t look away from her visible discomfort.
“I know what you need, Sayls. But I’m going at my speed. It’s been too long since I’ve seen this body, and there’s not a chance in hell I’m going to rush this.”
“Dante,” she growls and rises onto her forearms again with a scowl so fierce a lesser man would cave.
But not me.
Moving slowly, I advance on her like a panther circling his prey. When my hands are close enough to touch, she releases a shaky breath, but I hover them above her skin.
She whines in protest and thrusts her chest forward, pressing her tits into my waiting palms, and I finally come undone.
I work my fingers into the cups of her bra and yank it down so her breasts spill out over the top of it.
“Holy shit,” I say reverently.
Her nipples pebble under my scrutiny, and the view makes my cock jerk against my leg as precome leaks from my slit. Saylor reaches between us, her silky hand wrapping around my shaft, and I allow it for a long moment while I revel in her touch before nudging her away.
Her furrowed brows drop into a scowl, and confusion clouds her eyes.
“You’re going to come for me, sweetheart. Multiple times before I sink my cock into your needy little hole. You’re going to come on my lips, my fingers, and then I’ll do it all over again. I want you to make a fucking mess of this bed so when I do enter you, your arousal is all that fills the air.”
Her chest heaves harder with each word that leaves my mouth.
“Can you do that for me? Can you come all over my face? Because if you do, I’m going to drink from you like a man dying of thirst.”
“Holy shit. And you say I have a dirty mind.”
Those muttered words pull a chuckle from me that releases all of the worry that’s been holding me captive, and I hold the tab of her zipper between my thumb and forefinger before slowly sliding it down. When it reaches its end, just above her clit, I press down hard enough that her body jerks toward it, wanting it, needing the pressure. A quarter of an inch more and she’d get exactly what she wants.
Her stomach quivers, and I press down again before hooking my hands into the waistband of her shorts. I tug them down over her hips, pausing to kiss and nip her skin whenever the need arises.
