AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“How?”
“The only person on my mind was you.” He skimmed his fist down her ponytail, allowing it to slip through his grasp. “I wasn’t aching to follow her. I wasn’t feeling the need to pound her fiancé’s face into the ground. I wasn’t hurting to know she’s pregnant with his child. Because I have you.”
Quinley looked away. “You don’t have to say that.”
“Hey.” He curled one arm around her waist and pulled her close, curving his body around her. “It’s true,” he said as he swept his free hand up her back. “If you can look at Zaire and not be hurt, why can’t the same apply to me with Lucinda?”
“It’s not that I don’t think it can. It’s just that I’ve had a long time to get used to the situation with Zaire. You haven’t had that same length of time to make your peace with your situation with her, and she didn’t reject you the way he did me.”
“Doesn’t matter. Know why?” He palmed her nape tight. “Because I let her go. And somewhere between claiming you and hearing that you got shot, my cat did the same. You’re ours. Not her. I have no regrets, Quinley.”
She leaned into him, hugging him tight again. This time, though, it seemed that she just wanted to hide her expression from him. Maybe didn’t fully believe him. Or was scared to fully believe him.
“I wouldn’t say any of this if I didn’t mean it, Quin. I wouldn’t fill your head with lies, not even to make you feel better.” He stroked his fingers over her nape, doing a little foray over a bite mark there. “Ask yourself honestly, taking into account everything you know of me, do you truly think I would do that?”
She tipped her head up to look at him, pensive. “No,” she finally answered.
“Then there you go.”
“It’s just… we can convince ourselves of something to make it easier to deal with.”
“So you think I could be lying to myself? No, baby.” Releasing her nape, he brushed his palm along the side of her face and into her hair, pinning back the stray strands that were too short for her ponytail. “I’m too self-aware for that.”
“She’s your other half.”
“Doesn’t feel like it. She’s not the person who makes me laugh, who brought my cat out from under his cloud, who lets me take care of her because she knows I need it, who gives so much of herself to me while expecting nothing, who eats all my snacks and leaves IOU notes that never fail to make me smile.”
He slid his hand down to palm the side of her neck. “You fill that space inside me. Not her. I chose you. And if she was suddenly single and I was given the choice between you and her, I’d still choose you.” He breezed his thumb up the column of her throat. “You’re all I want, Quinley. You hear me?”
She swallowed hard, the doubt gone from her expression. “I hear you. But I need you to be quiet now or I’ll cry.”
“You’re already crying.”
“No, I’m not.”
His lips twitched. “My mistake.”
Her heart aching in a good way now, Quinley stayed still as he gently thumbed away her tears. He touched his lips to her forehead, pressing a feather-light kiss there. He pressed another to the outer corner of one eye… then to the outer corner of her other eye… then to her nose… then to the curve of her mouth.
His lips brushed over hers in a butterfly kiss. Again. And again. And again, adding a little more pressure each time.
His tongue sank into her mouth—just a shallow dip, flicking the tip of her own tongue. The kiss was light and easy and sensual. It went on and on, only pausing as he peeled off their clothes. Then he gently lowered her on the rug in front of the fireplace and took her right there.
It wasn’t slow and hard like the other night. It was soft and lazy. He touched her with an aching tenderness, a hint of reverence there. And possession. So much possession, reminding her who’d claimed her. When she came, he pounded into her like a savage until he finally exploded inside her.
Afterward, he collapsed over her in that way he always did. His face buried in her neck, he licked and blew over the brand there.
Softly dragging her fingertips over his back, doodling patterns, she became aware of something. Something that had made her cat sprawl to the floor with a satisfied purr.
Quinley tensed about the exact same time as he did. Ever so slowly, he lifted his head, his gaze captivating in its intensity. She licked her lips. “It isn’t my imagination, is it?”
He shook his head. “No. No, it’s not. We’re wearing each other’s scent.”
Which meant imprinting had officially begun. A thought that made her chest go tight and pulled a smile from her very soul. It just… there were no words to really describe what this meant to her; what it did to her insides.
His eyes flashed with satisfaction, but then they darkened. Heated. Fairly glowed with possession as his cock hardened inside her.
“Again?” she asked.
