“Tell me.”
“Touch me,” she whispered against his ear.
His good hand moved—but not where she expected. Not yet.
Up first. Over her stomach. Higher.
His hand closed over her breast, his thumb dragging across her nipple, deliberate, and the sound she made arrowed through him. He didn’t repeat it right away. Instead, he ran his fingertips down the column of her throat and made her wait.
Made her feel it.
Then again, over her breast—slower this time, more considered.
She tipped her head back, arching into his hand, her hair spilling down her back, the lamplight catching along her skin—and his world narrowed to just her.
“Solnyshko.”
She didn’t ask or open her eyes. Just rocked her hips, open to him in a way that hit somewhere deep and locked inside him.
She was close. He sensed it the same way he sensed a storm moving through the trees. The change was small, but there.
He released her breast and slid his hand down between them, finding her exactly where she needed it.
She gasped. “Pav?—”
“Stay with me.”
Her body clasped him, her rhythm disintegrating.
His good hand firmed, holding her as he drove up into her. “God, Harper?—”
Her name broke loose before he could stop it, her body clenching, pulling him with her. She came apart around him, and he held himself, just barely, on the edge.
And that?—
That was the line.
The last locked part of him gave, and this time, he didn’t fight it.
His breath left him in a rush. The tension pulled low and intense, then shattered, driving through him as his body followed hers.
Through the aftershock and the slowing of her breathing, her body relaxed but didn’t pull away.
Only when it was over did his hands loosen. Their bodies still locked together, he gathered her in, his hand at her back.
He didn’t move. Whatever this was?—
He’d already lost too much.
He wasn’t walking away.
Not this time.
37
Harper laywith her head on his chest.
Hail hammered against the window, and outside, the night was vast and black and belonged to someone else. Here, her world had contracted to this bed and the steady percussion of his heart under her ear.
