Page 56 of Wicked Fortune

She was his for now, yes. But when she learned the truth … when she understood who he really was. What he’d done.

A shock of cold dread pierced his heart, and he drew back slightly.

“Don’t stop,” she murmured, her eyes fluttering open, her expression one of pure, sensual need.

“Never,” he said, willing it to be true. Telling himself he had nothing to fear. There was no reason for her to know the truth.

She was his now … and his she would remain.

She lay on her stomach, propped up on her elbows as he sat up, his back against the upholstered headboard. She was naked, her feet crossed in the air, her hair mussed and wild around her face, her lips red and swollen. She looked well-fucked and beautiful, and very much at home.

Her hands were flat on the mattress in front of her, fingers spread, and he was tracing his own finger along the outline of her right hand.

“You’re not thinking loud enough,” he said, making her laugh.

“Impossible.” She grinned up at him. “Everyone says I’m the loudest thinker they know.”

“Already keeping secrets from me?” He said the words as a joke, but immediately wanted to kick himself. Even if she was keeping secrets, he was hardly one to talk.

“Not a secret. On the contrary. I was just thinking about what I told you before.” Her voice was teasing, and the way she bit her lower lip when she finished speaking was almost enough to have him rolling her over and taking her hard once again.

As tempting as that was—and as hard as the thought made him—he said only, “Told me what?”

She pushed herself up onto her knees, then moved to straddle him. He’d pulled the sheet up to his waist, but even so, the pressure of her body against his cock was enough to breathe new life into him. “Careful. Or we may never get out of this bed.”

“Maybe that’s my plan.”

He chuckled. “Maybe I like the way you think.” He brushed his fingers over her breasts—not to get anything started, but just because she was so damn beautiful. And, yes, because he wanted to claim her. “But right now,” he continued, “I want to hear the secret.”

“It’s not really a secret. More of a fantasy.”

“Oh, is it?” He settled back, making a show of getting more comfortable. “Do tell.”

She traced her fingertip along his chest, and he was certain her motives were the same as his—she was marking him as her territory. And he had no problem with that at all.

“You know how I said I liked older men?”

“I have a vague recollection. And for the record, I’m not yet in need of a walker.”

A smile tugged at her mouth. “The truth is, I’ve had this fantasy for pretty much my entire life. Ever since I started getting interested in sex, anyway.”

Her cheeks bloomed pink, which delighted him. Because his Aria was not a woman who blushed easily.

“And?”

“Honestly, it’s not much of a story. Just that every time I have a sex dream, the guy is always older. Even if I’m awake and fantasizing, he might start out around thirty, but by the time he’s undressing me, he has at least a decade on me. Usually two.”

“That’s it?”

She scowled at him. “I told you. It’s not much of a story.”

“But that’s not the whole story, is it?”

She rolled her eyes. “Okay, fine. The rest of it’s a little silly. A different dream, though they overlap sometimes. And in the dream, I’m always out in the world and something happens. Godzilla attacks. Or gangs are chasing me. Monsters, you know. All different kinds of monsters. And then this older guy swoops in and saves me. Sometimes he does fancy kickboxing stuff. Sometimes he magically transports me away. But he always wins. He always protects me.” She shrugged. “He sweeps me off my feet.”

She bit her lower lip, then looked up at him, the blush back in her cheeks. “Sometimes it’s you, Matthew. You’ve been in my dreams since the first time we met. I guess that makes you my dream man.”

He wanted to pull her close. To claim her once and for all.