Page 47 of Flawed Revenge

Fourteen

March 17th

8:18 P.M.

It wasn't enough.

Lion was still buried inside his girl, had just come harder than he ever had before in his life, and he wanted her again.

And again, and again, and again.

He could never get enough of his Katie-Bear.

“I can still feel you quivering around me, and I already want you again,” he murmured as he sucked on the pulse point on her neck, making her moan.

“You already made me come twice, no way I can come a third time this quickly,” she said, her voice taking on a sleepy note, and he hoped this was enough to wear her out so she’d get some rest.

There was no way every breath she took wasn't pure agony, and he absolutely should not have buried himself so deeply inside her that he no longer knew where he ended and she began. But he was selfish. He’d needed Kate, known she needed him, too, and he’d taken what he wanted.

“Be careful what you say, Katie-Bear, because that sounded like a challenge. One I don’t think you're up for me following through on.” She was still wearing her sweater, which was actually one of his, since they’d only been able to recover some of the clothing that had been on the plane, so he couldn’t see the bruises he knew had to be painting her chest. But he knew they were there, and he hated it.

She should have been safe with him. He should have done more to protect his girls.

Instead, they’d almost been killed when he was a mere couple of feet from them, and there had been nothing he could do to stop it from happening.

Keeping himself buried inside her, Lion balanced her weight with one hand, and with his other, grabbed the hem of her shirt and pulled it up and over her head, tossing it to the floor without a second glance. As he’d expected, her entire chest was a mottled mix of blacks, blues, and purples. She looked like an extra in a horror movie.

Feathering kisses against the dark stains, Lion fought down a violent, seething rage that demanded he destroy something. His girl had been hurt, and someone needed to pay for that.

“I'm okay, Leo. Alive,” Kate whispered, her hands framing his face, her fingertips stroking his temples before brushing around the lump on his forehead. “You're alive. Ariella is alive. We’re all alive.”

“But you're hurt,” he murmured.

“Yes, but so are you, so is everyone. I'm not dying today, none of us are. None of us is going to die before we’re old and we’ve lived full and happy lives.”

Damn, he wished he could believe that.

However, the truth was that no one could know that for sure. They thought they were ending things when they killed Dr. Gardner, but instead, there was a new threat, or at least a threat they hadn't previously known about, and now they were in more danger than ever.

“I love you,” he said, wanting to say it as many times as he could, trying to make up for all the years they’d missed because of his fears.

“I know. I love you too. I … love hearing you say it. For so long I've thought that you never loved me, that I imagined those ten months we spent together.”

“Never stopped loving you, Katie-Bear. Not for a single second. My entire team knew it. It’s why I wore this every second of every day.” His fingers found the engagement ring hanging from its chain around his neck. This was worth risking everything for, and he’d never once regretted his decision that day they’d escaped from their cage, killed everyone in the lab, to refuse to leave without it. Back then, it had been the only piece of his girl he had left. Now he had her there, in his arms, his length nestled inside her body. “Didn't take it off. Couldn’t. Needed to feel a piece of you with me.”

Kate’s smile was soft as she touched a single fingertip to the ring she’d cried tears of joy over the night he’d proposed. “I guess neither of us could completely let go. You kept the ring, and I kept your T-shirt.”

“Nothing could ever make me let go of you.” Even with the rest of his team meeting women, falling in love, and making tentative plans for the future, Lion knew he would have been perfectly content to live out the rest of his life alone.

For him, it was his Katie-Bear or no one.

“We have another chance now, though,” Kate said, and when he looked deep in her eyes, and saw the hope flickering there, a deep sense of peace filled him.

“Guess I'm getting down on one knee again.”

“Leo, you can't. Not while you're still inside me.”

“I can and I will,” he rebuked, touching a kiss to the tip of her nose.