Page 97 of Fall Before Her Throne

I’ve spent my entire life trying to get you to love me, Max. I’m not doing it anymore.

Suddenly, it all clicked.

Me. It was me. I needed to show her how I felt. She wouldn’t chase me, but she never said I couldn’t chase her.

My hands traveled up her sides, and her breath caught in her lungs. She froze as I began my slow exploration. Her ribs. Her arms. Her belly. All of it over her shirt. Just touching, just watching her from my place at her feet. Her cheeks darkened, and finally she sucked in an unsteady breath.

Nothing else existed except this.

“If you won’t take my life, I give it to you,” I murmured. “And I will spend the rest of my days atoning.”

Gently, I pulled the hem of her shirt up, over the curve of her ass. She didn’t tell me to stop, so I pressed a kiss to the bare strip of her stomach. Shivers erupted across her skin.

“Is that what you want?”

I closed my eyes and leaned my forehead against her belly. “This is all I’ve ever wanted.”

“Tell me the truth.”

My eyes locked on hers. “Leona Theresa Vero, you are the one thing I’ve told myself I can never have, and the only thing I’ve ever wanted. I was always meant to be here, on my knees, in front of you. It has always been you.”

Her lips pressed together and her chin wobbled just as another tear slipped out of the corner of my eye.

I’d spent years running from a future I thought I could never have. Here it was, right in front of me, and I swore to myself I would not let it slip through my fingers.

Not again.

Dimly, I was aware of the rest of the guys still present in this living room. Watching. Waiting to see what I would do. As much as I wished this was private, it was good that it wasn’t. They needed to see. This thing between Leona and me included them. If that was the deal, I’d take it in a heartbeat.

All my walls had crumbled, and she stood at the top of their ruin.

My choice was made.

“I love you. I have always loved you, even when I couldn’t admit it,” I said. “I’m so sorry. For everything. For all of my failures and secrets. For hurting you. For choosing my darkness over you and Cas. I wish I’d never done it. I wish that night—when I was fifteen and I found out your father killed mine—I had told you both the truth.”

Only then did I let the rest of them come back into my vision. With my arms still wrapped around her, I finally let them in. “I’m sorry. I don’t have any excuses. I know I fucked up. If she’ll have me, if you’ll have me, I’m here.”

She laughed, eyes full of tears and a smile so wide it could light the night sky. She leaned down at the same time I surged forward, and I kissed her with all that I had. Everything I’d held back for years and years.

All of me ached. My cock spurred to life in my pants, practically demanding to feel her, but I didn’t want to rush it. I didn’t want to fuck it up already. Yet when I broke the kiss, I could see in her eyes the message she’d been telling me all along. The one I’d only just realized.

I had to chase her.

So my fingers went to the tops of her thighs. I found her thong and peeled it down, inch by agonizing inch. I kissed a line from her navel, down, down, down. I didn’t stop my kisses until I finally pulled it all the way to her ankles and helped her step out of it. Her hands flew to my hair when my breath gusted over her skin.

I breathed her in, filling my lungs with her. Her scent. The natural musk of her fused with the scent I’d known for almost my entire life. The one I’d savored when she’d cuddled up next to me on the Albanian ship. The one I’d dream about on the loneliest nights, when I’d tell myself her smell was the only thing I could have of her.

“Leona, Leona,” I murmured, pressing a kiss right at the mound of her pubic bone. It was heaven. It was enough to make me feel like I was having a heart attack. “Maybe you did kill me. Maybe I am dreaming.”

My kisses pressed against her core. Her hands tightened in my hair when I let my tongue flick at her clit.

“We’re both very much alive,” she squeaked. “But I will kill you if you don’t keep going.”

I smiled against her skin, the first real smile I’d felt on my face in weeks. Months. Years? I couldn’t think straight while I gently kissed my way across her skin. She was a delectable dessert, one I’d starved myself from for far too long, and now it was like I finally had permission to taste. To feel.

A shift on the couch beside us brought the world rushing back in.

They were all watching this. Through lidded eyes, I could see their gazes locked on us. At first, I felt like they were invading our privacy. Intruding on a moment that only I needed.