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"Why?"

"Because they were only words before." His eyes stayed on mine. "Now they mean you. I don't want to use them on anyone else."

An unsteady laugh escaped me.

"That is an appalling line."

"It's not a line."

That was the problem.

I was starting to know the difference.

I put the mug on the floor, leaned forward, and kissed him.

I wasn't sure which of us was more surprised. I had never kissed anyone first before, and without my glasses I had to find his face with my hands, feeling the roughness of his jaw and the warmth of his cheeks before I found his mouth.

The kiss was clumsy at first. I was still shaking, my face was wet, and I could taste salt on my lips.

For one second, Jax didn't move.

Then a low sound caught in his throat, and one of his hands slid into my wet hair as he kissed me back.

At first, he was careful. His mouth moved against mine slowly, giving me time to pull away if I wanted to.

I didn't.

I opened my mouth beneath his and pulled him closer, and whatever restraint he had been holding onto disappeared.

His kiss deepened. His tongue slid against mine, warm and tasting faintly of chocolate and cinnamon, while his hand tightened in my hair and tilted my head to give him better access to my mouth.

The blanket slipped from my shoulders, but I barely noticed.

Jax rose onto his knees between my legs, and I wrapped my arms around his bare shoulders and pulled him closer. His skin was hot under my hands, and when he groaned into my mouth, the sound sent a sharp rush of heat through me.

"Reina," he breathed against my lips. "Wren. Dios, you taste—"

I kissed him again before he could finish.

I wasn't completely sure how I ended up in his lap. Maybe he pulled me down from the bed, or maybe I slid there myself, but a moment later he was sitting on the floor with his back against the mattress and I was straddling him. His shirt had ridden up around my hips, and I could feel his cock through his pants, hard and thick beneath me, pressed exactly where my bare pussy was already aching for him. The only thing between us was the fabric of his trousers.

I shifted against him without thinking, and we both gasped.

The pressure hit my clit so perfectly that my hips almost moved again before I managed to stop myself.

"Tell me if you want me to stop," he said, his voice rough against my throat. "At any point. You just say it."

"Don't stop."

He kissed his way along my neck and jaw, then down the side of my throat until he reached the place where Kaelen had marked me. He lingered there deliberately, pressing his mouth to the same patch of skin before rubbing his cheek over it in a slow, possessive gesture, as though he wanted to erase every trace of someone else.

"That's better," he murmured, sounding deeply pleased with himself.

I laughed, breathless, but the sound died when his hands slid beneath the shirt and settled on my thighs. He held them firmly, his palms warm against my skin, while his thumbs moved slowly along the soft insides. Each pass came close enough to my pussy that I could feel myself getting wetter, and all the while he murmured things in Spanish against my collarbone. I didn't understand most of them, and in that moment I didn't need to.

Then one of his hands moved higher beneath the shirt, passing over my hip before settling on my stomach.

My whole body went rigid.