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Julie mumbled something in her sleep, and one hand reached out, as if searching for something. Or someone. Gently, he took her hand and tucked it into his chest, and she immediately stopped fussing. Five more minutes wouldn’t hurt. He shuffled around so he could look at her directly.
He traced the outline of her profile with his gaze. She was so beautiful. How had he never noticed that tiny freckle right in the corner of her eye before? And those long, luscious eyelashes, so chaste on her cheeks. Lips still dry and cracked from her ordeal yesterday, but he wanted to lean in and kiss them, anyway.
“I know you’re staring at me,” she mumbled, not opening her eyes. “You’re starting to freak me out.”
“Sorry,” he replied. Not that he was sorry for staring at her. But he was sorry for so many other things. Sorry he hadn’t been able to protect her like he should’ve. Sorry he’d allowed his father’s legacy to fuck with his head. Sorry that he’d wasted twelve long years pretending he’d done the right thing by leaving her. But this wasn’t the time for all that. This was the time to celebrate their win. To celebrate themselves. He suddenly felt everything that’d happened between them smash into his senses. Not only over the past week, but right back to the beginning, when he’d seen Julie on her horse the very first day. The lust, the passion, the connection had been there from day one, and it was still there, even if the intermediate years had been filled with betrayal and rejection. He realized now that his struggles to come to terms with who he was and what he really felt about having a rapist as a father had less to do with his relationship with Julie than with his own dumb, immature, and self-centered need to avenge his shitty life. One thing was for sure, he was going to keep his promise to her this time, as long as that’s what she wanted.
“Aren’t I allowed to stare at the woman I love?” he asked teasingly.
Her eyes sprang open.
“What?” he asked at the obvious confusion on her face.
“I thought perhaps I dreamed that bit last night…when you said you loved me.”
“No, we were both very much awake.” He lifted a finger and stroked it down the side of her face. Tufts of caramel hair stood up at all angles, but he liked the disheveled look on her. Today, her eyes were the pastel, watercolor blue he loved so much, but they flashed with something brighter as she studied him. “And I meant what I said,” he added, hoping like hell she wasn’t suddenly going to renege on her declaration of love.
She snuggled closer into his bare chest, all soft and sleepy. “So did I.” She lifted her chin so she could look him in the eye. “The whole of last night seems a little surreal right now, a bit disjointed, as if it happened to someone else.”
He nodded in commiseration. Victims of violent crimes often reported feeling numb or disconnected from the crime. It was a mixture of shock, and the brain going into denial.
“But one thing remains crystal clear in my memory,” she said, not breaking her stare. “The intensity of my feelings for you at that moment. It was like I’d been hiding behind a wall made from my own stubbornness, and when you uttered those words I’ve been waiting so long to hear, I could finally feel all the emotions clearly again.” She bit her bottom lip. “I know that sounds a little silly, but…”
He lay a finger against her lips. “Not silly at all.” He replaced his finger with his mouth, kissing her tenderly, careful of her cracked and split lips. His own lips were chapped and dry from their ordeal yesterday, but Julie didn’t seem to mind, she even slipped her hand behind his neck and pulled him in for a deeper, more needy kiss. His cock was hard in a second. She was so perfect and desirable.
Nash had found her a spare pair of track pants when they’d got to the police station, so she wasn’t walking around bare-assed all night. And when they’d arrived home, she’d slipped into a pair of sleep shorts, but left his shirt on, saying it made her feel safe. He had to admit that his shirt looked pretty damn hot on her right now, molding to her contours like it never did on him. Before he could stop them, his fingers were undoing the top button, feeling the brush of her velvety skin as he did so. She closed her eyes at his touch and gave a low moan of appreciation. His cock throbbed at the thought of her. The second and third buttons were undone before he finally came to his senses.
“We shouldn’t do this,” he said, pulling the edges of the shirt back together, and hiding the curves of her sweet body.
“Why the hell not?” she asked, skewering him with her indigo gaze.
“I don’t want to hurt you.” Her poor body was still battered and bruised, her feet swathed in yards of white bandages.
“I trust you,” she said, and the simple words speared into his heart. His hand slipped beneath the fabric and cupped her breast, possessive and needy. Oh, so good. He reminded himself to be gentle. His mouth found her neck, felt the pulse flutter beneath his lips as she tipped her head back to allow him better access. She pressed her body against his, urging him on. As slowly as the blood pounding through his veins allowed, he undid the rest of the buttons on the shirt, until it fell open to reveal Julie’s flat stomach and lush breasts.
“Beautiful,” he breathed. Quickly, he removed his boxers, never letting his gaze stray from her spectacular body.
“Not bad yourself,” Julie rasped, her greedy hands flowing down his shoulders, over his pecs, finding each indent of his abs as they trailed downward. All he wanted was to be inside her.
Oh, shit. Reality dawned, dragging him out of his passion-fueled haze. “I don’t have a condom,” he said ruefully.
“I’m sure we can be careful, get creative,” she answered with a purr.
“You’re not worried about getting pregnant?” He levered up on his elbows to stare down at her. This was a change for the books.
“Don’t get me wrong, I’m not aiming to get pregnant today,” she replied. “But the thought no longer scares me as much as it used to.”
Hm, interesting. It seemed that quite a few boundaries had been broken down last night.
He slipped his hand lower, down the front of her sleep shorts, caressed between her legs, loving how she gasped at his touch and her hips shifted toward him. As gently as he could, he slid her shorts off and rolled her over. Ignoring the pain in his knee, he hovered above her, staring down into her blue, blue eyes.
“Don’t keep me waiting forever, Mr. Bodyguard,” she said, lifting her hips to meet his and grinding herself against his erection.
With a groan, he let go of his last shred of self-control and plunged inside her. The feeling was even sweeter than it’d been the other night. This was next level, and he felt he might not last too long. She moved with him, nipping at his neck and his ear, then bringing his head down so she could kiss him, deep and big.
Their rhythm quickened, and she gave a low-pitched moan in the back of her throat. Oh. God. He was going to come. She was so sweet. So hot. So trusting. She was driving him to heights he’d never experienced with any other woman. Except her.
Her climax shook them both as she called out his name and her muscles clenched around him. He only just managed to withdraw in time, and they lay panting and spent on the bed, sheets swirled around their ankles.
Gently levering her to the side, he pulled her into his embrace, cradling her cheek on his bicep, his chin resting on the top of his head, as their breathing slowly calmed, and they lay in the afterglow.
He didn’t want to get up, never wanted to leave this bed. If only they could stay cocooned in Julie’s room for the rest of eternity. But that wasn’t going to happen. He had a job to get back to in the city, commitments. Jake already had another client lined up for him, the job starting in the next few days, as soon as his knee healed. Could they juggle a relationship where he was in the city, and she was on the station, after only just finding each other again?
A long-distance relationship wasn’t the answer, and they both knew it.
One thing was for sure. He was never going to just walk away from Julie Bradshaw again. It’d taken him twelve years to discover the meaning of true love, he wasn’t about to give it up now.
But what was he going to do? How were they going to solve this dilemma? There was still so much he needed to sort out, including exactly what a relationship with Julie entailed.
