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He heaved what I thought was an agitated sigh, but then I remembered what Gabe had said to me about reading between the lines, and I looked harder.
I could see it. The blank expression he used like a smoke screen. He tried to keep what he felt hidden behind it. But it was there in the hard-set of his jaw, in the uncertainty buried beneath the dangerous glint in his eyes, and in the slight creases at the edges of them that bespoke of more than physical pain.
He shifted his weight and drew himself up straighter. “I couldn’t protect you, Raven. I understand your wanting to leave.”
“Me?” Maybe he’d taken a hard bump to the back of the head too. “You do realize thatyou’rethe one walking away, right?”
He licked his lips then pressed them together, but he couldn’t fool me anymore.
The tension that had been knotting my stomach changed. I’d had so much adrenaline coursing through my veins, and my emotions had been all over the place. Now, all of it was suddenly settling in a singular feeling in the core of me, low in my abdomen, setting me on fire.
I couldn’t help but follow the contraction of his throat muscles as he swallowed or notice the hard planes of his chest where the top buttons of his shirt had come undone.
I wanted to see more, feel more.Domore.
“Raven?” he said, his brow furrowed.
“I want you, Nico,” I said, the words spilling from my lips. I had no desire to hold them back. I felt strong. Alive. More than ever.
I lunged at him, slamming into his chest and reaching for his lips with my own. I felt feral. I was muscles, and teeth, and claws, just like earlier, but I didn’t want to use them to tear a man apart. I wanted to use them to hold him close, to mark him in the same way he’d marked me.
His lips parted for me, and his hands moved to my hips and drew me closer. I dug my fingers into his shoulders as I swept my tongue across his teeth then slid along his tongue the way he’d done to me.
He groaned against my lips but then pulled away, leaving me gasping for breath.
“It’s just the adrenaline, Raven. It isn’t real. You don’t actually want this.”
“I know it’s the adrenaline. I know I shouldn’t want this, not now, not after all that’s happened. But I do, Nico. I don’t just want sex. I want you. I will always want you.” I took a deep breath and steeled myself for what I was about to admit next. “I love you.”
His eyes widened and his breath caught in his throat.
“You don’t mean that,” he said, though his hands gripped my hips harder, sparking up my adrenaline-fried mind.
“I do mean that.”
I glanced around for somewhere more private than the open stretch of gravel road. There was an abandoned old shed twenty yards away with its door hanging wide open.
I grabbed his hand and tried to tug him along, but apparently, Nico was as immovable as a boulder when he wanted to be. He stood still, staring at me, then slowly pulled me back toward him.
I could see it in his eyes before he opened his mouth.
“I love you too,” he said.
His words rippled throughout me, leaving behind the most exquisite warmth in every fiber of my body.
I flashed him a knowing grin. “I know you do.”
He laughed, and then he kissed me.
“And what else do you know?” he asked when he leaned away a moment later.
I leaned up on my tiptoes until my lips brushed against the shell of his ear. “I know I want you inside me,” I said, feeling a thrill rush through me at my own words.
He groaned then dipped his head down to leave a trail of kisses along the back of my neck. “But I want to make you scream, Raven, and I don’t think you want your brothers breaking down the door when I do.”
Every word sent a little jolt of electricity through my body, making me pulse and throb. It irked me that he was probably right, though. The way I was feeling, there was no chance I’d be able to keep quiet. I sagged against him, but he chuckled.
“Don’t worry. I’ll make sure the wait is worth your while.”
