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“Yes, sir.” Cannon pulled Rosalie to his side. “Looks like we’re snowboarding together again, Snow Angel.”
Together.
“Excuse me.” Blowing past Cannon and Paul, she whizzed into the lobby. She ignored Irene as she hurried to the stairwell. Once behind the solid door, she pulled in a painful breath. She wanted to snowboard with Cannon again. Wanted so many things with the man she barely knew, but not this.
“Not this,” she muttered as she heard the door open behind her and latch a moment later.
“Rosalie, look at me.”
“Give me a minute.” The scents of chocolate and pine filled the air with every step he took closer. She raised her hand. “Stop. I need to think. Alone.”
Cannon gripped her hip and spun her to face him. “You’re not alone. We’re partners now, whether you like it or not, so talk to me.”
She admired the determined gleam in his gaze, though it scared the death out of her right now. “Don’t you see, Cannon?We can’t be partners.” She pressed her palm against her scar and let out a tremulous breath. “I froze during Julia’s abduction when one of the attackers pulled a knife on me. If Julia hadn’t shot him, either I’d be Malgor’s prisoner, or I’d be dead.”
She dug her fingers into her back as the confession rolled harsh and shameful from her lips. “If something goes wrong with our plan and we wind up face to face with Malgor and his knife, I’m afraid I won’t be able to fight back and protect you.”
He gripped her chin and forced her to meet his gaze. “Then stop giving him control of your memories.”
“How can I do that when my scar still burns at the slightest trigger? I freeze every time I train with practice knives. Forgetting isn’t that simple.”
He gripped his wrist with his other hand and tugged it away from her back. “You’re going about it all wrong. Listen to me, Snow Angel. I’m not saying forget. I’m saying redirect.”
She pushed him away and extended her arms wide, baring her vulnerabilities. “How, Cannon? I’ve been trying for two years to think of something, anything other than how that knife felt tearing me apart.” She rubbed her back and blinked against frustrated tears. “He didn’t just knife my back. He knifed my heart. The mark he left is permanent, not just on my skin but in my soul.”
“That’s bullshit. The mark he left isnotpermanent.Mymark is.”
He dropped to his knees and gripped her waist. Spinning her to face the wall, he jerked up her suit jacket and shirt with a roughness that matched the ferocity of his breathing and the beating of her heart. If he didn’t come home alive from this rescue, that already torn heart would surely shatter beyond repair.
“This time, my mark won’t only be on your skin; it’ll be in your mind.” He brushed his lips over her scar. “In your heart and soul.”
His hot words blanketed her tainted flesh. With both hands, she braced herself on the wall while he steadied her body and chipped away at her fears.
“From now on, when these nerves flare, you won’t feel pain. You’ll feelallof me inside you and you’ll think only of us.” He speared his tongue into the center of her scar where the fire burned the fiercest. “Do you feel me deep inside? Like when we fuck and I’m so entrenched in your sweet, strong body, I never want to break the connection?”
She opened her lips. Nothing came out but a squeak.
He gripped her tighter. “Answer me, Snow Angel.”
“Yes. I feel you.” She pressed back into his face, searching, needing more because shedidfeel him.
Her breath caught on a gasp as he suctioned his mouth over the mutilated circle of puckered skin. He’d kissed her there before, but this time, he sucked to the point of pain. A ragged sigh thundered from her lips as the fire in her back grew hotter.
Brighter.
In her mind, the dark flames she’d always envisioned tormenting her like an unfortunate soul in hell sparkled in dazzling reds and oranges. A new kind of hot agony snuffed out the old as he bit at her skin and sucked as if pulling poison out of her body.
“Cannon.” She reached back and gripped his wrists against the intense, glorious pain that was healing her better than any medicine.
“Do you feelthat,Snow Angel?” He licked the spot he’d marked with his teeth in slow, steady strokes. “Do you feelmeunder that scar? Do you hear me when I say you’re brave, beautiful, and fearless?”
“Yes,” she moaned as he flipped her pain to agonizing pleasure and the universe narrowed to only the two of them.
“I need you inside me.” Needed him to finish rewiring her brain and to solidify the bond he was forging with his scorching tongue and soul-deep declarations. “Now, Cannon.”
He pulled her down the stairwell and out onto the floor below. Dragging her into a storage closet, he slammed the door shut as he pushed her against the wall and shoved her pants to her ankles. “You want me, Snow Angel? All of me?”
Panting like a wild animal with no choice but to follow primal instinct, she pulled out his thick cock. “Yes. Please.” She’d never wanted anything more in her life, not just the blistering pleasure she knew he could deliver, but the salvation from the past—and from herself—that he offered.
