Wanted it for both of them.
“Again,” he urged her as he slicked his fingers, first one, then another, into her. “I need to feel you let go again, Grace.”
He looked up her body as he played over her with his hands, one between her thighs, the other on her luscious breasts, and nearly lost it when he saw how close she was to giving him another sweet release. She wasn’t fighting him, wasn’t fighting herself. On the contrary, it was just as she’d said and just as he’d hoped: She was reclaiming her sensuality by letting herself go with him tonight, straight to the edge of the limits she’d set just a little while ago. Limits he would never disrespect no matter how badly he wanted her. He would never hurt her. Never.
Dylan lowered his mouth back to her sweet skin at the same time as he thrust two fingers in. He curled them against her sensitive inner flesh just as she shattered, her muscles gripping tightly at his fingers as she rocked into his hand again and again.
After, he kissed the insides of both thighs, then made his way slowly back up her body while she worked to catch her breath. “That was...”
She broke off when he ran his hands up the lengths of her arms and threaded his fingers back through hers. He loved how soft, how relaxed she looked now as she blinked up at him.
“I’m a writer. I’m supposed to have words for the way you just made me feel. But I don’t.”
“You just did,” he told her right before he leaned in to kiss her, gentle again despite the unquenched fire raging in his blood. “And I’m right there with you, completely stunned and speechless by how beautiful you are.”
So beautiful, and so trusting, that he knew he needed to do the most difficult thing in the world.
“I should go.” He kissed her again. “Soon.” One more kiss and he forced himself to draw all the way back, bringing her up with him, naked and soft in his arms. “Now.”
“But you haven’t—”
He kissed her again before she could tear away the very thin thread of control he was still managing to hold on to. “And I won’t. Not tonight. Not until you’re ready for more.”
“I’m still not ready to have sex,” she said softly. “But that doesn’t mean you need to leave right now. So soon. Not before I touch you, too.”
He was tempted. So damned tempted that his hands shook as he picked up the blanket from the other arm of the couch and wrapped it around her. “When I said I want you more than I’ve ever wanted anyone else, I meant it. That’s why I’m not going to stay. Not tonight. Not until you can swear to me without even the slightest hesitation that you’re ready for more. Because when that day comes, you’d better believe I’m not going to walk away. Or stop. Not until both of us are so overfull with pleasure, with each other, that we’ll be raising the white flag together.”
“Thank you,” she said softly as she tucked the blanket more tightly around herself, then ran a hand through the hair he’d so enjoyed tangling in his hands as he’d kissed her. “Not only for a great night, start to finish, but also for leaving when it would be so much easier not to.”
They both stood, then, her bare feet peeking out from beneath the soft red blanket. What a beauty she was. And what a fool her ex had been not to love her.
He brushed his fingers across her cheek one last time, letting the pad of his thumb linger on her lush lower lip. “Sweet dreams, Grace.”
He had barely taken a step back when she surprised the hell out of him by gripping his T-shirt in her fist and yanking him into her. Her kiss was hot and hungry and just as sweet as their first kiss had been the night before, but full of a newfound confidence. The confidence he knew she must have possessed before the rich asshole from D.C. had done everything he could to stomp both her heart, and her life, to bits.
* * *
Dylan knew he couldn’t push Grace too hard, or too fast, but making himself walk away when he wanted her more than he’d ever wanted anyone, or anything, in his entire life was one of the hardest things he’d ever done. He’d loved seeing her blurry and needy and knowing it was because of his kisses, his caresses. But the high of her taste, her scent, the sweet little sounds she’d made as he teased her over the edge not just once but twice—none of those things could make him forget his fury at her ex or his worry that one of the Bentleys would come back one day to hurt Grace and Mason.
Dylan’s life had been a good one. He didn’t have any major demons, any serious darkness in his past, or inner conflicts that kept him tossing and turning at night.
Not until now.
Because he had her demons now.
He had never been a violent man. Ian, Rafe, and Adam had always been far more likely to use their fists. But for the first time ever, Dylan could barely think past the urge to track down the bastard who had hurt her and pound the guy’s face in.
He pulled out his cell phone as he slid behind the steering wheel and pulled his brothers into a group text.
NEED TO MEET ABOUT KEEPING GRACE AND MASON SAFE.
MY HOUSE. TONIGHT.
By the time he pulled into his garage, his brothers had dropped everything, just as he’d known they would, and were waiting for him.
“Tell us what’s going on,” Ian said.
Dylan let them inside, poured them all drinks, and pounded his before answering. “What do you know about the Bentleys in D.C.?”
“Fortune 500. Generations of money and charity work. Politics.”