Page 37 of Pain

I groaned and pulled him closer, taking his tongue into my mouth like I needed it to live, and he groaned in response and ground against me, his movements slow and intentional and very, very easy to read. The man was hard as a rock and tense as a spring.

Yeah, he wanted me just as badly as I wanted him. And he probably didn’t understand it any better than I did.

Which put us firmly in this together.

The corners of my mouth turned up in a grin at the thought, and Knight reared back suddenly, his eyes narrowed.

“Excuse me, are you laughing?”

I fought to hide the grin, fought to tamp down on the manic need to break into laughter.

I failed.

“You are laughing,” he said with a gasp. “What, you think the way I kiss is funny?”

That did me in. I didn’t get myself together quickly enough to keep the laughter from bursting out of me, and though I was shaking my head as hard as I could to indicate that I didn’t actually think he was funny, the laughter went on and on until I looked into his eyes and saw... hurt.

Pain. The fear of rejection.

And the laughter died as quickly as it had come.

I reached up and ran my fingertips over his cheek, not finding any of this funny anymore. “I don’t think kissing you is funny,” I whispered, desperately sorry to have put that expression on his face. “I just...”

I stopped talking, realizing that I didn’t know how to put what I’d thought into real words, and my gaze dropped away from his. He ducked down and captured my eyes with his again, his eyes still narrowed in something watchful.

“Just what?”

Right. Well, I already knew I owed him my life. I guessed I owed him whatever words I could come up with here. So I grabbed the ones that were floating around in my head. “I had the thought that kissing you felt like coming home, and for a girl who’s never really felt like she belonged with anyone before, that was a big deal. And then right after that, I thought that you must want me as badly as I wanted you, to be kissing me the way you were, and that we were in the same boat. In it together, you know? And it just... The combination of feeling so good and feeling like I’d finally come home and that you were in the same boat with me and that—”

He kissed me again before I could finish the rambling thought, and I clung to him, desperate for more and thankful beyond anything that I hadn’t had to try to finish that sentence. And moments later, he was stretching my arms above my head, opening my body up and making it vulnerable to him, and I was gladly stretching.

Giving him all of me.

Giving him access to everything I’d worked so hard to keep protected.

Because as surprising as it was, as impossible as it seemed, everything inside me was screaming that this man, this quasi-stranger who I’d always thought was an enemy, was the one place where I could actually count on being safe.

Knight held my wrists above my head with one hand while the other hand slipped down my body and under the waistband of the pajama pants I’d borrowed, and before I could react, he’d slipped the pants down over my hips. And then down over my legs.

And just like that, I was laying semi-naked in front of him, stretched out and vulnerable and gasping with need.

And then he... stared at me. Just lay there and looked, like he’d never seen a naked woman or something. It was infuriating.

“Did you get me in here and undress me just so you could look?” I gasped. “Surely you’ve seen a naked girl before.”

His eyes came up to meet mine, and he smiled softly. “Of course I have. But I’ve never seen you.”

He slipped his free hand under the hem of the T-shirt I was wearing and pulled it up over my head, then did something tricky that ended with my hands actually tied to the headboard.

I struggled, surprised and momentarily panicked at the idea that I was bound, and his hands went quickly back to the T-shirt, undoing whatever he’d done. I pulled my hands down, rubbing at my wrists, and looked up to find his face covered with concern.

“I’m sorry,” he said quickly. “I didn’t think about that before I did it. Didn’t think about what you’ve gone through.”

I put a finger to his lips, quieting him, and shook my head. “Let’s keep not thinking about what I’ve been through. I don’t want it in my head. I just want you. Make love to me, Knight.”

I felt the tension melt right out of him, and he came down on top of me, his mouth on mine and his fingers twined between my own. I opened my legs for him, inviting him to take me, and when he slid inside me, moving until he was completely buried, I gasped and arched.

Damn, he was bigger than I’d been expecting. Bigger and wider and more and...