Page 84 of Help Wanted

“You f linched.”

“It was because I felt kind of trapped for a second, but I’ll get over it. I want to power through.”

“It’s not even been a day. Maybe you should give yourself some time to—”

“No. Please just try again. It will be okay. I want this. It’s important. I want something good.”

Instead of moving over her again, he came up with a different plan. One where she could be in complete control of the situation.

He flopped down onto his back next to her and pulled her on top of him.

“I’m here. Do whatever you want,” he said, pleased with himself for coming up with such a great alternative.

She sat up, her thighs straddling his waist and then looked down at him nervously.

“I—I don’t quite know how to do this,” she confessed. She winced again, but this time it wasn’t with fear as much as embarrassment. He brought her hand to his lips and kissed her palm. She was so sexy, even in her inexperience.

“Just do whatever feels good to you, and I guarantee I’ll like it,” he said with a grin. “There’s no wrong way.”

She might not have much skill, but her instincts were sound. She moved on him like a professional. He put his hands on her hips to help guide her, not that she needed his guidance. He was actually trying to slow her movements as she fought to quicken the pace.

“Kenley…” He groaned out her name and clenched his fingers into her flesh. “Slow,” he begged. “It’s too much.”

Her hair fell like a curtain around them, and there was a very naughty smile on her face.

“I kind of like being the one in control. I feel so powerful,” she said wickedly.

“I might not have the power, but I can do this.” He pushed up off the bed to meet her thrust. The smirky little grin left her face, replaced by lust and pleasure.

She was getting closer. He could feel it with each thrust.

He raised his hips higher from the bed to enter her deeper. That was all it took and she collapsed on him. He could feel the tremors in her body as they matched his own pulses.

This was where he belonged. He would never be so stupid again as to think he could live without her.

She slid to the side and he turned so they were facing one another.

He trailed his fingers along the side of her face, down her cheek to her lips, which pulled up into a smile under his touch.

“Are you okay?” he asked as worry intruded on the moment. This seemed like a very unorthodox method to get over being robbed at gunpoint, but he was confident she knew what she wanted.

“I’m fine. A little tired. Thanks for making me do all the work.” Her grin told him she was joking. “I’m lucky. Things could have ended up differently for me today, but they didn’t. I want to move on and put it behind me.”

This sounded like a good plan, but now that he was thinking clearly again, he worried it wouldn’t be as easy as she made it sound.

He saw the bruises on her arm now. Where that man had touched her. Brady had mentioned the guy having the gun to her head. She must have been so scared, waiting for the last sound she would ever hear.

She had been attacked. Maybe it had been stopped before it became a higher offense, but the man—whenever he woke up in the ICU—would be charged with armed robbery and assault with a deadly weapon. Deadly.

He shuddered while trying to push the thought away.

He remembered his sister telling him once that people handled things differently. It wasn’t his place to tell someone they weren’t coping with something correctly just because it was different than how he would have dealt with it.

“Get some rest,” he suggested, hoping her wish to move on was as easily said as done, but he still had his doubts. He’d seen what Brady had gone through while wrestling the demons from his past. He squeezed her closer, wanting to protect her from her own demons.

“Will you stay?” she asked. He sniffed. As if there was any question as to where he would be spending the night.

“Of course. I would sit outside your door if you didn’t want me in your home, but I’m not leaving you.”