Page 67 of Disavowed

He took a deep, shuddering breath, his shirt tightening over his broad chest. When he opened his eyes his deep blue gaze was distant, and she guessed he was reliving that horrible, horrible moment.

“There was blood and body parts everywhere—all the children who were patients and most of Gray’s unit that was there giving blood. Everyone blown to bits. I found Anika—what was left of her—beneath a mountain of rubble and debris.” He absently rubbed his leg where she knew there was a long, jagged scar running up the outside of his thigh. “I collected her and buried her in the desert.”

Collected her? “Oh, Dom.” Instinctively, Daisy rested her hand atop his. The image of him forced to gather body parts of the woman he loved brought tears to her eyes. She could only imagine how deeply such a horrific event still haunted him. “I’m so sorry,” she said again.

He suddenly cleared his throat, then tucked the photo back into his wallet and tossed it on the table. He faced her and took her hands in his. “I’m not telling you this because I want your pity. Anika died a long time ago, and I’ve been using her death as an excuse to avoid getting close to a woman.”

The pain of loss in his eyes seared a hole straight through Daisy’s heart. She, too, understood the loss of loved ones. “I understand. You’ve never gotten over her. But as a man, you still needed sex from time to time.”

“No.” He shook his head, frowning. “That’s not the way it was with us. You”—he squeezed her hands—“scared me to death. It took me years to get to the point where I could make love to a woman without being drunk off my ass. When I finally did, I never stayed the night at a woman’s place. I never wanted to. Ever.”

And you didn’t stay the night at my place, either.

“That one night with you, I wanted to stay. For the first time in fifteen years I wanted to fall asleep next to a woman and wake up in the morning and have her face be the first thing I saw. Your face. You, Daisy.” He brought her hands to his mouth for a soft kiss.

“Then why didn’t you stay?” she whispered.

“Mainly because I was chickenshit.” He let out a bitter laugh. “I knew staying the night could have been the beginning of something real. So I left.”

“Mainly?” she asked, wondering if there was another reason. He hesitated before answering, confirming her suspicion that there was.

“There were other things going on that stopped me from getting involved,” he said finally.

“Another woman?” She held her breath.

“No.” He shook his head. “Just, other things.”

She wanted to pry into what other things he was talking about, but when he began stroking her cheek so tenderly she forgot all about it.

“From the moment I laid eyes on you I wanted you, but I never counted on it being anything more.”

“What are you saying?” She waited for his answer, silently praying it was the one she so desperately wanted to hear.

The look in his eyes was both fierce and tender at the same time. “I’m saying I want another chance with you. I’m asking you to let me spend the night and wake up in the morning beside you, even if all you let me do is hold you.”

Daisy could only stare, wide-eyed. It hadn’t exactly been a declaration of love, but the intensity of his words and the emotion with which he’d related his lover’s death resonated so passionately with her that she believed him.

He cupped her face and gently brushed at her tears with the pads of his thumbs. “I sure hope those are happy tears.”

Without waiting for an answer, he kissed her. His lips were soft, the kiss tentative, a stark contrast to the fiery, demanding kisses she’d become accustomed to with him. This time there was no urgent insistence. This time he was asking her permission. Whatever did or didn’t happen between them next was entirely her decision to make.

He pulled back enough to look into her eyes, and the stark emotion, the raw and hungry longing she glimpsed in his gaze, had her shaking all over. Her heart skipped beat after beat, as if it were somersaulting down a steep ravine, not knowing where the emotional fall would take her. Only one thing was certain.

I want to find out.

She drank in the hard lines of his chiseled face, the roughened, hardened beauty of the powerful man humbling himself before her. She sifted her fingers through his thick hair. He closed his eyes and made a low groan in the back of his throat. She touched her lips to his. When she laid her other hand on his chest his body trembled, and it occurred to her that he really was leaving the next move up to her.

Deepening the kiss, she lay back on the sofa, pulling him down on top of her. His body was heavy as he settled between her legs, his erection long and hard against her thighs. She slipped her hands under his shirt, reveling in the thick, hard muscles rippling beneath his taut skin. And all the while, their kisses deepened, unleashing a torrent of passion that could no longer be restrained.

“I never forgot this.” His voice was husky as his lips trailed a heated, sensual path along her neck to her collarbone, pausing at the deep V of her sweater above her breasts. “How beautiful you smell. How sweet you taste.”

When he nuzzled her breasts through her sweater, she ached with need. Too many clothes. If she didn’t feel his hands and mouth on her bare skin soon, she would surely die.

As if reading her thoughts, he lifted his head and swallowed, breathing hard, a questioning look in his darkened gaze. “Daisy—?”

“Shh.” She covered his lips with her fingers. “Make love to me.”

He crushed his mouth to hers in a searing kiss that made her heart feel as if it would pump right out of her chest, then he scooped her up gently in his arms as if she were no heavier than a delicate piece of lace.