I grinned, watching him stammer and fumble.
He scowled. “Something funny?”
“You’re fucking adorable when you grovel.”
“I’m happy my discomfort amuses you, but can you please put me out of my misery and tell me if there’s someone else?”
I gave his arm a tired shove. “I told you, I only love you, dummy.”
“You never took another model out for a test drive? Never?”
“I tried. Once. Just last week, actually.”
Holden’s jaw ticked. “Yeah? How’d that go? Cataclysmically awful, I hope.”
“You’re even more adorable when you’re being possessive,” I said and smoothed the frown off his lips with my fingertips. “Nothing happened. He wasn’t you. I told you, you’re it for me, Holden. There’s never going to be anyone else.”
His green eyes shone. “Me too. There’s no one else, River. And I’m going to be here for you however you need me to be. I’m supposed to be on a thirty-city book tour, but I’ll cancel all of it. Or you can come with me, but I don’t want to be apart from you again.”
“You’d be willing to stay in Santa Cruz? You hate it here.”
“It’s grown on me.” His smile softened. “And it’s where you are. I might go slightly stir crazy if we don’t travel now and then, but that’s nothing we can’t work out, right?”
“We can work it out.” I smiled, and something settled into a place deep inside me. The last of my tension and uncertainty fled, and my eyes fell shut.
Holden rolled me to my side, pulled my back to his chest and wrapped his arms around me. “Sleep. You need the rest.”
“I need you.”
Holden held me tight, his lips on my neck, softly kissing.
“I’m not going anywhere.”
I dreamed of Kyle, my fist raising to strike him and Amelia crying. I dreamed of my father coming back to life after a three-year hibernation. I dreamed of me on my knees in front of the ocean, screaming my pain into the wind.
And Holden…
I jerked awake and sat up. The room was dim; the clock said it was close to eleven at night. The familiar ache clenched my heart.
I dreamed him.
I rolled onto my back and a figure in the bed beside me stirred. Holden lay on his side, reaching for me in his sleep. His hand landed on my chest and joy flooded in, erasing the ache.
Holden peeked open one eye and smiled. Beautiful, without irony or protective walls up to guard him.
“Feeling better?” he asked.
I nodded against the pillow. “The grief is still there, but I’m not afraid of it anymore.”
“I know what you mean. My book did that for me. Like one long scream into the wind.”
“I’m proud of you for doing that.”
“I’m proud of me too,” he said dryly. “For lying half-naked in the same bed with you for seven hours and not losing my goddamn mind.”
With a rough sound in my chest, I pushed him back and lay on top of him, his body warm and heavy and real beneath me. I ground my hips against his. Once. Slowly.
He groaned. “Fuck, River.”
“Yes, that.”
His eyes widened at my feral tone, and his pulse jumped in the hollow of his throat. I bent my head and laid a kiss there, then dragged my tongue up toward his jaw, forcing his head back, exposing his throat. His breath caught, and his hands on my waist gripped me hard, pulling me to him. I worked my way up his chin, then took his lower lip in a long, slow suck.
Heads level now, Holden’s eyes met mine. Green fire burned through me, and beneath that, love.
My heart full and my body wide awake, I kissed him. A hard invasion, my tongue demanding entry and him giving it, opening for me. He cinched me tighter to him, his legs locking around mine, our erections straining against our underwear. Holden engaged in the kiss, taking as much as giving, his tongue sliding against mine and pushing into my mouth, exploring every corner, consuming.
“Missed you,” I whispered against his lips.
“Me too…Christ, River I had no idea it could be this good.”
Three years’ worth of unspent emotion gathered between us, twin storms ready to be unleashed on the other. Our kisses turned biting, needy, our heads angling again and again to leave nothing untasted. I had him pressed hard against the bed, and my hips thrust against his. Holden spread his thighs, allowing me in the V of his legs, his own hips rising to meet mine. We moved as if we were fucking already, cocks straining, aching for skin.
I braced myself over him so that I could engulf him completely. Take him how I wanted to take him. But Holden was strong, his body taut with lean muscle and a need as great as mine. He pushed me off of him and climbed on top of me, straddling my thighs.
“I’m going to take care of you,” he said, his voice low and rough.
The promise in those words was almost a threat, heating my blood with the visions and fantasies of us I’d been carrying around with me.
Holden nodded as if he read my thoughts, a seductive curl to his lips. His hand slipped down between us, to palm my cock over my underwear, then gripped my length. I pressed up into his touch. His breath caught and his tongue slid over his lips.
“I nearly forgot how big you are.”
“Christ, Holden…”
“I’m going to ride this cock, River,” he said, giving me another squeeze. “I’m going to make you come so hard, you’ll want to sleep again.” He bent over me, whispering hotly. “But I won’t let you.”
Fuck.
My chest tightened, my cock swollen and
