Love Her or Lose Her: A Novel (Hot and Hammered, 2)

A day after their rocky third therapy session, Dominic was grabbing a quick workout in the back bedroom—hoping to burn off some of his excess mental and sexual frustration—when he heard the sound of water running in the house and frowned. There was no one home, save himself—he couldn’t be more painfully aware of that fact—and none of the appliances were turned on.

What gives?

He finished his set of forty pull-ups and let go of the metal bar, which he’d hung in the doorway of the guest room. He waited for his breathing to slow so he could listen again, double-checking that he indeed heard water running. With a frown, he walked barefoot and shirtless down the hallway, toward the kitchen, to investigate. His pulse started to race at the possibility that Rosie had come home, but there was no one there.

A sound from outside the house brought Dominic to the front door. He opened it—and found his wife in the driveway.

Washing his truck.

He was so stunned by the sight, all he could do was stare. His wife was in tight black yoga pants and an old sweatshirt, hair up in a bun. Gorgeous, so fucking gorgeous in the setting sun. Pink and orange streaked behind her in the sky and made her skin glow. Love ripped through him like a hurricane, forcing him to lean against the doorjamb. As much as he hated watching her perform any kind of manual labor, he couldn’t help but be thankful just to have her there, whether it was temporary or permanent.

Hope rose up inside him, cramming his throat full as he searched the driveway for her things. Nothing was there, though. No suitcase. This visit was temporary—part of him had known that the second he opened the door. She’d made up her mind to go about their second chance the right way. He needed to try to respect that, which meant he wouldn’t even lie to his parents about the situation, even though he’d been sorely tempted. When the phone rang for their bimonthly call, he’d almost answered and told them Rosie was great. That everything was great. Just to reassure himself. But he’d avoided the call instead, because next time he told his parents everything was great, he wanted it to be true. This visit was progress. At this point, he would take any increment of Rosie he could get, even though he wanted to devour her whole.

Their therapy session had knocked Dominic on his ass, although he still didn’t believe Rosie was responsible for their situation. At all. Since returning from overseas, he hadn’t taken her to Argentina, even though she’d always wanted to visit to honor her mother. Hadn’t presented her with the dream house on the water, instead letting it languish untouched because he wasn’t confident in it being good enough. Worst of all, he hadn’t encouraged her to open the restaurant, even though she’d been talking about it for years. He was a quiet asshole who hadn’t been giving her the words she needed. Of course she’d left. She’d done nothing wrong—and no one could convince him otherwise. Watching her cry over that bullshit yesterday had been pure torture.

Still. He could admit that Rosie giving him real, tangible evidence that she loved him . . . made the organ in his chest beat faster. Made it ache. And if it didn’t make him feel like a punk, he might admit that watching Rosie clean his truck made him kind of breathless. When he and Rosie were in high school, she used to untangle his headphone cords. Sure, she did a lot of other things for him back then, like bake him brownies or put extra pens in his backpack before class . . . but there was something about the way she untangled his headphones and left them in a neat circle inside the cup holder of his truck that always got to him. Such a small thing, but he’d liked knowing she’d wanted to save him that minor frustration. He hadn’t minded watching her fingers move, either. A couple of times he’d found himself tangling the headphones on purpose just so she’d fix them.

Growing up, he’d been shown love through unspoken acts. Having his lunch made for school, a new pair of shoes showing up just in time for the old ones to fall apart. Those actions made him feel cared for and he didn’t have to ask for them, which saved him from feeling needy. Or like he needed to be taken care of. Men took care of their loved ones. Not the other way around. That’s what he’d been taught from a young age and the belief was hard to shake, so he lived for the small acts of caring from Rosie. It meant she loved him enough to think about him.

So, yeah, while he wanted to strangle Armie for making his wife cry, he could also maybe admit he needed some evidence that this woman still loved him. He needed it bad. When he returned from Afghanistan, she’d shown him evidence of her love on a regular basis. Spontaneous hugs, elaborate date nights at home with candlelight, simply telling him she loved him. It was becoming obvious to him that she’d eventually stopped doing those things because he’d been showing her his love in a totally invisible way. How could she have known he’d been saving up for the house since the day he got back?

In those months after his return, he’d felt so inadequate compared to the men he’d left behind. His plans had seemed so trivial. So he’d set out to do better. Along the way, he’d forgotten to make damn sure Rosie knew she was the most important part of his life. He’d let the two of them drift. Now, having her show him she cared, that she’d thought about him, flooded him with gratitude and relief.

But he couldn’t accept the gesture, could he? Not like this. In no world could he watch Rosie wash his truck in a rapidly dampening sweatshirt when it was fifty degrees outside.

Seriously, it might kill him.

“Okay, honey girl. Pack it in.” Dominic came out of the house, letting the screen door slap against the doorjamb. “Thank you for doing this, but you’re going to get sick out here. Come in out of the cold, Rosie.”

She pulled up the right sleeve of her sweatshirt to her elbow and dunked the sponge back into the bucket she’d filled, which explained the source of the running water. “I’ll be done in fifteen minutes. Could you grab the grocery bags out of my backseat, please?”

“When you come inside.”

There was a flash of something in her eyes that he’d seen at the therapy session. Regret. Heaviness. A little bit of panic. He didn’t like it.

“I’m digging in my heels,” she said.

“You’ve been doing a lot of that lately.”

He instantly regretted his words when she broke their eye contact.

“I’ve got on two layers under this sweatshirt. Please just let me do this?” Her voice was laden with determination. “I need to do something for you.”

Despite his fears over her falling ill, warmth rolled into his chest like clouds over the water, huge, blocking everything else out. “Will you stay for a while afterwards?”

She stopped soaping for a moment, looking at him over her shoulder. Blinking a couple of times. Slowly. “Yes.”

That single word made anticipation sing over Dominic’s skin, but his body needed to chill the fuck out. He was horny enough to read sexual intention into a brisk hello. If he’d learned anything by now, it was that his wife wasn’t breaking the no-sex rule. And he hadn’t caved on his promise, either. Next time he got relief, it would be inside Rosie, so help him God. Unfortunately, he was feeling the strain like nobody’s business.

Dominic went inside to throw on a jacket, then headed back out to retrieve the bags from Rosie’s backseat. While he was inside, she’d turned on the small vacuum cleaner they used for their cars, the loud hum absorbing the sounds of his footfalls. As he drew even with Rosie, she bent forward over the rear cab seat, leaving her tight, round ass on display.

Pure torture.

He itched to light up a cigarette, but he never smoked when Rosie was around. Only on the job site, while running errands, or after she’d fallen asleep. He’d come back from his deployment with the stress-reducing habit and she’d never asked him to stop, but he hated the idea of breathing tobacco breath anywhere in her vicinity and he damn well wasn’t going to start now, possibly hurting his chances of winning her back even more.

By the time Dominic returned with the grocery bags in his arms, his dick was hard enough to jimmy a lock. Rosie was still leaning forward over the backseat, knees planted on the torn leather of his truck, hips tilted enough that he could see the stretch of Lycra over her pussy. Jesus Christ. Was it dark enough yet to hide them from passing neighborhood traffic if he climbed into the truck behind her and rocked his cock into her from behind?

She flipped off the vacuum. “Dominic?” Her eyes found him over her shoulder, then lit up with what looked like reluctant awareness. “Did you, um . . . get the bags?”

“Yeah,” he rasped, hefting them up a little.

“Thank you,” she returned, sounding breathless herself, that ripe ass still on display.

Dominic growled. “Goddammit, Rosie. Did you come here to torture me?”

“No.” She quickly sat back on her heels. “No, I didn’t.”

“Just tell me what to expect here, Rosie. My body hurts. It wants yours.”

“I know.” She abandoned the vacuum and climbed out of the truck, hands wringing at her waist.

His heart picked up its pace so much at having her close—having her home—that he got dizzy.

“I’m really thrown off by what happened at our appointment, you know? Realizing we’ve both let this marriage get to this point . . . and I’m feeling kind of scattered. Like I’ve been seeing everything all wrong and I’ve just . . . I’ve fallen really hard off my high horse. And I don’t know how or if we’ll make this relationship work, but I know when I woke up feeling lost this morning, I wanted to be near you.” She inhaled in a rush. “Can we just spend some time near each other for a little while tonight?”

“Yes,” he said, voice resonating. His whole body resonating. “I want that.”

“Me too.” She wet her lips. “I’m going to finish up here. Can you go inside and preheat the oven for me? Three seventy-five.”

Backing away from her when she’d just admitted to needing him, even in a small capacity, was fucking agony, but he did it. Anything to not screw up this chance to have her cross the threshold of their home, even if it was just for a few hours. He stopped to glance back at Rosie on his way into the house and found her watching him from beneath her lashes. Looking . . . in need of reassurance? He knew how to give it to her. By worshipping her, pleasuring her, communicating love with his body.

But that didn’t work, did it? Not completely. Hadn’t Rosie said she felt empty afterward? He had to find a way to offer more. Give more.

Tell that to the testosterone flowing through his veins. As soon as he got inside, Dominic dropped the groceries off on the counter and adjusted his hard cock through his sweatpants. He planted his hands on the edge of the kitchen counter and breathed in and out. “Okay, not jerking off for a week was a bad choice, bro. Admit it. But you can do this. You can be in the same room as your wife and not fuck her until she screams the town into a power outage.”

Dominic visualized the same thing he’d been picturing all week, while trying to get his dick under control. One of his fellow marines had been bitten by a scorpion while on a perimeter check and the bite had gotten infected. Dominic pictured that mass of oozing flesh and started unpacking the contents of the grocery bags, teeth dug into his lower lip. Chicken stock, eggs, tomato paste, a green bell pepper.

His visualization exercise was working. He was halfway to losing his erection until Rosie walked in and immediately stripped off her sweatshirt at the door, carrying the T-shirt beneath it up to her breasts, showing off a hint of underboob before dropping back into place. She hung her sweatshirt on a hook and blew out a breath, glancing around the house as if she’d forgotten what it looked like, maybe even missed it—and Dominic’s throat cinched tight.

“Your truck was already pretty clean,” she said, tucking loose hair into her bun. “I feel like I cheated on my homework.” Her laughter was kind of skittish, reminding him of those first few middle-school dates to the coffee shop, when they were just getting to know each other. “Wow. Why am I so nervous?”

“This is your home. I’m your husband. You shouldn’t be . . .” Dominic heard the rote lines coming out of his mouth and dragged a hand down his face, laughing without a drop of humor. “I’m nervous, too, Rosie.”

Her breath caught. “You are?”

“Yeah.” Now that they’d returned to the scene of the crime, it became even more obvious how drastically their communication had dwindled. Their voices sounded almost foreign filling the kitchen together at the same time. “It doesn’t make you see me as less of . . . a man? Knowing I’m nervous?”

“What?” She pressed a hand to the center of her chest. “God, no. It makes me feel like I’m not crazy. It puts us on the same team.”

Surprise prickled up his spine. “I want to be strong for you at all times,” he said hoarsely. “Isn’t that my job?”

Her features softened as she regarded him. “Marriage isn’t a job, Dom.”

She hadn’t called him by that nickname in so long, his insides jolted upon hearing it. All day long, it was shouted over the sound of hammering on the construction site, but it sounded different coming from his wife. It came from the past. The future. It held weight.

“Duty is something I understand. It’s something I can’t fuck up.”

“I appreciate that. I appreciate what you do for us. For me.” The hand dropped from the center of her chest and she crossed to the counter, close enough to Dominic that he could count the goose bumps on her neck. “It makes me feel closer to you when you let down your guard. Makes me feel like I can do the same.”

Dominic was barely aware of moving closer. He found himself behind Rosie, zeroed in on the freckle behind her ear as she unloaded shopping bags. Fuck, she smelled good enough to take a bite out of. “You want me to put on your music?”

She shivered, fumbling a tub of sour cream and dropping it on the counter. “Yes, that would be nice. Thank you.” Her pupils had bled completely into the brown of her eyes when she glanced back over her shoulder. “I’m making empanadas.”

“Does that mean you’re happy?”

“This time . . . it means I want you to be. Happy.”

When he normally would have pressed his lap to her ass, kissed her smooth neck, and slid his hands up under the front of her T-shirt, Dominic backed away instead. God, it was unnatural to move away from the force field that drew him in so intensely. Like separating stuck magnets. Since she’d left, the kitchen had seemed so huge and empty; now it might as well be the size of a stand-up shower stall. His hands tingled with the need to run over her skin, and his mouth had definite acts of service in mind. Getting inside her head, however, was fulfilling a different part of him. The simple statement that she wanted him happy made his chest expand to the size of a marching band bass drum. Watching her prove it? Even better. Rosie had come over, cleaned his truck, and now she was making him a meal.

It was heaven on earth and nothing could ruin it. Not even his thwarted sex drive.

Dominic turned the knob of the old radio that sat on a perch in the kitchen window, salsa music crackling over the speakers. The device had belonged to her mother, and even though he’d bought her a new one several Christmases ago, she continued to use this one, static and all. Tradition. His wife loved tradition, but those little displays of it had been few and far between over the past few years. Or maybe she was just keeping them to herself.

Remembering how she used to dance in the kitchen while cooking made Dominic swallow hard as he watched her from his lean against the opposite counter. He catalogued every movement of her hands mixing the vegetables and meat in a bowl. Listened as she hummed along to the music as she spooned the filling into dough and forked the empanadas closed. When she turned to put them in the oven, Dominic took note of her shallow breathing and knew she’d been aware of him watching her the whole time. Careful, man, you’re letting the lifelong obsession with her show.

“Those should be ready in thirty minutes,” she breathed, fidgeting as she faced him. “Do you want to watch TV or—”

“Nah.” Before he knew his own mind, Dominic stepped into the warmth of her space, capturing her left hand in his right. “Can we dance, Rosie?”

“Dance?”

Dominic came another inch closer, and Rosie’s head fell back like a string had been cut, giving him her upturned face.

“I don’t know i-if that’s a good idea.”

“You don’t?” Hunger bloomed in his middle, but he kept his features schooled. “The therapist said we’re allowed to kiss. Dancing must be on the hippie-approved list, right?”

“Whoa,” she said unsteadily, her gaze dropping to his mouth. “First you want to dance and now . . . kissing. You can’t just throw all of that out there.”

Dominic grinned and rubbed his right thumb in a circle around the palm of her hand. “Didn’t ask to kiss. I said I wanted to dance.” He slipped his left hand around the small of her back and eased their bodies together. “You made that leap, honey girl.”

Rosie sputtered for a moment, but if she noticed Dominic swaying her into the low, slow beat of the music, she didn’t show it. “So I did.”

“I forgive you for sexualizing me.”

“Shut up,” she said on a giggle, then cut herself off with a gasp when she realized they were dancing. “Oh, you think you’re slick?”

“Did you seriously forget how much game I have, Rosie?” He brought her tighter to his body, groaning inwardly over the tits that poked into his stomach, the press of their thighs. “Maybe you need a reminder.”

“Maybe I do,” she whispered, her breath fanning over his mouth. “Just remember the rules, okay?”

Dominic made a sound in his throat that somehow spoke of misery and contentment at the same time. It was amazing to simply hold his wife again. For the last five years, whenever they touched, he got impatient almost immediately to satisfy her. Please her. Now he wondered if he’d been trying to overcompensate for not giving her what she really needed. Words. Intimacy without sex. Dominic dragged his tongue across the seam of his lips, noticing the flutter of her eyelids. What was he supposed to be doing again? Oh, right. Reminding her he still had a modicum of game left. “Mmm, girl. Your hands really worked that empanada meat.”

She burst out laughing into his chest, her whole body shaking.

Dominic’s deep rumble joined hers and tension ebbed from his shoulders. Damn, he loved making her laugh, and those instances had been too few and far between. For way too long. “What?” He nudged her forehead with his chin. “You saying my game is rusty?”

“Those are your words, not mine.”

“All right. Take two.” They grinned at each other for a moment, but Dominic felt himself sober. “When you were standing at the counter, the sunset was coming in through the window. All around you, turning these little curls near your ears to gold. I was thinking, I wish I was a painter or a photographer because keeping something that beautiful to myself makes me a selfish bastard. Even though I want you that way. All for me.” He closed his eyes and breathed in roughly through his nose. “Every perfect fucking inch.”

As he spoke, her fingertips twisted in the neckline of his shirt, her body going pliant against his. Somehow they continued to turn in a slow circle in the center of the kitchen, but Dominic didn’t have a clue how, when his body felt stiff and aching all over.

“Just kidding,” she murmured, going up on her tiptoes, sucking in a breath when Dominic dragged her higher against his body. “Your game is still tight.”

The word “tight” on her lips almost broke him. Almost made Dominic rip the yoga pants right off her. Two steps and he could boost her onto the counter, lick that sweet pussy he’d been missing like hell. No. For the love of God, don’t fuck this up. If he pushed and she backed off and left, he would hate himself for ruining this moment.

“Talk to me about something, honey girl,” he rasped. “You made an appointment to see the old diner space. You haven’t gone yet, right?”

“Nuh-uh. No,” she said too quickly, still on her toes, clinging to his collar, letting him turn her around the rapidly darkening kitchen. “No, but I tested my signature dish out on Georgie and Bethany. They loved it.”

“Sure they did. That’s amazing.” He pressed his lips together. “Was it the asado?”

She breathed a laugh and it slipped over his collarbone. “Of course it was. You’ll taste it someday soon, I hope.” A beat passed. “What have you been doing without me around? Do you cook?”

“God no. I’ve been eating at Grumpy Tom’s mostly. After work. Beer and a burger or whatever is easiest.” He stretched his fingers across the small of her back, trying to reach as much of her as possible. “Been sleeping with the television on. I know you hate that, but it’s too quiet otherwise.”

“Surely you’re not implying I usually fill the silence with snoring.”

“I wouldn’t dare.” He chuckled. “Nah, you don’t snore, but you . . . murmur things.”

She looked up at him, her mouth close. So close. “I do?”

Dominic nodded. “Mostly about the spice rub needing more paprika.” Briefly, he brushed their foreheads together, even though he was dying to linger. “Sometimes you ask for me.”

The kitchen seemed to close in around them.

“What do you do when I ask for you?”

It was getting hard to swallow. “Kiss your shoulder, hold your hand.”

“You do?”

Dominic just looked at her, suspecting his heart—as well as the truth—was evident in his eyes.

“My appointment to look at the commercial space is on Friday. Do you . . . want to come?”

“Really?” His heart knocked in his chest. “Yes. Yes, I want to come.”

The double meaning of those words wasn’t lost on either of them. Their fleeting dose of eye contact was proof of that.

This was it. She was moving forward with the restaurant. Even as he pulled her closer, he couldn’t help but get the sense his wife was slipping away . . . and he couldn’t figure out why. That reality made him want to claim her, own her, the way he’d grown accustomed to doing.

Dominic wet his lips and focused on not thrusting his hips. Not an easy feat, considering he was packing enough wood to build a deck and both of them were well aware. No way she couldn’t feel his erection with their hips pressed together, snug and restless. Any minute now, he was going to screw this up. Break the rules. Push too hard. So it hurt like hell, but Dominic settled Rosie on the flats of her feet and stepped back, swiping the back of his wrist across his sweating upper lip.

Talk. Talk. Make words.

Words. That thought shook something loose and Dominic gripped the lifeline before he could reach for Rosie again where she stood trembling under the dim pendant light. “Earlier I was thinking about how much you love tradition. I, uh . . .” He swallowed hard, begging blood to return to his brain. “I was trying to distract myself this week, so I cleaned out the basement and found one of your mother’s boxes. There are some recipes on notecards banded together.” He turned away from her beauty out of pure necessity, opening the drawer where he’d stashed the notecards. There was a ring box wedged in beside the notecards, but he didn’t want Rosie to see that. Somehow her mother’s wedding ring had ended up in their basement storage area and he’d opened the box to reveal it was missing stones and needed to be cleaned. He wanted to have it polished and the stones replaced, so he could give it to her when she came home. Which was the definition of getting ahead of himself. No help for it, though. A man could dream.

“The notecards were stuck together, but I peeled most of them apart without damaging any . . .”

Dominic trailed off when Rosie’s hands went sliding up his back. They stopped at his shoulders and he fell forward with a groan, catching himself on the counter at the last second.

“Turn around and kiss me.”

“I can’t. I can’t do it. I’m all fucked up.”

“Please? I miss kissing you so much.”

“Miss it?” That made him turn around, a frown dragging his eyebrows together. “I devour that mouth when we’re . . . when . . .” When we’re fucking.

Christ. Was that really the only time he kissed her?

Regret gripped Dominic around the throat and he shot forward, capturing his wife’s mouth with a growl. She sobbed against his lips and everything inside him sped up, slowed down, sped up again. He couldn’t stop to get a good breath because that split second of time would allow him to think, realize he never kissed his wife just for the hell of it. Just to be close to her. What the hell was wrong with him?

It was a full-on attack—and there was nothing he could do to slow himself down. Especially not when she moaned like she’d been waiting for this, for a kiss in the kitchen, for years.

Jesus Christ, had she?

Dominic bent her backward over his forearm and plowed his tongue into her mouth, once, twice, three times, his eyes flying open when Rosie’s joined his, brushing tentatively at first, then with more and more confidence. She ripped at the shoulders of his T-shirt until he eased back enough to let her tear it off over his head, leaving him shirtless.

“Rules, rules,” she whimpered against his mouth. “I—I just wanted to touch your skin.”

“You want your man’s clothes off, you fucking take them off.” He pulled her upright again and backed her up until she hit the counter. “Anytime.” His mouth moved over her face, neck, and throat, raining openmouthed kisses. “Anywhere.”

Rosie’s expression was dazed, her hands running up and over his pecs. “God, you look so good. I didn’t . . .” She bit her lip and laughed in that beautiful, exhilarated way he hadn’t heard in a long time. “Until I saw you in the gym the other day, I just assumed you got this way on the construction site.”

Dominic licked into her mouth and felt her body go boneless, her thighs restless against his. “I’ve got a motherfucking ten at home,” he growled against her swollen lips. “You think I’m stupid enough to let myself go soft?”

Her head fell back, and Dominic trailed his tongue up the center of her throat, sliding it into her mouth when he drew even with her lips. Kissing her and knowing he wasn’t allowed to be inside of her heightened every one of his senses to a fifteen. The rasp of her pussy every time her yoga pants moved against his sweatpants. The drag of their wet tongues, the smell of coconut on her skin. He grew wild absorbing every nuance without crossing the point of no return, but the deprivation threatened to rob him of sanity.

“Rosie,” he said thickly, sampling her mouth with slow bites. “I want to kiss you for another ten hours straight, but I can’t.” He gave in and ground their hips together once, moaning into her neck, listening to her echo the sound. “A little more of that mouth and I’m going to finish.”

“Do it,” she whispered in his ear, trying to wrap her legs around his hips. “I want you to.”

Not for the first time in his life, Dominic wished he wasn’t stubborn to the fucking bone. “No.” He pounded the kitchen counter with a fist. “Told you. Inside my wife or nowhere at all.”

Rosie made a frustrated sound, and he cut her off with a kiss, because he didn’t have a choice. His mouth was drawn back to hers with such intensity, he wondered how she’d ever walked through the house without him luring her into a make-out session. By the time they came up for air and dove back into another damp, writhing dance of tongues and teeth, pre-come was beginning to bead on the head of Dominic’s cock and nothing, nothing could stop him from rubbing that swollen flesh between her welcoming thighs.

“Please,” he slurred into her neck. “Please.”

“Do you trust me?”

“Yes. Yes.”

Dominic watched under half-mast eyelids as Rosie splayed her hands on his chest and pushed. He allowed himself to stumble back a step—and she pushed him again, bringing the backs of his legs up against the edge of a dining room chair. “Sit down, husband.”

He was always the one to dominate, but that power had been taken out of his hands. All he could do was sit back, hips shifting, wincing over the discomfort trapped in his briefs. “Wife.”

She pressed a finger to her lips. “Shhh. Trust me.”

Rosie started to strip, right there in their kitchen, like a fucking goddess, backlit only by the weak kitchen bulb. Her T-shirt came off slowly and was dropped to the floor, leaving her braless, those aroused bronze-tipped tits making Dominic’s breath wheeze in and out of his mouth.

“Touch them. Play with them, you gorgeous little cock tease.”

“Soon . . .”

When she turned around and slowly peeled the yoga pants down her thighs, Dominic gripped himself through his sweatpants, massaging the stiffness, making it worse, with no way to stop.

“I know that thong,” he gritted out, watching her reveal the strip of red that ran through the center of her high ass cheeks. “I’ve tied you to the bedpost with it, ridden you with it wrapped around my fist, shoved it in your mouth to keep you quiet. I own it as much as you do, don’t I?”

Rosie kicked aside her pants and nodded, coming toward him in nothing but a red triangle of material between her legs. “That’s right,” she whispered, stepping between Dominic’s outstretched legs and giving him a slow, hypnotic kiss. His hands climbed over her hips and kneaded her tits, mouth swallowing her gasps. “You know how to own everything you’re touching,” she said, flickering her tongue against his. “But I want to own you right now.”

Dominic’s groan was full of pain, his right hand returning to squeeze the bulge between his thighs. “Tell me what I have to do to stop hurting.”

Keeping their mouths locked together, Rosie straddled Dominic’s legs and sat. His stance was so wide, however, it left her core spread open for him to see, the red thong stretching over her pussy, unable to cover all of it. Dominic had no choice but to yank down the waistband of his sweats and furiously jack himself off, the end already approaching. There was no other outcome with his sexy-as-hell wife 99 percent naked on his lap and purring at him like a seductress.

“Are we breaking the rules?” he managed through clenched teeth, his chest heaving. “Say yes, honey girl. Say yes and I’ll fill you full.”

Rosie shook her head, a secret smile curving her lips. And then her fingers slipped down between her spread thighs to massage the drenched flesh beneath her panties. “I’m already so close, just from kissing you,” she said unevenly. “Tell me when you’re close.”

Dominic threw back his head and roared at the ceiling. “Goddammit, I told you—”

“Inside me or nowhere at all.” Her body started to tremble, her nipples turning to tight peaks. She scooted closer on his lap, the points of her nipples sliding through the sweat on his chest. “Remember sophomore year of high school?” Rosie murmured brokenly at his lips. “All those times in your bedroom when we were supposed to be studying.”

“I haven’t forgotten a single second with you.”

Tenderness flashed in her eyes, before it was once again overrun with lust. “We’d only make it about fifteen minutes before you had my skirt off and you were rocking, grinding against me . . .”

Dominic groaned. “Are we still pretending you didn’t scoot your hips all over the bed until I could see your panties . . . all wet and tucked between those tight ass cheeks?”

“You caught me,” she breathed, her eyes closed, and the fingers between her thighs started to move faster, producing another bead of semen on Dominic’s cock.

He was losing it. Losing it. Hearing her reminisce about those sweaty afternoons was going to push him over the edge and there was nothing he could do about it. Fuck.

“We took it as far as we could without going all the way.” Her eyelashes fluttered. “And we finally decided just the tip didn’t count, didn’t we?”

Dominic lunged forward off the chair, dropping to his knees, carrying Rosie with him. No sooner had her back landed on the floor of their kitchen did Dominic nudge his wife’s panties to one side and sink the head of his erection inside her pussy. Not driving it the entire damn way made him crazed, but the tight pressure of her entrance around his tip was incredible. Perfect. His fist squeezed along his inches, top to bottom, jerking off into the warmth between Rosie’s thighs.

“Such a wet girl, aren’t you? Got soaked teasing me with those pretty legs spread, didn’t you?” The bottom of his spine twisted and he groaned, knowing the end was coming fast. Now. “Keep playing with your clit. Do it. Get off with me.”

“Yes,” she whimpered, two fingers busy rubbing that button of flesh.

His tongue wanted to play with it so bad, he was salivating, but that would break the rules, wouldn’t it? He didn’t have a clue anymore. Just knew he was going to die if he didn’t get relief.

“I’m coming, Dominic. Please. Yes.”

Dominic gripped himself hard, feeling the release in his balls, a trapdoor opening for him to fall through. He pushed his mouth up against his wife’s ear and spoke through gritted teeth. “Listen closely. If I can play ‘just the tip’ with your virgin pussy for a fucking year, I can play the long game to get my wife back. I’m getting you back. Don’t you think for a second that I won’t kill to make us right again.” He swallowed the rising emotion in his throat and let the orgasm break over him. “I love you.”

It was agony to say those words knowing he wasn’t getting them back. It ripped something open inside his chest, and he fell on the only anchor he’d ever known, kissing her neck while his body emptied of pressure. Rosie’s did the same, shaking beneath him, her hips and heels moving restlessly on the floor, seeking purchase.

Something was different this time. Something had changed.

He wasn’t exulting in the proof that he’d satisfied her. Maybe to a mild degree—he was a man, after all. Her thoughts weren’t a total mystery right now and he loved that. He looked into her eyes, that contact holding, and for that moment, there wasn’t a single mystery between them. Just honesty. They were in this struggle together.

Honesty.

The house. He needed to tell her about the house.

Dominic pressed a kiss to Rosie’s forehead and helped her sit up, unable to stop his hand from running over the curve of her shoulder, up the column of her neck to cup her cheek. “Hey. Tell me you don’t regret that.” He cleared his throat. “Please?”

Rosie shook her head. “I don’t regret it . . .”

She seemed as if she wanted to say more, but couldn’t. There was still too much holding her back.

It was on the tip of his tongue to tell her about the house he’d bought them, but that hesitation on her part made him swallow the revelation down. Lock it back up.

The light in her eyes dimmed a little at his own hesitancy.

The timer on the stove went off.

As Rosie stood to take the empanadas out of the oven, Dominic’s head dropped forward on a curse. He couldn’t help but feel like he’d missed the buzzer-beater shot. She’d been right there in front of him, as vulnerable as he’d seen her in a long time, and he’d missed another chance to reach deep inside her mind. To grab on to their connection and twist his fist, strengthen it until they had no choice but to be together again. By the time he lifted his head, she’d put the empanadas on a cooling rack and started dressing herself. “So once they’re cool, you can—”

“I owe you a date,” he said, not wanting to hear the awkwardness in her tone. Wanting that conspiratorial tone back she’d had earlier when they were dancing. “I want to take you out on a date, Rosie.”

She smoothed her hands down the front of her T-shirt. “When?”

“Tomorrow night.” Dominic stood and pulled up his sweats, never taking his attention off of her. “I’ll pick you up at six.”

“I can do that.” Her hands met at her waist, fingers tangling. Finally, she dropped them and crossed to the door. “I’ll see you then.”

“Wait.” Dominic stayed her hand on the knob and waited until she met his eyes. “Thank you for all of this. The truck, dinner . . .”

“You’re welcome.” She glanced back at the kitchen. “It felt like going back in time.” Her voice dropped to a whisper as she lifted onto her toes and laid a soft kiss on his mouth. “I missed you. I missed how we were. Just . . . stay with me, okay?”

He cradled the back of her head and kissed her hard. “I’m not going anywhere.”

Dominic stood at the door long after she’d gone, wishing he’d been honest about the house. Wishing she would have stayed. He had to be honest with himself first, though. And he knew those impulses to keep his feelings and insecurities to himself, those beliefs that providing for their small family should be done in silence . . . they had to be dealt with. Maintaining his stiff upper lip hadn’t worked. It was time to show Rosie that every single day of his life had been about giving her a dream he’d thought was most important to her. To them.

Right or wrong about that, tomorrow night he would bring her to the house.

Tomorrow he would lay it all on the line.