Remy (Real Book 3)

I feel like murdering something today.

Something curly haired and brown eyed. In a black fucking suit I paid for. In a tie I paid for. Wearing a fucking smile he is going to pay for.

Pete and Riley are my brothers.

I’d kill for them.

But Brooke is holding back from me, and I can’t stand watching her smile at them the way I want her to smile at me.

I hear them joke around. Laugh during breakfast, lunch. Dinner.

Now I slam the speedball, straight in the belly, while my gut hardens with anger as Pete walks with Brooke out of the house—out of my house—and they come toward me. Austin is a test to my stability. I can feel every moment of my life here choking around me, setting the wheels in my head spinning with memories that are too vague to recall clearly, but too painful to forget. This house I bought to get close to the same parents who abandoned me as a youngster. They wanted nothing of me, but like some hungry dog, it took me a while to get it in my head that they weren’t going to throw me a bone. And I kept coming and coming, somehow expecting I was going to get it.

I feel just as starved for a bone as I see Brooke coming my way with Pete.

No. I feel more starved. I feel rabid with pent-up longing for her, and my temper is in shreds. So when Pete grabs her elbows and whispers something to her, and she whispers something back, my gut roils as my jealousy corrodes me.

Oh, yeah, I feel like murdering something.

“Hey, B, you might try stretching him, his form’s not ideal. Coach thinks it’s a lower-back knot,” Riley calls out from the door of the barn.

She starts heading over, and I scowl and pound the speed bag as fast as I can. Whackwhackwhack . . .

“Coach isn’t happy with your form and Riley thinks I can help,” she tells me, watching me hit.

And I keep hitting because I’m fucking mad at her.

She belongs with me.

I want to make out with her and make her as addicted to me as anyone can be addicted to anything, and maybe when she knows the truth about me, she won’t leave.

“Remy?” she prods.

I shift my body so she doesn’t keep distracting me and keep my eyes on the ball, making it fly as I hit it madly.

“Will you let me stretch you?”

Shifting even more, I keep slamming both my fists into the belly of the bag and notice she drops an elastic band to the ground before she reaches out to me.

“Are you going to answer me, Remy?”

Her hand makes contact with my back, and a jolt runs through me. Stiffening, I drop my head and angrily wonder if Pete feels a jolt when she touches him too, then I whip around and toss my boxing gloves to the ground.

“Do you like him?” I demand.

She just looks at me blankly, so I reach out and put my taped hand on the exact spot Pete touched on her arm. “Do you like it when he touches you?”

Please say no to me.

Please say no.

There’s no word for the way she’s tormenting me. I’m trying to protect her from me. I’m trying to protect myself . . . from what could be the biggest disaster of my life.

“You have no right to me,” she says in breathless anger.

My hold tightens on her, and I growl under my breath, “You gave me rights when you came on my thigh.”

“I’m still not yours,” she shoots back at me, her cheeks red. “Maybe you’re afraid I’m too much of a woman for you?”

“I asked you a question, and I want an answer. Do you fucking like it when other men touch you?” I demand, my temper rising.

“No, you jerkwad, I like it when you touch me!” she cries.

This appeases me.

It appeases me so much, the ice in my gut immediately morphs into lava. Dipping my thumb into the crease of her elbow, I gruffly ask, “How much do you like my touch?”

“More than I want to.”

She’s furious, but I know why she is.

Because we’re fucking killing each other being apart, and I want to end it. “Do you like it enough to let me feel you in bed tonight?” I prod.

“I like it enough to let you make love to me.”

“No. Not make love.” Fuck, she not only makes my cock hard, she makes life hard, period. “Just touching. In bed. Tonight. You and me. I want to make you come again.”

She surveys me in silence, and for a moment I feel her consider my proposal.

I have never before in my life seen a woman come like she comes for me.

Because she’s mine—and she’s as stubborn as they come. Fuck!

“Look, I don’t know what you’re waiting for, but I won’t be your plaything,” she says as she starts to pull herself free of me.

Grabbing her close, my voice is thick with frustration. “You’re not a game. But I need to do this my way. My way.” Before I can help myself, I bury my nose in her neck and scent her, my tongue sliding out to lick a wet path to her ear. A low groan rumbles up my chest before I seize her chin and force her to meet my gaze, silently willing her to understand. “I’m taking it slow for you. Not me.”

She shakes her head as if she doesn’t believe me. “This is growing old. Let’s just stretch you.” She walks to my back, and right now all her touch does is remind me what I want and she won’t fucking give me.

I jerk free and glower. “Don’t fucking bother. Go stretch Pete.” I wipe the sweat off my chest with a nearby towel, then ignore my boxing gloves and take up hitting the speed bag with my knuckles.

Whack, whack, whack.

“He doesn’t want me,” I hear her tell Riley as she stomps away.

I clamp my jaw and hit the bag harder.

♥  ♥  ♥

THE AUSTIN CROWD loves me a thousand times more than my parents ever did. It’s my city. Where I should’ve been raised. Where I hear people yelling my name, telling me they love me.

But it doesn’t feel real. It doesn’t feel like home. Not even the ring feels like home anymore. I feel fucking homeless lately. I walk around with a hole in my chest, and no matter how hard I punch, how much I train, it won’t go away.

Banners wave all over the arena. Women scream my name. Yet all I want is for Brooke Dumas to scream it. But she never does.

I take down my last opponent with a solid KO, and the screaming that follows is deafening.

“Our victor of the night, Remingtoooooooon Tate, your RIPTIDE!” the announcer yells.

Sweat drips down my chest, my body hot with exertion. My arm raised in victory, I glance at her to see if she’s watching. She is.

My lips curl into a smile as I point a finger at her, and I watch as a line of people start heading in her direction. Holding her gaze with an even wider smile, I point at a girl coming toward her with my red rose. Brooke’s gold eyes widen in disbelief, and my chest swells with happiness as she’s soon crowded by my fans, handing her roses.

She looks stunned, grasping each rose with an expression of consternation.

On our way back to the house, she’s trembling in her seat. I’m wound up too. There’s no way in hell she’ll be able to deny my kisses tonight.

“You were awesome, Rem!” Pete bursts out inside the car. “Man, what a great night.”

“Great fight, son,” Coach adds, his voice deep with pride. “Never broke form. Never dropped guard. Even Brooke felt the love tonight, huh, Brooke?”

Silence.

Brooke is completely silent, not looking at me, her lap filled with roses. My roses. And yet she won’t look at me.

“You totally killed it,” Riley continues.

I’ve stopped listening to the guys. The only thing I hear now is the silence coming from where Brooke sits, tense across the seat from me, with an armful of roses and completely fucking ignoring me. Frustration eats at me. Don’t all women like roses? She’s clenching her jaw and won’t even look at me, and I’m so fucking confused I want to pull my hair out.

My blood boils in my veins as I stalk into my room and step into the shower, open the cold water, and stand there, closing my eyes and reliving the way she stood there, watching the roses come at her. She’d looked surprised. But had she looked excited? Had she looked happy? This just isn’t playing out the way I’d planned. I’d planned to have her in my fucking bed tonight. Where I wanted to watch her look at me the way she does while I rammed into her panties and made her come a couple of times and gasp, Remington . . .

I’m still simmering in frustration and have just stepped out of the shower and grabbed a towel when I hear the door of my bedroom slam shut.

Suddenly my senses heighten. Every pore in my body buzzes with the knowledge she’s near.

And there she is. Brooke fucking Dumas.

I drop the towel.

She’s standing inside my bedroom and looking straight at me—even after the cold shower, my cock jumps to attention.

Her gaze drops, and her face flushes red as she stomps forward with gold eyes that flash with anger and hurt. She strikes my chest repeatedly, and the pain in her voice reaches into even deeper, more vulnerable places inside me.

“Why haven’t you touched me? Why don’t you fucking take me? Am I too fat? Too plain? Do you just delight in fucking torturing me senseless or are you just plain damn mean? For your information, I’ve wanted to have sex with you since the day I went into your stupid hotel room and got hired instead!”

I react instinctively and yank her up against me while pinning her arms down. “Why’d you want to have sex with me?” I angrily demand. “To have a fucking adventure? What was I supposed to be? Your one-night fucking stand? I’m every woman’s adventure, damn you, and I don’t want to be yours. I want to be your fucking real. You get that? If I fuck you, I want you to belong to me. To be mine. I want you to give yourself to me—not fucking Riptide!”

“I won’t ever be yours if you don’t take me,” she shoots back at me. “Take me! You son of a bitch, can’t you see how much I want you?”

“You don’t know me. You don’t know the first thing about me.”

“Then tell me! You think I’ll leave if you tell me whatever it is you don’t want me to know?”

“I don’t think it, I know it.” I grab her face, my insides roiling painfully as I look into her hungry, frustrated gold eyes. “You’ll leave me the second it gets too steep, and you’ll leave me with nothing—when I want you like I’ve never wanted anything in my life. You’re all I think about, dream about. I get high and low and it’s all about you now, it’s not even about me anymore. I can’t sleep, can’t think, can’t concentrate worth shit anymore, and it’s all because I want to be the fucking ‘one’ for you, and as soon as you realize what I am, all I’ll be is a fucking mistake!”

“How can you be a mistake? Have you seen you? Have you seen what you do to me? You had me at hello, you fucking asshole! You make me want you until it hurts and then you won’t do shit!”

“Because I’m fucking bipolar! Manic. Violent. Depressive. I’m a fucking, ticking time bomb, and if one of my staff messes up when I get another episode, the next person I hurt can be you. I was trying to break this to you as slowly as possible so I could at least stand a chance with you. This shit has taken everything from me. Everything. My career. My family. My fucking friends. If it takes this chance with you, I don’t fucking even know what I’m going to do, but the depression will hit me so deep, I’ll probably end up killing myself!”

When I notice the shock on her face, I force myself to release her.

Holy god, why’d I just do that? Why’d I say it like that? I sound like a fuckup. I thought she would one day stomp away and slam the door? Hell, all I have to do now is count the seconds. My nerves are run ragged like wires. I haven’t slept, and everything I’ve told her is not even half of the truth. My chest is a mass of tangles as I go grab a pair of pajama bottoms, then I grab a T-shirt from the closet.

I can see her struggling with the word. Bipolar.

Manic-depressive.

Crazy fucking loon.

I give her time to process and clench my hands, the T-shirt still at my side, and I feel like a grenade is about to explode inside my chest as I watch her struggle. I’ve just shot my plan of taking it slow and proving myself to her all to fucking hell. I’d been postponing. Biding my time. Maybe I didn’t want her to know. I wanted to pretend she’d never have to know. And I could be just this normal guy with her. I’ve tried all my life not to let it define me, even when for years that was the only thing I was.

Nobody told me I was a fighter, or that I could be a friend, a son, or a companion. All the medics told me was I was bipolar.

And now she knows. She knows this is me—and I’ve lost her. Before I had her.

I’m still adjusting to the fact that she will want nothing to do with me when, one by one, she slowly flicks open the top buttons of her top. At first I’m sure my brain is fucking with me. One button pops open, then the next, revealing sweet, tanned skin, more and more skin. My pulse jumps and my throat starts closing from the force of my need. Somewhere in the room, someone speaks, and it’s probably me. I’m in denial. I can’t believe it. I won’t believe it and she better get out of here before I do. “I’m take as-is,” I warn her. “I’m not medicating. It makes me feel dead and I intend to live my life alive.”

She nods.

I clench inside, right there, where my fucking heart is, as her fingers keep moving over her buttons.

“Take your clothes off, Remy.”

She flicks open her last button and parts her shirt through the middle, and my fingers spasm so hard at my side that the T-shirt I hold falls to the floor.

She’s so beautiful my eyes devour the parting of her shirt and the smooth skin she just revealed, and I still can’t believe something so beautiful and perfect would want to be with me. “You have no idea what you’re asking for,” I rasp, and I don’t know who I’m angry with. I’m just angry that I’m bipolar, and right now nothing can convince me that I’ll ever be good enough for her.

“I’m asking for you,” she counters.

“I won’t let you fucking leave me.”

She holds my gaze steadily, and my heart pounds so fast in my temples, I can barely hear her. “Maybe I won’t want to.”

My heart whams hard in hope, and I feel like it’s about to break all the ribs around it. “Give me a goddamned guarantee. I won’t let you fucking leave me, and you’re going to want to try. I’m going to be difficult and I’m going to be an ass, and sooner or later, you’re going to have fucking enough of me.”

She tosses her shirt to the floor and then pushes her skirt down her hips. She stands in a cotton bra and panties, her chest heaving, her eyes so deep and endless I feel sucked down to the pit of me. “I’ll never have enough of you, never,” she breathes.

I swear, in my life, nothing can come close to this. To the way I need her. Want her. Fucking love her. I’m being devoured on the inside with my feelings, tons of stuff I’ve never felt in my life, and a low, hungry sound rips unbidden up my throat.

She stops breathing, while I’m breathing so hard I can hear myself in the room, and I need to grab her to me so bad, I curl my fingers into fists at my sides as I speak roughly to her. “Come here then.”

She looks at me helplessly, and I wait, my heart crashing into my rib cage as I take her in, in that underwear. She’s the sexiest, hottest thing I’ve ever seen, every little muscle in her body sleek and compact, while her hips are curved like a soda bottle, her little nipples poking into her bra. When she takes the first step forward, my entire body tightens. Her pulse flutters, and my mouth waters with the need to taste her, suck her.

She stops a foot away, and I reach out and instantly tangle my hands in her hair and yank her head back, burying my nose into her neck. Her feminine scent makes me growl, and as she shudders and scents me back, I lick a wet path up her neck and engulf her in my arms. “Mine.”

“Yes, yes, yes, Remington, yes.” She fists her hands in my hair and I inhale her like a madman, then I grab her face and drag my tongue up her neck, her jaw, and lick the entry of her lips.

Hungrily, I part her open and nibble the soft flesh, making her whimper as I thrust inside. Our tongues tangle, and holy god, I swear I can feel her melt for me while I burn for her. I burn so fiercely my nerves crackle like fireworks inside me as I strip off my bottoms and her bra. I fill my hand with the flesh of one full breast and lift a puckered nipple to my mouth. I wet it with my tongue while I sift my fingers under her panties . . . and then she’s in my hand. Hot and slick. Mine.

“Tell me this is for me,” I gutturally command, teasing the tip of a finger inside her.

“It’s for you,” she gasps, then she kisses my temple and jaw as I tear off her panties with one quick yank.

Her eyes widen in pure female excitement as I lift her and swing around, slamming her back against the wall, her legs coming around me. I settle the length of my cock at her entrance and yank her arms up above her head.

“Are you mine?” I demand, sliding a hand between us and easing my middle finger inside.

“I’m yours.”

The words ripple through me as I scrape my middle finger deep inside her channel. “Do you want me inside you?” I huskily demand.

Her eyes are glazed with desire, her lips reddened and wet by me. “I want you everywhere. All over me. Inside me.”

I struggle to stay in control when I start penetrating her, slow and easy. Slow enough not to hurt her. Only to pleasure her. She whimpers as I stretch her, and as I start to pull out, she holds on to me and drops herself lower—taking all of me inside. Pleasure rips through me as her heat envelops me.

Crazed with desire, I grab her breasts and push my tongue inside her mouth, and she sucks me, drinks me. I feast on her jaw, her chin, her tasty little neck, then I duck my head and suckle one of her pretty nipples into my mouth.

“Remy,” she moans, and tightens her arms around my neck. Her strong, lithe, little thighs clench around my hips, and a bolt of pleasure shoots through my body, making me tremble as I hold still.

“Remy . . .” she pleads, rocking her hips. “Please, please . . . move.”

I groan and try not to think about how good she feels so that I can make it last, but she wants it . . . fuck, I want it more than I want to live. Slowly, I withdraw from all that wet, delicious heat, then thrust back in. A sound of pleasure tears from both of us. Her pussy ripples around me, and my cock is so ready to jet off, it takes everything in me to pull out of her snug warmth and thrust back in, and when I do, I growl and drop my forehead to hers, kissing her without control. I rasp her own name into her mouth and clench her hips as I pull out and ram back in, deep enough that every part of my cock is embedded inside her. I’m so worked up with this new rhythm, I go off violently inside her. She comes with me, and we shake and clutch each other. She twirls her little tongue up my throat as our bodies contract and unwind as we press together, and when I finally relax, I growl softly.

I’m still hard as rock and she’s still wet as fuck, so I grab her ass and keep her legs around me, carrying her to the bed. Still inside her, I set her down gently, prop a pillow under her head, and I start moving again.

Testing her first, doing it slowly, I’m wordlessly asking, You want more?

She responds with a sexy little mew as she rakes her nails down my back, and she’s stunning beneath me. A fucking wet dream looking up at me. Swollen lips. Glazed gold eyes. Flushed cheeks. Dark hair. She pants for air as I bend to force my tongue into her mouth.

“You wanted me,” I rasp, and, god, I can see that she does as she stops gasping to suck on my tongue. “Here I am.”

I claim her harder this time, plowing her so that every cell in her body is jarred by my fucking thrusts and so she knows I’m her fucking man now. She takes it so well and looks so hot as she comes, I pull out and rub my wet cock over her thighs, her abdomen, squeezing her lovely breasts in my hands and tasting her neck as I get her all sticky and wet with me.

“I’ve wanted to touch you for so long, Little Firecracker.”

I love how she likes when I play with her nipples. I love how hard and tiny they are, and how pink and responsive. Tweaking them until they look red and happy from my pinching, I grab her hips and take her again. Deep. Hard. My fingers dig into her hips, and she’s so hungry and tight, she moans my name, “Remington.”

I’m claiming her—and she’s giving it up to me with no protest. She wants to be claimed. She wants to be mine.

She is. Mine. Now.

She gasps . . . “Please, oh, god, you’re so hard, you feel so good.”

And I tell her she’s “so sweet and wet” as she grabs my buttocks and pulls me closer as she twists underneath me, and I can’t resist the way her pussy starts milking me. Her orgasm tears out a soft cry from her lips, and I release a low, ragged moan, my body clenching and releasing with her.

We collapse on the bed, and she draws my arm around her body and cuddles closer, kissing my nipple. I shift her so I lie on my back and she lies straight over me, her tight tummy against mine.

I feel like a goddamn king. I’ll never get enough of you, never. . . .

She’s the first woman I’ve ever come inside of. She fucking let me. To me, that’s code for You’re definitely my man.

Yeah, I feel fucking fantastic and I still want to bathe her in me so every inch of her beautiful skin smells of Remington Fucking Tate tonight, her man.

Shifting her, I spread her small, loose body over mine, stomach to stomach, and nuzzle her ear as I run my hands down her sweet curves. “You smell of me.” I fucking like it so much, I start sniffing her neck.

“Hmmm” comes her lazy answer.

My nose brushes against her temple as I clench her juicy ass. She sounds sleepy, but I’m too wired now to rest. “What does hmmm mean?”

“You said it first,” she saucily counters, and I can hear the smile in her voice.

My gaze trails down the curve of her jaw in the darkness as I gently tell her, “It means I want to eat you. Your little biceps. Your little triceps.” I nudge her nose with mine so she tips her head back, then I kiss her sweet mouth. “Now you.”

Easing sideways, she takes my hand and spreads it over her abdomen, where I left a damp trail on her skin. “It means I’m going French this week and not showering so I can smell you on me.”

God, I swear only my woman would say that. Groaning, I shift us sideways so that we face each other, then I reach between her legs and slide my semen up the inside of her thigh, into her pussy. “Sticky?” I croon as I bend my head and tongue her shoulder, meanwhile penetrating my wet finger back inside her. “Do you want to wash me off you?” I gently prod.

Brooke wiggles almost unnoticeably, but not so unnoticeably that I don’t see she wants to get closer to me, my lips, my body, and my fingers. I fucking love it. “No,” she breathes, parting her legs just a little bit for me. “I want you to give me more.”

What I want is for her to taste us, so I rub my wet finger across her lips and push it into her mouth.

“I wanted you since the first night I saw you,” I gruffly murmur to her, watching her suck on it.

“So did I.”

Her admission tangles all over my gut, and I shove a second damp finger into her mouth, watching her soft, gold eyes drift shut as she licks up our taste like it’s a banquet. When she moans, I’m swelling back up again.

“Do you like my taste?” I prod.

“Hmm. That’s all I want from now on.” She lightly bites my fingertips, and my cock jumps to full length as her teeth sink into my flesh. “I’ll always want my Remy fix after dinner,” she continues. I’m getting painfully hard and the teasing glimmer in her eyes is driving me insane with lust. “And maybe before breakfast. And after lunch. And at teatime.”

I groan, I can’t take it. A man with a purpose, I slide down her parted legs and my tongue lashes out to taste her sex. She archs up in offering, and I grab her buttocks to lift her higher to my mouth, her taste intoxicating. Sweet, with a little kick that lands straight in my fucking balls. I’m so fucking horny and thirsty for her, I can only speak in between licks. “I . . . want to . . . come . . . on every part of your body.” I suck her taste in, pinching my eyes shut as I savor, then I rise to stroke my erection along her entry once more.

She grabs my head and rocks in a silent plea as she takes my lips with hers. “Come wherever you want, inside me, outside me, in my hand, in my mouth.”

Her fingers curl around my cock, and the touch is so unexpected, so sweet and so bold as she gently strokes me, my cock jerks and I start coming, splashing semen all over her arm, her wrist. She rolls me onto my back and jumps on me, impaling herself on my shaft, and I bark out in pleasure and thrust my head back as I grip her hips and pull her up, then ram her back down, still jetting off inside her.

Later, she shudders with a soft scream, tossing her head back as she explodes with me, then she falls, limp and unresponsive, on my chest. I spread her over me and leave my cock inside her, panting, sliding my hands down her back, tracing her ass, the dents of her spine.

We lay for hours, petting. She’s weak, but I’m still hyped up from being with her. I can’t stop stroking my hands down her curves. I touch her knee, her bottom, her hair. “The night they sedated you . . .” she asks me groggily, hours later, “that was an episode?”

She caresses my abs, but not even her touch keeps me from tensing up at the topic.

“Can we even talk about it?” she asks.

I close my eyes as she continues caressing. I haven’t been given caresses that aren’t foreplay before. I don’t allow these when we’re done, I’m done. Like a fight. But she’s touching me and I like it so much, I press her down to my neck so she doesn’t put any distance from me. “You can talk to Pete about it,” I whisper.

“Why don’t you talk to me about it, Remington?”

Ah, fuck. I sit up and twist my feet off the bed, then drag my hands down my face. “Because a lot of episodes I don’t remember what I do.”

I start pacing. I hate talking about it. The topic distresses me. It’s something I can’t remember and usually have no clear control over. What does she want me to say? I do shit, and then I’m not sure I did it? I seem to lose control, and when I come to my senses, I usually find out from someone else what a major dick I seem to have been?

“All right, I’ll talk to Pete about it, but come back to bed,” she blurts out, but she ceded too easily. I’m no moron and I know she wants to know. Hell, she deserves to know.

“I remember you,” I tell her, just to be clear about that. “In my last episode. The tequila shots. The way you looked. The little top you were wearing. The nights you slept in my bed.”

She seems to absorb that for a moment and then whispers, her voice holding the most tenderness I’ve ever heard anyone address me with, “I wanted us to happen so bad.”

My chest tangles with emotion, and I swing around. The depth of her eyes is endless. The way they stare right into me. I feel seen. Without reproach, disgust. I feel hungered for. Wanted in a way I have never, ever, been wanted.

“You think I didn’t?” I whisper in disbelief. “I’ve wanted us to happen since . . .” Heading back to bed, I can’t resist kissing her. “Every second I want us to happen.”

Three fingers touch my jaw, her gaze curious on my face. “Have you ever hurt someone?”

God damn I hate having to tell her this. I want to tell her I’m strong, fast, the strongest and the fastest. I don’t want to tell her I’m a fuckup. Dangerous. Volatile. Yeah, I’m a mess. But I’ve never been a liar. “I hurt everything I touch. I destroy things! That’s the only thing I’m good at. I’ve found whores in my bed I can’t remember bringing back with me and I’ve tossed them naked out of my hotel room, pissed like hell because I don’t remember what I did. I’ve stolen shit, vandalized shit, woken up in places I don’t even remember getting there. . . .” I drag a breath, then sigh. “Look, since Pete and Riley alternate days off, there’s always someone to knock me out for a day or two when I get out of hand. I hit a low, and then I’m back. Nobody gets hurt.”

“But you. Nobody gets hurt but you.” With a worried crease in her forehead, she takes my hand in hers, and I can’t believe how something smaller than you can give you such a great sense of well-being. “Remy, do they have to knock you out like that?” She laces her fingers through mine, and I glance down and stare at her. At that crease on her forehead. Those gold, gold eyes, worried for me in a way that’s so new to me, it’s almost amusing. But it’s not. I want her to know I’ve got this. She’s holding my hand, and I grip her tighter so that I’m the one holding her. I will always hold us both.

“Yes,” I say emphatically. I don’t care what Pete has to do, but I need to be kept in line, now more than ever. “Especially if I want . . . this . . .” Using my hand, I signal to her, then at myself. “I want this. Very badly.” Then I nuzzle her. “I’m trying not to fuck it up, all right?”

“All right.”

I kiss the back of her hand. “All right.”

♥  ♥  ♥

BROOKE WAS MISSING her friend, so I decided to bring her up from Seattle. With some reluctance, I agreed she could go with Pete to pick up Melanie at the airport.

“Remy, you’re so good,” Brooke said, sloppy kisses all over my jaw, making me laugh. Yesterday I caught her and her best friend laughing, and Brooke made love to me all night. I’ve never been so connected to anyone in my life.

When I handed her one of the sedatives Pete and Riley use—because I want her to know how to put me down if she needs to—she wouldn’t so much as look at it.

“No, Remy, don’t ask this of me.”

“It’s just to make sure I don’t hurt you.”

“You’d never hurt me.”

I get hot just thinking about the ways she keeps on trying to protect me. I’m fucking sure she knows I’m her mate. If we were in other times, and I couldn’t hunt for a day, I know damn well she could hunt for both of us.

Coach yells from the corner, “Too slow, Riptide, too damn slow. Hit it!”

I glance at the hard bag and punch. Whack. Whack. Concentrating on hitting. It comes from your core, and as long as you direct it properly, there’s no fucking way there won’t be power in that punch. I work my core more than anything. Everything I do works it, even jump rope.

I spend all day at the gym, and when I get to my sparring partner, I see Brooke and Melanie at the door. My chest swells with happiness and proprietariness. She signals that they’re leaving, and I pull off my headgear and smile.

I get a rush making her happy. I turn back to my partner and focus. My life had never felt so right. So good. I’ve never felt so accepted or so fucking understood.

That night, Pete summons me to discuss my finances. Brooke is having dinner with Melanie. I glance at my phone but get no text from her.

We’re at the hotel bar.

A woman walks up. “You have amazing eyes.”

I ignore her and turn back to Pete, drilling him: “At what time did she say she’d be back? . . . You sure Riley’s getting her? . . . Why the fuck are they taking so long?”

“Riley texted they’re on their way back,” Pete tells me after like the tenth question, and he sends me up to my room.

I’m withdrawing into myself. I’m restless. My gut feels tight and I don’t trust when I feel this. I grab my headphones and sit down, tapping my foot. I listen to Chevelle’s “The Red.”

When she finally comes in, my chest tightens. Her cheeks are pale, but her eyes well with emotion when she sees me. I don’t know why my gut tightens.

She jumps on my lap, pries off my headphones, and slips them over her head. She frowns at the song. Yeah, she hates those rock songs, and I need to kiss away that frown. I kiss her nose, cradle her jaw, and rub her lips with my thumb. She jumps, drops the headphones onto the desk, and runs to the bedroom.

My gut tightens again, and I sit there, turning off my headphones, restless. I can feel the darkness teasing into me. I’m trying to calm myself. She’s here. She’s back. She’s all right.

I watch her return. Something in her eyes that I can’t pinpoint is feeding my monster ten times over.

“Remy, would you hold me for a bit?”

I study her, confused about what I feel. Then I realize she looks anxious and in need. “Come here.” I shove my chair back and extend my arm, and she wiggles against me as I engulf her. I chuckle softly, instantly calmed in a way that only happens when I touch her.

“You missed me?” I cup her smooth cheeks and tip her head to me.

“Yes,” she gasps.

I gather her to me and set my smile to hers. We stop smiling as the heat crashes through me.

My fingers outline her breasts, my mouth on her jaw, then I’m at the back of her ear, inhaling her, growling softly when her scent fills me. Winding me up and relaxing me. “Remy . . .” I hear the need in my name as she pushes my T-shirt up my shoulders.

I grab it in my fist and toss it aside, then strip her down to her skin, then yank her down to me again, my covered erection grinding in between her thighs. She strokes my chest and kisses every part she can.

“I missed you so much,” she says, running her lips over my jaw, grabbing my hair as she presses close to me.

I engulf her in my arms and stroke her back, then seize her face. “I missed you too.” I set a kiss on her sweet lips, and her nose, and her forehead.

She trembles, pressing so close. I want to open up and let her in any way I can. “But I missed your voice. Your hands. Your mouth . . . being with you . . . watching you . . . touching you . . . smelling you . . .” She takes my lips more desperately.

I try to slow down, but her mouth tastes amazing, and I need to remind myself that she is mine, mine, so I unbutton her and strip her bare as quickly as I can.

I draw her back to my lap when she’s naked.

My whole body clenches when I feel her pussy nestling my erection. She seems undone.

She slides between my thighs and I yank my sweatpants partway down my hips until my hardness pops free, and her fingers are all over me, rubbing, squeezing, caressing.

“I want to kiss you here. . . .” Brooke’s voice shakes with desire as she looks into my lust-tightened face, into eyes that I can barely keep open from the want. “I want to drown in you, Remington. I want your taste . . . in me. . . .”

She takes me in her mouth. Ecstasy burns through me as a sound rumbles up my throat. I need this so bad I rock my hips, slowly, up to her mouth, giving her what she wants and taking what I need. Her tongue runs all over me and her eyes are halfway down as she watches me, and I watch her back, amazed, undone . . . losing myself in her, praying she can rescue me from the dark already starting within me, the high of being manic.

♥  ♥  ♥

I FEEL LIKE a million fucking bucks.

Who the hell wants to sleep? I feel like climbing a mountain with Brooke on my back, taking her to the top, then flying down on a damn fucking parachute.

I prowl the kitchen and peer into the cupboards. I not only feel like a million bucks, my body feels like a million bucks. My fucking cock feels like a million fucking bucks and I want to give them all to Brooke Dumas.

I stick a granola into my mouth, orange juice, a spoonful of peanut butter. I pound in some more so Brooke can rest, but I am so fucking wired and so fucking hard just knowing she’s in my bed. . . .

I want to feed her and then fuck her and then feed her and then fuck her again and make her feel like a million bucks too, all in that order.

I start with the food and bring a huge bowl of cherries and granola to our room.

She’s there, lying in bed with the sheets at her waist, her tits pressed into the mattress. Fuck I want those tits squished against me.

Setting the food aside, I jump on the bed, and as I run my hands all over her satin skin, I growl, “You look especially good, Brooke Dumas. Good, and warm, and wet, and I wouldn’t mind having you on my breakfast platter.”

Nudging my face in between the mattress and her chest, I drag my tongue up between her breasts, then lick her collarbone, and her sweet taste seeps into me and drives me wild. “All that’s missing is a cherry on top, but I’m sure we have some.”

I grab a cherry and rub it against her clit.

Groaning with a half smile, she rolls to her back, her legs spread open, her pussy all wet and mine, her eyes all melted for me.

“Who’s your man?” I kiss her, rubbing the cherry around her clit. “Who’s your man, baby?”

“You,” she moans.

“Who do you love?” I prod as I roll her clit under the pad of my thumb and ease my middle finger into her pussy. She stares up at me with half-mast gold eyes, liquid with wanting.

“You drive me crazy, Remy,” she whispers as she wraps her fingers around my cock and pulls me closer.

“If that’s a lie, I’m going to make it true,” I think it fair to warn her.

I grab her hips and shove myself in between her thighs to rub my cock against her sex. I bend down the length of her body because I want to eat her. Lick up from her tiny toes, up the arch of her foot, her delicious calf, her precious knee—where I will linger and give it some love—then up her lean, toned thigh, up to her sweet pussy—which I hope will be soaked like a raining heaven by the time I get there.

Getting down to business, I go forward and nibble my way up the inside of her thigh. She starts laughing and kicks me on the shoulder, but I catch her leg to still it.

“Remy! That tickles.” She’s laughing, trying to pry her leg off my grip.

I cock a brow and run my finger up the arch of her foot, then up the inside of her leg. “This?”

She laughs and kicks again, twisting to get free.

So I swiftly change plans, grasping her wrists and pinning them above her head as I spread my big body over hers. I know she loves it when I hold her down. She can’t move unless I let her, and her eyes are darkening and she’s panting softly beneath me.

“Remy . . .” she says, sobering, her gold eyes both playful and caring as she looks up at me. “Are you speedy?”

I smile wickedly and drag a finger along the inside of her arm. “What do you think, little girl?”

“I think you’re very speedy.” She tugs free and runs her fingers over my hair as she looks into my eyes. My, probably, black eyes.

I bite her thumb gently and then lick it before I let it go. “So what are you going to do about it? Do you want me to lift the bed with you on it? Or do you want me to take you on it?”

She laughs and rolls over, flinging a pillow in my direction. I shove it aside and I grab her by the ankle, pulling her back easily to me. “Get over here.”

She laughs and fights to get free and I watch as she edges to the side of the bed, a peek of her pink pussy teasing me, driving me insane with want. I’m crackling with energy. I think I can fly her out of here if she wants me to.

She drives me so crazy, my every muscle is clenched and poised for me to make her mine. My blood storms through my body like fire rushing through my veins. Right now I want nothing more than to take her to heaven. I feel all-powerful, all-feared. I am Remington Tate “Riptide” and this girl is Mine.

I reach over the bed and she squeals and tries to stay free, attempting to crawl off the bed. I laugh when I catch her ankle and drag her back to me. “Where do you think you’re going? You’re mine. You get over here and let yourself be taken.”

“No, I need to pee!” she cries, flinging the other pillow at me, then she hurries to the bathroom and closes the door.

“Gah. Come the fuck here,” I growl, knocking on the door. She’s started brushing her teeth, from the sounds of it. Finally, the water stops and I hear her unlock the door. I open it and find her toweling off her hands. I go to her, scoop her up, and she nuzzles my neck as I carry her to the bed.

She sighs. Because she knows I want her. She’s being playful, making me chase.

“What am I going to do with you?” she groans tenderly, her fingers linked on my nape. She’s smiling up at me like I’m some long-lost prince. And what she doesn’t know is that this long-lost prince is going to fuck her into oblivion.

I fling her to the bed, and she squeals delightedly. I drop down on her and ram her legs apart.

I kiss one naked thigh first, then the other, then I kiss her pussy. “This is mine.” I lick it.

Her head falls back and she moans as my thumb steals between the swollen sex lips and dips inside her. My mouth waters and I growl softly as I use my thumb to enter her while I rub my tongue across her clit.

She parts her thighs and releases a mew that drives the hunter in me wild with the need to conquer. She starts thrashing and I grab her and hold her still. “Give me what I want, Brooke.”

Tossing her head side to side in pleasure, she whimpers and bites her lips and pumps her hips up to my face. “I’m all yours.”

“That’s right.” I tenderly urge her thighs apart as I come to my knees. “That’s right. Now open up. Let me in.” She does, and I sink between her legs, grip her hips, and my body tightens as I enter. “Yeah,” I say when she moans, tossing her head back. “Who do you love?” I drop my voice, undone by her, and then crush her mouth when she can’t answer me. “Who do you love?”

She moans and buries her lips in my neck, biting me. She murmurs something into my skin, clawing my back.

I moan back and hiss out, “Say my name, Brooke.”

“Remington.” She kisses my ear and tugs on my earlobe with her lips, breathing in my ear, excited. She’s gasping my name in lust, but I pretend she’s answering my question.

She’s wet and hot, and she loves me, and she’s all I’ve ever wanted. Stronger than I imagined, more female than I ever imagined. Funny and nurturing, vulnerable and sassy.

I love her so much my chest hurts as I watch her arch her spine and take me inside. I groan and duck my head as she clutches me to her. I clutch her back and try to slow down, and she rubs my skin with her fingers. She knows I need it and she gives it up to me with no protest. When she’s tired, asleep. When she’s busy, when she’s sweaty, when she’s hungry. She gives it up to me whenever I want, whenever I ask for it, because I’m speedy. Because I’m me. Because I know, deep in my gut, where it sometimes hurts to look at her, Brooke Dumas loves me.

♥  ♥  ♥

I’VE BEEN AWAKE for eighteen hours and twenty-eight minutes. My heart is pounding thirty-nine beats a minute. Brooke has been in my arms for exactly nine hours and twenty-eight, now twenty-nine, minutes. I’m jacked up and I can’t sleep.

She’s cuddled like a little kitten against me; I want to pet and lick from the top of her head to the soles of her little feet.

I’ve cataloged the room in my head. I know where everything is. I could run in it in the darkness without bumping into anything. I could carry her in my arms without danger. Everything’s in my head—perfectly visualized.

But nothing as perfectly as her face.

Her lips are parted and they shudder on each breath. Shaped like a heart, the bottom one just as juicy as the top. Her cheekbones are high and her eyelashes rest over them, soft-tipped crescents.

I just want to lie here in this bed in this darkened hotel room and drink her in all over again until I’m drunk and high on her.

I am a fucking pendulum.

Any disturbance to my balance, and I swing.

The doctors taught me this.

Once I swing high, nothing on earth will stop me from crashing back down. I fall by gravity. Natural urge of the body to restore balance.

But that’s the thing. A pendulum always seeks its balance.

She’s my balance. I need her more than air.

Ducking my head to her neck, I breathe her in and growl.

♥  ♥  ♥

AND IT’S A fucking crappy week.

I don’t like the way Brooke looks at Pete and Riley with a smile and talks to them. We’re flying to New York and I can’t help thinking how much I don’t fucking like that Coach treats me like I’m a goddamn pussy and need to fucking rest, and that Diane is giving me the same fucking food, over and over. But Brooke. I’m onto Pete and Riley, by god, I am. If they so much as give one look at her—they are done with.

I glare at them from the bench. They tried to help her with her suitcase; the dickwads think I don’t know they’re crushing on her?

I pull her closer to me and set a kiss on her forehead.

“Who are all these people here for?” she asks. A huge crowd is at the FBO where my jet parks when we arrive at New York, and security has cords holding them back. She’s so puzzled, it’s adorable.

“For me, who else,” I tell her.

Pete laughs. “Get off it, Remy.”

I swear they are all staring at her. I pull her to me. “Come here, baby. I want these good folks to know you’re with me.” I squeeze her ass to mark my property.

“Remington!”

I usher her into the limo before the rest come in, then I grab her to me and kiss her. I’m so fucking starved for her, I need to feel her heat, her warmth, her tongue.

My hunger is wild and unleashed, completely crazy. “I want to take you somewhere tonight,” I rasp into her mouth. “Let’s go to Paris.”

“Why Paris?”

“Why the fuck not?”

“Because you have a fight in three days!” She laughs delightedly, and I want to take her to Paris, I don’t care about the rest, but she whispers, “Let’s go anywhere with a bed.”

I immediately fuck her in my mind on a bed, and then I imagine— “Let’s do it on a swing.”

“Remington!”

“Let’s do it in an elevator,” I propose. I am fucking her in an elevator, standing, my tongue hot and hard and pushing into her while I plunge my cock inside her, over and over.

Laughing, she shakes her finger at me, and I grin. “I’m never, ever, doing it in an elevator so you’re going to have to find someone else.”

“I want you. In an elevator.” Standing in that elevator, my tongue in her.

“And I want you. In a bed. Like normal people.”

My eyes dip to her cleavage, then down her body, to her pussy tightly hugged in the most delicious pants I have ever seen. I want to write a fucking letter to the makers and praise them for a job well done. Thanks to their jeans I have a good view of my woman all the time. “I want you in those pants you’re wearing.”

She nods and grins, then twines her fingers through mine and lifts my hand to kiss my knuckles.

I’m curious to see what she’s doing because I don’t remember her kissing my knuckles like this. She crawls closer and cups my jaw, sets a kiss on my cheek, and runs her hands through my hair, and my entire body homes in on her touch and the tenderness in her eyes as she looks at me.

Car doors open.

Coach rides up front with the driver, and everyone else slides onto the bench across from us. Brooke tries wiggling free but I tighten her fingers in mine and make her stay put. I don’t want her to stop touching me, all my body craves it. My mind is not thinking any shit anymore. Who cares what Coach does, Riley . . . I just look at her. And feel . . . good. Calm. Calmer. I want to rest my head on her and I slide down—fuck me for being so large—then I pull her closer and set my head on her chest. I can hear her heart pounding under my ear. She went very still, and I want her to relax. I pull her closer and shift so she’s comfortable, and I feel her melt with me.

I close my eyes and my mind feels quiet. It is quiet. I like it. I’m not thinking of anything except the pounding of her heart under my ear. Then I feel her fingernail along my earlobe and I tighten my hold to keep her locked to me. Tenderness oozes out of her like a blanket. I shouldn’t want it this much, but I do. Nobody can take this from me.

“You guys want a time-out when we get to the hotel?” Pete asks us in a voice that I can barely recognize as Pete’s.

She’s moving her fingers in my hair, and when she doesn’t speak, I move my head yes, not lifting it so that she won’t take her hands away. I crave her hands. It’s not the contact as much as the tenderness in her touch. The way her fingers respect my muscles, push just enough, support and help them let go. It happens inside me. I don’t believe in words, but I believe in this.

She strokes me all over with both hands, softly, and I hear her chatting with Diane about a recipe for me while we ride to the hotel, and her heart is steady and strong under my ear, and she’s small and fragile and smells like she does, and I am never letting her go.

I will. Kill myself. Before letting her go.

When we get to the suite, I’m anxious again. She’s getting her cosmetics out of her suitcase, and I watch her hands move on her bag and pull out her toothbrush, and then she brushes her teeth. And I do nothing but crave crave crave. Inside me in the very pit of my being.

I want to break that fucking toothbrush and anything that takes her from me.

She rinses and towels her hands as I approach. She looks at me questioningly and I can’t explain what I need, but I am in a tangle and roiling and I need her like my next breath, and if I had to choose, I would choose her over oxygen.

I lift her in my arms and carry her to the bed, and she cuddles into my neck and breathes me as I lower her.

I pull off her small shoes and toss them aside, then take off mine and speak gruffly. “I want your hands on my head.”

She edges back on the bed. “Does it calm your racing thoughts?”

I take her hand and spread it over my chest. “It calms me here.”

Just feeling her fingers spread over me, I can breathe better, I stop thinking. I stare back into her eyes and slide next to her, then I drop my head to her chest and smell her neck. I’m so fucking in love with her I don’t think anybody could ever hurt me like this girl could. Not Scorpion, not my parents. Because I don’t care about them. Now all I care about is her.

I feel her softly kiss the top of my head as she runs her fingertips through my scalp.

This is the way I want to die one day.

With her at my side, our bodies touching. I won’t need to say anything, and she won’t need to hear it, because she gets me. She gets that words are sometimes bullshit and people don’t mean what they say and through it all it’s only actions that matter. And all I care is that she gets me. We are yin and yang or whatever that shit is called; she is my female and I need her. I knew it from the instant I saw her, and she knew it too, and that’s why she ran. She wanted me to chase and I did. I will chase her every time she wants to see if I want her and need her enough.

Quietly, she caresses me. I lie completely still and soak up her caresses, taking what she gives me, because she makes me realize I am so starved for it that I would kill for this, and for her.

And my brain goes quiet and my heart is calm and my life is at a standstill, and the pendulum that I am, all the swinging to and fro, finally stops and I feel like I finally found my center.

♥  ♥  ♥

I THINK I fall asleep. I dream of elevators, pink pants, swings, and Paris. I dream of her laughing in a Hummer limo and cupping my jaw and touching my hair and looking at me like I am the only man alive and like she loves me.

I wake up and she’s holding me in her arms and I don’t know what time it is, but I see she’s still in those pants. She tells me to take them off her, and I do, and I make love to her, and to my disbelief I fall asleep again.

My stomach wakes me. It is empty and grumbling. There’s warmth all around me, and Brooke’s hair. And I absorb it. I’d stay here all day if my stomach weren’t so vicious and my muscles so demanding.

I grumble at her, “Hungry,” and grab some sweatpants and stalk out to the kitchen. I grab some celery and peanut butter and start wolfing down to calm the hunger, a bit, then immediately start thinking about what else I can shove down my throat.

She appears and starts exploring what food is in the hot drawer. When I see her, I’m scooping up peanut butter on a celery stick and munching and almost swallow my tongue.

My eyes widen, and I drop the celery and cross my arms, staring while I feel a whole lot of good things rise up in my chest.

“Look at you,” I growl.

Clad in my RIPTIDE robe, she brings over some plates and I am delighted that her scent will get all over my robe and then on me when I wear it.

“I’ll return it when we get back to bed,” she tells me.

I shake my head and pat my lap. “If it’s mine, it’s yours.”

She sets down the food and I cup her hips and set her down on my lap as I stare down at the plates with a watering mouth.

“I’m so fucking starved.” I grab a red potato and chomp on it.

“You would love my mom’s red potatoes. She adds cayenne pepper and gives them just a little kick,” Brooke tells me as she forks one up and munches.

“Do you miss home?”

I chomp on another potato while Brooke looks at me for a moment. She has an expression and sets down her fork and fully faces me, then strokes the scruff of my jaw with her fingertips. “When I’m not with you, I do miss home. But when I’m with you, I don’t miss anything.”

I smile because I’m relieved. She brushes a dimple with her lips, and I growl and rub my nose against her little one. “I’ll tuck you close so you don’t miss it,” I promise her.

“Please do. In fact I’m sure there’s enough space right here.” She wiggles on me and I nip her little earlobe and squish her easily, saying, “That’s right!”

We laugh, and I take her fork and grab a potato and feed it to her. She takes the fork back and feeds me too. I eat, but I like feeding her more. All my instincts home in on her mouth’s opening for me and on her eyes watching me as I come feed her.

The way her eyes shine on me make me feel like I am a god.

I slide my hand under her arm and caress her while I fork up a bite for myself, then I cut some for her.

She watches me as I cut, and I watch her as she bites and savors it and gets all my blood pumping so fucking hot, I’m burning all the way down into my soul.

“Who do you belong to?” I ask her, stroking my fingers up and down the divots of her spine. But suddenly food isn’t what I want. I set down the fork and slide my hand through the parted fabric of my RIPTIDE robe, curving it around her waist. I set a kiss on her ear, rasping, “Me.”

“Entirely yours.” My heart tangles at her admission as she maneuvers so she’s straddling me, and she buries her nose in my neck and slides her arms around my waist. “I’m getting so nervous about the big fight. Are you?”

I chuckle and peer down at her. “Why would I be?” I tip her head back, and she looks worried, frowning. “Brooke, I’m going to break him.”

I want her to know there is no doubt in my mind I am going to break that motherfucker. I don’t hate him, I don’t give a shit about him, but he’s not taking what’s mine. I’ve worked all. Fucking years. For this. My whole life. I fight to live, and I live to win.

“Remy, I love the way you fight,” Brooke whispers, searching my face, “but you have no idea how nerve-racking it is for me.”

“Why, Brooke?”

“Because. You’re . . . important to me. I wish nothing touched you, and every few nights, you’re just . . . out there. Even knowing that you will win, it does a number on me.”

My chest tangles again at the thought of her leaving me, getting sick of me. “But you’re happy, Brooke? With me?”

I wait for her to answer. I don’t know if she understands that I don’t ask a lot of things I want to, I am not used to asking. I am asking her if she loves me. If she wants to be with me. If she will stay with me. If I make her as happy as she makes me.

She looks at me and I see the concern and tenderness in her gaze, and the knot inside me starts loosening before she even speaks, for I know the answer.

“Deliriously.” She slips her arm around my neck and presses close like I like her, whispering, “You make me happy. You make me deliriously happy and delirious, period. I don’t want to be without you for a second. I don’t even want all those women to look at you and shout at you the things they do.”

Her possessiveness gets to me. It speaks to me so deeply that I instantly feel possessive of her—I want to physically show her she has all my devotion, so my voice comes out rough. “I’m yours. You’re the one I bring home with me.”

I go to her neck and drag her soft scent into my lungs until I’m relaxed and satisfied, then I buzz the back of her ear and tell her, “You’re my mate, and I’ve claimed you.”

I can tell by her soft smile that she likes it. That she likes that I’ve claimed her. I start feeding her again, and it gets all my instincts up and running in the satisfaction of being able to provide and feed her, protect and love her.

We fall into an easy rhythm and she starts telling me about Melanie, Riley, and how those two have become friends, and I tell her, “Tell me more.”

“My sister, Nora, used to fall in love with anything. She used to make fun of me and tell me I didn’t like men.”

I scrape my hand down her spine, smiling. “Did you tell her you were waiting for me?”

She laughs and pokes a finger into one of my dimples. “I’ll gladly tell her that now.” She smiles and pokes both my dimples now. We keep eating, and I feel immense satisfaction that she’s never given her heart away. It is mine. She is mine.

“Do you remember anything nice about your parents?” she asks when we get back into the bedroom.

“My mother used to cross me every night.” I lock the door, and briefly I remember my mother. “She crossed me on my forehead, over my mouth, and over my heart.” I don’t mention that she also mumbled and prayed words all day that had nothing to do with the rest of the things she did to me.

“She was religious?”

It comes easily to block out the memory as I pull out my iPod and my headphones and shrug, bring my stuff to the nightstand. I won’t be sleeping for shit tonight. My head is already starting to buzz with things to do, punching bags to hit.

“Do you miss your family?” she asks softly.

I get into bed with her and I tell her the truth. “You can’t miss anything you’ve never had.” I grew up with my music, and that will always be with me. I would miss that like crazy and couldn’t live without it. Frustrated with my robe, I pull it off her and ease the satin off her shoulders. She knows I need her naked and pulls her arms loose for me, then cuddles her small, lean body against my bare chest.

She feels so good, I feel her breasts rising with her breaths, my nose in her neck, her scent calming my thoughts. I might be okay for a while, but I know it won’t last and I’ll be needing to do something in a moment.

I think she notices my feet are restless. Fucking feet fucking feet fucking fuck it fuck!

“If I told you something,” she whispers with a twinkle in her eye as she slides one leg between my thighs, our bodies tangled and close, “would you remember tomorrow?”

I pull the covers over us. “I hope I do.” Fuck me, I hate myself sometimes.

I’m trying to calm down the buzzing inside me when she strokes my head, and my leg stops. I bite back a growl and close my eyes and suck in her touch, then she reaches over me to the nightstand. I see she grabs my iPod and headphones.

“Put these on,” she says. She looks so excited, I grin. I fucking love my music, and a song becomes doubly important when she shares it with me. I straighten up against the headboard, drag her with me, put on my headphones, and drag her to my lap, where she crawls on and selects a song.

It starts, and I don’t think I’ve heard it, but I have tons of shit in there.

Then I start hearing a woman singing and she sounds upbeat and hopeful. The way Brooke looks at me, smiling, watching me with brilliant gold eyes, makes my gut clench, and I hear the words and what she’s telling me and my body tightens as I hear the chorus come: You’re so beautiful, but that’s not why I love you. . . .

I scan her face because a part of me just won’t take this as the truth. I look at her eyes, her nose, her cheekbones. She’s killing me, and I need to know she’s not messing with me, but she isn’t. She almost wears the expression of being the one who is softly singing it to me.

My body seizes and tightens in excitement. I feel made love to mentally, in my head.

“Play it again,” I tell her roughly. She bites her lower lip and clicks the button to replay it, and I can’t take listening to it one more time or my chest will explode into a million pieces—I will be all in fractions from now on.

I roll her over and set her on her back and place my headphones on her little head, brushing her hair behind her ears so it doesn’t get caught. Her eyes widen as the lyrics start playing to her, and I can see the way her irises flare and her lips part in surprise. Then she closes her eyes so tight, I see the crinkles at the corners, and I watch her listen.

I kiss her, slowly parting her lips with mine, so that it’s not the lyrics that tell her I love her, not a voice, not a word, but me.