Pleasure's Edge (31 page)

“Alec, I have to tel you something, too.”

“Dylan, let me say this.”

His grip on her tightened, but there was no command in it, only urgency. Her breath stuttered in her lungs, her body tensing, waiting for it to come, whatever it was.

“Dylan.” He gave her a smal shake, and her gaze locked to his, her heart kicking up a notch. “Christ, don’t look at me like that. Like you’re going to cry. Fuck, I’m sorry.”

She shook her head mutely. What could she say? She
was
going to cry again, damn it.

“Dylan . . . ”

The sky rocked with a shuddering rumble of thunder. She felt it as though it had come from inside her own body. She began to shake.

“Alec, please just tel me.” She closed her eyes, squeezing them tight.

“Dylan . . . I’m fal ing in love with you.”

“What?”

Her eyes opened. She wasn’t sure she’d heard him right over the pouring rain, the splashing tires from the traffic going by.

“I love you.” He gave her another smal shake. “Please say something.”

His face looked tortured, his eyes shadowed, worried.

“I love you, too, Alec.”

“You do?”

“I was coming here to tel you.” The tears were coming, her heart opening up, flooding with warmth and relief and a little panic that she stil hadn’t real y heard him say it.

“Are you sure?”

“Of course I’m sure. I don’t do anything unless I’m sure.” He pul ed her to him, squeezing her so hard she could barely breathe. But she was breathless, anyway, trying to absorb what he’d just said to her. He
had
said it.

He loved her!

She buried her face in his leather jacket, breathed him in, that dark, clean scent, the earthy tang of old leather, along with the fal ing rain. She was getting soaked to the skin. She didn’t care.

“Dylan? What the hel is this?” He pul ed the motorcycle helmet from her hand.

“I was going to ask you to take me for a ride.”

“What? Jesus. I need you to explain this to me. But let’s get out of this rain.”

He looped an arm around her waist and propel ed her toward his house, onto the porch. She fol owed him numbly, her heart racing. He set the helmet down on a smal wrought-iron table, then settled his hands on her shoulders, his blue gaze piercing her.

“Okay. Tel me what this is about. You said you’d never get on my bike in a mil ion years.”

“Alec, the whole thing with you and your motorcycle, it scares the hel out of me. And when you had your accident, when you talked about going to Baja with Dante . . . I couldn’t handle it. I couldn’t handle loving you and risking losing you the same way I did my brother. That’s why I ran from you. I’ve been afraid, on one level or another, since I met you. But I love you. I’ve had to face that. That I need to be with you, whether I’m afraid of you dying in an accident on your bike, or that I’m . . . that I can’t love anyone. I was scared to death and trying to pretend I wasn’t. Now I just need to work through the fear and be with you.”

“You’ve tried, at least. Which is more than I can say for me.”

“What do you mean?”

“I’ve spent my entire adult life on the run, tel ing myself I was searching rather than running. But then I met you. I found what I was real y searching for. And I couldn’t recognize it at first. Because I had deluded myself al those years into thinking the only option for me was not to get attached to anyone. Because anything we can’t control is random. Love is random. And I’d spent my life fighting that universal rule. I’d spent my life trying to be my father. I thought that was ideal. I thought
he
was. But he was a loner. And probably lonely. By his own choosing. But I can choose differently. I had to love you before I understood that. I’ve been so damn stubborn, hanging on to those ideas even after I began to suspect they were wrong.”

“I’ve been just as stubborn,” she told him, swal owing her tears.

“I’ve prided myself on being so independent. So brave, able to handle anything. But the one thing I couldn’t handle was loving anyone. I ran away from you because I was afraid of losing you.”

“I’m not going anywhere.”

“But you are. You’re going to ride your motorcycle to Baja with Dante. And after that, you’l ride somewhere else. And do your crazy backpacking trips, and diving, and God knows what else.

And I could lose you. I could lose you in some horrible and tragic way.”

The last words came out on a sob, and he hugged her close, kissing her wet hair.

“You won’t lose me. You won’t. I’ve done al those crazy things and I’m stil here, aren’t I?”

“So far.”

He held her, and they were both quiet a few moments. The rain was coming down harder, but it didn’t matter.

Final y, she said, “Alec, some part of me wants desperately for you to tel me you’l quit al of that, get rid of your bike, stop doing those wild trips. But I know that’s not fair.”

“I can’t promise you that. I love you, but I can’t do that. It would be a lie. I’d get restless. Resentful. One of the things I love about you is your fierce independence. I know if I travel somewhere without you, you won’t sit home alone, wilting, like some women would.

You’re not helpless without a man.”

“No. But I’l stil be scared.”

“I understand why. I get it. And, baby, I wish you’d never had to go through that kind of loss. But I have to be realistic with you. I have to be
real
.” He kissed the top of her head again, his grip on her crushing. “So, what the hel do we do? Without either of us changing who we are?”

“Alec, I’m the one who has to learn to adapt here. I can’t make you pay for me having lost my brother. I’ve already paid for far too long. I won’t do that to you. That’s why I bought the helmet.”

“You don’t have to prove yourself to me.”

She shook her head. “I needed to. For myself, maybe, as much as for you.”

“Not for me, Dylan. I love you just as you are.” He paused, held her hand to his lips, kissed it, making her heart surge. “But I need you to ask yourself if you can real y be with me.” He pushed away from her, held her at arms’ length, looked into her eyes. “Tel me Dylan. Tel me the truth. I don’t want you to live in fear.”

“I don’t want to, either. But you are the man I love. I love your fearlessness.” She stopped to sniff, and he reached up, brushing at her tears with his thumb. “It’s a big part of who you are. If I’m going to love you, I have to accept it al . I love who you are.” The tears wel ed in her eyes once more. She wiped them away with a wet, impatient hand. “And Alec . . . ”

“What is it?” he asked quietly.

“Why the hel haven’t you kissed me yet?”

He smiled then, pul ed her close and crushed his lips to hers.

It was a hard kiss, ful of intensity, emotion. His arms had never felt so strong around her, so solid. His tongue was sweet as it slipped between her lips, opening her up. As he always did. And as always, she melted al over. With desire. With love blossoming in her chest, opening her up even more. And it felt good.

He pul ed back, murmured against her mouth, “I love you, Dylan.”

“I love you. But, Alec, I’m stil going to be scared for a while. This love stuff wil take some getting used to. And learning to trust that you won’t be taken away from me . . . I may never get over that completely. I just don’t know. But I’m wil ing to try. I love you too much not to.”

“Good girl.”

At his words a shiver of desire ran up her spine.

“Alec ...”

He stroked her hair from her face. His was beautiful, the shadows gone from his blue eyes.

“Shh . . . let’s not talk anymore right now. We’re going to be together. We have time to figure things out. Let me take you upstairs and show you how I love you.”

She nodded. He looped his arm around her waist and together they went inside. He kissed her al the way up the stairs, his kisses growing more heated until they had to stop at the landing so he could pick her up and carry her the rest of the way to his bedroom.

She was panting, needy, her body aching for him when he kicked the door open.

He set her down, and with his mouth stil on hers, they pul ed off their wet coats, dropping them on the floor. His sweater came next, then hers, then their boots, their jeans, until they stood, naked, at the foot of his bed.

He never stopped kissing her. His hands were on her now, stroking, caressing, his fingertips, his palms, like little kisses everywhere they touched, warming her cold skin.

He was hard and gentle al at once: his mouth, his hands, his panting breath. And everything felt different to her. More tender.

More urgent. It didn’t make sense. But then, love didn’t make sense, did it?

He slid slowly down her body to his knees, his lips brushing over her neck, her stomach, then lower. His breath was hot at the apex of her thighs. His hands were stroking the smal of her back, her buttocks, the curve of her hips. She was trembling al over, desire moving through her in one warm surge after another. And when he bent and laid a soft kiss on her cleft, she sighed, the surge spiraling, her hands going into his wet hair.

“Ah, Alec . . . ”

He kissed her again, just that brief press of his lips, and she was aching, soaking wet, pulsing.

He brought his hands around her body, stil that gentle stroking that was making her crazy, used his thumbs to part the lips of her sex. And leaning in, he ran his tongue across the tip of her clitoris.

“Oh ...”

He did it again, pleasure seeping through her like a warm flood: her sex, her breasts, her thighs.

He began in earnest, then, licking, licking, the gentlest of touches with his warm, wet tongue. And she slipped over that edge and into orgasm, her body shivering with pure pleasure.

She cried out, her legs shaking. But he held her up with his strong hands. And he didn’t stop until the last quivering sigh had left her.

He stood, then, lifting her in his arms, and laid her on the bed.

He stayed where he was for several moments, simply watching her. And what she saw in his face was breathtaking: desire and admiration and love shining through it al .

She reached for him and he came to her, covering her body with his. And even with his enormous strength, he was stil gentle with her. Tender. There was no power play between them now, yet every touch, every whisper, every sensation, was purely sensual, the most erotic experience of her life.

She ran her hands down his back, loving the size of him, the hard muscles like steel curving beneath the smooth skin. And when she moved her hand between them to curl her fingers around his hardening cock, he pul ed in a breath, sighed it out on her name.

“Ah, Dylan . . . what you do to me. I need to be inside you.”

“Yes.”

He reached over her and pul ed a condom from the nightstand drawer, quickly sheathed himself.

“Alec, hurry. I need you. Need you . . . ”

“Baby ...”

Holding himself over her, he ran a hand over her cheek, down the side of her neck, across her col arbone, until final y, he cupped her breast in his warm palm. Desire ran through her in long, sweet shivers, her nipples going hard, her sex fil ing, swel ing once more.

As she watched his face, he pushed into her. One long, lovely stroke, and he was buried deep. His eyes were blazing, that glittering blue, as he looked at her, looked
inside
her in a way no one else ever had.

She knew he could see her, saw al of her. And loved her, anyway. Some part of her stil couldn’t believe it. But he was there with her, in a way he never had been before. Maybe because she was al owing it, final y. Maybe because they had said the words to each other. The first time for them both. There was magic in that.

And, practical girl that she was, even she could believe in that kind of magic.

He pressed deeper, making her moan, and her hands clutched at his broad shoulders.

“Alec, kiss me.”

He smiled, that dazzling smile of his, and bent his head to hers.

She leaned up, taking his mouth, opening his lips with her tongue, slipping inside. It was al sweet heat and slippery tongues.

Passion as hot as their bodies moving in rhythm. His hands went under her, around her waist, holding her close. Her hands went into his hair, stil wet with rain. She breathed him in: rain and earth and that elemental thing that was uniquely him.

Alec.

Hers.

“Baby,” he breathed, his voice fil ed with smoke. “I love you.”

“I love you, Alec. So much.”

He thrust, pleasure shimmering over her skin, through every nerve in her body.

“Tel me, Dylan. Tel me you’re mine.”

“Yes. I’m yours.”

She was. They belonged to each other. And she would face down whatever she had to, her fears and his, not to lose him.

He had taught her to be brave, to be
truly
brave, not to simply put on a façade and run in the other direction. Love had taught her.

It was a lesson long overdue. But it didn’t matter now.

He tightened his grip on her body, his tensing. And as he pumped into her, she held his face, watched him come, his features loose in ecstasy. Her own body trembled with dizzying pleasure, and when she came, he was stil shivering, holding her close.

They stayed that way for a long time, their breathing in sync, bodies pressed together, flesh to flesh. Heart to heart.

And she knew, for the first time, that this was what was important. This was what she’d been missing. They’d both lived their lives on the edge, in different ways. They’d both been running so hard. But somehow they had ended up together, had crashed into each other, ful of fear and fury. And despite that, had ended up with love.