Chapter 46 For the second time in as many minutes, my stomach drops, only this time it's as much from anticipation as it is from fear. I force myself to look at the well-worn boots, the denim-clad legs, the form-fitting white T-shirt. But I pause there, because if I look any higher, I already know the eyes waiting to meet mine are going to be warm, melted chocolate. Sly. Sly is in my dressing room...and he looks as devastating as I am devastated. All the defenses I've been stacking like bricks around my heart all day? Gone. Crumbled by a single look. Even before he says in that dark, gravelly voice that never fails to send shivers of the very best kind down my spine, "Don't you think we need to talk about this?" I'm not sure if it's his words or the look in his eyes, but my brain short-circuits. Just flat-out ceases to function. For a woman who's spent almost a decade getting by on her wits alone, it feels like a betrayal. And that's before he starts walking toward me. Slowly. Deliberately. Like gravity itself-pulling me toward disaster one relentless step at a time. "I didn't think you'd come," I whisper. "Eighteen hours ago, you asked me to hold you until you fell asleep." The words flow like warm syrup from lips I ache to taste. "Did you really think I'd walk away at the first little bump?" "They were coming after you. They were using me to hurt you. I saw-" My voice breaks as that horrible press conference comes back to me. "So you thought you'd take yourself out of the equation?" He takes up where I left off. He's closer now. So close that I can feel the heat rolling off him in waves while the warm, safe scent of him wraps around me like a blanket. "Let them come. Do you really think a bunch of reporters I don't even know matter more to me than you?" "You don't know what it's like." "I don't," he agrees, his eyes finding mine. "I know I haven't suffered the way you have-" "That's the point!" I insist as my heart takes up residence somewhere around the vicinity of my throat. "I don't want you to suffer. I don't want you to end up like me." "Strong? Brilliant? Powerful?" he fires back, though he still doesn't touch me. "Gorgeous? Melodic? Kind-" "That's not fair." I clench my fingers into fists to keep from reaching for him. "You know what I mean." "I do. But I already told you I'm not going to leave you alone in this, Sloane. Unless you want me to, that is." He leans forward until his lips-his perfect, soft lips-are only inches from mine. "Do you want me to leave, corazón?" My head spins. My breath catches in my throat. My heart beats out of control. And all I want is to touch him. And for him to touch me, even though it terrifies me. "You shouldn't be here." I force the words out when what I really want is to ask him to stay. "That's not the same as not wanting me here." As if he can hear the need burning inside me, he lifts a hand to my face, his warm, calloused palm cupping my cheek while his fingers slowly brush against the careful disarray of my hair. "Tell me you don't want me, Sloane. Look me in the eye and tell me you want me to go, and I'll never bother you again." My eyes dart around the room, searching for something to grab onto, something to concentrate on, besides the long, lean heat of the passionate man standing in front of me. I want him so badly it hurts, and all I'd have to do to put myself out of my misery is lean forward just a little bit and press my body against his. But I don't. I can't. Not when any move on my part will set us both off and ruin all the time I've spent today trying to distance myself from him. From us. From the mess we've made. Not for my sake but for Sly's. "I don't-" My eyelids flutter shut as my voice breaks on the lie. "Uh-uh," he tells me gently as my shaky words hang in the air between us. "You have to look me in the eye when you say it." "I don't want-" I manage to gasp out one more word this time. But my hands are on his chest, trying to push him away, even as my fingers twist in the soft cotton of his shirt to bring him closer. I can't look at him when I say it, can't lie to his face. His hands tangle in the ends of my hair and pull in a way that's more coax than command until my eyes flutter open. And then he's there, right there, his deep brown eyes gazing into mine while the corner of his mouth tilts up in a half grin that I can feel in my core. "Third time's the charm," he whispers. "I don't want to hurt you!" I choke out. It's the best I can do. "Then don't," he answers, and just that easily, heat explodes between us, drenching me in fiery incandescence from the inside out. Making me need, when I promised myself I'd never need again. Making me weak, when I've fought so hard and so long against any weakness. Sly knows it, too. I can see it in his blown-out pupils, hear it in the breaths bellowing in and out of his lungs. Feel it in the rapid rise and fall of his chest as it brushes against me. Tension builds between us, an agony of need rampaging through my veins as I hang, frozen on the edge of a precipice, waiting for whatever comes next. My hands clutch at his chest. My hips move restlessly against his own. And my mouth-my traitorous, tragic mouth whispers, "Please, Sly. Please-" I don't get to finish the plea, which is probably a good thing because at this point I don't have a clue what I'll ask for. And even less of an idea what I'll beg for. I do know, though, that when Sly's mouth slams down on mine, nothing has ever felt so right. The rightness scares me more than anything, has my entire being screaming at me to step back, to get away, to be anywhere but here even as I arch against him, desperate to get closer. I hate the mishmash of wants and needs warring inside me, the indecision of whether to run or wrap myself around him like a ribbon on the best present ever. But this is hard. More, it's terrifying. Because if I let him stay, if I let him make love to me like I so desperately want, then I'm doing more than just fucking in my dressing room. I'm jumping in with both feet. But then he looks me in the eye and whispers, "I've got you, Sloane. I promise. I have you." Experience tells me not to believe him, but lord help me, I do. And just that easily, any thought of resistance melts away. One kiss, I promise myself as I get swept under. One kiss and I'll make him go. Except, like everything else when it comes to Sly, things don't go according to plan. But how can they when his mouth ravages mine, not in a dance but in a claiming that vanquishes my defenses before I even realize there's a battle to be won...and lost? "Sly," I gasp out, my hands sliding to his shoulders in a last-ditch effort to maintain control-over myself or the situation, I don't know. But the truth is, I've long since lost it, even before Sly wraps his free hand around my waist and pulls me closer, head lolling back to bare my jugular until I don't even have the illusion of control anymore. And then he attacks, ravaging the sensitive skin of my neck, my throat, my collarbone with open-mouthed kisses and careful little scrapes of his teeth that make me whimper his name. "Sly!" This time when I call it, it's a plea for him to never, ever stop. And he doesn't. Instead, he propels me backward until I'm pressed against the nearest wall. "Tell me you want this." He meets my plea with his own as his hands fist at my sides. "Tell me this is okay." "I want this," I gasp out as I hitch a leg around his waist and pull him closer, my whole body threatening to erupt. "It's okay." "Tell me you want me," he whispers against my skin, pushing my dress up to my hips. "I want you," I cry, the words falling over us like rain on a wildfire-too late to stop the burn, too soon to know if we'll survive the flames. "I need you." "I need you, too," he grinds out as he grabs both my wrists in one big hand. He uses the other to reach down and rip the top of my fishnet tights and panties clean off my body. "I need you, Sloane." Seconds later, he's on his knees, his mouth on the very heart of me. "Sly!" One second I'm calling his name, and the next he's hurtling me straight into the cosmos so fast and hard that I can barely remember my name, let alone why I thought this was a bad idea. But Sly doesn't stop there. Not even close. Instead he slows things down until I feel like I'm going to implode. I rip my hands from his grip, clutch at his head, his shoulders, try to pull him back up so I can have him where I really need him. But he just laughs, biting at my inner thigh as he slides his hands around to cup my ass. "That's it, corazón. Tell me again how you don't want to hurt me." "Fuck you," I gasp out as I pull him closer, closer, closer. And then his mouth is on me again and all I can think is that I was born for this. Born for him. And maybe I was, because nothing in my life has ever come close to feeling this good. This right. This fucking perfect. It's a dangerous thought, one that any other time would have me taking about twelve steps back. But that's impossible now, not just because my back is against the wall but because Sly isn't letting up for an instant. Pleasure moves from peaks and valleys to one long, continuous roll that weakens my knees and has my entire body trembling. It goes on and on and on until I can barely breathe, let alone stand, and then it goes on some more. After minutes that seem like millennia of soft, pulsating pleasure, Sly eventually sits back on his heels and looks up at me. "I'd do anything for you, Sloane. I'll walk away if that's what you want. All you ever have to do is tell me you don't want this anymore. But we're not doing this bullshit ever again, okay?" he says as his fingers slip inside me. "You don't walk away to save me. You only walk away if you don't want me anymore." He moves his hand, and my whole body convulses, electric shocks running through my veins. "I was trying to protect you," I cry out as the need continues to build and build inside me once again. Goddamn, this man will be my undoing. "By breaking my fucking heart?" His words twist me up on the inside, but I'm too far gone to give them the attention they deserve right now. How can I when every cell in my body is threatening to spontaneously combust? "By getting myself as far away from you as I could," I answer brokenly. "Your reputation-" "Fuck my reputation. Fuck the media. And fuck anyone who thinks they get to tell me what my priorities are. You are my priority right now, Sloane." He pushes deeper, and I see galaxies of light as I try to fight back the pleasure threatening to topple me over the edge again. But Sly's saying important things, and I don't want to miss any of them. "And until you tell me otherwise, we're in this together, you and me. Understand?" "I-" My voice breaks. "Tell me," he whispers, his mouth right up against me again. "Tell me you're mine and that we're in this together. But only if you believe it, too." "I'm yours," I babble, my hands clutching at his shoulders, his hair, any part of him I can reach. "I'm yours and we're in this together." "And I'm yours," he says right before he sends me spinning off the highest cliff yet. The pleasure is so intense this time-so immense and overwhelming-that I burst into tears even as I drown in ecstasy. Sly gathers me in his arms immediately, pulling me close as he whispers sweet nothings in my ear. I cling to him with every ounce of strength I have left as we both wait for my oversexed, overheated body to slowly calm down. When I can finally breathe again, I whisper, "It's not that I don't want you. It's that I don't want you to have to go through what I have." He wipes the last vestiges of my tears away before whispering right back, "Corazón, what you've gone through is a travesty, and it's going to stop. It may take me a while, but the misogyny and assholery directed at you is over." "That's what I'm saying, Sly. It's not your job to take bullets for me." He gives me a look that says we'll see about that, and I'm too tired to fight him on it. "We're going to come back to this discussion when you haven't wrung every ounce of energy I've got out of me right before I have to give a two-hour concert." "We can talk about it all you want, but my answer isn't changing." Though he does drop me gently on the couch before crossing to the fridge in the corner and pulling out an energy drink. "Here. You should probably drink this." "You think?" I ask sarcastically. He smiles like a man who knows exactly how big his dick is. "Next time, you probably shouldn't send me a text like that." "Next time, I'll make sure you're banned from the building," I shoot back. "You can try," he replies. "But then who's going to make you come until you cry?" "Nobody." I give him a drop dead look. "That's the point." "Weak point." He crouches down next to me on the couch and presses soft kisses to my forehead. "That's the first thing you've said tonight that I agree with." I lean into him because I can't not. Because he's Sly and he's magic. My magic. "I think you mean the second thing," he says as he slides the torn remnants of my fishnet tights down my legs. "Also, you're going to need another pair of these." "You do have a talent for understatement, don't you?" I reach for my phone, which is somehow still in the pocket of the dress I'm wearing, and text Lucinda about a wardrobe malfunction. "Are you staying for the concert?" "I'd love to, but I can't. I've got curfew in about forty-five minutes." He sounds as reluctant to leave as I am to let him go. All I say, though, is, "Well you sure as hell aren't missing that." He grins ruefully. "Something told me you'd say that. In fact-" He breaks off at the knock on my door. "Ten-minute warning, Sloane." "That's Olivia," I tell him with a sigh. "Which means I really do need to get going. I'm not looking forward to explaining this wardrobe malfunction to Lucinda, by the way." "Oh, I'll take credit." This time, "self-satisfied" is the only way to describe his look as he leans over and kisses me once more. "Have a good concert." I can still taste myself on his lips. "Thank you," I murmur, though I don't know if it's for the sentiment or the truly impressive number of orgasms he just gave me. "You're welcome." He smiles against my lips, then nips at the bottom one before pulling back. When his eyes grab onto mine, I can see the seriousness in them-and the hurt that hasn't yet gone away. "I can't stay because of that damn curfew. But I'm going to call you tomorrow morning. Please tell me you'll answer the phone." I'm tempted to ask, Or what? But I have no doubt he'll demonstrate. And right now, neither one of us has time for that. "Text me when you get back to the hotel so I know you're safe," I tell him. He nods. "Back atcha." Then he drops one more kiss on my lips and disappears out the door just as Lucinda walks up to it. Her eyes go wide as she looks from him to my torn-up tights lying in the middle of the dressing room floor. "I don't suppose you'd believe I was choking and he used them to save my life, would you?" I ask, brows raised. "Not unless he went for your throat by way of your vagina," she answers as she lobs the new panties and tights at my head. 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