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“This,” he replies, brushing his plump lips across my neck, kissing my ear, making me shiver. “Is something I can’t fight anymore.”

Holy. Shit.

“Come here,” he says, voice low and dark, gravel and silk. “Need you, Casey. I want you so damn bad.”

I press my body to his, closing the minimal space between us. My breath catches when his arms wrap around me, and then he just lifts me up.

Like I weigh nothing.

Like I belong right there.

And maybe I do.

He carries me across the yard, through the shadows, into a cabin I assume is his.

It smells good inside.

Masculine.

Just like him.

Wood and leather and fire and warmth.

The door shuts behind us with a heavy click, and my heart gallops like it finally remembers how to run free.

He sets me down in the center of the room, but he doesn’t let go.

His hands stay on my waist, large and steady, thumbs pressing into the soft curve of my hips like he needs to feel me there.

“You’re fucking gorgeous, Casey,” he growls. “Every inch. Every curve. Every dimple. And tonight, I’m not stopping until you believe it, too.”

Heat flares down my spine.

I don’t know what to do with the words he’s saying. I only know my whole life, I’ve waited for someone to talk to me like that.

Only, this is even better than I imagined.

“I—” I start, but he silences me with a kiss.

It’s not sweet.

It’s not tentative.

It’s all heat and desperation and the kind of hunger that makes a woman forget who she used to be.

His mouth claims mine, demanding and reverent all at once, and I melt into him because there’s nowhere else I’d rather be.

When he peels my dress off my body, I brace myself for a flinch. For shame. But it doesn’t come.

Because Zeke looks at me like I’m divine.

Like he’s been starving, and I’m the only thing that can feed him.

And when his mouth finds my neck, my shoulder, the swell of my breast—when his hands map every inch of me with a worshipful hunger—I do exactly as he promised I would.

I believe him.

I believe I’m beautiful.