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“Did you get any help?”
“I spent the time waiting for my divorce in a woman’s shelter. They helped me as much as they could. I went to their counseling, but I’m still struggling to get free of my past, I guess. I took jobs out of state to get away, start again.”
“Was he fucking crazy? Didn’t he realize what he had?” Kade replied fiercely. “It’s goddamn lonely to be with someone who doesn’t give a shit, but I can’t stand the fact that he actually intentionally hurt you.”
Looking into his liquid blue eyes, she said hesitantly, “You sound like you know what it feels like to be with someone who doesn’t care?”
“I do. My girlfriend of ten years dumped me when I was in the ICU after my accident because I wasn’t what she had bargained for, because I wasn’t able to fulfillherideal. I do fucking know what it feels like, and it sucks. But I wasn’t powerless. I had money and I had family and friends.”
Asha’s heartbeat accelerated and she could sense Kade’s anger and the same sense of betrayal she had felt when Ravi had basically written her off and made her his target of rage because she couldn’t produce a child. “Then she wasn’t worthy of you. If something so superficial turned her away, then you’re better off without her,” Asha answered adamantly. Kade was a man worth keeping, whatever the circumstances. Didn’t his ex-girlfriend understand that he was the type of man most women longed to have, a man who was constant and would care, no matter the circumstances? “You deserved so much better than that,” she said sincerely, placing her palm against his whiskered jaw.
Kade’s eyes turned molten and hot, his nostrils flaring as he asked hoarsely, “How do you sleep with someone whose only objective is to get you pregnant and beats you up?”
Asha shrugged uncomfortably. “I was his wife,” she said matter-of-factly. “It was my duty, and if I’d refused, it would have been worse. It was usually over with pretty quickly.” She didn’t want to mention that she wasn’t left with much of a choice. If Ravi wanted sex, he took it. The few times she’d tried to fight it, he’d almost knocked her unconscious.
“That isn’t the way it’s supposed to happen, sweetheart.” Kade’s hand left her face, his fingers sliding sensuously through her hair. “You’re a woman who’s meant to be savored, a woman a man wants to pleasure. There’s nothing that would give me more satisfaction than to watch you come. Hard.”
His words shot straight from her fluttering belly to her core, moisture flooding between her thighs as she saw the desire in his eyes. Her cheeks were red with embarrassment, but there was raw passion raging through her body, making her unable to look away from his carnal expression. “How do you watch that when it’s dark?” she asked, unable to tamp down her curiosity. “He was the only man I’ve ever been with and it always happened quickly, with the lights off.”
“Shit! Didn’t he ever make you climax?” Kade brought his hand to her ass and pulled her unresisting lower body against his hardness.
Asha’s mouth dropped open with need as much as surprise. He was hard and wanting, the rest of his body as hot for her as his eyes. “No,” she admitted, mesmerized and unable to stay away from the unknown force that drew her to Kade. “It was dark, and it was over in a minute or two.”
“Baby, you should never be taken in the dark,” Kade answered, annoyed. “Do you know you look just like the picture of yourself in your portfolio? Ripe, needy, and ready to be taken and satisfied.”
Asha knew exactly what picture he was talking about. “You looked at my drawings,” she accused, feeling naked and exposed. That drawing was all about her yearning, her craving for something that didn’t exist.
“Someone? Sometime? Somewhere?” Kade verified gruffly. “I have the answers to those questions.
“Me,” he whispered hoarsely as his lips explored the sensitive shell of her ear, his hot breath making her shiver.
“Now,” he added, his fingers spearing into her hair and his hand pulling her ass up harder against his engorged cock.
“Right fucking here,” he finished with a masculine groan, his lips sweeping down to capture hers.
Kade’s scorching mouth sucked the breath right out of her body. Asha moaned against his lips and opened automatically, her need for this, for him, insatiable. She probablyhadlooked exactly like her self-portrait, because her need was intense and unstoppable, and now Kade was delivering what she wanted with every stroke of his tongue. He kissed like a man possessed, a man determined to conquer and dominate, and she responded with equal desire. Her fingers threaded in his hair and stroked down his neck, needing to touch him as much as he seemed to need to touch her. Asha felt captured, enraptured, and dominated, his hot, muscular body pressed into hers. But she reveled in it, in him. He savored her mouth, his need urgent, but his tongue explored every recess of her mouth like he needed to be acquainted with every inch of it. He vibrated with a masculine growl as she pushed back, as eager to explore the kiss as he, reveling in her freedom to taste him. Knowing Kade wanted her was heady, a pleasure that mesmerized her, filled an emptiness inside her that had been there as long as she could remember.
Kade. Kade. Kade.
Her hips moved forward, her pussy trying to get closer to his engorged member, cursing the layers of denim between them.
Closer. I need to get closer.
Asha knew she was drowning, losing control, but she gave herself over to Kade without a coherent thought, the needs of her body taking priority. She tore her mouth from his and begged, “Please. Oh, please,” she panted, needing more, frantic for more.
Kade lifted her easily onto the kitchen counter, bringing her breasts directly in front of his face. She gasped as he tore off the buttons of her shirt to get it open. Scantily endowed, she had gone braless, and the cool air hitting her sensitive, pebbled nipples was a shock.
“My shirt,” she murmured breathlessly, more embarrassed about her small breasts being revealed than the actual clothing.
“I bought you more,” Kade growled as his mouth sought and found one breast, his other hand coming up to tease the other.
Asha cradled his head against her breast, still panting with need. “Kade. Please.” His fingers and mouth nipped, pinched, and then stroked, driving her need too high, too desperate. Her head fell back against the cupboard, her body feeling like liquid fire as Kade’s mouth devoured her breasts, switching from one to the other, as though he wanted to own them both.
She whimpered, her hands on his shoulders to keep herself from crumpling on the counter.
“You’re so beautiful, Asha. So sweet I could lick and taste every inch of you and still want more,” Kade hissed, his tongue teasing her nipple.
“Small breasts,” she said disjointedly, unable to concentrate on anything except Kade’s heated torture.