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She sighed, and he moved his hands over her skin, got them all soapy and slid them over her curves. Did that until she was panting, until she was arching against him.

“Settle down,” he said.

He got some shampoo, washed her hair. Scrubbed his fingers through the silky strands. And when he looked at Bix, he sighed...

It almost looked like tears streaming down her cheeks, but of course, that could just be the shower.

It didn’t have to be anything else.

Maybe they weren’t tears.

She opened her eyes, though, and he could see that they were glassy. “No one has ever taken care of me before.”

It was like a punch to the chest.

No one had ever taken care of him before either. And that he was doing an all-right job of it with her...

Don’t. You don’t need to go there.

But it was fine. For now. He just wanted to care for her. He just wanted to give her things. Because she was Bix. And she was special.

He moved his hands over her curves again, then between her thighs, stroked her there until she was sighing.

He felt himself getting hard again, which he would’ve thought was impossible after that explosion of passion in the living room. But he wanted this. The passion.

It was reckless, he knew, but it was safer than the tenderness that was threatening to cave his whole chest in.

He pushed two fingers inside of her and watched her face as he pleasured her.

Then he backed her up against the shower wall, and positioned himself at the entrance of her body, and thrust inside.

He gritted his teeth. Nearly swearing when he realized what he’d done.

But she felt so good.

He was losing it. Because this wasn’t him. He was more controlled than this. He was more responsible than this.

Holding her tightly, still buried inside of her, he opened up the shower door, turned the water off. And stepped out holding her.

She clung to him, and he walked her to the bed, laying her down next to the cookies. “Hey,” she murmured when he withdrew from her.

“Condom,” he said. “My bad.”

But he meant so much more than that. It sounded casual. And he didn’t mean it that way. It really was bad. And he really did regret it.

It really was him, as if he had jumped onto a parallel path. One he had decided to get off of years ago.

And now here he was again. He had been careless. And he couldn’t be careless with her. He couldn’t afford to let feeling, to let need overwhelm him like this. He got a condom out of the bedside drawer and rolled it over his hardened length. Then he went back to Bix, kissing her deep as he thrust into her again.

She looked up at him, her eyes going glassy again as she wrapped her arms around his neck. “Daughtry.”

And right then, he would’ve given her the world. He wanted to slay every dragon that had ever come for her.

The intensity of the feeling that was building inside of him was unlike anything he’d ever experienced before. It wasn’t just an impending orgasm. It was more than that. She was more than that.

It was everything. Absolutely everything.

He focused on the pleasure. Focused on the building need within him. On the orgasm that was chasing him down like a hellhound. He focused on that, because it was easier. He focused on that, because it felt good.