Page 120 of Modern Romance December 2025 5-8

Amy gasped as his mouth trailed heat and moisture over her bare shoulder and neck as he joined her on the bed. Head flung back, she linked her arms around his waist as he freed her breasts from her bra and turned his attention to the quivering peaks, cupping, stroking, kneading as she arched her back to give him full access.

Pausing for a moment, he removed his boxer shorts, allowing his erection to fall straight into her waiting greedy hands, and they closed over the shaft, drawing a deep feral groan from the depths of his chest.

He returned to pay homage to her breasts once more, his tongue flicking a taut nipple. As need pounded through him, Leo fought for some sort of control when all he wanted to do was plunge straight into her softness.

‘You’re beautiful,’ he rasped as he removed the tiny panties she wore and propped himself up on one elbow to stare down at her now totally nude body.

She took his hand and guided it to the apex of her legs and the soft fuzz there. Her eyes drifted closed as he began to stroke her.

Her body was ready for him before he even touched her, so wet and hot as his fingers slid over the intimate folds.

Throbbing with need, he kissed his way up her body before sliding between her open legs. Her back arched as he rotated his hips before sliding incrementally deeper inside her, and she closed around him, tight as a glove.

As they moved together seamlessly, Leo felt the loneliness he never acknowledged melt away in the heat of their union, the softness of her body, the total surrender she offered him.

As the firestorm of sensation built inside her, Amy not only forgot how to breathe, she forgot where she ended and Leo began. It was a total immersion in a perfect, decadent storm of ecstasy that only ended when it finally exploded and annihilated them both.

Lying there, breathing hard, stunned by the intensity of the moment, she felt him kiss her eyelids and couldn’t help a nip of fear. She was affected too much by what had just happened.

Confused by the flurry of movement from Leo, Amy opened her eyes and watched him, at first bewildered and then understanding, as she realised there would be no intimate aftermath.

‘You’re going?’ she said, keeping her voice carefully neutral as she pulled the sheet up over her cooling body.

Retrieving his shirt from where it had fallen, his eyes brushed her face and, ignoring the hand squeezing his heart, he nodded. He had to keep moving because he hadn’t wanted to leave the bed at all; he had wanted to stay there and hold her.

That should not happen when you scratched a carnal itch, he thought, and it was a relief to recognise the loneliness he usually wore like armour settle firmly back into place. As he dressed, he welcomed the return of the hollow ache inside that was a permanent part of him.

‘Get some sleep, Amy. I’ll see you in the morning,’ he called over his shoulder before he left the room, closing the door behind him.

She heard the door slam but didn’t see his exit because she had turned over and was pummelling the pillows with her fists as mortification rolled over her in waves.

She really hated him for doing that to her.

She wasn’t too keen on herself either right now, for being such a total pushover.

Outside in the hallway, Leo leaned his shoulders against the wall and thrust his long fingers into his hair. Tilting his head back, he gently banged it against the wall, the sinews in his neck standing out like cords under his olive skin.

He stood there for several moments until his erratic breathing slowed and became regular again. He was in danger of complicating things, and he refused to do that. They shared a natural chemistry, that was all. Yes, it was hot, but it would inevitably cool, and so the sane thing to do would be to enjoy it while it lasted. Some heavy-duty sexual release would be both curative and pleasurable. It would wipe the slate and his head clean of the lingering chaos Amy had left behind.

It should have been a cut and dried deal. Logically, it would have been, had she not changed. He’d been deeply invested in her being the same sweet, pliable and ultimately weak Amy he’d known her to be.

He’d needed her to bethatAmy.

His teeth gritted in a frustrated grimace. Instead, she wasthisAmy.

The one who had stepped outside the box he had put her in and then crushed it under her small heel.

The one who stood up to him, who was not anxious in the slightest to please.

And the hell of it was, he found this new Amy even more attractive.

He shook his head, the groove between his brows deepening as he relived the staggering moment that peace had broken out when she’d stepped into a kitchen of warring egos, without even raising her voice.

She had managed them and they didn’t even know they were being managed. Was there a fear that she would manage him too, if he let her?

Chapter Seven

The last timeAmy had glanced at the clock it had been four a.m. As she reached for her phone and glanced blearily at the screen, she saw it was now half-past seven. She lifted a hand to shade her eyes from the light that was shining through the window as she hadn’t drawn the blinds last night.