Page 122 of The Moments You Were Mine

She broke our kiss, looking around the room and taking in the flowers and candles and champagne before eyes burning with desire returned to mine.“I didn’t expect all this.”

I ran my thumb along her bottom lip. For two seconds, I let the asshole JJ enter my mind, pissed that he might not have given her any of this. Romance and flowers and sweet, sensual, slow sex in the flicker of candlelight.

“I demand you start expecting it,” I said, voice rough and low.

“Yeah?” She cupped my cheek, and I leaned into the warmth of her stroke. “And what about you, Parker? What do you expect?”

“You’ll always be able to tell me no, Fallon. I’ll never expect you to say yes. But tonight, I want to taste you. Every single inch of you. To watch you climax around my tongue and my fingers before I take you up and over again while I’m buried deep inside you.”

She pressed a hand to her chest as if the words had hurt. It rose and fell at almost a frantic pace. She tossed her purse aside and pressed herself against me. She wrapped her arms around my neck and set her mouth on mine. Strong. Hard. Fast.

I met her pace, her demands lick by lick, but I wasn’t going to let her take this at her normal Fallon speed. I was determined to savor every single second of our first time together. I placed my lips on her neck, nipping and sucking as I found the dress’s zipper and slowly tugged it down.

My hands slid into the opening at the back, gliding over silky skin before pushing the material over her shoulders. I eased back enough that the dress dropped to the floor, leaving her in nothing but a thong and her cowboy boots. Her bare nipples were hard and straining. A delightful feast just waiting for me. I dipped my head, lapping at one and then the other, and she moaned. That same enchanting sound I’d heard this morning.

I picked her up and set her on the bed before returning to my worship of her. I started with the hollow at the juncture of her ear and neck, making my way down to the sharp cut of her collarbone, the gentle valley between her breasts, the taut slopeof her stomach, and the indent of her belly button, delighting in the birthmark I found right at her pelvic bone.

As I placed a kiss there, her hands tightened on my necktie, forcing me to meet her gaze. Something flashed in them. Humor mixed with longing and a surprising dash of hurt that had my hands freezing.

“Are you saying yes, Parker?”

My endorphin-overloaded brain couldn’t follow her thoughts.

Her hips pressed into mine, and a hand cupped me through the tuxedo pants.

“You feel like you’re sayingyes, but I could have sworn you once told me you’d never say yes to me. That you would never break. Never ring a bell and give in.”

I rested my chin on her stomach, despising I’d hurt her so deeply.

“I claim self-defense, Ducky. I’m sorry I hurt you to save myself from breaking a promise I never should have made. But you have no idea how close I was to shattering that night.” Her eyes turned stormy. “Or how much I hated it when I woke to find you gone. I thought I was protecting you, but instead, I sent you careening back into that loser’s arms.”

Goddamn tears floodedmyeyes.

She brushed at my lashes, fingers rubbing the dampness.

“Show me what you would have done if you hadn’t denied us both what we wanted.” Her voice was low and sexy and sent a pulse to my dick that was almost my undoing.

And I did just what she demanded, gliding fingers and tongue over the slopes and valleys, and embedding the love I felt into every touch. I indulged myself in studying and learning her, pursuing her pleasure until she was panting and her hips were thrusting. I sucked on the scrap of silk at her core, and she mewed. The sexiest sound I’d ever heard.

“I need you inside me, Parker, and you’re wearing too many clothes.”

“Say it, Wife. Say the word I want, and I’ll gladly remove the penguin suit.”

Her eyes sparkled. “Kermit?”

I bit her thigh, and just like with the pinch, I wasn’t exactly gentle.

She had the audacity to laugh once again, which made my determination grow.

I knew how to buckle down and get what I wanted. I could be unrelenting.

I dragged the tiny excuse for panties over her hips, trailing kisses over her skin as I revealed everything below them. I removed her boots and then stepped away from the bed to feast on the portrait she made with her hair spread along the pink satin of the bed linens, chest heaving.

As I stared, her hand settled low on her stomach, a protective motion.

I twined my fingers with hers, settling over the little bean growing inside her. That’s what it would look like at this stage if I remembered right from the parenting books I’d read. I’d get to watch this child grow while inside her, and I was surprised at how much that excited me. How much I truly wanted to be a part of it all. I’d watch over this baby and be the best father it could ever have. I’d trained to accept nothing less than the best from myself.

The idea of not being a SEAL for much longer stabbed me in the gut, but it wasn’t as severe as it should have been, because I had something even bigger and more important waiting for me, something filling that vague emptiness I’d been fighting.