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Then she took him in inch by inch, cherishing his groan, the colour in his cheeks, the way the muscles in his neck corded as he gripped her thighs.

‘Do you see what I see?’ she said, lowering her mouth to his ear, her eyes meeting his in the mirror. ‘How beautiful, how sexy, how incredible you are?’

He shuddered, dark lashes flickering as his vulnerability threatened to surface.

‘You’re so fucking incredible,’ she stressed, moving over him until his eyes were blazing anew, his cheeks hot, mouth slack. ‘And it’s time you realised it.’

He gave a guttural groan and threw her under him, one powerful thrust taking him straight to that sweet spot within. But she knew she’d touched a spot within him too. A spot that needed hitting, that needed telling, that needed loving…

No, not loving. This wasn’t love. She squeezed her eyes shut against it and focused on the pleasure tightening through her core. Every hit against her G-spot taking her to the edge. To the all-consuming high that only sex could bring. A safe high. A temporary high. A?—

‘Blake!’ She came so hard, so fast, her body gripping and shattering around him as he growled his release into the crook of her neck.

His entire body shuddered over her as he fought to keep his weight on his hands.

But she didn’t want his careful consideration.

She wanted him to fall. Wanted to feel him top to toe, pressing into her, consuming her…

wanted this connection for as long as she could keep it.

And sweeping her arms up, she tugged his own down, forcing him into her embrace and holding him tight.

‘Can you stay the night?’ she whispered.

‘Just you try and move me…’

* * *

They’d made love three times already and still he wasn’t satisfied.

She lay on his chest as the first rays of dawn seeped into the room, not quite asleep but not quite awake either.

It was impossible to sleep with all this racing inside him.

He wanted more. From her, from this, but what was more? An actual relationship. Hell, he’d never had one of those. Not of the serious kind. Sex, sure. But commitment, no.

And that was what he wanted. Exclusivity. The whole of her. No half measures. But how to broach that when he knew her stance on relationships, knew it as well as he knew his own. But if he could change…

‘What’s wrong?’ She lifted her head to look at him and he forced himself to relax as he traced circles on her shoulder.

‘Nothing. Not really.’

‘You’re a rubbish liar, you know that?’

He gave a tight chuckle. ‘I might have heard that once or twice before, yeah.’

‘So out with it…’

He couldn’t just say what he was thinking. Hell, he wasn’t even sure he trusted what he was thinking. And maybe this was the norm for her, getting close to people she worked with, creating a bond that led to…

‘Am I the first… what are we – subjects? The first subject you’ve slept with?’

Her face froze over, the panic in her eyes telling him to leave it alone. But too late, he’d asked. And he wanted to know. Even as the green-eyed monster reared its ugly head.

‘Astrid?’

‘No,’ she whispered, tucking her head into his chest. He didn’t know what pained him more, the confirmation or the fact she couldn’t look at him as she said it. ‘You’re the second.’

‘Who was the first?’

He felt her swallow. Was she protecting the guy’s identity? Or protecting herself from something that still hurt? And if it was the latter – fuck, that did hurt.

‘You don’t need to tell me.’ What came before him was her business, not his. He had no right, but… ‘I just?—’

‘He was an artist.’

‘An artist…?’ Another creator like herself. Someone who would’ve inspired her as much as she did him. A perfect fit. ‘How long ago?’

She wriggled even closer. ‘We broke up six months ago.’

Broke up? That suggested an actual relationship… from the woman who claimed love and marriage weren’t in her future.

‘How long were you together?’ He couldn’t help himself now. He had to know it all.

‘A few months.’

‘Monogamous?’

Nothing.

‘Astrid?’

‘I was.’

Oh fuck.

‘He was married,’ she whispered.

‘ What ?’ Of all the things he’d expected… ‘Did you know?’

She came alive, pushing up off his chest to glare at him. ‘How can you ask me that?’

‘Babe, I?—’

‘After everything I told you about my father. Who he was? What he did?’ She turned away, dragging her knees to her chest as her shoulders quivered and he came up behind her, his hand gentle on her shoulder.

‘I’m so sorry, I didn’t think. I just?—’

‘I swore I would never do that to someone. I would never be the other woman. I would never… never … I hated my father for what he did to my mother, I hated what it did to her, and she hated herself for it. How could you…?’

‘I fucked up, I didn’t think.’ Damn, he felt like the scum of the earth. ‘Hey baby, I’m sorry.’ He stroked her hair over her shoulder, kissed the soft skin of her neck. ‘Please come back to me. Please.’

Slowly she turned, but her eyes were downcast, her body folding into him as he wrapped his arms around her.

‘I trusted him,’ she whispered.

‘Did you love him?’

She shook her head. ‘I cared for him. I thought what we had was special. Sex but a connection too. And then one day, his wife rocked up and I… I just ran.’

‘I hope you gave him hell first.’

She swallowed a sob and his heart cracked open.

‘It wasn’t your fault, baby, surely you know that. It was his place to tell you, it’s not on you.’

He eased her onto her back. Her eyes were clamped shut, the tears seeping from each corner tearing him apart.

‘You did nothing wrong.’

He kissed each eyelid, traced each damp trail, and then kissed her trembling lips until she softened beneath him, her arms and legs wrapping around him.

It made so much sense now, the walls she had up. She wasn’t just a woman who couldn’t trust a man to stick around through the worst, she was the woman who had let a man in only to have it crush her. Turning her into her worst nightmare.

That was what he was up against.

At least he knew the score, and just like in the game, to know what you were up against was half the battle won… though he had a feeling that the stakes with Astrid ran so much higher than anything that had come before.

But she was worth it, and she’d made him feel worthy of it. That whole trick with the mirror, turning the act on him… he’d felt it. Every word she’d said, he’d felt it in his bones.

Of all the people in the world, she knew the worst of him and still she wanted him. That had to mean something deeper, something more, something worth exploring just as his brother had said… if only he could open her eyes to it.

‘I’m crazy about you.’

It was out before he could stop it and she shook her head.

‘Don’t. You don’t need to make me feel better. I don’t deserve?—’

‘Hey, I’m not saying it to make you feel better. I’m saying it because it’s true.’

She gave a tearful laugh. ‘Well, you won’t be saying that when my PMDD drops in to say hello next week.’

Next week? The team’s bye week. No ice for five days. So many ideas filled his mind on how he could distract her, how he could work with her own coping mechanisms and convince her he was in it for the long haul.

‘Consider it a date.’

‘Blake!’ She thrust her hips, the motion making his lower half perk up. If she’d thought to chide him, she’d be seriously disappointed.

‘I’m not kidding around, Astrid.’ He caught her chin in his fingers, lifting her face to his. ‘I’ll be here for you because I’m crazy about you.’

Her honeyed eyes widened. Was that fear, panic, mistrust? Whatever it was, he wanted it gone.

‘You don’t know what you’re saying, what you’re promising…’

* * *

Oh God, Astrid couldn’t breathe. Not with that look in his eyes, the words flowing from his lips teasing at her heart…

She lowered her gaze. ‘Until you live through it you can’t know.’

And now she sounded like his mother using the same line about their past, but Astrid was using it in relation to her PMDD which was wholly within her. No one else’s fault but her own.

‘But I will soon.’ He lifted her chin again, brought his mouth close to hers, those piercing blues too. ‘And I have so many ideas on how to help.’

‘And like I told you before,’ she said softly. ‘I’m better off on my own when I’m like that.’

‘You just haven’t met the right person to share that side of you with.’

She gave a sad smile, his sincerity chipping through her resolve. ‘Maybe.’

Though she knew it sounded hollow because there was so much more at play here than he knew. So much more she had to tell him because any conversation over what they were to one another had to be built on the truth.

And she wanted to tell him everything. About Chase. About the girls. About the karma pact.

But she couldn’t do that without speaking to Sissi first. And maybe, just maybe, telling Sienna all that she knew, telling her that she believed Aiden had loved her, that he still bore the mark of that love… well, it could change everything.

And telling Blake… if he forgave her, then the future was worth a discussion, but until then…

‘Astrid?’

‘Hmm?’

‘Anyone ever tell you you’re an over thinker?’

And then he kissed her, stripping away her ability to think as he travelled down her body, hitting on every erogenous zone until he reached his final destination, and her fingers and toes curled into the mattress with her cry.

‘To hell with maybe,’ he murmured between her legs, his eyes burning up into hers and choking up her throat. ‘I say, definitely.’