Page 47

I can’t stop smiling.

She loves me. Perhaps my Nova doesn’t remember our past, but she loves me.

“Ethan! Stop grinning. You’re drawing attention to us.” Lexy nudges me as I curl her tighter against my side and lead her out of the library, down the hallway toward the elevators.

A loud laugh rips from my chest.

“Ethan!”

“What? I can’t be happy? Because I’m so damn happy right now, I want to shout it from the rooftops.”

“Yes, you can be happy during this walk of shame we’re on, but the Deliminator never smiles !”

I pull us to a stop under a lone flickering sconce.

A few folks whisper among themselves as they walk past us, and from their widening eyes and pointed fingers, rumors will swirl soon.

“Do you want me to hide this?” I murmur, my chest pinching as I drag up our interlinked hands.

“No! Of course not. I-I’m just…I mean, look at me. Anyone can take one look at me and know what we’ve been up to.” She buries her face in my chest.

A rush of love infuses me as I pull her back to look at her.

Her eyes—the same brilliant blue I love—are bright and sizzling with life, her lips are swollen, and love bites and scratches decorate her fair skin.

She looks well and truly fucked .

My cock twitches and I haul her flushed against me.

“Ethan!” Those beautiful eyes glaze over when I spin her around and grind her against the wall.

She no doubt feels my sizable erection digging into her stomach.

“Again, already?”

“I’m insatiable for you, Nova. I don’t know how I’ve survived all these years. Fuck, I’ve waited and waited for this moment.” My voice thickens.

“I want to kiss you, make love to you, write you all the damn poetry in the world.”

Her eyes cloud with tears.

“Ethan,” she whispers, caressing my cheek, and I lean into her touch.

I’ve missed it so much.

Her touch. I’ve been sick.

Lovesick. Deprived for too long.

“You two, seriously. Get a room.” Someone clears his throat.

Narrowing my eyes, I whip my head toward the intruder, ready to tear into him for interrupting this sweet moment between my Nova and me.

Rex stands there, his bow tie hanging around his neck, his hair tousled like he might have just gotten some action of his own.

But his eyes are hollow, if not haunted.

Is something brewing under the surface with him?

He grins and waggles his brows.

“About damn time.”

“Fuck off. I’m busy.”

“Well then, I guess you’re too busy for this.” He dangles a gold key in front of him and unleashes his classic shit-eating grin.

“Presidential suite. A lovely king-sized bed, double shower heads, a hot tub big enough to host an orgy, fireplace already stoked and roaring, room service set up on the table. Lasagna and rib eye with your fucking Pintzer and her iced tea.”

I blink.

He waves the key in front of my face.

“Ethan? Hello? Are you overcome with love and gratitude for your favorite brother? Or do you not want this lovely honeymoon set up? I can give it to—”

I snatch the key from him and Alexis giggles .

“How did you know that we—” A lump suddenly forms in my throat as I watch those carefree eyes of my least serious brother sharpen.

“Boned? Got your head out of your ass finally? Well, the two of you disappeared and I’m like, thank God. You were obvious, Ethan—a ticking time bomb waiting to explode. All those arrangements? Having Lana call you at Mystique? The intervention at the gentlemen’s club?” He turns to Alexis and smiles.

“And who did you think insisted you start on the campaign with him first?” He points to me.

“Y-You’ve been in on it all along?” Her eyes are the size of dinner plates.

“Nah, more like facilitating the longest slow burn in history. Giving it the much needed kick in the ass.” Rex winks, then sobers.

“I’m happy for you two. So damn happy.”

An unfamiliar warmth hits me in the chest. All my life, I’ve felt like an outsider in my family.

It’s gotten better over the years, but I’ve always been jealous of the connection Maxwell and Ryland have with each other, or the camaraderie Rex has with Lana.

I’ve always felt like the odd man out.

The silent observer.

But it turns out, maybe they were right.

Maybe my doubts were unfounded.

My family loves me, just as I am.

I only need to open my mind and my heart to let them in.

Rex squeezes my shoulder and pulls me in for a hug.

“Proud of you, dude. You’re the best Anderson out of us all. Your loyalty and persistence. I’m floored. Now go get your happy ending with your woman.” He slaps my back and pulls away.

But before he fully disentangles himself, I grip his arm.

“Thank you, Rex. You fucker, I…I’m so glad to call you my brother.”

He doles out a lazy wink.

“I know. I know. I’m the best. Now go before Liam catches you. Good God, he’s going to rip your head off. And I can’t wait to see it.” He laughs and shakes his head as he strides back to the ballroom .

Grinning, I tug Alexis with me to the elevator, my heart feeling a ton lighter.

Minutes later, we’re in the presidential suite and before the door fully shuts, I have Alexis pinned against the wall.

She moans, her breathy sounds sending my blood to my groin.

I press kiss upon kiss on her forehead, her cheeks, her lips, then trailing my mouth down her neck, tasting her unique blend of lavender and sweetness.

“Ethan, this is madness,” she whimpers when I bite the enticing divot of her collarbone, my fingers making a work of her gown and bra and dropping them on the floor.

“Our love is fucking madness.” I lick her rosy nipple.

“I wouldn’t have it any other way.”

I hoist her up and carry her to the main bedroom before dropping her on the bed.

She’s a seductress—her fiery hair fanned across the white bedding, her heavy tits shaking with each breath she takes.

The way she looks at me, her pupils dilated, like I hold her universe in my hands.

A lost girl with a guy trying to prove himself—a love story that began in a hidden library.

Maybe it has to end there, but it’ll be fine.

Because we’ll just write another one.

She might not remember the most beautiful years of my life, but I’m going to create the best years for us in the future.

That will have to be okay.

Ignoring the ache in my chest, I shed my jacket and shirt.

Her lips part and her tongue dips out as I step out of my pants and underwear before gripping my thick cock.

“You’ve been warned,” I growl.

“I intend to work you hard, so every time you walk and feel the ache between your legs, you’ll remember who put it there. I have a decade’s worth of pent up energy and I’m going to use it all. Every. Single. Drop.”

She swallows, her legs parting, revealing her glistening slit .

I crawl above her. “Look at that tight little pussy. It’s pulsing for me already.” I bite her earlobe and she shrieks, then I lave it with my tongue.

I do the same to her neck, then the tops of her swollen breasts.

Sucking, nibbling, tasting, licking, making my little Nova writhe below me, desperate for release.

“I love my marks on you.”

My cock twitches when I admire my handiwork—every mark is my signature.

Mine. This woman is mine.

Pre-cum drips out of me, making a mess on her stomach, but I don’t care.

I’m a bottomless well of lust and love right now.

Grabbing her tits, I roll her nipples and flick at the hardened tips.

Then I press them together and bury my face in her swells, taking both buds into my mouth at the same time.

“Ethan,” she moans, her back arching as I suck her sweet tits, my hips gyrating, dragging my dick against her body, marking her with my pre-cum.

I’m so fucking hard, I can burst.

Moving down, I kiss her stomach before parting her legs and pinning it to the bed.

“Look at you lying there, your fucking tits heaving, your rosy nipples pointing at me, begging me to suck them. Fuck, you make me so hard.” I tug my dick, watching as more liquid drips down the length.

“But there’s one place I want to taste—because I’ve been salivating for it.”

I blow on her wet slit and she shudders.

“This pretty little pink pussy.” Groaning, I lick it from top to bottom and she screams, thrashing on the bed.

What a beautiful sound.

I want to hear that every morning, every night as I invent a thousand and one ways to make her cry as she comes around me.

“Too sensitive, oh shit.” She tries to wiggle away, but I pin her down .

“No way, my little hummingbird. You’re going to let me feast.” I dive in and suckle her swollen clit, nipping, licking, swirling it, then dragging my tongue to her sopping entrance, tasting her nectar—honey, lavender, an addictive sweetness making me drunk.

“So fucking delicious. I could drink this all day.” I tease more wetness out of her before lapping it up.

“Yes, please, oh fuck, please, yes,” she chants, gripping my hair and pulling it to the point of pain.

I insert a finger inside her and grunt as she sucks me in, gripping me like it’s my cock.

“So tight, Nova. Your pussy needs me. You’re going to drive me out of my mind.”

A burning heat ignites at the base of my spine and licks its way up my body, my balls heavy and drawing up, ready to detonate.

The wet sounds of me finger fucking her as I suck on her clit make my ears ring.

She claws at me, her legs trembling, locking around my neck.

I feel lightheaded. If I die right now, I’ll be the happiest man on earth.

“Come, Nova.” I fuck her harder with my fingers.

Two this time.

Her mouth parts in a soundless scream, her fingers white knuckled around the bedsheets.

“That’s it, fuck my face. Harder. Don’t let me breathe. Drench me, baby.” I bite her swollen nub.

“I’m coming, Ethan!” She detonates—her juices flooding out of her, wetting my face as she shakes on the bed like she’s electrocuted by pleasure.

“Fucking squirter, shit.” I lap all of it up, savoring her taste, groaning as I rut my cock against the bedsheets, seconds away from bursting.

Before she comes down from her high, I swipe my face, slicking back my hair, wet with her essence, and flip her on her stomach.

Tugging her ass up, I give the round swells a hard slap, watching the creamy skin redden in fascination .

“More, Nova?” Leaning down, I bite her ear and she wiggles that delectable ass over my cock.

“My beautiful, dirty girl. Fuck, I’ve waited for you.”

I slap those luscious curves again and she cries, “Yes!”

Damn, she reddens so well.

“Yes, Ethan. I need you inside me,” she slurs, her face pressed against the sheets.

I can’t think. I can’t speak.

My mind is a haze of love and pleasure, my body riding on the highest of highs.

Fisting her hair, I pull back and bare her throat, licking the tears streaking down her face before capturing her lips in mine.

With one deep stroke, I slam in and swallow her screams with my mouth.

My hips start up a maddening rhythm as I drive into her from the back.

It’s insanity—blissful insanity.

I break our kiss to drag in mouthfuls of air, my cock tunneling in and out of her in a staccato rhythm.

“So good.” I throw my head back and grip her hips tightly, my mind blissfully blank.

“So fucking good. Never enough.”

She lets out a keening wail, a flush spreading from her ass cheeks to the rest of her body.

I want—no, need—to keep pinkening her skin like this.

Every day. She’ll wear the flush as a badge of honor.

She’s mine.

My cock thickens, the pressure seizing up inside me, my balls heavy and retracting.

The sharp pleasure shoots up my shaft, and I’m seconds away from having the biggest fucking orgasm of my life.

“You’re mine, Nova. Mine, you hear me?” The smacking sounds are loud in the room, eclipsing the roar of the pulse in my ears.

“Yours, always.” She shakes again, incoherent sounds blubbering out of her mouth .

“I’m going to come. Mark you up from the inside, Nova. So much you’ll feel me dripping out of you whenever you walk.”

I slap her ass and she claws the bed, a raw cry tearing from her throat.

Her pussy throbs and clenches around my shaft as wetness shoots out of her.

She hurls off the cliff, and that does it.

“I love you,” I gasp.

My vision whitens, and my world obliterates.

I fall into an alternate state of being, the pleasure coursing through my veins as I unload unending streams of cum inside her.

Much later, when she’s tucked against my chest, a sweet smile on her face, my heart is whole for the first time in a decade.

Despite Dreamer not remembering her Keeper, my Lexy fell in love with me again.

Completely spent, utterly at peace, I let myself believe something I’ve never thought possible.

This time, I can keep my Nova.

This time, I can protect her.

Cherish her. Love her until the end of time.

But as I sink into sleep, a worrisome thread slithers inside me, and a last thought—to fate, to whatever higher power’s out there—whispers across my mind.

Please don’t take my happiness away this time. Please.