Maddie startled at the sudden knock on the door. It was late, and Chase had checked on her thirty minutes ago. She was locked and tucked in for the night according to their safety plan. She picked up her phone to text Chase—she’d agreed to text him if anyone other than room service came to her door—when the phone buzzed and a text appeared.
Josh: It’s me.
She climbed from the bed and crossed to the door. A quick glance in the peephole confirmed the text, and she unlocked the door. “What’s wrong? Is Ava okay?”
His lips flattened in a way that showed amusement and annoyance and wasn’t quite a grin. “She kicked me out.”
She leaned against the frame, concern leaving her in a rush as the dots connected. “Oh, really? What did you do to warrant that?”
“She says I snore.”
Maddie nodded. “She’s not wrong there.” He had snored briefly during the one night they’d spent together.
His eyes lit with humor as he held up a toothbrush. “She gave me this and told me to find another room. Then she suggested I ask if I could bunk with you.”
Maddie felt a giggle rise. “Hmmm. But…there’s only one bed in my hotel room.”
“That is a problem.”
“I mean, there’s a couch, but I’m sure it’s horribly uncomfortable. I wouldn’t even wish it on my worst enemy.”
She took a step back, and he came forward, into the doorway but not entering her room. Her body flooded with heat at his nearness, at his scent. A flash of memory from yesterday in the gym shower as he held her against the wall and gave her what she wanted set her body buzzing.
She’d really done that, demanded sex from him, and he’d given her exactly what she needed.
“I’m not your worst enemy, Maddie?” Her name on his lips was a caress.
“Not even a little bit,” she whispered.
“Can I share your room tonight? The couch is fine. I won’t ask for more than you want to give.”
It was decision time, but now that they’d arrived, it wasn’t any kind of decision at all. It was like water flowing down a valley, cutting a natural path, reshaping the landscape to suit the flow. No dams, no channels, nothing to hinder the course of nature.
“You can stay.” She grabbed his jacket and pulled him to her, bringing them chest to chest. She pulled him down as she rose on her toes. “And I want you in my bed.” Her lips were a centimeter from his as she whispered, “And in me.”
He lifted her from the ground even as he kissed her. He kicked the door closed behind him, then turned with her in his arms, his tongue sliding between her lips, and she heard the click of the dead bolt followed by the slap of the interior bar being engaged.
She sucked on his tongue as he carried her to the bed and set her down on the foot of the mattress. He ended the kiss by standing up straight. She gripped the front of his jacket, tugging at the zipper. Off. He needed all his clothes off.
She had yet to see him fully naked, and she wanted to see just how beautiful his body was, to lick every inch of him.
He smiled as he doffed his jacket, followed by pulling his T-shirt over his head. And there was his chest. His magnificent chest. Honed and chiseled and utterly perfect. She placed a hand on his pec, and he covered it with his own, sandwiching her palm and fingers between his warm skin.
“We’ve done fast and hot,” Josh said, “and it was glorious. But that’s not what I want from you tonight. I want slow and sensual and to explore every inch of you. I want to make you come over and over. I want to be utterly selfish with your body. By the time we’re done, I want you to fall apart at the mere touch of my fingers, because you know exactly what they can do to you.”
She bit her bottom lip and rose on the bed. She licked his nipple, then ran her tongue up over his firm muscle as she ran a hand over the other pec and down to his abs. Her mouth reached his neck, and she traced his clavicle with her tongue, then licked upward until she sucked his earlobe into her mouth.
He shifted, taking her in his arms as his mouth covered hers again. She liked that they didn’t need to talk. There was no need to delve into the hurts of the last week. This, right now, was about moving forward. Sunday no longer mattered.
His fingers threaded through her hair as he cupped the back of her head, and the possessiveness, the intensity of his kiss, blew her mind a bit. It made her feel like she’d never been kissed before this moment. Never been possessed quite like this. The only possible exception was in the forest yesterday.
Josh wanted her. Not Trina. Not some ideal woman. Her. And he wanted her with an intense, raw, virile energy that lit up the room and set her on fire.
She tugged at his belt, desperate to get him naked. Desperate to have his bare skin pressed to her. Inside her.
She stopped and scooted back, moving just out of his reach. “I’ve got an IUD, and I’m clean. I was tested when I found out my ex cheated on me. I haven’t been with anyone since.”
“I’m clean too. Regular physicals are part of my job, and I always have them run all tests.”
She bit her lip, feeling surprisingly nervous. “I want you bare inside me, but if it’s too soon for that for you, I’ve got condoms.”
He climbed on the bed, also on his knees so they faced each other. She tilted her head back to see his face as he loomed over her, so beautiful in the dim light of the bedside lamp. “I always use condoms when I don’t want more than a casual relationship with my partner.”
Flutters traveled from her belly to her heart, which started to pound to her own ears. “And do you want something more than casual with me?”
“I want everything with you, Maddie. I want it all.”
She leaned her forehead on his chest, closed her eyes, and took a deep breath, taking in the scent of him, flooded with feelings and overwhelmed. His arm closed around her, holding her tight. Several seconds passed as she reveled in the wash of emotion. Then she raised her head and met his gaze. “Make love to me, Josh.”
As promised, he took her slowly. His attention to detail and her reactions guided his touch as he explored her. Undressing her was easy—she wore only a T-shirt, pajama pants, and underwear—but he still managed to take his time with it, giving her breasts all his attention before moving lower to remove her pants and panties.
He moved to go down on her then, but she clamped her legs together. “Strip!” she demanded. She wanted to see and touch him too.
He complied with a laugh and then proceeded to slowly remove his clothes, stopping between each item to caress a new area on her body with his hands and mouth.
She was in a frenzy of need by the time his boxer briefs finally hit the floor and she could see every beautiful inch of him. He stood next to the bed, and she knelt at the edge, rapt with attention. She ran her hands over his body, taking his thick cock in her hand and stroking the smooth length. She was going to have this. She already had had it. But tonight would be different.
Yesterday in the gym had been wild. Hot. Frenetic. Perfect for what she’d needed. But this was something else altogether. Today, he was claiming her, and she was claiming him. Her body was his to play with, and she would give as good as she got.
She lowered herself and licked the tip of his penis, then put her mouth over the head. He bucked, and she loved that small loss of control. She’d made him do that.
She slid her mouth down on the shaft until she could take him no deeper, then she licked and sucked and cupped his testicles with one hand while the other wrapped around the base of his cock and stroked him. Her mouth and hands worked his body, his hard flesh sliding along her tongue.
He gasped and wrapped his fingers in her hair, and she reveled in the pleasure of it all, this perfect moment as she had Josh Warner deep in her throat and lost in the pleasure she could give him.
He wasn’t worried about anything in this moment. He wasn’t taking care of anyone but the two of them. He was taking selfish pleasure. She wanted him to come in her mouth. She wanted to feel him pulse against the back of her throat as she swallowed. She wanted to give him that ultimate selfish pleasure of only receiving.
But he didn’t let her. He withdrew from her mouth even as she resisted.
“Later, sweetheart. I promise.” His voice was deep and guttural and oh so sexy. He rubbed the tip of his cock across her lips. “I’m going to take everything you want to give me. But right now, I want to give to you, and then I want to come inside you, without a condom.”
She gave the tip one last lick, then obeyed his orders to move up on the bed so he could put his face between her thighs. Damn, she realized she really liked being ordered around in this situation. She was one hundred percent on board with this hot, bossy bodyguard in bed.
His tongue was hot and wet on her clit, and it was her turn to buck involuntarily. As he’d done with undressing her, his touches were slow and languid, each stroke of tongue or fingers a precision strike that maximized her pleasure even while drawing it out. He traced her folds and kissed, sucked, licked, and worshiped. It was a slow yet intense buildup to orgasm that tested her sanity.
When she reached her breaking point, he increased the speed and pressure of his tongue, and the delicious friction sent her over the edge. She cupped his face between her thighs, her arms cradling his head as she gasped and groaned, her orgasm coming at her in multiple waves.
She loosened her legs and tugged at his hair, opening her body, urging him to enter her. He kissed her belly on his way up her body, then sucked on her nipples. Finally, his mouth reached her neck. He sucked on her skin at the same time he entered her slick vagina with a sure, hot, deep thrust.
She gasped with the pleasure of being so utterly filled. Joined. Connected. Claimed.
But this wasn’t hard and fast like in the gym. No. As promised, he tempered his speed, and each slide of his body in hers was measured perfection. She rode the waves of her ongoing orgasm, the pleasure continuing endlessly.
He rose up on his hands, locking his elbows as he thrust into her. She opened her eyes. As much as she was lost in the moment, she wanted to see his face. His eyes were open as he gazed down on her with such intensity, and she felt utterly claimed. Part of him, as he was part of her.
He increased his speed, ratcheting up her pleasure and, from the look on his face, his too. He closed his eyes and tilted his head back. He was so close, and now she was climaxing again, but she wasn’t entirely sure she had stopped coming from the first orgasm yet. One pleasure flowed into the next.
He came, his thrusting punctuated by a guttural groan. He kept up the friction, rocking his hips, and she went over the edge again, taking her long, sensuous orgasm to a new peak. She clenched around him, gripping his back with her hands, sweat glistening on them both.
His breathing was ragged as he held himself above her, then slowly lowered to kiss her, long and deep. A romantic kiss that said so much more than words.
He raised his head and looked into her eyes, and for the first time since this afternoon, she saw the question there.
He still didn’t know. Sex without a condom in the heat of the moment wasn’t a binding commitment, and yesterday, after she’d gotten the sex she needed from him, she’d rejected him. He’d braced for that to happen again.
She smiled and stroked his cheek, her heart pounding as pure, unfettered feelings for this man flowed downstream, having cut a new, more direct path. “You’re mine, Josh Warner, and I’m never going to let you go again.”
Josh woke with a start, disoriented. For a moment, he feared it had all been a dream, but the cool sheets against his naked skin, not to mention the sleeping woman beside him, reassured him that the previous hours had been gloriously real.
He wanted to pull her against him and breathe her in, revel in having her in his bed—well her bed for now, but that would change in the safe house—and in his life. He didn’t want to wake her, though, so he rose on his elbow and stared at her. She was naked, and the blanket had slipped, leaving one breast bare in the dim light of the room.
She was so damn beautiful, from the shape of her nose to the slope of her shoulders to that perfect breast he wanted to tease and suck.
He wouldn’t screw this up again.
She shifted, rolling toward him, and said in a sleepy voice, “Are you staring at me, Josh?”
He pulled her to him, and she pressed her face against his chest. “Only a little bit.”
“Why?”
“Because I’m happy. Being with you makes me happy.”
Her lips pressed to his chest with soft little kisses. “You make me happy too.” She raised her head, and while her body was relaxed against him, he sensed she was more awake than asleep now. “This is real between us, isn’t it? No more excuses, no more yo-yoing from either of us? We’re together, in bed and out?”
He traced her hairline, tucking her hair behind her ear. “I’m all in, Maddie Foster. I’m crazy about you. I’ve never felt this way before, and I’m pretty sure that’s because I’ve never been in love before.”
He could just make out her features in the darkness. He really should have turned on a bedside lamp before making his declaration. A romantic strategist he was not.
She must’ve felt the same way, because she pushed him to his back, leaned across him, her chest pressed to his, and fumbled with the lamp to his left until the light snapped on.
He blinked at the sudden brightness as she did the same. “Say that again,” she commanded.
He held her gaze, forcing his eyes to adjust to the light. “I’m falling in love with you, Maddie. Head over heels. Ass over teakettle. All those phrases finally make sense, because you’ve flipped my world upside down, but when I’m with you, I know it’s the way the world should be.”
Her entire face—eyes, cheeks, brows, mouth—lit with the most beautiful smile he’d ever seen. “I’m crazy in love with you too, Josh Warner.”