His Regret by Bella J.

Chapter Twenty-Seven

PRESENT

Scarlet nestledher head deeper into the pillow. Hunter was on his side, slowly tracing his finger up and down her waist like he was committing every curve, every inch of her skin to memory.

The minute they stepped into the house earlier, Hunter tore the red dress right off her—literally. The entire foyer was currently littered with red fabric—and broken pieces of furniture, along with one smashed portrait of some or other half-naked woman painted in reds and yellows. It looked like a battle zone.

Naturally, Scarlet gave back just as hard. The claw marks on Hunter’s arms and neck were proof of that. Sex between the two of them was like war, a battle of passion and untamed desire that took complete possession of them both. And either they were too weak to fight it, or they were strong enough to embrace it.

Scarlet closed her eyes, her body aching in all the right places, yet more satisfied than she had ever been. How was it possible that within the span of a few hours everything changed so drastically between them?

Lighter. Easier. It was like something shifted and the attraction that had been there ever since they first laid eyes on each other no longer felt like something they needed to deny. In fact, it felt like they had no choice but to act on it. To give in to the need and consume each other. The way she felt when he touched her, it was like her soul came alive. And when her fingers would glide over his body, she felt his strength radiate from every ripped muscle, every well-defined ab, and the broad expanse of his back, and it made her want so much more. She never wanted to stop touching him, and she never wanted him to stop touching her. It just felt right…and odd.

Was she…was she falling in love with him? Was that even possible, for her to fall in love? Scarlet had never been in love before, she didn’t know what it felt like, what love was supposed to be like. The only glimpse of love she had was the sordid, twisted love Brent had confessed to her. It was ugly, it was malicious, and it was evil. But this, with Hunter, it was different, and she didn’t know what to make of it.

“So are you going to tell me why you chose this word?” His gaze followed his finger as it traced over the ink on her skin. Torment.

“Are you going to tell me about yours?”

“Maybe.”

For a moment they glanced at each other. It was already clear they were both screwed up from stuff that happened in their pasts. And after what happened in the restroom back at the bar, she was certain he knew what happened in her past, but she wanted to know what happened in his. What about his past had him so bitter, so sad that he felt the need to punish himself in a cage every night?

She wanted to know what demons he carried around, what kind of pain he needed to live with, and she was ninety-nine percent sure that it was because of a woman. A blue-eyed woman. That was the only reasonable explanation why he had the “never blue eyes” rule.

Scarlet lifted her hand and placed it over the tattoo on his chest, a heart being squeezed by a hand. “Tell me about this one.”

His hand paused and Scarlet could feel him tense, pain radiating all around him. For a moment, she didn’t think he would answer. Maybe it was just as painful for him to say the words out loud as she knew it would be for her to admit to someone what Brent had done.

But then his green eyes locked on hers. “Sometimes shit happens and it has the power to squeeze the life right out of you little by little.”

It wasn’t so much what he said, but how he said it. The pain that coated every word, and the way his eyes instantly lost their vibrant shade made Scarlet wonder if she really wanted to know what had fucked him up so badly.

“The blue eyes?” she asked softly, tracing every intricate line of the human heart on his chest with her fingertip.

He didn’t answer. And that was answer enough.

She took her hand off his chest and slipped it under her pillow.

“I was seventeen when it happened,” she started, and Hunter remained still, his gaze following his finger over her body.

“He didn’t pass his medical evaluation, so he was discharged. Sent home.”

Hunter’s hand slowly moved over her hip.

“No one thought it was true. Brent never showed any signs of being mentally unstable.” Deep inside her chest, Scarlet felt her heart being squeezed—slowly—with every word she spoke. Like Hunter’s tattoo.

“Until he showed me exactly how unstable he really was…in a shed…where no one could hear me scream for help. Where no one could hear me cry as he—”

“Stop.” Hunter gripped her waist tightly. “Stop. Don’t tell me more.”

“But I thought you wanted to know.”

“I don’t need to hear the details. I already know. And knowing what he did to you is enough to make me want to kill that son of a bitch in the most unimaginable ways. I want to see him bleed from a thousand different wounds—wounds I inflicted. I want to hear his screams for hours, days before he takes his final breath.” He took his hand off her waist and pulled it through his hair before turning on his back and staring at the ceiling.

Tears threatened to escape, but Scarlet swallowed them back. Too many tears had rolled down her cheeks already in her lifetime. But the thought that her torment, the hell she went through, affected Hunter like this made her heart swell inside her chest. Did he really care enough about her to feel this way, to feel like he needed to make things right for her?

Scarlet took a deep breath. “That’s why he’s so desperate to find me. He wants to make sure I don’t spill his little secret and jeopardize his chances on getting his hands on Grandma’s inheritance.”

“Where are your parents?”

She closed her eyes, trying to muster up the courage to talk about her life. To just finally let it all go. “I never knew my father. Right after my sister’s father divorced my mother, she had a brief affair with some man.”

Hunter sat up on his elbows. “Your sister?”

“Yup. My sister.” Scarlet almost choked on her words. It was the first time Scarlet had spoken about her sister to anyone. It wasn’t a topic she liked to discuss. “No one knew the name of the man my mother had been seeing back then. She never told anyone. Hence why I was given the family surname—Wolfe—and not my mother’s since she kept her married name.”

Hunter narrowed his eyes, a big frown forming on his forehead. “So where is your sister now?”

“Some place far from here.” She cleared her throat awkwardly since the words seemed to choke the air out of her. There was no way she would be able to talk about her sister. Not yet. Those wounds were far from healed, and talking about it would just aggravate them more.

“So,” Scarlet continued. “My mom died when I was twelve. A stroke at the young age of thirty-eight. Which is why my sister and I ended up living with our grandma. My sister’s dad was in the military, and he was hardly ever home.”

Hunter just nodded, and she felt him touch her hand with his, gently rubbing his thumb over her fingers. It was the softest, subtlest touch—yet it felt so strong that it somehow comforted her. Something she had never felt before.

“And the tattoo?”

“I couldn’t carry the torment and the pain inside of me any longer. I thought to wear it permanently inked on my skin would somehow lessen the burden inside me.”

“Did it work?”

“No.”

Hunter continued to stare at the ceiling. “It didn’t work for me either.”

They lay there in silence, the heavy cloud of all their pain hanging over them. Two broken people searching for their place in the world. Two broken souls that would probably never get put back together. What a pair they would make. Fucked-up, meet fucked-upper.

Unable to stand the smothering silence, Scarlet sat up on her elbows. “I suppose I don’t have to guess what the Blue stands for.”

He didn’t move, or even blink. It was like he wasn’t even there anymore.

“Is that her name?”

“Was.”

Scarlet balked.

“It was the name I used to call her,” he continued softly.

Holy shit. “Is she…”

“Yeah.”

Scarlet looked down at her toes sticking out from under the black sheets.

“Did you love her?” Dammit. Scarlet wanted to mentally slap herself for asking such a stupid question that had absolutely nothing to with her. “You don’t have—”

“I did. I loved her.” He finally turned to face her, his dark green eyes filled with so much emotion it almost knocked the wind right out of her. “I loved her more than anything. I would have died for her. I would have sold my soul for her. But instead, I watched them bury her.”

This time his words rocked her to her core. It felt like it shook the very foundation beneath her. The knowledge that he had loved someone else so completely, so irrevocably, was something she now wished she didn’t know. It made her chest tighten, her insides crawl, and her heart feel like it was about to stop beating at any second. There was no way she would have been able to say something to that even if she wanted to. The anger in his stone cold voice was nothing but a disguise, a concealer of the pain that he actually felt. The regret.

Hunter let out a breath, and then got off the bed and walked to the window.

“And that tattoo on your back?” Scarlet got off the bed and walked after him.

He turned around. “What about it?”

“I saw it at the fight earlier when you took your shirt off.”

She placed her hand on his shoulder, urging him to turn back so she could take a closer look. There were heart shapes that decorated the inside of the circle, the intricate lines weaving the hearts together, giving it a maze-like effect. The tattoo covered almost his entire upper back. It was beautiful.

Scarlet traced her fingertips over the inked lines. “It’s a Celtic love knot. I’ve seen one like this before.”

Hunter gave a step forward and turned, blocking off her view of his back. “It’s a Celtic love symbol, Scar. I’m pretty sure you’ve seen it in a lot of places.”

Scarlet stepped back. “Yeah. Probably.”

“Okay, enough with all the heavy talk.” He roughed a hand through his hair. “We should get some sleep.”

And then Scarlet watched as he got on the couch, her eyebrows almost touching her hairline. “Are you sleeping there?”

He glanced at her. “Where else should I sleep? You made it perfectly clear that I’m on the couch the other day when you didn’t even want me sleeping in the same room as you.”

She shrugged. “Yeah, well, that was before I fucked you.”

He snorted. “I fucked you, Scar.”

“We fucked each other.”

He raised a brow. “That’s a lot of fucking.”

“And I want to do it again.”

“So do I.”

He got up from the couch and stalked toward her with the kind of swagger a man with all the power in the world would have. This man was the walking personification of confidence, like he knew he had the power to melt the panties off any woman. Which he did. Lucky for her, she didn’t wear panties half the time. There probably wasn’t a woman in this world who wouldn’t want to experience a piece of him at least once in their lives. Scarlet, for one, wanted to experience it every damn day for as long as possible.

By the time he stopped in front of her, standing so close she could feel his breath skidding across her cheek, she was already rubbing her thighs together.

With a body that towered over her, and eyes that spoke volumes, telling her exactly what went on in that dirty mind of his, he stared down at her. Promises of mind blowing sexual pleasure swirled around those green irises and Scarlet once again found herself lost in their depths.

Hunter glanced down at her body. “When you’re standing naked in front of me like you’re doing now, there is only one thing I want to do, and that’s make you scream my name when I make you come over and over and over again until your body just can’t take it anymore.” He lifted his hand and lazily drew soft circles around her nipples with his fingertip.

“Then what are you waiting for?”

Hunter slanted his head to the side like he was contemplating all the ways he could make her shudder, make her body explode into tiny pieces of unadulterated pleasure. It sent the most powerful surge of anticipation straight from her core right up to her chest, her knees already turning weak.

Gently he dragged his finger down between her breasts, slowly moving over her stomach, her navel, until he stopped just above her pubic bone. “I want you to trust me, Scar.”

“I do.”

“No, I mean really trust me.” With his other hand he took a red streak of her hair and rubbed it between his fingers. “I want you to not fight me. Just tonight, don’t fight me.”

“You want me to give you control?”

“Yes.”

“Why?”

“Because it’s the only way you will ever be able to trust me.”

“And your need to control everything has nothing to do with it?”

Hunter let go of her hair, but his other hand remained close to where she knew he was headed. “I won’t lie to you by saying that I don’t have my own selfish reasons for wanting control over your body. You need to let go, and I need control. We need each other.”

Hunter’s lips kissed the spot just below her ear, sending shivers all the way down her spine. “But I do want you to trust me, and I also know that by giving me full control over you,” his finger slipped lower until it softly touched her between her legs, “over your body, is the only way for you to be able to fully trust me.”

Scarlet’s breathing deepened as his finger slipped through her heat, and she knew her body betrayed her by letting him feel exactly how turned on she was. Even with the idea of giving this man complete control he still managed to have her body ignited with a kind of need that felt surreal to her.

“Why is me trusting you so important?” Her voice sounded strained as he continued to move his fingers against her.

“Because I feel something for you, Scar. It’s scaring the shit out of me, but I do. And I know you feel something for me too. Don’t deny it.”

Scarlet swallowed hard as his eyes bore into hers. “Are people like us even capable of feeling anything, Ace?”

Then he pushed his finger inside her, taking her by surprise, and she stumbled forward, grabbing onto his shoulders. Every sensual part of her was throbbing, aching…demanding.

“You feel that, don’t you, Scar? The way your body is drawn to me, the way it responds to my touch? Whatever this is between us, it’s starting to consume us both and you know it.”

He placed a soft kiss right at the corner of her mouth. “Give me this. Just tonight, surrender that fight of yours and let me have control. I need it with you, Scar.”

“So do I,” she whispered. “I need control too.”

“No. No, you don’t. What you need is to give it up. You need to let go. You pretend like you need control, but you don’t. Let me take it from you. Give me your control, and let me show you that you can trust me.”

With his finger still working her between her legs, he gripped her waist with his other hand. She closed her eyes, allowing his touch to take her closer to the edge.

“It’s not that easy for me, Ace.”

Softly he kissed her collarbone. “I know. But just try.”

She leaned her head to the side, exposing her neck, offering him more of her skin to taste. Somehow this man had the power to ease the pain inside her, to silence the voices. She would be lying if she said she didn’t want to surrender to him. “Will you tell me why you need control so badly?”

He stilled, his mouth just below her ear.

“Tell me, Ace, and I’ll give it to you. I’ll give you control.”

She could feel his warm breath against her neck, but she also felt the tension radiate from his body. This was hard for him, opening up. But if he wanted her to let down her defenses, he needed to do the same.

“Tell me, please.”

His lips touched her neck. “Because sex is the only thing I can control. I can’t control life…and I sure as hell can’t control death. Sex, your body, your pleasure are the only things I know how to control. That’s why I need it.”

Everything inside of her screamed for her to let him do this, to let him take control. Yet a part of her fought it, and it was a part of her she wished she never had. She wanted to be normal, like any other woman who wanted to be with a man uninhibited. To let a man touch her, take her, worship her…love her without having all her demons screaming inside her head. But would she be able to do it? Would she be able to surrender?

There was only one way to find out.

“Okay,” she whispered, her voice lacking the confidence she always had. Her heart was pounding, her insides coiled tight. She was nervous, maybe even scared. But she had to do this. She owed it to herself to at least try.

Hunter removed his hand from between her legs. “Lay down on the bed.” It wasn’t a request. She could see it in his eyes, the way they darkened, how he stared at her with so much hunger and intensity. He craved it. He needed it. And she had to give it to him.

With small, slow steps back she moved toward the bed, never taking her eyes off his. Her mind was still screaming at her, telling her to stop, but she chose to listen to her heart, telling her to give in…just this once.

As she lay down on the bed, she watched Hunter walk around it. Like a starved predator his gaze swept over her naked body. There was so much heat, so much untamed carnal need swirling around him, she felt it all the way inside her core, causing her to writhe on the sheets.

He stopped next to her. “Grab onto the rail of the headboard behind you.”

“What are you—”

“No questions, kitten. You’re giving me control, remember?”

She bit her lip, desperately trying to push back her natural instinct to be stubborn and demanding.

He opened the bedside drawer and pulled out a pair of handcuffs. When she saw the metal glint under the faint light, her heart almost leaped out of her chest.

“No. I can’t.” She shook her head, the screaming voices inside her head yelling at her to stop. But Hunter leaned over her, gripped her cheeks while puckering up her mouth, and kissed her hard. So hard for a moment it took her breath away. His tongue swept through her mouth, claiming every corner, tasting her, leaving her no choice but to lose herself in his kiss. So lost in his taste, his scent, his undeniable dominion over her body that it was only when she heard the click of the cuff that she realized he had slipped the metal around her wrist.

She sucked in a breath, panic threatening to choke the air out of her lungs. “Hunter, I can’t.”

“Shhh.” He placed a finger over her lips. “I will not do anything you don’t want me to do. You don’t have to fear me or my intentions when it comes to you, Scarlet. Whatever I’m about to do is for your pleasure, but I need you to surrender that fight of yours. Just for a while. Let me show you how it’s supposed to feel when you give your all to one person without fighting it.”

His eyes begged her, his words pleading with her to give in to him, to just…trust him. So all she could do was nod.

Again his lips found hers and she felt him cuff her other hand as well. She took a deep breath, letting his words, his promise that she didn’t have to fear him, replay over and over inside her mind. Holding on to his words, choosing to trust them was the only way she would be able to do this.

“Focus on me, Scar, on us. Right here, right now.” He continued to lean over her. “There is no place for anything else inside your mind right now, okay? Just me and how I make you feel.”

He got up and she watched as he pulled three ties out of the closet. “I’m going to ask you this one more time, Scarlet. Do you trust me?”

Her mind was reeling, her heart racing, her body shuddering, but by God she trusted him. She needed to trust him. For so long she avoided trusting anyone, yet here she was unable to stop herself from letting this man break down all her defenses.

She gave him another nod, and he placed the tie over her eyes, casting her in complete darkness. Instantly the panic flared up, cold spreading from her chest down her spine. She writhed and tugged lightly at the cuffs around her wrists, unable to control her fear.

“Hunter—”

“Concentrate on me and what I do, Scarlet. Don’t allow your mind to take you anywhere else. Stay here…with me.”

She gasped when she felt his warm mouth cover one of her nipples, and he sucked gently while his hand softly stroked over her stomach. The sensation of his touch, his lips on her skin slowly thawed the ice that had spread through her body. She could hear him breathing, smell the scent of wild spice, whiskey, and soap on his skin.

It all surrounded her, and she chose to grab on to it, to concentrate on the sound of his breathing and the smell of him being so close since she couldn’t see him. Without seeing his face, she knew her mind would fuck with her by forcing images inside her head to fill the gap. But if she focused on his touch, his scent, she would somehow manage to hold on to the here and now.

His mouth let go of her nipple with a soft pop. “This body of yours is mine.” His tongue gently swirled around her other nipple, teasing the hard little bud. “And once you feel how fucking good it is to surrender your body to me, to clear your mind and let me be the only man to possess you, you wouldn’t want it any other way.”

His fingers slipped down between her legs and stroked gently through her folds. “You see, kitten, you’re already wet, needy, just by the idea of giving it all to me.”

“Hunter—”

“Shhh. I got you, baby.”

He shifted and kissed her against her inner thigh before gliding his tongue leisurely, gently, through her slit. Scarlet arched her back, her body quivering as the sensation spread through her like wildfire. More slow strokes, from her entrance and around her outer lips, his tongue flicking against that one spot guaranteed to drive her crazy. Her moans grew louder, and the gentle caress of his lips and tongue between her legs turned harder, wilder, more desperate, kissing and sucking her like he needed her taste more than he needed air. The sensation was so strong, the pleasure so intense her body started shaking. He placed the palm of his hand flat on her stomach like he was trying to calm the tremors that wracked through her. His tongue didn’t stop, and he continued his onslaught, letting her body climb and climb, higher and higher.

“Oh God,” she moaned, moving her hips, searching for more, wanting him to fuck her harder with his tongue. But then he was gone, and the warmth of his lips was replaced with the cold air crashing against the wetness pooled between her legs.

“Hunter, please. What are you doing?”

His hand wrapped around her ankle, gently rubbing her skin before replacing it with what she assumed was another tie. “Are you going to tie my legs as well?”

“You’re fighting it.”

“What?” She jerked her head up. “Did you not feel me trying to fuck your mouth by moving my hips just now?”

“Exactly. You’re still trying to control it. So you’re fighting it.”

He tugged on the tie around her one ankle, making sure it was secure, before working on her other ankle. “You’ll come when I let you. In other words, I control your pleasure. I give it to you. You don’t take,” he jerked the tie tight, “and you don’t control it.”

With both her legs tied, thighs spread open, the panic surfaced again. He had her completely bound, helpless, vulnerable, unable to do anything to defend herself. Now it was a complete battle of the mind. Two parts inside of her head pushing and pulling her in different directions. The first part had her mind flashing back to the times when she was bound and gagged, forced to live through hell. Unable to fight or do anything to defend herself, Scarlet had to silently endure the pain and the humiliation.

The other part of her mind tried desperately to keep her in that moment. To focus on Hunter and the way he was making her feel, the way he was making her body feel. Everything about his touch was warm and it set her skin aflame. It was nothing like the cold touch of the man she hated the most. Hunter was different, he knew where to touch her, how to touch her. Here with him was where she desperately wanted to stay. But that god-awful feeling of being weak and alone, defenseless and exposed was there while she felt the cuffs around her arms and the ties around her ankles.

She was about to beg him to untie her when she felt his fingers softly trace all the way from her ankle, up the inside of her leg, her knee, until he stopped on her inner thigh. “You still with me, kitten?”

With a deep breath she nodded, biting her lip, determined to see this through, to prove to him that she was capable of doing this, of surrendering without freaking out.

The bed shifted and his mouth was once again between her legs. Every stroke, every flick of his tongue was gentle, tender, and slow. He took his time tasting her again, allowing her to feel every sensation.

When she tried to buck her hips, he grabbed them tight and pushed them down, forcing her to keep still.

“Hunter, I need more. Faster.”

“You’ll take what I give you, and how I give it to you.” He removed a hand from her hip and she felt a finger circle her entrance, yet never entering her. She wanted to scream just like her body was, demanding that he give her more, faster, harder. Then his finger was gone and he cupped her breast, tugging hard at her nipple, the pain rippling through her body and crashing between her legs where his tongue continued to move.

Another shudder swept through her, and she knew she was so damn close. So close. The edge was getting nearer and nearer, and her body demanded to get pushed over.

But then another image, another memory, grabbed hold of her mind.

Brent was continuing his usual onslaught on her body while tears slipped silently down her cheeks. There was nothing she could do. It was no use screaming. No one could hear or help her. After the first few times he had done this to her, she tried to keep her mind strong, to keep her body from giving in. But it was the time her body completely betrayed her, a time when he forced a release out of her, that she knew he had truly broken her. She cried while the most painful release swept through her, ripping her soul to shreds, and she knew that nothing would ever be able to make her whole again. That was the day he had ruined her and left nothing but broken pieces behind.

Scarlet felt the tears sting her eyes, her veins turning to ice. A loud crack filled the silent space around them as Hunter slapped her thigh. “Come back to me, Scarlet. Don’t you dare let him take you from me. Not now. Not ever.”

“Hunter, I can’t—”

“Do not give him this power. Fight it, fight him. You need to fight him.”

“I can’t do it. I can’t fight—”

But before she could finish her sentence, Hunter shifted and pushed his cock inside her, giving her exactly what he knew she needed. The second he filled her the memory shattered, and her mind filled with nothing but him…Hunter, and how good it felt to be claimed by him.

He pulled the blindfold off as he gave a hard thrust, going as deep as he could. “Look at me, Scar. You’re here, with me. No one else. Me. I’m the one moving inside you.” He flexed, giving it all to her again, over and over, and she managed to open her eyes, to look at him.

“Let me take it away. Let me take him away, and erase every bad thing he has ever done to you.”

Tears escaped her, and rolled off the side of her face.

He cupped her cheek. “This is you and me. He no longer exists. Give me everything. Let me help you heal the wounds he left behind.”

By God she wanted that. She needed that, to let him take away every bad memory, to finally take away the pain that had been torturing her for so long.

“Don’t fight it, Scar. Let go.”

He kissed her again, his palm still on her cheek. The slow rocking of his body on top and against hers felt exquisite, gradually coaxing her to relax, to feel him inside her body…inside her mind…inside her heart. It was all so surreal, something Scarlet had never experienced before. For the first time it wasn’t just her body searching for release, but her soul searching for a connection with another—a bond.

Her head fell back, her eyes rolling closed as she started to embrace the freedom of just being with someone without fighting.

Hunter wiped a strand of hair from her face. “Look at me.”

She opened her eyes.

He moved, slipping in and out of her, still going at a leisurely pace, not rushing their bodies to a release. “I want you to keep your eyes on me so that you know it’s me you’re surrendering to. No one else.”

She nodded, and he kissed her some more, his tongue sweeping through her mouth, dancing with hers. God, she wanted him to move faster, to thrust deeper and harder, but she was completely at his mercy. She had to accept it the way he was giving it to her, she had no choice.

Lifting his mouth off hers, he looked down, his green irises fixed on hers. He flexed—hard—pushing deeper, and the slow burn that simmered in her belly turned in to a raging fire, threatening to burn her to ash.

“Hunter, please.”

“I got you, baby. I won’t ever let you fall. Let go.”

And then she did. She let go. She let go of all her pain, her fear, her panic, and most of all, she let go of her need to control.

With eyes locked on one another, pleasure possessed every part of her. Scarlet came, her body shuddering, her mind spinning, and her heart racing inside her chest as she cried out. It felt like the pleasure just kept on swirling around and around inside her until it exploded, ripping through her body and crashing against every corner of her soul.

All the while he kept his pace, never stopping, speeding up, or slowing down. Hunter made sure he milked every last drop of pleasure out of her until her body went lax against the mattress, her arms and legs no longer strained against the cuffs and ties.

“Beautiful,” he whispered. “So. Fucking. Beautiful.” And then she felt him come inside her, releasing his pleasure into her body. It was the best feeling in the world, neither of them rushing toward their climax, but rather accepting the pleasure in whichever way it was given.

Hunter buried his face in her neck, every muscle strained while the last tremors of his orgasm moved through him. Scarlet could hardly catch her breath. She had never experienced such an intense moment, such a powerful connection with anyone.

Hunter finally managed to lift his head, immediately reaching for the cuffs around her wrists. Once unlocked, he eased her arms down, gently rubbing his hands from her wrists to her shoulders. Their gazes locked, and he looked at her with so much intensity reflecting in his eyes that it almost took her breath away. “I’m starting to feel too much for you, Scarlet.”

Without thinking, she wrapped her arms around his neck, loving the heat of his body against hers. “Me too, Ace. Me too.”