As I dragged my mouth away from hers, I mumbled, “Naked. In my bed. As soon as possible.”

“Only if you promise me something,” she said, tightening her arms around my waist.

“Anything,” I said, still breathless from that kiss.

“Give it all to me,” she murmured in my ear. “The wild and the sweet, the light and the dark. Because I need them both. They make up who you are. And that’s the Nate I want to belong to.”

Fuck, I was so gone for this girl. “That’s a promise I can keep.”

***

We’d just devoured our pizza delivery and were lying naked on my sheets. I’d had her in practically every room and position in the house—spread eagle, spanked, tied and positioned against the bedroom wall—but my favorite by far was in the bathroom, her legs splayed wide and looking sexy as sin atop my vanity.

Yet, it didn’t feel like enough because I still craved the feeling of being inside her, nestled in her darkness—because even in her darkness there was light. Her soft glow filled up all the hollow and dim places inside me. I felt completely electric whenever I got to spend any amount of time with her.

Now she knelt before me, her fingers slipping to my hips and her tongue gliding up the underside of my shaft. Before she could take me further inside her mouth, I seized her arms and hauled her body up to mine. I flipped her to the mattress, my lips slamming over hers in a bruising kiss.

“You drive me insane, baby.” I drew away to catch my breath. Then I reached for a condom, rolling it quickly down my stiff erection.

I clutched for her hand and then interlaced our fingers—our thing, which always made me feel connected to her. My other hand burrowed into the nape of her neck, drawing her forehead to rest against mine.

I held her gaze steady as concrete as I inched slowly inside. Her eyes drifted partially closed on a moan. She adjusted her legs to rest higher on my back, so that I could burrow more fully in her warm and addicting heat. I plunged at a measured but gentle pace, setting a mind-blowing, drugging rhythm.

The rawness of the moment was etched in her furrowed brow, her shallow breaths. Her intense need and longing pouring out of her flushed skin. The depths of her feelings seemed to churn beneath her hazel eyes.

The way she looked at me, like I was her everything, made my chest ache and throb and surge. Hell, was there any better place in the universe right now?

“Fuck, Jessie,” I said in a husky voice, overcome with my own emotion. “You make me want to stay here like this forever. Watching you, feeling you, tasting you. I am so goddamn in love with you.”

She gasped and her eyes snapped to mine, full and glassy.

“Square,” she whispered, in a mix of wonderment and admonishment. “Did you just use the L word on me during sex?”

My thumb left her neck to circle lazily over her taut nipple. My other hand was still firmly laced in hers. I gave our powerful union of fingers a squeeze. “Yeah, Blue, I’m saying I love you during sex and I’m showing you, too. Been showing you all damn day. You got a problem with that?”

My mouth replaced my thumb and my tongue circled over her firm nub, matching the slower pace of my thrusts.

“Oh,” she whimpered, her head falling back. “So good.”

When I moved to her other breast, her fingers tightly gripped my hand.

“No, I don’t have a problem with that as long as. . . .” Her breaths were coming stronger and faster. “Oh God . . . fuck . . . as long as you don’t have a problem with me telling you I feel the same way during my . . .”

And then she sailed firmly over the edge, her chest a bloom of color, her legs shaking, and her lips trembling. It was so damn erotic that I followed suit after two final and firm drives.

Still inside her, we lay wrapped on my tangled sheets, as she placed a gentle kiss on my shoulder.

“You love me?” she mumbled into my chest.

I cupped her chin with my fingers in order to meet her gaze. “Yeah, I love you, Blue.”

Her eyes filled with unshed tears. “I love you too, Square.”

Goddamn, my heart felt filled to fucking capacity. I planted a soft kiss on her lips, on each of her shoulders, and then each of her breasts—because fucking hell, I wanted to worship at this girl’s altar.

“Does this mean you’d consider getting a matching bridge tattoo?” she said, her fingers tugging at the back of my hair.

“Hell no,” I said and she burst into a fit of giggles. “But I’ll build you one someday.”

“Promise?” she said with a smirk, but also with a bit of awe in her eyes.

And right then I didn’t care if I built it out of fucking Legos, she was getting her damn bridge.

“For you,” I said, my mouth tugging on her lower lip. “Anything.”