She shifted on the bed so that she was sitting up against the headboard. The sheet didn’t cover her breasts, but the last thing she was thinking about was modesty. She could feel herself stalling, hated that she was making things even more tense...but everything she was feeling had come on so suddenly that she was only just barely managing to process her emotions as they flooded through her.

“I don’t want you to go.” Chase’s passionate words resonated all the way down to the very depths of her soul. “I love you.” He slid his hands over hers. “You love me.”

“Chase, I—”

He pressed one finger over her lips. “Please, just let me say one more thing.”

She paused, then nodded.

“I know you want to prove some things to yourself. But you don’t have one single thing to prove. You’re an incredible woman, the sweetest, strongest person I’ve ever been fortunate to know. I don’t have one single doubt that you can take care of the things you want to take care of by yourself.” He caressed her cheek and she had to turn her face into his warmth. His love. “Let me help you. Let me be there for you. Let me be there beside you. Let me be your strength in numbers.”

All night long as she’d slept in his arms, her subconscious had been spinning, working to figure out how she was going to deal with everything. And for the past four days she’d been basking in wonder at the sweetness in every one of Chase’s smiles, at the heat of his kisses, at how good she felt with him, at how wonderful and unexpected his words of love were. She’d tried to convince herself that leaving was still the right plan, that it was something she had to do to know her own strength.

But love—the love she could no longer deny feeling for Chase—had changed everything.

Especially her stubborn belief that she needed to go it alone to prove that she was strong, to prove that she wasn’t a victim. Who was she kidding? Only a fool would walk away from this man.

She’d been a fool once before. But she’d learned from her mistakes: She wasn’t going to turn away from a love this pure, this real.

“That first night you found me,” she said softly, “I knew I would never trust a man again. I knew it wasn’t even possible. But then you walked into my life and turned it completely upside down. And suddenly, everything I knew, everything I believed came into question.” She shook her head. “I didn’t want to ask myself those questions. I didn’t want to make the mistake of hoping again. I didn’t want to end up believing in the wrong thing again. It was easier, so much easier, just to cling to those old feelings. It was easier to tell myself—to tell you—that our connection was just physical. Somehow I had to find a way I could justify not denying myself your touch, your kisses.”

Chloe realized it was just as well that she was naked with Chase on the bed as she confessed her innermost thoughts, her final secrets. She was done hiding anything from him. From here until forever, she’d willingly give him her body. Her heart.

And her soul.

“All along I think I knew our connection went way beyond physical. All along I think I knew nothing would be able to stop me from falling in love with you. No matter how many times I tried to tell myself that I was going to leave, that I needed to leave, that striking out on my own was the only option, another piece of my heart broke just trying to imagine leaving you. I thought being strong meant going solo, meant standing on my own two feet without needing anything or anyone to lean on, but then I heard you talk about your family, I watched you with Marcus and I saw the way you work as a team with your crew. You showed me that the real strength comes from learning how to trust again. You make me want to be brave enough to love again.”

Chloe moved closer to Chase, the sheet falling completely off her lap as she went to her knees in front of him on the bed, his hands held tightly up against her heart.

“I still want to be stronger, I still want to be a better person...but when I’m with you, I’m already the strongest, the best I’ve ever been. Your love makes me feel like I just might find the woman I’ve been searching for inside myself all these years.” Her tears were falling now, one after the other, as she professed the truth of her feelings. “I know we need to leave this fantasy world soon, but I don’t want to leave you. Not now. Not ever.”

Her heart pounded hard, so ridiculously hard, as she waited for him to respond to her heart laid out bare before him, practically raw and beating on the soft white sheets.

But he didn’t say anything at all, this incredible man she loved so much. He simply lifted her on to his lap and held her.

As all of her dreams finally came true, Chloe wanted to laugh with the joy of it all. She wanted to cry tears of appreciation for the little girl inside who had never been able to give up the dream of warmth.

And she wanted to love the man who held her heart with his.

Making her choice, she nipped at his lips with her teeth, once, then twice, then a third time. With each love-bite she could feel him growing bigger, thicker, against her groin.

She didn’t think, didn’t have to worry about hiding any of her desires anymore, as she lifted herself up just enough to come over his erection, then lowered herself down over his thick shaft. He was big, but she was already more than ready for him, had been from the moment “Good morning” had left his lips.

And still, even as she could feel how hard it was for Chase to hold onto his control, he let her lead their lovemaking. But, oh, how she’d loved making him lose control. And how desperately she wanted him to lose hold of that control again and again until there was no more thinking, no more chances for either of them to stop and think and worry.

“Last night,” she said as she lifted nearly all the way off of his rock-hard shaft, “do you remember when I had you in my mouth?”

She slid back down on to him and he pulsed hard within her, nearly setting off her own answering explosion.

“You were so gorgeous like that, Chloe.”

Each word sounded pained, she thought, as she slowly lowered herself back down onto him. “Which part did you like best?” she asked in her most innocent voice. “Having me on my knees in front of you?” She blinked at him, eyes wide. “Or was it watching yourself slide in and out of my mouth, watching my lips stretch wide to take all of you in?”

She felt it then, the vibration of a growl that started in the bottom of his lungs before erupting against her mouth as he covered her lips with his and kissed her hard.

Another second found her on her back, her arms pulled over her head and held in place by one of his hands at her wrists. Again and again he drove into her, and she wrapped her legs around his waist to take him deeper, then deeper still.

She wasn’t even the slightest bit afraid of the way he was holding her, but before she could tell him just how good it was, how close she was to coming apart, he stilled inside of her.

“I don’t ever want to take anything you don’t want to give. But I want you too bad, need you too much, not to lose control one day.”

She loved that he was so careful with her heart even when their bodies were on the verge of going completely out of control. And yet, she knew better now than to need these pauses. She didn’t need him to reassure her anymore that she was safe with him.

“I love it when you lose control. I love knowing I can do that to you. I love knowing that I can share all of my fantasies with you, that sometimes you’ll tie me up and other times you’ll be the one bound and waiting for me to lick every inch of your body.”

“I’ll never forgive myself if I step over the line, Chloe.”

“No lines, Chase. No boundaries. We don’t need them, I know that now, not when love is what’s behind every kiss—” She pressed her lips to his. “—not when love is what prompts every bite—” She nipped at his shoulder, then laved the small hurt with her tongue. “—not when love is what has me begging you to take me harder. Faster.” She clenched her inner muscles on him to reinforce her point.

She looked into the beautiful green eyes that had always looked at her with wonder, with laughter...and with love.

“I’m putty in your hands. And I love it. Take me, Chase. Turn me inside out.” She licked across his lips before adding, “Cross a line. I dare you.”

As soon as her challenge sounded in the room, everything became a blur as he spun her on the bed so that her hands and knees were under her.

Oh God, she thought as he came into her from behind. She tightened her fist into the sheets and held on for dear life as he pounded her again and again, his hands moving from her hips to her breasts and then back down between her legs in a perfect path of pleasure. How she loved it when he sprinted right over the lines and reduced her boundaries to smithereens.

Chloe no longer had any fears of being controlled and Chase no longer held back to make sure he didn’t push her too far. All that remained was the sweet ecstasy of trust.

And pure love.

* * *

After a shower so long and wonderful that the water had turned cold by the time Chase finally washed the shampoo out of Chloe’s hair, she told him, “I’m going to call the police and file a report. I’m also going to get a restraining order. I know I should have called right away. It wasn’t that I was ashamed to tell the police what happened to me. I know that I have nothing to be ashamed of.” Her eyes darkened as she said, “I just kept thinking I should have been smart enough to see it coming, that if I’d only realized how unhinged, how angry he was about me leaving him, then surely I could have made sure he couldn’t hurt me.”

If he ever came face to face with her ex-husband, Chase didn’t have the first clue how he’d stop himself from killing the bastard.

“You’re so good, so sweet, so strong that you can do absolutely anything you want, Chloe. Anything but blame yourself for other people’s weaknesses.”

“I know that now.”

Last night at dinner, he hadn’t shown her all the pictures he’d taken of her. Now, he went to his camera bags and pulled out another set of photos. “I took these. For evidence.”

She took them from him and quickly looked through the different shots he’d surreptitiously taken of her bruise during that first day. “I should have thought to ask you to take these for me. But I—” She stopped, took a deep breath. “I wasn’t ready to think about what I needed to do.” Her smile was small, but it was there, at least for a brief moment. “Thank you for being smart enough to take these, to plan ahead when I couldn’t.” She reached out her hand to him. “Will you come sit with me while I make the phone call?”

Chase was a breath away from telling her that he would do more than sit with her for a phone call. He and his brothers would make sure, in no uncertain terms, that her ex would never come near her again.

Instead, he walked with her into the kitchen, handed her the phone, and held her hand the entire time. When the call finally came to an end, Chloe looked shaken.

“Have I told you how brave you are yet this morning?”

“I love you, too,” was her response.

He pulled her onto his lap and wanted to hold her like that forever. But the quiet left her far too susceptible to replaying over and over in her head what she’d just told the police.

“I finally get to have breakfast with you.”

She lifted her head from his chest in surprise. “Breakfast?”

“You’re about to be blessed by another of my talents.”

He raised his eyebrows in a faux-lecherous way to remind her exactly what talent she’d just been party to experiencing. He missed her warmth, her softness, when she slid off his lap, but he was beyond glad to see her smile back as he slipped on a flowery apron.

“I swear I won’t say a single thing about marshmallows,” she said with a giggle as he turned so that she could tie it in the back for him.