Come to Me Softly (Closer to You #2)(91)
Author: A.L. Jackson

His stomach jumped, the muscles twitching as I gripped him, softly, then tight. The smooth skin was hot, radiating heat.

I burned.

I leaned up on my knees and brought him to my center.

For the longest moment we just stared, drowning in a sea of anticipation.

Jared’s mouth dropped opened as I slowly sank down on him.

He was so big, it stole my last breath, his body searing into mine, like he’d become the most prominent part of me. Spreading me. Filling me so full it almost hurt. This perfect, pleasured pain.

I dropped my head back with a whimper, and Jared dug his fingers sharply into my hips. “Goddamn,” he grunted, shifting under me to draw me deeper.

I planted my hands on his stomach, my eyes meeting his, silently asking him to lead me.

He lifted me, guided me back down, his movements controlled. Slow and hard.

I got lost there, watching as his face washed in pleasure, piercing blue eyes blazing into mine as he filled me again and again.

“You scared me,” I confessed on a murmured whimper, my fears openly revealed, given to the man who held me in his hand.

Jared increased our pace, moving to take hold of my waist with one hand while he let the other wander up to tangle in my hair.

I met with the vulnerable truth revealed in endless sea of his open eyes. “I scared me, too.”

Leaning back, my body arched, and I gave in to the heated tingles gathering low in my stomach. My walls grasped him as I slid up and down his length, meeting his hips as he rocked into me, straining as I coaxed the need from his body.

He just watched me.

Touched me.

He’d been the only one who ever could.

He brought the hand tangled in my hair to the side of my face, pieces woven through his fingers the same way he’d woven himself through every fiber of my heart while he continued to drive my body to the brink.

It all felt contradictory, the softness and the fire, the raging flames with Jared’s soft glow, all of it merging, molten as it surged through our veins.

The connection between us was so profound I was sure I’d been created from a tiny piece of his soul.

Jared steadied me, holding me still as he continued to rock into me. Harder. Faster. My legs shook when he hit that spot inside me. “Oh, God,” trembled from my lips.

“Let it go, baby,” he whispered.

My breath hitched in my throat, my fingers grasping at Jared’s skin when the pleasure broke free. I threw my head back, my eyes squeezed tight while I rode out the blinding bliss.

Jared jerked up to sitting, bringing us chest to chest. Both of his hands dug into my backside as he pressed me down, burying himself deeply in me.

So deep I cried out, shocked when I was slammed with another orgasm, just as intense as the first, but slower, languid as it lingered and spread out through every cell of my body.

I shuddered, shaking in Jared’s arms. He pulled me down, bringing us chest-to-chest again. He grunted and strained. With one last thrust, he went rigid.

Jared roared as he poured into me.

He let out a sharp breath, clung to me with all his life, his face pressed into my neck.

Panting, we both remained still, catching our breaths and stilling our frenzied hearts, holding on to what was precious.

Finally, Jared exhaled as one last tremor rolled through his chest.

He pulled me down at his side. I rested my head on his shoulder and trailed my fingertips over the rose imprinted on his chest. He shivered under my touch, but he didn’t pull away. He just wrapped me up in his arms, and at the top of my head, he released a gush of air that sounded distinctly of relief, gentle as he buried his nose in my hair. We rested in the silence, in the calm of the darkened room, listening to each other breathe.

Finally I leaned down and pressed my lips to the green eyes he’d forever etched as a piece of himself onto his skin, that piece of me he wanted to live eternally in his heart.

I felt the words forming on my tongue, and I took a chance. “Happy birthday, Jared,” I whispered against his skin.

He tensed below me, his fingers halting their lazy pursuit through my hair. Shifting, he blinked up toward the vacant ceiling. I worried I’d made a mistake before he finally spoke. His voice cracked over the hushed words. “I went to see her today . . .” His tongue darted out to wet his lips. “To her grave.”

I hugged him tightly. Floored. I knew he’d taken a step in the right direction. I just had no idea the distance he’d gone.

God, what had he been through today?

I had no clue.

In the silence, I waited, supporting him through the heightened emotions that bobbed heavily in his throat.

“It took everything I had to go there. I swore I never would, but I felt drawn . . . like there was no way to resist it. Like she was calling me back at the same time all the darkness in me was condemning me for even considering it.”

I snuggled closer into his side, urging him to continue.

He exhaled heavily. “All these months I’ve been running, trying to stay one step ahead of my past, because if I did, then I could keep it from catching up to me. And you . . . my sweet girl . . . you knew exactly what was happening. And like an ass**le, I just kept shutting you down.”

“You were scared,” I contended through a murmur, my fingertips smoothing over his bare chest.

He seemed to debate this for a second in his mind before he admitted, “Yeah . . . I’ve always been. Fucking terrified, Aly.”

He hooked his finger under my chin, forcing me to look at him.

Like I’d ever be able to look away.

“Baby, I can’t . . . please . . . just don’t give up on me,” he pled. “I’m f**ked-up. I told you a long time ago I was always gonna be. But I realized today it doesn’t always have to be like that. And, yeah, I’ve got a long way to go . . . I know it, and I’m sorry that’s who I am, but God, Aly, I can’t do it without you.”

He blinked rapidly, shook his head. “Maybe I could,” he admitted, like it just occurred to him that he had to rely on himself too, that maybe he was worth the effort. “But I don’t want to. I don’t want to do it without you.”

For a moment he held a breath. Then he blew it achingly between pursed lips. Tucking me closer, he uttered the statement at the top of my head.

“I need help.”

His words sounded with a trumpet of deliverance.

And I repeated the ones he’d promised me so many times.

“I’m not going anywhere.”

• • •

Faint rays of sunlight broke through our bedroom window. I blinked against them, slowly pulled from the depths of my restful sleep. I awoke to an empty bed. I propped up on my elbow and swept my palm across the cool sheets beside me.