Total pages in book: 128
Estimated words: 124320 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 622(@200wpm)___ 497(@250wpm)___ 414(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 124320 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 622(@200wpm)___ 497(@250wpm)___ 414(@300wpm)
Unsure what to say next, I step farther down the hall to inspect photos on the wall. There’s a series of collages. The first holds pictures of Noah, as to be expected. Lots of them with Ezra and a baby girl who could only be Mai.
There’s no pain in my heart seeing her, at first swaddled in Ezra’s arms and then growing bigger, rounder. Eventually standing on her own, her smile bright with a few tiny teeth. There’s no jealousy or resentment. How could there be? With her midnight blue eyes, sulky-sweet mouth and dark curls, she’s so obviously, like Noah, an extension of Ezra.
And I fall in love with her on sight.
“She’s beautiful, Ez,” I breathe.
“She is.” He comes to stand beside me, slips his hand into mine. I squeeze his fingers, but still can’t look away from the little dark-haired cherub Noah holds like a priceless piece of art. Ezra runs a finger over a picture with both his children. “He’s great with her.”
I nod, still processing the strength of my response to his daughter. My eyes drift to a collage of photos on the wall beside the one with him and his kids. At first, I don’t recognize the two children in the photos. They’re obviously older pictures, not shiny and glossy like the others. It’s easily a dozen of them. A girl and a boy at the park, on swings. Riding bikes. Eating dinner, surrounded by family. And at the center, them as babies in a bathtub.
“It’s us.” I can only gather enough air to manage those words. “Ezra, it’s—”
“Us.” He smiles and points to the photos on the wall. In one, it’s a Saturday evening meal, one at my old house. Our parents are there, my father and mother holding hands. Kayla, Keith. Ezra and me.
“Where did you find these?”
“My mother’s attic, garage. She has a lot more. These were just some of my favorites.” He pauses, turns his head to stare at my profile. “Are you here to stay?”
I don’t look away from the two babies at the center of the collage, caught mid-splash in the tub. A lifetime. We’ve known each other all our lives, yet missed so much. Wasted so much time. Not anymore.
“If you still want me.”
The words have barely left my mouth. He pulls me into him, pushes me to the wall. His body cages mine, protective and aggressive at once. I slip my hand into a gap between the buttons of his shirt, finding velvet over stone beneath. He squeezes my ass with one hand and clasps my neck with the other, tipping my mouth up and open. His kiss is deep, craving, the press of his shoulders and chest and hips and thighs a delicious weight that pins me in place so he can take all he wants.
God, how I’ve missed this—missed him. The textures, the taste and scent of him. He feels and tastes and smells like mine. I reach between us to palm his cock, sliding my hand up and over the hard, extended length of him.
“Let me give you a tour of the house,” he pants into my neck. Grabbing my hand, he drags me up the stairs. “There’s a kitchen, a half bath, a rooftop patio and some other shit.”
He crosses the landing, rushes us down the hall to a large bedroom and pulls me into his arms.
“Tour’s over.”
I drop my forehead to his shoulder and laugh, trying to catch my breath. “I don’t get to see the rooftop patio?”
He sets his thumbs under my chin and pushes up until our gazes lock. “After.”
“After what?”
His eyes go black-blue and he licks the arch of my neck, sucks my earlobe, cups my breast, brushing the nipple to hard life. He takes my mouth, the kiss a drugging, thorough exploration that makes my head spin.
“I want you so bad,” he says, his breath coming harshly. “My dick is telling me to take you right here on the spot.”
He gives me a head-to-toe heated perusal, licking his lips. “But you’re my gift. I also want to take my time unwrapping you, spreading you out on my bed.”
“As long as you’re inside me in the next five minutes, I don’t care which option you take. It’s been a long time, Ez. I need dick, not options.”
“Bed then.”
Holding his hand, I walk backward toward the large bed, never taking my eyes off him. It’s been so long since we were in the same room, much less alone. The bedroom is barely lit by one single lamp. When my knees hit the edge of the mattress, I reach behind me to undress.
“No.” Ezra gently turns me around, sliding his hands over my bare shoulders and arms, settling at my hips. “I want to.”
The hiss of his breath through his teeth mingles with the hiss of the zipper as he lowers it, peeling the brocaded silk back so air kisses and pebbles my bare skin. The dress slouches at my hips and then surrenders, falling to the floor in a spill of decadence around my ankles. He traces the bare curve of my ass in the skimpy thong, my thighs. He slips his fingers under the lacy scraps at my hips and slides the underwear down. I step out of it and he caresses the inside of my thigh.