Chapter 17: The Weight of Him

Deirdre's POV

He kissed me in the hall with the front door still open behind us.

Then he kicked it shut with his heel and kissed me again.

I had waited four hours on a cold wall to feel his mouth, and I was not going to be polite about it.

"The pack," he said against my lips.

"It's charged. Dermot did it."

"Dermot is going to hear about this."

"Dermot is in the kitchen with a sandwich."

He laughed, one rough breath, and I felt it in my teeth.

He took me up the stairs the way he had the first time, one step below me with his hand on my back, and I didn't stop to breathe once.

"You're faster," he said.

"I've got something to get to."

His room was warm tonight.

Someone had lit the fire and turned down the bed, and I knew without asking that Dermot had done that too.

I set the pack on the pillow myself.

I turned around, and Donovan was standing very still with his hands at his sides, looking at me.

"You already said you're sorry," I said. "In front of my father. Now say what you want."

He crossed the carpet and put his hands on either side of my face.

"I want you," he said. "I want you with the lights on, and I want you to ask me for it, and I want to be told when I've earned it."

"You've earned it."

"Tell me again."

"Donovan, take your coat off me."

He did.

His fingers were slower on the buttons this time, and I felt every one of them.

My shirt came open, and the dressing on my chest, and the line at my side.

He didn't stop.

He pressed his mouth to the skin beside the dressing and then below it, and he went down on one knee and kissed my stomach.

I put my hand in his hair.

"Turn around," he said.

I turned.

He undid my trousers and drew them down over my hips, and I heard him inhale behind me.

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