Chapter 16: The Night He Stayed

Gemma's POV

He turned around.

His face was raw, and the lamp was behind me, and he looked at me and did not breathe.

"Your terms," he said, hoarse. "No touch."

"I know what I said."

"You said not your hand. Not your arm."

"I said a lot of things." I took the coat out of his bandaged hand and dropped it on the floor. "I'm asking you to stay."

"For the night?"

"The guest room is free," I said. "You know the way."

He laughed, a short broken sound, and then I had my hands in his shirt and he had his mouth on mine.

He kissed me hard and hungry.

His bandaged arms hung away from me, careful, and his mouth was everything, hot and deep and shaking.

I pulled him backward through the flat, and we hit the bedroom door and the frame and then the edge of my bed.

"Your arms," I said against his mouth.

"Don't care."

"Keep them still. I'll do it."

I pushed him down to sit on the mattress and stood between his knees.

I undid his shirt a button at a time, and he watched my hands.

His chest was hard and scarred and rose and fell too fast.

I put my mouth on his throat and tasted smoke and salt.

"Gemma," he said, low, a groan.

"Say it again."

"Gemma."

I pulled my dress over my head and stood there in the lamplight.

His breath went out of him.

"Christ," he said. "Look at you."

"You have, for three years."

"I haven't." His eyes went down me and came back. "Not once like this. I was a coward."

I climbed onto his lap with my knees either side of his hips.

He was already hard, I could feel it straining through his trousers against my pussy, and I rocked against it once and he swore.

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