Chapter Seventeen
Eva
We ripped and tore at each other’s clothing like we were going to die if we didn’t fuck in the next few seconds, and I can honestly say that was exactly how I felt. I was so hungry for Trace that I couldn’t breathe, and my heart was racing like an out of control freight train.
I yanked at the heavy fisherman’s sweater he was wearing as he knelt to shuck off my jeans and panties.
“Off,” I panted, making him lift his arms to let me relieve him of the garment as I impatiently kicked out of the denims and lingerie he’d lowered to my ankles.
He stood and made short work of my sweater and bra while I fumbled eagerly with the zipper of his pants. My hands were trembling so badly that Trace finally took over and got rid of his jeans and boxer briefs himself.
I moaned as he pinned my hands over my head on the wall, his eyes wild and feral as he stared down at me.
“Fuck, Eva. What in the hell have you done to me?” he growled.
I couldn’t answer. I just stared up at him as air sawed in and out of my lungs. Trace was raw right now, and he was breathtaking. My body was straining, vibrating with the need to have this man inside me.
“Please,” I pleaded, wrapping my arms around his neck.
“Wrap your legs around my waist,” he demanded as he released his hold on my hands.
I hopped up and he caught my ass with both hands, squeezing my butt cheeks as he shifted until he was perfectly positioned.
My breath hitched, my body greedy as I felt his massive cock slide inside my damp folds and along my clit. I started to drown in sensation as my pebbled nipples abraded along the hard muscles of his chest.
I could forget my own name when I was entwined with Trace like this; the feel and the masculine scent of him was enough to make me lose myself entirely.
“Hold on to me.” His voice was commanding, but also raw and needy.
Like I was capable of doing anything else but hold him? He was the center of my universe right now.
I tightened my legs around his hips, urging him to fuck me.
Trace didn’t disappoint me, his forward surge pinning me tightly to the wall as he thrust inside my sheath. “Oh, God. Yes,” I screamed, wondering if I’d ever felt anything as good as his body connected to mine.
Spearing my hands into his hair, I leaned into his chest and kissed him, thrusting my tongue into his mouth as he began a punishing rhythm, pistoning in and out of my channel with a force that left me helplessly moaning against his lips.
His assault on my senses was merciless as I finally broke from the embrace to breathe, and his mouth started to devour every bare inch of skin he could reach. Trace’s tongue trailed a path from my ear to my shoulders, then back up again.
“You’re mine, Eva. You’ll always belong to me,” he said in a rough whisper.
Every nerve ending in my body fired as his low declaration vibrated against my ear. His fierce possessiveness made me burn even hotter, and I was desperate to climax. Every stroke of his cock rubbed his groin against my clit, and the brutal pace was driving me insane, and I could feel my orgasm starting.
His hand moved on my rear, allowing his finger to stroke along the crack of my ass and over the puckered opening of my anus. The sensation of the tip of his finger penetrating that forbidden opening fired a violent climax that seized my body like a small object being sucked into the path of a tornado.
“Trace,” I screamed as he continued to pummel into me. My back arched and my head connected with the wall. I gripped his shoulders, my nails biting into the skin of his upper back.
“Fuck, yeah. Claim me, Eva. Mark the shit out of me because I sure as hell know I’m already yours.” He groaned as he pinned me against the wall one last time, entering me hard so his cock buried itself to the root inside me.
I bucked in his arms in the throes of my climax, my short nails still embedded in his skin. Some animalistic urge that was roaring inside me did want to make him mine in any way I could, especially after he’d declared himself to me.
As my body started to relax, I let go of my vise-like hold on his shoulders and wrapped my arms around him with a sob that was part relief and part sorrow as he finished spilling his warm release deep inside my womb.
My body was satiated, but my heart was shattering. How could I leave this man, this wonderful male who now owned a part of my soul?
He carried me to the bed and gently laid me down after lifting the covers. I slid over and he lowered his body between the sheets. “What’s wrong?” he asked as he tenderly folded me into his arms.
“Nothing,” I lied, knowing he’d probably heard my brief, involuntary sound of sadness. “I think I was…overwhelmed.” Well, that was the truth.
“I want to make you happy, Eva.”
Trace made me ecstatic, which was why it was going to be so damn hard to pull myself away from him. “You do.”
Neither one of us said a word and we laid with our bodies entangled, my head on his chest while I listened to the rapid, strong beat of his heart, wishing that there was any way I could stay with him. Unfortunately, I never found a solution, and I knew these moments were precious because they’d have to sustain me for a lifetime.
Several hours later, I was dressed again, watching Trace sleep with my back propped against the headboard.
I had packed a small bag with only things I desperately needed, like a few changes of clothes and some personal items.
I’d left his mother’s ring next to his wallet and watch on the nightstand, somewhere I knew that he would find it almost immediately after he woke.
I wasn’t sure how he’d explain my absence to Sebastian and Dane, but he’d think of something. The important part was that Trace’s name wasn’t dragged through the mud, nor was his father’s.
Knowing Trace was a fairly sound sleeper, I let my hand lightly stroke his hair. “I have to go,” I whispered to a sleeping Trace. “I don’t want to, but I can’t destroy your life by staying.”
I sighed, knowing I had to get off the bed and force myself to go, but I was stealing every moment possible.
“I love you,” I said in a low voice, tears streaming down my cheeks unchecked. “I’m sorry I never told you, but it would have been awkward and complicated, and I know you’d hate that.”
In the distance, I could hear one of Trace’s fancy clocks chiming the midnight hour, and I knew it was time to go.
“Merry Christmas, Trace,” I murmured shakily as I palmed his cheek gently and then pulled my hand away.
I didn’t look back as I rose and hefted the light tote bag onto my shoulder and snatched up the jacket I’d set beside it. My tears were flowing like a river, blurring my vision to the point that I could barely see the door as I reached it and fumbled for the handle.
I’d just turned the knob when a very strong, very large arm snaked around my waist and Trace’s voice boomed loud enough to wake every soul in the house. “What in the hell do you think you’re doing!”
“Trace, I have to go.” I struggled, but my strength was no match for the furious male who had yanked my body against his.
“Bullshit. You aren’t going anywhere. You fucking love me. I heard you say it,” he rasped loudly.
I dropped the bag and the jacket I was holding as he lifted me up, strode over to the bed, and dropped me unceremoniously onto the sheets. I started to roll over and out of bed, but he quickly straddled my body and pinned my hands beside my head.
“Explain,” he said in a clipped, angry voice.
I looked up at him, my cheeks still streaked with wetness from my tears. He was enraged, but I wasn’t afraid of him. Even though his eyes were stormy and his nostrils flaring with anger, he wouldn’t hurt me. “I can’t explain.”
“You damn well can explain, and you will.”
I shook my head. “I can’t.”
“Tell me, Eva. If you have a good reason, I’ll let you go.”
My mind was racing with thoughts. “You promise?”
He nodded sharply one time.
Maybe telling him the truth was the only way he was going to let me leave. And I did have to go.
I took a deep breath and started to speak. “Britney knows everything. She stole my mother’s diary. I think she read more of it than I have. If I don’t go, she’ll publicize everything, and she’ll tell Dane that she only slept with him to get to you. She’ll hurt him.”
He looked confused. “That’s it? That’s a terrible reason. You aren’t going anywhere.”
“It’s enough. She’ll destroy your father’s reputation, and yours. And she’ll hurt Dane badly.” I yanked at my confined wrists irritably and glared at him.
“Honestly, sweetheart…no, it isn’t enough. I fucking love you, Eva. Do you think I give a damn what Britney does?”
He loves me? “You obviously heard me talking, so you know that I love you, too. I can’t let her destroy you. She threatened to expose everything about your father getting duped into marrying my crazy mother.”
“My father is dead, Eva. And I don’t give a fuck what she says about me or you. But I doubt she’d even carry through on her threats. Dane already knows she’s using him. She isn’t going to break his heart.”
“He knows? He isn’t in love with her?” Admittedly, I’d never thought Dane acted smitten, but he was a quiet sort of man.
“No,” he answered flatly. “Now let’s talk about us.”
I swallowed the lump in my throat as I looked up at him, speechless. His eyes were still burning with intensity, and I didn’t see any signs that his anger was fading.
He continued when I didn’t speak, “If you leave, you’ll break me, Eva. I’ve never felt this way about any woman, but I don’t think I can ever put the pieces of me back together again if you go. I need you to stay with me. Whatever happens, we’ll deal with it together, but you can’t run away. I can’t handle that.”
My heart squeezed until I felt like it was going to burst. “Why me?” I asked softly.
He loves me? I still wasn’t able to wrap my head around that statement, and I didn’t get why he’d want me. Oh, I knew he cared, but he loved me to the point where I was his weakness, a woman he desperately needed. Me?
“Why not you?” he asked in a calmer voice.
“I’m a mixed-race nobody, Trace. A woman who was in prison for most of her adult life—”
“Because your mother was a lunatic,” he finished. “You’re the strongest woman I’ve ever met. I think I knew from the moment you admitted that you didn’t know Chloe that I was doomed. I just didn’t want to admit it, so I convinced myself I just needed to fuck you. But it’s not true. Hell, I do need that, but I need more than that. I need everything from you.”
He sounded disgruntled, and I had to smile. “Do you think you can let me up?”
His grip on my wrists became gentler, and he finally pulled me into a sitting position as he grumbled, “I’ll release you, but I won’t let you go.”
He got a firm grip around my waist and tugged me between his legs.
I sighed as I felt the warmth of his body against my back. “I want to stay with you, but I’m afraid of what Britney will do. I didn’t want to go, Trace.”
“You’re not going, and I don’t give a flying fuck what Britney does. She’s out of here. I’ll apologize to Dane for losing him his fuck buddy, but I need you more than he needs her.”
I sat there for a moment, stunned. It had to be the first time in his life that Trace had thought about his own needs first, and I told him so.
“I have to this time,” he admitted. “I wouldn’t be worth a damn if you leave me.”
I kicked off my shoes and let them fall to the floor, then I turned, positioning myself on my knees and wrapped my arms around his bare shoulders. “I love you. I thought my heart was going to break,” I mumbled tearfully.
“I would have put it back together again, baby,” Trace said huskily as he nuzzled my ear. “There’s nothing I wouldn’t do for you.”
I clung to him as my tears fell again, landing on his bare skin as I hugged him to me. There was nothing I wouldn’t do for him, either. I was convinced that he really didn’t care if my past got out to the public. “It will get ugly if she talks,” I warned, my fear still present even though I was completely convinced that he loved me. I really didn’t want my past to cause him any pain in the future. It would kill me if he got hurt because of me.
“Don’t care,” Trace grunted. “The only thing that would hurt me is if you leave.”
I crumbled as he spoke his candid response, and I was grateful to whatever fate had brought this amazing man into my life, the only person who’d ever completely believed in me.
I pulled back as his arm reached out to the bedside table and he snatched something from his nightstand. “You forgot this,” he said in a slightly annoyed voice.
He had his mother’s ring.
“I couldn’t take that,” I stammered, surprised that he would ever think I wouldn’t have given it back.
He lifted my left hand and slid the beautiful ring back on my finger. “Take it now, then. I want you to marry me, Eva. Not pretend, but for real. Put me out of my misery and tell me that you’ll be my wife, that you’ll wear this forever.”
I looked from my hand to his face, not sure if I was elated or terrified. Then, because I couldn’t stop myself, I started to cry.