Chapter Thirty-Two
“You jumped out of a moving vehicle?!”
Mike’s face was incredulous. Rin had a hard time believing it herself. She had told Mike pretty much everything that had happened the day before, and she was still amazed at the insanity. The whole day felt almost surreal. If she didn’t have the aches and pains, and the lovely cast on her arm, to prove it, she’d have thought she had dreamed the whole thing.
Rin shoveled in another forkful of scrambled eggs. Mike had brought her breakfast in bed. His concern for her so touching she’d almost teared up… again. She would have thought her tear ducts would have been drained dry after yesterday, but apparently, they had rebounded just fine. God, she was starving. Not surprising since she had been too nervous about meeting with her uncle to eat breakfast, too uncomfortable to eat much of the lunch, and then too sleepy to eat after being discharged from the hospital. Her plate was practically licked clean in minutes.
“More?” Mike offered as she drained her glass of orange juice.
Rin shook her head, wiped her mouth with a napkin, and smiled. “Thank you for that. I was famished.”
Mike nodded but didn’t return the smile as he removed the tray. In fact, on closer inspection, he was frowning. As if he was thinking about some complex problem and not liking the result. When he returned to the bed, Rin had every intention of asking him what his brain was chewing so hard on, but her eyes were snagged by the jar in his hand. Recognizing it on sight, Rin’s nose wrinkled before he even unscrewed the top to release the stench of the goo inside. “Nope, no, no way,” she said, shaking her head vigorously back in forth in denial. “I do not want to smell that all over me today.”
Mike set one knee on the bed and crawled closer, waving the jar in her direction. “It’ll loosen up your muscles,” he cajoled in a sing-song voice, “and bonus, it’ll keep any nosy neighbors away so you can rest.”
Rin let out a snort. “Like anyone could sleep through that stench.”
“It’s not that bad,” Mike chuckled, “and you know you’ll get used to it after a few minutes.”
Cocking her head slightly, Rin threw Mike a coquettish smile. “Are you offering to rub my body, Mr. Myers?”
Mike’s return grin was positively wicked, “I am.”
“Allllll over?”
“Absolutely.”
Rin laid back more fully against the mound of pillows. “Ditch the goo and I’m game.”
Without hesitation, Mike threw the jar over his shoulder and carefully leaned over Rin’s body and gently kissed her smiling lips. So carefully, he pulled the covers back. Starting at her neck and then moving down her shoulders and arms, his hands hesitantly trailed over bruises, to knead her unmarked flesh and loosen the multitude of knots from yesterday’s impromptu work out.
Rin could feel the heat of arousal flushing her skin. Her nipples tightened, and her core throbbed. She didn’t know whether it was the pharmaceuticals coursing through her bloodstream, or just being this close to Mike, but at the moment Rin was pain free – pleasure was all her brain was registering.
With her mostly uninjured hand, she reached out and stroked the line of Mike’s erection that was tenting the front of his sweatpants. He groaned but moved his hips away from her fingers. “Your injuries… I don’t want to hurt you.”
Moving that hand to the back of his neck, she pulled him to her for a kiss. “You won’t” she breathed against his mouth. “We’ll take it slow and easy.”
Mike growled, “Slow and easy,” he repeated before licking his way into her mouth and sealing his lips to hers.
He felt so good. Rin couldn’t get enough of touching Mike. His torso was bare, all of that heated skin hers to touch. Wishing she had use of both hands, she stroked, she smoothed, and she gripped with her good hand, as their kisses grew in intensity, their breath mingling as they both began to pant.
Mike moved from her mouth, to kiss his way to her ear, down her neck and chest, to settle over a nipple, stroking it with his tongue, the already puckered bud tightened even further when he blew a cool stream of air over the damp surface.
Rin’s back arched off the bed. “Please, Mike, please.” She ached so badly to feel him inside of her. Her hand again reached for his erection and this time, he welcomed her touch, his hips tilting forward in encouragement so she slipped her fingers under the waistband of his sweatpants and gripped the hot, hard length. Mike’s growl of pleasure was music to her ears, and she watched his face in rapt fascination as she stroked his shaft. His jaw was clenched, his eyes closed, his cheeks flushed. Rin could have watched him forever, but her body had other ideas. Tightening her grip slightly, she gave him a playful little tug. “I want you inside me.”
Stripping off his sweatpants in what was probably record time, Mike sheathed his erection with a condom and then settled carefully between her open thighs. Rin groaned and closed her eyes in pleasure, loving the feel of his weight. When he went no further she opened her eyes and saw him looking at her intently. He dropped a kiss on her mouth and leaned his forehead against hers, his breath hitting her face in little puffs as he panted. “If you feel the slightest pain,” he said, the head of his erection finding her heat. “Say the word, and I stop.”
Rin nodded, but the only word she could manage was “please.” Mike thrust home, and that was exactly how it felt – like home. Mike filled all of her empty places. And as he brought her to a shattering climax, Rin knew, without a doubt, that she was exactly where she was supposed to be. Not in New York at the helm of some company, but here in this small town, with her wolf at her side.
Passions spent, Rin was feeling sleepy from the combination of the pain meds and the pleasure as Mike stroked a warm washcloth over her skin and dropped ticklish kisses on her belly. She giggled, and though Mike was smiling, Rin could sense that something had him distracted. Gripping his wrist to bring the sponge bath to a halt, she shot his a questioning look. “What’s wrong?”
Mike shook his head, “It’s nothing.”
“You promised no more lies, Mike. What’s wrong? Something is bothering you, I noticed it earlier too.” Rin gripped his wrist harder, her voice pleading, “Talk to me.”
Mike blew out a long breath, his shoulders slumping in defeat. “Aside from the fact that I’m still a little freaked out that you could have died. That I could have lost you…” Mike’s voice cracked with emotion and he let out a hard cough to clear his throat, before running his fingers through his hair in agitation. “It occurred to me that with your uncle’s death, you’ll inherit his company. It’s what he had planned.” Mike shook his head. “I still could lose you. All that money, probably properties, cars, jewels, hell, maybe even the Mona Lisa…” he waved his free hand in the air, “I don’t know.” His eyes clashed with Rin’s and her heart nearly broke at the sorrow in his gaze. “What do I have that could compete with that?”
He thought she was going to leave him Rin realized. Not going to happen. Not for all the tea in China. Taking his hand in hers, she laced their fingers together. “Do you know who I looked up to most growing up?”
“Jackie Chan.”
Rin let out a little snort of laughter. “Well, yes, he’s up there in my top three, but no. It was my parents. They were both doctors. They could have gone on to choose specialty medicine for the money, but they didn’t. They were happy with their tiny little family practice because they built it together. They only ever needed each other. They lived a good life, not because they had money but because they loved.”
Rin’s eyes welled with emotion and she had to clear her throat before she could continue. “I’ve only ever wanted a life like theirs. Some, like my uncle, may think their life was small, but to them it was perfect. To me, it was perfect.” Leaning in close, Rin laid her head on Mike’s shoulder and he nuzzled the top of her hair, breathing in her scent as she continued. “I feel at home here, a small town, a good job, friends… but mostly because I found everything I’ve ever dreamed of in you.”
“Marry me.”
Rin gasped and lifted her head to look at Mike as he rushed on. “I know this probably isn’t your idea of romantic, hell, I don’t even have a ring, but you – you are everything to me, Rin. Please say you’ll marry me.”
With tears overflowing her eyes and a smile on her lips, Rin said the word that made Mike feel like the luckiest male in the world.