Danni’s phone rang, cutting through the perfection.

“Ignore it,” she gasped, bumping her mouth against mine.

“You sure?”

“Yup.”

“‘Kay.” My hands roamed over her back, pulling her closer. The phone stopped ringing, leaving nothing but the sounds of our kisses as a temporary reprieve before it rang again.

“Ignore it,” she repeated.

“You sure?”

“Yup.”

“‘Kay.”

The bossier she got, the hotter I found her. We continued to kiss through the third call, then the fourth, until the fifth call became too much for her. Danni stamped her foot impatiently, growling as she spun away from me and walked over to her bedside table to pick up her phone.

I took the free time to collect myself, blowing out a breath and readjusting the big guy in my jeans when Danni wasn’t looking. At least the accident hadn’t made him any less enthusiastic about life.

“Everything okay?”

“It’s nothing.” She glanced up at me and smiled, her cheeks flushed. The biggest turn-on for me was knowing how much I affected her—a girl like Danni. Her reactions always made me want to ruin her even more. Whether that ruination was from unexpected tenderness or savage antics, it didn’t bother me. All that mattered was seeing her eyes light up, her chest bounce, and her thighs press together.

“That’s some kind of nothing to call five times.” I took two wobbly steps closer towards the bed until I was able to lean over and sit down.

“Shit, your crutches.” She panicked, running over to them. “I just left you.”

“I’m fine.” I laughed. “Now that the casts are off, it’s only my weak muscles that are letting me down.”

“I’m the worst girlfriend ever.”

Girlfriend.

She’d never said that word before. Sure, I’d called her my girl, and we’d told each other we shared a mutual love, but hearing her confirm it with a status made that shit-eating grin of mine explode as I watched her pick up my crutches and rest them against the bed. I reached out for her hands, pulling her in between my legs and looking up into her eyes.

“You know how you like it when I call you baby? Well, I like it when you call yourself my girlfriend.”

“Girlfr—” She blinked once, parting her lips and quickly glancing behind her before looking at me again. “Did I just say that?”

I nodded. “And don’t you dare try to take it back now. This wounded man can’t take any more breaks.”

Danni’s grin soon mirrored mine, and she leaned down, bopping her finger on my nose before she kissed the tip of it. “Calm down, boyfriend. I’m not taking anything back.”

I growled at the word boyfriend, using all the upper body strength I had to pull her closer to me and throw her down on the bed.

She squealed and giggled as I rolled her over, careful not to disturb the small picnic she’d laid out in the centre of her mattress. Her hair fanned out beneath me as I rolled on top of her, pushed my finger through it and searched her eyes.

“You’re too beautiful to belong to anyone, you know that? People are going to say it’s a crime that you’re mine.”

“Fuck those people,” she whispered back.

I kissed her again. Slowly. Tenderly.

We weren’t a love that was meant to happen. Nothing had been written in the stars. There’d been no early signs to get us where we were meant to be any sooner. We had no stories to share, other than those where we both passed each other by like strangers in the night. But every time I looked at her in my arms, and every time I tasted her breaths or felt her heart beating against my chest, I knew she was right for me. More right than anything had ever felt before.

Eventually, we managed to break away from each other, and I let Danni play the waitress to our little tea party, making myself comfortable against some plumped up pillows while she served champagne and fed me strawberries. I even chewed on some Percy Pig sweets from my beloved Marks & Spencer. I really was an old dude in a broken dude’s body.

I opened the envelope with my name on it, pulling out a beautifully scripted card. One that read:

Love is a two-part adventure. The first step is falling. The other is staying.

Now that I’ve invited you in, you’re never allowed to leave.

Your Danni x

I accepted that particular invitation with another kiss. Any excuse to press my lips against hers.

Danni removed my trainers as carefully as she could and looked after me all night like I mattered. I was fragile in her grip, and she wanted me to feel safe. I enjoyed her efforts so much, it seemed unfair to tell her how fucking strong she made me.

For the first time in my life, I wasn’t with a damsel in distress. I was with the warrior queen. She roared, soared and owned the whole goddamn world, and I’d never been happier to live in her formidable kingdom.

Danni turned to face me, her smile lazy and her eyes sleepy as she tucked her hands under her cheek and just… stared. I copied her pose immediately.

“You smell like mint,” she told me quietly.

“I do?”

“All the time. But not like regular mint. It’s manlier. I love it.” She smiled. “I love you.”

A sadness washed over her for just a split second, and she tried to blink it away—hide it with a small cough—before she slapped on her smile again. I reached over to brush her hair behind her ear.

“What’s wrong?” She opened her mouth to speak, but I cut her off before she could give me an excuse. “And before you answer with the standard response of nothing, you should know that I’ve come to expect more than that from you, Danni. Your honesty is the one thing I need from you more than anything. It’s what makes you so special to me. So please, don’t try to hide anything. No matter how much you think I don’t want to hear it.” I sucked in a breath, speaking through my exhale. “What’s wrong, Miss Pretty?”

She rolled her eyes at herself and shuffled in that little bit closer. “Fine. There’s a part of me that wishes I could stay here with you instead of going off to travel the world and follow this… thing, dream, whatever it is of mine. And the longer I’m with you, the harder I’m finding it to think about the other stuff.”

“As flattering as that is, you know what I’m going to say, don’t you?”

“Yep.” She sighed softly, staring straight into my eyes. “You’re going to tell me that I’m not allowed to quit. Then I’m going to tell you I don’t want to quit. Then you’ll tell me I’m special and you’ll wait, and that will make me want to stay even more. And, no doubt your next move will be to tell me that you’ll make it extra special for me when I do finally arrive home, and then I’ll probably get this huge, huge, huge lump in my throat and—”

I cut her off, urgently closing the gap to press my lips against hers, so hard she couldn’t even mumble a sound. It only took a second, but with my hand resting on the curve of her neck, her tension began to slip away with every stroke of my tongue.

My lips took a journey around her face, gently kissing every place they could before I began to speak against her mouth again. “You’re the prettiest girl I know, but man, you sure do talk too much.”

She laughed with me, slapping the tops of my arms.

“I’m serious, Marcus.”

“So am I. Danni, we’re young enough for you to do this, and I’m experienced enough with women to know that the worst thing I can possibly do is keep you caged up and all to myself. Even though you’ve no idea how much I want to lock you in this room forever and devour you. You, more than anyone I’ve ever known, are not meant to stay in one place.”

“I’m not like the other women, Marcus.” Looking up through her lashes, she penetrated my fucking soul, her words hitting me square in the chest as I stared into her pools of blue and became a lost citizen. No longer part of society. Just roaming her world, careless, hypnotised, ridiculously in love with what stared back at me.

“Why would you say that?” I eventually whispered.

“Because it’s important. I need you to know.”

“I already know. There is no other you. I don’t know what the hell you see in me, or why you want me in your life, but guess what? I’m grateful that you do. And if I held you back just to play kissy on your bed and bang bang on the wall, I’d love it. I would fucking love it. But I’d hate myself for loving it. Every second. Every minute. Every hour. Every day. I’d hate myself because I want to be there when you make the world take notice. I want to see you flourish. I want to be the guy who gets to stare at you on FaceTime five times a day, while everyone else gets the public version of you. You can do this. But you’ve got to want to do this. For you.”

“I see me in you,” she whispered.

“What?”

“You said you didn’t know what I saw in you, or why I want you in my life. It’s because I see me in you. You have the same zest for life. You care for people. You’re pure happiness to me. Everything is effortless, and I feel like I’ve known you before.”

“Was I a god then, too?” I smirked.

Her eyes searched mine for a whole half second before she threw her head back and burst out laughing, and that was when I decided that the rumblings of Danni’s belly laughter were, by far, the best sound in the whole wide world.

She pressed her body close to mine and wrapped her arm around my waist. “The best she ever had.”

“Does she want it again?”

“More than ever,” Danni breathed, looking down at my lips. “But… your legs…”

“... are not what I’m going to need you to ride,” I growled, pressing my lips to the curve of her neck and inhaling her scent. “Aim a little farther north, crawl on top of me, and let me see every inch of you staring down at me.”

Her hand flew to the belt on my jeans as I nibbled her, kissing and sucking, and making her skin come alive beneath me. It didn’t take her long to take control, shove me on my back, and strip me naked until I was lying breathless and waiting. Danni slid off the bed, standing right beside me and never letting her eyes drift from mine as she reached to the side of her dress, slowly released the zipper, pushed down the straps on her arms and let the material drop to pool around her feet.

In the muted light of her bedroom, and with her tanned skin on full display for me to devour, I was as hard as I’d ever been. Both my dick and my heart were pounding, unable to believe that someone like her was mine. Fucking mine!

There were moments in life that would be remembered forever, and as Danni climbed on top of me, grinding her body into mine and working me into a frenzy, letting her ruby red lips travel the entire length of my body, I knew I’d remember this time with her as much as the first.

The girl in the pretty white dress who I’d slept with on holiday had let me see the innocent side of her—the vulnerable version that wanted to be screwed by a man who had no cruel intentions.

This night, the vixen in the scorching red dress was taking control, letting me see the devilish side of her that came alive at my command, ready to play, sate, and ravage repeatedly.

As she sank down onto me, and I let my head fall back into the pillow, I didn’t know which girl I adored the most.

I knew one thing for certain, though.

I was keeping both.