Marcus's rough, calloused hand comforted me, but it brought rushing through my blood every naughty thought I'd had about him. That sensual, rough hand taunted me. Tantalized me.

Leaving the cemetery, my thoughts blurred. Everything changed somewhere between the caress of Marcus’s comforting hand and lingering grope of his hand between my breasts.

First, that grope’s rough feel against the softer skin between my breasts had me wondering how a wealthy businessman like Marcus had those callouses. Callouses that seemed more like they belonged to someone who worked for his real estate development firm rather than the hands of the man who ran the company.

Sometime after exiting the creaking gates of the cemetery. After the intensive reddening of my eyes and nose from my tears and blowing my nose. Between seeing the lines of sorrow darken Marcus’s gorgeous face. His forehead creased, his eyes darkened. One look at his face and I saw that his pain only made him more beautiful to me. When our eyes connected, he must have seen how much I needed him.

Another blur, fast forward and Marcus is holding me to his broad chest.

I felt safe when he held me. I never wanted to leave those arms, unless it was to be on my knees for him.

My every thought was full of naughtiness for him. How much I wanted to belong to Marcus.

When I hugged him tighter, as he held me close and his hold on me tightened as well, I felt all of him. His gorgeous, hard body, quickly filled the distance between us. His hard abs, strong chest and huge erection were pressed, hard, into the soft curves of my body and there was nothing separating us. I’d hugged him plenty of times in the past, but when I held onto him this time as he held me tight against him, it was different.

I hadn’t let go of his hand. So now his hand was trapped between my breasts.

It had been an accident; I'd tried to convince myself.

Well, for a second. Marcus's hand was close to my heavily beating heart. My nipples got hard, doing their best to beg for his attention. In a split second, I’d felt a thick rod of hardness pressing into me, and I moaned. Such a small sound escaped my lips. So lightly, a quiet sound but he didn’t miss it. But a flickering glance of the flame between us, and everything changed. We couldn’t go back. And I didn’t want to. That sound had escaped my lips and lit a candle in the darkness of our desires. No longer could we hide the flames growing between us.

I wanted to want to go back to before when I could try and hide my feelings. But that couldn’t happen because I needed to belong to Marcus more than I'd ever needed anything in my life. When he touched me, every desire became a possibility. I wouldn’t let this opportunity pass, even if was my damnation. I was ruined for any other future because I had to belong to him.

Marcus had walked back into our home silently. He made a pot of coffee. We remained nonverbal, not able to discuss what was happening.

I had always imagined that I’d seduce him. That I’d be the aggressor.

Of course, even when I heard my mother’s cancer diagnosis, I still didn’t imagine her death as the catalyst to my seduction attempts. Still, the events were set in motion because of what had passed between us.

When he handed me a mug of the hot elixir I should have found solace in, I closed my hand around his again, and with my other hand, I placed the mug he’d offered me on the counter. Marcus surprised me by then putting his mug on the counter.

We stared into each other’s eyes. Every second we looked deeper into each others’ souls. Our thoughts, our desires, bared between us without a single word. And, then, he finally spoke.

“I’m sorry, that was…you’ve always been a daughter to me, Tara.” His gruff voice hardened my nipples into an instant peak. I hadn't thought they could be any stiffer or more alert after feeling so much of him moments ago when he'd held me.

His eyes were on my thin black dress, and I knew Marcus saw my stiff nipples aching for his touch. His face flushed and I knew this was incredibly awkward for him. Marcus was always a good man. It was one of the things that I loved about him.

Loved.

Shit.

Wanting to fuck your stepdaddy was one thing, but loving him was even worse.

“You’ve always been more than a father to me, Marc.”

He brushed his thumb over my lower lip. “Everyone else calls me that. You should call me Marcus. I’ve never liked Marc.”

“M-Marcus,” I said, shivering suddenly with a chill through me. That feeling of a point of no return.

He wrapped and arm around me, and I knew I should have grabbed my coffee and ended this situation. But this was everything I wanted.

“I’ve tried to take care of you,” Marcus said, his words stilted and obviously difficult to form because of their fumbling cadence. His voice was deeper, darker somehow then it ever was. I felt his words tingle all over me. His full lips pressed together, pursed, relaxed. He was struggling with how things were irrevocably changed between us. Any resistance that he had brought mine to a screeching halt.

This man was the reason I never had a boyfriend, never kissed a boy, never had sex. Because no one could compare to what I could never have. His voice was the only one I wanted to say my name. His body was the only one I wanted to know mine.

This was what I wanted, and I prayed for the courage to go after it rather than to resist wanting it.

"You have taken care of me. You're the best stepfather, the best father that a girl can have. But…" I felt hot tears streaking down my cheeks, and I felt like my whole body was cold and hot all at once. My knees wobbled, and my throat was scratchy and sore. I practically collapsed on him.

Those big arms scooped me, and I wrapped my legs around him, but it wasn't sexual. The sexual attraction was there, always there between us, but this was a comfort. Caring. The passion between us was wordless and necessary. Effortless, and right. He carried me to his chair in the living room, and I sat on his lap, pressed my head into his chest, and squeezed my eyes shut. Tears poured out my clamped eyes and stung my cheeks, but I wasn't cognizant or capable of the conversation or the seduction. This was nothing like my fantasy, but I wasn't fretting over that, either. I was so safe in my stepdaddy's arms that I didn't need to worry about anything. It was the most calm I'd ever felt in my life, even though I was shattering and melting with all my tears. In his arms, everything was safe. I was grounded with his strength.

I wept until I was sleepy in his arms. When I’d fallen asleep in his arms, I focused on nothing but how Marcus held me against him. And I didn't analyze, for once, anything about how he felt or how I felt about him. I just was, and that was enough.

When I woke up some unknown time later, his large thumb was brushing away my tears with a firm, possessive touch. I felt small, fragile, porcelain in his grip. Protected from my pain. It was like he could consume everything that hurt me. Calm my every wound. Marcus was strong for me, my strong daddy when I was just the little girl in his arms. He peered into my eyes, his reddened eyes deep pools of pain searching my own while reflecting his utter anguish.

The doorbell rang.

Reality crackled through the air with the trilling sound. In that instant, the intrusion was warring with the electricity sparking between Marcus and me. We shared a stolen glance, and each headed for the door, trying to compose ourselves. The magic spell around us was broken, but it couldn't be forgotten as if some invisible power held me still in his arms, and the space between reality and that truth of us pressed together was a physical pain for us both.