She filled an emptiness in me I hadn’t known was there.

Eva buried her face in my throat and hummed softly, her legs tangling with mine, her hands gliding over my back. “Hard and yummy all over,” she purred.

“All over,” I agreed, cupping her ass and pulling her tighter against my hard-on.

Her shoulders shook with a silent laugh. “We have to be quiet.”

“I’ll cover your mouth.”

“Me?” She nipped at my throat. “You’re the noisy one.”

She wasn’t wrong. As rough and impatient as I could get when aroused, I’d never been loud . . . until her. It was a struggle to be discreet when situations called for it. She felt too good, made me feel too much.

“So we’ll take it slow,” I murmured, my hands roaming greedily over her silky skin. “Ireland will be sleeping for hours; there’s no rush.”

“Hours, huh?” Laughing, she pulled back and rolled away from me, reaching for the nightstand drawer. “Overachiever.”

Tension stretched across my shoulders as she dug out the breath mints she kept handy. I was reminded of similar situations, when women had reached into the nightstand drawer for condoms.

Eva and I had used condoms only twice. Before her, I’d never f**ked a woman without one. Avoiding pregnancy was something I’d religiously adhered to.

Yet since those first two times with Eva, we’d gone bare, relying on her birth control to prevent conception.

It was a risk. I knew that. And considering how often I had her—at least two, sometimes three or four times a day—the risk was not inconsiderable.

I thought of it sometimes. I questioned my control, my selfishness in putting my own pleasure above the consequences. But the reason for my recklessness wasn’t as simple as pleasure. If it were, I could deal. Be responsible.

No, it was much more complicated.

The need to come inside her was primitive. It was a conquest and surrender in one.

I had wanted to f**k her raw before I’d even had her the first time, before I knew definitively how explosive it would be between us. I’d gone so far as to warn her prior to our first date that I needed it, needed her to give me that, something I’d never wanted with anyone else.

“Don’t move,” I said roughly, sliding over her while she was still stretched out on her stomach. My hand pushed between her hip and the bed, reaching between her legs to cup her cunt in my palm. She was moist and warm. My stroking fingers made her slick and hot.

She muffled a moan.

“I want you just like this,” I told her, brushing my lips across her cheek.

Reaching for my pillow with my free hand, I yanked it over and then shoved it under her, lifting her h*ps to an angle that would let me sink balls-deep.

“Gideon . . .” The way she said my name was a plea, as if I wouldn’t get down on my knees and beg for the privilege of having her.

I shifted, urging her legs apart and pinning her wrists beside her head. Holding her down, I thrust into her. She was ready for me, plush and tight and wet. My teeth gritted together to restrain the growl that surged from my throat, a tremor racking my body from head to toe. My chest heaved against her back, my violent exhalations ruffling her hair lying across the pillow.

Just like that, just by taking me, she had me right on the edge.

“God.” My h*ps churned without volition, screwing my c**k into her, pushing me deeper until I was in her to the hilt. I could feel her all around me, from root to tip, clenching in ripples that milked me like a greedy little mouth. “Angel—”

The pressure at the base of my dick was insistent, but I was capable of staving it off. It wasn’t a question of control, but of will.

I wanted to come inside her. Wanted it enough to consider the risk—as terrifying as it was—acceptable.

Closing my eyes, I dropped my forehead to her cheek. I inhaled the scent of her and let go, coming hard, my ass flexing as I filled her up in thick, hot spurts.

Eva whimpered, writhing under me. Her cunt tightened, then trembled around my cock. She cl**axed with a soft, sweet moan.

I growled her name, searingly aroused by her orgasm. She came because I did, because my pleasure turned her on as much as my touch. I would reward her for that, show her the depth of my gratitude. She would get hers, over and over again, as many times as she could take it.

“Eva.” I rubbed my damp cheek against hers. “Crossfire.”

Her fingers tightened their grip on mine. Her head turned, her lips seeking.

“Ace,” she breathed into the kiss. “I love you, too.”

—

IT was shortly after five in the evening when I drove the Bentley through the gates of the Vidal estate in Dutchess County and into the circular drive out front.

“Aw, you drove too fast,” Ireland complained from the backseat. “We’re here already.”

I put the SUV in park and left it idling. One look at the house, and a knot tightened in my gut. Eva reached over, taking my hand and giving it a squeeze. I focused on her steely gray eyes instead of the Tudor-style mansion at her back.

She didn’t say a word, but she didn’t have to. I felt her love and support and saw the glimmer of anger in her eyes. Just knowing she understood gave me strength. She knew every dark and dirty secret I had, and yet she believed and loved me anyway.

“I want to stay over again sometime,” Ireland said, poking her head between the two front seats. “It was fun, right?”

I looked at her. “We’ll do it again.”