She was still reeling from the revelation that was his body — the perfectly sculpted chest, the thick, muscled thighs, the cock that looked like it would stretch her to the limit — when he lowered his mouth to her inner thigh.

Her head dropped back of its own volition as he kissed his way up the tender skin, his big hands stroking the outside of her thighs as his tongue came out to flick against her skin, his teeth biting down just hard enough to cause a fresh wave of wetness to rush to her core.

He pulled aside her panties, exposing her center to the cooler air in the room.

“I knew you would be this beautiful, Nora.” She felt the whisper of his breath against the secret cleft at the top of her thighs. “I knew it.”

He ran two fingers lightly over her clit, then let them slide between her folds until she moaned with the pleasure of it, the torture of having his mouth and fingers so close to filling her.

“Look at me while I taste you,” he commanded.

She lifted her head, looked down at him between her thighs.

“I’m going to make you come with my mouth. Then I’m going to fuck you until you know you’re mine.”

It wasn’t a question. It wasn’t a request. She barely had time to register this version of Braden before his hands hooked around her hips, his big shoulders nudging open her thighs as the heat of his mouth closed on her pussy.

She gasped as he worked his tongue all the way up her slick folds to her clit. His fingers slid inside her as he teased the little bud with the pad of his tongue. The room seemed to tilt as sensation took over, cutting her loose from the tether that usually anchored her to reality.

She moved in time to the stroke of his tongue, rocking her hips against his mouth as he plunged his fingers in and out of her, alternately sucking and lapping at the center of her desire.

She felt his head in her hands and realized she’d given up any semblance of politeness, making it clear he was right where she wanted him as he worked her pussy with his mouth, an orgasm already rumbling from the deepest parts of her body, threatening to crack her open like a lightning bolt.

“Braden…”

He moved his fingers faster, closed his mouth around her clit until it was buried in the heat of his mouth, her hips grinding against it. She was on the brink, standing at the edge of the abyss when he pressed on the secret spot hidden deep inside her. Then there was no holding back, and she tumbled over the edge into the darkness, nothing but her body shuddering against his mouth, clenching down on his fingers, the explosion going on and on until she thought she would die from the pleasure of it.

When she opened her eyes it was to find him kneeling on the edge of the bed between her knees. His eyes were glassy, his jaw tight as he bent his head to kiss her. He enveloped her mouth in his, the taste of her sex salty and sweet on his tongue, his cock straining between her soaking folds.

She wrapped her legs around his hips, trying to pull him into her. He resisted, dropping his mouth to her neck, kissing his way to the sensitive spot at the base of her throat.

“Please,” she said. “I need you.”

“Not as badly as I need you, beautiful.”

The words were said against her skin as he continued down her chest, pulling back the fabric of her bra. He took her erect nipple into his mouth and she cried out, arching her back off the bed as the pleasure shot between her legs. She felt the emptiness at her core, was desperate for his cock to fill her.

To feel his body moving against hers.

He took one nipple between his fingers while he sucked on the other one, moving his hips against hers, letting his cock slip and slide through her wetness, close enough to feel like torture, the sensations an assault on every nerve in her body.

She took his head in her hands, forced him to look at her. “You can make the rules next time, I promise. But right now I’m going to die if you don’t fuck me, Braden.”

He lifted his head and kissed her again, then reached into his nightstand for a condom.

She sat up, plucked it from his hand, took him in her mouth. He groaned as she stroked his shaft, sucking on the tip before taking him all the way into her mouth.

He pulled her off him. “You asked me to fuck you, remember?”

Nothing could make her forget the throbbing vacuum at the center of her body, waiting to be filled by him. “I remember.”

She’d barely gotten the condom on his shaft when he shoved her backwards onto the bed, hooking her legs over his shoulders as he positioned his tip at her entrance. He hesitated, and she knew what he was thinking.

Nothing would ever be the same after this.

And somehow she knew neither of them would come out of it unscathed.

She cried out, her nails digging into his ass as he pushed into her with a vicious thrust. He held still for a minute, kissing her deeply, letting her body loosen for him as her mouth opened under his. He was still kissing her when he started moving inside her.

It was an impossible kind of perfection: his cock filling every inch of her, his body hard and smooth as it glided against hers, the rhythm he played like a finely-tuned instrument against her hips as he rocked into her.

Moving with him was second nature, her body expanding as he drove into her, clenching down on him as he pulled out. The friction of his cock against her clit caused another orgasm to blossom inside her like a flower. She could feel it bloom as he sank into her. Could feel the pressure, hot and insistent, building at her core.

“Look at me while I fuck you, Nora.”

His command was guttural, the raw need in his voice unfamiliar. She opened her eyes, found him staring at her with such intensity that she looked away. She didn’t want him to see her so clearly. Didn’t want him to see all the broken parts of herself she’d been hiding under a veneer of confidence.

He lowered his head to her cheek, nudged her face forward, kissed her as he thrust into her again. “There’s no hiding from this, love. No hiding from me. I want all of you.”

He broke off their kiss and picked up his pace, his gaze fevered as he plundered her body, driving into her again and again until the fire inside her was raging, on the verge of exploding until she was nothing but heat and flame.

“You’re going to come for me,” he said. “I can feel it.”

He slipped a hand between their bodies, circled her clit gently with his finger while he pushed into her. It cut loose the last vestige of her control.

Then she was the fire.

It licked at her insides until they were one, her body shuddering again and again as he groaned, coming as he pumped into her at a frenzied pace, like he couldn’t take her hard enough.

Couldn’t go deep enough. Couldn’t take her far enough.

She rocked against his hips, wanting to milk him of every drop, wanting to make her own orgasm last. Wanting to stay here in the place where there was no fear. No secrets. Just this man who had been made for her. This man she’d been waiting for without even realizing it.

He drove into her one last time, dropping his head to her collarbone, leaving a trail of kisses up her neck and along her jawline until he reached her mouth. The pressure of his lips was slow and tender, like he, too, didn’t want it to end. Like he wanted to put off the moment when he would pull out of her. When they wouldn’t be one anymore.

She kissed him back, cupping his head in her hands, his hair damp where it met his neck. When he pulled away, he rolled onto his back, pulled her into his arms, kissed the top of her head as he smoothed her hair.

“I knew it. I knew you were meant for me.”