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  “I want to hear words from your lips,” he adds, his tone stronger as he moves the feather over top of my belly and traces a circle around my navel.

  I pin him with a determined look. “I like it.”

  He nods, his hazel eyes darkening on mine. “Where do you want me to touch you next?”

  I bite my lip and reply, “My nipples.”

  He smiles an oh-so sexy smile and moves the feather around both of my breasts, his eyes fierce on my nubs as they harden beneath his touch. “Would you like my mouth on your nipples instead?”

  “Yes, please,” I moan, my voice breathy as my entire body trembles for a lot freaking more.

  The bed dips as he kneels beside me and crouches over to pull my left nipple into his mouth. He releases it with an audible pop. “Do you like it when I bite your nipples, Tre?”

  “Oh my God, yes,” I moan, my ass grinding into the bed as I fight the restraint of the cuffs. I ache so damn bad to score my nails over his bare back, but watching him come alive like this is its own form of aphrodisiac.

  He moves over to my other nipple and bites down gently. I cry out when his teeth pull back and scrape along my flesh.

  “Are you okay?” he asks quietly, looking up at me.

  “Yes, Gareth,” I answer, a nearly painful need pooling between my legs.

  He stares deep into my eyes as he moves the feather down between my legs. With a gentle stroke up my inner thigh, he hits my sensitive nerve bundles. I buck up off the bed so high, my belly touches his chest. He growls as he watches me writhe beneath him.

  “Jesus Christ, I can smell how much you want me, Sloan.” His voice is guttural, needy, and wanting. He’s overwhelmed just as I was the first time I took control of him in his closet.

  “I want you so badly,” I moan.

  “How do you want me?”

  “I want you inside of me.”

  “What do you want me to do inside of you?” he asks, tickling my clit with the feather until I’m desperate to scream.

  “I want you to make me come!” I exclaim.

  He moves the feather faster over me and states in a commanding voice, “Say please.”

  “Please. God, Gareth, please make me come.”

  Within seconds, he’s tossed the feather and is kneeling between my legs. He rolls me over onto my belly, crisscrossing my cuffed wrists above my head so that I can no longer bend my arms or raise my head.

  “I’m going to spank you now, Sloan, because you were a bad girl earlier.”

  “Oh my God,” I groan loudly into the pillow.

  “Is that a yes?”

  “Yes, please,” I cry out.

  “Good girl. Tell me if it gets too hard, understand?”

  I nod.

  He reaches around and pinches my clit without warning, causing fireworks to explode behind my closed eyelids. His voice is firm when he demands, “Words, Treacle. I need to hear you say it.”

  “Yes, Gareth, spank me,” I reply, my voice taking on a new tenor I’ve never heard before. “I’ll tell you when I’ve had enough.”

  He releases my clit and rubs his hand up and down my spine, stopping to palm my ass cheek in his big, meaty hand. Then he crooks his hands under my hips and props me up on my knees.

  “God, you have a beautiful arse,” he growls before giving it a light smack.

  My moan is soft as I breathe out, “More.”

  “More?” he asks, desire and amusement in his voice as he pulls his hand back and slaps me again.

  “Yes,” I cry out, feeling the sting this time and nearly coming apart at the seams when all the blood rushes to my centre. “More, Gareth, baby. Please.”

  I hear him undo his jeans, then his erection suddenly drags against my slit just as his hand collides with my backside again. This time, the burn is harsher, his touch swifter. I feel myself growing wetter and wetter.

  “Do you want more?”

  “I want you,” I reply, pressing my backside against his shaft and desperately rubbing myself on him.

  “My hands or my cock, Treacle?”

  “Your cock,” I cry, my voice ripped from my throat as he impales me with his erection, filling me completely.

  He stills inside of me and squeezes both of my ass cheeks in a punishing hold. “You like that?”

  “Yes,” I moan, rocking my ass against him.

  “You want me to move?”

  “Yes!”

  “Your command is my wish,” he states, then grips my hips hard in his hands as he begins thrusting into me at incredible speed. Our skin claps together as the metal handcuffs clink above my head. The restraints bite into my wrists, but the pain only further stokes the pleasure. The thrill. The tremendous building between my legs.

  Good God, if this is how he felt when I took control over him, then I can definitely see the appeal.

  This experience is similar to how we were the first time we slept together, but it was Gareth who needed encouragement to dominate this time instead of me. That’s the beauty of what we have together. It’s not a power struggle or a dominant and submissive. It’s a fluid ebb and flow. A balance. A partnership. As Gareth said to me before, we are not all one thing. We are more. So much more.

  In only minutes, my body convulses around him. He follows soon behind, both of us too keyed up to hold out on our orgasms for very long. The moment Gareth finishes coming inside of me, he pulls out, grabs the key to the handcuffs, undoes my wrists, and pulls me on top of him. My body covers his as his arms wrap tightly around me.

  Once we catch our breaths, he strokes my hair off to the side and drops a soft kiss on my forehead. “That was…” he starts, but it’s me who finishes.

  “Perfection,” I reply against his chest, unable to lift my head to look at him right now.

  His body shakes with amusement. “I’d have to agree. But we’re perfect in other ways, too.”

  I nuzzle up to him, my body soaking in the heat of him like a cat lying in the sun. “I’d have to agree as well.”

  He continues playing with my hair and eventually adds, “I think in sexual terms, they call this rolling.”

  I look up at him, propping my chin on his chest, and reply, “I think I call this Gareth and Sloan.”

  After a quick shower, Gareth and I are lying naked in bed together, clean, satiated, and spooning like a couple that’s been doing this for years instead of months. He’s completely wrapped around me, holding me and caring for me. This man—this crazy, incredible man—is actually with me. It’s still hard for me to believe that a human being like Gareth Harris exists in the world, let alone is sleeping in bed beside me. We are so different from what I had with Callum. I was never myself in all my years with Cal. I was always what I needed to be. But Gareth lets me be who I want to be, which is something I didn’t even realise I so desperately needed.

  This realisation is a lot to take in at once. The overwhelming emotion I feel toward Gareth is like a volcano inside of me that’s pushing to erupt.

  “Sloan,” Gareth’s hoarse voice croaks into the dim moonlight illuminating our bright white bed. “Are you still awake?”

  “Yes.”

  “Are you happy?” he asks, his voice tender.

  I inhale quickly, my heart growing inside my chest in response to his simple question. “Very much.”

  “What are you happy about specifically?” he asks and we both tremble with silent laughter.

  “Us,” I eventually reply, unable to wipe the smile off my face.

  “Anything more you want to share with the class?” he asks and tweaks my side playfully before nuzzling his face in my hair.

  I choose my next words carefully. “I don’t think I’ve been this happy without Sophia beside me in a long, long time. I didn’t know what I was missing.”

  Gareth grows quiet for a moment before asking, “How do you mean?”

  My eyes look upward when I think back to how dense I’ve been. “I didn’t realise how much I truly settled with Callum.
My mother terrified me about how difficult it is to raise a child alone. She was actually extremely vocal about wanting me to get an abortion. Made an appointment for me and everything without even asking.”

  “Jesus.”

  “I know,” I reply with a sad huff. “An abortion was never something I’d consider for myself, but she didn’t care about my feelings. And neither her nor my sisters wanted me to marry Callum initially. But I was so desperate to give Sophia a different life than I had, you know? I wanted a complete family for her. A mother and a father. Stability. Now I’m sure they’re dying to say, ‘I told you so.’”

  “You don’t know that, Sloan,” Gareth coos in my ear, squeezing my hip affectionately.

  I exhale and shake my head. “I just wonder what might have been if I’d never married Cal.”

  After a long pause, Gareth pulls me closer, his hand wrapping around my wrist as our arms entwine across my bare chest. His lips tickle my ear when he whispers, “But if you never married him, you wouldn’t be here with me right now.”

  My chin quivers as his reply shoots through my body and causes tears to prick behind my eyes. I sniff softly and ask, “Does that mean you’re happy, too?”

  “Are you joking?” he retorts, dropping a kiss on the side of my neck. “I’m completely happy. I didn’t know what I was missing either.”

  I blink and allow the silent tears to fall freely out of my eyes and onto the pillow, grateful for our position so he can’t see how much his words mean to me.

  He tightens his hold on me and adds, “I never knew I could be like this with a woman. Ever. I think that after seeing my mum die, I got it in my head that women are fragile. It’s why I was so protective of Vi and her choices in men. It’s also why I never found a woman I was comfortable enough to really let go with. I put up a wall because I was scared of hurting someone. I never trusted myself with anyone enough to do what I did with you.”

  He kisses my shoulder and pulls me in closer. So close our breaths synchronise with one another. So close I can feel the pulse of his veins against my skin.

  His chest vibrates on my back as he continues. “Since the second my mum died, I’ve had this discomfort lodged in my chest. Like I was constantly holding my breath and couldn’t let it out. I never knew how to get rid of it, so I just got used to it. I got used to the pain and forgot what it was like to feel good. To let that breath out.

  “Then, when you came to my house that night and asked me to kneel, it felt like I fucking exhaled for the first time since I was eight years old. You gave me so much strength by simply letting me surrender. Strength I didn’t realise I was missing.

  “Now that I’ve completely fallen in love with you, I can inhale and exhale over and over, and there’s all the air in the world for me because you’re beside me.”

  My breath catches in my throat as his words sink in. I roll over to face him, desperate to see his face after he uttered the most beautiful thing I’ve ever heard. His arms tighten around me as I cup his face in my hands, our legs intermingling as moonlight reflects in his eyes.

  “What did you just say?” I croak, my emotions completely taking over.

  He stares back at me, his face deathly serious. “I said I’m in love with you, Sloan.”

  “You are?” I ask, still unable to believe it.

  “Like crazy,” he confirms, stroking the path of a tear that slid down over my nose.

  I bite my lip and smile a true, genuine smile. “Well, that’s good because I think I’m in love with you, too. I’m not quite sure when it happened. Maybe it was right after the attack. Maybe it was on this trip. Or maybe it was back when you first kissed me outside of my house. I don’t know. But at some point, you burrowed inside of my heart and made me feel something I’ve never felt before. And I know I’m divorced, and I have a daughter, and I am way more than a handful, but I think we can—”

  My words are cut off by Gareth’s mouth as he presses his lips to mine and kisses away the doubt, and the fear, and the laundry list of things in our lives that make us a highly complicated couple.

  Because, right now, in the paraphrased words of Taylor Swift, we’re just a man and a woman in a love story, just saying yes.

  “I HAVE TO HEAD OVER to Hayden’s room, so I guess I’ll see you on the beach?” I ask, draping my garment bag over my shoulder and propping myself in the doorway of the loo in our suite.

  Sloan is wrapped in a fluffy white towel, finishing her makeup at the vanity. Vi’s itinerary says we should arrive at the bride and groom suites by ten a.m. today before the wedding begins at eleven.

  This morning has been interesting to say the least. Sloan and I woke at different times, showered at different times, and have been doing an awkward sort of “don’t touch each other” dance all over our suite. We’re acting like two teenagers who just lost their virginity and don’t know how to behave around each other the morning after.

  I’m over it.

  “Okay, I’ll see you later then,” Sloan replies as she stares at me in the mirror, her mascara wand frozen in the air.

  I move in behind her and drop a kiss on her bare shoulder. “Love you,” I add with a cheeky smile and turn to leave.

  She makes a strange noise in her throat and replies, “You’re just going to drop it on me all casual like that, then walk away?”

  A broad smile spreads across my face as I turn to see her still watching me in the mirror. “Should I have dropped it another way?”

  She swivels in her chair to face me, her tan legs exposed as she replies in a rush, “Well, I mean, if we’re going to just say it any time, I’m wondering what your family will think or how they’ll see this. Will they think it’s happening too fast because they barely know me? What if they think I’m a gold digger? And what happens when we get back to Manchester? I have to figure out what I’m going to do with Sophia and when it’s appropriate for you to officially meet her. This is a complicated process, Gareth. We should talk about it—”

  “Sloan,” I stop her midsentence and her eyes shoot up to me.

  “What?”

  I hit her with a crooked smile and reply, “I’ll see you at the wedding.”

  She puffs a strand of hair out of her eyes and replies, “Okay.”

  “I love you,” I add with a smirk.

  She bites her lip hesitantly, then adds with a small smile, “I love you, too.”

  She turns back toward the mirror and, before I realise what I’m doing, I toss the garment bag on the bed and stride straight for her. She looks up in surprise as I turn her in her chair and hoist her up onto the vanity. Her bare legs wrap around my waist for balance as I kiss her and add, “I seriously love you.”

  The smile on her face could light up the whole world when she replies, “I seriously love you, too.”

  My brows lift. “See? We’re getting better at this already.”

  “Gareth, I want you to walk me down the aisle.”

  “What?” I exclaim, stepping inside the bridal suite after Vi texted me a 999 urgent message. “Vi, everyone is waiting down at the beach. Where’s Dad?” I ask, looking around the room.

  “I sent him down to the beach.” She shrugs with a shy smile.

  I exhale heavily and shake my head, taking a minute to look down at the stunning lace wedding dress my sister is wearing. “Vi, you are beautiful.”

  “Thank you. Now will you please walk me down the aisle?”

  “Vi, no. Dad would be crushed. I just stopped fighting with him. I don’t want to start again.”

  “It was his idea.”

  “What?” I ask, my eyes wide and jaw dropped.

  “He said he would love to walk Rocky down the aisle and it would make him extremely proud to see you walk me down the aisle.”

  “Vi, you’re his only daughter.”

  “I’m aware.”

  “He won’t have another chance at this.”

  “I know,” she replies, her eyes firm on mine. “Gareth, a lot of what you sai
d at dinner the other night is true, and I want you to know we haven’t forgotten any of it. All of our best childhood memories are because of you. You’ve always been there for us. You’re the one who started Sunday dinners after all.”

  “What are you talking about?” I scoff as I unbutton the suit jacket that Sloan made me and put my hands in my pockets. This is a conversation we should have had last night, not minutes before Vi is supposed to walk down the aisle.

  “Don’t you remember those picnics you made for us every Sunday? We ate them at the park behind our house.”

  I shake my head. “Of course I remember, but that wasn’t—”

  “Those were Sunday dinners, Gareth,” she interrupts. “You’ve kept our family together all these years, and there is no one else I’d rather have give me away to Hayden.”

  Her eyes well with tears as the gravity of what’s about to happen sets in on both of us. I pull her into a tight hug, my lips pressing to her hair as I murmur, “You were a mini mum the second you were born, Vi. Don’t you dare sell yourself short.”

  “Fine, we’re both amazing.” She laughs and pulls back, adjusting her long veil that stretches the entire length of her dress. “Now, let’s go get me married before I change my mind and pull a runner.”

  I shake my head at her joke. “And what name will you be getting married under today?”

  She inhales deeply, a look of peace flitting across her face. “Vilma Harris-Clarke. The one and only.”

  I nod and take her arm in mine. “It sounds perfect.”

  The ocean air is warm as Vi and I make our way down to the beach where the ceremony is taking place. In front of a large set of rustic, double doors draped in pink and white flowers, we spot Dad holding Rocky beside Leslie and little Marisa. They are huddling close to the doors to conceal themselves from everyone else on the other side, waiting for Vi’s big entrance.

  Vi is already crying as she approaches, her face lighting up at the sight of our tiny Rock Star in a fluffy pink dress. She pulls her arm out of mine and hands me her pink bouquet to reach out for Rocky, who instantly reaches back.