Unbroken (The Secret Life of Amy Bensen #3.5)(26)

“Amy, listen to me.”

“Let go, and I will.”

He stares at me for several heavy seconds, seeming to weigh my seriousness. I tilt my chin up, letting him test my will with his own intense stare, but I do not waver. He notices, his body lifting from mine, his hands pressing against the wall on either side of me. I’m so out of my mind right now I want to pull him back. I know I’m lucky to have someone who loves me enough to want to protect me, but I’m angry with him. I’m hurt. I grab his shirt.

“We have no reason to believe we’re in danger. Not yet. So we’re staying until we do. We’re starting our life. End of story. Meg was a part of taking my brother from me. She’s not ruining my holiday or my wedding. I won’t let her.”

His expression softens. “Amy, baby.”

“Don’t ‘Amy baby’ me right now,” I warn.

“You wanted to leave after your nightmare.”

“And you convinced me to stay,” I remind him. “It worked.”

“We’ll do the holiday and our wedding, no matter where we are.”

“I need it to be here. I need a home I share with you. You can’t tell me I finally have the freedom I’ve craved for six years, and then take it away.”

“I don’t want to.”

“Then don’t. We have no solid evidence of danger. I don’t want to be afraid anymore.”

He pushes off the wall and covers my hands with his, settling them between us, the shadows of his past etched in his eyes and fighting this battle for him. “Amy—”

“I need to stay,” I repeat. “And so do you. You aren’t even working, Liam. When was the last time you picked up a pencil to design?”

“I’ll design again when you’re safe.”

“I managed fine for six years. I’m not with you for protection. I’m with you because I love you.”

The shadows in his eyes deepen. They’re the kind of shadows created by heartache, loss, and something else I know all too well. “I can’t lose you, Amy.”

His voice is pure anguish, and any hint of anger left inside me vanishes instantly. “You can’t defeat fear without facing it,” I whisper, repeating what he’d once told me.

I watch his face harden, darkness swimming in his eyes, and this time, it’s him that snaps. His fingers tunnel into my hair, his mouth closing down on mine, his tongue caressing mine with hot demand. The taste of him is pure darkness and torment, and his need to drive it away is downright primal. His body presses into me. I melt into him and one of his hands splays on my back, molding me closer. In an instant, my bra is unhooked, his hands cupping my breasts and teasing my nipples. I feel the energy between us, the shift in Liam, and even in myself. We’ve solved nothing about going or staying in the city, but there is a wall falling from between us, a part of Liam he fights, which he’s unleashed for me to see, feel, and experience.

He tears his mouth from mine, staring down at me with a vow. “I won’t lose you.”

In the next second he’s turned me to face the wall and my hands flatten on the hard surface to right myself. He steps to me, leaning close, his hips anchoring mine. “Losing you is my fear,” he confesses, his voice roughened by emotion.

“You won’t lose me,” I pant, my sex clenching as one of his hands slides into my panties and strokes my clit.

“You’re right,” he assures me. “I won’t. I won’t let someone else take you from me.” He moves my hands up the wall. “Don’t move them.”

He’s gone then, and I’m cold where he’s no longer touching me, hot where I want him to touch me. I can feel him, though. Everywhere, in every part of me, and my skin tingles from the heat of his stare, my nerves prickle with the sound of him undressing. And I realize, too, that I know this man. I understand his need to take me, to control me now, because he feels he has none. He’s afraid he can’t protect me. He’s tormented by the idea that the nightmare I brought to him will never truly be over, no matter how much he’s willed it to be gone. And I get it. Oh how I get it. This is my world he’s living in now. The one where control is hard to come by and we take what we can, where we can. Like he’s doing now.

The air shifts and I know he’s closing in on me even before he kneels on the floor at my right hip, one of his hands flattening on the small of my back. The connection scorches me, sending heat waves up over my skin. He doesn’t move; seconds tick by and he lets me wallow in the anticipation building inside me. Already my sex is tight, wet, and I am desperate to feel him inside me. No matter how much I need or want control, I also need the way he owns me in moments like these. The way he demands I give him everything and leaves room for nothing but pleasure. Desire. Him.

His fingers curl around the silk string of my panties, his hot breath fanning my hip, his teeth scraping the delicate skin beneath the fabric. “My woman,” he murmurs, and as much as that one word defies my need to rule my life once and for all, it’s erotic and right in a way I can’t begin to examine right here and now. “My wife soon. Not soon enough.”

Wife. The word does funny things to my stomach. “Yes,” I whisper.

He nips my skin again, and I yelp. His tongue does a lavish swirl over the sting I swear I feel in my sex, in my nipples. I fight the urge to reach for him and my fingers curl on the wall. His hand flattens on my belly and I tremble with the promise of where he will go now. Where he will take me next. Slowly, his fingers walk downward, slipping under the tiny slit of black lace there. I hold my breath, waiting for the onslaught of sensations I know will follow. His fingers tease my clit, lightly caressing, and my legs wobble uncontrollably, leaving me no option but to plant my palms near my head to hold myself up.