21. Mira

21

MIRA

"Table, couch, or bed?" Zane asks as soon as we're through the front door. There's an urgency in his voice that tells me he wants to get this over with as fast as I do.

"Thai food in bed would be a bad idea," I decide. Then again, after the torturous car ride, first to the Thai place, and then to the condo, where Zane's hand kept sliding higher and higher under the hem of my dress, caressing my thigh… I can't imagine sitting an entire table length away from him. "I vote the living room."

Sitting on the couch might be detrimental to the eating portion of the night, but I don't actually care. Then again, couch shenanigans might still involve eating. Just of a very different variety.

He dumps our takeout containers on the coffee table and dishes out spring rolls and pad thai like we're being timed.

I touch his knee with my fingertips, afraid I won't be able to stop if there's any more contact between us. "We don't have to do this."

"Your stomach growled," he grits out.

It really did. Audibly. For a second, we both thought something might be wrong with his car before we realized the growl was coming from the passenger seat.

I was nervous about Aiden's therapy appointment, so I barely ate breakfast. Then I assumed I'd be going back to the condo afterwards, but we went to the arena instead. It's been a solid eight hours since I've eaten anything more than a protein bar.

I shrug. "Stomachs growl. It's what they do."

Steam is rising off of the noodles in a slow swirl, and my mouth is watering. The problem is, another, more insistent part of me has been soaking wet since Zane dragged me onto the ice and kissed me silly.

He slides my plate closer to me. "Eat."

"I imagined this differently." I snap my wooden chopsticks in half and stab them into the noodles. I know I'm pouting, but I don't care what my stomach says; I'm hungry for Zane, not Thai food. "When I told a man I loved him for the first time, he was supposed to be so overcome with emotion that he ravished me on the spot."

"It was a pretty public spot."

"Fine," I concede. "A closet, then. Lots of equipment closets in the arena, I'm sure."

"Lots of cameras, too."

He sounds so rational. So level-headed. It's maddening when I've spent the last hour with my heartbeat firmly between my thighs.

I turn to him with a scowl. "How are you so calm?"

Zane slowly lowers his chopsticks and turns to me. He's all sculpted golden stubble and dreamy blue eyes. I can't look at him without imagining the scrape of that stubble between my legs. Those eyes hovering over me, black with want as he?—

"It's thrilling to score a goal in hockey. The feeling of slapping the puck and watching it sail into the net… It's unreal."

I blink at him, dazed at the subject change. "Is that supposed to be an innuendo?"

The corner of his mouth twitches into an almost-smile. " But, if I try to score every time I get the puck, I'll miss most of my shots. Sometimes, the conditions aren't right."

"Are you—" I make a show of looking over my shoulders before I face him again. "Are you talking to me right now?"

The conditions could not be more right. If he'd touch me where I want him to touch me, he'd know that already.

Zane leans over and the world narrows. He's an inch from me, his breath warm against my lips, his thumb brushing back and forth over my jawline. My breath catches and I'm prepared to sacrifice our dinner by swiping it all to the floor so he can throw me on the coffee table instead.

"Right now, the conditions aren't right," he says in a low rumble. "You're hungry, and you're no good to me if you starve to death."

What about if I spontaneously combust from sexual frustration?

I swallow hard. "I won't starve in the next hour."

"That's the problem." He tips my chin up and drags his eyes over my face, down the line of my neck. He bites his lower lip, and I've never seen anything more sensual in my entire life. "The plans I have can't be contained in one hour. I need you strong if you're going to make it through the night."

My brain short-circuits. I feel his words fizzing in my chest and tingling in the tips of my toes. I've forgotten how to speak, how to eat. Which might be why Zane grabs a bite of food and holds it to my lips.

I accept it, never letting my eyes shift from his. Watching me slurp noodles can't be cute, but he looks utterly captivated.

Finally, he blinks and hands me my chopsticks. "Eat."

I don't taste a single bite of the food I shovel into my mouth. We eat in silence. Mostly because, if either of us says anything, the fraying restraints keeping us apart will snap and I'll be in Zane's lap before he can say "pad woon sen."

Zane is still eating when I slide my takeout container across the coffee table, but before I can even lean back, Zane scoops me up and places me on his lap. My knees are on either side of him. His hands drag down my waist, trying to bring me closer, but I resist.

"Thai breath," I protest. "I was going to brush my?—"

He catches my lips in a kiss, easing his tongue into my mouth as I soften into him. I sink onto his lap and go dizzy with the evidence of how much Zane wants this pressing against my panties.

"I don't care," he pants, breaking away long enough to slide the straps of my dress off of my shoulders.

The material bunches around my waist and Zane groans when he sees I'm not wearing a bra. He takes one nipple into his mouth and then the other, lavishing attention with his tongue and rough strokes of his thumbs along my ribs and the undersides of my breasts.

He works down my body, sliding the dress lower and lower until I have to lift my hips so he can slide it down my thighs. I get momentarily tangled in the material, but Zane doesn't hesitate. He lifts me up and sits me down on the edge of the coffee table. One by one, he frees my legs and tosses the dress to the side. Then he drops to his knees between my spread thighs.

"This is mine." He drags a knuckle over the seam of my lace thong. "You want to be mine."

It's not a question—more of a reverent observation. But I nod anyway. "Forever."

His eyes flare as he shoves the lace aside and parts me with a claiming lick.

I whimper and slide my hands into his hair. He takes his time adoring every wanting, hidden part of me, but there's nothing gentle about it. Zane drags me relentlessly to the edge with lips and teeth and, fuck , his tongue and fingers, too.

He thrusts into me, fucking me with his tongue while his thumb draws dizzying circles over my clit.

He was right: I would have passed out. Even with food in my belly, I still barely have the energy to work my fingers through his hair and hold on for dear life as he drives me to an orgasm that steals my breath and leaves me limp on the coffee table.

"Holy shit," I breathe, throwing an arm out to the side and accidentally tipping over the leftover pad thai.

Zane doesn't seem to notice. He's kissing his way over my hip and my stomach. He slides me off of the coffee table and back into his lap on the floor. While I'm still floating in post-orgasmic bliss, Zane unzips his pants and pushes into me.

I cry out as I sink down onto him. "Wait! I wanted to?—"

I don't know how to finish the sentence. Because I want it all .

I want to watch Zane fall apart in my mouth.

I want to peel him out of his clothes and taste his salty skin.

Most of all, I want this to last and last and never, ever end.

"We will." He grabs my waist and pulls me against him, burying himself in me until there's no more space. Until we're sealed together and I can feel the last ebbs of my orgasm fluttering around him. "We're going to do all of it, Mira. But I need you now."

I nod because I lose the ability to speak when Zane lifts me up and then fills me in another slow thrust.

He scrapes his gaze over my flushed neck and pinched nipples. Then his eyes settle on where we're connected, where he's disappearing into me again and again.

With one tug, he shreds my thong off of me and tosses the ruined scraps over his shoulder.

I'm completely naked on top of him, fully at his mercy—and there isn't a single part of me that's scared.

I want him in every way it's possible to want another person, and I don't know another way to convey that except to bring his lips to mine.

Zane kisses me and fucks me until we're breathing too hard, until our focus shifts to where we're coming together and falling apart.

"Fuck," he growls, digging his fingers into my waist. "You feel amazing. You're amazing."

I curl my hands in the hair at the nape of his neck and rock against him. I meet each of his movements with my own until I feel his hips stutter. Zane's face creases and his mouth drops open. I feel him twitch deep inside of me, and knowing that I can bring him to this takes me right down with him.

I clench around him, and he holds me tighter, deeper, as we pulse together until I collapse against his heaving chest and his arms fall loosely around my back.

We lie there together for a long time, breathing and coming back down to Earth.

Then we slide apart and shift into normalcy. Zane takes off his shirt and pulls it over my naked body. He cleans up the spilled noodles while I package up the leftovers and stash them in the fridge.

When I come back from the bathroom after finally dealing with my Thai breath, Zane is leaning against the counter with a glass of water. He hands it to me and I take a long drink.

He fists the loose material on either side of my waist and tugs me against him. The air shifts and, just like that, I'm a bow strung tight again. "Pick your poison: table, couch, or bed?"

"What's wrong with the counter?" I pat the countertop familiarly. "This quartz has seen some things."

Those "things" being my bare ass and what was, up until that point, the best sex I'd ever had in my entire life.

Zane smiles. "I fucked you here because I knew that, if I took you to bed, I'd never let you leave. I was trying to convince myself that this was temporary. I was an idiot."

"You had a lot going on at the time. We both did."

We still do , I think. But I don't want to bring Dante into this moment. Not yet.

Zane goes still, and I'm worried it's too late.

"I didn't think I wanted this, Mira." He indicates the air between us. "I never wanted kids with Paige. I was messed up when we were together, but I knew enough to know that we couldn't take care of a child. And I thought I just didn't want them. But then there was Aiden. And now…" He hooks his hands around my lower back, bending me against them. "I just didn't want to raise them with her ."

My heart is in my throat. I can barely talk around it. "Are we having the kid talk right now?"

I just managed to tell Zane I love him for the first time. I meant it, but I don't know if I'm ready to plan out our entire future. Especially when a not-insignificant part of me is waiting for the other Dante-sized shoe to drop.

"No. I'm having the kid talk," he says, clarifying absolutely nothing. He brushes a thumb over the confused crease between my brows. "I didn't want to freak you out before—but if you're really in this, I want you to know exactly where I'm at."

I swallow down the joke that's sitting on the tip of my tongue, waiting to diffuse the tension and gets us back to fucking as soon as possible, and nod instead.

"I want absolutely everything with you, Mira." He exhales. " Everything . I want your body and your heart and a lifetime together. I want you to be there for Aiden and to carry my babies. I want kids that are half you and half me and all wild. I want a forever family that no one can take away from me."

I'm hanging on his every word, with him… right up until the end.

I drop my eyes, watching as I run my fingers along the hem of his shirt, back and forth. "I can't promise that. I want to, but… With Dante out there and everything with my dad, I don't know if I can?—"

"I've been talking with Hollis about everything." Zane grabs my chin and brings my eyes to his. "He thinks there's a way you can get out from under the accusations."

Hollis? His agent? I remember Zane saying something about him once being an attorney, but there's no way Hollis has handled a case like mine before.

"They aren't accusations. I killed my dad." My voice hitches. "I did it. I'm guilty."

Zane holds my face, brushing tears away from my cheeks that I didn't even know were there. "We don't need to figure everything out tonight, but I want you to know that you have options. I want you to know that, when you're ready, I'll be here to help you every step of the way."

I want that. God, do I want that.

But what if Hollis can't help me? What if I go to the police and they slap cuffs on me and lock me away?

I could lose Zane and Aiden and the beautiful future he's painting for us.

I bite my lip. "I just think?—"

"Take your time." Zane kisses me slowly like he's trying to prove we have all the time in the world. "Think it over. When you finally tell me what you want, I want you to be sure. Because I am, Mira." He drops his forehead to mine. "I'm so sure. I know exactly what I want."

My head is swirling with a thousand different things I want to say, but I hold it all in. "Okay. I'll think it over."

"Good. Now, I ask again—" He tugs me against him, his eyes dark, and his voice a devastating rumble. "—table, couch, or bed?"

I don't even need to think about it. "Bed. Pronto."

Zane picks me up and throws me over his shoulder. He carries me, laughing, all the way to his room where he dumps me on the bed. I'm giggling until he takes off his pants, and then my mouth goes dry.

And for a few hours, I forget about the future. I forget about my past and the ways it's tied around my ankle like a cement block. I forget about the world beyond the edges of this bed. Beyond the places Zane touches and tastes and fucks me.

When it's late—so late I'm starting to get hungry again, but there's no way in the world I'd ever leave this bed—Zane folds our hands together over my head and presses into me.

I'm wet and ready. He slides home like he belongs there, like we should always be like this.

"Fuck, I still want you," Zane groans, driving deep. "I'm inside you and I still fucking want you."

"Zane…" I can barely breathe. I'm exhausted and full and it still isn't enough.

When is it going to be enough?

The steady drive of his body into mine pushes us both into what has to be the last orgasm of the night, because I don't think the human body can take much more than this.

I clench around him and Zane stutters, groaning into my skin and kissing my chest. "I want you, Mira."

"I want you, too." I squeeze his fingers and he brings our hands to his chest, holding them between our bodies. I kiss his knuckles and promise him the most I can right now. "I'll always want you."