Lexi is worried that these feelings will never leave her. That she will always be taunted by the reality that she has taken someone’s life. His life.
“Baby, listen to me. What you have done, it was an act of bravery. You must stop feeling guilty because you are a hero, nothing else. And you
have
given life. Please accept that it is a blessing, a gift, the strength you found. You are an inspiration, strong and beautiful, kind and loving. You did a remarkable thing and what you had to do. It was smart and intuitive and he is gone thanks to you. We are all indebted to you because I would not have you in my arms everyday if you had not.” Lucca moves an unruly tousled wave of hair from her face to behind her ear and brushes her cheek with the pad of his thumb.
Lucca tries to convince her. She gives a pitiful shake of her head but grips his hand in a gesture of appreciation, thanking him for his confidence and reassurance.
“If you feel compelled to read over those words at any point, you will have the optimistic words beside it bringing you back to your present. That feeling may never go away, Alexis, but it will fade in time and become distant. Inconsequential. You need to move forward and embrace your next chapter and stop agonising over things out of your control.” Casey sips her tea and breaks off some shortbread to nibble on. “How about I drop by after my holiday and see how you feel in a week’s time, and you can let me know how your writing has gone. Things should get brighter through time and with positivity. Right now, I’d like to talk about those dreams you’ve been having.”
I’m trying to escape. I’m running through the Australian bush.
He’s chasing me ... he’s shouting at me ... my bare feet are hurting and bleeding.
It’s dark ... it’s hot.
I’m scared.
I can’t get away.
I need to get away.
Lexi knows Casey has her best intentions at heart, but in a week’s time she doesn’t know where she’ll be. She hopes she’ll be protected and safe. This unsettles her and adds to her anxiety, because all she ever wanted was to feel secure. Right now she just feels vulnerable and in limbo.
Then, after another glance into Lucca’s mesmerising eyes, he has her.
Safe.
Protected.
Secure.
She smiles and nods her head, agreeing with Casey. Lexi realises then that the reality is, it doesn’t matter where she’ll be next week because Lucca will always be with her. And where there is Lucca, there is lust, love, and light.
And where there is light, there will be no darkness.
Home
Lexi – three weeks earlier
Stretching, I turn around, weaving my arms around my fiancé’s brawny chest, and gaze into the sparkle of his bright, azure-blue eyes.
Lucca’s eyes.
Taking in his handsome, glorious body and his sexy smile, I melt into him.
“Morning, beautiful,” Lucca whispers before placing soft kisses on my lips and moving a soft, unruly brown wave from my face.
“Hmmm, what time is it?” I ask, smiling as I gaze at my exceptionally large and exceptionally heavy blue diamond ring resting on his chest. Lucca rubs his thumb over the generous stone.
“We need to get up and organise the packing of your things to take over to our house, but maybe after I do this ...” Seductively, he kisses and bites my neck. I fling my head back, giggling in response. “Then maybe I will do this …” He runs his hands over my breasts, cupping them and causing them to swell, and my nipples to harden like the diamond on my finger.
I love morning sex.
I love him.
Moaning with pleasure, I purr, “Hmmm, I like this game.”
“Then maybe I will do this …” he teases in his sexy, husky bedroom voice. He trails his fingers over my navel and straight to my pelvis, then underneath the seam of my lace thong. I part my legs while I wiggle and pulse sensitively for his touch, then jerk up quickly when Doris starts barking from outside the bedroom door, startling me into reality.
Damn!
The game was just heating up.
I have missed her so much while being away in Tuscany. I feel guilty that I didn’t give her a lot of attention last night when I arrived home from the airport, but I was exhausted and just needed to sleep, despite her trying to suffocate me with affection. I missed Cameron last night too and never got the chance to see him as he was working a late shift. Hazel and Dominic waited up for us to arrive from the airport, and I was delighted to see them but it was too late to stay up and gossip about our travels.
Pouty lip. That will work. I’m pining for Doris.
Lucca stops his seductive teasing and looks at me. “Baby, is this dog going to be a problem? I want you desperately, but she is wrecking my mojo here, and I am not sharing you. I think she needs some obedience training,” he drawls as he continues to ravage my neck. Pausing, he glances up at me through his black feathery lashes.
God, he is beautiful, charming, and all mine.
I look at him with my big brown eyes and exaggerate my pout as I trace my fingers over his lips.
“No way. She is not getting in the bed, Lexi. We are not starting this.”
“Lucca, just five minutes for a cuddle. She used to get in here with me, so it’s not fair to shut her out now. I promise I’m all yours, and when you take me to your house later, I will be all yours over and over again while we have fun in your bed. And a promise is a promise.”
Lucca sighs reluctantly, losing his grip on me so I can get up. “God, you are fucking adorable. And it is not my house; it is our house now. Okay, let her in, but she will be getting kept in the opposite side of our house, Lexi, and nowhere near the bloody bedroom.”
I smile and lean over, kissing him appreciatively. As I jump out the bed, he smacks my ass and shakes his head. I open the bedroom door.
Tornado …
She jumps on me, throwing me back on the mattress with her long, grey, velvety legs and wrapping them around my neck as she nearly smooches me to death. I can’t stop giggling. Lucca is horrified.
“Lexi, fuck. Are you okay?” he panics.
“Yes, she’s just playing. Where’s my little ray of sunshine? I’ve missed my little cupcake so much. Have you been a good girly?” She wags her tail frantically, burying into my neck as she whimpers and whines in response to my baby talk. I squeeze her so tightly I could crush her, but she doesn’t mind at all.
“Fucking hell, this is not happening. I have seen it all now,” Lucca grumbles. Doris turns around and pounds on top of him. She licks him as she whines and whacks me with her wagging tail. “Lexi, can you get your dinosaur to jump down?” Lucca moans, trying to push her off him.
I giggle. “She likes you. Just pet her like last night and she’ll leave you alone,” I reassure him. He rubs her head, and she purrs with delight, then rests her chin on his muscular chest and stares up at him with her human-like amber eyes, sussing him out. I love that she has warmed to him.
“I do not fucking believe this. That dog is spoiled rotten, but I do think she likes me, so that is a start.” He cocks his head to the side, eyeing her up and grinning crookedly.
“You two need to get along, and I think you do actually like her,” I say playfully.
“She should be a working dog, Lexi. Not a lap dog.” He moves, but Doris pins him down to the bed. Gripping him with her huge paws, she nuzzles her head under his arm.
“Admit it, you love her,” I tease. Smiling, I watch Doris show Lucca lots of friendly attention.
“Not nearly as much as I love you. Right, you have had your five minutes. I want you back now.” He frowns and curls his lip mischievously, showing his dimple.
“Done deal,” I mumble as I drag Doris off Lucca’s lap by the collar and out into the hall. “Hazel, can you take her out please?” I yell downstairs.
Lucca is ready to give me a lecture on my dog, but before he does, I seductively sit on top of him, straddling his groin. I slide myself down so my breasts press against his chest.
“It starts with five minutes. Then that bloody thing will want in bed with us all the time, and that is not happening. You are all mine, baby,” he says, pressing his erection between my legs rubbing my throbbing ache for him.
“I’m all yours now,” I reply, twirling a soft wave of my hair and lifting it up to brush seductively against my lips.
Burning me with his bedroom eyes, he rewards me with his sexy dimple smile. He rolls me over, placing his dark, bulky arms at either side of my body and holding me. I lift my hands and grasp his defined biceps then wrap my legs around his waist and link my feet at the bottom of his back, rocking my hips up to meet him. His breathing becomes heavier and needier, and his dark shaggy hair flops around his face as he gazes straight into my eyes.
Turned on.
No end.
He kisses me, groaning into my mouth as his wet tongue tangles dirtily with mine. It sends a surge straight to my wanting, damp sex. My butterflies have woken up and are fluttering their wings in response. My sensitive nerves and tissues are pulsing for him, and my arousal is drenching my tiny thong with excitement.
Rubbing my fingers along his indented contours and protruding veins of his upper arms stirs so much greedy anticipation.
I let go of his upper body and wrap my arms around his defined, smooth back, pulling him in closer towards me. Inhaling his sexy scent drugs me, makes me lose control. I trail my fingers over his firm ass and grip it.
“Fuck. I need you so fucking bad,” he groans as he slides his hands down my side and over my hips, hooking his thumb under the thin strap of my lace thong. Grabbing the thin material, he moves his hips back, giving space between us so he can rip them off me.
“I will buy you new ones,” he pants through gritted teeth before I protest.
He’s going to be buying me a lot of new lingerie at the rate he tears through them, but I love his primal approach; his animalistic prowess has me caged inside his unforgiving, dominant possessiveness, and I can’t seem to get enough.
He trails his hand up the contours of my hips and outlines my breast, flicking his thumb over my diamond-hard nipple.
Heaven.
Dropping his head, he kisses, licks, and teases my erect nipples in turn. He moans, his hot breath warming the wet flesh of my breasts.
“Fuck, you taste so good.”
Groaning, I grab Lucca’s hard, violent cock, tightening my grip on his thick length. Stroking and teasing his rock-hard tight skin, I tug back and forth towards my clitoris allowing his swollen head to touch me in just the right spot. I hold his heavy sack, massaging his testicles and rubbing his pre-ejaculation against my clitoris.
He bites down on my breast with the sensation of my touch. “Jesus, that is fucking good … I feel it, baby. Tell me what you want. I want you to feel,” he demands. “I want to please you. Do you want my fingers … my tongue … my cock? Tell me what you want to ease that ache.”
All of it.
“I want your tongue, your fingers, and your … cock.” I can’t believe I just said that word out loud! But in the heat of the moment and with all the sexual experiences Lucca is threatening me with, I’m beginning to lose some of my inhibitions.
Before I finish my sentence, his head is between my legs, and his tongue is dancing around my wet, fleshy folds, stimulating my sweet spot while his fingers slide inside my swollen core with one finger pressed at my back entrance.
Sweet contact.
Sweet sensation.
Sweet Jesus.
“Jesus, Lucca, it’s so good, don’t stop,” I breathlessly moan as I tighten my grip on his hair as he continues with his oral masterwork, and I buck under the glorious torture. Closing my eyes and biting my lip, I dig my nails into his scalp.
“Baby, open your eyes. I want to see you.” Sexy, smouldering eyes drown me, and it’s the sexiest vision.
Holy shit!
After a pause, he drops down, picking up speed with his tongue and pressing deeper into my front wall with his fingers. It’s driving me crazy. I thrust up to meet his tongue and sheath his fingers farther in my core.
“Baby, you are close. Fuck my tongue and come for me,” he demands as his thumb presses my sweet spot and his tongue slides into my hot narrow avenue.
Italian sex god.
Expert.
Climbing to a soaring smash, I cry and scream, kicking out my twitching feet behind his back, throwing my head to the side and rocking my hips to his sweeping tongue penetration as I ride out the electric waves of my orgasm.
“Shhh, Doc. We are not alone,” he chuckles.
My cheeks are flushed, and my heart is pounding. I feel a little dizzy, clinging onto the last current sparking my nerves.
He’s right—we’re back in my own house in Scotland, the home I share with my brother Cameron and my best friend Hazel, and I know they are both here.
I’m mortified.
Oh dear Lord. I hope they didn’t hear me.
“I can’t wait to get you alone in your house,” I say as I grab his hair and pull him up my sweaty body to my lips. His thick lips are swollen, wet with my juices, and wanting to claim my mouth.