“Hmm. What have you been doing?” I asked, my hands settling over his.
“Arranging your surprise.”
“Ooh, I like surprises.” Grinning, I turned to face him.
“C’mon then.” Nate ushered me back inside and secured the doors before leading me upstairs. Excitement rushed through me, eager to discover what he’d been up to all the time he’d been gone.
When we reached the closet, Nate shrugged off his sweatshirt. “Get naked,” he instructed with a challenging raise of his brow.
I smiled and obeyed, removing my sweatshirt and leggings. “I love this kind of surprise.”
Nate cocked his head and smirked, his brow still raised, no longer in challenge but with wry amusement. I reached for the waistband of his sweatpants. “Nah-ah,” he said, backing out of reach, “not me, only you.”
Now I was really confused. I hurried out of my clothes and handed them over. Large eyes turned hot as they travelled up and down, his lips parting to accommodate increased breaths. My spine straightened proudly, thrusting my breasts forward. I
wanted
him to look at me. Feel his desire prickle every inch of naked flesh as he drank me in.
“Kara, you’re incredibly beautiful,” he growled, reaching for my face as his mouth hovered over mine. “I want you so fucking badly right now.”
“Take me.” I stepped forward, straddling his thigh as he nudged between my legs, and slid my hands into his hair. “I need to be fucked.”
His head snapped back. “Jesus! What happened to the shy woman too afraid to tell me what she wanted?”
I took his hands and moved them to my arse. He didn’t take much persuading, his palms sliding over me, cupping and squeezing. “Think your earlier confession sent her packing.”
His neck rolled, giving more of his flesh to my mouth. “If I’d known that was all it would take to set the siren free, I’d have told you a hell of a lot sooner.”
I stilled. When had Nate realised he loved me?
“I’ve known for a while,” he said, leading me into the bathroom.
My eyes widened when I took in the scene. The bath was full, bubbles almost spilling over the rim. Ylang-ylang and vanilla scented the room from the many lit candles, and towels were warming on the heated rail. “You did this? For me?”
“It didn’t start out as quite the romantic weekend I had planned.” He turned to me. “I’m hoping it will finish that way.”
“What’s the occasion?”
He looked taken aback. “You don’t know?”
I shook my head as I took his hand and stepped into the bath. All my worries and stresses literally washed away as I sunk into the warm water.
“You’re really not joining me?” I asked when he crouched beside the tub.
“This is all for you. Let me take care of you.”
I scooped up a handful of bubbles and playfully dotted some on the tip of his nose. Nate blew them off with a grin. “Lay back.”
I obliged, drawing a deep breath of heavenly scented air. Using gentle pressure, he began massaging my shoulders. “When you sat in my kitchen and admitted how frightened you were, the enormity of how deep my feelings ran suddenly became apparent. You made me reassess all my priorities. I knew I had to put my own fears and desires aside, and be strong for you. How easily I could do that confirmed the truth of my feelings.”
My mind drifted, lost in wonderful dreams of this loving man attending to me. A man who’d placed more importance on what I needed from him and given us a chance. I’m not sure how much time passed before Nate spoke.
“It isn’t all about sex for me,” he murmured, “not with you.”
My spine stiffened. My vicious accusations were still eating away at him. “I know.”
“But I love making love with you. You’re so tight and warm, I can’t help myself. When I slide inside you…”—he pressed his lips to my shoulder—“it’s like nothing I’ve ever experienced. It’s so right, the perfect fit. We were made for each other.”
Nodding, I remained quiet, leaving it open for him to talk some more. “I can’t be sorry for wanting you,” he said, “and I refuse to refrain from touching you every goddamn chance I get.”
“I don’t want you to,” I breathed, my pulse quickening. His fingers were moving deftly over my décolletage, and my nipples were erect and occasionally peeping through the bubbles, begging to be caressed. “I shouldn’t have said that. I apologise.”
“Forget it.” Nate waved a wet hand in the air, dismissing its importance. “I know you were upset and angry. The same way I know you’ve been flying under the radar for far too long, hoping no one would notice you.
But I did.
I noticed you, Kara.”
I stilled his hands and twisted to face him. His eyes were focused, so blue, radiating pure love and commitment. It pushed words and thoughts I never believed possible to have again to the forefront of my mind.
I tried saying them, but they refused to come out of my mouth. My heart had been armoured against attack for too long, fearful of being hurt, of loving again. I cupped his nape, urging his mouth to mine, desperate to show him another way. The kiss started gently, but like a wave approaching the shore, it gradually built, gaining strength with each passing second.
God
. My heart swelled so much I had to pull away to catch a breath.
“That’s for making me realise that I’m not the woman I thought.”
“Kara.” Nate hugged me close, showing no concern for how wet he got. “Don’t you see? The sweet-natured, smart, funny, gorgeous woman you are has always been there. Your star has always shone so brightly.” He shifted to kneel beside the tub, arms still around me. “A broken heart and mistrust blindsided you. I simply encouraged you to open your eyes and use that inner light to sear through the darkness.”
Never had I felt as alive and free as I did right now. This bath was a cleansing of the soul, a ritual to wash away all the bitter memories and start over. I pulled back and clasped his hands tight. “Can I tell you something?”
“Anything, baby, you know that.”
I chewed my lip and took a deep breath. “Stuart hated blow jobs. At least, from me anyway.”
Nate’s brows lifted. “O-kay, that was so
not
what I expected you to say.”
I chuckled. “I want no more secrets. Let me explain what happened.”
“No need. As I said, Mai told me.”
“She doesn’t know the half of it,” I admitted. Mai was only aware that I’d been cheated on. No dirty details. “We met at university. Stuart was a bit of a bad boy, used to smoke and drink. I watched him work his way through dozens of women before he targeted me in our final year. During the summer he underwent an entire transformation, cleaned himself up. Dating me was all part of his game-plan to get ahead. I was just being used.”
“Which is why you had trouble accepting I was being genuine,” Nate murmured, using his thumbs to work over my palm.
“Hmm,” I agreed. “Six months in, he started telling me how to dress, who I should be friends with, where I could go. We would argue, and sometimes…” My mind drifted to a dark place, where images of his fury flashed like lightning in my mind. “He wanted me a certain way so no other man would be interested.”
“
His
insecurity,” Nate muttered gruffly, “not yours.”
“I see that now.”
“Anyone who got to know you would see how enchanting you are, regardless of your outer beauty. That’s all a bonus.”
“People rarely got the chance. I’ve always been a little socially awkward, so it was easy to stop going out. When I did, he was with me.”
Nate frowned. “Your family must’ve noticed you were becoming so introverted?”
“I didn’t live at home so it wasn’t always apparent, but they did. Liam especially. He told me to leave numerous times, said it wasn’t healthy.”
“He was right,” Nate snapped. “Why didn’t you?”
I lifted a shoulder. I’d asked myself the same question many times before, and never found an answer. Until now. Staring into the piercing translucent eyes of a man who worshipped me unconditionally, I finally confronted it. “Stuart didn’t care about me. I latched onto the nearest person, trying to fill the void my mother had left, hoping to find the love I’d lost and missed. It was all completely for the wrong reasons, but I was drowning in grief. He took advantage of my weakness.”
“Bastard.”
Nate moved around the tub, massaging my other arm with a touch more aggression than before.
“I agree.” I drew my knees up and rolled my neck. Reliving my past was making me tense, even with Nate trying his hardest to relax me. “Fast forward to last year. We both worked for Morgan Sanders. We were at a hotel with colleagues, celebrating our exam successes. My best friend was there, the third wheel in the house we shared—”
“You
lived
together?” Nate’s hand stilled, his grip on my upper arm squeezing hard.
“More by circumstance than by choice.” I covered his hand with mine, encouraging him to release me. When he did, it took a second for the colour to return to my skin. “I’ve never lived with a man, not properly,” I assured him. His shoulders relaxed, his attention returning to my fingers, careful not to let the ruby band slip off.
“We had a room booked for the night.” I tipped my head back, my brow furrowing. “It was odd he’d left me alone. When I couldn’t locate him I went upstairs, thinking he’d got drunk and passed out. I stumbled into our room looking for him…” I laughed bitterly. “Boy, did I find him. Standing, trousers bunched around his ankles and his dick in her mouth.”
Nate winced. “There’s really no need for this,” he said, cradling my face and pressing a kiss to my lips. “I wish you hadn’t been fucked over, but I don’t care about the rest. Hearing it only makes me appreciate you more.”
“Please let me finish. I want closure. Let me get everything off my chest so I never have to talk about it again.”
His eyes held mine for a long time. Eventually, he sighed. “Okay,” he murmured, “if it’s what you need.” Then he completely stunned me by stripping off and slipping into the bath at the other end.
Finding the strength I always did from the deep pools of love gazing back at me, I continued. “I didn’t see the busty brunette’s face because she didn’t have the decency to stop. But I knew it was her. I’d seen that dolphin tattoo on her arse enough times to know it was my best friend.”
“Jesus,” Nate muttered harshly, placing my right foot on his chest so he could massage my calf.
“Sometimes, I still see his face. The lazy drunken smile curling lipstick smeared lips when he invited me to join them in a threesome…the wild eyes when he attacked me a few weeks later.”
“The fucker did
what
?” My foot landed with a splash back into the water as he straightened.
“You don’t get to decide when this ends,” I mimicked Stuart’s snarl. “I’m the one who controls this relationship.” I stroked my neck with both hands. “Just as his fingers pinched hard around my throat and his fist made contact with my cheek, Liam barged in.”
“He hit you?” Nate bit out.
“Once,” I confirmed quietly. “He got really mad.”
His fingers were rigid, almost pulling his hair as he pushed them through the glossy chocolate strands. With my hands either side of the tub, I pulled myself upright and caught his forearms, lacing my fingers with his. “There were other times he came close but never did.”
Nate took a deep breath, trying to calm down. Anger wasn’t the right way to deal with this. My beautiful lover always knew what to do or say in any given situation. “Did you report him?”
I shook my head. “I just wanted to forget everything.”
His lips thinned in disapproval. “Physical abuse, verbal and mental abuse, it’s fucking abuse whichever way you look at it.”
Hearing Nate say it didn’t make it any easier to acknowledge. “The rest is a blur. Yelling. Struggling. Liam dragged me out whilst Stuart nursed a bloodied broken nose on the floor.”
“Liam should’ve fucking killed him.” I’d never seen the harsh gleam of vengeance in Nate’s shimmering, almost navy eyes, darker against the paling of his skin. A chill chased up my spine.
“Stuart decided he was the injured party and took his revenge by spreading malicious rumours at the office, calling me a slut behind my back, rubbishing my work. He sent me threatening text messages, saying if I didn’t go back to him he’d kill himself and I’d be to blame.”
“Jesus fucking Christ. The man was one fucked up son of a bitch.” He pulled me forward, sending a wave of foamy lukewarm water spilling onto the tiled floor, and cradled me in his lap.
“He threatened Liam with assault, that’s why I didn’t go to the police. I couldn’t put it on my dad.”
It felt like an age before Nate spoke again. “No one will ever touch you like that again. Never make you feel that way. I’m making that promise to you now,” he vowed, his voice choked with hard-edged emotion.
“I knew he wouldn’t do it. The bastard was too selfish.”
I waited a while before continuing, a little shaken by the rage still coiled in his tense frame. In a much quieter voice, I said, “They’d been at it behind my back almost the entire two years we were together. Our relationship was built on lie upon dirty lie. None of it was real. I hate how I allowed myself to get trapped in that situation and not be strong enough to get out.”
“Ah, God.” His head fell back to rest on the lip of the oval tub. “Fucked over by two people you’d invested your trust in. It all makes sense.”
I nodded. Finally, he understood why I’d been closing myself off, the reasons for my overreactions and jealous behaviour.
Staring at the ceiling, he quietly said, “At least now I know your resistance to opening up wasn’t because of me.”
God.
For a man sure of himself in so many other ways, when it came to us, he was just as at risk and scared of being broken. Until now, I’d never appreciated that I held as much power over him as he did me. “It’s never been you,” I reassured, kissing his chest where his heart beat rapidly beneath.
I gave him time to digest everything. I’d done a lot of talking, but there was a lot of unspoken explanations for Nate to absorb that were equally as important. At the most inappropriate time, I began to laugh. “You know what the stupid thing was? The only thought I had when I saw them together was, why did he never let me give him one?”