Desperate need bubbled below the surface of her skin. The inevitable explosion of passion, always so present when she was with him, was only one touch away.

“Tell me what you want,” he said gruffly. “Keep looking at me like that and I swear to God I’ll give you anything.”

“Kiss me,” she begged. “Just kiss me.”

* * *

Kat’s mouth, pink, wet, and soft, entranced Carter. They’d kissed a million times, in a million different ways, but her request seemed so fucking huge that, for a split second, he could do nothing but stare. A divine image of her mouth around his dick immediately flashed before him, simultaneously drying his throat and weighing his body down to hers in seconds.

Skin to skin, flush and warm.

Carter tried to calm himself but struggled. Fact was, his body didn’t feel like his own. It was as though something had taken it over, like it was being controlled by something.

Something bigger. Something incomprehensible.

He closed his eyes and exhaled a soothing breath.

Who was he kidding? Kat had taken him over. Kat had control over him.

She’d had a hold on him since he was eleven years old. And if he hadn’t realized it before, he sure as shit knew now that he’d loved her every second, minute, and hour of those sixteen long years. He’d lost himself to her on a lonely, dark street one heartbreaking night in the Bronx, and now he finally understood that he’d never, ever truly found himself again.

Sixteen years. Five thousand eight hundred and forty-four days.

Jesus, how had he survived without her for so long?

He loved her, desperately, and, truthfully, it terrified him. He’d missed her without even knowing her and fantasized about her whenever he’d begun to lose himself to the bullshit surrounding him as he grew up. If he weren’t so hypnotized by her, Carter would have laughed at his own blindness and the ridiculous denial he’d immersed himself in since Kat had come back into his life.

As subtle as it was, her body writhed underneath him. Her legs shifted against the mattress and her hips lifted, rocking toward him, seeking out any type of friction. She was exquisite. He opened his mouth, gasping into her. His entire body shook when he pressed his lips to hers, and he grunted when she pulled him down, deepening the kiss quickly.

Their tongues met, reunited, touching, tasting, and rubbing together, inside her mouth, then inside his. Carter gripped her waist with one hand and her face with the other as their passion began to snap and sizzle. Sweet Jesus, the heavy ache pounding between his legs was torturous. He ground his hips against her stomach, showing her what she did to him. Not that she would ever understand. She had no comprehension at all.

He’d been such a damned fool to think he could ever get away without speaking those three words to her. The three words he’d never uttered to another human being in his entire fucked-up life. They’d taken his ass by surprise, but the relief that came with them was more freeing than any parole board’s release letter could ever be.

He moved his mouth from her lips to her jaw and down her neck. She bent backward, curving under him so that he could access any place he wanted on her gorgeous body. He began with her chest, yanking the straps of her bra down the tops of her arms so he could pull at the cups, releasing her to his eager hands and demanding mouth. With his eyes closed, Carter began to lick, suck, and tease, tugging her between his lips. He moaned when she scratched his back, pulling him closer while whispering her need for him.

Carter let his lips caress her hip, the soft flesh of her belly, all the way to her panty line peeking temptingly from beneath her shorts. He wanted her on his tongue. He wanted to feel her in his mouth and make her come so hard she’d see stars. He wanted to devour her, bury his entire face in that shit and never come out for days. He wanted her gasping and soaked. He wanted—

“I missed you,” Kat breathed.

Astounded by the pained expression on her face, Carter rested his chin against her hip.

“I missed you while you were gone.”

Carter’s heart fractured. “I missed you.” He brushed away the stray hair lying on her cheek. He shook his head. “God.” He kissed her. “I was a fucking fool to walk away from you.”

Walking away from her was as close to being burned alive as Carter imagined he would ever get. The pain had crippled him, rendering him immobile.

When the boys had visited him in Kill and tried to explain how Max had fallen apart when Lizzie left, Carter had struggled to understand. Now he knew exactly what pain his friend had been through—was still going through.

Carter never wanted to feel that pain again. He doubted very much that he would even survive it a second time.

“I know why you did it,” Kat whispered. “And if you walking away helped you realize that you love me,” she continued in a hushed tone, “then I’m happy you did.”

Christ, she was right. He’d walked away and cracked into a thousand pieces, bare, with nothing to hide behind. Realistically, Carter couldn’t refute admitting his true feelings had been inevitable. And now that his finely executed punk-ass demeanor had been thoroughly fucked, Carter at last accepted just how exhausting it had been.

“Carter.” Kat reached for his hand and placed his palm flat against her heart. “Show me,” she whispered. “Show me how much you love me.”

As his eyes scoured her face in question, Carter’s brain flashed back through all the times they’d come together, thinking about the ways in which he’d touched her, kissed her, moved inside of her. Show me.

At the beach house.

On the sofa.

The very first time they were together, soaked from the rain, desperate, on his bed until dawn.

He’d loved her so much even then.

Without even knowing it, he’d shown her what she meant to him by using his body instead of his shitty, inadequate words. When the sensation of having his body inside of hers had been so overwhelming and he’d been unable to find his rhythm through the thick clouds of need, he’d simply breathed her in, kissed her languidly, or touched her in places he knew made her moan his name.

Those had been his favorite moments. Connected together but not moving. No frenzy. Just being. Those were the moments Carter was most at peace.

He brushed her hair back and kissed her. He was gentle, his mouth pressing into hers only a little, while his tongue whispered across her lips, tender and loving.

You’re so beautiful, his kiss said. You make me breathless.

The moan from Kat’s throat told him she heard it, felt it. He placed his hand on the back of her neck, lifting her to his mouth. She never resisted. She was incredible in her generosity. Pulling off his boxer briefs, he moved over her, shifting down her chin, kissing her throat, and licking her chest. He nibbled and grazed his teeth across her stomach. His hands slid up her thighs, opening them.

I’ve wanted you forever.

Her hands fisted the bed when he laid small kisses from one hip to the other. Kat bent her knees and rested the balls of her feet on his shoulders. He caressed the crease where her thighs met her body and spread her legs farther, as they beckoned Carter forward, her bare skin aching for his mouth. He kissed the top of her cleft, seeing the sparkle of the wetness lying there. Gently, pushing her lips back with his mouth, he let his tongue seek out her swollen heat and began winding it in slow circles that made her eyes roll and her spine arch.

Holy fuck. She was the most delicious thing he’d ever tasted. His fingers moved, slipping easily along her sodden skin, teasing and asking for more with every dip, twist, and stroke. Little by little, Carter pushed two long fingers inside her and moaned into her skin when she cried out and swiveled her hips against his face. She was so warm. He pulled them out and pushed them back in while he sucked and licked her.