But I lose the ability to muffle my pleasure when Tobias abruptly lets go of my hair, my breast, and acquires both of my wrists, locking them at the small of my back.

“Spread your legs.” He spits on my backside. Growls while slapping it sharply. “Time to put me out of my misery, you fucking temptation.”

I should punch him in the face for spitting on me. Except I love it. Except I’d have to stop receiving what he’s giving me, which is all-out hedonism. He’s bearing down on top of me now, his hips pumping in a frenzied way that says the end is near and I’m powerless to the lust. Powerless to do anything but raise my buttocks like he told me and take the raw and wonderful conquering of my body. The spiral he loosened inside me earlier begins to coil the other direction again, faster, faster and my legs shift and dance, knowing what’s coming.

“Please, please, please.” I flex my wrists but he holds tight. “Keep going.”

“Anything you say, love.” He’s breathless now. Wild. But in the eye of the storm, his voice has lost all trace of arrogance. All artifice. He’s just mine. He’s just ours. “Just don’t stop liking me, Elise. Just keep…I don’t want to lose that. This. I’ve never had this.”

Our fingers intertwine at the small of my back. “I won’t stop.”

On that promise, his stomach muscles flex and strain against my backside and he moans brokenly into my back, the excessive warmth increasing even more inside of me, his movements turning jagged, his hands letting go of my wrists to scramble down to my hips, yanking them back desperately for three final drives—and that roughness at that angle blows my second fuse, forcing a closed-mouth scream from deep in the recesses of my body, both of us straining over that near-painful clench of my body around his, before he falls forward onto me, gathering me close, so close, in the circle of his arms. “Elise. My God.”

A whistle blows somewhere in the distance and the crowd cheers.

I turn and collapse against him, our bodies swaying in a slow dance for several seconds, before we meet for a kiss. And when I see the look of completion, awe, understanding in his eyes, I somehow know they match my own.

What we’ve just done has snapped the circle together with a finality I can feel in my bones—and I’m pretty sure I no longer have a choice but to exist in the center of it, trusting hope to outweigh my fear. Hoping that against all odds, the circle stays intact.

Chapter Eighteen

I’m still in an orgasmic haze when we reach my apartment.

Tobias drove to Jersey for the match this afternoon, so I have the pleasure of skipping the train and riding in his silver Audi, the interior of which smells like new leather and vanilla. We weren’t able to speak much to Banks after the game, but we waved to him as he followed his team onto their idling bus, earning Tobias a very professional nod—and me, a distinctly promissory one. It was more than a nod vowing to please me later, it was a nod telling me much more. That he has something to speak to me about. Share with me.