“I’ll prove it to you. I’ll show you I deserve you. I’ll be the man you’ve always needed me to be. No more letting you down. I promise you. I love you so fucking much, Blue.”

“You don’t need to prove anything to me. All I’ve ever wanted is your love.”

“You have it, but that’s just the beginning,” Lincoln says before he turns ravenous.

He’s on a mission tonight, and even if he doesn’t realize it, I do. He’s trying to escape the grief of what happened today, and there’s nothing I won’t do to help him. There’s nothing I wouldn’t do for him, period.

It’s a simple fact now. No questions asked. Our path may never be smooth and easy to navigate, but we’ve been through too much in finding our way back to each other to give up again.

Lincoln Riscoff is mine.

His lips coast down my neck, leaving a wake of heat. He slips my shirt over my head, then cups my breasts in his hands.

“So beautiful. So fucking beautiful.”

With a tug, Lincoln frees my breasts and thumbs my nipples. The buds tighten into even harder nubs, desperate for his mouth next. He rolls them between his thumb and forefinger, and I writhe on the bed beneath him as heat builds between my legs.

“I don’t spend enough time on your gorgeous tits. That all changes now.” He pinches them tighter between the pads of his fingers, and a bolt of pleasure shoots through me as I buck my hips up toward his body.

He covers one nipple with his mouth and sucks hard enough to steal a gasp from me. When he switches to the other side, the sparks of heat grow to the point where I think I might actually come from this alone. I never have before, but Lincoln has proven to be the exception to every rule.

When he scrapes across the tender skin with his teeth and pinches the opposite nipple, something breaks inside me and a rush of pleasure sweeps through.

“Oh my God. Oh my God.” I grip his shoulders hard as I ride it out.

When I finally release him, Lincoln lifts his head. “You’re so beautiful. I need to see that again.”

He lifts up from the bed and his fingers go to the waist of my pants. Within seconds, I’m naked but for a thong, and Lincoln presses his mouth against the lace, breathing me in.

“Please, I need . . .”

“Everything. You need fucking everything from me, and I’m going to give it to you.”

When he snaps the elastic on my panties, the only barrier between us is gone.

He takes his time, licking and stroking, bringing me all the way to the edge and pushing me over again and again until I’m not sure I can hold back another scream. But he doesn’t stop.

Lincoln’s determined to make me beg, and if this is the way he wants to cope with his grief, there’s no way in hell I’m going to stop him.