He’d never wanted like this.

Every moment with her was a sensual revelation. Hot. Effortless.

Perfect.

Pulling her into his arms, he kissed her mouth. "You taste good everywhere."

He felt her smile right in the center of his chest as she said, "So do you—at least, where you’ve let me taste."

The bright spark of fire in her eyes told him he wasn’t going to be able to hold her off any longer, so when she reached for the hem of his T-shirt, he helped her get it off over his head.

Her eyes were wide with clear delight as she ran her hands slowly over his shoulders. "You’re so big," she said in an awed voice that resonated straight to his groin, just like every other damned thing she’d said and done tonight. "And so hard."

Her hands were small, but he already knew how well she used them, and as her nails scraped lightly over his ni**les, he sucked in a breath at the pleasure of being with her. Pleasure so big he actually forgot for a split second that—

"Rafe?" Her fingers stilled over his ribs, near a heart that was beating too hard, too fast for the beautiful woman beneath him. "What happened to you?"

Before he could respond, she was shifting so that she could see the long, jagged scar across ten inches of his skin. No one’s touch had ever been as gentle.

"Who hurt you?"

"No one that matters."

But she wouldn’t accept that, and when she said again, "Who?" he knew he had to tell her the full truth, a truth almost no one else knew, including his parents.

"An ex-husband of one of my clients."

She gasped in horror, her eyes wide and furious on his behalf. "He came after you?"

Knowing it would only be worse if he waited until after they’d made love to tell her, he admitted, "After I caught him cheating on my client and when their divorce was final, I ran into her again." He wasn’t proud of what he’d done, and there was a huge chance that, once she knew, Brooke might get out of the bed as quickly as she’d climbed into it. "We ended up in bed together." The flash of shock in her eyes came and went so fast, he almost thought he’d imagined it. "I was only that stupid once." He hadn’t been thinking straight the night he’d broken one of his cardinal rules—never get involved with a client—but had simply been hoping a quick hit of physical pleasure could erase the churning in his gut over what his life had turned into. "Of course, she immediately threw it in her ex’s face—that she’d slept with the man who had caught him cheating on her."

Rafe braced himself as he waited for Brooke to respond to his admission. She’d always been an open book to him before now, but suddenly he couldn’t tell what she was thinking...or if she was so disgusted with him that she was a breath from ordering him from her bed.

"How dare they?" He blinked in surprise as she said, "He might have been the one to use the knife on you, but she practically handed it to him."

Rafe’s breath started up again on a rush of relief...and the knowledge that he’d never done a single damn thing that was good enough to deserve Brooke’s sweetness or her fierce protection of him.

"I brought it on myself."

"No, you didn’t!"

He’d never heard Brooke raise her voice before, and he was suddenly reminded of the way his soft-spoken mother could emerge as a snarling tiger whenever her kids were threatened in any way. Brooke would be just as good with her own children, kids he could so easily see her playing with on the beach—jumping off the dock hand in hand with them, tucking them into bed at night with a bedtime story about princes and princesses.

He swallowed hard as he realized where his brain had gone—and how easy it had been to go there.

"You made a mistake by being with her, but they both took out their fury with each other on you." Brooke slid her arms around him, warm and strong. "And that could never be your fault."

The gash had hurt like hell that first week before dulling to a steady throb these past couple of months. But now, for the first time since the night he’d walked into the ER, bleeding through his shirt, he could hardly feel it. Instead, his senses were entirely captured by the steady beat of her heart against his chest, the fragrant scent of her hair, and the slick heat of her arousal against his thigh.

She pressed kisses down over his shoulder and chest, until she reached the top edge of his scar. Her lips feathered over it. "I don’t ever want anyone to hurt you again," she told him as she softly kissed the length of the skin and muscle that had been stitched back together in the emergency room.

Something swelled beneath his breastbone, an emotion that was bigger than this night, bigger even than the way Brooke was healing him one kiss at a time.

She reached for the zipper of his jeans, and he let her pull the denim down, but when his erection jumped beneath the light stroke of her fingers over cotton, he knew better than to let her pull off his boxers, too. All it would take was the slightest touch of her fingertips over him, and he’d lose it.

A few seconds after removing his boxers himself, he kicked off his last piece of clothing and both of them were finally naked. He kissed her and reveled in the amazing feeling of her bare skin sliding against his for the first time.

His.

She was his.

The thought was echoing over and over in his head when she told him, "I’m ready now."

Slowly caressing her gorgeous curves, moving his hand over her br**sts, waist, hips, and inner thighs, he finally slicked his fingers through her wetness. She arched into his touch, and he bit down on her earlobe.