Eyes Wide Open: The Blackstone Affair, Book 3 (Volume 3) - Softcover

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Raine Miller is the New York Times bestselling author of the Blackstone Affair series: Naked, All In, and Eyes Wide Open. She lives in California with her husband and two sons.

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Eyes Wide Open

1

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Ethan’s eyes held on to me as he mastered my body, his grip firm on my hips, his thick flesh filling me up and moving inside me, his mouth all over me, his teeth on my skin.

All of this from the man who had broken though the walls I’d built and captured me. They were demonstrations of touch and pleasure, a means of cementing the connection between us, of keeping me close to him. It was his way. He didn’t need to worry, though.

Ethan had me.

Despite the whole mess tonight, he had me in his arms and underneath him, his commanding strength taking charge in the way it’d been from the beginning. Holding me safe. That night on the street when he’d coaxed me into his car and the later phone calls demanding I acknowledge him were just the start of my understanding of Ethan Blackstone. There was so much more to the man than I ever imagined back then.

I wasn’t going anywhere. I was in love with him.

“I want my cock in you all night long,” he rasped, his blue eyes flashing against the moonlight as he moved. Looming over me, he plied my body in every which way as the light shone on our naked flesh through the balcony window. Hands, mouth, cock, tongue, teeth, fingers—he used them all.

Ethan said things to me like that during sex. Shocking stuff that made me hotter than hell, nourishing my confidence, and showing me how much he wanted me. It was precisely what I needed. Ethan was my answer, and he knew exactly what I craved. I don’t know how he understood me so well, but he did without a doubt. Tonight had confirmed that message loud and clear. I guess I could finally admit that I was in need of another person in order to be happy.

That other person was Ethan.

I’d let someone in. The hard shell around my heart had been compromised, and very thoroughly too. Ethan had done it. He’d worked on me, and pushed me and demanded my attention. He never gave up on me and loved me in spite of my cavern of emotional issues. Ethan did all that for me. And now I could revel in the fact that I was loved by a man whom I loved in return.

“Eyes on me, baby,” he commanded on a harsh breath. “You know I have to have your eyes when I take you!” His hand had moved up to grip my hair and he tugged. He never hurt me when he pulled it, though. Ethan knew just how much pressure to exert and was fully aware it sent me over the edge. I did know about his need for my eyes being on him and I held onto his fiery blues with everything I had.

But Ethan knew more about me than I knew about him.

“You’re going to come first!” he gritted out, thrusting deep and hard, finding the sensitive spot within me needed to accomplish his directive.

As I felt the pressure build I let myself go to that perfect place of ecstasy, pinned beneath Ethan’s body, which was burrowed in mine, his blue eyes just inches above me. He took my mouth as the orgasm ripped into me, filling another part of me, making me accept more of him, binding us together more deeply.

His orgasm followed mine within seconds. I could always tell he was close from how he tightened to inhuman hardness right as he was about to come. The feeling was out of this world and intensely empowering. That I could pull such a reaction from him and elicit such feeling in another person did something to me. Something that healed me a little bit each time it happened—I kept getting better inside my head because of Ethan and the ways he showed his love for me. I had some hope about myself that I could be happy and live a normal life.

Ethan had given me that.

“Tell me, baby,” he exhaled in a harsh whisper, but I could hear the vulnerability that accompanied the boldness. Ethan wasn’t without his own insecurities, he was just a mortal like the rest of us.

“Always yours!” I truly meant my words as I felt him let go inside me.

When I opened my eyes sometime later, I realized I must have dozed a bit. Ethan had rearranged us halfway on our sides, but we were still joined together. He liked to stay buried inside me for a while afterward. I didn’t mind, because it was something he desired and I loved making him happy.

I just wish he’d tell me more about his dark place. He was afraid to share, and while it bothered me, I mostly understood his fear. I often wondered if his reasons for needing to touch me all the time and possess me so thoroughly during sex, and afterward too, had something to do with his time as a prisoner. They tortured him and scarred him and hurt him. It pained me just remembering how he’d been that night when his dreams woke him up in a panic.

I trailed my fingers over his shoulder and back. I imagined the angel wings of his tattoo and the words below them. And I felt the scars too. Ethan flicked his eyes open and pegged me hard. “Why wings? They’re beautiful, you know.”

“The wings reminded me of my mum,” he said after a moment or two of silence, “and they covered over many of the scars.”

I leaned forward, kissing his lips with a soft touch. I cupped his jaw and decided to take the plunge. I didn’t want to scare Ethan away from talking to me if he was in a mood, but figured I had to try again at some point. “And the quote? Why that one?”

He shrugged and whispered, “I think I died a little tonight.”

So much for him opening up and sharing. He wasn’t up for any more delving into his past. I could tell. “What do you mean you died a little?”

“When I couldn’t find you after that message came in on your mobile.” He traced my cheek and then my lips with his finger—just the lightest touch, and I felt a shiver roll through me.

“Well, you did find me eventually, and no dying allowed, mister. That would be a real major buzzkill.” I tried to tease him into a lighter mood, but it didn’t seem to be working. When Ethan was in a serious frame of mind, he didn’t just switch out of it easily.

“I’m glad you feel better,” he paused and thrust his hips with a renewed erection, sinking in deep, “because I needed this with you, badly.”

“I’m here and you have me,” I murmured against his lips as he draped my legs over his shoulders and took charge of another round of pleasure. Once was rarely enough for him.

Ethan made me feel desirable. He made me feel beautiful and sexy, from the words that came out of his mouth to the touch of his body in mine when he made love to me. And afterward, when he held me against him like I was precious.

Somebody wanted me, despite all that had gone down in my past. Someone was willing to fight for me. I was important to another person. To Ethan I was. The power in that knowledge was life-changing.

Ethan’s particular brand of attention was intense and a lot to accept at first, but it worked for me. Ethan worked for me. He could show me how much he wanted me, and for the first time I had some hope that we could really make this relationship work. The “let’s go slow” part hadn’t happened at all like we’d agreed when we first met. But if we had gone slowly, I very much doubt I’d be naked in bed with him at the Somerset coast, in an English manor fit for a king, which happened to be owned by his sister, and being fucked to the brink of another magnificent orgasm right...