Entwined With You

was inside me, a part of me, taking every bit of my love and passion and giving me back so much more.
    “I love you,” I moaned, tightening my core and squeezing him. “I love you so much.”
    “Eva. God.” He shuddered, coming. He groaned into my mouth, his hands flexing against my scalp, his breath gusting hard across my lips.
    I felt him spurting inside me, filling me, and I trembled with another orgasm, the pleasure pulsing gently through me.
    His hands roamed restlessly, rubbing up and down my back, his kiss that perfect blend of love and desire. I felt his gratitude and need, recognized it because I felt the same way.
    It was a miracle that I’d found him, that he could make me feel this way, that I could love a man so deeply and completely and sexually with all the baggage I carried. And that I could offer the same refuge to him in return.
    Laying my cheek against his chest, I listened to his heart pounding, his perspiration mingling with mine.
    “Eva.”He exhaled harshly. “Those answers you want from me … I need you to ask the questions.”
    I held him for a long minute, waiting for our bodies to recover and my own panic to subside. He was still inside me. We were as close as we could be, but it wasn’t enough for him. He had to have more, on every front. He wasn’t going to quit until he possessed every part of me and infiltrated every aspect of my life.
    Pulling back, I looked at him. “I’m not going anywhere, Gideon. You don’t have to push yourself if you’re not ready.”
    “I am ready.” His gaze held mine, blazing with power and determination. “I need
you
to be ready. Because it won’t be long before I’m going to ask you a question, Eva. And I’m going to need you to give me the right answer.”
    “It’s too soon,” I whispered, my throat tight. I lifted slightly, trying to gain some distance, but he pulled me back and held me down. “I don’t know if I can.”
    “But you’re not going anywhere,” he reminded, his jaw set. “And neither am I. Why put off the inevitable?”
    “That’s not the way you need to look at it. We’ve got too many triggers. If we’re not careful, one or both of us will shut down, cut the other one—”
    “Ask me, Eva,” he commanded.
    “Gideon—”
    “Now.”
    Frustrated by his obstinacy, I stewed for a minute, then decided that whatever the reason, there
were
questions that needed answers no matter what. “Dr. Lucas. Do you know why he lied to your mother?”
    His jaw worked as he clenched his teeth, his eyes turning hard and cold. “He was protecting his brother-in-law.”
    “What?”
I sat back, my thoughts spinning. “Anne’s brother? The woman you were sleeping with?”
    “Fucking,” he corrected harshly. “Everyone in Anne’s family is inthe mental health field. The whole fucked-up lot of them. She’s a shrink. Did any of your Google searches dig
that
up?”
    I nodded absently, more concerned with the vehemence with which he said the word
shrink
, practically spitting it out. Was that why he hadn’t gotten help before? And how much did he love me to make the effort to see Dr. Petersen despite his loathing?
    “I didn’t know it right away,” he went on. “I couldn’t figure out why Lucas lied. He’s a pediatrician, for chrissakes. He’s supposed to care about kids.”
    “Screw that. He’s supposed to be human!” Rage filled me, a white-hot desire to find Lucas and hurt him. “I can’t believe he could look me in the eye like he did and say all that shit he said.”
    Blaming Gideon for everything … trying to drive a wedge between us …
    “It wasn’t until I met you that I finally started to get it,” he said, his hands tightening around my waist. “He loves Anne. Maybe as much as I love you. Enough to overlook her cheating and cover up for her brother to spare her the truth. Or embarrassment.”
    “He shouldn’t be practicing medicine.”
    “I don’t disagree.”
    “So why is his office in one of your buildings?”
    “I bought the building because his practice is in it. Helps me keep an eye on him and how well he’s doing … or not.”
    Something about the way he said “or not” led me to wonder: Did he have anything to do with Lucas’s less profitable times? I remembered when Cary had been taken to the hospital and how special arrangements had been made for him and for me, because Gideon was such a generous benefactor. How much could he influence?
    If there were ways to put Lucas at a