I slowly withdrew my fingers from Colette's still-quivering pussy, bringing them to my lips and sucking her off of them. “Delicious,” I murmured, savoring the taste of her. “But I'm not nearly done with you yet.” With a sudden movement, I stood up, lifting her with me and turning to sit back down with her straddling my lap. My hard cock pressed against her core through our clothes, a promise of what was to come.
“Now,” I said, gripping her hips and grinding her down onto me, “let's see how many more times I can make you scream my name tonight.”
CHAPTER 18
Colette
“Wait,”I gasped, my voice catching somewhere between a plea and a breath.
Silas went still beneath me, every line of him tense, solid, barely contained. His hands didn’t move, but I couldfeelthe restraint in them — the careful way his fingers eased their grip at my hips, like he was afraid of breaking something fragile.
I wanted him.God, I wanted him.
But the wanting was tangled — too close to the ache I’d been trying to outrun since everything collapsed. Every time I thought I’d burned the past away, it found its way back into my throat.
“I just—” I started, then stopped, the words caught between my ribs. “I need a second.”
His brow furrowed, but he didn’t speak. Didn’t push. Just waited, breathing hard, eyes searching mine with a patience I didn’t deserve.
It undid me more than anything else could have.
BecauseJoshnever waited.
Joshhad made me feel like slowing down was an inconvenience, like the only way to be wanted was to keep up.
But Silas… he justwas. Steady. Present. Warm.
“I’m not stopping,” I whispered, my lips brushing his jaw. “I just… want to make sure I’m… thinking clearly. I don’t want to be someone else’s mistake. Not again.”
His breath shuddered out slowly, the sound more intimate than anything that came before it. “Colette,” he said, my name roughened in his throat, “you couldn’t be a mistake if you tried.”
Something inside me loosened at that. The ache, the fear — all of it. And when I finally leaned in, forehead to his, the wanting was still there, sharper than ever.
But it felt different now.
Like the start of somethingreal.
I wasn’t sure what scared me more.
I thought maybe if I leaned in, if I justlet it happen, the noise in my head would quiet. That wanting him would feel clean instead of complicated.
So I kissed him — softly, carefully — and for a second, it worked. The world narrowed to the warmth of his mouth and the steady weight of his hands at my waist.
But the second stretched too long. My breath stuttered. Something in my chest cracked wide open, and the rush of it wasn’t desire anymore. It was fear.
Grief. Everything I hadn’t wanted him to see.
“I can’t,” I whispered, pulling back. “I thought I could, but I can’t.”
Silas didn’t speak. Didn’t move. His eyes searched mine, full of something heavy — not disappointment, not frustration. Just understanding. The kind that hurt worse because it was gentle.
He reached up, brushed a thumb along my jaw, the touch steady and unbearably kind. “Colette,” he said quietly. “You don’t have to explain.”
I tried to laugh, but it broke somewhere halfway out. “I always think I’m fine until I’m not.”
His hand fell away, but not far — resting on my shoulder, warm through the fabric of his shirt. “You don’t have to prove you’re fine, either.”
The silence that followed wasn’t awkward. Just… full.
