“Teal.” Carter doesn’t know what to do with his hands, so they’re all over me, along my arm, my shoulder, till he’s cupping my face. “You’re not broken. And you’ve always been my first choice. Since I was nine years old and first moved to Catalina Street and saw you and your sisters roller-skating up and down the street.”
I wipe my eyes. “Oh, man. The pink roller skates.”
He laughs and says, “Say it again, please. Say you love me, Teal.”
“I love you, Carter.”
His lips meet mine, clumsily at first, though I’m not sure why—from him not seeing well, or maybe just the intense emotions we both seem to be feeling. But then we get the angle of our faces right and theneverythingis right. Everything. His big lips gliding over mine, me opening my mouth to let his tongue in, our breath getting heavy. I grab at what I think is his pec, or maybe just under, at his rib cage, and his hand slides over my hip, over the juncture of my thighs. He grabs me there, lightly, giving me a squeeze, and I gasp, breaking the kiss to moan as quietly as I can, even though we’re the only people here.
“I told myself I wouldn’t make love to you until you fell in love with me.” His voice is gruff and low and I can feel it somehow vibrating against me through his hand. Or maybe that’s because he’s gliding his palm against me in a rhythm that makes my eyes want to roll backward.
I try to laugh, but it comes out like a series of erotic groans. “But we…but you were fine with oral?”
“I tried so hard to resist you, Teal, but I never could.”
I gasp when he rolls his palm in a way that hits me exactly right. “Do you—God—do you have a condom?”
He immediately pulls his hand back from between my thighs, and I am not too embarrassed to whine in disappointment.
“We aren’t doing it for the first time in an old-ass movie theater,” he responds.
“So you’re going to take me to the new one?” I ask, trying to lighten the mood, because it sounds like he’s sort of rejecting me again.
His arms wedge under me and I squeak, and then he hoists me into his arms. “Ha. No. We’re going to leave right now, actually, and I’m going have you in our bed.”
Our bed. In our home. Because Carter Velasquez is my husband.
It’s still scary, to think I’m on the verge of having what I have always secretly wanted. But I want to be brave and brave and brave, so I wrap my arms around his neck and, with my lips, find the spot I kissed during our first dance as esposo y esposa.
He hisses in a breath, and I can feel goose bumps forming under my mouth. “That’s one of your erogenous spots, isn’t it?” I whisper.
“It’s…something. God. I can’t even breathe when you—” And then I do it again, proving him right as he holds his breath in and then shakily lets it out when I’m done. “Damn, Teal. Damn.”
We make it back to his place in about five minutes. He kept doing this dumb move of hitting the gas while simultaneously trying to stare at me, like he was in awe of the fact that I was his, seriously his. “Pay attention to the road!” I kept squeaking, watching him blush over as he whipped his head back front-facing.
As soon as we make it through the entryway, I basically jumpon him. He catches me, his hands on my ass, leaning me against the wall as we begin kissing with the intensity of a teenage make-out session. He cups my face with one hand, and I hold on to the back of his neck and squeeze. My entire body feels pre- and post-orgasmic at once—warm and tingly, focused only on how I can get ever more closer to Carter.
“Wait,” I say suddenly. He freezes, slowly lowering me to the ground. I wince when my left foot hits.
“Are you in too much pain?” he breathes.
I laugh, because even though Iamin pain, and am probably due for another Advil, the endorphins of him, of his lips and shoulders and hands and everything, are doing a better job of numbing the ache than any pill. “I’m fine. I just wanted to, ah. Change first. If that’s okay?”
He furrows his brow and nods. “Okay. Just—”
“I’ll let you know when I’m ready for you in the bedroom.” And then I limp that way as fast as I can.
Once there, I about rip open the top drawer to my dresser, pulling out socks and bras until I find what I’m looking for. I hold it up in front of me: the barely-there bikini lingerie Sage and Sky gave me on my wedding day. I haven’t even tried it on yet, but with something like this, in which the fact it’s not supposed to fit is kind of the point, it doesn’t matter. I peel off my clothes as clumsily as I can, putting my weight on the dresser and off my foot, and then tie it on.
I burst into laughter when I look at myself in the mirror. The little triangles of the top barely hide my nipples. The bottoms—let’s just say I would absolutely be arrested if I wore this to the beach. The backside is a thong, so it hides about as much as the front. There’s something about the fact that at first glance, it has the same form as a normal bathing suit, but then all the naughty bitsare more or less on display rather than covered. It’s ridiculous and hot at the same time.
I open the door to call for Carter, but he’s right there, patiently waiting. His eyes drop down my body, and his mouth falls open. “Do you like it?” I ask, putting my hands on my hips and posing as sexily as I can with my weight on one foot. “I was thinking of sunning just a little bit, before sex.”
He’s staring at my breasts, where I’m pretty sure one of the fabrics has busted off my nipple just by my lifting my arms a little. “What? You sure?”
I snort. “I’m kidding, Carter. This is lingerie.”
He stares between my legs, and then he reaches out to touch me there, sliding his fingers where the fabric doesn’t even cover, where I am already beyond slick for him. “Good,” he says, gruff enough to make me gasp, and then he grabs me to lean on him as he slides one, then two fingers inside me.
