There’s something so primal about it. So brutishly satisfying.
It’smemaking her moan like that. It’smyteeth scraping the sensitive bud of her clit.
The firelight flickers against the white ceiling, and a frosty breeze rattles the window behind me, poking invisible tendrils through the hairline gaps in the wooden frame. The chill dances across the back of my neck, but it’s nothing compared to the heat swirling between Maddy and I.
“Oh, shit.” Maddy tilts her head back, eyes hazy with pleasure. “Oh god, I—whoops!”
For a split second, she almost leans back too far and loses her balance, hands flying out to brace herself against a crumpled pile of my notes on ferns. Maddy blinks down at me, owlish in her shock, then bursts out laughing.
I smirk and nip at her thigh.
“Did you swoon for me, darling?”
“No. No way.” Maddy shakes her head in denial, her knitted sweater slipping off one shoulder to show a glimpse of collarbone. “That is not what happened.”
My fingertip traces a gentle line up her seam, and Maddy’s breath catches above me. I circle her entrance, teasing as I get closer and closer. “Are you sure? It certainly looked that way from down here.”
“I—no.”
“No?” My free hand grips Maddy’s leg and squeezes. She’s soft but athletic, with hard muscle beneath her curves. Mouthwatering. “No, you didn’t swoon? Or no, you’re not sure?”
And I’m teasing us both at this point, because Maddy’s nibbling on her plump bottom lip, her hips rolling hungrily toward my touch, while my hands tremble and my heart thuds against my rib cage.
I’m so close.
A mere twitch of the finger away from sinking inside her. From claiming Maddy in a whole new way, stroking the sensitive spots inside her until she wails. From pressing inside her tight channel and feeling her body clamp down on me, massaging my knuckles, silently begging for my cock. Sure, I’ve licked inside her more times than I can count, but I’ve never donethat.
Maddy’s breath catches, like she can hear the pulse thudding in my temples. Like she can pictureexactlywhat I’m contemplating, the last threads of my control vibrating like plucked strings. Like she can see the movie playing in my head, and she’s spellbound too.
Then my hand draws back, leaving a glossy trail on Maddy’s bare thigh, and she exhales shakily. Clearing my throat, I lean down and lick her again, forcibly wrenching my brain back on track. Trying to lose myself in her salty-sweet taste, hertwitching thighs, the breathy moans that float through the quiet study.
“Holding out on me,” Maddy jokes weakly, but I’m a coward and pretend not to hear. It’s easier than admitting that she’s right. Than admitting the truth.
Because here it is: if I cross another line with Maddy, if I make her mine in that way, if I feel her body cleave to me like that… I fear I may never be able to let her go.
And already, the evenings are getting brighter. The sun is getting stronger, and springtime wildflowers have started to dot the grounds. They peek through the grass as I stride to the greenhouse each morning, mocking me. My countdown with Maddy began weeks ago, and at this point, I’m on borrowed time.
Ignoring the hollow desolation in my chest, I crane my neck to lick and suck and nibble at the slice of heaven between her thighs.
Yes, it’s an arbitrary line.
Yes, it’s surely far too late to protect myself from eviscerating heartbreak.
But I’ve known enough grief and loss in my life that I can’t help trying. Can’t help bracing myself, trying to hold back just enough that I won’t fall into complete despair the moment Maddy leaves.
This girl was never mine to keep. She blew onto my island on a winter breeze, and soon the spring tide will carry her back to the mainland then on to distant lands. Maddy’s told me enough about her life so far, about the adventures that she’s had, for me to know a fellow explorer when I meet one. She won’t be satisfied in this hushed, empty manor, trapped on this barren rock in the foaming sea. Not for long.
It will start to feel like a prison. I should know.
And when that time comes, Iwilllet her go. Hear this: I will not trap Maddy here, frozen in amber with me in my misery.
But until that day…
I hitch her thigh over my shoulder, rubbing my whole face against her glossy folds before latching onto her tight bud and giving a long suck. Maddy’s cries echo around the study, loud enough to be heard across the manor, but I can’t bring myself to care. Let them hear.
Because until that day comes, I want to fucking bathe in this woman.
* * *
