Let it happen.
My hand stroked his neck…
34
A bolt of lightning crossed the sky, and the garden lit up as though the sun had just risen. Thunder rumbled far off, and again lightning seemed to tear through the clouds like a crack across a mirror.
Amid a gust of wind, Lucas and I pulled away from each other. The desire was still there, though. The hesitation as well.
Someone said we should walk to the cliffside to watch the storm over the sea, and soon we were all marching toward the lemon grove using our cell phones as flashlights. Roy tripped and cursed, and Chiara repeated what he’d said like a parrot, provoking merriment.
“Really, you all,” Angela chided them.
What I saw on the cliff left me speechless. On the horizon, the clouds were glowing, the sea was choppy, and lightning came down from the sky like fire. The roar of the waves and the howl of the wind drowned out everything else. It was terrifying, but also fascinating. Beautiful, but also savage.
The electricity in the air made my hair stand on end. I walked forward, and the wind caught me like a sail, and the breakers striking the rocks far below reminded me of how high I was. How close I was to the void.
I walked forward a little more, and my toes hung over the edge. Adrenaline shot through me.
A drop of water fell on my cheek. Another on my forehead. It was starting to rain.
Everyone rushed off to the lemon grove. I heard their shouts and laughter as they vanished. I didn’t move, though. The storm had hypnotized me.
I closed my eyes and leaned my head back, stuck out my tongue and licked the rain that hammered my lips, soaking my hair and clothes. I’d always wondered why there were so many scenes with rain in movies. What was supposed to be so pleasant about letting water soak into your bones and plaster your hair to your head and cover your feet in mud?
Now I knew. I felt Lucas’s body behind me, and my heart started to beat faster. He touched my stomach, pulled me back from the edge, and stayed there, holding me. My nerve endings were raw. It was exhilarating.
I felt something soft. Lips brushing me.
I couldn’t breathe.
I turned, trembling, and the sky glowed above us like a sparkling ball of fire. I looked up at Lucas, and he looked down at me, pressing his forehead into mine. He had pulled me back from the edge of the cliff, but I was at the edge of something else now—a different abyss, one I couldn’t escape, one I was ready to hurl myself into.
I understood those scenes set in the rain, the magic that surrounded them. The pleasure of cold rain on hot skin burning with desire. Begging to be touched, begging to come close.
Even the air between us felt like an insult—something keeping us apart.
This was no dream.
This was no fantasy, recreated in my mind a thousand times.
This was happening.
I felt his hand on my cheek. His lips just inches from mine.
One second. Two. Three…
It was agony! Torture! But a part of me didn’t want it to end. The anticipation was driving me mad. That moment, while he hesitated between kissing and not kissing me, was the most intense I had ever experienced. The most erotic. Erotic: That was a word I’d heard before, but I’d never known what it meant.
Four. Five. Six…
I decided for both of us and sought out his lips. I kissed him because the desire was causing me to ache. It was clawing to get out of me. Lucas pulled back to stare at me.
One second. Two. Three…
And his lips struck mine again, hungry and firm. I moaned as my tongue felt his tongue, as I tasted his flavor. As I kissed him as though the world were on the verge of ending and nothing could save me but that kiss.
Lucas was breathing hard as his hands clutched my face with desperation, pulling me close so he could feel me. Feel it. Feel what we were together. Two bodies quivering with desire under wet clothes.
