She didn’t want to answer. Giving her ex room in the bed she shared with Lucas was sacrilege. Deep down, she knew that man was full of shit, belittling her at every turn. He delighted in making her second-guess herself. However, knowing it and believing it were two different things.
Ultimately, keeping her feelings of inadequacy and embarrassment seemed wrong. “Knox hated it. I mean, he always wanted me to do it to him, but he told me that I didn’t do it right. That I needed a lot of practice. The couple of times he reciprocated, he pretty much made me beg for it. Said very few women could get off from it, so he didn’t like to waste his timetrying. He made me so self-conscious about it, and then it turned out he was right. I couldn’t come from it. I never asked again.”
There was another long pause. “Elyxandre, look at me.”
She stayed locked in the position she’d been in.
“I’m not moving until you look at me.”
He waited her out. Finally, she raised her arm slightly and looked down her body at him.
“El, that man is a liar. He just didn’t bother to learn how to do it right, or else he was just fucking selfish. If you really don’t want me to do it, I won’t, but I hope you’ll let me show you just how wrong he was.” He dropped a single kiss to the top of her mound. “You trusted me earlier. Can you trust me one more time?”
She stared at him for what felt like an eternity, searching for signs that he was placating her. Seeing only care and concern, she finally gave him a single nod of her head.
A smile spread across his face. “Thank you, sweetheart. The only thing you need to do is lie back, close your eyes, and try to relax. Even if you don’t have an orgasm today, it should still feel good. Just let yourself enjoy the sensations, and let your body respond how it wants to. There’s no right or wrong about anything with sex, as long as it feels good. And this should feel really, really good.”
She felt herself nod, the movement a bit jerky in response as she suddenly felt cold. With a deep breath through her nose and a slow exhale through her mouth, she worked to relax her muscles.
His hands smoothed down her legs, raising one leg over his shoulder, then doing the same with the other. His mouth hovered over her warm center, and he started with short, soft laps of his tongue over her clit as his hands caressed whatever skin he could reach. Eventually, more of her muscles began to unlock, and each time she felt herself relax one step further, shefelt him do something new with his mouth or move somewhere new.
He murmured against her skin. “Doing okay, beautiful?”
“Yes.”
The tip of his tongue gently probed at her opening.
She arched her back. “Oh god, yes.”
His strokes became bolder, the pressure of his hands more forceful, but he never made her feel uncomfortable physically. When he returned to her clit, gently sucking on the now-hard nub, she felt herself lift, like taking off in an airplane, float, and then drop as if hitting a pocket of air pressure. While the climax wasn’t as intense as the previous ones, in some ways it felt more pleasurable. It was definitely more intimate, and not because of where his mouth was pressed.
While the ripples passed through her, he took long, slow licks across her clit, in the creases where her groin met her leg, and between her folds. Each pass was incredibly tender, and she felt her eyes well up with tears. Rather than try to analyze why she was reacting this way, she let her thoughts float and simply enjoyed the pleasure he brought her.
Gently, he lowered her legs from his shoulders, and one kiss at a time, he traveled his way up her body until he lay above her, propped on his forearms. “How was that?” he asked her.
“It was nice.” Realizing that response sounded like the experience was less than pleasing, she apologized. “Sorry, that sounded lame.”
“No, it didn’t. I was aiming for nice. When you’re ready for not nice, you let me know,” he said with a wink. His face took on a more serious expression, and he used his fingertips to brush back wisps of hair from her face. “At the risk of ruining the moment, I need you to try and push him out of your head when we’re in bed together. I know that won’t be easy. I’d be willing to bet that was one of the first ways he gaslighted you. Putting theonus of fault on you meant he could escape any heavy lifting in the relationship as far as sex went.”
“I’ll try. I don’t want him here either.”
“If you start doubting yourself because of something he said to you, I want you to tell me so I can start ripping that shit right out of your head. We haven’t even scratched the surface of the things I want to do with you, but I’m guessing we’re going to run into some other obstacles along the way.”
“Will you make love to me now?” she asked. She felt her cheeks flood with heat, as if she were being foolish for asking him, but with the combination of the week’s events, the break-in, and now this time with Lucas, she felt more vulnerable than she ever had before. She needed him to find her desirable. To want her. While it didn’t define her as a person, she knew that right now it was what she needed to start pushing Knox’s bullshit out of her head.
He dropped his mouth to hers, the tip of his tongue sweeping between her lips and requesting permission to enter. She opened for him, and the faint tang of her taste on his tongue spurred her to return his kiss with a touch of desperation.
When he retreated from the kiss moments later, he nuzzled her nose with his. “I have been making love to you, Elyxandre. Ever since I woke you up. But, yes, I’d love to keep going.” Another soft kiss to her lips, this time a simple touch of flesh. “I know I said I didn’t want Knox in our bed, and I don’t. No more than I want Tonja here. If we need to talk about them, we can. Just know you’re safe with me, all right? There have been two partners in my life—my high school girlfriend and Tonja—and other than when I was married to Tonja, I always used a condom. Next week, I’ll make an appointment to get tested so that you’re assured everything is good.”
She felt her body flush in embarrassment. “I’ve been on birth control since high school, and I haven’t been with anyone inyears. I was faithful to Knox, even though he wasn’t faithful to me. I took my vows seriously. When I found out he was cheating on me, I got tested immediately, and I never had sex with him again. Even after we divorced, I couldn’t seem to find the will, let alone the energy, for anything involving men as dating partners. He’s the only man I’ve ever been with, sad as that is.”
He kissed her again. “You’re more than I deserve, Elyxandre Hookstead. I know we haven’t known each other very long, but there’s something between us that feels right. You’re the only woman I want, and there won’t be anyone else as long as we’re together.”
She opened her mouth to tell him not to make any promises, but he put a hand over it to keep her from speaking.
“I know that, based on your experiences, you don’t believe I can mean that.”
A lingering kiss was pressed to her temple. He trailed tender kisses down the side of her face to her jawline, and he had just moved to her mouth when they were interrupted by a phone ringing. She wanted to ignore it, but she knew they couldn’t, especially since it was her phone.
