Enjoying her surprise, he ran his finger up her spine, and let his fingers tangle in the long locks of her hair. Licking his lips he held tightly, and thrust again, moving her body forward as she cried out.
“Again, faster, Daniel,” she demanded as their eyes met in the mirror.
Without another word, Daniel thrust hard and fast, filling her body again and again as the slapping sound of skin against skin filled his apartment.
Her words filled his head, “Faster- again- I want it, Dan,” leaving him dizzy with lust, and the desire to conquer, to possess.
He heard her come as her moans grew higher, louder, and her body gradually lowered to the bed until he lay on top of her, his forearms linked under naked body as he moved against her, pressing his lips to her neck, enjoying her scent, and the way her body fit perfectly against his.
With a last thrust, he felt it too, that jolt of release and his body relaxed inside her.
17
Caitlin
Caitlin awoke that morning,to her surprise, in Daniel’s arms. Lying on her side in his cozy king-size bed, she noticed Daniel was spooning her and still holding her tight.
This surprised her, but then again, the very fact that she was waking up next to him was surprising. An amused smile crept across her face as she was cocooned under a giant, fluffy duvet with the one man she least expected to ever wake up next to.
She briefly considered going back to sleep, cuddling up closer to Daniel for a few seconds, before her pleasant thoughts were interrupted as she remembered the events of the day prior. She sighed as thoughts of her dad’s mafia ties invaded her mind; there was no going back to sleep after such a revelation, Caitlin realized. In fact, she had woken up a few times during the night, plagued by nightmares of her father and the various mob-related dangers her restless mind concocted as she tried to sleep.
Caitlin took one last deep breath as she mentally prepared herself for the day ahead. She knew her father would no doubt try to mend things and explain himself, but she wasn’t sure she was ready to listen to him yet. It hurt knowing that he had kept such a devastating secret from her for so long, even if he was trying to make ends meet and was a wonderful father otherwise. Knowing that her mother may have been involved too was just an extra twist of the knife in the fresh psychological wound inflicted, however unintentionally, by her own father.
She sighed deeply, slowly wiggling out of Daniel’s arms and sitting up on the side of the bed. She ran her hands through her long, tousled red hair sleepily in an attempt to smooth her wild locks. Lifting her arms to the sky, she stretched as a yawn escaped her lips. Caitlin turned to look at Daniel, who had also begun to stir as sunlight filled the room through the openings of the bedroom curtains. His face looked serene under the bright rays of the sun, Caitlin noted dreamily, as his eyes fluttered open.
If someone had told her even a week ago that she’d be waking up next to him, she would have thought them completely insane. She probably would have taken it as an insult, in fact.
“Hey,” he whispered drowsily, propping his head up on the pillow with his chin in his hand. “How are you feeling today?” Daniel let out a long, lazy yawn as he stretched his sinewy, muscular arms and rolled over onto his back, sitting up against the bed’s intricate wooden headboard. He reached over and gently massaged Caitlin’s back, pausing every few seconds to idly play with her hair.
“Better because I’m with you, actually,” Caitlin replied, leaning backwards into Daniel’s hands as he got to work massaging any tenseness out of her neck, back, and shoulders. “That feels really nice. Ugh, you’re going to make me want to go back to bed.” She chuckled airily as Daniel ran a hand through her long, fiery red hair.
“And what’s so bad about that?” Daniel said playfully before scooting over to sit next to Caitlin on the side of the bed. She rested her head on his shoulder for a moment, breathing in the lingering, minty scent of his aftershave.
“Nothing if you don’t want to ever leave the house again, I guess,” Caitlin snickered before finally getting up from the tantalizingly comfortable bed. “Have you got any tea? I was hoping to make us some before you woke up, but I might as well mention it now.”
“Oh, tea in bed? How surprisingly domestic of you,” Daniel half-teased, offering her a sleepy smile. “Yeah, I do. It’s out in the kitchen cupboard above the stove. I’ve got a kettle in the cabinet as well.”
Caitlin nodded, pulling one of Daniel’s oversized t-shirts over her head and grabbing a pair of sweatpants out of her bag beside his bed. “I’m going to go make tea and try to wake up, then. I’ve got a lot to think about today,” she mused aloud, sighing at her exhausted, listless expression in the bedroom mirror above one of Daniel’s dressers. “I need to talk to Dad later. It’s only right that I give him time to tell his side of the story, right?”
“I think you should, yes,” Daniel responded, shrugging nervously. “I don’t want to tell you how to approach the situation or anything, because that’s for you and Noah to figure out, but--” before he could finish his response, though, a knock was heard at the front door. Daniel raised an eyebrow at first, glancing over at Caitlin quizzically.
“Do you think--?” she asked, anxiety rising in her voice. She ran out into the hallway to answer the door. Daniel leapt from the bed and began haphazardly getting dressed in a panicked frenzy.
Caitlin stood on her tiptoes to look out the peephole in the door before letting out a sigh of both relief and frustration. She wordlessly unlocked the door and opened it, finding herself standing in front of her red-faced father, who looked ashamed and uncomfortable.
“Hi, Dad,” she said flatly, ushering him inside Daniel’s home. Normally, it would be embarrassing for her to let her father see her at a man’s house in her pajamas, but today was different. “Come in.”
Noah cleared his throat nervously and followed her inside and into the kitchen. “Erm, is Daniel here, too?” he asked awkwardly, scratching the back of his head. Caitlin got to work making tea as her father sat down at the kitchen counter.
“Yeah. He’s still waking up. I’m sure he’ll be out in a moment to get some tea,” she said somberly. The entire interaction felt awkward and painful, she thought; maybe Daniel could help smooth things over with the two of them.
“Oh, you’re making tea? May I...?” he asked as Caitlin nodded, grabbing a mug from the cupboard beside the fridge and handing it to him.
Caitlin and her father were mostly silent as she shuffled about the kitchen and her dad stared down at his hands in shame. Finally, after an agonizing silence, the kettle whistled loudly. Caitlin turned off the stovetop and reached for the kettle before pouring her father a cup.
“Sugar?” she asked bluntly, passing him a tiny container of white sugar. Noah nodded and dipped his spoon into the container, scooping out a teaspoon of the sweetener and stirring it into his tea.
After taking a sip of the hot tea, Noah finally spoke up. “Caitlin, I’m sorry you had to find out the way you did.”
