He works an inch lower, then a little broader across the tops of my shoulders. He doesn’t linger anywhere that would embarrass me yet. He focuses on what hurts. My eyes burn—not from pain, from relief.
I let my head sink into the pillow and pay attention to what he’s doing. He uses his thumbs to circle a knot I’ve had for weeks. He feels it. He pauses. He starts small and gradually deepens the pressure.
“Here?” he asks.
“Mm,”I say, because words feel like too much work.
He stays with it until the knot eases under his hands. He doesn’t rush to the next place. He waits for a second, making sure it’s truly gone before moving on. Then he moves down along my scapula, thumbs bracketing bone, palms firm, and I can’t help the sound I make. It’s quiet and unguarded and grateful.
“Good?” he asks, checking in.
“Yes,” I say. “More.”
The word, so reminiscent of last night, makes me tense for a moment as heat sweeps through me. But he doesn’t stop, just keeps working his hands over me, relaxing me again.
He gives me more. I drift for a minute, not asleep, not awake, held in the cradle of steady pressure and the low sound of his breath. When he shifts his weight, the bed moves and reminds me he’s kneeling beside me, fully present, not a dream.
His hand slides gently over the mark on the side of my breast and has me sucking in a breath. He pauses and runs his fingers over it gently. I hadn’t felt it until just now, but now that I have, it’s a small throbbing pressure that’s making sure I know it’s there.
“Does it hurt?” he murmurs.
I take a moment before answering. Yes, it does. It’s sore and, every time his hands run over it, it sends a wave of pain radiating out of it. But with the pain is a sweet pleasure.Knowing that it’s his mark on me. Knowing that every throb comes from him and what he did to me. The way he marked me, claimed me, made me his in every way possible.
“Not so much,” I finally say.
He spends a little bit more time running his hands over it, then leans down and presses his lips to the area.
My heart shudders and practically drops at his feet at that. I’m in trouble. Really big trouble.
But he just continues, not knowing the magnitude of what just happened inside me.
My lower back complains when his hands reach it. He gives that spot extra care, using heel-of-hand strokes that warm the muscle. He works around my spine, respectful of bones, coaxing the smaller muscles to soften. When he gets to the top of my hips, he pauses.
“May I go lower?” he asks, and it does something to my heart that he would ask, even after he took my body fiercely.
“Yes,” I say into the pillow.
He lowers the sheet and his hands change. Still careful, still focused on soreness, but the awareness of the place and what it means changes both of us. My breath hitches.
He slows again, as if to steady me. He works the outer edges, the places that carry more tension than I ever admit. He kneads there, working his way inward until finally, he reaches another sore spot. The memory of his hand coming down onmy ass and what it did to me makes another wave of heat sweep through me.
I resist the urge to squirm, rub my thighs together against the wetness building up between them.
“Olivia?” he says softly.
“I’m okay,” I say, huskily. “It’s good.”
He moves to the backs of my thighs. I flinch, overwhelmed, and then melt; the muscles are the sorest part of me. He knows it the moment he lays his hands there. He supports the work with a palm under my knee, gently bending the leg to change the angle on the hamstring. The pressure he uses is firm without being painful, the stroke long enough to warm, short enough to target.
“You’re very good at this,” I say, voice muffled by the pillow. I snuggle my head into it, aroused but also drifting, floating.
The numbers on the clock blur, then clear.
Then register. I tense and move to sit up quickly, but Roberto’s hand is between my shoulder blades, pressing me to the mattress.
“I’m late,” I blurt. “I have to— Let me—”
I struggle to get up, but his hold is firm and relentless. “Relax,” he says softly. “You’re fine.”
