He makes a face that's half pleasure and half pain. "A little too good, Angel. If you keep touching me like that, this is going to be over embarrassingly fast."
My chest swells.
I'm beyond relieved he didn't hate this. I would have felt like an insensitive idiot if he did.
Elijah's heavy-lidded gaze turns hungry as he coats his hands liberally in the black paint and then discards the bottle, lifting his fingers to my hair. I nod, giving him permission as he runs some through the dark strands and then uses the excess to paint a streak from one cheekbone to the other, over the bridge of my nose, and grins at his creation.
"There," he says. "Now you look like a warrior."
Taking his cue, I paint twin streaks of gold down both of his cheeks, and one on his chin. It really does sort of look like war paint.
And aren't we going to battle?
I gasp when he settles his palms against my breasts, leaving handprints there that he drags down my torso and smears around my hips. He's careful not to get any on my belly button, but I have a feeling it's going to get coated regardless. I'll have to make sure I clean it really good after since the piercing still isn't fully healed.
Elijah uses his grip on my waist to spin me around and we swap colors again for him paint over my entire backside in teasing, languid strokes that make my belly squeeze.
"Your turn," I whisper when he's finished painting me all over, and I get to work covering the rest of him in swaths of black and gold paint, choking on a mix of rage and empathy when I have to paint over all the scars on his back.
When he turns to face me, he looks completely ridiculous. I stifle a laugh when I step back to admire my handiwork, and his crooked grin and accompanying laugh as he holds out his hands and does a little spin for me makes it come out in earnest.
"What?" he teases. "It doesn't suit me?"
"No," I joke between laughs. "It totally does."
When I smile back at him, I feel like a kid again.
This is…fun. My hands are wet and slippery, and I can't wait to make an absolutemesson that canvas. Have I ever played with paint? Surely I must have in school or something, but right now I can't even remember a time when I might've finger-painted something. My childhood was about survival. Built on neural pathways of self-preservation instead of learning through play.
But I canplaywith Elijah.
As he comes in closer and curls a hand around my waist to draw me into him, I settle my hands and forearms against his chest, peering up at him. It takes me a second to notice it, the light,the life, in this eyes, but when I find it, I want to cry.
I did that.
I make him that happy.
"What are you thinking?" Elijah asks, caressing my neck in his painted fingers.
"That I'm happy you're happy."
His lips quirk up and I berate myself for ever thinking that Elijah might be too good for me. Not because he isn't good.He is.But because I didn't think I had enough goodness left in me to be enough for him.
I do.
He brings it out of me—the parts of myself I thought I lost in the foster system and with Jesse. Elijah makes it okay for me to be soft. Makes it safe to be vulnerable.
"Want to know what I wished for my birthday?" he asks, and then recklessly pushes his paint-covered hands into my hair to tip my head up so my lips are a breath from his.
My pulse thrums in my ears when he presses his paint-covered body against mine.
"Isn't that bad luck?"
He laughs like he thinks that's cute, and tells me, "I wished that I could keep you."
His mouth is on mine before his words even fully register, and my toes curl as he kisses me with a passion so honest and eager it drags feelings out of me so strong they almost hurt. My heart aches and flutters beneath my rib cage as he draws his hands down my sides and over the curves of my hips, lifting me against him.
There's a slight grimace in his kiss, and I know it must hurt his hand, but I kiss him through the pain because he needs this. He needs to feel like he can still be the person he was before he hurt himself.
