They fold into each other’s naked bodies, their stormy kisses slowing to a lingering breath between their lips. Knees and noses touching. Nelle reaches down, wraps her fingers around him—James jolts at the touch—and guides him between her thighs. He groans as he inches into her warmth, unable to think past the pleasure.
Facing each other, they rock in slow, breathless, torturously tingling movements. Each plunge brings him closer to his edge. Each touch fuses them together. His lips find the slope of her neck. She cradles his shoulders, nails digging in. He has never felt so content, so happy, so—
James erupts, groaning as his legs tense, his toes curl, and his hands find momentary purchase on Nelle’s ass. Their rhythm slows, like an ocean wave hitting shore, until they stop completely.
Nelle holds him while he shudders and recovers. How can this be real? He must be dreaming.Nelle is here. This is real. Nelle is really here.Sweat-spiraled hair falls over his forehead. He needs more of her.
“James.” Nelle brushes his hair back.
He blushes. “Sorry, it’s been a while, so I—”
“No,” she heaves a breath. “It’s perfect.”
She pushes his head down in a silent order.
“Yes, ma’am.” He slinks beneath the covers and plants a kiss on her ankle. Up her calf. Along her soft thigh, guiding her open again. When his lips graze her inner thigh, she gasps. Her fingers nestle in his hair as he finds her center. Languorous strokes—kissing, sucking until she is swollen—turning her body into lava.
“Yes,” she murmurs, heels sliding on the sheets.
James can’t help but grin at her pleasure. He focuses in, tongue flickering like fire, transporting him to another realm, a magical pocket where no barriers stand between them. No secrets, no lies, no clothes.
He pauses, his lips wet, and massages her with the pad of his fingers while he speaks.
“Iloveyou,” he says.
She whimpers. “I loveyou.”
He brings his mouth back to her, and Nelle says his name in quick breaths while her restless hands squeeze his hair, squeeze the sheets.
“James, James, James.” A wave shatters over her.
After a few sweaty, dazed moments, Nelle releases the iron vise of her thighs from his head and throws the sheets back. They lie in silence, sweat-slick bodies pressed together in the yellow daylight. Taking comfort in a realm of relaxation. Their own little cocoon.
Finally, when James’s heartbeat has quieted to a dull thump in his temple, Nelle says, “Let me look at you. Let me remember this.”
He sits back against the pillows while she takes him in. A smile works on his lips.
Nelle is most beautiful thing he has ever seen. Eyes that carry firefly light, spirit of a horse on the run. Dirty-blond strands fall over her collarbones. The lines of her body deserve a spot in the Louvre.
A lifetime of memories pass through James’s head: Charleston’s cobblestone streets, white bedsheets in DC, dancing on a rooftop in the rain, kissing on the Eiffel Tower, confessing their love on a beach in France, tracking down the cottage in Scotland. Making love for the first time. Nelle learning how to run. James learning how to fly.
“I am eternally grateful for you,” he says. “You’ve given me so much.”
Nelle runs her cool fingers through his hair. “You’ve given me more.”
James and Nelle only leave his bed for water, coffee, and a bag of grapes. Morning shadows shrink across tousled bedsheets, and he follows the path back between her thighs twice by dinnertime. Long after sunset, in the quieter hours of night, the apartment door squeaks open.
They break apart from their whispers and touches. He is immediately taken back to their last night of lovemaking. The creak in the hall that led to Quill and a gun and Nelle bleeding out all over him.
“The flashbacks are really kicking in for me right now,” Nelle whispers.
“Me, too.” He pulls on sweatpants. “It’s just Jessie, though.”
She nods. “We don’t have to worry about Quill anymore.”
Part of him hopes itisQuill that he hears through the wall, ranting about a novel-to-TV adaptation, andnothis cousin Jessie, whom he will have to obliterate on sight for leaving Nelle here unannounced like a surprise welcome-home present.
Nelle is right on his heel as he steps into the hall.
