Worship.
I ease her gently onto her back. Her brow furrows for half a second, sleep trying to hold on, but when my mouth finds the hollow of her throat, she exhales slowly and her eyes blink open.
They meet mine—cloudy with sleep, dark with recognition.
“Couldn’t sleep?” she whispers.
“I didn’t want to,” I murmur.
Her lips twitch in the hint of a smile. “Why not?”
I trace the line of her cheek with my knuckle. “Because this is the only time the universe feels quiet.”
She touches my face then, thumb brushing over my jaw, and I lean into her palm like it’s the only gravity that matters.
We kiss.
Slow.
Deep.
No urgency.
No hunger.
Justcertainty.
I shift between her thighs, feel her legs part to cradle me, and my hands explore her like I’m cataloging starlight—memorizing her curves, her softness, the way her breath hitches when my fingers skim just below her ribs.
“You’re staring,” she says, voice soft and raspy.
“I’m memorizing,” I correct. “Every scar. Every sound. Every second.”
She laughs under her breath, and even that—especiallythat—makes my chest ache.
Her laugh always ends with a pause. A quiet inhale, like she’s catching herself. I kiss that breath off her lips and feel her melt beneath me.
This is the part no one ever tells you about.
Not the sex.
The reverence.
The way your soul recognizes someone else’s weight and shifts to make room. The way their body becomes not just a home, but alanguage. And right now, she’s speaking to me with every inch of her.
I lower my mouth to her chest, to the swell of her breast, kissing the skin there like it matters—which it does. Her fingers slide into my hair and stay there, gentle but anchoring, like she knows if she lets go I might slip away into her entirely.
I move lower, mapping her belly with my lips, my hands skimming her thighs, coaxing her legs open as she gasps softly.
“Tatek,” she breathes. “What are you?—?”
“Let me worship,” I murmur against the inside of her thigh. “Let me show you what you are.”
She shudders beneath me.
And when I finally taste her again, she cries out—no filter, no shame, justneed.
I use my mouth like a prayer.
