I smile and dip my head to kiss his hand.
‘I don’t know what would have happened to me, what sort of person I’d have become, if I hadn’t had Taran – and Celyn, and all the other estate workers – in my life. They more than kept me grounded. They taught me how to be human.’
My heart has expanded to breaking point. I turn my face towards him and brush my lips against his in the sweetest of kisses.
We pull back and stare at each other in the darkness for along moment, and then we’re moving, turning to lie down and gathering each other closer: hip to hip, chest to chest, and finally, mouth to mouth. It’s gentle at first, full of love and longing. I’m trying to pour every ounce of care and compassion into this kiss.
And now we’re going deeper, escalating to skin-shivering, blood-warming intensity. His hands push into the hair at the nape of my neck, my fingers press against his jaw, his body moves on top of mine and my legs come around him, drawing him in as close as I can get him. We gasp into each other’s mouths as the need and want become impossible to resist.
‘Do you have anything?’ I ask breathlessly.
‘Inside.’ His voice is a guttural growl. He’s never sounded sexier.
A minute later, we haven’t even made it past his front door when my back is against the wood, my legs wrapped around his waist, his hands supporting my weight as our mouths come together. He releases one hand to cup my face and his hips take up the slack to hold me in place as we give everything we’ve got to our kiss, making up for lost time.
He lifts me away from the door and opens it, carrying me through and snatching up his wallet from the hallstand. Then we’re collapsing on the sofa and for a few delicious seconds the whole weight of his body bears down on me. He tries to push himself up to give me room to breathe, but I don’t let him go far – I like the feeling of his heart thudding against mine.
The wood groans and creaks beneath us and he laughs against my neck.
‘This sofa is so old. Let’s go upstairs.’
He has to wrench himself away from me because I donotwant to move from this position.
But now he’s kicking off his shoes, so I sit up and remove my own and he takes my hand to lead the way to his bedroom. I feel edgy but in the best possible way, my breathing erratic and choppy as I try not to lose my footing climbing the stairs.
It’s dark in his room and he leaves the lights off as we kiss each other at the end of his bed. When his mouth moves to my jaw and then to my neck, I look up and see stars twinkling back at me. There’s a giant window in the ceiling, I realise, and then I’m not thinking about the sky because he’s drawing my T-shirt up over my head and I’m turning my attention to the buttons on the front of his shorts.
We’re completely naked when we fall down on the bed, and the shock of feeling so much of his warm skin against mine makes me gasp out loud.
He slowly runs his hand all the way down my body from my throat to my waist, our lips still connected. I slide my palms along the ridges of his broad shoulders and down his back, pulling him closer, and the sensation of him pressing against me with no barriers between us makes me feel like I’ve been spun in a circle.
He breaks away to grab his wallet and for a dizzying few seconds I’m glad one of us is thinking clearly.
When he’s ready, he returns to his position above me and stares down into my eyes. I can’t see the light in them – it’s far too dark – but I can tell that his expression is serious.
Reaching up, I brush my thumb over the straight line of his mouth and his lips part, his teeth capturing my thumb between them, his tongue stroking the pad as his hips slowly surge forward.
I cry out, overwhelmed by how much I’m feeling, not just physically but emotionally.
‘Are you okay?’ he asks roughly, stilling.
‘Don’t stop,’ I beg.
His eyes rest on mine as he sinks fully down. And then our mouths come together again and we begin to move, unhurriedly at first, and then more urgently as we lose ourselves in each other, just as we did all those years ago.
I wake up at the crack of dawn, when daylight seeps through the giant skylight in the roof of Ash’s bedroom. He’s sleeping peacefully beside me and I feel a rush of joy as I realise that I can stay here like this, with him. It’s my turn on the rota this weekend so I have today – Friday – and Monday off. Siân will assume I’m having a lie-in, so she’ll head to work without expecting to see me.
An enormous modern white telescope sits beneath the window – about ten times the size of the older-looking one downstairs. I stare at it with interest before my bladder gets the better of me and I climb out of the warm bed, grabbing Ash’s hoodie to put on as I hurry downstairs in the chilly morning air.
When I come back from the bathroom, he’s awake.
‘Sorry there’s no en suite,’ he says with a sleepy smile as I rush back under the covers and into his arms, my heartskipping at seeing him again. ‘One day I’ll make a whole bunch of alterations to this place.’
‘One day?’
‘When it’s mine. My father won’t let me touch it now. He doesn’t know about that, though.’ He nods at the skylight. ‘I figured it was worth the risk.’
‘That’s some telescope.’
