"You want to go to bed." He's already moving toward the door, one arm locked across the backs of my legs. "I'm taking you to bed."
"This is not what I—put me down?—"
"Nope." He shoulders through the door and carries me down the hallway. His hand slides higher on my thigh, proprietary and warm. "You asked for this. You're getting it."
I'm laughing now, breathless and ridiculous, my hair hanging in my face as the hallway passes upside down. A door opens somewhere behind us—Mitzy's voice calls out, "Get it, Riot!"—and I bury my burning face against his back.
His door opens. Closes. He tosses me onto the bed like I'm cargo, and then he's over me, caging me in with his arms, grinning down at me with a look that makes my stomach flip.
"Now." He lowers his head and brushes his lips against my jaw. "About those cramped accommodations."
"They were very cramped."
"Terrible, really." His mouth finds my throat. "No room to move."
"Exactly." My voice is already breathless. "Very limiting."
"Mmm." His teeth graze my pulse point. "I've got a lot more room here."
"Show me."
He does.
This time, there's no cold rock at my back, no fear of being heard, no danger pressing at the edges. Just his hands learning me again—slower now, more thorough. Just his mouth mapping every inch of skin as he peels away my clothes. Just his voice, rough and reverent, telling me exactly what he's going to do before he does it.
He takes his time. Drives me to the edge and holds me there until I'm begging—actually begging, words I didn't know I had in me spilling out against his shoulder. And when he finally lets me fall, he watches my face like it's the only thing in the world worth seeing.
When he finally slides inside me, we both go still. The fit is different like this—deeper, more intense, nothing between us but skin and heat and the growing certainty that this is something neither of us expected to find.
"Evie." My name on his lips sounds like a vow.
"I'm here." I pull him closer, wrap myself around him. "I'm right here."
We move together. Slow at first, then faster as the need builds. His hands grip my hips, my thighs, my wrists pinnedabove my head. I arch into him, meet him stroke for stroke, and when the wave finally crests, we break together—his groan swallowed by my gasp, both of us shaking apart in each other's arms.
After, we lie tangled in his sheets, sweat cooling on our skin, my head on his chest, and his fingers tracing lazy patterns on my back. The ocean crashes against the cliffs below, a rhythm as old as time.
"Stay," he says. "Tonight. Stay with me.”
"I wasn't planning on leaving."
"Good." His arms tighten around me. "Because I'm not sure I could let you go."
I smile against his skin. "That's very dramatic."
"I'm a dramatic person. Ask anyone."
"I thought you were all jokes and deflection."
"I contain multitudes." His hand slides up my spine, cups the back of my neck. "Evie?"
"Yeah?"
"I'm glad you threw that rock."
I laugh—soft, surprised, genuine. "Me too."
"And I'm glad you made me climb that cliff."
