I inhaled slowly.
Trust him.
I exhaled.
He won’t hurt you.
It was minutes later when I heard the door click. Then a sharp inhale. My pulse raced.
“Wh—” He cleared his throat. “What is this, pup?”
Inhale. Exhale.
“I…”Tell him.“I thought, maybe if… if I weren’t able to touch you… maybe you’d want to um…” I pulled my lip between my teeth as I trailed off. I should have written this down. He always did the talking for us. I liked that. Liked not having to think about it.
“That I’d want to touch you?” he supplied.
I nodded.
Silence for a moment, and then his voice was closer. “You did this, so I’d feel comfortable touching you?”
I nodded.
Silence.
It was so faint. His fingertips over my chest. Only two. Starting at my sternum and whispering down ever so slowly. Like water droplets on a cold glass, leaving an invisible trail as they went. I shivered at the feel of them.
They reached my lower abdomen and changed course. Two became three. Tracing over my hip, my side, my back. He was circling me, the faint touch a way for me to track him until he paused behind me.
“You really trust me this much?” he asked, and I’d never heard his voice sound so soft.
“Yes,” I whispered in response.
Three became four. Then his palm flattened over my hip and I shuddered. He circled. His hand never leaving me. It trailed higher over my spine, stopping over my right shoulder. “Is it okay to be positioned like this?”
My surgery had been arthroscopic, the scars present but minimal. I wasn’t sure if he’d noticed them, or if he knew about my injury from the media. Either way, that he’d asked had a warmth spreading through my chest. I nodded.
“Use your colors if you need them.”
His hand pulled away. I tried to find him. Tried to hear him. Tried to anticipate his next move and failed.
His thumb rested on my chin, pulling down until my lip came free of my teeth. “You bite this too much.” He ran a fingertip over the abused skin. “If you keep it up, I’ll have to give you a chew toy.”
Breathe.
The touch lowered, combing through my beard. Slow. Gentle. Fingertips on my throat. Tracking my Adam’s apple as I swallowed. Lower.
Breathe.
They swiped along the base of my neck as if tracing something invisible.
Breathe.
My collarbones. The outline of my tattoo. Soft swirls through chest hair. It all left me trembling. How could a touch so light affect me so strongly?
Breathe.
I gasped as a single finger circled my nipple. Then the other.
