His forehead drops to mine for one long beat, like he’s steadying himself.
Then his mouth slides to my throat.
I shiver hard enough my teeth almost click. His lips move over my pulse, not hurried, not claiming—just there, warm and real and too careful. My fingers go back to his skin, tracing ink because I need somewhere to put my hands and because touching him has turned into its own kind of anchor.
He kisses me like he’s learning me—what makes me gasp. What makes me tense and go still. What makes me shiver. When his hand skims under my sleep shirt and settles at my waist, he pauses.
“Still with me?”
“Yes.”
His thumb strokes once over my side. “Use your words, darlin’.”
I close my eyes. “I want this.”
A low curse leaves him, half relief, half restraint. He kisses me hard then, and the edge comes back—still controlled, still checked, but there. Heat under the tenderness. Hunger under the care.
That I understand better.
The phone light catches his shoulders, the spread of tattoos over his chest, the planes of muscle under skin that’s gone gold-silver in the blue glow.
I touch him again, openly now. No searching, no checking…just learning. His breath roughens under my fingertips.
“Jesus, Yank,” he mutters, and the endearment lands somewhere low and volatile in me.
He shifts us, easing me back onto the mattress. He doesn’t pin me. Doesn’t crowd me with his weight until I tug him closer. Even then, he braces himself on one arm like he’s holding back.
I hate that I notice. I hate that I like it, his care.
His hand slides between my thighs, slow enough that I feel every inch of the movement. He finds heat and damp already there and his eyes lift to mine.
“Storms turn you on, huh?” he asks, quiet and wicked and a little wrecked.
I glare at him, breathless. “Shut up, Lafitte.”
His smile is small and real. “There she is.”
Then he touches me properly and all thought leaves.
Not the frantic rush of the first time. No grabbing, no collision, no need to outrun what either of us might feel if we slowed down long enough to notice.
This is deliberate.
Patient in a way that feels almost cruel because he keeps me right at the edge and watches my face like he’s taking notes. His thumb circles. His fingers stroke. He kisses me through every break in my breathing and swallows the sounds I can’t seem to keep in.
Thunder cracks overhead. I jump on instinct.
He stills immediately, palm warm against the inside of my thigh. “You with me?”
I nod too fast.
His hand comes up, cups my jaw. “Reva.”
I force the air back into my lungs. “I’m here.”
“Good girl.”
The words light me up like a struck match.
