"Good."
He lifts his hand off my hip. Brings it up. Takes my chin between his thumb and index finger. Tilts my face up so I have to meet his eyes.
"One more."
"What."
"You tell me right now this is a one-time thing, or you tell me it isn't. I'm not going to be a weekend for you, Simone, and you're not going to be a weekend for me."
My chest does something.
"Is that you negotiating a scene or negotiating something else."
"Both."
I look at him. Really look. The gray at his temples. The tired at the corners of his eyes. The way he's holding my chin like it's a cup he doesn't want to spill.
"It isn't a weekend."
"Good."
"Gray."
"Yeah."
"Kiss me already."
He does.
And God.
He kisses me like a man who's been thinking about it for two days and disciplined himself out of it the whole time. Slow. Deep. No rush. His beard is soft against my mouth and his lips are not soft at all. He tastes like whiskey and the good kind of tired. His hand slides from my chin to the back of my neck and fits there like it was measured for it.
I make a sound into his mouth I didn't plan.
He swallows it.
Kisses me harder.
His tongue finds mine and it's patient and filthy at the same time. He knows what he's doing. The hand on my hip slides up under the cardigan, under the tank, palm flat on my lower back, fingers spread wide. Not moving. Just claiming that stretch of skin.
When he pulls back an inch my lips feel swollen.
"Upstairs."
"Yes sir."
His eyes go dark.
He stands up. Me with him. One of his arms under my thighs and the other across my back and he lifts me off the couch like he's been wanting an excuse to. I wrap my legs around him. My arms around his neck. My forehead drops to his.
He carries me up the stairs.
Not fast. Each step deliberate. My braids swing against his shoulder. He smells like wood and whiskey and the cold air he was standing in on the porch.
At the top of the stairs he turns left.
His room, not mine.
