Friday was their last full day together. They stayed in bed until noon, ordering room service and feeding each other beignets while powdered sugar got everywhere. Logan madelove to her slowly that morning, like he was memorizing every inch of her, and Mara let herself be vulnerable in ways she never had with anyone else.
"I'm going to miss you," she whispered against his shoulder.
"I'm going to miss you too." He kissed her forehead, her nose, her lips. "But we'll make this work. I'll come back as soon as I can get leave."
"And I'll be here waiting."
That night they went back to Frenchmen Street, to the same jazz club where they'd danced earlier in the week. The band recognized Mara and called her up to the stage. She sang one song, a classic jazz standard about love and longing. Her voice was smoky and rich and Logan watched her with an expression that made her forget the words halfway through.
When she came back to him, he pulled her into a kiss that made the whole room disappear.
"You can sing," he said against her lips.
"Full of surprises." She took his hand. "Let's go. I want you to myself."
They went back to the hotel and the moment the door closed, everything that had been building between them all week finally broke free. This wasn't gentle or slow. This was urgent and desperate and full of the knowledge that tomorrow he'd be gone. Logan's hands were in her hair, her back against the door, and Mara couldn't get close enough.
"Mara," he breathed against her neck, and the way he said her name made her knees weak.
She pulled him toward the bed, shedding clothes as they went. "We don't have much time left."
"Then let's make it count."
They moved slower now, deliberate. Logan lifted her onto the mattress with care, following her down until their bodies aligned in a slow, full press of skin to skin. The room glowed with thesoft amber of the bedside lamp and the faint neon pulse from the Quarter below—light catching on the sheen of sweat already gathering at her collarbone, the hard line of his shoulder.
He paused above her, palms cradling her face, thumbs stroking her cheekbones like he was committing every detail to memory. Their eyes held, heavy with everything the morning would steal away: time, distance, this fragile new thing between them.
Mara reached up, fingers sliding into his hair, drawing him down until their foreheads met. She felt the tremor in his breath against her lips.
"I don't want to rush you," he murmured. "I want to taste every part of this night."
Her heart squeezed. "Then taste me."
He kissed her deeply, slowly—long, languid strokes of tongue that felt like promises. His mouth traveled lower with the same unhurried reverence: the hollow of her throat, the sensitive spot beneath her ear that made her sigh, the slope of her breast where he lingered, sucking gently until her nipple hardened under his tongue and her back arched in quiet offering.
When he reached her stomach, he pressed open-mouthed kisses along the soft skin there, hands sliding down her sides to hook under her hips. He eased her thighs apart, settling between them with a low hum of appreciation. Mara’s breath caught as he looked up at her—eyes dark, intent, full of hunger and something softer, something that made her chest ache.
He started with feather-light kisses along her inner thighs, working inward until his breath ghosted over her center. Then his tongue—slow, flat, deliberate—dragged up the length of her in one long stroke that made her hips lift off the bed.
"Logan—"
He answered with a soft sound against her, vibrating through her core. His hands held her steady as he explored her withdevastating patience: circling her clit with the tip of his tongue, then flattening it to lap broad and slow, then sucking gently until her thighs trembled around his head. When her fingers tightened in his hair, he slid two fingers inside her—curling them in that perfect come-here motion while his mouth stayed devoted to her clit.
The pleasure built in quiet, rolling waves rather than sudden crashes. Mara’s moans were softer this time, breathy and broken, each one pulled from somewhere deep. She felt herself tightening, climbing, the heat spreading outward until her whole body was taut and trembling.
He didn’t rush her toward the edge—he coaxed her there, steady and sure, until the orgasm unfolded like silk unfurling: long, luxurious pulses that rolled through her in slow, shuddering waves. She came with his name on her lips, quiet and reverent, hips rocking against his mouth as he drank her through every aftershock.
Logan kissed his way back up her body, tasting of her, until he reached her mouth. She pulled him into a deep, lazy kiss, tasting herself on his tongue, her hands already guiding him between her thighs.
He reached for the nightstand, rolled on the condom with practiced ease. Then he settled over her again, notching himself at her entrance. Their eyes met—raw, unguarded—and he pushed in slowly, inch by careful inch, until he was buried deep, hips flush to hers, bodies locked in perfect stillness.
A shared breath. A shared heartbeat.
He began to move—long, rolling thrusts that dragged pleasure through them both in measured strokes. Mara wrapped her legs around his waist, heels pressing into his lower back, drawing him impossibly closer. Every glide was intimate, deliberate—his pelvis grinding against her still-sensitive clit in lazy circles that kept the heat simmering.
Their mouths met again and again—kisses broken only by soft gasps, murmured names, quiet admissions that felt too big for the room: “I don’t want this to end,” “Stay with me just like this,” “I’ve got you.”
He slipped a hand between them, fingers finding her clit once more, circling in time with his thrusts. The combination unraveled her slowly: first the tightening deep inside, then the spreading warmth, then the trembling that started in her thighs and climbed until her whole body bowed beneath him.
