She would argue that she didn’t know what she asked for, but her heart knew. Her body craved his touch, from head to toe, inside and out, and it wasn’t hesitant to beg, if necessary.
Skin smoothed against skin as his palm slid along the outside of her thigh, past her hip, continued over her torso, and upward to her throat. His body followed the path his hand traveled until they were once again chest to chest, hip to hip.
The moment her scent, which clung to his lips and face, reached her nose, she flushed with arousal. Always aware of her responses,knowing fingers wrapped around her throat and squeezed a fraction tighter, locking their souls together.
Somehow, while he’d tortured her with his mouth and fingers, he’d removed the rest of his clothing, and she felt his hard, hot cock against her mound, throbbing, as if eager to slide inside her and make her his again.
In a single thrust, he embedded himself deep within her. After a moment of recognition passed between them, he began to withdraw and return to her channel. The edges of her eyesight began to swim with a mix of light and heat. Even after all this time, he still knew exactly where to touch her, how hard or soft to apply pressure, how fast or slow to move, in order to make her burn upward, outward, and then detonate into a state of both destruction and creation.
They were powerless to stop what was between them from the moment they met. Two poles, north and south, drawn to each other despite the distance between them all these years.
As she crested the endorphin high of her orgasm, he followed directly behind her, pouring himself inside her womb. She felt more than heard him murmuring into her neck, where his head was buried. The telltale pulses and twitches within allowed her to fall back into herself, sated both physically and emotionally. All she wanted now was to crawl as close to him as she could, latch onto him, and bask in his warmth and comfort.
When his own heart rate and breathing calmed, he slid over her body to lie on his back, an arm thrown over his eyes.
Nerves fluttered like dust after it was violently disturbed. Instead of dropping back comfortably to its original resting place, it weaved on the air currents, settling in new places. Self-consciousness took over.
She had initiated, so there was no one to blame but herself. Had she made a mistake?
Afraid to look at their actions too closely beyond physical needs, she rolled over on her side, away from him, curling in on herself, and closed her eyes. Like a terrified kitten, if she couldn’t see the problem,it didn’t exist. If she didn’t move, he wouldn’t know she was there. Perhaps he’d fall asleep, and she could flee the space without him knowing. Then, in the morning, they could pretend it hadn’t happened.
The very thought of doing so made her chest ache.
A rustle of skin moved against the material covering the bed. The mattress shifted as he sat up, then stood.
Before she knew it, she was being picked up from the bed, heard the covers being pulled aside, and then she was lying on the sheets and being covered by the light comforter.
The shadow disappeared.
Silence.
She’d pushed him too far. He was…
Crawling back into bed behind her.
Arms snaked around her, gathering her close, their bodies lining up into long-remembered patterns. His lips rested at her ear, his warm breath wafting across the shell.
But there was a tenseness between them, one even worse than what had existed before arriving in Los Angeles, because now she was uncertain how they were supposed to continue. He’d made it very clear that after they rescued his friend, she would be assigned a new city to live in. A new life. There’d been no indication that he would be any part of that, even though it was clear he could be if he wanted to.
All her life, she’d been outspoken. If she wanted to say something, she said it. If she wanted to know something, she asked. Sometimes she was able to hold back out of self-preservation. Right now, she had so many things she wanted to say. So many questions she wanted to ask.
For whatever reason, the questions were lodged in her throat. There was no fear of reprisal from Ildefanso. Even when he didn’t like what she’d had to say, he listened to her. Treated her words, thoughts, and feelings with respect. That didn’t mean they hadn’t argued over things.
Memories flickered deep inside her mind.
Oh, yes, they’d certainly argued. Heated discussions, often loud, but also passionate. Their arguments hadn’t ended with doors slamming, each other in isolated rooms. They’d ended, usually with items destroyed, but also with them tangled in the sheets, laughing over their own stubbornness. Sometimes, he even picked a fight just to get her wound up when she got too serious, and she’d be lying if she said she hadn’t done it once or twice herself.
“I can feel your brain in overdrive,” he murmured sleepily against her head. “Don’t think.Sueño, belleza.”
She didn’t want to sleep. Sleeping would make her little bit of time with him pass so much faster.
“I’m not cold, like you. I’ve never been able to shut down the way you could. Time doesn’t change everything.”
The thumb that stroked lazily back and forth on her forearm suddenly stopped. “You think I’m shutting down right now?”
Looking straight out into the room at the wall across from her was the only way to continue this conversation. “Aren’t you?”
The sigh he let out felt weighted. His forehead rested against the back of her head, his warm breath now against the nape of her neck. She felt his lips moving, but no words came from them, so he was speaking in silence to himself.
