Satisfaction coils behind my rib cage.
It’s a heady, intoxicating thing to realize that, while I am the one eating, he is the one who's hungry. That his body can betray him, too.
He sets down his glass and rises to his feet. His height seems to unfurl endlessly.
I tilt my head back to meet his gaze. His eyes sharpen. His face is set in stern lines.
With a single step, he invades my space, and my breathing hitches. He tilts my face up with a touch to my chin, and I open for him, helpless to do otherwise. He bends over me, and then comes the wine: warm, fragrant, and notes of apple and pear with a hint of honey.
It’s filthy, the way he feeds me from himself, the wine carrying the heat of his tongue and the gunflint aroma of the Chablis Grand Cru.
I swallow, feeling the velvet weight of it settle behind my ribs. The sensation is like I’ve been captured. Like I'm drinking him in, taking a piece of him into my very marrow, becoming dangerously intertwined with the man standing over me.
"How does it taste?" He scoops up a drop which has dribbled down my chin and brings it to his mouth, sucking it.
"Like you," I say honestly.
A look of lethal contentment settles across his face. "Good." He bends and captures my mouth with his. My scalp tingles. My toes curl. Promptly, I melt into him.
He kisses me like I’m dessert after that amazing meal. I wrap my arms around his neck and kiss him back. The next moment, he swings me up in his arms.
My lips cling to his. I press closely to his obscenely wide chest. And when he swipes his tongue over my teeth, I feel like I’m coming apart.
I’m sure he’s going to carry me off to bed. Instead, he heads for the settee in the living room and lowers me down amongst the cushions.
He follows me down. I part my legs without being told, and he settles his wide hips between them. The column at his crotch presses into my pussy. It feels so good. I whimper.
Color smears his cheeks. "The sounds you make drive me crazy."
"Oh?" I ask breathlessly.
"And your tits." He cups my breasts with his big palms, weighing them. "They’re magnificent."
He drags his thumbs over my nipples, finding the tight peaks even through the material of my sweatshirt.
Heat scalds my cheeks. I begin to squeeze my thighs shut but, of course, his lean hips stop me.
He settles his palm on my stomach.
Warm. Possessive. Appreciative.
I stiffen for half a second on instinct. Not because I’m ashamed. I’m not. I’ve always owned my curves. But that small softness there has never been anyone’s focus before.
His thumb strokes slowly over the gentle curve of my belly.
“You’re thinking too hard,” he murmurs.
“I’m not.” I totally am.
Heat scalds my cheeks. There’s a dawning realization that he truly sees me. He desires me exactly like this.
“You’re beautiful.” He looks deeply into my eyes. “You keep me sane, Ember. You remind me of everything good and real in this world. You’re mine, Ember. Only mine.”
Hearing him say this in such an unguarded way cracks something open in my chest. I bite the inside of my cheek, focusing on the sting to ground myself.
This is the first time I've felt married.
Not from the sex. Not from the contract. Not from the ring weighing down my finger. It’s from him being open with me.
