“I’m not doing this with the back of your head again, Lorenzo.”
My name. In her mouth. While she’s looking at me.
Cazzo.
“Isabella.” It comes out rough. Wrong. Like the word has too many syllables and all of them hurt to say.
“I’m right here.” She cups my cheeks. Bitten nails. Calluses from keyboards. “Look at me.”
I look.
She works my shirt buttons. Methodical. The same focus she brings to everything that matters to her. Gets the shirt open and doesn’t recoil at the blood, the cut on my arm, the bruise forming on my ribs.
“You should have that looked at.”
“Later.”
“Gia’s going to kill you.”
“Later.”
Warm against my chest. Mapped against the ink and the scars. She traces a line down my sternum with one finger and I can’t look away.
I freeze. Default to her hips. Familiar. Safe. Slide to the hem of her shirt and pull it over her head. Cotton bra. White. Nothing fancy. More devastating than the midnight silk because this is simply and fully her.
I reach for her waist. She catches my wrists.
“You’re not turning me around.”
“I’m not.”
She unclips her own bra. Lets it fall. And she’s looking at me while she does it, watching my reaction, daring me to look away.
I look. At her. At everything. Every muscle in my body locks. The pressure shoots up my skull.
“You going to say something, or just stand there turning purple?”
The laugh surprises us both. Mine. Short, rough, no notes of humor. More like a sound that escapes when nothing else will.
“I don’t—” The words stall. She’s standing in front of me and I have blood under my nails and I don’t have the language for any of this.
“You don’t what?”
“Know how to do this part.”
She stares. “This part?”
“The facing-you part.”
The sarcasm drops for a second. She’s seeing me. All of me.
“I should warn you,” she says, “my face is a whole situation right now. Very attractive post-crying look. Mascara everywhere. Really top-shelf ambiance.”
Not funny. Something in me loosens anyway.
She pushes her leggings down, her underwear with them, steps out of both. Standing in nothing. And I’m standing here in an open shirt and blood-stained pants, and there’s nothing pretty about this. Violence and grief. Nothing else left.
“Your turn.” She tugs at my belt. I let her. Her fingers work the buckle, the zipper. Practical. Focused. Brow furrowed like the buckle owes her something.
