I’m shaken. I have terrible dreams about my mate from time to time. I guess I feel guilty for not being there on that terrible, awful day.
“I’m sorry you had a bad dream.” Carla’s voice comes out of the dark a few minutes later, quieter now, some of the heat gone out of it. “But you don’t get to snap at me for trying to help andthen act like I’m the problem here.” There’s an edge back in her voice now, sharper this time. “I get it, Magma. You regret what happened. Fine. I can live with that. But you’ve been treating me like I’m contagious ever since we had sex, and I’m sick of it.”
“That’s not?—”
“Isn’t it?” She sits up. Even in the dark, I can feel her looking at me. “You won’t look at me. You barely talk to me unless you’re giving me an order. You moved your bed six feet away, like sleeping near me might be catching. So yeah. I’m starting to think you regret it. I’m starting to feel like you think less of me now.”
“I don’t think less of you.”
“Are you sure? Because from where I’m sitting, it looks a hell of a lot like you think I’m some kind of slut who jumped you the first chance she got, and now you can’t stand to be near me.”
“That’s not what I think.” My voice comes out rough. “Not even close.”
“Then what is it?” She’s not backing down. I can hear it in the steadiness underneath the anger. “Because I’d really like to know, Magma. What exactly is going on in your head that makes you flinch every time I get within three feet of you?”
I should give her something easy. Tell her it’s about the mission, about staying focused, about the danger of getting attached to someone I might not be able to keep alive.
None of it would be a lie, exactly. None of it would be the truth, either.
“I still want to fuck you,” I say instead, and the words come out low and rough. “That’s the problem. I haven’t stopped wanting to get back inside you since we had sex, and it’s gotten worse instead of better, and I don’t know what to do with it.”
She goes very still.
“So that’s it.” Something shifts in her voice, gone quiet now too. “You’re not avoiding me because you regret it.”
“No. I’m avoiding you because I want you so damned badly. I’m trying to do the right thing here.”
“Then stop.” She moves before I can finish whatever I was about to say, crossing the gap between us on her knees. She stops right in front of me…waiting. “Just stop because I want you too.”
There’s a beat where I could still end this.
“Fuck it,” I grind out.
I get a hand into her hair and pull her mouth to mine.
She makes a small sound against my lips, surprised and pleased all at once, and her hands come up around my neck. I deepen the kiss because there’s no version of this where I could have stopped. I get my other arm around her waist and pull her into my lap, careful of her feet, careless of everything else.
This time I make myself slow down.
I get my hands on her face and just hold her there for a second, my forehead against hers, both of us breathing hard already.
I pull away a little, looking at her.
“You’d better not be second-guessing this. I’m not going to tell you to stop. I want you inside me,” she tells me.
I laugh, low and a little broken, and kiss her again, slower this time, learning the shape of her mouth instead of just taking it. She melts into me the way she did the first time, but there’s none of the urgency of the river.
I unclasp her bra and cup both her breasts in my hands and just look at her for a moment. She’s so damned beautiful.
“You’re staring,” she whispers.
“I know. You have great tits. They’re big and bouncy.”
“They’re not that big.”
“They look pretty big to me. They jiggle and bounce and make me so fucking horny I don’t know what to do with myself.”
She giggles softly. “That’s because I’m overweight by a good ten pounds.”
