Page 106 of Wild Abandon

My tears stop and are replaced with a burn. A need for Nate.

I kiss him harder, and he meets me with equal passion.

“I need to feel you.” I lift the hem of his shirt, and Nate hesitates for a moment before sitting up and allowing me to peel off his shirt.

When I toss the shirt over the side of the couch, I look back at Nate, and I freeze.

The sight I see makes me gasp.

Nate is lying inches in front of me, the skin of his chest glowing in the night, as I take in what he has done to himself.

Directly over his heart and inching up into his shoulder is a cascade of deep red roses tattooed into his skin for eternity. Billowing, blooming, and thriving, the deep burgundy color of the magic roses are draped over him like a tartan. The largest rose lies over where his heart beats.

The skin is still raw from the newness of the tattoo. I gently brush my fingers over it, and he flinches.

“Does it hurt?”

“Every day.” His voice is deep and low.

I remove my hand, but he takes my wrist and places my palm back against the skin.

“Love never dies.”

It’s like the tattoo on his wrist. A promise of forever to someone else.

I inch away from him. Again reminded of his undying love for a woman who is not me.

Nate pulls me back, and my chest slams against his as my eyes collide with his.

“This is for you.” He swallows hard and stares at me, pleading, wanting me to understand. “You are my red rose.”

He did this for me.

He had no idea we’d be together again, even for this last time, yet he engraved himself with me. Because in the faint line of the petal that rests just over his heart is my name in a beautiful cursive that flows into the movement of the design. On his skin for eternity.

I sit up and raise my shirt over my head. I snake my hand around my back and unclasp my bra, so it falls to the floor.

When our bodies collide, it’s as if the world finally makes sense. My hands touch his face, his chest, his back. His are on my neck, my arms, and my stomach.

Someday, I’ll daydream and remember how his velvety skin felt along the pads of my fingertips and how the hard muscles that lay beneath twitched with every touch. I’ll remember the way his back dipped in at the tailbone and how his shoulder blades rolled out of his skin when I ran my hands up the sides of his torso. I’ll remember the scar he had on the underside of his jaw, only visible when my lips were kissing his neck.

And I’ll remember how he whispered, “I love you,” every time his lips touched my skin.

I take his mouth in mine again and run my hands into his hair, tugging lightly. My body is a ball of fire and nerves and need.

I need Nate.

“Make love to me. One last time,” I plead. “If I never love again, I need this memory to take me through the lonely nights. I know you have a past, but I need you to treat me like I am your future.”

I don’t have to ask twice. Nate’s mouth is back on mine, his hands and his body taking over me.

There is no urgency. Everything is done with patience. Savoring every moment because it is the last.

We undress one another with locked eyes. We caress each other with locked lips. I whimper when his hand loves me gently down to my core. He says my name into my lips when I run my thumb over the swollen head.

And, when he enters me, I nearly burst out of my skin at the intense feeling of him, bare, inside me.

“You feel so good,” he groans as he takes my head into his hand. His hips roll against mine, making my orgasm build, as he loves me from the inside out.