Chapter 24 #2
Not wanting to disturb him, especially since it was making me feel nearly explosive with buzzing pleasure, I restrained a plea to let me turn around and look at him.
As if he heard the direction of my thoughts, Ford bent down to place a kiss on my shoulder and his hands on my bare hips. He turned me back around slowly, only lifting his head enough to get me facing him again before his lips settled on the front side of my left shoulder.
I knew where he was going, but the open-mouthed kiss he placed on my other shoulder still took my breath away. Kept stealing it as his mouth moved a slow path down to my upper arm. He lifted my hand, placing it on his shoulder so that it would be easier for him to reach.
He was moving so, so slowly. Enough that I didn’t stop the pained whimper from my throat. Ford’s eyes snapped up to me, holding firm as his mouth moved down another inch.
I felt his teeth on the next kiss, either from a nip of warning or his smile.
By the time Ford made it down to my wrist, I’d discovered that the hollow of my elbow was particularly sensitive.
That the scrape of his stubble against the hidden skin on the inside of my forearm was enough to crack my sanity in half.
That my pulse jumped to meet the warmth of his mouth when he placed his lips over my inner wrist.
All of those discoveries, and I still wasn’t quite prepared for the burst of light that exploded in my chest when Ford placed my hand in both of his and placed his mouth on the center of my palm, then my fingertips, then settling on the back of my hand—right over the eyes of the snake.
He was making me feel cherished, treasured. Something I’d convinced myself that I’d never be to him. In tune with me to a degree I was still mystified by, Ford noticed the slight change in my demeanor and looked up at me.
I shook my head, my throat feeling a little too tight for comfort. “I think I’d like to see your Mark now.”
Bellamy had said something once, after a few sips too many of whiskey, that seeing your Mark on you paranima was a…heady experience. Ford certainly seemed to agree.
I wanted to see it for myself.
Ford slowly dropped my hand, then reached behind him with one hand and ripped his t-shirt off. Now I did remember seeing him without a shirt on. Many times, all cataloged in my mind.
The first time I’d seen him do it, when he was still a lean nineteen-year-old, I’d had such an intense reaction, one the Bond took off with and ran, that I had to take an hour long walk in too-few layers just to get my thoughts back in order.
Eight years later, with no reason to push away those thoughts, and this close…well, it was no surprise my hands greedily clung to his shoulders. I pulled our chests flush together, causing us both to groan, and tipped up on my toes to kiss him.
Ford met me halfway, wrapping his forearm around my bare back and all but suctioning me to him. This time, the way our mouths moved together was slower, a little dirtier.
Eventually, gravity got the best of my weak knees and I started to let my weight fall away. Ford caught me first, then redirected so that I fell back on the bed.
He pulled away for a moment, looking at me with that same haze in his eyes, before diving back down with a kiss that tipped my head back against the mattress.
In a messy scramble of limbs, we pushed further up the bed. I went all the way to the pillows, but Ford stopped halfway, sitting up so that he could focus on pulling off my riding boots.
Right. We hadn’t even gotten so far as to take our shoes off.
Socks, his boots, his pants, my pants, all gone within seconds, discarded into a blind corner of the room. The slow torture Ford had put me through while touching every inch of our Mark seemed like the better option now. I wanted to savor the moment.
Then Ford reached down to the band of my underwear and I no longer cared. I was okay with fast, so long as it kept his large hands pressing into my hips.
Sitting back on his haunches and giving me a prime view of his muscled thighs dusting with dark hair, he rolled down the band of my underwear and kept going until I was revealed to him.
The force of his attention was enough to turn my entire body red with a flush. His eyes didn’t move an inch away from my center as he pulled the scrap of fabric away from my legs. Didn’t move as his hands returned to my thighs, stroking upwards to curl over my knees and slowly push them open.
Ford’s name was caught in my throat as a broken plea.
As if that was enough for him to remember this was real, he looked up. “Is there anything I should know, Esme? Because the second I get my mouth on you, I don’t think you’ll be able to speak coherently anymore.”
Surely, this was a dream, nothing more than my deepest fantasies. Surely, this wasn’t my reality.
“There’s, um,” I swallowed, suddenly feeling a pinch of nerves. “It’s only been you.”
I don’t know what I expected, but the look of near glee that lit Ford’s expression was not it. I couldn’t help commenting on it.
“I’d understand if there was someone before me, that’s not it,” Ford said, hands massaging my thighs in a way that made it very difficult to concentrate on what he was saying.
There was a slight edge to his voice that betrayed him.
“But, yes, I’m relieved to know there was no once since. Even with everything…”
Suddenly, there was a horrible, bone-deep wash of panic that swept over me.
“Please don’t tell me if you—” my throat closed over the words.
Intrusive thoughts slammed into me from all sides, imagining what Ford may have done when he went to visit his family, if he’d ever snuck out or— “I don’t want to know. ”
It was probably a little childish, but I didn’t care.
“Esme,” Ford said, yanking on my legs so that I was swept under him. He placed a hand on either side of my head and bent down, bringing our noses nearly to touch. This close, with his pupils this dilated, it was like staring into the night sky. “There has been no one else since the day I met you.”
“It would have been okay if you had,” I lied, not even entirely sure where it was coming from. Maybe guilt that he’d felt some type of duty to me, when from his perspective, I had been an equal partner in the rejection of the Bond.
I felt Ford’s laugh on my mouth. “No, I don’t think it would have been.” He bent down to lick across my lips, causing a sharp spike of desire at my core that had me digging my nails into his wrist. “Need I remind you what happened a few days ago?”
“Oh, shut up,” I said against his mouth, knowing I’d lost the battle and, honestly, not even caring anymore. All that seemed important was accomplishing my goal of fusing our bodies together.
Ford seemed happy to comply, chasing my lips for another deep kiss. His entire body moved in time with his mouth, which brought our hips flush together.
I could feel him against me, the heat of his length even more intense than I could have imagined. Before I could make quick work of taking off his boxers, Ford ripped his mouth from mine and started trailing hot kisses down the length of my neck.
My head tipped back on instinct, giving him easier access. I didn’t feel all that in control of my body, spun past the point of awareness, but I was pretty sure my hand looped around the back of his neck and threaded through his hair. I might have pulled a little bit.
I was sure that I had done so when Ford groaned against the skin of my upper chest. I felt the vibration in every corner of my being.
Everything started to move a little faster, then. Ford’s movements became more hurried, more of a continuous pass of heat over my chest then breasts then stomach.
My body was starting to move in a desperate way, my hips tipping up and back, not quite able to get what I wanted in either direction. They slowed under Ford’s grip, his hands settling on either side and gripping tight.
Ford looked up at me again, holding my eyes for one prolonged beat, searching for my okay. I was going to kill him if he hesitated a second longer, and told him so.
With a smile that had my insides buzzing even more intensely, Ford pushed my legs apart and licked up my center.
The sound that left my throat was inhuman. When his lips closed around my clit, I managed a broken, “Oh my God.”
I was having a hard time understanding how something could feel this good.
This had to the Bond or something about Ford in particular, because this was past the point of belief.
Ford seemed to know exactly what to do to wind me higher and higher, focusing on long, suctioning pulls at the apex of my thighs and teasing the core of me with two fingers.
I could feel myself barreling towards release, and something about that felt wrong. I wanted him inside me.
“Ford,” I tried, but he was undeterred from his mission. If anything, it felt like he knew I was going to ask him to stop and was digging his heels in. Every place he touched me inched up in intensity, punctuated with a poignant nip at my center that made my vision black out for a second.
I had no choice but to start pulling on his hair, grappling with him to try and pull him up to me. “Ford.”
That made his eyes rise to mine, but he didn’t move just yet. He flattened his tongue and took his sweet time leaving me, before finally, finally moving to rise over me again.
The second he was in reach, I pulled his face to mine. Our foreheads rolled together as we both tried to catch our breath.
“I want to feel you,” I said.
I’d seen Ford bleeding in a hundred different ways, and I still didn’t think I’d seen as pained of an expression on his face as I did in that moment. “Baby, I’m trying really hard to stay in control right now. Please don’t beg. I’ll lose it.”
Well, that was just asking for it. “Please.”