21. Dante #2
The door to our quarters is already ajar.
Gianna stands barefoot near the armoire, her hair twisted into a loose knot, strands falling like shadows against her throat.
She is wearing one of my shirts, sleeves rolled, collar slipping low over her collarbone.
There is no accusation in her eyes, only that steady, disarming quiet she wears like a second skin.
She does not ask where I’ve been.
She doesn’t need to.
She can smell it on me.
Blood.
Smoke.
The crisp edge of resolve.
I close the door behind me.
She tilts her head slightly and walks toward me.
Nothing in her steps is rushed.
She does not run.
She does not demand.
She only moves like she knows I will come to her anyway.
When I reach her, I cup her face in both hands, and she lets me.
My thumbs graze the bones of her cheeks, the soft bow of her mouth.
Her lips part under my touch, and she breathes something close to my name.
It is a sound scraped from the back of her throat, and it drags something primal from mine.
Her hands come to the buttons of my shirt, and she undoes them one by one.
Slowly.
Like it matters.
When she pulls the fabric back, her eyes trace the bruise blooming over my ribs, the scar high on my shoulder, the blood that isn’t mine still drying at my cuffs.
She says nothing, only lowers her mouth to the hollow of my chest and presses a kiss there, like an answer.
The bed is behind her, neatly made, the duvet smooth and untouched.
I don’t want the bed.
Neither does she.
I press her back against the hardwood floor, my jacket still on, belt clinking faintly as it brushes the rug.
She moans when her spine hits the ground, but not in pain.
It is the sound of thirst breaking.
She hooks one knee over my hip and pulls me between her legs, the fabric of my trousers dragging against her bare thighs, her body already warm and open beneath mine.
We don't rush.
We don't speak.
There are only the sounds: her breath catching when I kiss the spot behind her ear, the wet friction of her thighs parting wider as I grind against her, the low groan that builds in my throat when her fingers dig into the back of my neck.
Her nails scratch over my scalp.
She bites my jaw.
I feel her legs tighten around my waist and know that the floor is burning her skin, but she doesn’t move.
When I finally push into her, it is slow, grinding, merciless.
She arches up, gasps, then clamps her mouth over my shoulder to muffle the cry.
I stay buried there, deep inside her, unmoving for a long moment, just breathing into her hair while she shudders under me.
Then I start to move, deep, dragging every inch of myself through her until she trembles, her body twitching with every slow thrust.
Her head rolls back.
Her arms wrap around my back, her palms splayed against my ribs as if to hold herself together.
She is making those sounds now—half gasps, half moans—soft, reverent, like prayers whispered in secret chapels.
I kiss her throat.
Her breasts.
Her stomach.
I drag my tongue along her skin like I am starving and she is the only thing that will feed me.
She whimpers when I grind against her clit, when I stay deep and just move my hips in slow, rough circles, pressing all of me into the places that make her forget how to breathe.
Our bodies speak what our mouths won’t.
Her legs shake when I pull out almost entirely and thrust back in, hard enough to drag a cry from her throat.
She pulls me down and bites my lip when I kiss her.
I taste blood.
Hers or mine, I don’t know.
I don't care.
The sounds fill the room.
My name under her breath.
Her breath in my ear.
The slick, obscene sounds of skin on skin, of her cunt dragging wet over my cock again and again until I have to grit my teeth to keep from spilling into her too soon.
She flips me without warning, straddling my hips in one smooth motion.
The shirt she wore is gone.
Her skin is flushed.
Her hair is wild.
She plants both palms on my chest and sinks down on me, slowly, fully, unblinking.
She starts to ride me.
Not frantic.
Not performative.
Her body takes me like it was made to, her pace steady, torturous, her muscles flexing around me every time she grinds down.
My hands find her hips, then her ass, then the small of her back.
I dig my fingers in to anchor her.
She moans when I do.
Then she leans forward, her forehead pressed to mine, her breath breaking over my mouth with every thrust.
She is so close.
I feel it.
Her breath hitches.
Her lashes flutter.
She starts to tremble again, thighs tensing, chest slick with sweat.
She clenches hard, her orgasm tearing through her in waves that force a broken scream from her throat.
Her body milks me, and I let go, burying my face in her shoulder and coming so hard I forget where I am, forget who I am.
Only her.
Only this.
We lie there afterward, a tangle of sweat and breath and silence, the rug soft under my back, her hair damp against my neck.
For this one breath, this single moment, I let myself believe we are still allowed to have this.