Chapter 18 #2
"I know." Her eyes meet mine, and they're darker than I've ever seen them, pupils blown wide with want. "That's the problem. I never actually hated you. I just hated how much I wanted you."
Something inside me snaps. I pull her against me, and she gasps as our bodies collide, skin on skin, wet and slick and perfect, nothing between us now.
My mouth finds hers, and the kiss is brutal, desperate.
Weeks, months, years of pent-up frustration pouring out all at once.
She kisses me back just as fiercely, her hands sliding up my shoulders, into my hair, and when her nails drag over my scalp, every nerve ending in my body sparks to life.
I break away to breathe. "Tell me to stop," I say against her lips, giving her one more out.
"You better not."
My hands slides down her sides, over her hips, and over her round ass, where I fill each hand with a heady amount of cheek and squeeze hard. She arches into me with a gasp that I swallow with another kiss. "Tell me what you want."
"Everything," she breathes, her voice breaking on the word. "I want everything. I want…" Her hand wraps around my hard length, and my vision goes white. "I want to feel you come apart. I want to know I'm the one who does this to you."
Then, before my mind can put together a response, she's sinking to her knees on the wet tile.
"Wait..." I start, but her mouth is already on me, and the word dissolves into a groan that echoes off the tile walls. Coming in here was one thing, but getting on her knees for me is another.
"Fuck, sweetheart," I exhale sharply. My hand finds her hair, tangling in the wet strands. She looks up at me through her lashes, water streaming down both of us, her lips stretched around me, and the sight alone nearly destroys me.
She takes me deeper, hollowing her cheeks, and my head falls back against the wall. Her hands grip my thighs, her nails dig in, and my cock twitches, already feral that she's leaving a mark for me. The soft sounds she makes vibrate through me with every stroke, and I'm on the verge of insanity.
"God, yes," I pant, my hand tightening in her hair. "Just like that. You're so—fuck—so good at this."
She hums in response, and the sensation makes my knees almost buckle.
I'm getting close, too close, pleasure building at the base of my spine like a coiled spring.
My hand tightens in her hair, and I'm fucking her mouth.
Tears stream down her cheeks as she chokes on my length, and still she doesn't pull away.
She takes it, takes everything I give her.
"I'm going to come," I warn her, and she doubles down, her hands gripping me tighter as her tongue does something that makes stars burst behind my eyelids, and I'm right there, right on the edge, about to fall, and I pull her up by her hair.
She comes up with a gasp, her lips swollen and red, her eyes dark with arousal.
"Why?" The word is almost a whine, and seeing her like this, wanting me, frustrated that I stopped her, is almost as devastating as what she was just doing.
"Not here," I rasp, my voice completely wrecked. "Not like this."
"But I want—"
"I know what you want." I capture her mouth, tasting myself on her tongue. "But the first time you make me come…" I pull back to look at her, needing her to see how serious I am. "It's going to be inside you where I can watch you fall apart."
"Then take me to bed."
I don't need to be told twice. I lift her, her legs wrapping instinctively around my waist, and carry her out of the shower. We're both dripping wet, leaving a trail of water across the bathroom floor.
"We're making a mess," she says breathlessly.
"I don't give a damn."
I shoulder through the doorway, and we're back in the bedroom. The morning light filters through the curtains, illuminating the room and the scattered pillows still on the floor where they fell. I lay her down on the mattress, and she looks better than any fantasy I've ever had.
"No more walls," I say, settling between her thighs.
She pulls me down to her. "No more pretending."
"No more running," I add, and she nods.
"I'm done running." Her hand cups my face. "I want this. I want you."
I kiss her deeply, slowly, pouring everything I haven't been able to say into it.
"Then let me worship you properly," I murmur against her lips. "Let me show you what it means to be mine." I kiss her again, deeper, claiming her mouth in a way that leaves no room for doubt. When I pull back, I brush wet hair from her face, studying her. "You're scared."
She doesn't deny it this time. Just holds my gaze, and I can see the vulnerability there, the fear warring with want.
"You're already trying to figure out how to pretend this didn't happen," I say softly, tracing the curve of her jaw.
"How to rebuild your walls after." Her eyes flash with something not quite defiance.
She opens her mouth to protest then closes it.
"Too late, sweetheart." I kiss her throat, feeling her pulse race beneath my lips. "Way too late."
"Arrogant," she breathes, but her hands are sliding up my back, pulling me closer despite her words.
"You knew what I was when you married me." I work my way down, kissing the valley between her breasts. "Knew exactly what you were getting into."
"This wasn't part of the arrangement."
"No. This is so much better." I take a nipple into my mouth, and she arches into me with a sultry moan.
"This is real, and it terrifies you." She doesn't respond with words.
Instead, her eyes meet mine, and in them I see the admission.
This terrifies her, but she's here anyway.
"That's my girl," I murmur against her skin, and I feel her shiver.
I work my way down her stomach, pressing kisses to each trembling muscle, and when I settle between her thighs, she doesn't protest. Just watches me with dark, hungry eyes.
"Look how ready you are," I murmur, pressing kisses to her inner thigh. "Your body knows who it belongs to."
She could snap back at me. Instead, she just bites her lip, a tiny, almost imperceptible movement that sends heat straight through me.
I lower my mouth to her, and the first taste nearly undoes me.
My tongue traces her slowly at first, learning the shape of her, but my restraint fractures when she gasps my name.
I dive deep, my tongue pushing inside her as she arches off the bed.
I thought I could go slow, savor this, but I've wanted this too long.
She tastes like everything I've been craving.
Her hand finds my hair, fingers threading through and tightening when I find a rhythm that makes her thighs quake. She's not directing, just holding on, anchoring herself as soft, desperate sounds spill from her lips and drive me insane.
She's close already. I can feel it in the way her thighs tremble against my shoulders, the way her breathing becomes shallow and erratic, the way her hips roll, seeking more.
But I don't let her fall. Not yet. Every time she gets close, when her body goes taut and her breath catches, I pull back, gentling my touch to featherlight brushes until she's writhing beneath me, her fingers flexing in my hair, wordlessly begging.
Unable to take the sweet torture, she pants, "Please.” The word is barely audible, but it's everything.
"Please what, sweetheart?"
She stares at me for a long moment, pride and need battling in her expression. Then something shifts, a conscious choice, a surrender. "Please make me come."
"As you wish," I say before spearing her with my tongue, a reward for her admission.
I plunge in deep, and I know she feels the groan that rumbles up from my chest. Her back arches, and I suck her bundle of nerves hard, and she explodes.
For seconds, I'm delirious, unsure what's better, the taste of her coming apart on my tongue or hearing my name fall from her lips like a prayer.
I lick her through the aftershocks, savoring every drop until she's pushing weakly at my head, oversensitive and trembling.
When I crawl back up her body, her eyes are glazed, unfocused. I catch her chin gently, making her look at me.
"Stay with me," I say softly. "Don't hide from this."
For a moment, I think she'll retreat anyway, but then she cups my face, pulling me down into a kiss that's tender and honest. No walls. No games. Just Asha.
Then, pulling back, she bites my lip. "I'm not hiding. You have a job to finish, husband."
"Fuck, yeah, I do." My tone is pure gravel. She just claimed me and asked for my cock in one sentence. I reach between us, positioning myself at her entrance. "Last chance to change your mind."
Her legs wrap around my waist in answer, pulling me closer until I push inside her slowly, and we both groan at the sensation. She's impossibly tight, impossibly perfect, and for a moment, I can't move, can't think, can't do anything but feel.
"God," I grit out. "You feel—"
She silences me with a kiss, her nails digging into my shoulders. When she pulls back, her eyes are dark with need. "Move," she whispers, not a demand but a plea.
I pull almost all the way out and thrust back in, and she gasps against my mouth. I do it again, finding a rhythm that has her clutching at me, all that careful composure dissolving.
"Look at me," I say, and she does. She holds my gaze even as I drive deeper, harder. "Let me see you," I pant as beads of sweat gather across my shoulder blades.
The sound of her wetness pulling me in echoes around the room like a siren song, and there's no denying she more than wants every second of this.
She could close her eyes. Could hide. Instead, she keeps them locked on mine, letting me see every emotion flickering across her face: pleasure, vulnerability, something that looks dangerously close to a four-letter word.
The thought has me widening my legs and changing the angle, with a need to drive in deeper to conquer depths no man ever has, to leave my mark. She cries out, the pinch of pain catching her by surprise, and then her eyes roll back in pure euphoria.
"That's my girl, taking everything I give her like a good little wife."
She's shaking now, her whole body trembling as pleasure builds. Her mouth opens like she wants to say something, but no words come out. Just small, desperate sounds that drive me wild.
"That's it." I watch her face transform. "Let go for me. I'll catch you."
Her eyes search mine, and whatever she sees there…
trust, desire, promise…it's enough. She shatters with a cry, and the feel of her pulsing around me drags me over the edge with her.
I bury myself deep as I come hard, my face in the crook of her neck as I work to steady my racing heart.
When the world finally stops spinning, I collapse beside her, pulling her against my chest. She comes willingly, tucking her head under my chin, her fingers tracing idle patterns on my skin.
"Don't," she says quietly.
"Don't what?"
"Don't make me regret this." Her voice breaks on the last word. "Please don't make me regret finally letting you in."
I tighten my arms around her. "Never, sweetheart."
We lie there in silence, hearts gradually slowing, reality waiting at the edges. I can feel her thinking, processing, but she's not running. Not building walls. She's here, in my arms, choosing to stay.
"The pillows are still on the floor," she says finally, and there's the faintest hint of amusement in her voice.
"So they are."
"If we stay in this bed all day... it still only counts as once, right?"
I know what she's asking. We don't do relationships. We don't sleep with the same person more than once. It's safer that way. Cleaner. Things don't get messy.
But I want messy. I want beautiful, complicated, earth-shattering messy with her.
And this will be happening again and again today, tomorrow, every day after, until the day I die, because she is mine.
Whether she's ready to fully accept that or not, we are happening.
So, I'll give her this fiction. This temporary safety net while she adjusts to the reality of us.
"Yeah," I say, my hand sliding down her spine. "It only counts as once."
She's mine now. Completely, irrevocably mine.