Chapter 17 This Endless Heaven #2
"So, I just…" I blow out a breath. "Be real with me. I feel like you've been…I don't know, holding your breath, sort of, for a while. With us. Giving me the time and space to work through things. Finding a new…equilibrium." It took a moment to dredge up the correct English word.
"Have you?" he asks. "Found a new equilibrium?"
I nod. "Yes, I think so. Knowing that the club is opening tomorrow, that helps.
It means we're getting back to normal, or—or maybe a new normal is more correct to say.
Regardless, it feels good to know we can resume operating the club.
" I lead him to my bedroom, and start pulling my clothes from the closet and draping them onto the bed. "What will you do now, Ren?"
He shrugs. "I've been considering my options."
"And?"
"I haven't decided yet. I don't think the Club is the right fit for me, long-term, work-wise. I hope you understand that."
I collect an armload of clothes and stack them with the rest on the bed.
"Of course, Ren. The club is my home, my career. I love it here. I like the work. I like watching the customers. I like the challenge of running such a complicated business. But it doesn’t have to be your job.
I just hope you don't decide you have to go back to Brazil.
" I turn away from him and hurry back into the closet, scraping hangers together, studiously and determinedly not looking at him.
I have my arms around the load of clothes and I'm about to lift the hanger hooks off the bar when I feel his presence behind me. I go still, breath snagging in my lungs like a burning, bursting balloon. My skin pebbles all over, my nipples harden, and I involuntarily press my thighs together.
"Ren," I whisper.
"Mmmmmm," he hums in return, his nose pressing against the back of my neck, inhaling my scent. "Sophia, my beautiful, sexy, delicious darling."
"Delicious?" I echo, the word barely a breath.
"Mmmm-hmmm." I feel his fingers slide down the short, thick column of my braid, catch at the hair tie at the bottom. "Sweeter than honey. Every…last…inch of you." He punctuates each phrase with a soft, delicate kiss to the back of my neck, each one ripping a quiet gasp from my lips.
I clutch the clothing in trembling fingers. "Ren, I…I want…" I squeeze my eyes shut as desire ripples through me, at war with my long-ingrained habit of ignoring my desires, of suppressing my needs, of dousing my passions.
Ren sidles up close behind me, and his hips press against my backside, the thick hard ridge of his erection pressing between my ass cheeks, and his chest is at my back and his hands roam down my sides and come to rest low on my belly.
"Tell me what you want, my love, so I can give it to you." He tugs the hair tie off, and his fingers rake gently down through my hair, loosening the braid so my hair falls in kinked waves to brush my shoulders.
"It's hard to say it, Ren," I whisper.
"Try. Please. It's just you and me. And we have all the time and privacy in the world." He lifts the mass of my hair aside and kisses my nape, behind my left ear, behind my right, and each kiss pours jet fuel on the fire of desire burning inside me. "Tell me what you want, Sophia. Please."
"I want you to make me feel good," I say, the words so quiet I can barely hear myself.
"I can do that," he answers.
The closet we are in is large, an expansive walk-in with floor-to-ceiling racks for hangers, cubbies for purses, and shelves for shoes; I've used less than a third of it, as clothing and fashion have never been a priority for me.
To our right is a full-length mirror. Ren pivots us away from the rack to face the mirror.
"Watch," he breathes. "Watch me make you feel good, my love. Don't look away."
He towers over me, his broad shoulders occluding the world behind him, his eyes holding mine in the reflection.
Dressed in dark blue jeans and a plain black T-shirt, I look short and slender against his tall, broad, hard, bulky frame.
His thick arms wrap around me like steel bands.
I reach up and stroke my fingers down his biceps, barely breathing as I wait for him to make his move.
He keeps his eyes locked on mine, a small, eager grin curving his lips, and his beard, thick and unkempt from weeks of neglect, tickles and scratches my cheek. I scrape my fingers over his beard, along his jawline.
"I think I like this," I say, realizing belatedly that I'm speaking Portuguese. "The beard. Perhaps trimmed a bit and brushed, but…I like it longer."
His grin widens as he answers in the same language. "Then trimmed and brushed it shall be for you, sweetest one."
His fingers dance inward and downward from my diaphragm to the waist of my jeans, pausing at the button. He slips the button free. Pinches the tab of the zipper. Lowers it slowly, gradually, centimeter by centimeter, until my fly sags open, baring a wedge of my white cotton underwear.
His teeth snag my earlobe, and his breath huffs hot and noisy against my ear. A kiss to my cheekbone near my ear. Fingertips slip over my belly, dance beneath the elastic of my underwear; I suck in my belly, anticipating his touch where I want it most, where I need it most.
"Ren," I gasp, aching for him, for more, for the intimacy of his touch. "Please."
I watch the reflection, rapt, as he eases his hand inside the cotton, over my mons pubis, and then a shrill whimper escapes my gritted teeth as his long middle finger rests over my seam.
"I—" another whimper emerges from my throat, a high, tight, wordless noise of need. "I want to…"
"What, Sophia? You want to what?"
"See." I push my jeans down until they catch at my hips. "I want to see. I want to watch you touch me."
"What do you know?" He teases in English. "So do I."
He drops to a crouch behind me, fingers hooking in the waist of my open jeans, and pulls them down; I help by wiggling my hips, shifting my weight from foot to foot as he tugs the tight denim down until they're piled around my ankles.
He lifts my foot and whips the jeans away, and then I lift my other foot and they're tossed aside, leaving me in my panties and T-shirt.
Remaining crouched behind me, Ren grasps my hips, nosing one side of my bottom over the cotton, and then the other. He curls one finger into the elastic and tugs my underwear down an inch or two at my right hip, and kisses the exposed upper swell of my buttock.
"Ren, please—my god, I—I need—I want you to—"
He rumbles a quiet, amused laugh. "Did you think I wouldn't take my sweet damned time with you, Sophia?" he asks. "You'll be a quivering puddle by the time I'm done with you, I promise. It just won't be quick getting you there."
He runs that finger inside the elastic from right hip to left, lowering my underwear a bit more, another inch or two, baring more of my bottom, and he kisses flesh as he exposes it.
Left to right now, kissing, kissing—the upper swell, the hint of the cleft. Right to left, more kisses dotting and peppering here and there, here and there.
And now, all at once, the tight white cotton briefs droop past the bubble of my backside, clinging and catching where my thighs press together. I shift my thighs, and the panties drop to the floor. Ren tosses them aside. Rises to his feet behind me.
His fingernails scratch up my sides, bringing my T-shirt up with it; I'm momentarily blinded as he tears the garment off and tosses it aside to join the growing pile of my clothing.
Now I'm clad in only a simple, tight, compressive white sports bra, unattractive, unsexy, and a real bitch to peel out of.
"Would you ever consider wearing lingerie for me, Sophia?" he asks, his palms roaming my belly, my hips, down my thighs, teasing near my core but never quite touching me where I want him to.
"I don't own any fancy underwear, Lorenzo," I answer.
"I have a fantasy," he whispers, trailing his fingertips along the thick band of elastic at my diaphragm.
"Tell me," I whisper back.
"You, in nothing but a few scraps of red lace." He tugs the band upward until the lower swell of my breasts spills out, slowly rolling the tight undergarment up and away. "Like the most perfect present, all wrapped up for me."
"I think…" I breathe, pausing to swallow the lump of hot nerves in my throat, feeling my belly flutter with the wingbeats of a billion restless butterflies.
"I think that could be arranged." I gnaw on the corner of my lower lip, breath lodged in my throat as Ren peels the sports bra up and up, past the sticking point so my breasts tumble free, swaying heavily.
The bra joins the rest of my clothes on the floor, and now I'm nude while Ren towers behind me, fully clothed.
"My fucking god," he breathes, his gaze hungrily raking over my curves, lingering at my breasts before dropping to my sex. "You are exquisite, Sophia. Breathtaking."
My heart squeezes, melts, and I hold my breath and meet his eyes in the reflection. "Ren…god. The things you say to me."
Reaching around me, pinning my arms to my sides, he cups my breasts in his big hands, calluses scraping rough against the tender skin.
Thumbs brushing over my erect, sensitive nipples, Ren watches me in the mirror, watches me gasp and press my thighs together at his touch, watches my jaw drop open as I whimper when he tweaks my nipples with a sharp, pinching twist.
Needing to touch him, to feel the reality of him, the solidity of his skin and muscles, I reach up and frame his face, rake my fingers through his beard, lip caught in my teeth. I arch my back, push my breasts into his hands.
He kneads the tender weight of my tits, growling a sound of appreciation.
"Have I ever told you that your tits are fucking incredible?" he murmurs.
I shake my head. "No, I don't think you have."
He lets them go, and they bounce, sway, jiggle. "Look at them, Soph. Goddamned magnificent."
"They're just boobs," I protest. "Nothing special."