17. Nico
17
NICO
LUNA MIA
I wake up covered in sweat. My room is dark but the moonlight shines from the open window. The silence in the house is eerie and I strain to hear my guests on the other side of the wall. There’s faint movement but I don’t know if that’s normal or not.
It’s like fire still licks my skin. I take three rounds of deep inhale and exhale. A ritual that’s as familiar as it is painful. My hand itches to make the person responsible pay before I have to remind myself that it already happened.
The sheets are damp and I get up, stripping the bed and walking to the laundry room to get them into the laundry machine. I’ll start it in the morning; now that I have a guest, I can’t live during the night like I usually do. I want to know what Marie looks like when she sleeps. Is she as peaceful as Ember? Does she frown?
I pull on a pair of grey sweatpants and advance on the bedroom door, slightly ajar. Pushing it open, I stand there frozen as I survey the room. Ember sleeps soundly in her cot but Marie seems to struggle against her own demons. Her head whips side to side and she whimpers low. I know the feeling all too well and my gut stirs.
I approach the bed and, not for the first time, the need to touch her almost overwhelms me. Years of conditioning and training help me remain in control. Though I’d wished she’d take it from me.
“Marie,” I call out but she doesn’t wake up, turning away from me and curving herself into a ball.
I know first hand what it’s like to have nightmares. To be stuck in your own head, knowing intimately that you’re reliving a memory and that nothing is real but being incapable of waking up. I call out her name, louder this time, bedding a knee on top of her bed. I don’t mind if Ember wakes up. She’ll fall back asleep, but Marie needs to get out of her own head.
“Marie!” I raise my voice and shake her shoulder, her skin soft under my hand. Before I can fully get comfortable with the new feeling, she gasps as she sits up.
“Where’s Ember?” she asks in a panicked tone.
“In her cot. She’s safe. You’re safe.”
Slumping slightly, she raises her hands to cover her face, shaking it slightly, then rubbing her eyes.
“I’m sorry I woke you up, Nico. I’ve always had trouble sleeping without…” She doesn’t finish her sentence but I don’t need her to voice the name of the person she loved most. “I don’t sleep well by myself.”
She fidgets with her hands, her soft top revealing her left shoulder. Without thought, the fingers of my right hand travel the distance between us. I pull the fabric back up with my thumb and index finger, grazing Marie’s skin. Our breaths itch in tandem.
What comes out of my mouth next isn’t like me but I wouldn’t take it back for the world.
“Want me to sleep here with you?”
She sputters and I smirk. I’m not propositioning her again. But I could if I knew she’d take the bait. The uncertainty of our situation right now is too intense, too deep. I don’t like not knowing. I want to lay myself bare before Marie but she’s not ready to receive me.
“Get your head out of the gutter, Miss Marie. I’m only offering my presence.”
“I know”, she huffs.
It’s adorable. A sign of her youth. I’m not much older than her. Twenty six to her twenty, but the blood on my hands and the need for vengeance in my system aged me beyond the number written on my passport. Marie has always been sheltered.
I stay silent and let her decide. It doesn’t take long before she scoots over to one side of the bed and gives me an order. “Get in.”
Those two words send a shiver of need down my spine and I bury it deep inside myself. I’m her reprieve, her safety net, her guardian in the storm. I don’t want to be the one making demands, yet another person to satisfy and listen to when she’s probably already dealing with too many at home. I get under the covers without a word and turn to face her.
The pillow is cool under my cheek. Despite the cover of night, her eyes shine with an emotion I don’t have a name for.
“What are you thinking about?” I ask.
I can’t be sure but I think she blushes and now I definitely need to know. I wait again, giving her the upper hand.
“I was watching your lips,” she says. I pass my tongue to my piercing three times. “Yeah, exactly that. You always do that when you’re thinking or waiting for something.”
“Are you telling me I have a tell?” It’s more than a tell, but I won't reveal that.
“Yeah.” She smiles and it could illuminate the whole room. “You have a tell. And I like it.”
Her voice is barely above a whisper, like she doesn’t want the walls to hear.
Hesitantly, her hand lifts. Before she can touch me, she asks softly, “Can I?”, and I nod. We’ve been there twice before. Three is my favourite number. The knowledge of a circle completed sends flutters inside my chest. My throat dries. These sensations are new. I catalogue them in a folder named after her and let her move slowly.
When her index lands on the metal on my lower lip, she presses down immediately this time, giving me yet another taste of what it’s like to be touched by her. And to like it. Even Damian doesn’t touch me beyond helping my skin heal after a session. She flicks my piercing side to side three times before pulling my lower lip down and releasing. I hold my breath for what she’ll do next.
Her eyes, turned darker, flick to my nose ring. She meets my gaze and I nod again, consenting to whatever she has in mind. Her middle finger glides softly from in between my eyebrows to the bridge of my nose, to the piercing but she doesn’t linger and slowly brings her fingertips to my left cheek. “Is this okay?”
I swallow hard and close my eyes, focusing on where her hands rest against my face. She’s warm and I don’t recoil. My body isn’t trying to tell me to remove her from me. My heart beats fast in my chest at the novelty but none of the usual shudder and disgust taints the experience. “Yes, Miss Marie,” I breathe as I open my eyes again.
Her fingers slowly move down until they rest at my pulse point, while her thumb is back at my mouth. Trepidation makes me dizzy.
“Open,” Marie commands, and my cock stirs to life underneath the sheets. I obey and she slides her thumb inside my mouth, finding the metal on my tongue and playing gently with it with the pad of her finger. I can taste her skin, and unlike the first time, I can fully revel in it this time. My eyes roll back and I harden further in my sweatpants.
The slight pressure she applies on my tongue in a series of three threatens to unravel me right in front of her. My own hands tighten into fists. I could play the brat and move but I don’t want that with her. I want her to tell me what to do, I want to be what she needs. I don’t know what that is yet but I know we’re about to enter a new territory.
She retracts her thumb from my mouth and puts it in hers and I whimper. I don’t mean to, my body not fully my own where she’s concerned and I’m finding that exhilarating. Through her own finger, our tongues touched and I moan at the idea of doing it but this time, without any intermediary. What would that be like? Does she taste as good as her skin does?
The sudden image in my mind of me licking every inch of her skin as she pulls on a leash locked on a collar around my throat has my balls tightening up. I’m not even discreet as I squirm, my hips thrusting against thin air, trying to get a modicum of relief against the fabric of my boxers.
Marie watches me intently, her lips parted around her thumb. She closes them around the digit and hollows her cheeks and I moan again, following the movement. For the first time in my life, I want her to do that to me. I want her to touch me. I want her to give me pleasure. I want to give it all to her. All I am is want , needy desire and mindless lust.
She removes her thumb from her mouth with a pop and arches a playful brow. Her attention is intoxicating, smoother than warm liquor and stronger, too. “What do you need?”
“Whatever you’ll give me, Miss Marie.”
The sheets cover us up to our shoulders but she glances down and it’s as if she could see me and where I hurt most right now. “I’ve never seen anyone come before. I’ve never wanted to,” she says, almost conversationally. “I want to see you do it for me.”
I frown. What she wants is still unclear to me. Does she mean she wants me to throw the sheets off our bodies and get naked or touch myself above my clothes, or none of the above? “Can you be more specific?”
“I want to watch your face as you come, Nico. So touch your cock under the covers and make yourself come for me. Can you do that?”
I nod eagerly and wrap my hand around my hard cock under the waistband of my pants. Playing with my piercings, I let out a soft breath, though it’s not enough. Our eyes stay locked as I pump my length into my fist hoping I’ll get to experience more of this. I want to be on my knees for her the next time we do this. There’s no doubt in my head that there will be more times. I’m barely scratching the surface of what I want to do with Marie. I want the tails of a flogger branded with her name to lick the skin of my back. The things I’d let her do to me… My brain is going haywire trying to conjure images of what could be.
“Look at me,” her stern voice gets me back into the reality of this moment.
She licks her lips. My orgasm draws near as I look into her sad eyes, alight with hunger, just for me. Her face relaxes with awe as she takes me in, covering every inch of my face with her dark gaze.
I squeeze myself harder and whimper again, clamping my lips shut.
“Fuck, I love that sound you make. Don’t hold it.”
“What about Ember?” I pant.
“She’s asleep.”
It’s answer enough. My breath hitches, my rhythm picks up and I come with needy sounds that she devours greedily, the edges of my vision turning white.
It takes me a few seconds to come down from my high. I’m drunk on lust, the call for more already having my cock jump back to life. It won’t ever be enough with her. Without ever touching me fully, or me touching her, I came harder than I ever have. And I’m determined to keep her, forever.
“Show me,” she urges.
The mess left in the wake of my climax makes me wince, the texture of coldness unpleasant, but I’ll hold on for her. I lift my hand from underneath the sheets, my fingers glistening with my release.
Marie simply smiles. “You did so good, Nico. I’ve never seen anyone so beautiful and vulnerable before. Thank you.”
“You don’t have to thank me, Marie. I’m the one who came.”
“I know but I needed the distraction.”
Pride swells in my chest and my cheeks heat. “Anytime, luna mia . Now, I really need to shower. I don’t like having my cold cum on my skin.”
“Oh my God, I’m so sorry, of course. Do you need anything from me?”
She moves to sit up but I place my clean hand above her shoulder, shy of an inch. I want to touch her but I’m on high alert and focused on cleaning myself. Nothing else matters but showering and changing into clean boxers. The only reason I’ve held on this long is because the fluid belongs to me and she gave me the best orgasm of my life. “Just sleep. I’ll be back in five minutes.”
“Okay.”
When I’ve scrubbed my skin and changed into clean clothes, I make my way back into Marie’s bed, just shy of an inch between us. Her soft snores send me into a peaceful sleep only disturbed twice by Ember’s cries for feeding. Each time, I fall back asleep a little closer to the woman who’s changing everything.