Chapter Eighteen
Lex
I take three deep breaths before I move. Three deep breaths to come back to my body. Three deep breaths to allow my heart rate to slow. Three deep breaths to ensure Mari is long gone.
My legs feel shaky as I walk to the door, slide it closed, and lock it behind me. I don’t allow myself to look for Mari’s retreating back, for that godforsaken scarf, before my studio is all sealed up again. I need my bubble. I need to escape the outside world. I need to create.
But first, I need something else – something more.
My lips are still sore and swollen from our kiss, and I brush my fingertips over them before gliding that hand down my body and shoving it inside my trousers and underwear.
I’m as wet as I thought I was, and I waste no time.
I rub my clit in harsh, tight circles. It’s so rough, it starts to hurt after a short time, but that’s what I want. That’s what I need.
Besides, I’m so turned on from our kiss that in no time, I’m coming. Holding my breath, squeezing my eyes shut, and thrusting into my hand like that will give me the relief I need. I don’t make a sound until the orgasm has faded away, and I exhale slowly.
I slide my hand out of my clothes and keep it hanging ominously in front of me as I walk to the stainless-steel kitchen sink and wash my fingers clean.
As I wipe them dry, I’m overwhelmed with the urge to cry, to sob, to fall to my knees and roar with tears and pain and all the mess that is buried inside me.
But I don’t. I refuse to.
I’m tired. Mari being here – in my sacred space – has thrown me so much, I can feel the pull of my work getting thinner, more threadbare than it was a moment ago. And I don’t want that. Can’t have that.
So I push away from the sink and crouch down in front of the canvas again.
It’s an effort to lift my brush, to move the paint, and to pick up where I left off, but after a few strokes, I find the pull again.
I’m aware but not surprised that it gets stronger as I continue to think about Mari as I paint.
About their lips. Their taste – sugar and strawberries and a sweetness I have never deserved – and their breath on my lips a moment before I touched them with mine.
Even recalling the words they spat at me, the scorn they looked at me with, and the way they hinted they may be staying in Amsterdam…
All these things not only torture me, but they also spur me on.
They have me falling back into the dreamland I am safest in.
My escape. My sanctuary. My art.