Chapter 41
Chapter 41
High tide. Salt air. Even the birds look exhausted, my blood is mostly sugar and milk, and I need a nap before dinner.
Conor finds me on the second-floor landing and whisks me away. Silent, half smiling. One arm around my neck as he pulls me inside his room. He presses me against the wall and kisses me, long and shallow and then deep.
“You taste like hazelnut.”
“Hmm.” I bite his lower lip. “And I forever will, given the amount of gelato I just had.”
He hunches down just enough to laugh into my throat. It’s so unlike him, the constant touching, the kisses on my collarbone, how he pulls me in. He doesn’t hide what I do to his body, that I’m making him smile. Such a sea change, but also—this is Conor. It couldn’t be more familiar, the weight of his touch, my lungs bottling up his scent, the low, rumbling sounds in his chest as he pulls away to ask, “Okay?”
I don’t know what he refers to. His thigh between mine, his fingers laced through my hair, the spontaneous abduction. I nod.
“Are you tired?”
I nod again, this time with a grin, and a minute later I’m on his bed. The glass lamp that used to be on the accent table is gone. Instead of wasting time on stupid questions, I sit up and peer into the familiar paper bag he holds out to me. The fruit marzipan he bought me today.
When I lift my chin to smile at him, he’s there, boxing me against the mattress, palms on either side of my hips, voice low and serious.
“If the wedding isn’t happening, Tamryn and I need to go back to Ireland as soon as possible.”
My stomach squeezes with—No. Nope . I’m not going to panic over this, not before he’s told me, “Why?”
“The estate.”
“Has she reached a settlement?”
“Maybe. Things are looking up, because my brothers started fighting each other.”
“Heartwarming.”
“Isn’t it.” He kisses my nose. “It’ll be much better if we’re there. We might actually be able to get this shit sorted out once and for all.”
“Okay.” I think about it. “What is it that you want from this?”
“Nothing. I don’t need my father’s money. But Tamryn deserves it. And a lot of the assets…she can do more good with them than any of my shithead siblings.”
It makes perfect sense. And I have no intention of starting this relationship withholding my trust. “I get it. She needs you, and she’s family. Is there anything I can do to—”
“You could come with me.”
I jerk back, that’s how little I expected this. But then my lips twitch, and…“What? Like I’m your girlfriend, or something?”
He rolls his eyes. One more kiss, this time on my forehead, and then he straightens to his full height. “Part of me would love nothing more than to have you there as I deal with this mess. Then there’s the other part, the part that would really like for you to consider mixing your genetic material to mine at some point in the future, which is terrified of showing you the depravity and greed that runs in my family.”
“Banking on my ignorance, huh?”
“It’s all I have.” He sighs. Runs a hand through his hair. “I know it might not be possible. You have to take Tiny—and Bitty, I guess—home. I know you promised Rue and Eli to house-sit. But I did want to extend the invitation.”
I cock my head. Study this tired, hurried, too-handsome man. “How come?”
“I’ve been shutting you out for a long time. And I want to make it clear that it’s not going to happen again.”
There is a give inside me. Space hollowing, yielding, readjusting, to make room for a new sense of quiet joy. “Sit,” I say, tapping at the bed, snaking an arm around his waist when he does. “When are you leaving?”
“I’m not sure yet. Dakota is booking us flights out of Palermo.”
“Who’s Dakota?”
“My executive assistant.”
“Ah, right. The dude who goes through your emails.”
“Actually, that would be Seb. I have more than one EA.”
“More than one, as in…two?”
Silence.
“Three?”
A sigh.
“Oh, Conor.”
“I covered for Minami and Sul when they went on parental leave, and the carry allocation—”
“Yes, yes. I don’t think my brother has that many. Then again, my brother occasionally stops working.” I lean my forehead against his temple. Kiss his cheek. “If you ever buy me flowers, should I assume that they’re from Seb or Dakota?”
“I would never buy you flowers.”
I frown. “Never?”
“I would buy you a potted plant.”
“Why?”
“It’s a beloved pastime of mine, watching you drag them to the brink of death and then squirm to Rue and beg for resuscitation—”
He knows me so well, it’s only natural for me to want to kiss him. And once I’m kissing him, I cannot help continuing, pulling him down to the bed, trying to close the distance between us.
I didn’t mean for this to happen. But he smiles, and his mouth is on mine again, fresh and deliciously flavorless, a respite after all that sugar, and that’s how little it takes. His warm hands caressing my skin, folding me easily out of my overalls, my underwear. My fingers scrambling to the opening of his jeans, just as effortlessly. “I…” He finishes kissing me, unhurried, smooth. “We don’t have to do anything. Ever. If you—”
“No, no, but should we—wait?” I ask in between his tongue licking over my lips. I inch back. “I just was wondering, if maybe…”
He stares at me, curious, patient. His gaze doesn’t betray the eagerness that jumps in the quick, heavy rhythms of his pulse under my palm. I laugh.
“What?” he asks, but he’s smiling, too, like all he cares about is being here, with me. Understanding is secondary.
“I was wondering if our first time should be more momentous. Our real one. After all the shit we’ve put each other and ourselves through, you know. And then I remembered that—” I exhale more laughter against his collarbone. “That you are you . And I am me . And that we’re kind of fucked up. I mean, I lost my virginity on MDMA, and your idea of a romantic gesture is probably opening a high-yield savings account for me and then ignoring me for two weeks because you’re not worthy of—”
His lips press against mine, a contusion of a kiss. Half-teeth, but also soft. “Maya,” he tells me, mouth finding my throat. “The things you say, and fuck, you always smell so— fuck .”
My palm finds the outline of his erection, feeling the tremor in his muscles, the purchase as he presses against me, looking for more contact.
“Conor? I haven’t, either.”
“What?”
“Been with anyone else. Since Edinburgh.”
He goes very still. Closes his eyes. “Shit,” he breathes. “I’m not going to—I think I’ve run out.”
“What?”
“Last night.”
“Run out of…?”
“Self-control.”
I smile. Cotton rustles as I slide my hand in his boxer briefs.
“ Jesus .” He grips my wrist, stills it, but doesn’t move it away. “Were you serious about being on birth control?”
I take his free hand with mine and lift it until he can feel the implant in my arm. “Okay. Shit, okay. Can I—I’m skeptical of my ability to pull out—”
“Yes. You can.”
He groans, lowers the front of his underwear until it’s hooked behind his balls, and then—it’s not smooth, but he does end up inside me, and I can’t breathe. This time it’s on our sides, my knee bent and pulled up high against his flank, and I can’t control anything about this, not the angle—not quite right—nor the depth—fucking absurd—and I have to make myself inhale, air in and air out, until I feel my insides softening around him.
“Okay?” he asks, sounding a little ruined, a tinge of panic in his eyes. He digs in deeper. Hits a wall. Groans when the pleasure-pain of it makes me clench around him.
Okay , I say, except no sound comes out.
“Christ. Jesus Christ, Maya, I—If I…” He exhales. A silent, self-pitying, humorous laugh. “Will you trust me? I…”
I have no idea what he means. I’m still trying to learn how to exist with him inside me. “Yes. I trust you, I— Oh .”
My ass cheek is cradled in the palm of his hand, and he moves me against him. I close my eyes and give myself up to it—being ground onto his cock like I’m an extension of his body, shallow strokes, rubbing against a really good spot, heat and tension coiling in my belly, and—
“Maya,” he breathes, “look me in the eye when you’re making me come.”
My eyelids flutter open, and that does it. I feel him lose it inside me, a tightening grip, the sense of fullness. He groans, guttural, against my mouth. Locks eyes with me throughout it. Shudders. Gives in to the pleasure and lets me witness it with no shame.
It’s beautiful to see. I want Conor to do this, to show me this, to come without me, a million more times, but with one last sigh he slides back down to earth. And says, “Good. Now we can…”
His arms close around me. He’s still hard. Moves inside me slowly, more easily. More kisses, lingering. My thigh trembles as he hooks it over his elbow, a hint of strain to my hips, but the warmth tingles up my nerve endings again, and he’s touching my tits, and I’m laughing even as the air rushes out of my lungs. “That was so rude, Conor.”
“What—fuck, this is good —what is rude?”
“Coming inside me before even telling me how pretty I am.”
I clutch the fabric of his shirt, and he laughs, too, against my mouth. Amusement, joy, shared in a single breath.
“You’re okay,” he says. His thrusts are soft and unhurried. Lazy. I could use more speed, but—this is for him. I want this to be for him. “Pretty enough, I guess.”
I bite the flesh of his shoulder hard enough to leave a print, and he chuckles.
“When I saw you in Edinburgh,” he murmurs, “I couldn’t look away. You don’t—I can’t make you understand. I don’t have the words.”
He tilts my hips in a way that has us both groaning. He’s sated. Barely moving.
“I just couldn’t conceive of it. You were the most beautiful thing I’d ever seen, and the cliché of it—of being a thirty-five-year-old man developing a crush on a girl who was only twenty.” He sighs around my cheek. “I kept thinking about my father and all those women. How ridiculous it looked from the outside. I wanted none of that. But you were there, smart and self-assured and independent, but also young. And after that first night I told myself, fuck, no. Absolutely not . But I still had breakfast with you, and you turned every ordinary moment into a masterpiece.” He shifts us until I’m kneeling on top of him, my palms on the sides of his head. His hands run up my bare thighs, the place between us that’s already soaked with his come.
I think about it—those relaxed, unguarded smiles of his during the day we spent in Edinburgh. The warm surprise in his demeanor, as though that gentle happiness was unusual to him. You should have someone making you feel like that every day, I thought. I am available.
His hips thrust upward, and I let out a loud moan. I hear the breeze carry it away and bite my lower lip.
“And then you made a move, and I’d never been so turned on. I watched you sleep and kept thinking—I could wake her up. I could give her what she asked for. I could fuck her, and it would be better than what she’s had so far.” His teeth run up my throat.
I shiver. “It would have been.”
He laughs. “Older guy. Your brother’s friend. So fucking trite, isn’t it?” His strokes are easy paced, but no longer gentle. His thumb draws a circle around my clit, and that’s it. My orgasm is plain, straightforward, the product of Conor being close, the drag of his sweat-slick skin against mine, the delicious scent of his warmth. It’s good, even perfect, long pulls that hold him tighter and tighter inside me, forcing him to spill again. Above all, though, it makes sense.
I’m not sure anything but this pleasure ever did, not this clearly, not for me.
“I think we should do this a lot,” I tell him later, once I have re-mastered the art of speech. We’re on our sides again. He gathered me to his chest and doesn’t seem to want to let go.
“I guess it was all right.”
I pinch him, and he steals my hand. Brings it to his lips. “Can you get in touch with Seb?” I ask. “If you’re only staying through tomorrow, it’d be nice if we made the most of it. We could go back to Isola Bella in the morning.”
“I would love that.” Without letting go of me, he twists around and grabs his phone, switching it on for the first time since the morning.
The barrage of notifications—texts, emails, and something else that could be the company Slack—pops up so chaotically, my brain cannot help reflexively taking in a few of them.
There are some issues with the CTO they wanted to appoint.
I wasn’t able to reach Avery or you—know about the wedding, just wondering if all is good.
Wow, volcanic eruption.
Any reason you are not picking up?
When will you be back? Davida wants to set a meeting.
Hark, your EA is in my office crying because he couldn’t get in touch with you.
We reached Minami; you are no longer needed.
Man, the fucking CIM Calatrava just sent around
Are you dead? Because people are calling dibs on your office.
We share a look. I unwrap the marzipan we just nearly squished, trying my best not to laugh. “Wow, Conor. Your life sounds…”
His eyebrow lifts.
“…delightful.”
“Hey. My hard labor paid for that.” His chin points at the cherry-shaped ball I’m sinking my teeth into.
“And no lack of work-life balance has ever tasted better,” I say, chewing.
Texts are still delivering. The amount of scrolling he has to do to get to his messages with Seb has me feeling a little nauseous.
“It’s a miracle, I think.”
“What?”
“That you used to reply to every single one of my texts.” I take another bite. Let the sweetness of the almond paste linger on my tongue. “Is it normal for senior management to work this much?”
“It’s an active deal period,” he says, a broken record. I wait, patient, until he sighs, “No.”
“Do you still have people snooping around all your messages and giving you digests?”
“Sometimes.” Another sigh. “Yeah.”
“Good to know. Then I won’t send you nudes or lewd sonnets. I’d rather not sexually harass your underpaid, under-benefited assistants.”
“They are extremely well paid, and you know very well that we give good health insurance.” He rubs his eyes for a while, until I’m sure he must see bright spots. “I could work on this,” he says. Then corrects himself. “I will work on this.”
“Hm?”
“Being more available. Being present. Senior management load.”
I fight back a yawn. “I fully plan to make every second away from me miserable for you.”
A breathless exhale that’s not quite laughter. “It already is.”
“No, I mean…Even more.” The room is warm, and the sugar makes me sluggish. “You’ll be shocked at how amazing it is, to be in a relationship with me. I’m so interesting and fun and not at all unhinged. I’ll blow your mind.” I burrow into him. “And your body, of course.”
“Christ.” His hand is at the back of my head. I let myself drift into the back-and-forth of his thumb, the temperature of his skin.
“You made me come about ten times. I owe you.”
“How about we don’t keep count?”
“Said Mr. Numbers Guy, the investment banker.”
“I’m not an investment banker, and you are a physicist.”
“I am. I can and will pull my weight,” I reassure him.
“If you insist,” he says. He’s smiling, I can hear it in the accent, slightly thicker than usual. I could open my eyes to make sure, but this is so nice. Dozing off. Feeling close to him. His breath and mine. Making up for three years’ unshared air.
“I do. And you said you wanted me to be in charge.”
A hand settles on my hip. Perfect weight, perfect heat. “Such a menace,” he whispers, and there is none of the usual teasing in it, the faux hint of reproach. His voice is emotion stacked on emotion, and while I can’t name any with certainty, I still feel my lips pull upward, and find that I’m too sleepy to keep them straight.