Chapter 19
IVY
Back at the apartment, Soren eases the jacket off my shoulders as if he’s peeling foil from something warm and fragile.
I sink onto the deep couch, ankle crossed over knee, fingers fumbling for the laces of my boots. A sigh of exhaustion escapes me before I can stop it, fatigue suddenly hitting me after a day of adventure, full of wings and beer and whiskey.
He’s on one knee before I finish the exhale.
“What are you—”
“It’s okay,” he interrupts. “I’m helping you. You’re tired.”
“I can take my own shoes off.”
His palms slide under my heel. The boot yields with a soft pop, and cool air rushes over my sock-damp skin. “Just because you can do something, doesn’t mean you should.”
He sets the boot aside, matches it with the second. Then he stays there, kneeling between my knees, his fingertips resting lightly on my shins.
My skin tingles at his touch.
Streetlight slants through half-open blinds and stripes his cheekbones in gold.
I can smell yeast and hops still clinging to both of us—barrel-aged stout, distant laughter—and underneath it, the cedar wood and smoke notes that seem baked into his skin. It makes my tongue press to the roof of my mouth.
He stands first, offering me a hand.
When I take it, he doesn’t pull. Just folds our fingers together like he’s locking carabiners.
In the kitchen, he opens the fridge. Light pools across his tattooed forearms. “Do you want a glass of wine? Water? What can I get for you?”
“A sparkling water would be great,” I say, proud of myself for not doing what I’d normally do and keep the drinking part of the night going well past what’s good for me.
His tendons flex when he tears the pull-tab on a lime seltzer, bubbles whispering against aluminum. He pours into a tall glass, slow enough nothing spills, then nudges the glass across quartz until condensation gathers against my knuckles.
I take a sip and swallow once, twice. The fizz stings sweet at the back of my throat.
He sets his own empty hand on the counter edge, leaned in so close his belt buckle ticks against the drawer pull.
And then he’s next to me, standing a fraction too close to be casual. When he reaches for me, it isn’t dramatic—two fingers under my chin, tilting my face up so our breaths trade places. His eyes are storm-grey with flecks of silver that dart to my mouth.
His hand moves to the back of my neck. “God, you’re gorgeous,” he murmurs, his lips touching the shell of my ear.
He moves his head back, assessing me again, his eyes gentle—a far cry from their tempest in the dive bar bathroom.
The first brush is soft—lip to lip—like he’s testing something. Then pressure layers.
I sigh as my bottom lip is caught gently between both of his, his exhale filling my lungs. I taste barley and something metallic.
I should slow this down.
I don’t.
Because my only hesitation is the echo of Adrian in my ear. Heal. Heal. Heal.
Well Adrian can fuck right off.
He can’t cock-block me from Miami when I’m all the way in Ravelle, no matter how hard he tries.
So I don’t step back.
Instead, I lean in.
And then Soren’s hands are on my chest through my top, my nipples pebbling under his touch.
My hands find his hips, denim dragging under my nails as I fist shallow fabric.
He answers by parting my lips with his tongue—not invasive, just inquiry—then retreating so I follow him forward off the stool.
The fridge hum matches our breathing. He backs me two steps until my tailbone meets the counter edge, porcelain dishes clinking inside cupboards when we bump them.
His thigh slips between mine, pressure riding up until seam meets seam, and he waits for me to rock before meeting me with a slow grind that turns sparks into current.
He peels off my tank top, cool air skimming my skin and tightening everything north of my ribs. His gaze dips to my collarbone, sternum, black lace stretched thin where my ribs end. “God,” he says, hoarse, “you really are lovely.”
His words skate heat straight down my midline, my nipples peaking against the thin fabric before he even touches them. When he does, finally, it’s palm-first and then he groans, his face lighting up as his thumbs orbit the delicate silver barbells trapped between lace.
Metal transmits temperature quickly. The cold shock blooms into an ache that pools low in my core, and I lean into it.
“Jesus fuck,” he murmurs. “Just when I thought you couldn’t get any more perfect.”
His deep voice and his words, and his strong hands massaging my breasts, do something to me. My legs give—and he catches me. “Easy, stray,” he murmurs.
“What did you just call me?” I feel like I must have misheard him, the word sticking in my head.
“Stray,” he shrugs. “Why, you don’t like it?”
I roll it around, thinking about its meanings. Thinking about me, about him. About everything.
The word lands somewhere deep.
Like it fits.
I look up at him. “I love it.”
He watches every flicker across my face as if he’s memorizing coordinates—how I gasp when the bars roll under lace and then catch under callus. How my head drops when the pinch becomes a tug, then becomes a gentle torque that lifts me onto my toes. Like he’s learning me in real time.
My own moan surprises me—raw vowels bouncing off stainless steel appliances like we’re in a cathedral built for hunger.
His shirt is gone next, followed by the lace peeled down my arms which are still goose-bumped from temperature shock. His heartbeat hammers just left of center of his inked pecs, and I press my lips there to feel it knocking against cartilage.
He leans down and takes one of my nipples into his mouth. I yelp as he bites down, tugging the metal bar between his teeth—and then push into him.
We migrate without discussion, him walking me backward while kissing blind, hips steering around the couch corner and through the hallway’s narrow gauntlet adorned with skateboard decks framed as art.
My shoulder blades skim drywall in passing and leave faint sweat prints we’ll discover tomorrow like cave art.
Somehow, we make it to his bedroom. It smells darker now, resinous cedar from his cologne faded into the sheets. City lights twinkle beyond the glass balcony door.
Clarity snaps back when the mattress edge hits the back of my knees, the memory foam folding my calves upward. We tumble horizontally across the king-size expanse, atop the rumpled comforter.
He cages me from above, elbows locked. But his weight never fully settles on me, because his right hand immediately starts its journey south.
He traces my center line—sternum, solar plexus—and I tremor when he reaches my navel. He circles it once, before his thumb hooks inside the elastic waistband of my panties.
The band snaps audibly as he yanks it away from my hipbone, leading my panties and my shorts and tights south past my thighs, my ankles.
I kick them free somewhere near the footboard.
Shadows undulate as the ceiling fan spins lazily above us, slicing the moonlight into rhythmic fragments strobing across his torso.
His fingertips pause, his eyes locked on mine as he asks a silent question.
I answer by arching my hips upward, meaning yes, definitely more, yes now please.
The cold air from the fan sweeps across my already slick folds. Anticipation has been doing its work since the first barstool leg-press happened earlier in the evening.
He strokes me, teasing, and little zaps radiate from my clit throughout my body.
When he finally reaches the entrance to my pussy, he sinks one long digit inside me, breaching my opening, followed immediately by a second. “Fuck, you’re so wet,” he groans.
He curves his fingers then, a come-hither rasp across my front wall.
I moan, his calibration accurate.
His knuckles press my outer lips flush, pulling me apart. His hand presses low, grounding me. He’s distributing pressure everywhere, everything connecting all at once.
I clench rhythmically around his fingers as I rock my hips.
His third finger enters me, stretching me. It burns, delicious, borderline too much yet also not enough.
My core clenches greedily around the width, wishing it was his cock but also happy to have any part of him inside me.
His eyes are locked on mine the entire time, his eyelids refusing to blink. The grey rings of his irises are silver, like they’re an eclipse with iris storms converging inside. “Look at you, so hungry for my fingers inside you.”
I nod. “Mmmhmm,” as my hips buck against his touch, angling myself so my clit grinds against the side of his hand.
I can’t look away, his eye contact somehow making the magic he’s working with his fingers even more intense. Inside, my tension winds like a metal coil, a spring tightening with each rub and stroke.
I struggle for breath as my hips buck against his hand, angling myself so it hits in just the right place.
“Stay with me,” he instructs.
My coil twists tighter and tighter, then something snaps inside me and my back arches off the bed. I slam down on his hand, and cry out, “Fuck,” as my orgasm takes over. It shreds me from the inside out, my hips bucking and bearing down on his fingers which he continues to ram into me with force.
I let out a shapeless, wordless syllable, as if my vocal cords have been scraped raw by his effort, stars bursting behind my squeezing lids. My thighs firmly clamp around his arm, trapping his wrist as my core pulses, electricity rippling outward.
My limbs tingle, extremities buzzing. My shoulder blades kiss the mattress again only when the orgasm begins to subside.
“You liked that, didn’t you?” he smiles, continuing to fuck me with his fingers. “I can feel your pussy clenching around me. Good girl.”
My stomach drops, then tightens.
As I release around him, he slowly withdraws his glistening fingers, as if he’s deciding when I get to come down.
He lifts his hand deliberately toward his mouth, his tongue lapping between his index and middle finger. He hums in appreciation, self-evident satisfaction curving a smug smile. “Fuck, you taste so good,” he says. “I can’t wait to eat you next time.”
Even though I’ve just had an orgasm, my clit pulses at the thought of him lapping at my pussy with his tongue.
Aftershocks twitch my inner walls, as if ghost thrusts continue to echo within me.
Suddenly, the air is too thick. My lungs demand oxygen, and I roll sideways in an attempt to regulate my tempo. It’s as if I just finished a sprint or a marathon with no training.
I expect him to do more—and I’d be more than happy to keep going—but then he just… stops.
Instead of jumping on me like I expected, he slides a space between our bodies. He’s only a palm-width away, but he adjust the blankets and pulls them upward, a gesture that seems strangely tender—a juxtaposition with the ferocity of his hand only minutes ago.
It’s as if we just signed a wordless contract, my pulse felt in my throbbing clit as if it enthusiastically agrees to the terms.
He reaches over to his nightstand, then hands me his T-shirt, still smelling like him, and I pull it on.
I figured he’d want to go all the way—maybe more than once. But he’s treating me almost with deference, like he doesn’t want to spook me.
I want more. I need more.
But then his lips press against my temple, lingering. I inhale his scent, a heady combination of sweat, lime, soap and that signature cedar. I exhale as he reaches out and swipes strands of hair away from my forehead.
“Okay, time for sleep now,” he says, stroking my hair, as if he didn’t just make my back arch off the bed like an electric shock. “My beautiful stray.”
Beautiful stray.
His words roll around in my mind.
I like the way it sounds. As if it describes me accurately, but also makes something sad into something pretty.
Something special.
And I drift off to sleep—his arms wrapped tightly around me, feeling safer than I have in longer than I can remember.