Chapter 35 Kit #2
I threaded my arms around his waist. “For so long, I’ve thought I was a monster, and I thought if I told you all of this, that you…” It sounded absurd after seeing his reaction, but I couldn’t stop. “Maybe you would think that too. And maybe you couldn’t love a monster.”
“Your father was the monster,” he replied, “but you are the most beautiful soul I've ever known. You saved my life, Kit. That's who you really are. A rescuer. Protector. The man I love.” Easing back, he cupped my face in his hands and stood on his toes to press a kiss to my forehead. “I adore you, and I still think you’re perfect.”
When he settled flat on his feet, I tipped my head against his and let my eyes slide closed. The weight of shame that had dogged me for over a decade was gone. My chest felt light and, for the first time in years, I could breathe easy.
Penny stayed quiet, and his fingers continued their soothing strokes through my hair until my jaw creaked with a wide yawn. He snickered and bumped his nose against mine.
“I think we should get you into bed before you fall asleep on me.”
He ushered me under the covers, then crawled in beside me. Once we both settled, Penny pressed himself up against my back with his arm snugged around my waist. He gave me a squeeze.
“Thank you for telling me. I want you to trust me with all of you.”
I slid my hand over his and wound our fingers together. “I do. I do trust you, Pen. More than anyone else.”
His sigh tickled the back of my neck. “Good.”
Despite feeling like I could have dozed on my feet a minute before, sleep stayed teasingly out of reach.
I let my eyes wander the clear sky outside the window.
The moon was low against the clifftop and ringed in an icy halo that promised more snow the next day.
Without a single cloud to hide them, the stars seemed all the brighter.
I was too restless to lay still for long. Pinned by Penny’s arm, my movements were limited, but it only took a few minutes of fidgeting and shifting for him to tighten his hold on me.
“What’s wrong?” he asked.
“Can’t sleep.”
I shivered as his lips brushed against the back of my neck.
“I could wear you out,” he whispered, trailing kisses down and across my shoulder. His hand slipped out of mine and wandered under the hem of my shirt, fingertips tracing up my torso and making my whole body flush hot.
His kisses became more substantial as he peppered them down my neck and the back of my jaw. We were both breathing heavily by the time he shifted his attention to my ear, nipping at the lobe and dragging his hand low over my belly.
I pressed back against him, grinding purposefully against his hardness and eliciting a strangled moan.
His hand slid down, finding my stiff member and cupping it through the fabric of my pants. I let out a groan and pressed forward into his grip.
It wasn’t enough. I needed to touch him, too.
I pushed his arm off my waist and twisted around, watching the heat flare in his eyes as I settled close and left just enough space between us for our hands to maneuver. My fingers traced the shape of him beneath his pants, and he sucked a breath.
“Oh,” he whispered, “that’s nice.”
I grinned. For a man who never had a shortage of things to say, it was something else entirely to see him nearly speechless.
But then his hand slipped beneath my waistband and curled around me, and there was no room left to think about anything else.
My eyes slid closed as I gave myself over to the bliss of friction while I returned the favor.
Moments passed as pleasure overrode the emotional exhaustion of my confession, but it still wasn’t enough.
It wasn’t close enough, intimate enough, and I wanted more.
Finding the words to explain what I needed felt nearly impossible.
“You said you’d make it good for me,” I finally managed to say, “when I was ready.”
Penny’s hand stuttered to a stop. When I peeled my eyes open and met his, they were wide and hopeful.
“I want to make it good for you,” he said with a slight tremor to his voice. “I’ll make you feel good. All of you. If you'll let me.”
I nodded and eased closer. “I will. I want that. I’m ready.”
A hungry look came over him, and his throat bobbed with a hard swallow. When he released me, I missed his touch immediately, aching for the feeling of him crowded in close, against me, hands on me. He threw the blankets back as he rolled over to rise.
“Don’t move,” he said as he hurried to the door and disappeared out into the hall.
I propped myself up on an elbow and waited until he returned, now with a small ceramic crock cradled in his palm. He caught my questioning look when he set it on the bedside table, and blush splotched his cheeks.
“Oil,” he said, as if that answered everything.
He stripped out of his shirt, and I sat up to tug mine off over my head. I felt his gaze like fire over my skin. My hands shook as I tugged loose the knot cinching my pants to my waist, then wriggled out of them.
Penny’s freckled cheeks pinked as he pushed his pants off his waist. He stood before me, and his chest fluttered with hitching breaths for only a moment before he closed in once more.
He crawled onto the bed and straddled my thighs, sliding his hands up to my waist. The touch was scorching, and I remembered how cool his skin had been when he was in the grips of the poison.
I spent too many hours watching him struggle to breathe, thinking that I didn’t know how I’d face a world without him in it. How I didn’t want to.
I’d held him then, trying desperately to comfort us both. I held him again now, but everything was different. I didn’t need reassurance, just his bare flesh against mine to feed the fire raging in my gut.
He leaned in when my arms curled around his waist, and I pulled him flush so I could bury my face where neck met shoulder.
His fingers trailed through my hair while I clung to him, soothing my sudden nerves as his chest rose and fell against me.
I needed this moment, this closeness, more than I realized.
“You okay?” Penny leaned his head against mine.
Okay was an overstatement. I’d felt raw and exposed since we stepped into this room but, for once, I reveled in it.
“I’m perfect,” I whispered against his skin.
I had no more secrets keeping him at a distance. He knew every part of me, my past, and all the things that brought me to this moment. The only thing left for him to learn was my body, and I was eager for him to know that too.