Chapter 36
Thirty-Six
CLARA
I n hindsight, I should have walked straight back out the second I heard Jesse moan. I would have been able to convince myself that it was a squeaky bedspring or the bathroom door shutting.
If I’d walked out, then I would have gone down to dinner feeling mostly normal. I mean, there was still a part of me that would have spent the entire time thinking about almost kissing Jesse and what might have happened if we hadn’t been interrupted earlier. But that would have been manageable.
But no, I just had to go into the bedroom. I had to follow that sound. The potential of that sound was too much for me to resist.
And now I was sitting at dinner, feeling uncomfortable. Jesse was sat next to me, a pale pink hue high on his cheeks, his limbs loose and relaxed, and I felt like a tightly coiled spring.
Those five minutes in that room were playing on a loop in my head. And it was worse than just replaying the almost kiss because at least anything I conjured up following that was make-believe. But the five minutes in that room were real .
The way his breath hitched when he twisted his hand. The fluid movement of his hips. The little sounds he couldn’t stop himself from making as he got closer and closer. The moment when he was almost suspended in time as he tipped over into bliss before reality caught up with him, and then he was a whimpering, quivering mess. Putty in my hands.
To add to my uncomfortable physical state—the steady pulse between my legs that felt more like an ache than anything I had ever experienced before—I was also stressing out mentally.
Had I been too bossy? Was anything I said even all that sexy? I didn’t know I had that in me and maybe it was because I was shit at it. Did he really want a ‘maybe later’ or was that just the post-orgasmic haze talking, and now that the euphoria had passed, he was done? Maybe the whole thing had just scratched an itch.
We were sharing a bed, which was bound to confuse things between us. Maybe the heat of the Marseille sun had got to him, and his brain was fuzzy. He just wanted a hand that wasn’t his, and I was there .
But what if he did want a ‘maybe later’? Was I even capable of having sex with someone else? Was I good at it? Andrew was the only person I had ever had sex with, and our sex life was basically a footnote in our relationship by the end. Did I even remember how to have sex? When was my last orgasm that hadn’t come at the hands of my vibrator? Actually, when was my last orgasm?
Somewhere in all my spiralling, I managed to eat my dinner. I might have held a conversation or two, but I couldn’t remember. The moment I noticed Dad clearing the table, I shot up, thanked him for dinner and got out of there. There was only one place I could go that would maybe shut up the noise in my head, and I was thankful I never bothered changing out of the bikini I put on earlier. Within seconds of arriving at the pool, my shoes, shorts and dress were discarded, and I dived in.
* * *
I could feel the moment Jesse arrived, but I didn’t let him distract me, and just like the other night, he didn’t interfere. I kept going until I botched a tumble turn and nearly smashed my face into the wall, signalling that it was time to stop. I swam over to Jesse, having no idea how much time had passed. The ache in my muscles and the quiet in my head suggested it had been a while.
“Hey,” I said as I settled next to him, keeping my hands to myself this time.
“Hey. You okay?” he asked gently.
I nodded. “I misjudged where the wall was, but no injuries.”
“Good, because I don’t think I could have saved you from Becky if you said otherwise.”
I laughed, my eyes dragging down his body, and my laughter stopped abruptly when I realised that my head was at crotch height. The memory of the weight of him in my hand slammed back into me, and the quiet I had earned ended.
I rested my arms on the edge of the pool, keeping clear margins between my skin and his as I looked back at his face. “Thankfully, we won’t have to find out.”
He nodded and hummed to himself. “Did you exhaust yourself out there or…?”
The silence that followed as he trailed off was thick.
His meaning was obvious, but I was drowning in doubts now that the dust had settled, and I didn’t know what I wanted.
The ache and pulsing desire that settled in my bones before dinner was begging for me to make good on ‘maybe later’. To let this man, who said he would take anything I gave him, give me everything.
But the silence went on for too long, and I didn’t break it. Not an explicit no, but not a yes, either. I waited for Jesse to be annoyed. For something to flicker over his face that suggested he was mad at me. An eye roll, or a deep sigh, a clench of his jaw. A touch on my arm in the hope of changing the outcome.
Instead, he just asked, “You getting out?”
I nodded and pushed myself out of the pool. He stood up also and picked up a towel that he must have brought with him. He held it open for me, and I stepped into it. He wrapped the towel around me, holding me for a fraction of a second before he stepped away and scooped up my discarded clothes.
* * *
He dumped my clothes in the general vicinity of the rest of my stuff when we got back to our room. I laughed to myself because he was an unpacker. His clothes were all in drawers or hung up in the wardrobe. He was meticulous about his clothes, but he accepted that I was not built that way and wasn’t going to try and change it.
“I’m gonna go take a shower,” I said.
He smiled at me and then flopped back on the bed as I locked myself in the bathroom.
Every time I was in this bathroom, my mind immediately thought about the man currently lying on our bed. At the beginning of the week, that fact made me panic, but now I believed that if I opened the bathroom door and asked him to make my dream come true, he would.
I stepped under the stream of water and tilted my head back, letting the water run through my curls, and thought about what I really wanted. If I got out of my own way, then what exactly did I want? As I drenched my hair with so much conditioner that it turned white, I came to the conclusion that I wanted to make good on ‘maybe later’. I’d been on edge since I walked into the room earlier. I’d been desperate to fall apart ever since I’d let my fingers trace along his happy trial, his stomach muscles tense as he got closer, while he stroked himself.
By the time I finished my shower, and I squeezed as much excess water out of my hair as I could, I was confident in what I wanted. And confident in the knowledge that if it changed at any point, Jesse would meet me where I was. No matter where that was.
Jesse was still lying on the bed when I left the bathroom. He looked almost exactly like he did when I walked in on him earlier, in his boxers and T-shirt, the hem rucked up, giving me a glimpse of the hair that disappeared underneath the waistband of his underwear. He looked over at me as I exited the bathroom in a cloud of grapefruit-scented steam, a gentle smile on his face.
“You good?” he asked.
I nodded as I walked over to the bed and climbed on, throwing a leg over him and straddling his hips. His hands immediately came up to rest on my thighs, his warm palms spreading against the muscles, and his thumbs started sweeping up and down.
“Still want to make good on ‘maybe later’?” I asked, my voice quiet. His hands tightened around my legs, which made my hips shift against him. He was starting to get hard in his boxers and the friction of it against my naked pussy made me gasp.
I leaned forward, my hands resting on either side of his head, and started pressing barely-there kisses along his jawline. I heard him take a deep breath through his nose, and his hands moved up underneath the bottom of my towel, his fingers hitting the crease of my thighs. My hips rocked against him.
“Is that a yes?” I teased.
He exhaled on a huff of a laugh as he released his hold of one of my legs and moved it to the back of my neck. His thumb brushed against my jaw as he directed my head away from his jaw to look at him. I gasped as I took in the intensity of his eyes. One stormy grey, the other an even more beautiful mix of blue and brown. With one look, I could see the depths of his desire, and I wanted to wrap myself up in it.
I leaned forward and finally, finally , brought our lips together.
I didn’t know if it was intentional, but our kiss played out exactly as I described it earlier. It started as a tender, almost hesitant, press of our lips. Then Jesse wrapped his other arm around my back and coaxed me closer to him. I fell onto my forearms, and our chests pressed flush against each other. The change in angle meant he could kiss me deeper.
I had never really been all that bothered by kissing before. It was fine, but not something I felt like I needed in my life all that much. But kissing Jesse made me understand why some people loved it so much. I could spend forever kissing this man, and it still wouldn’t be long enough.
I was so lost in the almost lazy push and pull of our kiss that I hadn’t noticed my hips grinding against his now fully hard cock. It was only as his hand stroked along my spine and settled on my hip, trying to halt my movement, that I fully noticed I was dry-humping him to find a release. Embarrassment flooded my veins at my wanton display, and I broke our kiss, burying my face in his neck.
“Look at me for a second,” Jesse said, his voice deep and gentle in my ear. I reluctantly lifted my head to look at him. His intense stare caught mine. “We have two options. We can stay exactly as we are, and I can try and wait until you’ve used me to finish yourself before I come in my pants, or we stop, and I’ll get you to fall apart in a different way.”
Any embarrassment I had about rutting against him like a horny teenager disappeared. While the thought of getting off like that and knowing I had the power to get him to fall apart the same way was tempting, it wasn’t what I wanted. I pushed myself up to a seated position, the head of his cock pressed against my clit, and removed my towel, leaving me completely naked.
“Fuck,” he whispered. His eyes roamed over my body with an intense heat that almost made me want to cover myself with my arms, but I resisted, sitting proudly on top of him. “Is this actually happening?” he asked as his hands skimmed up my sides, raising goose bumps along the way. “So you do turn pink in some places when you blush.” He sounded almost amused as he reached my breast, cupping it in his hand, his fingers avoiding my nipple completely, before he squeezed it gently.
“Huh?” I said, half in a daze at the assured nature of his touch.
“Your blush is rarely visible on your face. You have to really pay attention to even notice it. But your chest tells a different story; it’s such a pretty blush there,” he said as he caught my nipple between his fingers. His calloused fingertips against my peaked nipple made a breathless moan escape from me. “Oh, you weren’t joking. They are sensitive. I’m not even doing anything.” Jesse sounded reverent as he released me and rolled me onto my back.
“There are better things to joke about,” I said as I settled onto the sheets. I threw my silk-covered pillow onto the floor and rested my head on the second pillow I had there. Jesse settled in between my legs and let his hands start exploring my body. Long fingers dragged up my sides until they settled just underneath my breasts. His pinkie finger found the usually hidden tattoo by my left breast.
“It’s an apple,” he said.
“I know,” I laughed.
“Why an apple?” He stroked around the edges of the tattoo, making me shiver.
“We were young and dumb,” I managed to get out.
“So you all have apples?”
I smiled. “No, we all got dumb tattoos to commemorate finishing A Levels. I was the teacher’s pet, so, apple.”
“And you got it on the side of your boob?” His fingers started brushing inwards, getting closer and closer to my nipple.
“That was the joke. That, and I didn’t want my parents to know I got a tattoo.” His eyes dipped to my ribcage and the elaborate skull and flowers tattooed there in black ink. I laughed again. “Yeah, I stopped caring about that.”
It was his turn to laugh, a deep and throaty sound, as he removed his hands from me. Before I could mourn the loss of his touch, he pinched my nipple, and I nearly came off the bed.
“Out of curiosity, have you ever been able to come only from having your nipples played with?” He punctuated his question with another pinch, and my hand clutched the sheet beneath me.
“Yeah, once. I was on my own, though, and because it takes a while Andrew didn’t feel like giving it a go.”
His face screwed up.
“New rule, you can’t bring him up when I have you naked underneath me. Or on top of me. Maybe even at all when we’re like this.”
“That won’t be a problem.”
“Fuck, Clo, the things I want to do to you.”
My eyes settled on his crotch where I could see the outline of his cock resting heavy in his boxers.
“I think I have some idea,” I teased.
“If I play with your pretty nipples, can you make yourself come without using your hands?” he asked as he pressed his thigh in between my legs, the cotton of his boxers teasing my clit. I ground my hips against it.
“I’m going to ruin your boxers.”
“Oh, I am counting on it. Please make it so that I can never look at this pair of boxers again without thinking about the first time I got to see you come. Just one question, is there a point of pain that it stops feeling good for you and it just hurts?”
I felt a different kind of warmth flood through me as he pulled his T-shirt off, leaving his chain dangling down and brushing against my overheated skin.
“I don’t know, but if it gets too much, I’ll say…latte.”
“Deal.”
Before he even finished speaking, his fingers started rolling one of my nipples, bringing it to an even harder peak and sending sharp jolts of pleasure through me. I started grinding my hips against his thigh, feeling pressure coil deep in my belly, but something wasn’t working.
I’d never been quick to come, which was fine by myself, but historically, had pissed Andrew off, and so more often than not, I faked it so he wouldn’t feel bad. As I tried to get myself to come against Jesse’s thigh, I wondered how long it would take for him to start getting impatient enough that I would feel the need to fake it.
I hadn’t noticed that I’d stopped moving until Jesse’s voice brought me back.
“Where have you gone?” he asked as he lazily rolled my nipple. And with that one question, I knew that I would never have to fake an orgasm again.
“Get up for a second,” I said. He raised to his knees quickly, concern clouding his eyes.
“Are you okay? Did I hurt you?”
I reached out to cup his erection and squeezed it to show I was still in this. His eyes slipped shut for a moment.
“I’m fine, the angle just wasn’t right.”
I stroked along his length once before he gripped my wrist and removed my hand.
“What do you need then?”
“I need you on your back again, legs spread.”
He moved instantly. His eyes watched me hungrily as I straddled his thigh. I carefully settled my knee against his balls and leaned forward so that he could still have access to both of my breasts. My hands settled on the headboard, and I looked down at him.
His eyes flicked from my chest to my face. “You’re really testing my endurance right now, Clo.”
I rolled my hips against the cotton of his muscular thigh, pulling a groan from deep within him. “I take it this is fine then?” I teased.
He pinched my nipple, and it was my turn to moan. My hips pressed down harder against him.
“More than fine.”
I started riding his leg faster. I could feel the cotton underneath me getting wetter, and with that, the friction got better.
“Do me a favour and use your teeth,” I groaned out, moving my hands from the headboard to the mattress to make it easier for him to reach them without moving me too far away from the sweet spot I had found against his thigh.
His tongue swirled around the hard nub of my nipple, the rough texture adding a shot of pleasure through me. I could feel the pleasure coiling in my stomach, getting me closer and closer to release. Just as I was about to remind him that I asked him to use his teeth, he finally took my nipple between them and tugged.
“Shit,” I breathed, the sensation just the right side of painful. “Do that again.”
Jesse moved to the other nipple and repeated the action, overwhelming me further with pleasure. My hips sped up.
“You gonna come for me, Clo?” he whispered into the skin of my chest. I whimpered in response. “Come on, baby, be a good girl and come for me.”
He ended his sentence by biting one nipple while he pinched the other, and I went over the edge with a broken moan of Jesse’s name. Pleasure coursed through my body and made all my muscles shake as they rode through the orgasm. When I felt spent, I collapsed against Jesse’s chest. His fingers traced up and down my spine as I tried to calm my breathing and heart rate.
“No one can ever use my name again. Unless it’s you, saying it like a prayer as you fall into sheer bliss.”
I exhaled heavily. “You’re being dramatic.”
“No, I’m serious. Single hottest thing I’ve ever heard.”
I pushed up off him and slipped out of his grasp to get off the bed.
“Come back,” Jesse whined.
“I’ll be right there, just focus on getting those boxers off,” I said as I crouched by my suitcase to look for the box of condoms I told Rachel I wouldn’t need. I could see Jesse scrambling out of the corner of my eye and heard the dull thud of his underwear hitting the floor. I found the box and removed two condoms. As I stood up and turned back to the bed, my mouth went dry at the sight in front of me.
Jesse confidently stroked his cock. Despite having it in my hand earlier and feeling it swell underneath me mere moments ago, I hadn’t seen it in all its glory yet. I swallowed thickly. When I managed to drag my eyes away from his hand wrapped around himself and to his face, he wore an expression that was both smug and filled with desire.
“Remove your hand,” I said as I tore open one of the condom wrappers, threw the other one on the bed, and crawled onto him. I took him in my hand and stroked it twice before I rolled the condom on.
“You really might kill me, Clo,” he said brokenly.
I smiled as I steadied one hand on his chest for balance and the other to hold him steady as I slowly pushed him in. His hands immediately came to my hips, and we both stayed suspended in time while I took him all in. When my hips were flush against his, I tipped forward until my forearms hit the mattress and our heated chests were pressed against each other again.
“Shit. So, I’ve just realised that my hips don’t want to straddle like this anymore.” I could hear the apology in my voice.
“No worries, baby, I’ve got you.” Jesse wrapped an arm around my waist and rolled us until I was on my back, and he was on top. His voice was husky in my ear, his chain cool between us. I clenched around him at the sound of it, and a guttural sound escaped from him.
“Could you come again?” he asked through gritted teeth as he slowly pulled out and thrust back in. I slipped a hand between us and started circling my clit. Immediately, I felt pleasure start to build in my core.
“Yeah, I’ve got another one in me,” I panted, my legs wrapping around his waist to bring him closer.
“That’s my girl,” he said as he knocked my hand out of the way and replaced my fingers with his. When he found the perfect rhythm, I clenched around him again.
“Keep doing that,” I said breathlessly, grabbing onto one of his shoulders while my other hand moved to my almost too-tender nipple. With the barest of pinches, my back arched as my second orgasm took over. The waves of pleasure coursing through me were overwhelming, leaving all my muscles quivering. I was vaguely aware of Jesse’s hips still driving into me, sending shocks of pleasure through my overly sensitive body.
“There’s that prayer again.” There was a tightness to his voice.
I didn’t realise I’d said his name as I came. I smiled as I wrapped both my hands around his neck, my fingers tangling with the hair at the nape and tugging gently.
“You gonna come for me?” I leaned up to press a quick kiss to his parted mouth. “Please come for me, Jesse.”
The moment I said his name again, he stilled. I felt him pulse inside me as his orgasm tore through him.
As he came down from his orgasm, his weight pressing me into the mattress, I traced random patterns on his sweat-slicked back.
“You know, my middle name is Taylor. Is thirty too late to get people to start using it?”
I laughed and pulled him tighter to me.