Chapter 24 #2
“We’re going to take as long as we need to take,” he says. “And if that means edging you for hours, then it’s hours.”
Hours.
The thought of us, like this, for hours looms in my brain like a powder keg and a discarded match.
“But we’re not rushing this,” he says. “Understood?”
I nod, feeling light-headed.
“Good girl.” Then he picks me up, guiding my legs around his waist as he carries me to the bed.
His breath is hot against my neck as he lowers me down onto the mattress. “Lift your hips,” he murmurs.
I do as I’m told, and he slides my shorts down my legs.
His mouth curls up. “Nice knickers.”
I look down just in time to remember the very unsexy pair of gray cotton underwear I hastily threw on before going to Bella’s room. “I was dressing with espionage in mind,” I say. “Not this.”
“And this is how you usually dress for espionage?”
“No, but I was all out of camo, and I tragically left my black latex at home.”
“That’s too bad,” he says, hooking his thumbs in the waistband. “You always looked sexy in black.”
“Everyone looks good in black,” I point out.
“But not everyone is you,” he says, his heated eyes catching mine. Then, with a flourish, he tugs my underwear off and stows them in the pocket of his shorts.
“A souvenir?”
“It was this or a Hawaiian T-shirt I saw in the gift shop,” he says with a smirk before dipping his gaze between my legs. “Fuck,” he whispers, looking utterly wrecked at the sight of me.
“You act like you’ve never seen me naked before,” I tease.
“Yeah well…” His throat bounces as he swallows. “It’s not exactly something I tire of.”
Dark eyes trail up and over me, pausing, lingering, then starting over like he’s attempting to memorize every inch of me, a different kind of souvenir.
But he only lets himself savor the view a moment longer before he’s right there, on top of me, chest to chest, kissing down the length of my neck, pausing only to pull my shirt up and over my head before continuing south.
I arch my back, pushing my hips upward. “Please.”
“Please what?”
“Please take your pants off.” I reach for his belt buckle, desperate for him, but he brushes my hands aside.
“Slow down,” he commands.
I sit up on my elbows. “Are you purposely trying to torture me? Because it’s working. What do you want? Government secrets?”
His lips quirk with amusement. “Do you know any government secrets?”
“No, but trust me, if I did, I’d give them up right now.”
“As thankful as I am to know you’re not the one with the nuke codes, I’m taking my time with you, Ros.”
He positions himself right between my legs, his beard scratching my inner thighs as he draws slow, agonizing circles with his tongue. I squirm, thrusting my hips to meet the pressure of his mouth, now delirious with want, but he continues to make good on his promise—or threat—to take his time.
When finally—finally—his mouth is on me, the strokes of his tongue are slow, drawn out, and painfully restrained as he eases back and forth, in and out, keeping my orgasm within sight but just—just—out of reach. A skill that is as delicious as it is frustrating.
“I forgot how good this felt,” I pant, gripping a fistful of sheets.
“I didn’t.”
I let out a string of moans interspersed with breathless pleas of yes and more until he nudges my legs far enough apart that he can slide one long finger inside me. A low, whiny sob breaks in my throat.
“I know, baby.” His voice rumbles across my skin, rewriting my DNA with each breath. “You needed this, didn’t you?”
All I can do is moan my response. I’m so close. Embarrassingly close. And he can tell.
“That’s it,” he praises. “Come hard for me.” So I do, crying out low, trembling whines as my orgasm rips through me.
It’s been so long since I’ve come from anything other than my vibrator or my hand, and it’s so perfect, exactly what I needed and how I needed it.
Not just the orgasm itself, but him. Him touching me the way only he knows how.
Him, pulling me apart and putting me back together again. Him, taking control.
After the last shock waves of orgasm have subsided, I open my eyes to find Liam looking up at me from between my thighs, eyes wide and worshipful, and suddenly I can’t wait another minute. I need him inside me.
“Please,” I beg, and this time he obliges.
His weight settles on top of me and my hands slide under his shirt, desperate and possessive.
Mine, I think with feral instinct as I trace the lines on his chest, but the thought is quickly replaced with no, not mine. But mine for tonight. Mine for the next hour. Mine for however long this moment lasts.
It’s this thought that slows me down, undoing his belt and tugging down his boxers with careful precision. If this is all I get, I don’t plan on wasting it.
But my carefulness lasts only a beat before I’m pressed against the mattress, his hands curling around the nape of my neck, his mouth beckoning mine open in a maneuver he knows I used to like. Still like.
“Is this still what you want, Ros?” He takes my bottom lip between his teeth, biting hard enough to send a sting of pleasure and pain through my body.
“Yes,” I gasp, needing him so badly, literal tears prick my eyes. “Fuck me, Liam. Please.”
I’m so desperate, so eager, that it’s not until he’s right there that a realization strikes hot against my core.
I jerk back. “Wait.”
Liam’s body stiffens. “What’s wrong?”
Something swells at the base of my throat, acutely aware that this isn’t an easy topic to navigate.
The last time we talked about condoms was nine years ago.
We used them until becoming exclusive, after which they hadn’t seemed necessary anymore.
I was on the pill, and we weren’t seeing other people.
But now everything is different. Now there’s no longer a safety net of commitment and exclusivity between us.
Liam might have said he hasn’t needed the condoms in his wallet, but I don’t want to make assumptions about what that does or doesn’t mean.
I lick my lips, swallowing a tentative breath before I finally ask, “Should you wear a condom?”
For a string of seconds, he just blinks at me, then slowly comprehension ripples through his features. “I haven’t been with anyone else.” Then in a choked voice, he asks, “Have you?”
All my organs switch places.
“I haven’t either.”
Our eyes meet, a silent accord passing between us, but what it means, I’m not sure, only that everything in me is suddenly wound tight.
“You’re still on birth control?” he asks.
I nod. It’s such a clinical question. And yet here with him, it feels heavy, laden with subtext.
“I can wear one if you want,” he says.
“You don’t have to. Unless you want to,” I add quickly.
“Not really,” he says, blushing like he’s embarrassed to admit what we both know, that it feels much better without.
He blinks. I swallow. Another beat of silence passes. Then finally, he’s right there and I’m saying his name over and over in a string of whiny, trembling pleas.
It’s better than I remember. Not just the feeling of him thrusting inside me, smooth and strong, pausing, then doing it again, but the way we move together with a kind of practiced fluency, a language we’ve spent years learning and mastering.
We breathe in tandem, our foreheads pressed together as he grips my hips, angling deeper, sweat dripping down his neck, his chest.
Liam might be more of the strong-and-silent type elsewhere, but in bed he coaches me through everything.
Open your legs wider for me, baby, that’s it.
Good girl. Can you take me deeper? Yes. Just like that.
Keep making those pretty sounds for me. But the closer he gets, the less he talks, until his movement is punctuated only by a score of muffled moans, thrusts losing all sense of consistency as our bodies crash into each other with needy, desperate force.
My own exhales come in shallow, tempered bursts, senses narrowing to the points where our bodies meet. Where our limbs are so intertwined, it’s impossible to tell where I end, and he begins.
Closure, I tell myself. You’re getting closure. That’s all this is. But the mantra dulls under the weight of his body, the way my blood hums with a singular rhythm.
Him, him, him, it chants, like little electric currents firing off between us, pulling us closer, deeper.
His pace picks up, losing any semblance of tempo or structure, and it’s suddenly too much. Too soon. All of it. The slick wetness coating the inside of my thighs. His scorched breath on my neck. The decadent pressure of him inside me.
There’s one more strangled moan, one more collective gasp, then his eyes claim mine, blown-out pupils holding me captive as we unravel together.