41. Queenie
CHAPTER FORTY-ONE
QUEENIE
RECOMMENDED LISTENING ‘STARLIGHT’ BY JAI WOLF, MR. GAbrIEL/ ‘ONLY’ BY RY X
Noah continues playing ball after ball for a vigorous thirty-minute session. My all-white outfit gets thoroughly splattered like I’m playing the Holi festival of colors.
He becomes better and better at reading the ball, with each shot he makes.
After the first few balls, I step aside to watch him perfect the shot that’s troubled him so. And marvel at the precise arch and curve of his body, long hands and legs working in perfect coordination, in excellent tandem…even the way his tapered chin dips toward the ball is a thing of precise definition and beauty.
I fall a little bit more for him when I see him play with absolute and total focus.
In the last fifteen minutes, I collect all the balls he’s hit over the rooftop.
When I’m done, I put them in the duffel bag.
When the last ball of the machine spits out, Noah lets it go and walks towards me. He even throws his helmet and bat on the ground.
We meet in the middle of the rooftop.
“Well?” I hold a red season ball. “What do you think? Think you can hit the perfect four through the covers in the next match?”
He sweeps me off my feet and hoists me up over his waist. I shriek and yell. Then he swings me around, while I hold onto his neck with both hands, digging grooves into his shoulders. His skin.
“Can you not do that? It’s scary!”
Noah lets me slide down his sweaty and color-filled length. And kisses me on the nose. “Now you know how I felt like when you stood in front of me.”
“But I got the result I wanted. So did you,” I retort indignantly.
“I had to. Your parents would have murdered me if I let a ball flying at two hundred kilometers per hour hit your pretty face.” He sounds so aggrieved and relieved at the same time. “Plus, I like your pretty face too much.”
I giggle at his convoluted reasoning. “Actually, my sister would totally approve of you. She’d forgive you my murder because you’re so hot and have a cute butt.”
“Oh yeah?” He kisses me a little harder on the lips. “And what does her sister think of me?”
“Her sister thinks you need a shower because you stink. And I need to lie down because I’m going to collapse in a boneless heap after swinging that bat like a maniac for ten minutes!” But I bite his lower lip and then soothe it with a luscious kiss.
“Her sister likes your pretty face too,” I say against his lips.
His sculpted cheeks billow out with the force of his feelings. His eyes are obsidian again. But I can read the flashes of tectonic emotion in them. They’re deep, depthless even. And they exist just for me. A line of sweat runs down his philtrum. He’s flushed with a warrior-like glow.
It just delineates how incredibly ridiculously handsome he is. My dark-haired, dark-eyed warrior.
He cups my jaw in his hands and kisses my forehead. “Thank you,” Noah says gravely. “I’ll never forget this gift as long as I live. Thank you for this, Queenie.”
I hold his hands in mine. I don’t answer. But the words carve a home for themselves in my newly awakened heart.
And I’ll never forget you as long as I live.
I direct Noah to the facilities on the first floor where he takes a well-deserved shower, while I set up the rest of our date. Rain starts pattering the glass from above, providing a natural background music to the night.
I absolutely have to thank the boys, Fox, Ares, Simon, and Jace, for helping set this up. Fox and Ares grumbled no end while they calibrated the machine to Noah’s height and filled it with paintballs. They dragged it to the rooftop with Jace and Simon’s help.
Simon called the daughter of the House of Niamh owners and got her to open the place for me. Jace helped me with the rest of it because Mischa had to watch her siblings for the night.
When Noah walks back to the rooftop, he’s in the same outfit he’d worn the night we first met.
I pause in setting out our picnic dinner and watch him move toward me.
He’s lean-hipped and long-legged. But he doesn’t move in a gangly or awkward way. There is an athletic grace to his movements, punctuated by when he isn’t holding the bat or running on the field.
His unbuttoned dark blue-black dress shirt flies behind him, as he adjusts the Henley he wears over casual jeans. I told him to discard his shoes because of the picnic blanket situation.
It’s criminal how good he looks in simple clothes. And how badly I want him out of them.
He smiles, goofy and pleased. “You changed too?”
I point at my ruined cricket whites folded neatly at the edge of the picnic blanket I’d set up over a large sleeping bag. “I just shimmied out of them.”
I’m wearing a simple red summer dress which ties in a halter knot at the base of my neck. And I tied my hair up in a bun because it is too freaking hot, and the exertions left me sweating. And I’m braless for the first time in…ever.
Noah kneels down and places the daisy he’d worn, behind my ear. “Hey, daisy girl,” he says softly.
My breath hitches. “I thought it was desi.”
“I like daisy better. Mum would love it.” He picks up a cracker and dips it in caviar before popping it whole in his mouth.
“What else did your mom love?” I finish setting up the last of our dinner and sit cross-legged in front of him.
“Seashells,” he answers. “We used to walk the beach at Darling Beach, the Sydney Harbor Front, and collect shells. She had a whole jar full of them.” His smile is pure nostalgia as he has another cracker.
Then he sighs and lies down on his elbows on the blanket. “Not that I don’t appreciate all this…but…what brought this on?” He waves a hand around the blanket.
I’m a little mesmerized by the veins sticking out of his hand, since he’s pushed the sleeves of his shirt up. There’s also a dusting of light black hair there. I want to touch them.
“I…” I take a deep breath. His gaze immediately dips to my chest. I tingle there. “I don’t like being indebted to anyone. I think it’s the whole immigrant coming to America thing. And my parents are extremely self-dependent. They encouraged it in my sister and me.”
“Okay.” His eyes are so patient, so focused on me. It makes it easier and harder to talk to him. Face to face, like this.
“I really thought I had this year and all its problems under control. But then I met you and –” I give him a weak smile. Tuck my flying hair behind my ear. Try to put into words what he’s done for me; what it means for me. “I am not going to list everything you’ve done which includes giving me your actual bed to sleep in and rescuing me from a terrible, public scandal.”
“Let’s not forget the multiple orgasms.” Noah winks at me.
I put a hand on his firm thigh. He stills immediately. “I’m trying to tell you something here.”
“You don’t have to thank me for what I’ve done, Queenie.” He puts his hand over mine.
“No. This is not thank you.” I shake my head. “This is—” I search for the right word. “A gift.”
“A gift,” he echoes.
“Yes.” I nod. “I want to give you something, heaps of things,” I echo his words from long ago. “So, you can see what you mean to me.”
“You fixed my brain for me, Queenie. That’s priceless.” He twines our fingers together. “There’s no gift big enough I can give you back.”
“That’s not—” I shake my head. And some of my hair falls forward. I go to push it back when Noah says, “Let it be. Please?”
I let it brush against my cheek while the rain plays a symphony to my confession. “I’ve not told anyone about the neuroscience thing. And you were so immediately supportive of my choice I could just hug you for it, you know.”
He widens his arms. “I’m yours to hug anytime, Hellcat.”
“And then…” I worry the picnic blanket. “I…” I swallow and continue, “I have never had an honest-to-god romantic date.”
“Are the men in Connecticut blind or stupid?” His peeved question bolsters my courage.
“I have had dates before,” I say quickly. “And I’ve even done it with other guys.”
“Who are these other guys and where do I find them?” Now he sounds quietly dangerous.
I laugh at him. “Come on.” He looks grimly at me. “It was a long time ago. I haven’t been with anyone since senior year began. It just got too hectic, and I am a focused person.”
Noah inches my dress up at the knees. “I love it when your focus is on me.”
“Anyway.” I push his hand away. “This one is for me as well as you. The night we met doesn’t count because we didn’t call it a date, right?”
He nods. “Okay?—”
“So, I wanted to have a date with you. A real, romantic date. A picnic dinner under the stars and rain.”
“I thought you were a prickly, pragmatic woman who hates all that.” He tugs me forward. “I didn’t know you were a closet romantic.”
I land on his chest with a thump. And push myself up on my elbows. “You’re not…you’re okay with this being a real date?” I ask him, worriedly. “I know we haven’t talked about it or defined it but?—”
“Do you know how long I’ve been waiting to take you on a real date?” Noah spears a hand into my hair, dislodges half the bun. “Do you have any idea?” He asks roughly.
“How long?” I look into his eyes and try and discern what he’s feeling. Whether he’s on the same page as me.
“Too fucking long. If you were dating Teddy Durham, I’d have made you break up with him. That’s how long,” he answers grimly.
I chuckle faintly. “You’re being overdramatic. Teddy never liked me. He only saw me as the girl who served him cake and tea.”
“Teddy’s a fucking idiot. But I’m grateful to him.” He urges me closer to him. Our lips and breaths are aligned now. I’m half sprawled over him. “His loss is very much my win.”
“I’m not a prize to be won, Noah.” I try and push away from him.
But he holds me in place. With just one hand on my skull. His eyes are dark and unfathomable. A lock of his wet hair falling on his forehead. “You’re the prize, Queenie. No one in my life has ever done what you just did for me. You saw a problem in my game and fixed it.”
“I could have got us both concussed. It could have gone either way,” I remind him.
He shakes his head. “Nah. You’re Queenie Madhavan.” He smiles, slow and devilish. “Everything you do is perfect.”
I smile, pleased. A blush climbs my cheeks. “Stop talking, you liar.”
“I’m just following the script of the romantic date.” Noah kisses the tip of my nose. “Compliments. Check. Now it’s time for the kiss.”
“We should eat. The dinner’s going to get cold,” I protest half-heartedly. But I inch closer to him anyway.
The want inside me is a living, breathing entity. Separate and disparate. Reckless and consuming.
“I don’t mind.” He kisses the side of my chin. Soft and sweet. Endlessly seductive.
My knees go weak and I’m half-lying on him. “The wine needs to breathe.”
“It can suffocate.” Noah runs a shaking hand down my arm. Takes my palm in his and presses a kiss to it.
I tug my hand back. “That’s the kiss, then. Now let’s do dinner.”
Noah shakes his head. Slow and deliberate. “No. I want dessert first.”
His hair tickles my neck, springing chills all over my skin. I melt into him. I give into him.
“I should at least put away the food.” I sigh against his hand, kissing the rough palm.
“You do that. I’m eating.” He kisses his way up my arm.
I turn around awkwardly, anticipation and desire turning my belly into a shivering mass. He is a hot, male, insistent presence at my back. Plastered skin to skin against me.
Noah kisses the sweaty nape of my neck as I gather the watercress and lobster salad platter I’d ordered from Domenico’s, the fanciest restaurant in town. I place it in the basket. My sandwiches are in the wrapping paper, untouched.
He cups my breasts and squeezes them when I put the nibbling bread away. My breath hitches and I almost go cross-eyed from the pleasure.
I reach over and grab the crackers and caviar, going into a cat cow pose. He pushes his erection into me, and I shudder in response.
“I want to take you like this. You on all fours and open for me. In every way,” Noah murmurs the sinful words in my hot ear.
I choke on air. Grasp at his hand, around my waist, while I hurriedly shove the crackers into the basket. They make a crackling sound as they break and fall.
He pulls my floaty skirt up, inch by inch and bares my legs and thighs to the cool night air.
Lightning strikes above followed by a crack of thunder. BOOM!
I almost jump out of my skin at the sound. And the sensation of Noah’s rough fingers skimming the wet gusset of my panties.
“I—” I think I love you , I think wildly, disjointedly to myself.
“Don’t talk,” he instructs. He kisses the side of my neck. Licks it. “Don’t think.”
I shudder endlessly and put an arm around his neck to brace myself.
“Do you have any idea what you do to me?” Noah kisses my bare shoulders and the blades. “Do you?”
I shiver delicately. “I’m just me,” I strangle out. Holding him tighter. “I’m just me,” I repeat, helplessly.
And really, I don’t get it. My want for Noah has been intellectualized from the first day. He is handsome and pretty and decent and fun. And I am crazy about the V at his pelvis. And he plays cricket like a fucking god.
“Exactly.” He sweeps the half-falling bun to the other side. Finding new and sensitive places to kiss, lick, and suck. “Exactly.”
In that moment, surrounded by his freshly showered scent, his heavy words reverberating through my skin, dewing me inside and out; I want to believe him.
I do believe him.
I reach for the tie at my nape, but he drags my hand down and places it on the front of his jeans. We unzip his fly together. Bumping over the erection jutting out of his boxers. So proud and hot and hard.
All mine.
I grasp him in one hand while he tips my head up and kisses me deeply. Deeply. My cheeks go hollow from the force and strength of his kiss. Still, I want more. I am half-pretzeled as I kiss him and devour him as much as he does me.
I stroke him, firmly. Like he’s shown me.
Now, he trembles. I don’t let go, kissing him harder, stroking him harder.
He cups my breasts inside the dress and brushes knowing thumbs over the stiff peaks. I gasp-moan in his mouth. He does it harder. Pinching at my nipples. The electrifying shock of it runs from my navel to my womb, squeezing it tight.
“Are you wet for me?” He grunts.
I nod, desperately. Eagerly. Unashamed. “Yes, yes,” I pant out.
“Show me.”
I take his hand, and we lift my rucked-up skirt together. My knees are shaky, my spine is gooey, so I rest more of my weight on his strong thighs, his waist.
The chilly night air hits my wet panties. And I shove the elastic aside and guide his fingers in. When I turn to remove my hand, he shakes his head.
“No. Stay.”
My heart thuds erratically, out of control, as Noah pushes one finger in slowly, slowly. Along with mine. And I sense, feel my own arousal. Sticky and wet and endless.
I shudder again. Beyond control. Beyond all rational thought.
He goes knuckle deep in and I feel the stretch and burn of our combined fingers inside me.
“One more.” He bands his hand over my tits, pressing tight against me, pressing me to his chest, widening my thighs with his knees. I try and grip and stroke him harder through the jeans, through the tight fit.
It is heaven and hell at the same time.
In this new position, he is able to glide one more finger in. And then I do too.
“It’s…Aaah!”
I grip his cock hard, digging into the velvet soft skin. The sensation of having him fill me like this, to the brim and more…while he surrounds me, so I’m almost trapped against him, is terrifying. Arousing.
He works the knot of my tie with his teeth, while he pumps our fingers in and out of me. I stroke him harder and harder. I feel a bit of precum coating my hand. And it makes me gush even more.
“God, you’re so tight. So perfect,” he groans.
The knot falls off. Noah moves his hand an inch, the dress slides off my chest. So, it’s only him covering me. Inside and out.
“I’m close. I’m so close,” I pant out.
I stroke him recklessly, hurriedly. And he pushes into my hand, growing impossibly harder. He sucks the tender place where my shoulder meets my arm, leaving bite-sized marks. Love bites.
“I want to taste you,” he rasps out. “I need to…”
He doesn’t give me time to think. To wonder. To worry. He just turns me on the blanket and follows me down. Taking the dress with his hands. I try and keep my screams in, because he’s still fucking me with our fingers. The pressure builds inside me like a wave drowning me.
He takes my panties with the dress, so I’m completely, completely naked in front of him.
I go to cover my chest but the look in his obsidian eyes is obliterating. He looks like a man possessed. A man devoted. His eyes are slits, nostrils flared, pink lips parted, like he’s forgotten how to breathe.
A gasp bellows out of his chest, rumbling into me.
I let myself be seen. Touching his hair, his face, his shoulder instead. He’s hot to the touch. Incendiary.
“Fuck.” He stresses.
Then, he kisses my stomach. Every inch of it, while still fucking me. Endlessly, mindlessly.
I’m coming a little. Because I can’t help it. But he knows my body well now. So, he slows down the pace. And swirls his fingers around.
“Noah!” I gasp out, half-threat, half-plea.
He goes down, sucking on my navel. And more liquid pours out of me with the suction. I arch my back and dig my heels into the ground.
He stretches against me and noses my wet, messy core.
“Better than pie,” he murmurs. Then he winks at me. The fiend winks.
“Fuck you!” I pant in anger, pulling at his hair in an effort to torture him.
“You’re going to, absolutely.”
Then he eats at me. Licking and sucking up and down my entrance. Going deep into my folds and using his fucking tongue. Each lap wrings more shocks of pleasure in me. Each stroke makes me see stars.
I stuff my hand in my mouth, taste myself.
He swipes over my entrance once more. I scream and come. And come and come.
Then he swirls his teeth over my clit.
And I whimper. Because another climax hits me on the heels of the last one. I clutch at his shoulders, digging my heels deep into the ground.
I’m afraid I’ll fly apart.
Noah cups my butt and squeezes. Holds me by the pelvic bones, open and at his pleasure.
And does it all over again, until I’m writhing and twisting. Unable to take the pleasure he’s giving me, unable to stop him from doing so.
“Please,” I sob out. Tears run down the corner of my tightly shut eyes.
He finally lets me wring out the last aftershocks of the orgasm, which clenches my core so tight and hard, I die for a moment. His tongue pads my core, making it his in a way I’ll never be able to erase.
When he finally comes up, he licks his lips. Like I’m a tasty dessert.
I can’t help it. I blush. All over again.
Noah watches my tits flood with color. And his eyes go obsidian again. He cups them both in one wet hand and sucks on them. Hard. Then soft. Then hard again. His cheeks hollow from the effort.
I go wet again. And again. Unable to control the impulses, the desire he ignites in me.
But I want to taste him too. To feel him too. To drive him over the edge too. So, I push at his chest. And, by some miracle, he backs down. I throw a leg over his waist and clamber on top of him.
He plays with my undone hair, wrapping them in his fist while I kiss him. Eating at his face, his mouth. I bite at his collarbone, where the faintest scar rises in a ridge against his unmarred skin.
I mark his fast-beating heart with repeated kisses. He clenches and unclenches on my hair; but lets me do what I want.
I shove off his tee shirt and he raises his arms willingly. Just looking at me with unreadable eyes. Damning me with them. I am mindless, a creature driven by instincts and impulses. Want. Need. Lust. Craving.
I kiss his Adam’s apple, when he swallows hard. His skin’s salty sweet with sweat and musk. I kiss the daisy tattoo over his heart. Owning it a little. His other hand shoots up to my skull.
I slither down his magnificent chest. I suck at his nipples, raising them to wet points. And he presses me closer to his skin. I play with and mark all six of his abs. Perfectly cut, perfectly honed. Perfectly earned. Then, I come to the Adonis Dimples.
He groans when I bite them both. Just a little. He smells of musky sweat here. It’s incredibly arousing. And then he says, “Do it again.”
So, I do it again. This time, hard. And his cock surges against me. Impossibly, unbelievably hard. The veins are sticking out, purple. I grasp him in one hand and push his chest down. I stroke him, one, twice, thrice.
“Queenie, my pants.” He arches against me.
“Fuck the pants.”
I kiss my way down his happy trail.
“You don’t…” He touches my hair. My shoulder. His hand is shaking. Trembling. Even his voice is unsteady. Unmoored. “You don’t have to?—”
I kiss the nest of curls around his cock. “I know.”
I take him in my mouth. My spine tingles, because he feels so good, so full, and so Noah. I move up and down his length, experimentally, and he curses.
“Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.” He also grabs my hair and holds it in a rough, caressing hand.
I move harder on him, trying to take more of him. My teeth hit his sensitive skin, and I suck on him like a lollipop.
“God. Fuck. No. Yes!” Noah gasps out. He is unrecognizable.
I do the same he did to me. I grab his superfine ass and hold it. Squeeze it. He flexes reflexively into me. And pushes more of his length down my mouth. I feel him hit the back of my throat. Impossibly full, filling me up.
“Queenie, please, let me fuck you,” he begs.
“You are,” I talk around his dick.
He shakes his head. “Properly. Inside you.”
But I want to make you come. I think. And I’m so amazed by the thought, by the idea of having him climaxing inside my mouth for the first time in my life , I stop for a moment.
Noah takes full advantage of my lethargy. And kisses me full on the lips.
He also hurriedly shoves his jeans and boxers off; they fall on the opened food hamper. I barely have time to think of the hygiene of it all, when he tears open protection and jerks it on in rough, uncoordinated movements. His cock weeps with precum.
Then Noah climbs over me. My head hits the edge of the blanket, so the stark cold of the stone floor hits me. I gasp from the heat and chill of it all.
“Turn around. Okay?”
“Okay.”
He turns me around. Now I can feel him all over my back, my flanks, my knees.
His eyes are glazed, possessed. He just jerks my legs apart and raises me by the hips. I automatically support myself on my elbows because he is a hulking presence all around me. His longer length surrounds me like a great beast, a shadow I can’t escape, a lover who demands everything.
Every. Thing.
He pushes into me, from the back. Slow. Controlled.
I arch and cry out, reflexively moving into him. He holds me in place with his hands on my back, my stomach.
I tremble to keep still, letting him move at his pace. But my heart’s out of control and I see dark spots.
A drop of his sweat falls on my back.
It’s. So. Hot.
My lips part. Eager for him. For any part of him.
As if he’s read my mind, he cups my cheek and gives me a finger to suck on while he feeds into me slowly. The invasion true and never-ending. A tight burn I crave more than my next breath.
I bite and suck, my core contracting with each inch he gives me. When he’s buried to the hilt, he bends over me. And cups my tits.
“ Fuck,” he breathes, right into my ear. And bites it. “Fuck, Queenie.”
I shudder against him. Desperate for friction. For movement. For release.
But he doesn’t move. His knees shake too, his thighs flex too. But he doesn’t move.
“Move!” I beg him. “Move, please!” I turn my head and fix him with a desperate glare. Very aware of how undone, how completely messy I am.
“I want.” He clenches his jaw. “To make.” He puts a hand on my back. And I arch like a cat against his touch. Tactile and needy. “This last.”
So, I move against him. Sinuously. Seductively.
He hits a spot inside me, and I groan. My arms tremble from effort and completion.
Noah finally moves. Stretching me so deliciously, I feel flayed. Like the sun is beating down on my skin and I am burning from it. He strokes out completely before slamming back in.
I stifle my scream and throw my head down.
He does it again. I move to meet him for the stroke. It’s unbearably heated. Unutterably sinful. It’s everything I dreamed of and read about.
My channel squeezes him when he moves inside and protests when he leaves.
Our dance turns slow, syrupy. His movements are controlled by my breaths. My breaths are controlled by his cock. I strain toward my peak. Wanting it. Fighting it. Loving it. Hating it.
Colors explode in my eyes, painted on the back of my lids.
Noah grabs my chin and kisses me roughly. And he moves. Fast. Too fast. So fast, I lose my breath, my mind, any semblance of control. Any illusion of being my own person.
I become entirely his.
He rubs a sure, knowing, rough thumb on my clit. And fucks a finger inside me. Swirls it.
I shiver delicately, endlessly as I come. The orgasm takes me under. Taking me over. Taking me away from this earth. I’m unmoored. Unanchored. I’m all feeling and skin and sensation.
I kiss him and sob against his mouth.
He grunts, his sweaty-wet hair falling over my cheek, my jaw. Tickling me. Owning me yet another way.
“Come for me. Come with me,” I tell him softly. Or maybe I just think it.
But I nuzzle into him, letting him take all of me. My weight. My worry. My self. I touch his right leg, the femur holding a ridged scar, thick and brown. I run my hands down it. Loving it, loving him.
And he flexes into me in preparation of his climax.
I know his body too. I know how he moves and what he wants. So, I move my wet cunt into his hand. Give him more access into me.
And he comes for me. Comes with me. Saying my name and fuck and God against my lips, like a prayer. Like the only words in the universe.
He opens his depthless eyes at the last moment, as I feel him jet over and over into me. Filling me up with himself, giving me all of himself.
It’s wild. It’s catastrophic. It’s everything I have ever wanted in the secret corners of my pragmatic, protected heart.
It happens. The thing I never expected to happen. The thing that changes everything. Changes me.
I fall. Fast. Hard. Forever.
I fall the last little bit in love with Noah Calvin Dumaine. And I don’t come back from it.