21 #3
He kissed me again, deeper now, his tongue sliding against mine while he lifted me against him.
My legs wrapped around his waist like my body had been waiting days, months, maybe a year to get back to the place where he knew how to hold me.
He turned from the counter, one arm locked beneath me, the other spread wide over my back, and carried me down the hall like I weighed nothing.
My door was half-open.
He nudged it wider with his shoulder and stepped into my room.
The lamp near my bed was on, soft gold spilling over the rumpled comforter and the stack of books on my nightstand.
There were clothes on the chair, lip gloss tubes scattered near the mirror, a hoodie tossed across the foot of the bed, all the little pieces of my life he hadn’t been allowed to touch before.
He stopped just inside the room and looked around.
I felt him take it in.
Not sexually. Not like a man cataloging where he could put me.
Like a man finally standing in a place I lived.
My throat tightened. “What?”
His arms tightened around me. “I’ve never been in here.”
“No.”
His eyes came back to mine, and the hunger softened into something devastating. “Thank you for letting me.”
That almost undid me.
I kissed him before I could cry again.
He made a sound against my mouth and crossed to the bed, lowering me onto the mattress with a care that made the need worse. His body followed mine down, heavy enough to make me feel him everywhere, controlled enough that I knew he was still thinking, still holding something back for me.
I didn’t want anything held back.
My hands went to the hem of his hoodie, tugging. “This needs to go.”
He pushed up on one arm. “Bossy.”
“Wet.”
“Also fair.”
He sat back long enough to drag the hoodie over his head, and his shirt came with it for a second, revealing a hard strip of stomach and the V of muscle disappearing beneath his jeans before he yanked them both off.
His hair was wrecked, his mouth swollen from mine, and the look he gave me from between my knees made every thought I had scatter.
I reached for him.
He caught my hand and kissed my knuckles.
Slowly.
One by one.
Then he leaned over me again, bracing his weight on one forearm while his other hand slid into my hair, careful with my braids, his thumb moving along my temple.
“I meant it,” he said.
My breathing was already uneven. “Which part?”
“All of it.”
“That’s a lot of parts.”
“I’m a complicated man.”
“You’re a dramatic man.”
His mouth brushed mine. “That too.”
I smiled into the kiss, and he felt it. I knew he did because he went still for half a second, like my smile against his mouth was something he had missed more than he wanted to admit.
Then he kissed me like he couldn’t stand the distance anymore.
His hand moved from my hair to my waist, pushing under my sweatshirt just enough for his palm to find skin. The contact was warm and rough and familiar, and I arched into it with no pride at all. He groaned into my mouth, fingers spreading against my ribs as if he had to remind himself I was real.
My hands slid over his shoulders and down his back, his muscles jumping beneath my palms.
“Aura,” he said, voice thick.
“Don’t stop.”
“I’m not stopping.” His mouth moved to my cheek, my jaw, the corner of my mouth again, like he couldn’t decide where he needed to be most. “I’m just trying not to rush you.”
“I don’t feel rushed.”
“You’re shaking.”
“So are you.”
He looked down between us and let out a rough laugh. “Yeah. I am.”
That softened me in a place I didn’t expect.
I touched the side of his face, my thumb brushing near the fading bruise. “You’re cold.”
“I’m getting warmer.”
“Easton.”
His eyes lifted to mine. The teasing dimmed, replaced by something so focused my pulse tripped.
“I’m here,” he said.
The words were simple and didn’t feel simple.
I curled my fingers around the back of his neck and pulled him down. He came willingly, his mouth finding mine again, his body settling more fully between my thighs. The kiss turned slower for a moment, deeper, almost reverent, until I couldn’t tell where apology ended and want began.
His hand slid lower, gripping my hip, holding me still as his body pressed into mine with a restraint that made me ache.
I broke the kiss with a gasp. “East.”
He froze.
Not from hesitation.
From the name.
His eyes closed briefly, and when they opened, the look in them almost made me whisper it again just to watch him survive it.
“You can call me that,” he said, voice low. “Anytime you want.”
I swallowed. “East.”
His control fractured.
His mouth came down on mine again, and this time, the kiss went wild.
He gathered me up against him, rolling us until I was higher on the pillows and he was over me, one hand braced beside my head, the other sliding beneath my back to pull me closer.
My legs tightened around his hips, and he groaned when I moved against him, the sound rough enough to make heat flood through me.
He pulled back, breathing hard, his forehead pressed to mine. “We need to talk about rules.”
I laughed, breathless and shaking. “Right now?”
“Right now.”
“You are lying on top of me.”
“I noticed.”
“You have terrible timing.”
“I’m trying to have good timing for once in my life.”
That sobered me fast.
His hand came up, brushing my hair back from my face. “I don’t want the old rules.”
My heart stumbled.
He saw it and kept his voice steady. “I’m not saying no rules.
I’m saying I don’t want rules built out of fear and silence while we pretend they’re enough.
I want words. I want you telling me what you want, what you don’t, what changes, what stays.
I want you to trust me enough to stop me, and I want you to trust me enough to tell me yes without punishing yourself for it. ”
My eyes burned again.
“I don’t know how to do that perfectly.”
“I don’t need perfect.” His thumb brushed my lower lip. “I need honest.”
I nodded slowly. “Then honest is I want you.”
His chest moved against mine.
“I want you too.”
“I want this to be different than your apartment.”
His jaw flexed. “It already is.”
“I don’t want rage tonight.”
“No.”
“I don’t want punishment.”
His eyes softened with something fierce. “Never.”
“I don’t want you to be careful like I’m glass either.”
A faint smile touched his mouth. “Demanding.”
“Specific.”
“I can work with specific. I’ve fucked you enough to know your kink.”
I slid my hands behind him again, dragging my nails lightly up his back. His eyes went darker, and his hips pressed into mine on instinct before he caught himself.
I smiled a little. “You’re struggling.”
“I am heroically suffering.”
“That sounds dramatic.”
“You like dramatic.”
“I like you.”
His face changed.
Every playful thing between us dissolved into heat and ache.
“I love you,” he said, and this time it didn’t sound like a confession ripped out of him by pain. It sounded like a promise he had walked through rain to deliver. “I am so fucking in love with you it makes me sick every time I walk away from you.”
My lips parted.
He kissed the corner of my mouth, then my cheek, then the damp place beneath my eye where the last tear had fallen. “I’m done walking away if you are.”
“I’m done,” I whispered.
His mouth found mine again, and I opened for him, letting the kiss take me under. His hand slid beneath my sweatshirt, higher now, his palm spanning my ribs as his thumb brushed just under the edge of my bra. He paused there, his breath harsh against my lips, waiting.
I arched into his hand.
His answering sound was ruined.
“Words,” he said, barely holding on to the command.
“Yes.”
His thumb moved, slow and deliberate, and my fingers tightened on his back.
Heat spiraled low through my body, sharp enough to make me gasp against his mouth.
He kissed the sound from me, deep and hungry, his hand learning me through fabric and skin, patient until patience turned into something that shook both of us.
His skin was warm now, rain cooling at the edges, his chest rising hard beneath my hands as I touched him.
He looked down at me. “I want you naked, Aura.”
I nodded.
He didn’t rush. His fingers found the hem of my sweatshirt and lifted slowly, giving me time to change my mind with every inch. I didn’t. I raised my arms, and he pulled it over my head, dropping it beside his shirt.
The room stayed soft around us.
Lamplight. Rain. His breath on my skin. His eyes moved over me, and for one terrible second, fear tried to rise out of old habit. Then his hands settled on my waist, warm and steady.
“Just you and me,” he said.
I exhaled.
“Just us.”
He lowered his mouth to my shoulder, then the curve above my bra, kissing me like every inch deserved an apology and an introduction.
My fingers threaded through his wet hair as his mouth moved lower, his hands holding my waist, my ribs, my hips, never grabbing without giving me the chance to breathe into it first.
The tenderness made me ache worse than the roughness ever had.
“East,” I whispered.
He looked up, his mouth against my skin. “Tell me.”
I swallowed, my hips shifting beneath him. “I don’t want to think anymore.”
His eyes burned. “Then don’t.”
He came back up my body, kissing me hard enough to empty my head and soft enough to fill my chest. I wrapped my legs around him again, pulling him closer, and his restraint slipped another dangerous inch.
His hand slid down my thigh, hooking my knee higher against his hip as his body settled into the cradle of mine.
The friction made us both stop breathing.
His forehead dropped to mine. “Aura.”
I smiled, breathless and trembling, and touched his mouth with two fingers. “Yours, remember?”
His hand tightened on my thigh.
“Mine,” he said, his voice rough enough to scrape.
Then he kissed me again, and the word disappeared between us, swallowed by rain, heat, hands, and the sound of both of us finally reaching for something that wasn’t meant to hurt.