Chapter Thirty-Seven #2
The kiss returns hard, immediate, deeper than before, driven by everything that has built between us.
My hand tightens at her waist, my grip firm and grounding, holding her exactly where I want her as the contact intensifies.
Leona doesn’t hold back. Her hands move again, not just holding me now, but pulling, her body pressing fully into mine, her breath breaking into the kiss, uneven but controlled.
I feel it. Track it. Stay right on the edge of it.
I don’t slow it down.
I can’t.
Not anymore.
The moment has already gone too far for that, the control I warned her about reduced to something fragile, something I’m holding onto by instinct alone instead of discipline.
And the way she stays with me—the way she doesn’t pull back, doesn’t hesitate, doesn’t break under the pressure—only drives me further.
My hand tightens again at her waist, pulling her flush against me as my other hand moves from her jaw, down along her throat, then lower, taking one nipple between my fingers and rolling it gently, playful and yet still demanding.
Her body reacts to me perfectly. She arches her back and lets a small moan escape her lips.
Something gives way in me then, hearing that sound.
“Leona.”
I say it against her mouth, my voice rough and strained in a way that doesn’t belong to me.
She doesn’t answer. Instead, her hands tighten, pulling me closer while her body shifts forward, closing what little space remains.
My hand moves again, firm and guiding, not asking.
What little control I have left is no longer restraint.
It has become direction, instinct, the darkest kind of certainty.
I hold myself there by force, keeping still where I am, giving her the space to stop this if she needs to.
Every muscle in me is locked against the urge to take more than she is ready to give.
“Still with me?”
I ask, quieter this time, but heavier for it.
“Yes.”
The word comes fast. Certain.
That is all I need.
I pull back just enough to look at her, my breathing heavier now, my control visibly fraying, something darker settling into me—not anger, not frustration.
Hunger.
“You don’t stop me,” I say, my voice low, rough with the weight of it, “unless you mean it.”
Leona’s breath catches again, her chest rising sharply, but she doesn’t look away. She doesn’t pull back. She doesn’t stop me.
Her hands tighten instead, and then she shifts—forward, deliberate, closing the last fraction of distance between us herself.
That is my answer.
With a ragged grunt, I force myself into her entrance, settling in as far as I can until I reach her center.
The heat and slickness of her nearly strip the rest of my control away, but I make myself hold there, giving her a brief moment to adjust. I watch the smallest gasp leave her lips.
I watch her body react, tense, then slowly begin to ease.
Her chest rises and falls as she forces herself to focus on her breathing, on staying here, on staying with me.
Then her gaze lifts to mine and locks there.
I watch the exact second she chooses to keep her focus on me and nothing else.
“I’m okay,” she whispers, certain. “I want this.”
The control I had been holding onto shatters.
Not all at once. Not cleanly. It gives way in pieces, each one stripped off by the way she stays with me, by the sound of her breathing, by the fact that every time I push, she answers instead of retreating.
I can feel myself turning rougher with it, more certain, more direct, every instinct in me narrowing to pressure, pace, and the need to keep her exactly where I want her.
I am not gentle. Every movement is hard, deliberate, drawn out just enough to make her feel exactly what I am doing to her. I take control of the moment completely, driving it forward, giving her no room to mistake who is setting the pace now.
Leona feels it.
I know she does.
Her breath breaks harder. Her hands tighten on me, not to stop me, not to slow me, but to hold on while I drive the moment further. Each thrust rewards me with a soft moan as she meets me thrust for thrust.
My hands stay on her, one at her waist, the other moving where I need it, grounding, guiding, holding her where I want her while the rest of me slips further out of restraint.
The pace sharpens. Every reaction she gives me makes it worse.
The way she shifts against me. The break in her breathing.
The small sounds she can’t quite hold back.
All of it keeps dragging me further under.
I can feel exactly how much she is still with me, and it makes me want more than I should take.
Then her hand comes to my chest. Not pushing. Not resisting. Just there. Enough to interrupt me by a fraction.
That catches me harder than resistance would have. My whole body pulls up short for half a beat, my focus snapping fully to her face. She is flushed, breathing hard, completely present, her eyes locked on mine with nothing absent in them. No panic. No distance. No drifting.
Only her.
Then she presses into me instead of away.
Leona looks up at me, her expression open, unguarded, flushed with something that isn’t fear, isn’t hesitation, just feeling.
Intensity. Want. Her breath is uneven, her gaze locked on mine in a way that pulls me back just enough to see her, not just feel her.
She leans into it, her hand pressing more firmly against me now, guiding instead of stopping, shifting the balance between us. I don’t resist, not this time. I let it happen. I let her move me. I let her take that control from me in a way that doesn’t break the connection but changes it completely.
I go back onto the bed, the movement controlled but unguarded now, my body yielding beneath hers as she positions herself above me, her entrance kissing the tip of my cock.
There is no hesitation in me, no attempt to reclaim it, no instinct to correct it.
My hands settle at her hips instead, firm and steady, grounding rather than directing.
My gaze never leaves hers.
Not once.
I watch her as she hovers there for a fraction of a second, the tension between us tightening again in a different way now, less about control, more about choice. About her choosing this. About her taking it for herself.
And then she does. With controlled expertise, she lowers herself down on my cock, taking all of it at once. She begins to move, finding the rhythm we had already built. I watch as she tips her head back slightly, her face turning upward as she fully takes control from me, fully takes me. I let her.
My hands stay at her hips, firm but not controlling, my grip tightening only when her movement pulls me further into it, my breathing heavier now, less controlled than I have ever allowed it to be.
I watch as she uses me for her own pleasure, rocking back and forth, up and down, her movements fluid and real.
I watch as she brings her fingers between her legs and begins to circle around her clit.
Her breath fractures and her movements lose their rhythm just enough to tell me she is right on the edge of it, her control slipping in a way that has nothing to do with fear and everything to do with feeling.
Her face changes. Not soft, not gentle. Something sharper, something raw and unguarded, breaks through instead.
Her features pull tight with it, her lips part as her breath catches, and her body tenses before releasing completely.
It is frightening and beautiful all at once.
Her blonde hair falls forward, loose around her face, spilling down as she tips her head back, her body fully in the moment, no hesitation left, no distance between what she feels and what she allows herself to show.
There is no pulling away, no holding back, only her and the way she lets herself feel it.
That is what undoes me. I feel it hit me harder than anything before it, sharper than the build, sharper than the tension, sharper than the control I had already lost. The sight of her like that, fully present, fully unguarded, fully taking it for herself, breaks something in me that hasn’t broken in a long time.
My grip tightens at her hips, not to control, not to stop, just to hold onto something as everything in me follows her over that same edge.
My breath leaves me in a rough exhale, my head dropping back for a fraction of a second before my focus snaps right back to her, like I can’t not look, can’t not see her through it.
Because it isn’t just the release.
It’s her.
The way she stayed. The way she didn’t break.
The way she took control of something that should have overwhelmed her and made it hers instead.
Even as the intensity begins to ebb, not disappearing all at once but receding in waves and leaving behind something quieter, heavier, our breathing hasn’t steadied yet.
It still comes uneven, still catches at the edges, our bodies slow to come down from something that pushed both of us further than either of us intended.
I don’t move right away. I stay where I am, my hands still at her hips, my grip no longer tight but not gone either, like I’m not ready to let go of the moment just yet.
My chest rises and falls harder than it should, my control still not fully returned, my focus locked on her in a way that hasn’t shifted since she tipped over that edge.
She is still there, not drifting, not pulling away.
Leona’s head lowers slightly, her breath still uneven as she comes back into herself, her awareness settling again piece by piece.
Her hands rest against me, no longer gripping, just there, grounded and present.
For a second, neither of us speaks. The silence isn’t empty.
It is full of everything that just happened, of everything that hasn’t been said, of the fact that neither of us stopped when we should have.