28. Delilah #2
An intrusive flash hits me without warning: his fingers inside me that last morning, slow and devastating, his cock thick against my ass while I arched into his touch, the phone ringing and ringing until he pulled away.
Another: his mouth frozen against mine in the dark of the stable, those two suspended seconds before he kissed me back like he was starving.
Another: Aimie’s perfect teeth in her perfect smile.
I exhale through my nose and nudge Storm into a trot.
The world starts to bounce.
That’s when it gets worse.
The trot sends me back against him with every stride.
My ass fits into the cradle of his hips like it never learned to leave, like my body remembers exactly where it belongs even when my heart is still bleeding.
I feel him. Not just warmth. Him. The shape of him, unmistakable, the way he goes still and tense like he’s trying not to let me notice.
Too late. I notice.
Heat pools low in my belly, traitorous and liquid. I grip the reins harder, my knuckles going white.
His breath catches against my ear.
“Delilah-”
“I’m fine.”
His hands slide.
Not much. Not enough that I could call it what it is.
They move from my waist to the outside of my hips, then lower, following the bunch of the dress as it climbs.
His fingers skim the bare skin of my thigh where the cotton has given up entirely.
Just the outside of my leg. Just enough to keep me in the saddle.
Just enough that I feel the calluses. The heat. The careful, devastating slowness of a man who knows he shouldn’t and is doing it anyway.
My pulse pounds between my legs.
Tell him to stop.
I don’t.
Storm’s muscles work beneath us. The rhythm is obscene if you let it be - rise and fall, rise and fall, my body sliding back against his with every stride.
I let it be. I can’t not. Every movement drags me along the front of him, and his grip on my thigh tightens once, involuntary, before he loosens it like he’s angry at himself.
“Doctor said careful,” he murmurs, and it sounds like an excuse. It sounds like a prayer.
“This is careful?” The words come out breathless. I hate that. Hate how easily he still affects me.
His thumb traces a slow line along the hem of my dress. Along the sensitive skin just above my knee. Then higher. Not under the fabric. Not yet. Just the edge. Just the suggestion of what he could do if I let him.
My whole body leans into it before I can stop myself, a small helpless shift, and I feel him notice. Feel the way his chest expands against my back. The way his mouth is suddenly too close to the side of my throat.
He pulled away. We shouldn’t. You’re vulnerable.
I am not vulnerable now. I am furious and aching and still in love with a man I have not forgiven yet. My dress is bunched in my lap, and his hand is on my bare leg like it belongs there.
“Lucas.”
“I know.” His forehead almost touches the back of my head. His voice is wrecked. “I know.”
We should turn around. We should stop.
I give Storm his head instead.
He explodes into a gallop.
Wind in my hair. Dust in my eyes. The world blurring past in streaks of gold and green. Lucas’s arm locks around my waist, hauling me back against him so I don’t come out of the saddle, and now there is no pretending.
I am in his lap.
My back is flush to his chest. His thighs clamp around mine, holding me steady, and the dress is meaningless - a scrap of cotton that hides nothing. I can feel how hard he is against me, thick and unmistakable pressing into the curve of my ass, and the speed only makes it worse.
Every stride a grind. Every breath shared.
I’m flying.
I’m alive.
I’m the woman who tamed this horse years ago, the woman who walked into a paddock full of screaming chaos without flinching.
I am also the woman whose husband is holding her like he’ll die if he lets go, his mouth open against my hair, a sound in his throat that I feel vibrate through my entire body.
She’s back.
And she is so, so angry that she still wants this.
The wind steals my breath, whips tears from my eyes. Storm runs like he’s been waiting for this too. Lucas’s hand never leaves my waist. The other stays on my thigh, fingers spread, possessive and shaking, like he’s holding on to more than just me.
I reach down.
Put my hand over his.
For a moment he goes absolutely still. Like the dark. Like those two frozen seconds before he kissed me back in the stable.
I don’t look at him. Don’t explain. I just slide his palm higher. Under the ruined hem of my dress. Over bare skin that has been waiting for so long.
I put his hand where I want it.
Right there. Against the heat of me. Against the slick, aching center that does not care about investors or Aimie Lawson or the fact that I should hate him.
A sound tears out of him. Raw. Almost pained.
“Delilah-”
“Don’t talk.” My voice is wrecked against the wind, barely audible. “Just - don’t.”
His fingers don’t move at first. He’s shaking - I can feel the tremor running through him, through the arm banded around my waist, through the hand pressed between my thighs. The war in him is palpable: the man who didn’t choose his wife and the man he’s trying to become.
Then I press his hand harder. Roll my hips once into his palm.
Something in him breaks.
He cups me.
Slow and devastating. Two fingers dragging through the wetness he finds there, spreading me, learning me again like he’s been starving for this. His middle finger finds my clit and stays there - not rubbing, just there, pressure, the gallop doing the rest.
Every stride a filthy little grind against his hand. Against the thick line of his cock pressing into me from behind. His breath is a ruin against my neck. His arm around my waist tightens until it almost hurts.
I bite my lip and rock into his fingers anyway.
He groans into my hair. His mouth opens against the side of my neck - wet and wanting, kissing down to the join of my shoulder, back up, again, like he can’t pick a place and stay there. His arm bands my ribs, holds me so close I feel his heartbeat hammering against my spine.
His fingers finally move the way I need them.
Slow circles. Then a slide. The pad of his finger catching my clit, spreading the slickness he finds, not pushing inside - not yet - just painting me with my own arousal while Storm runs and Lucas’s mouth marks my throat and the world dissolves into sensation.
“Fuck,” he breathes against my skin, wrecked. “You’re - Christ, Delilah, you’re soaked.”
I hate that it makes me clench. I hate that I push his hand harder, that I use him, that I let him feel exactly what months of unfinished mornings have done to me.
He groans into my neck like it hurts him. Kisses harder, teeth scraping, tongue soothing.
I ride until my leg screams and my lungs burn and my face hurts from smiling.
Until the wanting and the wind and the heat of him blur into one long, impossible thing.
His mouth never leaves my throat. His hand never leaves where I put it - fingers slick, possessive, stroking me in time with Storm’s gait until I’m trembling, until I’m gasping, until the pressure builds to something unbearable.
“Let go,” he whispers against my ear. “I’ve got you.”
I shatter.
The orgasm crashes through me like a wave - sudden, devastating, pulling a cry from my throat that the wind tears away. My whole body arches back into him, his arm the only thing keeping me in the saddle, his fingers still working me through it while I shake apart.
When I finally come back to myself, Storm has slowed to a walk. I’m slumped against Lucas’s chest, boneless, my dress hopelessly tangled around my hips.
His hand slides away. Slowly. Like he doesn’t want to stop touching me.
“That was incredible,” he says. His voice is wrecked.
I laugh - or try to. It comes out shaky, overwhelmed. “I know.” A pause. “I’m incredible.”
He laughs too. The first real laugh I’ve heard from him in months. It vibrates through his chest into my back, into all the places his hands have just been.
“Yes,” he says, quieter now. Looking at my mouth. Not taking it. “You are.”
I face forward. Try to catch my breath. Neither of us mentions what just happened.
Neither of us has to.