28. Luisa
— ? —
Luisa
The dishes sat in the sink like a reproach.
I turned on the water, squirted soap onto a sponge, and began scrubbing the wine glasses with far more intensity than they required.
Behind me, I could hear Wade moving through the living room, collecting napkins, straightening cushions, being helpful in a way that made my skin prickle with awareness.
Neither of us spoke.
The silence wasn’t uncomfortable, exactly. It was the kind of loaded quiet that happens when two people are both painfully aware of each other’s bodies and neither one will say so out loud.
I scrubbed harder.
“You’re going to break that glass.”
His voice came from directly behind me. Close. Too close. He was a wall of heat at my back, every hard inch of him printed against my dress.
“I’m cleaning it.”
“You’re punishing it.”
I rinsed the glass, set it in the drying rack, reached for another one. “Did you enjoy yourself? At book club?”
“Immensely.”
“You asked a lot of questions.”
“I was curious.” He reached past me to grab a towel, his arm brushing mine. “The worldbuilding was surprisingly complex.”
“It’s a werewolf romance, Wade. The worldbuilding is ‘hot man turns into wolf and has sex.’”
“You’re underselling it.” He started drying the glasses I’d washed, standing so close our elbows kept touching. “There’s the whole mate bond system. The pack hierarchy. The territorial instincts.”
“You sound like you’re writing a dissertation.”
“Maybe I am.” He set down a dried glass, picked up another. “Maybe I’ve discovered a new academic interest.”
I snorted. Actually snorted, like some kind of farm animal. “You’re making fun of me.”
“I’m absolutely not making fun of you.”
“You’re standing in my kitchen discussing werewolf mating rituals with a completely straight face.”
“Because I find them fascinating.”
I turned off the water. Dried my hands. Turned to face him.
He was closer than I’d realized. Close enough that I had to tilt my head back to meet his eyes. So close I could make out the flecks of gold in his irises, the faint stubble along his jaw, the slight curve of his mouth that suggested he was enjoying this far too much.
“Why are you really here?” I asked.
“I brought you flowers.”
“You brought me flowers and then stayed for an hour of explicit supernatural fiction.”
“The flowers were the excuse. The fiction was a bonus.”
“Wade-”
“I wanted to see you.” His voice dropped. Softened. “I spent the whole day thinking about you. About last night. About the way you looked at me at the festival.”
My heart stuttered. “How did I look at you?”
“Like you were trying to decide whether to kiss me or kill me.”
“Those aren’t mutually exclusive.”
“I know.” He smiled. “That’s what I like about you.”
For a beat neither of us moved, the kitchen quiet around us, the evening light filtering through the window and turning everything gold. I could hear the distant sound of crickets. The soft hum of the refrigerator. My own pulse, loud in my ears.
“The living room,” I said finally. “We should… the living room.”
“Lead the way.”
I walked past him, hyper-aware of his footsteps behind me.
The living room looked different in the evening light, softer, more intimate.
The broken couch was still floor-level, surrounded by the cushions and blankets I’d arranged to make it functional.
The orchids Wade had brought sat on the side table, their petals catching the last rays of sunset.
I sat down on the floor-level couch, tucking my legs beneath me. Wade lowered himself beside me, close but not quite touching.
“So,” he said.
“Use your words, Buckley.”
Another charged silence.
His eyes drifted to the book Agnes had left behind, still sitting on the coffee table with its ridiculous cover and its dog-eared pages.
“Can I borrow it?”
I blinked. “What?”
“The book.” He nodded toward it. “I want to read the whole thing.”
“You want to read a werewolf romance novel.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
He turned to look at me. His expression was earnest, almost vulnerable. “Because you like it. Because your book club reads it. Because I want to understand what you enjoy, and then I want to share my thoughts with you.”
Warmth spread through my chest, soft and unhurried.
That was… that was unexpectedly sweet. The idea of Wade Buckley reading a shifter romance and then discussing it with me, actually discussing it, not mocking or dismissing, was flat-out dangerous for my heart.
“Okay,” I said. “Yes. You can borrow it.”
“Thank you.”
He picked up the book. Flipped it open to a random page. Started reading.
His eyebrows rose almost immediately.
“Damn,” he grunted.
“Wade-”
“‘His tongue traced the seam of her-’”
“NOT IN FRONT OF ME!”
I shrieked the words, lunging for the book. He laughed, actually laughed, the sound bright and surprised, and held it above his head, out of my reach.
“This is literature, Luisa. Art.”
“Give it back!”
“I’m just trying to appreciate the craft-”
I scrambled toward him, reaching for the book, and somehow ended up half in his lap, my body pressed against his as I stretched for the novel he was holding just out of reach. He was still laughing, his chest shaking beneath me, his free hand coming up to steady my waist.
“You’re very aggressive about your reading material.”
“You’re very annoying about everything.”
“Fair point.”
I made another grab for the book. Missed. Lost my balance and ended up sprawled across him, my face inches from his, both of us breathing hard.
The laughter faded.
His gaze fell to my lips.
“I wonder,” he said slowly, his voice roughening, “if we could recreate some of these scenes.”
Heat flooded through me. “Wade…”
“There’s a particularly interesting one in chapter twelve. The one Agnes read earlier.”
“That involved a werewolf.”
“I can improvise.”
I was blushing. Actually blushing, my cheeks burning, my whole body aware of everywhere we were touching. His hand was still on my waist. His thigh was pressed against mine. The hard heat of him pressed against me through the thin fabric of my dress.
He let the book fall.
Both hands found my waist now, and in one smooth motion, he shifted us, lying back on the floor, pulling me on top of him. I ended up straddling his stomach, my dress pooling around my thighs, my palms pressed flat against his chest.
“I know which one I want to try,” he said. His voice was gravel. Pure gravel, scraping against my nerves. “Do you want to?”
I couldn’t breathe. My legs were wrapped around his torso, my thighs pressed against his sides, and he was looking up at me with an expression that made my insides liquefy.
“Luve.” He said my name like it was the only word he knew. “Do you want me to do this?”
I nodded. Then, because nodding didn’t feel like enough: “Yes.”
His smile was slow. Wicked. Delighted.
“Thank God you wore a dress today,” he grunted.
And then his hands were sliding up my thighs, pushing the fabric higher, and he was guiding me, lifting me, shifting me, until suddenly I was positioned over his face, my knees on either side of his head, my dress hiked up around my hips.
“Wade, I-”
“Shh.” His breath was hot against my inner thigh. “Let me.”
His hands gripped my hips, steadying me, and then his mouth was on me, through the thin cotton of my underwear at first, a teasing press that made me gasp. I felt his tongue trace along the edge of the fabric, felt his fingers hook into the waistband and tug it aside.
And then nothing between us.
“Oh God-”
His tongue found me and I stopped thinking.
He licked into me like I was a meal to be savored, long and slow and devastatingly thorough. His hands held me in place as I squirmed, his fingers digging into my hips with just enough pressure to make me feel anchored. Claimed.
“That’s it,” he murmured against me, the vibration making me shudder. “There you go.”
I couldn’t hold still. My hips moved of their own accord, rocking against his mouth, chasing the sensation. He groaned, actually groaned, like tasting me was affecting him, and the sound sent a fresh wave of heat through my core.
“Wade-”
“So good for me.” His tongue circled, then flattened, then circled again. “Look at you. My perfect girl.”
I was going to die. Actually die, right here on my living room floor, with my ex-husband’s face between my thighs and his mouth doing things that should be illegal in at least three states.
“Please,” I gasped. “Please, I need-”
He knew what I needed. His tongue found exactly the right spot, the right pressure, the right rhythm. My thighs were shaking. My hands found his hair, fingers tangling in the soft strands, holding on like he was the only solid thing in the universe.
“That’s it,” he said again, the words muffled against me. “Come on, Luve. Let go.”
The pressure built, coiling tighter, winding up like a spring about to snap. His mouth was relentless, worshipful, like he could do this forever and never get tired. Like making me feel good was its own reward.
“I’m-” I couldn’t finish the sentence. “Wade, I’m going to-”
“I know.” He sucked gently and the spring snapped.
I came apart.
It crashed through me in waves, pleasure so intense it was almost painful, my whole body shaking, my thighs clenching around his head, his name breaking on my lips. He kept going through all of it, gentler now, drawing out every last tremor until I was boneless and gasping above him.
“Mm.” His voice was satisfied. Smug. “Delicious.”
I slid down his body, my limbs barely cooperating, until I could reach his mouth. Kissed him hard, tasting myself on his tongue, feeling him smile against my lips.
“Your turn,” I said.
His eyes darkened. “You don’t owe me-”
“I want to.”
I kissed my way down his chest, my fingers working at his belt, his button, his zipper. He lifted his hips to help me push his pants down, and then there he was, hard and wanting, straining toward me.
“Luisa-”
I took him in my mouth before he could finish.
His whole body jerked. His hand found my hair, not guiding, just touching, like he needed the contact to ground himself. I hollowed my cheeks, took him deeper, felt him pulse against my tongue.
“Fuck.” The word came out strangled. “Luve, that’s-”
I hummed around him and his hips bucked.
I set a rhythm, slow at first, then faster, reading his body like a language I’d never forgotten. The way his breath caught and his thighs tensed. My name falling apart in his mouth.
“I’m close,” he warned. “I’m-”
I didn’t pull back.
He came with a groan that seemed to originate somewhere in his chest, his whole body shuddering, his fingers tightening in my hair. I swallowed everything he gave me, worked him through it until he was twitching with oversensitivity.
Then I crawled back up to lie beside him.
We sprawled there a long while, flat on our backs on my living room floor, staring at the ceiling, both of us panting like we’d just run a marathon. The evening light had faded into true darkness, and somewhere outside, a cricket was chirping.
“That was,” Wade said, and stopped.
“Yeah.”
“I mean, that was-”
“I know.”
Silence. More panting.
“That was a goddamn great book,” he grunted finally.
I laughed.
I laughed so hard I had to roll onto my side, my whole body shaking with it, tears streaming down my face. He was laughing too, that rare, full laugh that transformed his face, made him look younger, made him look like the man I’d fallen in love with twelve years ago.
We lay there on the floor, laughing together in the darkness, and I thought: Maybe this is what healing feels like.
Maybe it feels like laughter, after everything.