Chapter 31
The boning on my dress underneath me digs into my elbows as I prop myself up to watch Kit work, the muscles in his shoulders rolling in the moonlight.
His eyes glitter with something magical, like just the sight of me bare before him has him transported to another plain of existence.
I want this delicious tension to swell until it shatters, leaving us both completely wrecked in its wake. Kit’s thumbs brush the insides of my thighs, and all the air leaves my lungs in one trembling sigh. It morphs into a frustrated curse as he does it again, closer to where I want him.
Where I need him.
I’ve been avoiding the thought that I need him anywhere, for any reason. But that’s a lie. It’s always been a lie. Right now, my insides ache with a gaping chasm of emptiness. It’s been empty for so fucking long, I’ve forgotten what it feels like to be filled up.
Kit swipes his tongue over my center, his breath skimming over my skin. My hips buck off the floor, reaching for him after he’s pulled away. Before I can force myself to relax, to hide my desperation, his thumb is on my clit, and I see stars.
My head falls back as a groan claws out of my chest, and I know Kit can see it. How afraid I am, how small I feel, how empty I’ve been these past years without him. And he’s split me wide open, just like he ripped my bodice with his bare hands. There’s no hiding from him. There never has been.
“You taste exactly the same.” His voice drapes over my skin like mulberry silk. Pure luxury. “I never stopped being hungry for it.”
“Please.” The word slips from my lips without my permission. It’s high-pitched and trembling and needy.
His thumb slides between my folds, slick with arousal, not penetrating, but with the kind of urgent pressure that makes me crave all of him. “Andie, I need to hear you say it.”
“Say what?” My voice cracks, and I throw an arm over my eyes, embarrassed by what he’s reduced me to in a matter of seconds. But I gave him permission, didn’t I? Handing him those scissors with the silent plea, Let me loose, let me breathe, let me be.
His thumb makes its path through my folds again as he says in a low voice, dark with promise, “The truth.”
I tremble, and a bead skitters across the floor. It’s another piece of the flimsy fortress around my heart falling away. The words are heavy on my tongue, and I’m so tired of holding them in. But I’m terrified to hear them in the space between us. Afraid of the havoc they’ll wreak if I let them go, where I can’t control them anymore.
I swallow with a whimper.
“Look at me when you say it,” he says, the edge of command in his voice sending a crackle through my veins.
Goddamn him and his silent dare—he knows I can’t say no. I grit my teeth and meet his gaze. I expect to find a challenge, a sharpness to his expression.
I want it. I want the antagonism I need to tear into him, to take what I need right now, without regret. I want us to fight each other for release until neither of us can move.
Kit clearly has other plans.
His eyes have gone soft, a line appearing between his brows. His whisper hangs in the silence like a promise. “It’s just you and me, Andie. Tell me the truth.”
Tears hot behind my eyes, I curl my hands into fists at my sides, bracing for impact. I open my mouth so the words pour out in an urgent whisper. “I need you, Kit. Please.”
“Good girl.” The glitter in his eyes returns, but he only allows me a glimpse of it before he seals his mouth over my core and closes his eyes with a groan. I can’t help the cry that escapes me as I fall back on the hard floor.
It’s been so long, but Kit remembers everything. Like he cataloged every single place on my body and how it needs to be touched. His lips and tongue work at a furious pace, the stubble on his cheeks rasping against my thighs.
My hands scramble for purchase on the wood floor as pleasure uncoils deep in my belly.
Kit lifts my legs over his shoulders. His hands climb up my stomach to pin me to the floor.
I whisper a curse into the dark, sparks heating up my insides in bursts of sensation. A preview of the main event. The way he’s got me pinned down means there’s nothing for me to do but surrender to him. It’s what he’s wanted this whole time, isn’t it? To give myself over to him, pliant and wanting?
And it feels so good, I do.
I slide one hand into his hair and curl the other around the leg of the nearby drafting table, holding on for dear life. Kit’s fingers scrape the underside of my ribs, like he’s searching for my bleeding heart. His mouth never stops, never gives me a moment to catch my breath.
My climax crashes into me so suddenly I cry out. My voice goes hoarse as my body tenses. My free hand slams to the restored wooden floor and my spine arches right into his waiting hands, like he’s got my heart on a string. I can pretend he doesn’t affect me all I want; the truth is, he’s one hell of a puppet master, and I’m his to play with. Heat unfurls between my legs and crackles through my limbs. I shake and shake and pant through the orgasm, equal parts pleasure and ache, still not full enough.
I lift my head to see what the hell he did to make me feel like that, and the look in his eyes is pure sin. His eyes crinkle at the corners as his tongue softens its strokes over my clit. The bastard is mighty pleased with himself for that, isn’t he?
I melt into the floor, unable to fault him for it. The room spins, so I squeeze my eyes shut. “I hate you.”
“I know, sweet potato.” Kit’s mouth moves up my stomach as he emerges from between my legs. He takes a detour to lave each of my breasts, sucking my nipples into his mouth before letting them go with a soft pop. I’m trembling with need again by the time he runs his tongue along the underside of my jaw.
“I don’t have a condom with me,” he says, voice taut with longing and disappointment. “Didn’t think I’d get this lucky.”
His hips settle between mine, the weight of him alone making that chasm in me feel wider, gnawing with hunger. He’s not playing fair. I don’t care. Tilting my hips to cradle his length against me, I admit, “I’m on birth control, and I’m safe. You?”
“I’m safe too.” He props himself up on his elbows, his chest rising and falling with shaking breaths. He shifts to cradle my head in his hands, forcing me to look him in the eyes.
Damn him. For all my wishes to keep this sex as impersonal and distant as I can, just to keep my fool of a heart safe, Kit’s intent on keeping us linked. We’re both connected to a live cable, and when we touch the track, there is only go, go, go.
“Andie,” he says in a low voice, “we don’t have to do this. I’ll stop.”
The tears from earlier are back, climbing up my throat. I can’t let him see them, so I crush my lips to his in a desperate kiss.
He kisses me back with a hunger that knocks the wind out of me and thrusts his hips in time with his tongue.
Time to take some control back, to shield myself before I completely fall apart in his arms. “Stop and I’ll never forgive you.”
He enters my body like he never left. We hold our breaths as he fills me so slowly, I could scream in frustration. “God, you’re so—”
He smirks. “Amazing? Perfect? Everything you dreamed of?”
“I waited a decade for this, and you want to take your time?” I hook a leg around his hips and pull him in.
“Jesus, Andie.” He grunts, squeezing his eyes closed. “You can’t just do that.”
“I already did.” I sink my nails into his shoulders.
“You’ll pay for it.” He draws out and slams into me.
“Yes.” I’m not sure how long it’s been since I’ve had sex, but I know it’s been ten years since I’ve had sex like this. Our sex has always run the gamut, from slow and lazy to fast and furious, but it was always, always more than our bodies speaking to each other.
Sex with Kit has always been an earth-shattering event.
I can’t dwell on it, or I’ll drown. So I roll my hips, and we are so utterly fucked. We have never, ever done this without a condom, and it feels so otherworldly, I’m already coming undone.
Kit drives into me, mouth set into a determined line. On a mission.
I tilt my hips an inch forward, two inches back, but no matter what, the emptiness inside me still yawns wide open. An itch I can’t scratch, even with nothing at all between us.
I let out a frustrated groan, and Kit grips my thigh to his side, holding me still.
“Kit,” I warn, my hands curling into fists on his back.
“Who are you fighting, Andie?” he asks gently. More gently than his taut muscles would lead me to believe is possible in a moment like this.
It’s all it takes for me to break. My sides heave with a sob. “I’m sorry, I can’t—” I bury my face in my hands.
“I’m not fighting,” he whispers, his lips on my neck. “Don’t fight.”
“What does that even mean?” I mumble, and he smiles. How the hell can he be smiling right now?
“Let me in.” He captures my lips in a kiss. “Tell me what you need. Let me help you get there.”
I move a hand to his chest, fingernails biting into his skin.
“What do you need? Time?” he asks through gritted teeth.
“No, I need—” I shake my head, utterly embarrassed by my own shyness. “Can I get on top?”
His lips pull into a grin as he plants a hand on either side of my head. I whimper when he pushes off me, but he doesn’t go far. After he settles with his back against one of the windows, he beckons. “Come here.”
I follow, straddle his hips, and guide him into me. When I bottom out, we both roll our heads back and groan. There it is, the piece of me I was worried I’d never be able to reach. He’s so deep I can feel his pulse like it’s mine. I kiss him slowly, my tongue moving in time with my hips as I ride him.
He reaches his hand between us, and I break the kiss on a sob, burying my face in his neck. His fingers sink into the flesh of my ass as he adjusts our angle, groaning when he finds it.
Soon our skin is smacking, echoing in the silence of the loft. I press my hands against the cool glass on either side of his head, bracing for every stroke as I inch closer to the edge.
With a grunt, Kit plants his feet on the hardwood floor and thrusts into me, harder and deeper than I’ve ever felt. I let my control collapse around me as Kit drives out all the pain I’ve held for the last ten years.
“Kit,” I gasp. “Kit, I’m going to—”
He presses his lips into my hair. “I know. Let go. I’ve got you.”
I shatter around him with a shout that echoes in the loft. Kit doesn’t stop his steady rhythm, my pleasure streaking with pain. When he finally lets go, he buries his face in my neck with a groan that rattles through my aching bones.
We’re slick with sweat and arousal, throbbing with pain and pleasure. I’m dizzy, absolutely untethered from my body as I come down, resting my forehead against the glass, my breath fogging Atlanta’s skyline.
I make an attempt at levity. “Nice to know those thighs aren’t just for aesthetics.”
He wraps his arms around me, pulling my body snug against his so his laugh shimmies through me too. I sink into the feeling of safety.
We don’t speak at all as we clean up and stumble upstairs and into my bed. As I’m draped over his naked chest, sleep pulling me downward, I pretend I don’t hear Kit say, “I’m still in love with you, Andie Dresser.”
FIRST LOOK AT FOREVER
SEASON THREE
EPISODE TEN
PRODUCER:
You and Andie seem to have grown closer after the wedding you went to.
KIT:
[smiling] Huh. Do we?
PRODUCER:
Have you been physically intimate yet?
KIT:
[grins]
FIRST LOOK AT FOREVER
SEASON THREE
EPISODE TEN
ANDIE:
[eyes wide] Are you asking me if we’ve had sex?!
PRODUCER:
Yes. Have you been physically intimate with your husband?
ANDIE:
[long pause]
I don’t want to talk about it.