Chapter 23 #2
She skimmed the soap up the line between my hip bones and back to my chest as if she were starting over.
As if she had all night. Water and lather ran down everywhere her hand had been.
The steam was so thick now I could taste it in the back of my throat.
My pulse was working in three places I could name and at least one I could not.
I made my hands stay at my sides. I made them.
"You are getting yourself into trouble," I said. My voice came out lower than I meant. I was watching her face. I was not blinking enough.
Her hand slid lower. Soap traveled with it. The pad of her thumb passed over the cut of my hip, paused, did not commit, moved on.
"That's the plan, isn't it?"
I let her have one more pass. I let her think she was driving.
Then I closed my fingers around her wrist, firm, and eased the soap out of her hand.
I set it back on the ledge with a small clean clack of stone on stone.
Her smile faltered, just for a beat, the way a smile falters when a woman realizes the game has changed hands.
My hand went into her hair. Wet, heavy, slick under my palm, the strands sliding through my fingers as I gathered them at the back of her skull. I tilted her face up where I wanted it. Not asking. Showing her where I wanted it, and waiting for her to give it to me. She gave it to me.
The kiss I gave her was hard. I had been holding myself on a short leash since she had walked into this bathroom, and now I was not.
My mouth took hers and stayed there. I felt her small sound go straight into my chest. My free hand moved to the small of her back, then to her hip, then up the wet slope of her spine, pulling her in against me until there was nothing left between us at all.
Her breasts dragged against my chest. Her stomach pressed against the hard line of me.
I felt her shiver and I knew it was not from cold.
"I am not done with you," I said against her mouth. Low. Just for her.
"Good," she breathed back, half laugh, half something else.
I turned us in the spray. Her back went to the cool tile wall and she gasped against my mouth from the shock of the temperature.
I covered the sound with another kiss, deeper this time, slower, and felt her hands come up and grip my shoulders, then slide higher, fingertips at the back of my neck.
I kept her there with my body. I kept her head where I wanted it with the hand still in her hair.
My control was fraying at the edges and I could feel it.
She could feel it too. Her mouth opened for me without being asked.
I kissed down her jaw. I kissed the line of her throat where the water was running.
I followed the spray down between her collarbones with my mouth, then lower, across the wet curve of one breast, the other, taking my time, learning her again with my mouth in the steam.
Her breath caught somewhere above my ear.
Her hand was still in my hair. I went lower.
I dropped to one knee in the spray. Water ran down my back in a steady sheet and pooled around my shin where it met the tile floor.
I kissed the soft place at her hip first, low, slow.
Then lower. Then I lifted her thigh up and settled it over my shoulder, and her free hand slapped flat against the tile behind her to keep her standing.
The first taste of her made my hand tighten on her thigh.
She was slick already, slicker than the water on her skin, and the difference was something I could feel against my tongue.
I went slow. I made myself go slow. I worked her with my mouth the way I had learned her, every place that made her breath stutter, every place that made her hips lift toward me without her telling them to.
Her hand fisted in my wet hair. Hard. The pull at my scalp went straight down my back like a wire pulled taut.
I made a low sound against her that I did not bother to keep quiet.
Her thigh trembled where it lay across my shoulder.
Small involuntary sounds came out of her, half words, soft broken syllables she did not know she was making.
"Stay with me," I said against her, just for a beat, then went back to what I was doing.
Steam thickened around us. Her hips started to move on their own, small lifts toward my mouth, and I slid one hand up the back of her thigh to hold her steady and let her have it.
I gave her exactly what she was asking for. I felt her breath start to break apart above me. I felt the tremor climbing the inside of her thigh against my jaw. Her free palm was still flat against the tile. Her other hand had not let go of my hair.
"Daniil," she breathed out, high and broken. Then, "Yes." Then, lower, ragged, "Right there."
I did not stop. I did not move from where she had told me to stay.
I kept the pressure exactly where she had asked for it, and I felt the moment she went over.
The long shudder ran from her hips up her spine in one slow wave.
Her hand fisted in my wet hair hard enough to sting.
She came with my name still on her mouth, a soft cry going up into the steam, and her body broke for me there against the tile.
The spray made her wet hair stick down dark across her shoulder when her head fell.
I felt the tremor of it run out of her in long aftershocks, and I stayed with her through every one.
I rose. Slow. I let my hands skim up her sides as I came. I pinned her gently to the tile by her waist, kissed her with the taste of her still on my mouth, and felt her open to it, slack and shivering and smiling against my lips at the same time.
"Whose are you?" I said, low.
"Yours, you possessive ass."
A small almost-laugh moved up out of my chest. I held it down.
"Say it without the editorial."
Her smile widened against my mouth. Her eyes were dark and slow.
"Yours, Daniil. Only you."
Then I was in her.
I lifted her leg around my hip and slid my forearm under her thigh to hold her there.
The angle of the tile took the rest of her weight.
My free hand went flat to the wall beside her head for leverage.
The slick of the water fought me. I had to be patient.
I pushed in slow, a careful give that wanted to break clean and would not let me, and I made myself wait through it, breath held, watching her face the whole time.
The give of her around me was almost too much after what I had just watched her do.
I held there for one beat. Two. Her forehead came to mine. Her breath went into my mouth, hot.
"Whose is this?" I said, against her mouth, low.
"Yours." She got the word out on half a breath. "Yours, Daniil."
"Mine," I agreed.
Then I moved.
Slow at first. Then harder. Then harder still.
The spray hit my back in a hot constant sheet and ran in a steady river down between us, over her shoulder where her wet hair was plastered dark against her skin.
The angle the tile made for me let me feel every catch and give of her.
Her nails found my shoulder and dug in, then climbed to the back of my neck and dug in there too.
The wet slap of us together echoed off the tile in small sharp claps.
The steam blurred the edges of the room.
Her face was open. Her mouth was open. The flush was climbing her throat in slow patches, the way it did when she was close already.
"Look at me," I said.
Her eyes lifted to mine and stayed.
"Stay with me."
She nodded. Her mouth was open. Her breath was coming in small sharp catches that broke around my name.
I held her like that for a long stretch, watching her face, watching the flush climb her throat. Then I needed her in a different angle. I needed more of her. I needed her over me where I could put both hands on her.
I stepped back from the wall and brought her with me, her leg still around my hip, my arm still under her thigh.
The built-in bench was warm under the back of my thighs when I sat.
I drew her down astride me and her knees settled either side of my hips on the wet stone.
She sank, slow, eyes locked on mine the whole way down, lower lip caught between her teeth at the last inch.
I felt her take me back in fully and the soft sound she made for it went straight through my chest. Her hands found my shoulders and stayed.
Mine went to her hips and stayed. The spray was hitting her back now, running in clean sheets down her spine and over the curve of her, raining off her chin onto mine.
She set the pace. I let her. She rode me slow at first, watching my face the way I had watched hers, lifting and sinking with the spray running between us.
I could feel her thighs working on either side of my hips.
I could feel her hands tightening on my shoulders every time she came down.
She found her rhythm and quickened. Her chest rose into the water as she did, and I watched the spray break over her collarbones in small bright trails.
My own control started to fray at the edge.
I let it fray for a beat. Then I took it back.
My hands closed on her hips. Firm. I held her there and slowed her down, then guided her down again on my own count. Harder. Deeper. Where I wanted her. Her breath caught at the change. A small sound came out of her that was not quite a word. Her eyes did not leave mine.
"Look at me," I said again, even though she already was.
She nodded. Her hair was dark and heavy and dripping around our faces. Her mouth was open.
I slid one hand up the wet line of her stomach to her chest. I cupped her there and felt her breath catch under my palm.
My thumb crossed her once, slow, and her hips stuttered on my next stroke.
My other hand stayed at her hip, guiding her down on every beat now, harder, the way she was asking for without words.
Her forehead came down against mine. Her hair, soaked through, hung around our faces like a curtain.
Her eyes stayed on mine the whole time. That was the part I could not get over. She did not look away.
"Mine," I said, against her mouth.
"Yours," she answered.
The heat built. The steam closed in around us until the rest of the room was gone.
I felt her start to tighten around me, felt her breath shorten down to small ragged sounds I knew the shape of by now.
"Do not stop," I told her, low, mouth at her ear.
"Stay with me." "Don't stop," she echoed, broken, half breath, half plea. "Daniil, please."
I let my own control finally slip the rest of the way.
My hands locked at her hips and I drove up into her, once, twice, a third time, hard and deep.
Her teeth found the place where my neck met my shoulder and she bit down.
Not gently. Her nails dragged across my back and I felt the sting and welcomed it.
She broke around me, a long cry going up into the steam, her body clenching down on me in waves. "Only you," she got out, between gasps, the word ragged. "Only you."
"Mine," I said, and then I was gone too.
I came with her, hard, deep, my forehead going down against her wet shoulder, my face against her neck where I could feel her pulse hammering against my mouth.
I spilled into her in long pulls and my arms locked around her, holding her flush to my chest. Her aftershocks ran through her and through me both. I felt every one.
For a long moment neither of us moved.
The spray was still running. Her heart hammered against mine, slowing in small steps.
My own breath came back to me one stretch at a time.
I reached out without lifting my head, found the lever, and nudged the water back toward warm where it had cooled.
Steam rose up fresh around us. I gathered her closer.
I kissed her temple. I kissed her wet shoulder where my forehead had been.
I kissed the bite she had left at the place where my neck met my collarbone, because she had earned the right to it.
Then I just held her, and let the water run, and did not say anything for a long beat.
She tipped her head back against my collarbone. I felt her smile against my skin before I heard it.
"Do you like your present?" she said, low and smug and soft, all at once.
My voice came out quieter than I meant it to. Clean.
"I love it." Beat. "May I have more?"
She laughed. Quiet, into my chest, a warm small sound that I felt more than heard. Then she reached up, both hands on my jaw, and pulled my face down to hers. Her kiss came with the warmth of someone who had every intention of saying yes.
I had spent years being the man who could carry anything. The man who carried the family, the war, the bodies, the name. I had been good at it. I had never thought to ask whether it cost me anything, because asking was not part of the job.
I had not known, until this evening, how good it could feel to be the man someone else carried, just for a little while.
I let her carry me.