28. June #2
The sculpture is me. It’s my face, my shoulders, my collarbones.
He’s captured the expression I make when I’m painting.
Cinna snapped a picture of me once like that, so I know how I look: lips parted, brow furrowed, eyes focused on something that doesn’t exist in the real world. He sculpted me in the act of seeing.
I press a hand to my chest.
The tarp crinkles behind me. His warmth arrives at my back, close enough that I feel it along my spine.
“They’re me,” I say.
He inches closer. Then slowly, his arms slide around me from behind, careful enough that I could step away if I wanted to. His hands settle against my stomach. His chin hovers near my temple.
“Of course they’re you.” His voice is low and his breath moves through my hair. “No attempt I’ve ever made can get you out of my head.”
I fall back into him. My shoulders meet his chest and his arms tighten, and the scent of him closes around me, woodsmoke and rain. My body fits against his, pulling away slightly but not really wanting to.
Then my rational brain asks me, “What the hell are you doing?” So I pull away an inch. He holds on loosely. We’re both doing it, this push-pull between wanting and running. My fingers wrap around his forearm, half removing it, half keeping it there.
What are we doing?
He turns me slowly to face him and I don’t resist. His hands stay on my waist. My palms press flat against his chest where his heartbeat is pounding. His eyes are open, unguarded, searching my face.
“Don’t do it,” I whisper.
But that’s a lie because all I can think is, God, just fucking kiss me.
He cups my face with both hands. His thumbs trace along my jaw. He’s looking at my mouth.
“This is stupid,” he mumbles.
Then he kisses me.
There is no slow build. We go from nothing to everything because we’ve been fighting this so long that giving in is now the only option.
My fingers twist into his shirt and pull hard.
His hands slide from my face into my hair.
I’m kissing him back with everything I’ve locked away for years, all the bickering, all the nights I lay awake wanting exactly this.
His teeth graze my lower lip and a sound leaves my throat I didn’t know I could make.
My hands find the back of his neck and his arm wraps around my waist so tight there’s no air between us, and our mouths are hungry and graceless.
My back hits the shelves behind me as Dorien pressed forward. The movement rattles everything—the metal, the jars of brushes, the dozens of plaster busts—and something heavy shatters against the tarp by my feet, sending a spray of white powder up my jeans.
He doesn’t look, doesn’t even flinch.
All he wants is my mouth, my skin, my body pressed so hard to his that I lose track of where I end and he begins.
We are heat and motion, hands everywhere, our lips desperate.
I’m not thinking about anything except the softness of his tongue against mine and the way he bites my bottom lip like he wants to keep a piece of me.
He lets go of my mouth just long enough to drag his hand up my side. I grab his wrist and bring it higher, refusing to be subtle. His palm cups my breast and he groans into a kiss, a sound so hot it makes my thighs tremble.
His thumb finds my nipple through the fabric, and I arch into it shamelessly. I want him to touch me harder, so I make him. He obeys, massaging, kneading, then loops his other arm around my waist and lifts me off the floor.
I wrap my legs around him. My sneakers are dangling and kicking the shelving unit as he turns, knocking more stuff to the ground, but he’s unstoppable.
He carries me to a table, scattering tools and small boxes. The tarp crumples, supplies roll everywhere, but all he cares about is pinning my hips to the plywood and kissing me so deep I forget my own name.
I get desperate. I fumble for his belt, and he stops me with a hard squeeze to my thigh.
“No,” he says, voice rough against my mouth. “Not yet.”
He undoes my jeans and yanks them down so my bare ass hits the cold table. He steps back for a second, just enough to look, really look, at me. I spread my legs for him, and he bites his lower lip, just gazing.
The way he stares is like he’s seeing a woman for the first time, like every inch of me is a study for a sculpture. He’s hazed, obsessed, hungry. It’s the most exposed I’ve ever felt because I’m wet, open, and on display. And he’s looking like he wants this to be the last sight he ever sees.
He kisses me again, messier and more urgent, then cups me between the legs and groans.
His fingers are strong as he traces every part of me.
He circles my clit, and I gasp, so he does it again, and again, changing the pressure, changing the angle, narrowing in on what makes me shake and moan the most.
He pulls back to watch my face.
“I like hearing that,” he says, thumb stroking exactly where I’m most sensitive. “I want more. Give me more.”
I can’t handle the intensity of those eyes, so I pull him forward, wrap my arms around his neck, and just hold on.
I moan into the curve of his shoulder. My cheek drags over his jaw and I want to bite it, but I’m too desperate to breathe. His hands are everywhere, sculpting every inch of me like I’m made of clay.
He pushes his fingers inside me.
I cry out, hips jerking up off the table. I cry out his name. Everything is heat, pressure, the stretch of his fingers filling me, and then he’s kissing me again but it’s different now, deeper and wilder, his tongue driving against mine while his hand fucks me.
God, he’s good at this. Of course he is. He always has to be the best at everything.
He keeps his mouth on mine, swallowing every moan, like he wants to eat up all my sounds. My hands fist in his hair and I try to pull him closer but he’s already everywhere.
He breaks the kiss just as I’m about to climax. His forehead presses to mine, eyes locked on my face, and he watches every twitch and gasp like he’s memorizing it for later.
“Say it again,” he says, voice rumbling so deep I feel it in my bones.
“Dorien.” It’s a whimper, and he loves it.
His fingers speed up, curling just right, and I shatter.
He wants to see it, so I let him. I grip his shoulders and cry out his name again and again, like it’s the only word I remember.
I come so hard my thighs clamp around his wrist and my whole body trembles.
He keeps working me through it, massaging deep inside, then gentler, sliding his palm over my pussy and down my legs as I shake, gasp, and come down slowly.
He kisses my cheek, my shoulder, then the curve of my breast through my shirt. He licks a line over the fabric and nips at my nipple. I moan again, weaker this time, and he just grins against me, smug as hell.
He straightens and looks at his hand. His fingers are glistening from being inside me, and he stares like he can’t believe it’s real. Then he brings them to his mouth and licks them clean.
I swear I almost come again just from watching.
He groans and says, “You taste so fucking good.” Then lower, his voice scraping the softest part of me. “You’re the most beautiful woman I’ve ever seen.”
Heat flares along every inch of my skin. I want to disappear and also never stop being on display for him. I want to be his masterpiece, his muse, the center of every obsession in his head.
I reach for his jeans and fumble with the button. I need him inside me. I want us to burn everything down with the heat of our joined bodies.
But his hand closes gently over mine, stopping me. His touch is gentle enough that I could pull away, but I don’t. I just freeze, heart pounding in my chest.
“No,” he says softly. “That’s enough for now. Can I just hold you?”
It’s the last thing I expect. I’m so used to people always wanting more, always taking, always pushing, but Dorien just wants to hold me.
I slide off the table and yank my jeans back up. His arms are already open, waiting.
We collapse together on the tiny sofa in the corner and our bodies tangle together. He wraps himself around me, chin resting in my hair, arms a barricade against the world.
I fit perfectly against him. For the first time in weeks, I’m not cold. I’m not empty. I’m protected.