Chapter 13 #2
I pulled him closer, fingers working at the buttons of his shirt until I could push it off his shoulders. The hard planes of muscle shifted under my palms. He was warm and solid and real, and I couldn’t get enough of the way he felt against me.
We rolled. I ended up half on top of him, the dress bunched around my hips. His hands slid under the hem, tracing bare skin, reverent and careful. When his fingers brushed the lace of my underwear I shivered.
He pulled back just enough to look at me. His eyes were dark, pupils wide.
“I don’t know if this is real,” he whispered, voice rough.
I let out a shaky laugh. “I’m not sure either.”
His hand came up to cup my face. His thumb brushed my lower lip. “If it’s not… don’t wake me up yet.”
I kissed him again. Harder. Deeper. His arms wrapped around me, pulling me fully against him. I felt the hard length of him pressed between us, hot even through the fabric of his pants. My hips rolled without thinking, seeking friction. He groaned into my mouth, the sound raw and desperate.
We moved together like that for long minutes on the couch. Slow, rolling movements. Hands learning each other. Mouths tasting. I kissed his jaw, his throat, the hollow beneath his ear. He tilted his head back with a sigh that sounded like surrender.
“Dani,” he breathed against my neck. “What have you done to me?”
I didn’t know what he had done to me either.
I sat up, still straddling him, and reached for the zipper at the back of my dress.
He helped me, fingers steady even as his breathing wasn’t.
The red fabric slipped down my arms and pooled around my waist. His eyes darkened as they moved over me.
Not just hunger. Something softer. Something that made my chest ache.
“You’re stunning,” he whispered.
I leaned down and kissed him again. Deep and slow. His hands slid up my back, unclasped my bra, let it fall away. When his palms cupped my breasts, thumbs brushing over my nipples, I gasped into his mouth. He swallowed the sound, answering with a low groan of his own.
We needed more space.
He stood, lifting me with him as if I weighed nothing, and carried me down the short hall to his bedroom. The dress was left somewhere between the living room and the bed. My underwear followed. His pants and boxer briefs joined them on the floor.
When I was bare beneath him, he looked at me like I was something sacred. His hand moved between my legs, gentle at first, learning what made me gasp, what made my hips lift toward him. His fingers circled, stroked, found the rhythm that had me clutching his shoulders.
“Luke,” I whispered, voice breaking.
He kissed me through it. Deep and slow. When the pleasure crested and crashed over me, he held me through every shudder, murmuring soft words against my lips that I couldn’t quite catch.
I reached for him then. When I wrapped my hand around him, he groaned, forehead dropping to mine. He was hot and hard and velvet-smooth in my grip. I stroked him slowly, learning the shape of him, the way his breath hitched when I twisted my wrist just right.
“Dani,” he rasped. “I need you.”
I guided him between my legs. He pushed in slowly, inch by careful inch, giving me time to adjust. When he was fully seated, we both stilled. The feeling of him inside me was overwhelming. Full. Right. Like two broken pieces had finally found a way to fit.
We moved together in long, rolling strokes that built pleasure in deep waves. His forehead rested against mine. Our eyes stayed open, locked. Every thrust drew a soft sound from me. Every roll of my hips pulled a groan from him. We kissed between breaths, tongues sliding, teeth grazing.
The pleasure built slowly. Tighter. Deeper.
My nails dug into his back. His hand slipped between us, fingers finding that perfect spot again.
I came with his name on my lips, clenching around him, pulling him over the edge with me.
He spilled deep inside me with a broken groan, body trembling, arms locked around me like he never wanted to let go.
We stayed like that for a long time. Joined. Breathing. Hearts hammering against each other.
Eventually he shifted to the side, pulling me into his arms. His leg draped over mine, keeping me close. I rested my head on his chest, listening to his heartbeat slow. His fingers traced lazy patterns on my bare back.
"That was—" I started.
"Yeah." He kissed my temple. "Yeah, it was beyond words."
He got up after a minute, came back with a warm towel, cleaned us both up with the same unhurried care he brought to everything. I watched him do it and felt something settle in my chest that I hadn't let myself feel in years.
Then I caught the clock on his nightstand.
"I have to go," I said, sitting up too fast. "It's later than I thought. Maya's got Lily, but I told her I wouldn't be too late."
"Stay a little longer."
"Luke."
"Five minutes."
I gave him ten, tangled together in the dark, neither of us saying much, just breathing the same air.
Then I got dressed, and he walked me down to my car, his hand warm around mine the whole way.
At the door, he pulled me in one more time. Kissed me slow and deep, nothing rushed about it, like he was trying to make it last past the moment it actually ended.
"Drive safe," he said against my mouth.
"I will."
"Text me when you're home."
"I will."
He kissed me once more, softer this time, and I finally made myself pull away and get in the car.
I drove home with the windows cracked, the cool night air on my face, and I couldn't stop the smile that kept creeping back no matter how many times I tried to put it away.
It had been a long time since I'd let myself feel anything close to this. Longer since I'd trusted it enough to let it stay.
I didn't know what tomorrow would bring, didn't know what any of the next few weeks would bring, for either of us. His career was about to change shape in ways neither of us could predict. My contract still had an end date stamped on it, somewhere down the line, waiting.
But for tonight, I let myself have this.
Just for tonight, I let myself dream too.