Ricardo
Chapter Fourteen
Julia is sprawled on the blanket, a beautiful boneless mess. Her chest is heaving, her skin flushed a beautiful pink, and her eyes are closed, her long lashes casting dark shadows on her cheeks.
She is exquisite.
And she is mine.
I have never felt more possessive of anything in my life.
I bring my fingers to my mouth and suck them clean, savoring the taste of her.
Sweet. Musky. Utterly intoxicating.
She is the most delicious thing I have ever tasted.
And I am not even close to being done with her.
I lay beside her now, braced on one elbow and just watch. Her legs are splayed out on the blanket, her body bathed in the flickering firelight, and she is the most open, the most vulnerable, that she has been with me all night.
I am tempted to let her rest.
To let her catch her breath, to let her body recover.
But I can't.
Not after the most beautiful orgasm I’ve ever had the pleasure of witnessing. I am still rock hard, and all I can think about is burying myself inside her and feeling her come around me like that.
My cock is so hard it's painful.
But I know I can't just take what I want.
She has given me so much tonight. More than she knows.
She has trusted me with her body, with her desires, with her vulnerability.
She has let me see the ugliest parts of her, the parts she has spent a lifetime trying to hide.
If that is all she is willing to give tonight, then that will be it. And I'll consider myself the luckiest man alive for having had it.
But hopefully, that won't be all.
After a while, her eyes flutter.
I reach out and tuck a stray strand of her flaming hair behind her ear.
"Welcome back," I murmur, a lazy smile on my face.
Her eyes open, and she looks up at me, her gaze dazed and unfocused, but there is no shame in them. No regret.
And that is my victory.
"Wow," she breathes, her voice a husky whisper. "Just... wow."
My chest swells with masculine pride.
I chuckle, smug and satisfied. "I take it you enjoyed that.”
She turns her head to the side, her cheek pressed against the blanket, and looks at me, her lips curved into a sated, sleepy smile.
"Understatement of the century," she says.
I preen. I can't help it.
"You," she continues, her voice still a little breathless, "are very, very good at that."
"I had a very good subject," I say.
She blushes, a delicate pink that is a lovely contrast to her freckles.
"I have never... I mean... I've never felt anything like that before," she says, her voice dropping to a more serious tone.
"I figured as much," I say, my fingers now tracing patterns on her stomach.
She shudders, then looks shy.
"No, I mean..." She looks down at her hands, which are now clasped together on her stomach. "I've never... finished like that. With... someone."
My smile fades.
That son of a bitch.
"Did he ever even try?"
She shakes her head, her cheeks flushing with a fresh wave of embarrassment.
"It's not something he was interested in," she says quietly.
I narrow my eyes.
"It's not like I never... did," she adds, seeing my expression.
Her face is blazing again, and I'm not happy to see it. I want to erase that bastard's face from existence.
"It was just never... intentional on his part."
"I see," I say, my voice dangerously low. "So if you had one, you had one. If you didn't, oh well. He couldn't be bothered to actually make an effort."
"It was... just not something he was into," she says, a note of defense in her tone that I hate.
"Making the woman he was going to marry feel good was not something he was into," I clarify, my anger rising.
"I think he saw it as an act of... submission," she says. "He was always very clear that there was a certain way a man and a woman should be together. That there was a natural order to things."
"A natural order," I repeat, the words tasting like ash in my mouth. "And what, pray tell, was your role in this natural order of his?"
She looks away, unable to meet my gaze.
"He was the man," she says quietly. "I was the woman. His pleasure came first."
My anger, which was already simmering, now boils over.
But I don't let her see it. I don't let her feel it.
That's what he would do. He would get angry and she would feel responsible. She would feel the shame, the guilt.
I am not that man.
I force the anger down, and I replace it with a tenderness that is so fierce it almost hurts.
I take her face in my hands and turn her to face me, my thumbs stroking her cheeks.
"Julia," I say, my voice low and gentle. "Look at me."
She hesitates for a moment, then her eyes lift to mine, and the vulnerability in them makes my chest ache.
"There is no natural order," I say, my voice firm yet gentle. "It's a load of shit that weak men spout to make themselves feel better about their own inadequacies."
She blinks at me, a little stunned.
I push myself up to a sitting position and take a deep breath to calm the rage that is surging through me. It will do neither of us any good right now.
I feel her shift to sit up as well. She pulls a pillow onto her lap. Modesty. I want to burn the word from existence.
I take the pillow and toss it aside.
She flinches. Just for a second. It's so small I might have missed it, but I don't.
I don't get angry at her reaction. I get angry at him all over again.
I sense her about to open her mouth, and I know what she's going to say before she can even breathe it.
"I swear, Julia," I warn, "if you apologize."
"I shouldn't have said anything," she says, apology in her tone. "We were having a good time, and I just had to—"
"Basta!" I growl.
She flinches again.
And then I feel like an ass. I didn't mean to be so harsh. The anger I felt for Harrison was clearly spilling over to her.
I soften my expression, my tone.
I reach for her and pull her close. She lets me, allowing me to gather her onto my lap. Her skin is warm and soft against mine. She fits here perfectly. As if she was made to be here.
I wrap my arms around her, holding her close. "I'm sorry," I say, my lips pressed against her hair. "I'm not angry with you. I'm angry with him. I am angry for you."
She relaxes against me, her head resting on my shoulder.
"He was my life for a long time," she says quietly.
"Then let me tell you something about him," I say and lean my cheek against her hair.
"He was a bad lover. He was a bad partner. And he would’ve been a very bad husband.
He is not ‘traditional.’ He is just inadequate.
There is nothing natural about a man who takes a woman's desire and uses it as a weapon against her.
There is nothing natural about a man who doesn't want to make the woman he claims to love feel good.
That is not a natural order. That's a sad, pathetic little boy who is terrified of a real woman. "
I pull back so I can look at her.
"So what does he try to do? He makes her small. He makes her doubt herself, her desires, her worth. He tells her it's for her own good, so she won't realize that she's too good for him."
I take her face in my hands, and I force her to look at me.
"Your pleasure is not an afterthought, Julia. It's a necessity. It's more important than my own. Your pleasure is my pleasure. Your desire is my desire. Do you understand?"
A single tear escapes and tracks down her cheek.
I gently brush it away with my thumb.
"He broke me," she says, her voice cracking.
"No, cuoro mio," I say gently. "He tried. If he had succeeded, you wouldn't be here right now."
I lean in and kiss her softly.
"Let me show you," I whisper against her lips. "Let me show you how it's supposed to be. How you deserve to be loved."
For a long moment, she just looks at me. I can see the war waging inside her. Years of conditioning versus the raw, undeniable truth of what she has just experienced.
This isn't just a continuation of what we started earlier, and she knows it. This is a real beginning for her. This is when she finally takes a step forward, not just physically, but emotionally as well.
It's not enough that she left him and came back to Chicago and got a new job. That was a physical separation. A new chapter. She thought she had let go of the baggage, but all she'd really done was put it away. She hadn't unpacked it.
This is the unpacking.
And it's messy. And it's painful.
And she is so, so brave for letting me help her do it.
She doesn't say anything.
She just nods, a small, jerky motion.
And that's all I need.
I lay her back down on the blankets, her head resting on the plush pillows. I settle beside her, my body propped on my elbow, and just look at her.
I look at the firelight flickering over her freckled skin. At the soft curve of her hip. At the way her breasts rise and fall with each breath she takes.
I look at the beautiful, broken, brave woman who has somehow managed to find her way to me.
And I feel something I haven't felt in a long, long time.
Hope.
I lean down and kiss her again. In the kiss, I tell her all the things I don't have the words to say yet. She kisses me back, her hands coming up to cup my face, her fingers tangling in my hair. She is no longer passive. She is an active participant.
She is choosing this.
Choosing me.
My hands start to explore her body, my touch reverent and worshipful. I trace the line of her jaw, the column of her throat, the delicate bones of her collarbones.
I cup her breasts, my thumbs brushing over her nipples, which bead into hard points under my touch.
She arches into me, a soft sigh escaping her lips.
I could spend hours like this. Just touching her. Learning her. Mapping every inch of her body with my hands and my mouth.
But I know she's not ready for that yet. She's still a little fragile, a little unsure. And I am still hard and aching, my cock pressing against her thigh, a reminder of what is still to come.
And what is still to come is the most important part of this. It's the final nail in the coffin of her past. It's the act that will truly reclaim her body as her own.
My hand drifts down, over the soft skin of her stomach, and back to the wet heat between her legs.