Chapter 7
"Hi..."
Kate's smile is the first thing Leire gets when she opens the door. The second is the redhead's embrace when she closes it, and the third: the kiss that swallows the moan Leire couldn't hold back when their lips brushed.
She barely had time to look at her, because now their mouths are pressed together and the Australian's hands are sliding up under her shirt, but she thought she caught a different flash in the redhead's eyes, a darker shade in her green irises, green like freshly cut grass.
"Hey, wait a second," Leire pants, fighting the flutter low in her belly. "Let me look at you first, baby."
Leire cups her face in both hands and drags them back, drawing Kate's reddish strands away with her fingers to clear her face.
"You're going to see the same thing as always," she murmurs, holding onto Leire's waist as Leire smiles at her.
"Maybe, but you know I love looking at you," Leire whispers against her lips, and steals a quick kiss before going back to studying her.
She runs her thumb along the scar on Kate's eyebrow, then slides her index finger down, tracing from her left cheek to her right without losing that dimpled smile that has Kate completely won over.
"I love your scar, and one day I'm going to count every single one of these freckles," she says without thinking, taking her in as if she's the only thing in the world.
"That would take a very long time, and we never have enough of it," Kate points out.
Leire's smile fades and her eyelids drop, her gaze falling just before she feels the Australian's hand under her chin, lifting it back up.
"Sorry," Kate whispers. "I didn't mean that."
"Yes you did, and it doesn't matter because you're right, we don't."
Kate swallows. The last thing she needs today is an argument with this woman.
She doesn't think she could handle it — too many emotions layered on top of the exhaustion from such a long trip.
She got to the hotel an hour ago, unpacked, took a long, restorative shower, and now she's here, and she doesn't want anything to ruin what she needs to be perfect, or she'll fall apart.
"Let's not talk about that today, please," she begs quietly. "I need you to smile at me and keep moaning against my mouth."
Leire's breathed-out laugh sends a shiver running through Kate's whole body, and she presses back to her lips.
"Wait," Leire pulls away, amused. "I need to look at you a little longer."
She places her hands on Kate's cheeks again and focuses on her eyes, on the intensity in her gaze, on that trace of something different that Leire can't quite name.
She knows something is going on; she can't even explain how she knows, but she's terrified to ask, and part of her feels she has no right to demand anything this woman doesn't want to give freely.
Leire can't get the conversation with her friend Marta out of her head, and she feels uncomfortable with herself for letting Kate hold her in that gaze full of all the love she knows Kate feels, while being unable to give her even half of what she deserves.
She's thought a lot about it these past few days and decided she'd bring up Costel and the renewal — that the least she could do was tell her to her face that this brand, which in the twenty-first century requires signing an image clause that, while not explicitly stated, they both know would treat a relationship with a woman as a clear example of bad image, because Costel is deeply conservative and has never supported or shown any empathy toward the community, wants to renew her contract for five years, and that she's decided to accept.
"Done looking?" Kate smiles at her, pulling her back to the present without knowing it.
"I don't think I'll ever get tired of it," she whispers sincerely, catching Kate's lower lip between hers as she turns her and pushes her onto the bed.
Kate lets herself fall and sits, and Leire stands in front of her, pulling her shirt over her head and then stepping out of her pants.
"How was the flight?" she asks playfully as she reaches behind her back for her bra clasp.
"Not nearly as interesting as this, that's for sure," the redhead murmurs, her eyes fixed on the body she's mapped entirely with her hands and tongue more times than she could ever count.
"This too?" Leire hooks a finger in the waistband of her underwear and tugs it out as she asks, stepping toward her.
"That's the most important part — it would get very much in the way of what I need to do."
Leire laughs, but the laugh ends in a broken gasp, because when Kate looks at her like that, full of want, her whole body melts and she feels something like turbulence between her legs.
"Then take them off yourself," she breathes, stepping close enough to stand between Kate's legs as the tennis player parts them.
The redhead puts her hands on Leire's waist and holds her firmly as she kisses her abdomen first, sending a shiver that raises goosebumps all over Leire's skin. Then she traces her index fingers around the waistband slowly, looking up, searching for her lover's eager gaze.
"Don't torture me too long, please," Leire begs — her nipples are so hard from arousal they're starting to ache.
"Just a little longer."
Kate turns her, and with Leire's back to her, she pulls her underwear down very slowly, scattering kisses and bites across her ass that flood the Spanish woman's thighs with heat.
Then, pressing lightly with both hands, she turns her to face her again and holds her gaze on her sex while she wets her lips.
Leire feels a pull of arousal that detonates right at her clit, forcing her to press her legs together and clench to stop the burst of desire burning through her.
"Don't close your legs — open them so I can see you." The sound of Kate's low, hoarse voice makes Leire swallow.
Leire is so turned on right now she knows she could come if Kate keeps drawing this out. She shifts her feet apart, and the redhead tilts her head with disapproval.
"Not enough," she objects, and Leire has to press her legs together again, choke back the gasp that tears through her, and open them again — this time wide enough that her lover can see all the slick heat that has already spread down the inside of her thighs.
The Australian puts her hands on Leire's hips and brings her mouth close, pressing a kiss to her mound before inhaling deeply.
"You're like a damn drug," she murmurs, and Leire starts to tremble. "And today I need a really good hit."
Kate pulls back and drops onto her back on the mattress, feet still on the floor, and waits.
Leire knows what she wants, and she wants it so badly she almost trips over her own feet as she climbs onto the bed, settling Kate's body between her knees as she crawls forward and positions herself directly above her head.
"Wait — stay exactly like that," Kate says, taking in the full, gorgeous sight of her wet, flushed sex with a wolfish smile that makes Leire clench twice in a row.
"Kate, please..." Leire begs, so desperate her voice comes out as a high, tight whimper.
Kate smiles, and from above Leire watches her run her tongue slowly over her lips — and decides she can't wait anymore. She drops down and grinds her need against Kate's mouth.
"Yes, God," she breathes shakily as Kate's tongue comes out deliberate and fast and moves with exactly the speed Leire needs right now.
"Put your fingers inside me," she demands, struggling to stay upright.
"Not yet," Kate answers, circling her clit with her lips and working it with her tongue while her hands grip Leire's ass.
She wants to keep drinking from her, soaking herself in the warm slickness that, from the very first time she tasted it, felt like something she knew she'd be addicted to.
"I can't take any more, Kate." Leire's voice is so strained that the redhead knows it's only seconds before she lets go — so she gives her what she needs: three fingers pushed deep, and her tongue grazing her clit in light, deliberate strokes.
She knows that destroys her, and the ragged moan that tears out of Leire's throat confirms it.
Leire digs her fingers into her own thighs as the wave of her orgasm rolls through her entire body, branching out from her center and leaving her scalp buzzing and her toes curled.
"You're going to be the death of me," she says through a breathless laugh as she collapses to one side.
Kate moves across the mattress, toeing off her sneakers to lie down beside her as she unbuttons her pants and pulls them off.
Leire watches her undress, and she can't help herself when Kate's small, freckled breasts are finally bare — she takes one nipple into her mouth and moves with her as the Australian strips off her underwear.
"I want to see your face when you come," Leire decides, climbing off the bed and offering Kate her hand.
She leads her to a sofa where she'd already imagined them the moment she walked into the room — Kate on top of her. She drops into the center of it and Kate straddles her.
"Are you comfortable? How's your back?" Leire asks before doing anything.
The same dark flash from when Kate arrived crosses her lover's eyes again, but it's so fleeting that Leire decides not to push.
"Fine," Kate answers.
She's uncomfortable with this too. She knows she has to talk to her, that Diane is right and if she decides to retire, Leire needs to know — but technically she hasn't lied just now.
With the injection, she doesn't feel any pain, and maybe it would be easier to process everything that's happening if it still hurt.
"Then move for me, please," Leire urges in a rough whisper, sliding her hand between the redhead's legs and finding her just as wet as Leire herself.
Kate lifts her hips slightly, places her hands on Leire's shoulders, and her abdomen shudders as she exhales when Leire starts to push inside her.
"Good?" the Spanish woman asks, wetting her lips.
Kate's answer is something like a low grunt of assent, but her eyes have squeezed shut for a moment, and Leire knows that sometimes — like right now — it hurts, and that she needs a few seconds to adjust without any movement.
"Have I ever told you how beautiful you are when your cheeks flush like that?" Leire asks.
Kate looks at her and nods. She'd love to smile right now, because she loves hearing things like that when she feels this vulnerable, but this time it hits differently — it sets off a knocking in her chest that tightens into a knot of anxiety and takes a few seconds to ease.
Kate knows Leire means it when she says it, but she realizes that, especially now, she needs so much more than her words and her promises of love.
At this point, she needs Leire to find the courage to repeat outside this room everything she says inside it — but she's not going to say that today.
Today she needs her attention, she needs Leire to really want her.
She starts to move, slowly, and watches Leire's pupils blow wide, because Leire loves this — Kate up on her lap, her fingers inside her, rocking to find what she needs.
"You're so sensual," Leire breathes, mesmerized by the redhead's movements.
All Leire would need is a little pressure between her own legs and she knows she'd come even before Kate.
She always thinks she'll do it — that she'll touch herself while Kate's on top of her, match her rhythm, and come with her, because nothing gets her off harder than shaking while she hears her lover's moans — but she never does, because Kate hypnotizes her so completely when she moves like this that every muscle in her body goes rigid and she can't move at all.
"You're almost there," Leire murmurs, leaning forward slightly to place a hand at the small of Kate's back to make sure she doesn't fall backward like she did once after an orgasm, when she nearly ended up on the floor, her whole body shaking from the force of it.
Kate's response is another low grunt of confirmation that Leire feels like a lick against her clit.
"Come for me, baby — you know I love watching you," she whispers, looking up at her, and she can see the exact moment Kate's eyes go almost white before they close for a beat and open again, locking on Leire's as she comes.
When they're done they stay there — Kate straddling her, wrapped around her body, while Leire strokes her back with both hands and the exhaustion starts to catch up with the redhead.
"Let's go to bed," Leire whispers, and Kate opens her eyes slowly and shakes her head.
"Just a little longer," she pleads quietly, because she doesn't want to move, doesn't want this moment to end — she knows that once they get into bed and fall asleep, the next thing that will happen is that she'll have to get up in the middle of the night and slip back to her own room before people start moving through the hallways.
"Of course," Leire kisses her shoulder and pulls her close with a sudden fierceness that makes Kate exhale a sharp breath and her eyes fill, because it's in moments like these — in the strength of those sudden embraces — that she most feels the love Leire has for her.