Chapter 11 #2
He stilled. “Too much?”
“No,” I said, smoothing my hand over his chest. “Not too much. Just… a lot.” My voice shook. “I want you. All of you. We’ll go slow.”
Something inside him loosened. His breath shivered through him, and he dipped his forehead toward mine even though I was too short for him to reach. “Okay.”
He guided himself toward me, one hand braced near my head as if shielding me from more than just his weight. The first press of him nudged at my entrance, a slow bloom of pressure where our bodies met. The whole room seemed to hold still.
There was pressure. Stretch. A deep, steady ache that wasn’t pain—just the shock of so much man fitting into so little space.
My fingers curled into his ribcage, and he went rigid above me.
“Liv?” His voice rasped, frayed at the edges. “Hurt?”
“It’s… intense,” I whispered, shaking my head. “But good. I just need a second.”
He nodded, and the tremor running through his arms shook the bed frame. “I wait.”
Every part of him went perfectly still—muscles locked, breaths careful, like he feared even shifting wrong might break me. I eased my hips the slightest bit, letting my body find the angle it needed, giving myself a moment to adjust.
“Okay,” I breathed. “More.”
With more control than I thought possible, he pushed in slowly—inch by agonizing inch. A soft burn warmed into heat, spreading low and deep, drawing a helpless sound from my throat.
By the time he was fully seated inside me, sweat shimmered along his temples. His breathing had turned uneven, chest rising in long, strained pulls.
“Liv…” His voice fractured. “You feel…”
“Good?” I asked softly.
His answer wasn’t a word—just a sound torn from somewhere deep. “Yes. Good. Too good.”
A breathless laugh escaped me. “That’s the idea.”
Curling over me, his mouth found mine again, kissing away every flicker of uncertainty, every trace of tension.
The first roll of his hips was barely a movement, just enough to let my body settle around the fullness of him.
The second drew a muted gasp from my throat.
The third unspooled something inside both of us.
He listened with his whole body.
The shift of my breath. The arch of my spine. The soft sounds slipping out no matter how I tried to hold them in.
Every time I reacted, he followed—testing, learning, adjusting with a tenderness that shouldn’t have fit the sheer strength of him. His gaze moved between my mouth and my eyes, watching every change in my face as if it showed him where to go next.
“You’re following me,” I whispered, wonder edging each word.
His breath brushed my cheek. “Yes. I follow you.”
The rhythm sank deeper—still controlled, still slow, but carrying a new weight. Something tight coiled inside me again, building fast, fed by the way he breathed my name against my temple, unable to hold it in.
“Liv…” His voice cracked. “I feel… so much. I don’t want to hurt. I don’t want to stop.”
“You’re not hurting me.” I lifted my hips into him, seeking more. “You’re perfect. Keep going. Please.”
The plea tugged something loose inside him.
His next thrust found a deeper angle, and the world burst behind my eyelids. A broken sound tore from me—half gasp, half release—and he answered with a low, gutted noise that vibrated through every point where our bodies met.
Everything narrowed to the steady, building drive of his hips. The creak of the mattress. The slick heat between us. Spring air clinging to sweat and skin.
My legs tightened around him. His breath caught, hips driving harder, deeper, searching. The pressure climbed fast—rising, relentless—and then I shattered. A scream ripped out of me as my orgasm crashed through every nerve, fiercer than the first.
“Liv…” he moaned, voice frayed with desperation. “I’m… close. I can’t…”
“Yes,” I panted, my body still twitching through the aftershocks. Each slow roll of his hips drew it out again. “It’s okay. I’ve got you. Let go.”
His whole body jolted, fighting the instinct to stay in control even now. One more careful stroke. Then another.
And the wave broke.
He buried his face against my temple as release slammed through him. A roar ripped from his chest, deep enough to shake the headboard, but he still held himself above me with trembling arms, terrified of crushing me even as pleasure wracked him in hard, shuddering pulses.
The feel of him losing control inside that much restraint tipped me straight over the edge again.
Heat detonated inside me, spilling outward in bright, dizzying waves.
My fingers dug into his back, gripping fur and slick skin and the staggering strength of him as my climax rolled through me a third time.
When the aftershocks eased, Vek shifted just enough to take some of his weight off me—still inside, still careful, still watching my face as though reading the aftermath as closely as he’d read the moment itself.
His hand found mine where it trembled against the sheet.
Long fingers threaded through my own, anchoring me with a warmth that softened every last shiver.
“You safe?” he asked, voice rubbed raw.
“With you?” My thumb traced along his knuckles. “Yeah. I am.”
The breath he let out held relief, tangled with something he didn’t yet have words for.
He slipped free with slow gentleness, then guided me onto my side and followed a heartbeat later.
My back settled to his chest as though he’d been built for this, one strong arm circling my waist and drawing me into his heat.
Every muscle in my body hummed—loose, spent, satisfied in ways I wasn’t sure I’d ever felt before. Something in my chest loosened and then opened quietly inside me, a tender ache I wasn’t brave enough to name.
He nuzzled into my hair, inhaling lightly, as if memorizing the scent of us—shampoo, sweat, spring, something new that belonged only to this room. “Good,” he murmured against my neck. “You with me. Good.”
The words weren’t perfect. They didn’t have to be.
At the foot of the bed, Boone let out a long, theatrical sigh—the canine equivalent of signing off on the situation. June Bug startled awake, blinked blearily at us as though we’d disrupted her favorite nest, then tucked herself back into her pile of laundry.
Thunder had rolled off into the ridge, leaving the house wrapped in a gentler kind of quiet. Sleep tugged at my vision, coaxing me toward it.
This didn’t feel like temptation winning or common sense losing. It didn’t feel reckless, or borrowed, or foolish. It felt like an opening. Like stepping through the first door of something I’d spent years circling without realizing it.
His hand settled over my stomach again, and my fingers curled over his without thinking.
“Vek?” The word drifted out of me, blurred by sleep.
“Yes?” His voice brushed my ear, softer than I’d ever heard it.
“I’m not sorry,” I whispered.
A long breath filled his chest behind me, warming my back. “Not sorry, too,” he murmured, quiet as a secret meant for the dark.
The night settled into peace around us—the beams, the mountain—everything calm for the first time in a long time.
Wrapped in the arms of a man the world insisted didn’t exist, I let my eyes close. Loneliness, that old familiar ache, slipped away so easily it startled me.
For once, I wasn’t alone at all.