Chapter Fifty-Seven
Ruby
His hands find my waist, and he’s turning me, spinning me around, pressing my chest to the counter before I can draw breath. The edge bites into my hipbones. I don’t care. His hand between my shoulder blades, pushing me down, and I go, cheek against the cool wood, the grain rough against my skin.
“Don’t move.” His voice is low, rough, barely controlled.
I don’t. I grip the counter edge, knuckles white, and I hear it then: thunder, distant, rolling across the sky outside. A flash of lightning illuminates the kitchen through the window, paints everything in stark white and sudden shadow.
His hands are rough at my waist, shoving my pants down, my underwear, dragging them to my knees. I step out of one leg, leave them tangled around the other, and I feel him behind me, the heat of him, the hard line of his cock against my thigh.
“Condom.” I manage to get the word out although it’s half-swallowed by the counter.
“Got it.” The sound of tearing foil, the snap of latex, and then his hands are back, gripping my hips, pulling me back toward him.
Thunder again, closer this time. The lightning flashes, cracking through the sky. He pushes in slow. I feel every inch, the stretch, the burn, the way my body has to adjust to take him. I gasp, fingers digging into the wood, and he stops, waits, his breath hot against my neck.
“Okay?” The word is gritted out, strained.
“Don’t stop.” I push back against him, take him deeper, and he groans, the sound raw, unchecked.
He starts moving. Not gentle. Not careful. The rhythm he sets is hard, relentless, and I feel him everywhere, the drag of him as he pulls out, the slam as he drives back in, the way his cock hits something deep inside me that makes my vision spark.
Lightning again. I see the coffee mug on the counter, inches from my face.
The one he filled before he walked out. The chip on the handle.
The lipstick stain on the rim. Evidence of him in my space, my life, my kitchen, and now inside me, and I grip the counter harder, feel the wood bite into my palms, and I meet him thrust for thrust.
Thunder crashes, simultaneous with the lightning now, the storm right overhead, and the sound covers my moans, covers the slap of skin against skin, covers the wet sound of him fucking me, the way my body takes him, grips him, pulls him deeper.
His hand slides from my hip, around, finds my clit, and I cry out, the sound lost in the thunder. He circles me there, rough, deliberate, matching the rhythm of his thrusts, and I feel it building, the pressure, the heat, the coil curling low in my belly.
“Xavier–” I don’t know what I’m asking for.
He knows anyway. His fingers speed up, his thrusts deepen, and he’s hitting that spot inside me with every stroke, the angle perfect, brutal, exactly what I need.
The lightning flashes constantly now, strobing the kitchen, and I see the tool belt hanging by the door, his initials etched on the inside flap, and I come with his name tearing out of my throat, my body clenching around him, milking him, my legs shaking so hard I can barely stand.
He doesn’t stop. He fucks me through it, keeps the pressure on my clit, keeps the angle, and I’m sensitive, too sensitive, but I don’t want him to stop. I want more, I want everything, and I push back against him, take him deeper, feel the slap of his balls against my thigh.
“Again,” he grits out, and I don’t know if he’s commanding himself or me, but I feel another wave building, impossible, inevitable. The thunder crashes, the lightning flashes, and all I see is the half-finished cabinet we were working on, the brush marks visible in the paint.
He shifts his angle, drives deeper, and I come again, harder this time, my scream lost in the storm, my body arching off the counter, his hand the only thing keeping me pressed down, keeping me grounded, and I feel him swell inside me, feel his rhythm falter, his grip on my hip bruising, desperate.
“Ruby–” My name, torn out of him, and he comes, pulsing inside me, his forehead dropping to my shoulder, his breath hot and ragged against my neck.
The thunder rolls away, distant again. The lightning fades to occasional flickers. I feel him softening inside me, still twitching, still filling me, and I don’t move, don’t speak, my cheek pressed to the counter, my hands cramping from their grip on the edge.
He pulls out slow. I feel the loss, the emptiness, the sudden cool air where he was warm. He deals with the condom without moving away from me, his hand on my back, steadying, grounding.
“Shit,” he says, his voice rough. “Your hipbones.”
I look down. The counter edge has left a red mark across my hip bones and my stomach. I hadn’t noticed. I don’t care.
I straighten, my legs unsteady, and I turn to face him. He’s still breathing hard, his hair damp with sweat, his eyes dark and fixed on me with an expression I can’t read.
The coffee mug sits between us on the counter. The tool belt hangs by the door. The half-finished cabinet waits in the corner.
Everything looks the same. It’s not.