Chapter 27 #2
The first round is not slow. It is pure aftermath.
Applause still in my ears. His hands under my dress.
My fingers in his hair. His mouth between my thighs like he is trying to prove a point to Amsterdam, the past, God, and possibly the entire adult products industry.
I come with one hand braced on his shoulder and the other twisted in the sheets, saying his name too loudly and not caring who hears.
He rises, wipes his mouth with his thumb, and looks so pleased with himself that I should push him into the canal.
Instead, I grab his jacket and drag him down onto the bed.
His laugh breaks against my mouth. God, that laugh. I will never get tired of earning it.
We undress each other with none of the desperation of secrecy and all of the desperation of wanting. His jacket hits the floor. My dress follows. His shirt buttons survive only because I like the shirt and feel generous. My bra does not receive the same mercy.
“Ruthless,” I gasp when he tears one strap.
“I’ll buy you another.”
“I liked that one.”
“I liked it too.”
“Clearly not enough.”
His mouth moves over my breast, and the complaint disappears into the ceiling.
The second round is slower. Not gentle exactly.
Sin has never been only gentle, and God bless him for that.
But deeper. The kind of sex where every kiss feels like a sentence and every touch has meaning underneath the heat.
He lays me out on the bed and takes his time with me, his hands and mouth moving over places he knows by heart but still treats like discovery.
I arch into him, laughing once when his hair falls into his eyes and he looks impatient with his own body for having the nerve to obstruct his view.
“Come here,” I whisper.
He does.
He comes over me, broad and warm and mine, and when he pushes inside me, my eyes sting. Not because it hurts. Because Amsterdam gave us ruin once, and somehow we came back with a ring.
He stills when he sees my face.
“Laurel?”
I touch his cheek. “I’m okay.”
His eyes search mine.
I smile. “I’m just happy.”
The words change him. His forehead lowers to mine. For a moment, he doesn’t move. He just breathes with me. Then he kisses me.
When he starts to move, there’s no hurry. He holds my hand beside my head, his fingers laced through mine, my ring pressing against his skin with every slow thrust.
I come looking at him.
He follows with my name in his mouth, his body shuddering over mine as if even now, after all this time, I still undo him.
We don’t go back downstairs in half an hour. Or an hour.
At some point, my phone buzzes on the nightstand with a message from Opal, who left SINsual when I did.
Opal York
Everything is fine. Stop pretending you’re coming back.
I laugh so hard I snort. Sin reads it over my shoulder and looks entirely unrepentant.
“Smart team,” he says.
“Enablers.”
“Same thing.”
I type back one-handed because his mouth is on my shoulder.
Professional emergency. Handle without me.
The reply comes fast.
Sure, boss.
I drop the phone and roll toward him. “They know.”
His hand slides over my hip. “Everyone knows.”
That sentence used to terrify me. Now it makes something warm spread through my chest.
Everyone knows.
And the world did not end.
The third round starts because I make the mistake of telling him the serpent prototype has an improved pulse pattern inspired by his touch. He takes that personally and insists on verifying. For research. Obviously.
We test nothing from the Eden line because the suitcase is downstairs with the product team, but that does not stop Sin from saying he needs to compare methodology.
I tell him that is the least sexy sentence ever spoken.
He proves me wrong.
Repeatedly.
By midnight, the suite is a disaster.
My heels are somewhere by the window. His belt is hanging off a chair.
Room service sits half-eaten on the table because we ordered it and then forgot food was a thing bodies need.
Champagne has gone warm in the bucket. My launch notes are scattered on the floor, and at some point Sin uses one page to demonstrate exactly where he thinks the serpent model needs more pressure variation.
I tell him he’s banned from product feedback.
He tells me to put it in writing. I tell him my hands are busy. He agrees. Enthusiastically.
The fourth round happens against the window with Amsterdam glowing beneath us.
His hands on my hips. My palms pressed to the glass.
His mouth at my ear telling me how beautiful I looked onstage.
How proud he is. How badly he wants to marry me.
How he would go through hell again if it led him here, to me, to this room, to my ring catching light while he holds me.
I should scold him for saying romantic things while actively doing very unprofessional things to me against hotel architecture. Instead, I come so hard my knees nearly give out. He catches me.
He always does.
Later, much later, when the city has gone quieter and my body is boneless and overly pleased with itself, I end up sprawled across his chest in bed. His hand moves lazily up and down my back. The room smells like sex, champagne, and the very expensive candle housekeeping left on the dresser.
I lift my head. “We really didn’t go back to my own reception.”
“No.”
“That’s rude of us.”
“Yes.”
“I’m the guest of honor.”
“You were honored.”
I bite his chest. He laughs, hand tightening on my hip.
“Careful,” he says. “Don’t start something you can’t finish.”
“Ready to show me some more tricks, Mr. Sinclair?”
The fifth round is lazy at first. Sweet.
A little clumsy because we are both tired and oversensitive and laughing too much.
Then his mouth finds mine, open and deep, and the laughter fades into something warmer.
He rolls me beneath him and loves me slowly while the city watches through the curtains we never closed.
When I come this time, it is quiet. Emotional. His name barely more than a breath.
At some point before dawn, I wake to him sliding back into bed after getting us water. He tucks me against him, careful with my sore body, and kisses my forehead.
I look at my ring in the dim light. Then at him.
“You know,” I whisper, voice rough, “the first time we were in Amsterdam, I thought wanting you was going to ruin my life.”
His eyes soften. “And did it?”
I think about everything.
The scandal.
The pain.
The apartment I had to leave.
The job I took.
The life I built after.
The man holding me.
The ring on my hand.
“Yes.”
His expression tightens. “Laurel—”
I touch his mouth.
“Good thing,” I whisper. “I like this one better.”
His eyes close for a second. When they open, they are bright with something he would deny if I pointed it out.
“I love you,” he says.
“I love you too.”
His mouth comes down on mine again. Open. Warm. Familiar. A kiss full of every place we’ve been and every place we’re still going.
And when Amsterdam wakes around us, when the first pale light slips over the canal and turns the room gold, Sin pulls me closer like he still can’t believe he gets to.
This time, he does.
This time, we both do.
The End