18. Delivery #2
"In the alley I understood I was drowning myself to keep you dry.
That the leaving was the fight that kills you faster than the water.
" My hand finds the beat of his heart through his shirt.
"You told me once a man on a road alone at the dark is how you lose.
I was about to be that. Alone, on the road, sure I was being noble. "
My face turns up to his in the dark. "Promise me you won't be that tomorrow. Promise me you come like a man with a team, not a man throwing himself at the dark to make up for a girl on a truck. Promise me you don't do the Karachi thing."
"I promise," he says, dropping his voice down into that low register meant for nobody but me, and I can feel the whole weight of what it costs him to lay that down.
"I come back with the team, or I don't come reckless at all.
You got my word on it. And you promise me you walk through that door tomorrow morning believing I'm coming for you, not just hoping on it, yeah. "
"I promise."
The dark is closing and the plan is waiting and there is exactly this much time and no more. Both of us know to the minute what tomorrow asks, and the knowing sharpens the four minutes into something that will not wait for a safer night, because there is no safer night left.
I reach for him first this time, my hands framing his face as I pull him down into a kiss that tastes of desperation and forever and all the words we have never dared speak.
His arms band around me like steel, lifting me against him so my back meets the wall.
The cool surface is a shock against my heated skin, but nothing compared to the fire of his body pressing into mine.
I explore him like I might never get another chance.
My palms slide down the strong column of his neck, over the broad shoulders I have watched carry too much for too long.
I trace the ridges of muscle in his chest, the faint scars that map his history, feeling the rapid thud of his heart beneath my fingertips.
He is solid heat and restrained power, every inch of him taut with the same need thrumming through me. I drift lower, nails grazing his abdomen sucking the musk off the fine fuzz below his belly, and wrap my fingers around the thick, hard length of him.
He groans low as I take his ample girth barely into my mouth as I stroke him slowly, learning the velvet-steel weight of him, the way he pulses in my grip. the way he beads in my mouth, sending white heat straight down through me.
"Mira." My name is a rough warning and a plea all at once.
I squeeze his balls gently, which earns me an arching and a groan, with my tongue flicking over the sensitive tip, and his hips jerk into my touch.
he beads some more and I am there to catch them.
The sound he makes sends fresh heat pooling between my thighs.
I want to memorize every reaction, every place that makes his breath hitch and his control fracture.
He peels my shirt away and drops it. His hands claim me in return, but I keep exploring, mapping the flex of his back as he pulls me up and higher. My legs lock around his waist. The hard press of him against my core makes me ache.
He shifts his hips and drives into me in one powerful thrust, burying himself to the hilt, making me gasp, the sudden fullness pulling a broken moan from my throat. We stay locked like that, breathing hard, foreheads pressed together while my body adjusts to the thick invasion of him.
Then he begins to move. Deep, relentless strokes that claim me completely. Each powerful thrust rocks me against the wall, hitting that perfect spot inside me with devastating precision.
I cling to his massive shoulders like I am weightless, nails digging in as pleasure spirals higher. His mouth devours mine, then trails down my neck, sucking at the sensitive skin. One hand grips my hip while the other slides between us, his thumb circling my core in tight, perfect strokes.
The intensity builds fast and fierce, sharpened by the knowledge that this might be our last stolen moment. I tighten around him, my inner muscles gripping his thick length as waves of pleasure crash through me. "Travis," I gasp.
He growls my name against my neck in response, "Mira," low and rough and full of possession.
His pace quickens, thrusts growing harder and deeper, driving me toward the edge with ruthless precision.
He thrusts deep one final time and releases first, spilling hot and thick inside me as his body shakes against mine.
His hot fluid sends me to a perfect shatter around him, my release hits like a storm, pulsing and clenching around him in powerful contractions as he drags me over with him.
Later, in the quiet with the dark pressed against the glass, I hold onto the four minutes the way I have learned to hold onto him, without auditing it, without running the math on what it costs.
We stay joined against the wall for long moments, his arms still wrapped around me, my legs trembling around his waist.
He does not pull away immediately. Instead, he presses soft kisses along my shoulder and up my neck, his hands gentling over my skin in tender strokes that contrast the earlier intensity. I thread my fingers through his hair, holding him close while our breathing slowly evens out.