Chapter Five
Elizabeth
“Love comforteth like sunshine after rain.”
Venus and Adonis
Evan waffled, and I thought he was about to reject me—again—but after he shared all his emotional vulnerability, I didn’t think it was because he didn’t want me.
Before he started spilling raw secrets I’d assumed he was a player, lying about leaving town in the morning as an excuse to walk away with no lingering commitment, Chelsea-style. But then he’d opened up about his therapy, and it was strangely endearing.
If anyone was behaving like a player, it was me.
The more time I spent with Evan, the more I wanted to touch him, kiss him, undress him, and act on this growing attraction.
The promise he’d be flying home in the morning compelled me to act now, rashly, with no regard for future regrets.
Hell, I’d regret it more if I let him go without some action.
But as I led him to my bedroom, my shyness redoubled. I only had a handful of condoms I’d picked up at the gay pride event last month. I hoped they weren’t novelty condoms, but the pink polka-dotted wrapping paper raised doubts.
My nerves grew steadily.
How did I end up bringing home a total stranger with the express intent of a one-nighter? If he wasn’t leaving, would I have even considered doing this so fast? Should I tell him I changed my mind?
What if he changed his mind?
As if sensing my hesitation, he leaned on my bedroom door frame—God, he had no right to look that gorgeous—and asked, “You sure about this?”
Was I? I had a free pass right here, right now. I could tell him to leave, and I’d never see him again. It would speed up the inevitable. I knew what was behind door number one: so long and farewell. Would it end any differently if I asked him to stay?
“Let’s make a deal.”
He smiled and inched closer. “What kind of deal?”
Calling back to our conversation about fear, I said, “For tonight, let’s just live in this moment.”
He crossed into my space enough that I could feel his heat, his energy. Another foot and we’d be touching. “Leave the past in the past?”
This was so unlike me. “And let tomorrow take care of tomorrow.”
My brain echoed with Shakespeare. Tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow. Let me have some fun tonight.
He ducked his head a little, bringing his eyes even with mine, so fucking sexy. “If that’s what you want.”
“Don’t you?” Were we both pretending to be adventurous?
“Yes.” Evan inched forward, touching my wrist. “So.”
The word was almost a question, like this was the final chance for either of us to opt for the safety of a goodnight, but parting would be such sweet sorrow.
“So.” My echoing voice came out a rasp. I fought the urge to look at my feet, to avoid the invitation in his green eyes, the temptation of his lips curling in a gentle smile. Instead, I channeled my inner Chelsea and met his gaze, encouraging him to make the first move.
There was no sudden switch, no moment where we fell off the precipice, tumbling irrevocably into turbulent passion. He just claimed my forearm and tugged me closer.
I leaned into him, my heart beating faster, and when our lips brushed this time, he didn’t pull away.
The light graze gave way to pressure, lips parting, a taste of his tongue.
Every move was slow, deliberately tantalizing.
His arm snaked around my back, pulling me into him, so he could seriously kiss me, and a thrill traveled straight down my core.
Despite the bumpy lead up, Evan knew how to kiss, and I surrendered to him. Confident, sexy Evan gave me a bad case of the butterflies.
I broke away long enough to sink onto the edge of the mattress, fizzing with the promise of intimacy with a man I barely knew. The warnings in my mind had yielded to curiosity, desire, the intoxicating power of seduction.
He ran his thumb along my chin, and I drank in the sheer beauty of his features.
His long eyelashes framed emerald eyes with specs of gold.
The flush on his cheeks only highlighted his smooth clear skin.
The golden scruff on his jaw threw his boyishness into stark relief.
And that pouty mouth hid perfectly straight white made-for-TV teeth.
His eyes had fallen on my lips as well. And then without any further discussion, he knocked me onto the bed and followed, hovering over me, kissing me again.
My cerebral cortex shut down. I touched his neck, awed at the goosebumps I was causing.
He hunched his shoulders in response, encouraging me to lift up and run my tongue along that skin for an encore performance.
“Can I…?” With a tug at my sweater, he lifted it over my head. His fingers ran along the edge of my bra, snapping the front latch, then he trailed kisses down my chest, taking one of my nipples in his mouth, sucking gently and licking roughly. I groaned.
I forced Evan to sit up so I could get his shirt off and stopped dead to take him in. Tight muscles—not showy, just right—etched his torso. I ran my fingers across his lightly dusted chest and down his smooth abs, enjoying how his skin rippled. “You’re ticklish.”
“A little. But it’s nice. You feel amazing.”
I did feel amazing, but part of my brain kept trying to derail the train flying brakeless down the tracks. I needed him now. But what about tomorrow?
Where had I come up with the idea to let tomorrow take care of tomorrow? I was terrible at that.
There was a reason I didn’t usually do this. It was as foolish as drinking too much, but knowing I’d have a hangover had never stopped me. I was going to hurt when he was gone.
There’d be shame of course, but I’d sort that.
I didn’t believe sex was wrong, despite social conditioning.
Shame was like a vestigial impulse, bred into me through osmosis and rampant misogyny.
I consciously rejected those beliefs as patriarchal bullshit, but even knowing shame was mostly imaginary, I had years of internalized messaging to overcome, so it hit me, unbidden. The price of being a woman.
I’d also feel the loss of a part of myself I was giving over. But mainly the loneliness of my everyday would sharpen in the absence of this connection, however brief. I’d touch the sun tonight, but tomorrow would be cold and dark.
Nothing new. Loneliness was my lot in life. Nights like this only made me temporarily forget. Not that I often sought mindless oblivion because I wanted a life with someone. I wanted forever. But tomorrow, I’d be in this bed alone, memories of this delicious pleasure fueling a thousand fantasies.
Fears evaporated as Evan kissed me again with even more conviction. I relaxed, experiencing the moment. After all, that was the promise we’d made. And in the moment, his groin ground into me, hard evidence of his attraction against my thigh, as we rutted like high school teens cheating at sex.
I reached for the button on his pants and unzipped him. His cock sprang forward behind his flimsy boxer fabric, and I slid my hand under his waistband to touch his rock-hard erection.
“Ah, Lizzy.”
I froze for a half a beat. But the slip only reminded me this was fleeting. It didn’t matter. There was no point correcting him. Tomorrow, he’d be gone.
I ran my thumb under the ridge on his cock, loving the tortured sounds escaping his lips.
His hands shook as he worked my pants off, and as his hit the floor, he reached down to retrieve a condom from his wallet. A normal non-polka-dotted condom. “These don’t expire, do they?”
I almost laughed, but he tossed it onto the pillow and lay beside me, utterly nude, and there was nothing funny about how beautiful he was. And that beauty wanted me.
“You’re delicious, Evan.”
He rolled so our noses met, our chests nearly brushing, his extended cock pressing right above my throbbing need. This must have been how Eve felt after she’d tasted the fruit of knowledge—aware of the forbidden, taking it anyway.
A smile pulled up one corner of his mouth. “You’re an absolute dream.” His fingertips lit on my shoulder, gently. “I want to touch you.”
Like he hadn’t already sucked on my nipple. Shamelessness rode shotgun to my self-consciousness.
“Touch me.”
His awkwardness now banished, his hands roamed everywhere, making my skin electric.
I was all potential energy, like a static charge.
A balloon would have stuck to me. He touched my cheek, my neck, my shoulder, my arm, my hand, my fingers, my fingertips.
These last he lifted to his lips and kissed one by one.
Freed of any inhibition, I let myself explore every inch of his arms, abs, back, ass, hips, until need grew irrepressible, and my hips moved of their own accord, rocking against his thigh, wanting wanting wanting.
He reached for the condom and looked into my eyes. “Are you sure?”
“Yes.”
He rolled it on, and finally, finally, finally, ran a finger along my clit.
I moaned, and he did it again, kissing me as he heightened my need.
After so much foreplay, it felt incredible, and I would have let him stroke me until I came, but that was a feat I could accomplish on my own.
I wanted to reach that climax with him inside me.
“Please.” I tugged him toward me, urging him to settle between my legs. He entered, slowly, so slowly, with a sigh of a groan. Stroking me, sliding in me. “Oh, God. Evan.”
I let my knees cant to accommodate him. His eyes closed, and his lower lip sucked between his teeth, as he stretched me, until our hips met. He looked like sin, skin flush, mouth swollen from kisses, peering down at me through those long eyelashes, like he was just as entranced by me.
This right here was the kind of connection I longed for. I knew it was fleeting, not even real. Just the sugar hiding the bitterness of my real life, but I wanted to pretend, wanted to make myself believe this would last forever.
And then he dragged his hips up, and my back arched from the undeniable bliss of the ebb and flow of our bodies in unison.
He managed to keep an even rhythm, like he was pacing himself, touching me, kissing me, making this moment last, but the desire built, and I wanted more. He wanted more, moving faster, faster, reaching for infinity.
Our kisses became an afterthought. Lips brushing, lips forgotten.
My head fell back, and I lifted my knees so he could go deeper. All decorum deserted me as I crossed my ankles over his tail bone and begged him to fuck me harder, faster, getting closer and closer to nirvana just from hearing him pant.
“I should slow down. Oh, oh shit.” He slowed, but clearly too late.
I moaned in frustration. I’d been right there.
My moan turned into a prolonged oooh, yes when he dropped down between my legs, laid his hands on my inner thighs, and ran his tongue along my clit, sliding a finger inside me, then two, finding the exact spot he’d been hitting before.
I opened my eyes, and the sight of that pretty, pretty boy doing dirty things brought me to the edge.
And then his thumb circled the space between his tongue and his fingers, and I came almost instantly with a hard spasm, riding out a wave of cresting endorphin bombs that went on forever.
I floated in a cloud of good feels, no words, and a blank mind. Money couldn’t buy this bliss.
“Oh, my fuck,” I sighed, tightening my thighs against him.
Evan crawled up beside me and collapsed, head on pillow, relaxing with a profound exhale. He laid a hand across my stomach, and by the weight alone, I could tell his muscles had worn out from the expenditure. He kissed my shoulder. “All good?”
“So good.”
I’d felt the earth move. I’d felt the sky tumbling down.
But I couldn’t help wonder, how much better it would be if Evan and I weren’t strangers?
I longed to really know someone, to understand what they wanted, to learn and grow together until language was no longer necessary. A transparent communication of souls.
Oh, shit, I was thinking about Rousseau again.
I almost snorted at my own ridiculous tendency to over-analyze even a fling, and then my heart squeezed as I remembered that this was just a fling and he’d be leaving. The freaking one-night-stand roller coaster of emotions had struck again.
I nestled into his chest, breathing in the smell of him. I could have curled up and drifted off in complete comfort, but he sat up on his elbow. “Do you want some water? Or do you want to sleep?”
Sleep sounded delicious, but I was keenly aware of the time slipping away. I rolled off my side of the bed and grabbed a robe, pulling it on before fetching two glasses of water from the kitchen.
When I returned, he was pulling on his boxers. Was he leaving?
I sat on the bed. “What time’s your flight?”
“In the afternoon.” He settled back beside me, pillow propped behind him.
“Maybe we should talk about this?”
He gave me a coy smile. “What happened to living in the moment.”
“Oh.” I frowned. “If that’s what you want.”
He shook his head. “That’s what you wanted. I’m along for whatever.”
“Whatever, huh?” I looked down at my water and spun the glass a little, watching the ripples level out, like my life would in a few hours.
He laid his hand on my knee. “Don’t take that the wrong way. I mean it. I’m up for whatever you want.”
“You don’t care?”
He didn’t answer right away. He sipped on his water and seemed to think. I waited, weighing my own feelings. I was historically shit at asking for what I wanted. What did I want?
Finally, he took a breath and started. “Look. I’m in a complicated place in my life.
I’d be lying if I told you that I’d be content with a one-night stand with you, but I don’t really know what else I can offer right now.
I could ask you to wait and trust that I’ll be ready for something more serious in a short time.
” He exhaled. “But I don’t know if that’s even what you want, so how could I ask that of you?
And I can’t promise that my situation will be less complicated any time soon. ”
I hated to ask, but I had to. “You’re really not married?”
He blanched. “No. Nothing like that. It’s just my job situation and the distance.” He’d taken my free hand at some point and caressed my thumb. “Can you understand?”
I could. I didn’t like it, but it made sense and it sounded grownup and honest. “So when I said, live in the moment?”
He set his glass on the nightstand and ran his finger along the neckline of my robe. “I really like this moment.”
I closed my eyes, literally and metaphorically. Forcing myself to appreciate the here and now, I curled into him and somehow drifted off to sleep with his arms around me.