7. Unbridled
“Stay.”
A shiver ran through me. I was drowning in desire for him. I turned my face towards his, and our lips met. His were firm and warm, cautious, but lustful. At once, I was twenty-one again, giddy, full of the libido of my youth. My heart was a hummingbird in my chest, thrumming in my temples, a high-pitched ringing in my ears. His caress along my arm sent a rush through me, my fingers tingling. Thrills raced over my skin, penetrated into my bones. What started as timid and reserved quickly escalated to a wanton disregard for anything else but each other. A fire ignited within me that I hadn’t felt in so long, it almost hurt. My desire grew exponentially with each rush of breath, each stroke of lip on lip. My fingers ran through his hair, over the back of his neck, drawing him closer and closer until there was no space left between us. His arms enveloped my waist, sliding over the gauzy fabric of my linen shorts, and I wanted nothing more than to take him inside myself.
He ended the kiss first, a few soft brushes of his lips against mine, and there we stood, breathless and embracing against the door of his villa. The ringing in my ears had been replaced by the pounding of my pulse, beating to the rhythm of my now lascivious greed. “Whoa,” I said unintentionally.
He smiled. “You’re sure?”
“No more talking,” I oozed.
He swept me up off my feet, my legs encircled his waist, and he carried me to the back of the room. Up the two steps of the dais, he dropped me on the bed—he was not lying about the softness, it was plush and amazing—and immediately tore off his top. I was taken aback. What appeared as the start of a good amount of weight in his torso was suddenly revealed to be much more of an impressive ‘dad-bod,’ if I understood the term correctly. Broad shoulders, a wide expanse of a chest that looked powerful, and a solidly firm stomach. It occurred to me that actually strong people didn’t always look like body builders. In fact, if I had to choose the physique I found most attractive, the contestants for Mr. Universe could hit the road, because I would always choose this. “My god, Jason. You need to stop hiding your physique under baggy clothes.”
I pulled off my shirt and my bra, and a crooked and amused smirk spread across his face. “Says this goddess of loveliness shrouded in burlap,” he replied.
“Oh, shut up,” I replied, ignoring the little voice in the back of my head that tried to tell me he was lying. He wanted me, and that was evident in both the hunger in his gaze and the heat that flowed toward me. That, plus the newfound confidence I was feeling since the zipline, quashed any shred of negativity left over from my more recent past of insecurity.
I sat up and pulled him to me by the waist of his shorts. I pressed my lips to his chest, and the heat of his skin sailed through me. My pulse quickened as I opened his fly. His fingertips massaged my scalp, trailed down my throat. He leaned my head back and devoured my mouth with his kisses. I let his shorts drop from him as he leaned me back onto the bed.
My essence ached for him. All at once, the onslaught of physical intimacy after countless months of nothing made me ravenous for more. My veins coursed with fiery lust. He slipped his hand under my waistband, and I wondered why I was still wearing shorts. At least I was wondering that until his fingers slid over my most sensitive place and I made an unholy sound in reaction.
My skin suddenly hot with embarrassment instead of desire, I pulled my face away and covered it with the nearest pillow I could find. The bed bounced lightly from his laughter beside me.
Afraid to show my face, I whined into the pillow, “What the hell was that?”
“It’s okay,” he tried to say in a comforting tone, but his voice was strained. Holding back the chuckles, I bet. “You said it’s been a while.”
I groaned.
“I’m serious,” he said, kissing my shoulder. He tried to lift the pillow from me, but it only made me clamp down harder. “You’re really going to let one little moan ruin what we’ve both been thinking about for probably a decade?”
“It wasn’t a moan.” I was certain that my words were coming out garbled through the mound of fluff I pressed over my shamed face, so I finally threw it back toward the headboard. “In what world is sounding like a farm animal sexy?”
No matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t hide the amusement in his face. His pinched lips fought the smile pulling up at the corners of his mouth, his raised eyebrows quivered to remain in a sympathetic pose. As much as my shame and embarrassment fought to overpower everything in me, his efforts were endearing.
“I won’t lie: it was not a sound I was expecting,” he said. “But I don’t think it was bad. I certainly wouldn’t equate it with any animal. We’re both a little out of practice.”
“Really? How long has it been for you?”
He shrugged. “Like you, I lost count after a few months. I didn’t want to believe it at first, but I wouldn’t be surprised if she’s been having an affair.”
“If I didn’t know better, I’d say the same about Fred. But I don’t think he cares as much about that as some do. He’s the type that really loves to work all the time.”
There was silence between us for a moment. The steady thrum of the rain on the roof and the occasional claps of thunder filled the void as we sat, myself topless, and him stark naked. Tentatively, he put his hand on mine. “Like I said before, if you don’t want to do anything tonight, I can sleep on the couch… after I take the coldest shower possible. Or, if you really want to risk the weather, I won’t stop you from leaving.”
As if on cue, thunder boomed overhead and vibrated through me. My gaze remained fixed on his face, that boyish charm and earnestness that I always admired still present after such a long time.
“You really don’t think that sound was awful?”
“Honestly, it was kind of sexy. It was like my touch unleashed a primal side of you that you keep hidden.”
I smiled, feeling the tentative return of the beast he mentioned. “You wouldn’t be entirely wrong.”
“Do you want me to stop?”
I didn’t answer him with words. Instead, I pulled him into another deep kiss as I threw my shorts to the floor. He rolled me back, hands gliding across my skin like a warm breeze. It had been so long since anyone had touched me like this that his gentle caress made me tremble in anticipation of what comes next. His kisses floated over my cheek, my ear, and to the hollow of my neck. One quick inhale from him at that spot sent me careening into the arms of pleasure.
This was no dormitory with ancient furniture and thin walls. We were in a private cabin, one built with the intention that a romantic couple might do what romantic couples do. Someone would only hear us if they were to come right up to the porch, and even then, what would they expect? Just like the ziplining that afternoon had reawakened my desire for adventure, his heat, his lips, his fingers reawakened a deep hunger for satisfaction.
Once again, his hand slipped between my thighs, and this time I let go of my shame, my fear. With each subtle movement of his digit, a whimper, a moan, a gasp was set free of my lips to his delight. He’d learned some new tricks in the decade since we’d last touched like this, and each one made my body sing.
His mouth lingered at my throat, but I pulled him away. “No hickies. I can’t cover them up,” I said, breathlessly.
A mischievous smile spread across his handsome face. “Perhaps not here,” he said, quickly pecking that spot, “or here,” and pecked the top of my breast, “or even here,” and gave a harmless nibble at my waist. “But what about here?” His lips grazed at the crease of my groin, tickling me intensely. I couldn’t help twitching and almost kicking him in reaction. Because of this, he shifted his body to pin my legs down and planted his mouth on the place just above the joint, sucking on the soft flesh and flicking it with his tongue. Both giddy and surprised, I writhed as much as I could under his restraint.
When at last he pulled back, he gazed upon his work. “Yes, that’s coming along nicely.”
“What happens when I wear a bathing suit tomorrow and that purple spot is peeking out from under the fabric?”
“You’ve got cover-ups,” he said with a shrug. “And shorts.”
“Not that I wear in the water.”
Still, he squinted at the developing bruise he’d made, as if analyzing it. “Hm. It’s not quite right, is it? Needs more work,” he said and began anew.
He only continued this for a moment more, and then shifted downward, and my giggling subsided. He no longer held my legs down, instead pressing his hands against the inside of my thighs to push them apart, and he spread them wide. He hummed as he lapped at my sex, like someone enjoying a delicious meal.
When he pulled my flesh between his lips, my back arched up off the bed and I grabbed at his shoulders. Our one night so long ago was so rushed, over so fast, that it felt unreal. We didn’t bother with the time it took to appreciate each other. This time, though, with his hands sliding gently along the tender flesh of my inner thighs, and his tongue tracing the peaks and valleys of my sex, we could take our time. I still felt the nagging desire to charge through to the end, but why? No one was looking for us. There was no deadline to meet, no schedule to keep, no danger of someone walking in on us. It was just me, just him, just this bed.
I closed my eyes and tried to let myself experience only the moment. No anticipating what I needed to do, no thoughts on how to move or sound, no momentarily imagining how Nikki or Fred or Annie would react if they knew. Instead, I listened to Jason’s satisfied hums, felt his caresses, and let the waves of our desire pull me under.
How long had it been since I’d felt anything this tender, this divine? I truly couldn’t recall. Perhaps I never had. It amazed me that he was able to hold back as much as I assumed he was. With how long it had been since we’d touched or been touched by our supposed loved ones, it would have been completely understandable for us to be pushed over the edge within moments. Somehow, he was able to control the steady rise and fall, the delicate escalation of sensory input, always pushing me toward that final moment, but without haste.
But, as in most sexual encounters, there came a moment when softness and control were not enough, and the beast was fully unleashed.
“I can’t wait anymore,” I gasped. “Get up here.”
With a quick wipe of his face, he crawled up and smothered me in a kiss. I lifted my hips to his and silently urged for him to enter me. My core throbbed almost painfully from need, and the only thing to quiet the ache was for him to bury himself deep within me until I was gasping for breath.
At last, he pressed slowly into me, and the ache was replaced by a surging pulse that seemed to start somewhere deep in my marrow. I wanted to continue to draw this out, to feel the weight of his body on mine, the sweat of our skins commingling as we tumbled. But I knew that neither of us could hold out for very long.
In a flurry of motion, of breath, and animalistic noises, our passions combined into an unstable and volatile chemical reaction, combusting only moments after we began.
Panting as our bodies cooled, Jason gave me a sheepish look. “Now I’m the embarrassed one.”
“Don’t be. I enjoyed that.” And after a few moments to steady my breathing, I added, “Besides, that was only round one.”