Chapter 5 The Monkey Camp #2
She gnaws her lip again, and my cock twitches. "I make notes about... everything." There's a wrinkle in her nose. "This is kind of embarrassing, but I also like to... write stories?" She says it like a question, as if she's asking if it's something she should feel awkward about.
My breath catches as two thoughts collide in my mind. "I happen to know"—I watch her face for the exact second it changes—"that you read romance novels. The filthy kind."
Color floods up her throat instantly, gorgeous and immediate. "How would you possibly know that?"
"I saw you reading one at the office. Last spring.
You had it propped against your laptop during lunch, and you didn't notice me walk past your desk twice with how you were absorbed in it.
" I let myself smile, slow, a little wicked.
"I went home that night and bought it on my Kindle. Read the whole thing in one sitting."
"You did not."
"I did. I have problems with the second act. I think the hero waited too long to make his move, given the absolute tension the author built in chapter six." My voice drops. "Though I suppose I understand the appeal of waiting now. Considerably better than I once did."
She's staring at me as I've suddenly revealed a second, secret face. "You read romance novels thanks to me."
"I read that romance novel because of you. I have since read several others, entirely in the spirit of research." I let that sit for a second before I go further. "Is that what you write about, Nora?" Heat rushes through me. "Do you write filthy stories?"
Her mouth opens and then closes. The fire crackles. Above us, Copérnico makes a low, contented sound, settling further into the canopy like he, too, senses something is about to happen and intends to enjoy it.
"I write," she says, finally, voice low, "romance. Badly. For myself. No one's ever supposed to see it."
"Why do you think you write badly?"
She looks uncomfortable. "Well, I've never let anyone read it, and writing in total secrecy for years does a number on your confidence about whether any of it's good.
" She pulls the blanket tighter, a defensive gesture that doesn't match the heat still climbing in her face.
"It's embarrassing. I'm the person who corrects tip math at weddings.
I'm not supposed to also be the person who—" She stops.
"Who what?"
"Writes things I'd be mortified to have anyone in this company ever associate with my name."
"I'm not anyone in this company right now." I swallow. "I'd love to read what you write."
"Santi—"
"One scene. You choose it." My pulse is fluttering, waiting for her answer like it matters more than anything that has mattered in longer than I want to admit.
"I won't laugh. I won't think less of you.
I think, if I'm honest, I'm going to think considerably more of you, which might be a problem, given that I already think about you constantly, and I'm not sure my professional composure can survive an upgrade. "
Her hands are shaking slightly when she reaches for her pack. I watch her dig through it—past the emergency kit, past the map with its bleeding ink—until she finds the notebook.
She holds it as if it might detonate.
"This stays between us," she says. "Whatever happens after this. This part stays between us."
"Always."
She opens it slowly, flips past pages I can see are dense with handwriting—some of it crossed out, some underlined twice, the visible architecture of someone who edits as fiercely as she writes—until she finds a page near the back.
She stares at it for a long moment, jaw working, and then, instead of handing it to me, she turns it around in her lap so I can see the page from where I'm sitting.
"That one," she says, not meeting my eyes.
I lean in, feeling my throat go dry. I wanted this for so long; I feel I can hardly breathe. The handwriting is small, slanted, urgent in a way that tells me exactly how fast she was writing when she got to this part.
I start to read.
He kneels between her thighs, his eyes gleaming with lust. She tries to say something—a protest, a joke, anything to put a wall back up—but then his mouth is on her, and the wall doesn't matter anymore.
He doesn't tease. He doesn't make her wait the way she expected him to, after everything. He licks into her pussy, slow and deliberate, like he's already memorized exactly what she needs and is simply, finally, giving it to her.
"Look at me," he says, lifting his eyes to hers without ever losing his rhythm. "I want you to watch me do this."
He swirls his tongue around her and then dips his fingers—
I stop. My own pulse is loud in my ears, and my cock has gone painfully hard.
I meet her gaze across the fire and swallow hard.
"Is this what you would like someone to do to you, Nora?
" I ask, low, watching her face for every flicker.
"Is this what you've been writing, alone, in meetings and hotel rooms and on planes, thinking about? "
She doesn't look away. "Yes."
"Let me give you exactly what you put on that page."
"Santi—"
"Since reading that paragraph, I've discovered I have absolutely no intention of doing anything else for the rest of the afternoon while we wait for the storm to pass.
" I reach for the hem of her shirt, slow, deliberate, watching her eyes go dark and unfocused at the touch.
"I want to do exactly what's on that page.
I want to kneel down right now and find out if I can make you shake the way you wrote it. "
"Santi—" It comes out as barely more than breath.
"You said he doesn't make her wait." I drag my mouth along her jaw, unhurried despite every instinct telling me to hurry. "I don't intend to either."
Her hands find my shirt, fisting in wet fabric, pulling me down with her as I ease her back against the rock, taking my time peeling the wet fabric of her shorts down her legs.
I settle on my knees between her thighs, where she is completely bare and exposed to me, where she is already wet and glistening in the firelight.
I swallow hard. "For the record," I say, "I read ahead.
I know exactly what you wrote happens next. "
"Then stop talking about it," she says, breathless, "and do it."
I don't make her wait.
***
Nora
His hands find my hips, steadying, and I haven't even finished exhaling when his mouth is on me—no hesitation, no testing, just exactly the slow, deliberate attention from the page made real, like he memorized the paragraph and is now simply, devastatingly executing it.
It is, without question, the most exposed I have ever felt in my life. And I have never wanted anything more.
My head spins as his mouth folds over my sensitive lips and his tongue swirls around my aching clit. I'm still sensitive from earlier, and that only makes the sensation of his tongue flicking even more intense.
"Look at me," he says, lifting his eyes to mine without ever losing his rhythm, exactly the way I wrote it, and the precision of the echo nearly undoes me even though he's barely started.
I look at him. I don't know how I manage it—every part of me wants to close my eyes and dissolve into sensation—but I hold his gaze, and his expression darkens, like watching me watch him is its own kind of fuel.
He doesn't rush me. He takes his time, even when it's infuriating, even when my hips are bucking on the rock, urging him on.
He holds my thighs apart firmly and devours me in a way I've never been devoured before.
His tongue is hot and quick, and then slow and gentle, alternating between sensations and driving me to insanity.
Despite how intimate this is, I don't feel exposed or shy. The way he's holding my thighs, the way he meets my gaze, and the way he kisses, sucks, and licks at my most private part make me feel held and safe by someone with no intention of ever letting go.
"Santi—" His name breaks apart on my tongue, dissolving into a sound less like language and more like static.
He doesn't stop this time. He doesn't slow or pick up pace; it's as if he knows me and knows what I need to reach my release, knows that I need that consistent pressure.
He gives me exactly what I need, lapping at my clit like I'm oxygen and he's suffocating.
Around and around his tongue goes, nudging me, edging me, cresting closer and closer, driving me right to the edge...
and then tipping me over in a crashing wave.
My hips buck, and his hands move under to cup my buttocks as I come, holding me, guiding me through as pleasure coils through me from the relentless press of his mouth.
He doesn't stop until the very last of it ebbs out of me, gentling everything at exactly the right moment, the same precision in his retreat that lived in his approach.
When he finally lifts his head, firelight gilding every line of him, his expression is somewhere between satisfaction and starvation. His lips are glistening with my juices, and there's a hot pulse between my thighs at the reminder of what he just did to me.
"My version," I say, my voice wrecked, "did not do that justice."
He laughs, breathless and wrecked in his own way. "Your version was extremely tasteful."
He presses one more kiss to the inside of my thigh, almost absently, as if he can't quite make himself stop touching me yet.
Then he props his chin against my hip, watching me with an expression that's far too pleased with itself, and I feel his fingers trace one slow, idle line up my thigh, like he's already considering round two while I'm still catching up from round one.
"What happens next, Nora?" he asks, his voice low.
"Next?" I ask.
"In the chapter." His mouth curves, slow and wicked. "I read your scene. I performed your scene, by my own estimation, excellently. Fair's fair, Nora. Tell me what happens next, or perhaps you feel I didn't quite follow the brief and you need me to go down on you again?"