I sigh, but don’t turn around to face him. “Because you’re not sure you want this. That’s reason enough for me.”
He spins me around with surprising speed, and presses me back against the door. He leans his weight into me, not enough to be heavy, but so that I can feel the hard jut of his erection against the softness of my belly.
“First, you’re wrong. Want doesn’t even begin to describe how I feel about having you in my bed. You’re sexy, intriguing, and you look damn good in my shower. Though next time I’d advocate we do that part without our clothes.” I scoff out a laugh, but when he tips my chin up with his finger, he looks serious. “But I wasn’t asking why you thought it was a mistake. I want to know why you look so exhausted, and why you’re not wearing shoes, and what that homeless man on the street said to make you look so scared. I want to know why I couldn’t take you home and do this in your bed. Those are the whys I want answered.”
And those are precisely the answers I can’t give him, so instead I rise up on my toes and kiss him again. He groans against my mouth, and his tongue delves inside, searching and demanding. When I’ve forgotten everything besides the heat of his kiss, he pulls back, resting his forehead against mine. I’m panting for breath when he says, “Don’t think I’ve forgotten about those questions.”
That leaves me two options. Leave before he digs any deeper … or work harder at distracting him.
The choice is easier than it should be.
Chapter Seven
I touch his chest, and push him back until he stands far enough away for me to gather the ends of my damp dress and pull it up and over my head. I'm not wearing a bra, so my nipples immediately pull into painfully tight buds in the cold room. His gaze drops down to take me in, and I fix my eyes on his bare chest in turn. I'm confident in my looks, but I also know that I don't necessarily meet modern society's idea of a perfect beauty. I was made for a time when men valued the curves of a woman. My breasts are plump and full, and my stomach slopes out into generous hips. Sometimes men would rather I be thinner, but that's another thing about me that I can't change. This is the shape I'll always have.
From the dark look in his eyes, I guess he’s not the type to prefer stick thin girls. His face dips close to mine, and his stubbled cheek rubs against my jaw. Hot breath tickles my ear, and he whispers, “You're so damn beautiful it hurts.”
This time I don't have to ask him to touch me. His hands reach out to cup my breasts, his palms rasping over my taut nipples. I bite my lip and close my eyes.
Sweet suffering.
That will be how I remember this night for the rest of my days.
I should walk away. I might make a point to avoid emotional attachments, but I know a few things about highs and lows. And Wilder is one peak that’s guaranteed to come with a miserably low valley. But I also know that I wouldn’t normally risk a dalliance with a non-artist. Too many risks. Too many complications. But tonight there's so little energy in me after that fiasco back in the club that there's almost no risk at all to take this one thing for myself, this one night.
“Look at me, Kalli.”
I open my eyes and think one night. And I’m not sure which is more overwhelming, my excitement for what’s to come or the dread for the moment when that one night ends. He lifts my breasts, dragging his thumbs over the tips; it takes all my concentration to keep my eyes on him.
“We might not know each other now, but I have every intention of knowing you after tonight,” he says. “I'm going to know every inch of your body. I'll know what makes you breathe faster and what makes you feel like you can't breathe at all. I'll know what makes you close your eyes, and the sounds you make when something feels good. If there's one thing I am, it's determined, and I've decided to know you better than anyone ever has.”
I must have been holding my breath during his speech because he leans down and kisses me before murmuring, “Breathe.”
And I do. I drag in air desperately, and he smiles. “Well, there's fact number one. You like it when I tell you what I'm going to do to you, don't you?”
“Gods, yes.”
He laughs. “One God wasn't enough for that one, huh? I'll keep that in mind.”
With a hand on my shoulder, he maneuvers me to sit on the bed, and then he kneels in front of me. With a gentle hand, he picks up my foot and props it on his knee. He studies the scrapes for a moment, but they must all be minor because he abandons that foot to pull up the other. He looks confused for a moment and I say, “Don’t you dare ask me if I’m drunk again.”
“It’s just … I could have sworn there were scrapes on your feet, but they look fine now.”
I stiffen. Well, that at least tells me what time it is. We must have passed midnight sometime between the shower and now. Whatever might have happened to my feet was undone with the start of a new day.
I lie, “Just sore is all.”
“And I still don’t get to know how you lost your shoes?”
“Nope.”
“Did something bad happen? Was there—”
“I’m fine.” It takes all over my willpower to block out thoughts of the bad thing that happened tonight. He thinks of me as a victim when really, I’m the villain here. “A little cold though.” I scramble back and tug his comforter down enough that I can slide between the sheets. They’re cold too, and I shiver. “Take off those wet jeans and come warm me up.”
He grins. “Yes, ma’am.”
He undoes the button at the top of his pants, and I’m so eager to have him that I feel giddy.
“Wait,” I say. Then I scoot back down the bed, still holding the blankets tight against me. “I want to.”
He makes a sound low in his throat, but drops his hand away. I reach for the front of his jeans and seek out the zipper. I suck my bottom lip between my teeth as I drag it down. Since the denim is wet, it takes both of my hands to inch the jeans down his hips. Then I let him kick them off the rest of the way, along with his shoes. Underneath he wears black boxer briefs.
Boxer briefs are hands down the best invention of the last century.
I lift my eyes to his, and his gaze pierces through me as I drag that last item of clothing down his hips, too.
And suddenly, I'm nervous.
I've never slept with someone like this. Without knowing exactly where we stand, and how things will end with the other person. Every other time, I've been in control. But now, the balance of power is completely off because I want this with a desperation that puts too much out of my control.
I lift my hand and wrap my fingers around his erection, thinking maybe it will shift that balance, give me the upper hand. He utters my name with a low growl and smoothes a hand over my cheek, resting one callused thumb on my bottom lip. I tighten my grip and give a slow tug.
“Jesus, Kalli. You feel so good.”
I kiss his thumb when it passes over my lips again, and he bends, taking my mouth in a bruising kiss. He pulls back the covers and grips my hips to slide me further up the bed. Back in the open air, I should be cold, but I'm not. In fact, I'm burning up.
Wilder crawls up my body, his limbs sleek and strong. He dips and places a kiss on my sternum, just between the swell of my breasts. He closes his eyes, humming under his breath and drags his stubbled cheek over the sensitive swell of skin until his hot breath skates over the tip.
I cry out, arching under him, and he's barely even touched me.
“I think,” he says, murmuring just above my skin, “that this part of you will have to wait.”
“Wait?” I ask, breathless.
“Mmhmm. I told you that I'm going to know all of you, but you're so fucking responsive. And so damn sweet. I know if I taste you here …” His teeth graze my nipple for just a second, and my back nearly bows off the bed. “I’ll get impatient if I take your perfect breast into my mouth, and I won't be able to resist being inside you.”
“So don't. You're not the only one who lacks patience.”
He chuckl
es, moving over to kiss my shoulder. “I made a promise, sweet. And I keep my promises.”
He hovers above me and presses his lips to my temple, then my forehead, followed by the tip of my nose.
“We'll start small,” he says, moving over my cheek and down the line of my jaw. “You know, when I saw you in that grocery store, I almost thought I was dreaming. You looked … God, you looked unreal. So out of place there. Too beautiful for words.” His teeth nip the other side of my jaw before he sucks my earlobe into his mouth. “Then you were so sweet to Gwen. Instead of spending the day telling me about her favorite Disney princess, all she could talk about was you. Kalli. And every time she said your name I wanted to kick myself for not getting your number, for letting you slip through my hands.”
He moves then to my neck and at the first lave of his tongue, I grip his shoulders. I'm not sure whether I want to beg him to stop teasing me or to keep going. “Then when I saw you tonight, I thought …” He laughs and continues, “I thought I was crazy. I acted crazy, following you when you took off. And then when I lost you, I was certain I'd been hallucinating. That I had wanted to see you again so badly that my mind had gotten the better of me. Tonight I'm going to bury myself in you so deep that I'll have no doubt that every second of this is real.”
I dig my fingernails into his muscled shoulders and give in to my instinct to beg. “Wilder, please.”
In reward, he lowers his head and sucks the tip of one breast into his mouth. I gasp and wrap my legs around his hips, using all my strength to pull him down toward me. His length falls heavy against the damp fabric of my underwear, and we both groan. He pumps his hips, sliding against me, and I press up hard.
“You're trying to make me break my promise.”
I tangle my hand in his hair until he meets my gaze, then give him an innocent smile. “I have no idea what you mean.”
“Sure you don't.”
He shifts back, pulling my legs from around his waist, and spreading them open. He slides down more, raining kisses over my belly and hips and thighs before settling that sinful mouth just above the line of my underwear.
“I'm going to know this part of you too, sweet. So don't hold back. If you like something, you tell me. Okay?” When I don't answer, he runs the flat of his tongue over the strip of fabric between my legs. I whimper and he asks, “Okay?”
I breathe a shaky, “Okay.”
He brings my legs up and together long enough to pull the scrap of fabric over my thighs and off. Then he lays me open again.
He'd said he was determined, and if I’d had any doubt, I believed him then. He's meticulous and thorough and sinfully skilled with his mouth. My hips rise and fall with his ministrations, and I lose track of the number of times I call his name.
It doesn't take him long to know me at all. Within minutes, he's zoned in on my most sensitive spots, discovered which movements make my legs shake, and the pressure that makes me tighten my grip in his hair.
“You taste sweet here, too. So damn sweet.”
He keeps me on the edge for so long that when I do fall over, it catches me by surprise. It lifts me up and then flattens me, leaving my head dizzy and spinning. The pleasure is so thick that my body feels heavy with it, like I might not ever be able to move again. And he's still going, easing me through it, drawing out my pleasure until the last possible second, until my hearing goes fuzzy, until it goes on for so long it almost hurts. Almost.
And I can't help but imagine if he'd be this dedicated to getting to know the rest of me. Not just my body. But my thoughts. My desires. My fears.
As my mind clears and the real world rolls back in, alarm streaks through me like lightning. Suddenly I am unable to keep all my thoughts at bay. Not about what happened tonight, or who I am, or all the reasons I can never see Wilder again after tonight. And the truth scorches me, burns me up, and sends tears pricking at my eyes.
Because I've never felt anything this perfect. Never been so overwhelmed by the need to touch someone, to hold tight and not let go.
And knowing that I can't? That I have to let him go … It's devastating.
It all catches up to me then, the lack of sleep, the exhaustion from all the energy I've expended. And that’s when I pay for all the lightness I felt by holding on to the inspiration. I’d felt light and free, but now the full weight of all my years is back. Doubled even. Rather than lying sated and carefree in his bed, I feel as if I’m being crushed against it, pressed down by a mountain of stones.
“Kalli.” By the way he says my name, I guess it's not the first time he's said it. “Where'd you go? Come back to me.”
I take a gasping breath, trying not to let it overwhelm me, and Wilder rolls to lie beside me. Tears well in my eyes, and I want to scream because he shouldn’t see me like this. I don’t want him to see me like this.
“I'm okay,” I answer, even though I’m not. And I know without even having to look at him this time that he doesn't believe me.
“Come here.”
He pulls me flush against his chest, just drags me over as if gravity isn’t fighting tooth and nail to pry me back. I cling to him—arms and legs and lips. I bury my face in his neck, kissing him there between gasping breaths. And somehow he makes it better and worse all at the same time. From the moment I laid eyes on him, he represented the life I would never have. But back then it had been abstract. A vague idea of family and love and permanence. But it’s not vague anymore. I know the taste of his mouth and the weight of his body on mine. I know what it’s like to give my pleasure up to another person, to give them complete control. I know what it’s like to give that to him, when I’ve always maintained my head, my emotional distance with every other man in my life.
Then there’s this … his arms around me and his soft words in my ear telling me that it’s going to be okay, telling me it’s fine every time I choke out an apology. He doesn’t just tolerate my emotion, he welcomes it. How will I ever forget the feel of this?
Sometime between his stroking of my hair and the kisses he drops on my forehead, my thoughts thin and then go quiet. My tears dry up. I buckle under the weight of the night, and in his tight hold fall straight to sleep.
Chapter Eight
I wake to exquisite warmth, and for a moment it’s thousands of years ago, and I’m lounging under a golden Greek sun. I remember the mountains where we dwelled for so long. I know that land like a lover’s face. Each sloping feature is as easy to recall now as it was a millennium ago. Things had been so much simpler then, and the prospect of eternity had still seemed a blessing. Slowly, I become aware of a breeze rippling through my hair, but it’s not the mountain wind that beckons me. This isn’t cool and crisp, but warm and sweet.
I drag my eyes open, and instead of mountainous rock, I find soft, heated skin. I blink, confused because the body I’m draped over is not familiar. The chest is broader, dusted with fine blond hairs that reappear low on a taut stomach.
Van is long and lean with dark hair. I conjure his face, and it comes to me with an oxygen mask fitted over his mouth. Then the memories return in a rush, first pain and guilt and confusion, but they swiftly fade into horror.
I try to jerk upright, but the arm around my middle tightens, and I’m drawn further onto the body of the person lying next to me.
Wilder.
I blink. And those memories come back too, but slower. They tease at my mind almost as sensually as the actual events of last night, and now I’m practically on top of him. One of my legs is slung over his waist, and it’s abundantly clear that we’re both naked. Then I remember exactly how our interlude had ended. Or rather … the fact that it hadn’t really reached its end. Not for him anyway. He’d completely flipped my world upside down, and then instead of reciprocating, instead getting to know his body as intimately as he explored mine … I cried.
I cried on him. While naked. Then apparently, I fell asleep.
Oh man, I suck.
I look up at his face, and despite
my wiggling, he’s still out. The scruff on his face has thickened even more overnight, and I have to resist the urge to drag my fingers across it. His chest rises and falls steadily with each breath, pressing his abdomen up against my breasts each time. His hand is positioned low on my back, fingers curling almost possessively around the curve of my bottom.
And for a brief moment, I think about shifting further on top of him. His erection is semi-hard, brushing against my leg, and it would be so easy to slide my hips over his, to rock against him. Would his hand slide further down my ass when he woke? Would he pull me down for a kiss? In his sleepiness, would he look more sweet or sexy? I could do my best to erase the way last night ended, and maybe he’d forgive me for crying all over him and leaving him unsatisfied in his own bed.
But to what end? It would be good, maybe even brilliant, but when it was over, there would be questions I couldn’t answer. And while my actions yesterday had tamed the need to use my gift, I wasn’t running on empty anymore. Not like last night.
In fact, I can feel the energy pulsing in me, announcing its presence, reminding me of who and what I am.
It would be stupid to start this again in the light of day. And I’d done enough stupid things in the last two weeks to last me for the next century.
No. I promised myself one night. And that night had already come and gone, so now I had to say goodbye. To this warm bed. To the heat of Wilder’s skin. To my one night of almost normal.
Carefully, I peel his hand off my back, and place it on the bed. I shift up on my knees, trying not to jostle the mattress too much, and then slip off the bed. The floor is cold, and the air-conditioner is still on full blast, so goose bumps riot across my skin.
I find my dress on the floor, and it's still damp and cold. I glance back at the bed, and a traitorous voice at the back of my mind wants him to wake up. I want him to see me there, standing naked in his room, and I want him to stop me from running, to take away this choice I have to make.