The Cure

Chapter 21

It must have been four in the morning; the room was still pitch black. Nate rubbed his eyes, the bed beneath him a boat on high seas, as he made a hasty inward analysis of his body, from head to toe. He didn't need to vomit, surprisingly – Hell, he was still drunk – nor the bathroom; his phone was nowhere to be seen.

Then, despite his inebriation, he felt the heavy wince of intuition weighing upon him.

He wasn't alone.

But he didn't have the time to reflect upon it further before the corner of his bedsheet was lifted, and somebody snuck into his bed.

Their feet were cold as they burrowed into the blankets, and he felt, rather than saw, a body pull closer towards him.

He knew who it was.

The air crackled and fizzed, which meant it was her; his senses instantly heightened at her mere presence. He tensed, staring into the black air about the ceiling as the soft cheek met his shoulder.

After a minute, her feet began to warm up, and they snuck towards his own.

He gulped.

He could hear her breathing now; breathing forced to slow, quivering; he smelled smoke on her hair, and beer on her breath.

Her leg was against his, then sneaking over it; she shifted closer, her breasts beneath a soft tee-shirt pressing lightly against his arm; he was wide awake, now, his heart hammering.

They lay like that for what felt like a lifetime; then he felt her cheek move.

She was looking at him, or at least, in his direction in the dark.

He ducked his head.

He could pretend it was an accident that his lips found hers amidst the black obscurity of the air, softly, trembling; he heard a breath escaping from her nose, exhaling delicious relief, as he asserted more pressure; the kiss was sweet, and yearning, and long and languorous, as she reached up and wrapped her fingers into his hair, pulling him closer still, and he was tasting her, a gentle, almost grateful groan creeping unbidden from his throat.

She got carefully onto her knees and straddled him, never once breaking the kiss as she pulled the blanket up and over their heads, cocooning them in heady, thrumming warmth.

'Congratulations, Doctor Wells,' she whispered against his lips, and for the first time his heart pulled when he heard it, and not just his heart, and he let her kiss him, deep, slow, and her body moved and her hips rolled and soon, she would know how much he wanted her.

She let out a shivering gasp against his lips.

'Fuck – Lola, I can't,' he mumbled urgently, panting as pleasure leaked up his body from beneath her rolling hips; she paused, relishing the feeling of his firmness pushing against her, between her legs as she sat up, balancing on his hips. 'Lola –'

'I'm sorry, I should have thought—'

'I just – I can't.' His hands had remained soldierly at his side until this point, but now he slid his palm across the bedsheet, searching silently for her hand, using all of his willpower to stop himself from caressing her thighs, kneading her backside, pressing her more forcefully against his crotch.

'I get it.'

'I can't since – well –'

'You're in love with Rosie.' He dared believe he heard her voice quaver.

'Because I don't think it was a mistake.' His voice came conflicted, thick with longing, strained, and his tickling fingers met her fist, clenched against her knee, and traced the skin on the back of her hand. 'Was it?'

She was quiet, still in the warmth of their cocoon, her breathing slowing as she leaned forward once more, lying at length against his torso, her cheek against his chest, her hair tickling his jaw, his heartbeat pounding in her ear; a small moan nudged his throat as her hips shifting lightly against him.

He nuzzled her hair with his lips, whispering against the soft skin of her forehead.

'Was it?'

He heard her swallow. 'I don't know.'

Nate curled a finger beneath her chin, and lifted her head to meet her lips again – that one wasn't so much of an accident – wanting only to reassure her, to prove himself, to peel back the film that shielded their new reality from her.

But a sweet, and soft kiss was impossible, and his heart was still thumping, and her tongue was sliding into his mouth and her fingers through his hair and he opened up to her, letting her explore, humming dark and low in his throat, thrumming heavy and aching in his boxers, pulsing with pleasure each time she rolled her hips down into his.

Now she moved away from his body, off the bed, and he felt the cool prickle of air in her absence, trying desperately to find reason in his racing thoughts as she heard her fumbling in the dark.

He moaned again, cursing when he heard her tee-shirt, her underwear, land softly on the floor.

She crept back onto the bed, kneeling carefully between his legs, her hands sliding over his hips, tracing downwards towards his boxers.

'Lola,' Nathaniel murmured, his voice one he barely recognised, as the fingers dug at the waistband and straining material. He gripped the mattress. 'You know I can't – please.'

'Do you want me to go?' She whispered into the darkness after an uncomfortable pause.

'I want you to tell me. I don't want it to be for nothing if – tell me it's not a mistake for you,' he pleaded into the black billows of night air, his mind still racing, desperately aware that she was newly naked, at his disposal; he swallowed. 'Because it's not, is it? It never was.'

She was silent.

He tried again. 'Hell, if that's a mistake—' he reached out for her hand again, '—what you do to me, Lola, God, what are you doing to me—'

Lola sniffed, seemingly encouraged by his speech, and the fingers slipped over the soft material and the firmness beneath it with a quivering, desirous sigh, her thumb caressing the wet spot where the tip strained against the cotton.

His whole body shouted for her touch; his mind pleaded with him to surrender, to pull off his underwear and press himself into her hand; but he took her wrist lightly, his face screwed up in concentration, praying to any God that would hear him for resolve, for resolve, for resolve.

'Lola.'

The thin material of his underwear was a useless barricade, a deceitful hiding place for his own infidelity; with superhuman willpower, he tightened the grip at her wrist, pulling her hand away, capturing it under his own upon his chest.

She froze; her repeated sigh was almost afraid. 'Do you want me to go?'

'I can't. Not until—'

'I'll just go.'

'—I didn't say that—'

'If you don't want—'

'—I didn't say that either.' His patient smile warmed his low voice, the tense grittiness melting away as he chuckled.

He felt her relaxing at the warm sound of breathless laughter; she slowly uncurled her legs from beneath her, unfolding her body from where she had been knelt between his legs, slowly, uncertainly.

He was still pinning her hand to his heart, the beat heavy in her palm, and after two feeble attempts to withdraw herself from his grasp, she lay slowly down beside him, her damp cheek resting on his shoulder, wet eyelashes twitching against the skin of his chest.