The Cure

Chapter 34

Nate's words had come out as a joke, and he had shielded their half-reality well, for he had teased her well atop their dining table, making her shudder with desirous frustration, for more reasons than one.

Firstly, that he was a sucker for control.

Secondly, that he was furious with her for denying him, lying to him, and it was only fair to even the playing field a little.

And thirdly, that if it was going to be the last time, a one-off, like Hell he wasn't going to rip off that towel to count the tattoos beneath, find the soft peak of her round breasts, the curves of her bare waist for the first time.

Like Hell he wasn't going to drop to his knees before her.

Because if she had turned on her heel abruptly afterwards, disappearing again for days on end, at least he would know how she tasted.

But it hadn't been a one-off, and when his alarm had brought him to reality yesterday morning, she was still sleeping soundly against his chest, her face unlined, unworried, the habitual black smudge of last night's mascara on her eyelids.

He had slid masterfully out from beneath her so that she barely grimaced, and waited ninja-still until her breathing found its somnolent rhythm again, before creeping out of the room.

And when he had come back from work, he had held his breath before his front door, the dark corridor a familiar place for his dithering, now, telling himself that if the flat was empty, so be it – clean cut, painless, and nobody gets hurt.

But she had been there, in yoga pants and a tight sports top, a light sheen of sweat across her skin as she turned lazy about the room, lighting candles, her yoga mat still unrolled on the parquet.

She had smiled over her shoulder, bending to light the tealights on the windowsill, and his gaze had fallen instantly to the swell of her backside in those tight pants, every drop of blood in his body rushing south.

He pulled the matches out of her hand from behind her, approaching silently enough to make her jump, smoothing a hand over her curves, kissing the small of her back.

'I'm all sweaty,' she had murmured, arching her back anyway to present herself to him, her palms against the windowsill as his own sloped over her backside and further down, reaching gently towards the centre and between the legs that she opened, slightly, inviting him, rewarding his touch over the Lycra with a low hum.

'Oh, fuck,' he had whispered as she looked over her shoulder, her eyes pleading; he marvelled at his instant arousal, how he was immediately, furiously hard for her, and he'd decided that he would have to take her like that, for now, he had no choice; pulling her yoga pants to her knees and pressing forward, because sixteen hours without it had been unbearable, and the sound of her cries had rung in his ears all day.

She was impossibly tight around him, and the sound of her breathless moans drove him wild, and he was going to come too quickly, surely, looking down at her with a long moan as he teetered at the brink, too high to stop it, now, but battling all the same against the hot and irresistible waves of pleasure begging for its release, whispering low that he couldn't last, that he was gonna come, that she was so tight, which only made her seize even more.

No, she was coming too, her hand between her own legs, spasming around him, choking out quivering cries and shuddering, and he abandoned the fight, slamming into her, pouring himself into her, pleasure rippling through him and pulling her name off his lips in breathless shouts.

That tight neediness; so quickly, urgently resolved.

So, she had thought about him all day, too.