No Strings Attached

Chapter Three

She giggled softly through the silent tears that were streaming over her smooth skin to puddle against the palm of his hand, laying a kiss to his skin.

“I need you to not move a single muscle without thinking of me,” he whispered softly, dragging his shaky breath into his tight lungs, “I need you to be completely mine – in every possible way that you can be. You fascinate me ...” Running the palm of his hand over her smooth, tanned skin, raking the nails slightly in places, he didn’t miss the telling catches in her breath as he did so, “Everything about you just ... I love you. I love you so much it’s almost fucking painful. It hurts, it’s like a knife edge, I’m just balancing somewhere at that point between pure pleasure, and this kind of gut rot that sets in when you leave me.”

His lips crashed down to hers the very second that his agonized words left his mouth, his hand, that had touched her so gently just moments before, was now fisted in her hair, gripping her beneath his passionate ministrations.

Nervously, her own hands fisted against his chest, pushing him away slightly, “But you ...”

“Don’t even think about finishing that sentence,” he broke in quickly, “That doesn’t mean I don’t love you! That means ... fuck, I don’t know ... “, A frown creased his forehead, he couldn’t explain it to her properly, and it was frustrating him, “... I guess I want to be the source of everything for you ... pain, pleasure, comfort. I want to drive you so wild you lose yourself, and then I want to be the one thing you can depend on to bring you back again.” Something about her quiet contemplation had him carrying on with his speech, her silence making him nervous, “Does that make sense? I want to share every experience with you ... all of them. I want you helpless, wide open to me, just for me. I want to give you something you’ve never had before. Can you understand that?”

She nodded slowly, his words sinking through her, before she bit her lip worriedly, “But ... uh ... I mean,” Pulling her hand from his skin, she rubbed her palm over her forehead, as if to push the thoughts through her head faster, “I shouldn’t enjoy that, Nate. You know, with ... um ...well, with everything, I shouldn’t like that, I shouldn’t want that to happen again ...”

The thought that those kinds of touches would be welcome to her, during sex, was drawing an uneasy feeling through her. The thought that it would be okay for Nate ... who she loved, to touch her like that when they were expressing something so good and pure, it made her feel ... dirty. Especially after the things her father had said to her, the things he’d done to her – she should be disgusted that Nate could treat her like that.

“I don’t want to hurt you, kitten,” he whispered, “I’m not trying to hurt you – I’ll never do that.”

“But then ... what is it for?” she whispered hoarsely, so confused by the raging emotions that were rolling through her. It had all seemed ... so perfect on the few occasions that they’d been together before ... like her body was doing something it had been made to do – touching him – but now, although it was perfect, amazing ... mind-blowing at the time, it felt like it really should be ... wrong. And what felt even more fucked up was that it didn’t.

Quietly, his dark grey gaze flickered over every contour of her delicate features, and he allowed every single nuance of emotion to pour out of them – so that she would see the truth in his eyes when he finally spoke, so that she would see how much it meant to him. “It used to be just ... child’s play I guess ... with anyone else it still would be. Get my kicks where I can,” the pain that shot through her at his admission shook her to the core. She’d known he’d had girlfriends in the past, of course she had, but somehow now that she knew they’d done this, it felt so much more real ... so much more like an intimacy that he’d shared with another woman – that it cut her to the marrow, “But with you ... I don’t know, it’s become ... ingrained in the way that I love you. I need to know every single facet of the girl that I love ... every tiny dimension, every whimper, every scream. I want your darkest secrets in my hands, and to know that you’re absolutely, completely, 100% totally fucking mine.”