Gentle lips against my throat, sapphire moonlight painting us in pallid color, and the most tender, bruising grip holding me close as if terrified to let me go. This, this is a moment I'm dying to draw.
To capture the flickers of golden shadows across his bronzed skin with every flash of lightning. To immortalize the flush of his cheeks, the sweat above his brow, the deep bruises blossoming along his jaw and cheekbone, and the dark scruff on his jaw. To remember exactly how it feels to be held so closely, to be nothing short of adored, to stand in the brilliance of Micah Costa's full and undiluted attention.
I used to think it felt like a high, being with Micah, but as his fingertips trace down each vertebra in my spine with such exalted concentration, I realize that something as fleeting as a passing high couldn't possibly compare to the feeling of being in his arms.
His tongue drags across my fluttering pulse, and when he sucks my skin hard enough to leave a bruise, my fingers splay open on his broad shoulders, digging into the taut muscle that flexes as he draws me closer. We've been tangled in my sheets for hours — our lips and tongues and bodies intertwined with an addictive fervor I've never experienced before.
It's a haze of moonlit memory — calloused fingers locked around my wrists, teeth nipping at my skin, tender words punctuated with declarations so salacious my cheeks flared as he whispered them against my ear with each deep thrust of his hips. But every single time, he manages to leave me with the sweetest words, the soft embrace of gentle promises that always carry me through each climax he coaxes from my body.
My only one. You're my only one, Josie. My only one. God, my only one.
"I don't want you to leave." My voice is barely loud enough to be heard over the pelting rain, but I know he heard me when his fingers hesitate on my spine for the briefest moment before continuing their slow ascent up to the base of my neck. His fingers slide into my hair, massaging my scalp gently until my eyes roll back in my head and his lips pull into a satisfied smile against my temple before pressing a whisper of a kiss to my forehead.
I'm still straddling him from the last time we had sex, held delicately against his chest long enough for the rush of my last climax to slow into a gentle fading buzz against my skin. Long enough for my heart to come down from its frantic cadence. Long enough for my eyes to grow heavy and the warmth of his shoulder against my cheek to lull me into a sleepy trance. I could fall asleep right here in his arms, my cheek on his shoulder, his fingers gently massaging the already sore muscles in my back, thighs, and shoulders.
I breathe in the scent of him. The warm amber of his cologne mixed with the heady scent of his sweat and — and the district aroma I've only ever smelled after we have sex.
It's a mixture of us. Of our bodies. And it's utterly intoxicating.
"I'm not going anywhere, Jos," he murmurs it the dark, his arm tightening around me just enough to send a satisfied rush of heat across my skin. " It's you and I from this point on, remember? I'm not going anywhere."
His palms flatten on my back, slowly rubbing circles of heat into my skin. It's a gentle carress, one that might even lull me to sleep if the flicker of heat between my thighs didn't flicker to life at the words now resounding through my mind.
I'm not going anywhere.
I graze my lips against his collarbone as a shiver of need climbs up my spine. I've lost count of the amount of times we've had sex tonight, but when his hands still on my back as a quiet moan slips from my lips, I smile at the realization that it'll be at least once more before I fall asleep tonight, and all because of that one, breathy, barely-audible moan.
His lips graze my jaw, down to my pulse point on my throat, and I run my fingers through his hair, tugging on the strands when his lips dip down to my chest and pull the aching tip of my nipple between his teeth.
I'm not going anywhere.
His hands slide down my back, holding me close as he leans forward and lays me down on the sea of blankets. I'm not sober-minded enough to be embarrassed by the whimper of a moan that escapes me when his teeth tug harder on my nipple before laving the ache with his tongue while his hand palms my other breast, playing mercilessly with my nipple until my back is arching off the mattress, eyes rolling back.
His hand falls away from my breast, and I nearly squeak in indignation until the feel of his calloused fingers slides between my thighs.
It's you and I. It's you and I. It's you and I.
I've never given it much thought, but if I had to imagine Heaven, this would be it. A moonlit night, tangled sheets, gentle words, rough hands. An endless loop of intimate moments, of vulnerable confessions, of whispered promises, of sex so intense my mind fractures and pieces itself back together with every climax. Sex so intense, I swear our souls touch. Send an echo.
His thumb teases my clit, rubbing slow, torturous circles that make my legs spasm every time the callous on the side of his thumb grazes the bud of nerves, lighting up every nerve ending in my body like a firework show.
I attempt to tug him closer, to shift my hips forward, to add more pressure, to silently ask him to go faster. God, please go faster. But he doesn't oblige. Rather, he pulls my hands off his body and locks them into an inescapable hold above my head, pinned against the pillows — a silent demand to not rush him, to let him take his time. A silent promise to make it worth my while.
When his thumb finds my clit again it's an even softer touch — a whisper rather than steady contact. And somehow, somehow that barely there touch, that torturously reserved brush of his thumb has my eyes flying wide and my back arching off the bed so intensely my breath lodges in my throat.
I tug to get my wrists free, the demand to pull him closer nearly short-circuiting my brain, but his hold on my wrists doesn't budge.
"Mmm, how do you want to come, baby?" He hums against my skin, biting down on the hickey he's leaving on the swell of my breast before redirecting his attention to my other breast. His thumb keeps a teasing pace on my clit, giving me more pressure and easing off just when the pressure in my lower belly begins to build.
Up, up, up and then gone.
So close, so so close and then gone.
His tongue drags across my nipple before he pulls back and blows a cool breath of air across the glistening nerves, sending a rush of goosebumps across my entire body.
His thumb adds a little more pressure, a little more friction, and I think I might cry. I might actually cry it feels so good.
My entire body is tense, nearly about to hit that peak when he pulls his thumb away again.
My entire body is hostage to the orgasm trying to claw its way out of me. Like water receding from the shore before a tsunami, the air in my lungs is gone, the control over my shaking legs, my shaking arms, my shaking hands, my shaking jaw is gone — towed away from me.
He sucks on my nipple hard enough to fling white dots over my vision like confetti, and even now, I can feel the haughty smile tugging at his lips as he pulls back to watch me writhe under him because he knows, he knows I'm too far gone to answer him.
"Like this?" he slides a finger into me and I nearly shatter. Nearly, nearly, nearly. Please.
I can't breathe. I can't think. I can't respond. I shake my head and tug my wrists feebly. I want him. I want him.
He adds another finger and I moan so loud my throat hurts.
He curses, pulls his fingers away, and as I nearly sob at the loss of contact, at the loss of the climax that was so close I could nearly taste the endorphins on my tongue, he releases my wrists and wraps my legs around his hips.
"Nah, you're going to come on my cock." His words are a promise against my ear and finally, finally thrusts into me as he murmurs against my lips. "Come on my cock, Jos. Let me see how fucking gorgeous you are when you come on my cock."
It's instantaneous. The tsunami hits with the first thrust of his hips and my throat burns with the whimpers that fill my room. They're nearly sobs — of relief, of ecstasy, of pure pleasure.
Every nerve in my body is a live wire, lighting up with the kind of mind-numbing sensation that pulls me down so deep I can't process anything other than the feel of the waves. Like I'm just under the surface of the ocean, being pulled along with each rise and crash of the tide.
And then I blink and see the gentle moonlight coaxing me back toward the surface, back to the air, back to reality. And it's only when I break the surface and my lungs unfreeze, helplessly tasting my first breath of air since they froze in my chest, that I realize the moon has been shrouded by a passing storm cloud, and the light, that gentle light that brought me back is still here, radiating from the man on top of me. His face is nuzzled into the crook of my neck, his hips reaching a crescendo that sends another aftershock of pleasure flooding up my spine and he buries himself deep inside of me and stills, the heat of his climax pulsing inside of me, sliding down my thighs.
"You and I, Jos." He murmurs the words over and over and over after each kiss against my throat.
Pale blue.
Pale blue.
The shade of his eyes, had they not been hardened, forged into something stronger, more durable, less breakable as a boy.
Pale blue.
That's what he becomes when he's laying in my arms, in the middle of the night, while we're hiding away from all of our fears. His breath is a heated rhythm on my throat, punctuated with soft, tender kisses against my fluttering pulse. I wrap my still-shaking arms around his shoulders and pull him closer into a hug, watching my fingers trace the lines of his tattoo in the flash of lightning.
Somewhere beneath the black ink artwork etched on his skin like armor is a soul begging to be loved. A hand asking to be held. A boy still hiding in the open arms of the forest, wondering if it's safe to come home yet.
And as I pull him closer, placing a soft kiss on the side of his head, a tear slides down my cheek at the realization that now, now that hand can be mine.
A/N:
Not to be cryptic, but this might be a good time to brace yourself for the journey ahead.