Don't Speak (A Modern Fairytale, #5)(39)

Her head rested against the wall of the gazebo as she panted through the final shudders of her first orgasm, feeling alive and limp and gloriously loved.

***

At some point, instinct had taken over: an almost blinding lust that had urged him forward. His fingers had unclasped her bra without permission or forethought. His hands had spanned her waist, then skimmed over the silky skin of her belly, moving upward. By the time his palms reached her breasts, cradling the warm, soft skin with reverence, he’d journeyed way too far to consider retreat. He wanted to touch her. He desperately wanted to be the first to touch her.

Because what he said in the car—that he was falling in love with her—wasn’t a line or a lie. It was truly how he felt: like the world would fucking end and the planet stop spinning if he couldn’t be with her. She was an unlikely obsession, this girl he’d known for such a small amount of time. Were he asked under fire, he couldn’t possibly account for the depth and certainty of his feelings for her. It was like being swept away on a current he couldn’t fight. He could either move with it, or he could drown.

Without replacing the cold, damp cups of her bra, he slipped his hands from her breasts and immediately pressed his chest against hers to warm her through the dampness of their clothes. The rigid peaks of her nipples pushed against him, and he gathered her into his arms, maneuvering slightly to sit down on a bench behind him and cradle her on his lap. She rested her cheek on his shoulder, her drying hair tickling the skin of his throat as she took a ragged breath and exhaled softly. Now and then he felt the aftershocks of his ministrations, the way she shuddered or sighed, the way she nestled against him like she wanted to burrow into his soul for all eternity. She didn’t know, but she was already there.

“Laire?” he asked softly, his voice competing with the rain falling on the thatch above.

“Mmm?” she murmured, pressing her lips to his throat.

“You okay, darlin’?”

“Mm-hm,” she hummed, her voice low and sleepy.

He smiled to himself, holding her closer. “Sure?”

“Yeah,” she sighed.

“First time?”

“You know it was.”

“I love that it was.”

She took another deep breath, kissing him again. “Is it always like that? When . . . when a man touches a woman? On her breasts?”

“Not every woman’s as sensitive, I imagine.”

“And when you touch a woman . . .” She wiggled on his lap, and he knew that her clit was likely as taut as her nipples, aching for his touch. “. . . on her below-parts? That happens again?”

His cock, which was semi-erect against her ass, twitched. “Even more, darlin’.”

“My God,” she murmured, sitting up. “I can barely imagine.”

And if Erik thought she was stunning before, now . . . now she belonged to him. The sated look on her face, the softness in her dark eyes, the slack bee-stung pink of her lips. It was his. It was his because he’d put it there, and he felt such a wave of protectiveness, of devotion, of crazy forever-style love, he couldn’t stare at her anymore without blinking back an unexpected burn in his eyes.

Placing his hand on the back of her head, he pushed her face into his neck and held it there while he made himself breathe in, clean and deep, and let the power of those feelings settle in him and around him. They were a part of him now. He owned them just as much as they owned him. And thankfully his tears receded before falling.

“Rain’s stopping,” said Laire, her voice sweet.

“Hmm,” he murmured. “But I thought we’d just live here in this little house forever, Freckles.”

“Cozy,” she said, pressing her lips to his throat again, the gesture comforting and distracting at once. “Erik?”

“Yeah?”

“On Corey, what I just let you do would be bad.”

He clenched his jaw against the notion that anything they’d just shared could be bad. “We’re not on Corey.”

She swallowed, then laid her cheek on his shoulder again, her warm breath kissing his neck. “I know.”

“You feel bad, Laire? I mean, do you feel like it was wrong?”

She was quiet for a moment before lifting her head to look into his eyes. “It was too beautiful to be wrong.”

“Our own rules,” he reminded her. “Our rules say what we did was beautiful.”

Her lips tilted up, and she nodded at him. “Our rules are the best.”

“Yes, they are,” he said, chuckling softly at her happy, satisfied face.

He looked over her shoulder at the path. Beams of sunlight were starting to make their way through the trees. Tourists would start looking around the gardens again. Anyone could wander by them, and while being caught making out wasn’t a big deal in his eyes, he imagined she might not feel the same.

“Want me to hook you up?” he asked, patting the unfastened halves of her bra through her shirt.

She sat up and reached under her shirt to quickly latch and adjust her bra. “Nope. All good.”

He cupped her cheeks tenderly as he rested his forehead against hers. “Thank you.”

“For what?” she asked, holding his forearms gently with her fingers.

“For trustin’ me. For lettin’ me be with you.”