Between Hello and Goodbye(92)

He filled his hands with my breasts while I tugged at the waistband of his pants. I reached in and wrapped my hand around the huge, hard length of him. But there was too much clothing between us.

“Take it off,” I breathed.

He released me long enough to take off his shirt. As soon as he did, my mouth was on his skin, warm from the shower and hard—hard abs of pure muscle, hard pecs, hard pounding of his heart for want of me.

He stripped out of his pants and then lifted me and carried me around to the front of the couch and laid me down. The weight of him on top of me… I never wanted to forget what that felt like. I never wanted to be without these touches, the heat of his kisses, the power of his body moving on top of mine. He slipped inside me with one easy thrust and made a sound that was half sob, half growl of pure need.

“Faith…” he breathed into my neck.

I clung to him, my arms wrapping around his broad shoulders, while he spread my legs another few inches to get at me better. Deeper. To drive into me harder when I was already delirious and on the verge of an orgasm. A few heated thrusts was all it took, and it crashed over me.

Asher felt the pleasure shuddering through me and gripped my hip, driving hard and slow to draw it out. After a few moments, with the aftershocks still running along my limbs, I pushed against the hard wall of his chest till he was sitting. Then I straddled him, reached between us, and guided him back inside me.

He gazed up at me, exhausted to the bone but still fighting. His eyes were darkly beautiful and full of love for me but swimming with pain too. I silently vowed to take as much from him as I could. For the rest of my life. Starting that night.

“Give it to me,” I whispered hotly in his ear, writhing on top of him, rolling my hips. “Give me everything.”

I felt his answering grip on my hips tighten as he pressed his face into my neck. He knew what I meant. I began to ride him harder, and he moved me up and down on him, using my body.

“Yes,” I breathed. “Just like that.”

His jaw clenched and his eyes turned black as I craned down to kiss him, a biting, sucking kiss. He grunted into my mouth, and then the suddenness of another orgasm burst through me with his relentless thrusts. The wet sounds of arousal, the scent of our bodies, the heat of the breaths we shared all created a delirium, a fever dream I never wanted to wake up from.

“Yes, Asher,” I said, feeling him close, feeling his body tense against me as I rode him with intensifying urgency.

He made a sound deep in his chest but couldn’t contain it. A pained grunt issued from his throat as he came. He emptied himself inside me, his face a mask of relief, his fingers on my hips holding me into his release. I felt it surge through him and into me, and then he sank back on the couch. I continued to roll my hips, making sure every last drop was mine. Only when I was sure he was spent, did I let myself fall against him, sweaty forehead to sweaty forehead, both of us breathing hard. He wrapped his arms around me, lifted his chin to kiss me, and brushed away the strands of hair that stuck to my cheek.

“I love you,” he whispered. “I don’t know much of anything anymore, but I know that. Whatever is left of me, is yours.”

“I love you,” I said against his mouth that I was still kissing, his tears and mine mingling. “I’m never going to walk away from you again.”

He held my face in his hands, his eyes beautifully soft and dark and shining.

“And I swear on my life I will never give you a reason.”



The next morning, I woke early, wrapped in Asher’s arms in his bed where we’d moved to continue our reunion.

We have to be quieter now. We have a child to think about…

I suppressed a laugh. My life had been on pause for so long and was now suddenly on fast forward, and yet everything was perfectly right. Exactly the way it was supposed to be.

I slipped out of bed and drew on my underwear and one of Asher’s T-shirts. The house was quiet and still as I crept outside and took the short path from his backyard to the beach. The storm had blown itself out, and the sun was making its way from behind the clouds. I had forgotten to bring a towel, but it didn’t matter. I plopped myself right on the damp sand and sat with the ocean.

I leaned back on my hands; they pressed into the grains, and though it may have been my imagination, it seemed I could feel the energy of the island humming beneath me. Welcoming me, maybe. It had tested me and found me worthy. The water came and went in gentle surges, washing over my ankles, like an apology.

“I’m sorry, too, for calling you ‘godforsaken,’” I said, then laughed. “And now I’m talking to an island.”

But we made our peace, and I took in the horizon. The endless blue. I inhaled deeply, tasted the salt of the sea on the air, and listened to the crashing waves. Then footsteps.

Asher sat beside me, wearing a shirt and long shorts. That adorable frown was between his brows and his eyes heavy.

“Something on your mind?” I asked gently.

“Faith, I’m sorry.”

I nudged his elbow. “Pretty sure all the sex last night was to show there’s no hard feelings.”

He didn’t smile. “I still need to say it.”

He stared out over the water, lost in thought for long moments, saying nothing. But I could feel some relief in him—the worst of his grief had been purged last night with Kal in that storm, and what was left was almost sort of beautiful. Like the sun breaking through storm clouds. Gold light through heavy gray, each making the other more lovely.