Midnight Lily(34)

"I want you, too. So much. But not out here. Not on the ground. I have to . . . I have to give you better than that."

"This is fine," she said, and I couldn't help smiling at the desperate note in her voice.

"No. It isn't fine. But I won't leave you unsatisfied. Can I touch you?"

Her eyes met mine and widened very slightly. They were a darker shade of violet, glazed with passion.

"Yes," she said. I brought my mouth back to hers, reaching beneath her dress and letting my hand trail up her thigh. She froze.

"Trust me," I said. Her body relaxed, and she began kissing me again.

I used my finger to trace the waistband of her underwear, and she shivered above me. Reaching inside, I found the small swollen nub hidden at the top of her folds and circled my finger around it. She pushed herself into my hand and moaned. I thought I was probably going to come in my pants at the excitement of seeing her so aroused. I parted my own legs under her so I had room to bring my hand lower and slipped one finger into her wet entrance. "Oh, God," I murmured. "You're so wet, so sweet." She brought her face into the side of my neck and I felt her mouth open on a gasp as I went just a little deeper with my finger, using my thumb to circle and play with her sensitive peak. Her hot breaths against my neck made me lose my mind with desire. But this was about her. This was about bringing her pleasure.

Just as I thought it, Lily's body went taut, her small cry muffled against my neck as she shuddered and came on my hand. After a moment, I slipped my finger out of her and brought my hand to her neck so I could lift her mouth gently to mine. Before our lips met, I glimpsed her face, drunk with pleasure, a small smile on her lips. I kissed her slowly, trying desperately to rein in my own unfulfilled need.

Lily let out a small sigh, resting against me for several moments. We breathed together, the downpour shifting to a gentle smattering on the leaves above. "The rain is stopping," she murmured softly.

"Does that mean we have to go back?" I asked.

She smiled and put her lips back on mine, nodding her head.

"Come back with me. Stay with me tonight."

"I can't. My mother . . ."

"You're a grown woman, Lily. Surely she can't expect you not to live your life."

She sighed, pulling away from me and scooting off my lap. I was still half hard and I adjusted myself slightly. "That's exactly what she expects. For her, I'll never grow up. It's . . . complicated."

"Then explain it to me."

She stood up and I did, too. "I'll find a way to come to your lodge in the next few days, okay?" She smiled. "And in the meantime, we still have the forest."

"I'll take whatever I can get, Lily of the Night." I smiled and kissed her again. We still have the forest.





CHAPTER ELEVEN


Holden



The next few days were among the happiest I'd ever spent, despite feeling sick and chained to the pills I hadn't yet found the courage to stop taking. That chore weighed on me, a dark shadow in the back of my mind. I knew I needed to do it and do it soon—I wanted Lily to know all of me, not the shell of the man I'd become.

Plus, the headaches were getting worse. I was sick in a way the pills had never made me sick before. I needed to get off them and regain my health before I could begin to give anything at all to another person. But in the meantime, I reveled in the wonderful, seemingly dreamy world Lily created. We walked through the forest hand in hand as she pointed out all the things I'd have missed if it was only me: the wood thrushes and butterflies, the columbine bushes, now maroon in late summer. We drank the cold, sweet stream water that flowed from the mountains above and fed each other wild strawberries.

We kissed everywhere, against trees and rocks, in wide-open fields, and at the edge of the stream, lying in the sunshine as the water gurgled and splashed next to us. She worked me into a frenzy of lust so powerful I could barely catch my breath some days. I wanted her with every cell in my body. And the way she moved her hips against mine, the way her eyes glazed over when we touched, I knew she wanted me, too. I had never known this type of physical want, even stronger than the craving I felt for the pills. It made me crazy, but it brought me hope. The numbing peace the pills brought was an illusion. Lily, Lily was real. And with her, I didn't need to be any of the titles I'd collected. I didn't need to be my mistakes or my pain. I was just . . . me, and I started to finally hope that that was okay.

But I also knew very well Lily was innocent—her tentative touches, her surprised reactions, the unabashed delight she showed each time I touched her in a way that brought pleasure, told me all I needed to know.

Maybe once I got off the pills, we could just stay in this forest until the end of time. A simple life suddenly seemed like a wistful, impossible dream. To spend days walking through the fresh air of the woods, talking about everything and nothing, and to enjoy evenings in front of a warm fire, reading, and then making love late into the night, celebrating life in the most ancient of ways. I wanted to dive into that kind of deeply beautiful simplicity, suddenly longed for it clear to my soul. It sounded like . . . freedom.

I walked to meet her at the edge of the forest a couple days after I'd first touched her under the boughs of a tree in the mist of the rain. It was a sunlit evening, and as I stepped into the dim light of the woods, she turned slowly toward the sound of my footsteps. She was wearing a pale purple dress and her brown boots. Her lips tipped up in a beautiful smile, and the whisper of a breeze picked up a lock of her hair.