Page 82 of Fool Me

We’ve gone from kissing for show, to admitting there’s more, to life throwing the emergency brake on us. Now that we’ve stopped spinning, it’s taking us a second to find our bearings.

Those fingers stop their movement and inch closer, following the hem of the flat sheet until they brush my heated skin. I stop breathing as the fabric drags slowly down my ribs. Each agonizing second stretches and my body reacts like it’s her tongue licking my flesh, not cotton.

By the time it stops at the top of my hips, I’m hard as stone and in dire need of her hands on me—any part of me. Soft fingertips caress the same path the sheet just took, stopping to trace the lines of ink on my skin.

Heat sizzles under the gentle scrape of her nail as it outlines each petal of the Indian paintbrush before moving on to the mountain peaks that the flowers frame tracing each line.

“A reminder of what you gave up?” she asks with so much certainty and understanding it reinforces how right this is.

“I might have moved away with the intention of never coming home, but I never wanted to forget where I came from.”

Her thumb brushes over it and I think she’s going to pull back, but she keeps her palm there, resting just below my ribs.

“When we get back, I want to take you on a date.”

“That’s not exactly the revelation I expected.” She giggles.

“A real date. One where it’s not about people seeing us for something other than our past. One that’s about our future,” I clarify.

“I see. And what would we do on our real date?”

She’s being fucking coy with me, looking like everything I’ve always wanted, and it makes it hard to think. Especially when she shifts closer.

The sheet is still hiding the evidence of what she’s doing to me, but one deep breath, one more inch, one more move, and my body will sell me out.

My hand cradles her hip, a weak attempt to give me a moment to get my wits about me before this goes from zero to sixty. It’s taken us weeks to get here and this is too damn important to rush.

“Same things we always do together, but without the agenda. No more faking it, no more putting on a show. From now on, our dates are just about us.”

“If it’s about us, does that mean you’ll watch the fireworks with me and we can find a secluded spot away from our friends so we can make out under the stars?”

“If that’s what you want.”

Her tongue traces her lower lip. “What I want is to kiss you with no one watching.”

“Is that all?”

“Not even close, but it’s a good start.”

It’s a green light and I take it, wrapping my palm around to grab her ass and tug her to me. Harlowe gasps at the roughness of it.

Eleven days, two-hundred and sixty-six hours, god knows how many minutes since the last time I had her like this, and tonight we are guaranteed not to get interrupted. Work isn’t waiting for either of us, her friends are in bed or occupied with the crackling fire, and chatter still floats through the window from the patio.

She melts against me, her leg sliding between mine and her palm roaming up my chest to the side of my neck. Her scent, her smooth skin, her heat wraps around me. It’s so encompassing,I’m not sure that we will ever truly separate—like part of her will always own part of me.

I take my time running my nose along her jaw, enjoying the steady thrum of her heart against my chest.

“Be greedy, Altas.”

She throws her words back at me from the last time and it lights a fire in my chest. “You want me to take from you, Clover?”

“Yes,” she breathes, her voice cracking with need. Somehow she pushes closer, closing space that wasn’t there. Her peaked nipples skim my chest.

“I’m going to start with this mouth first—take my time kissing you until I’ve made up for all the times I wanted to kiss you and didn’t. Then I’m going to take and take until you’re too tired to give me more.”

“Please,” she whimpers when I bite down on her ear before kissing a path to the corner of her mouth.

“You’re going to give it to me, aren’t you? You promised me all of you,” I remind her.

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