Page 73 of No More Words

She pats his rear. “I know what you’re doing. But why like this?” she asks, her arms coming around him. So. Excruciatingly. Slow. He’s tormenting her.

“You mean like this?” He demonstrates with another slow withdrawal that drags a moan from her. She feels every inch. “As in why aren’t we banging the headboard against the wall or trying to break the bed?”

“Yes, yes.” She laughs. Her hips move in sync with his, finding the new-for-them rhythm he’s set.

His big hand cradles the side of her head. His eyes bore into hers. “I’m making love to you.”

She blinks. “Why?”

A low laugh vibrates his chest. “You look so serious.” His mouth quirks, the right side pulling up higher than the left. “Because I love you?”

She clasps his head with both hands and searches his face. His declaration is a balm to her soul. She feels like he’s the only person she can trust, the one she can truly open up to. “You love me.”

“I do.” Blaze kisses her nose before his eyes darken. He picks up the pace, drawing a guttural sigh from her.

And just like that, the tide shifts. Her head tilts back and a low moan replaces her smile. She clutches his back and grips the sheets. Their energy swells and problems fall away, leaving nothing but him and her in pursuit of the same endgame. That moment of bliss.

Afterward, they lie on their backs, breathing heavily, staring at the ceiling. His hand finds hers among the sheets, and she says, “That was ...”

“Incredible? I was thinking more like epic. Or mind-blowing. But incredible will do.” He scratches his chest and she laughs, because he’s right.Incredibleis an inadequate description as to how he made her feel. There was an added layer tonight, as if an invisible barrier lifted and suddenly there was more of him. More of them. It wasn’t just physical. He made her feel treasured. Adored. No longer alone.

“You love me,” she whispers, letting the words roll around her mind, find their place.

From the corner of her eye, she sees his head turn on the pillow to look at her. “I never stopped.”

“That night at the beach when you tossed my shoes in the bonfire. You said ‘loved.’ Past tense.” It was fall of their senior year, the first bonfire of the season. The varsity football team had beaten their rival the night before and most of the class wanted to celebrate. Olivia was there with Ethan. Blaze had brought Macey, and he was drunk. With Macey hanging on his arm, he’d confessed that he’d loved Olivia. Appalled, Macey stomped off. But when Olivia told Blaze to have Macey take him home, he plucked her white canvas Keds from the sand and tossed them into the fire before stumbling off.

“I was angry. Sorry about the shoes. Guess I owe you a pair.” He laughs like a devious little boy and shows her three fingers.

He’s confessed his love three times. “When was the third?”

“Thefirsttime was at the lake house.”

She rolls to her side, facing him. He does the same. “Was that the time we were fishing?” They’d been thirteen, their last summer there. They fished from the end of the Whitmans’ dock. Blaze dropped a worm in her hand and said that he loved her. She laughed in his face and pushed him into the lake. It was the morning before Lucas was caught shoplifting. They’d been so young.

“Our last summer there,” Blaze murmurs. His fingers skim her hair.

Thick emotion pushes its way up her chest. She rolls out of bed.

“Where are you going?” Worry laces his voice. He sits up.

“Getting some air.” She pulls on her jeans and shirt and pads barefoot to the great room. She rifles through her purse, grabs her smokes and lighter, and goes to the porch. She lights up and takes a long pull. Blaze’s house resides on top of a sloping hill and his view goes for miles. Homes are scattered among the rolling landscape of San Luis Obispo’s backcountry, lit up like earthbound stars. The evening is quiet, absent of cars and music, a neighbor washing dishes in the kitchen. Sounds she hears in the suburbs. Her gaze follows the horizon’s dusky sky. Lily is out there, somewhere. Alone, she imagines, frightened for Josh. The only family she has.

Blaze joins her and drops his biker jacket over her shoulders. “Those things will kill you.”

She snorts. Unless stress finds her heart first.

“I love it out here.” So peaceful. “Why’d you always sleep at my house?”

“You were there.” He leans his weight against the porch rail beside her, his back to the view, and crosses his arms. “Why’d you leave?” He tilts his head toward the house.

Because everything she’s been fighting to ignore wants to be heard. “Those summers at the lake house were the happiest ones I had. They just went away. I felt like I lost your parents. Lily wanted nothing to do with me because Lucas was being an ass and I had no problem telling him so. Then he wouldn’t stop screwing around. Every summer he did something stupid until your parents finally got fed up. I overheard them talking. It’s his fault. He took those summers from us. I pushed him away. Lily too. Then I found you with Macey.”

“So you pushed me away.”

“When I saw you together, I felt like I’d lost everything about those summers. They were well and truly gone.” She looks up at the now blacksky and takes a long drag on her smoke. “My dad told me Ethan was the father of Lily’s baby. He’s not, but for years I believed so.”

Blaze whistles. “Shit. That’s why you broke up?”

---