Page 82 of A Brush with Love
“Never.” His mouth crashed against hers with force, saying what words couldn’t. He belonged to her in any way she wanted him.
As he felt her pulse around him, every part of her gripping him closer, he followed her over the edge, his body fracturing in the waves of pleasure.
As the sensation ebbed away, Dan hovered over Harper’s body, her panting breath against his chest, and their eyes locked with a heavy intimacy.
She reached up a shaky hand and brushed his hair off his forehead, then rested it against his cheek. He turned and planted a kiss into her palm, watching the smile bloom on her mouth.
CHAPTER 26
HARPER
Harper stirred from a light sleep to the feeling of Dan’s fingers tracing along her skin. She squinted one eye at the clock on her nightstand and realized she’d only been dozing for a few hours. The night had passed in short periods of sleep followed by bursts of kisses, touches, and sighs as they explored each other’s bodies.
Harper turned her head and her gaze traveled up Dan’s body. She ate up every piece—the long legs stretched under her comforter, his delicious bare chest propped against her headboard, the soft smile warming her from the inside out.
“Hi,” she murmured, closing her eyes again to the soft tickling of his fingers.
“Hi.” He slid down to lie next to her, faces level. “This is unexpected,” he said, tracing a fingertip over her ribs. “I like it.”
Harper stiffened. Her mind was so far removed from her sense of self—instead somersaulting about the future and what-ifs—that she often forgot about her tiny tattoo.
“It’s kind of silly.” Harper moved her arm from under her pillow to her side, covering it. Dan clucked his tongue and lifted her arm away.
“You seem to say that about the most interesting pieces of you.” His dimple made a morning appearance and caused herpulse to beat so forcefully that her tattoo was probably dancing against her skin.
“So what’s the story?” he asked, his finger returning to its tracing. “Why the canine?”
Harper arched an eyebrow at him. “Dental anatomy’s going well, huh?”
Dan laughed but his eyes urged her on. She took a deep breath.
“It’s a copy of the first anatomical drawing of a maxillary canine. I got it when I was accepted to dental school.” She chewed on her lip, remembering the day. “Ineverplanned on getting one. But when I got the call from Callowhill and it felt so huge and special and surreal, I needed to do something just as monumental to remember it.”
She closed her eyes and a small smile tugged at the corners of her mouth as she remembered hanging up the phone and looking around her as if the world had just opened the door to its secrets. She’d felt the urge to dance and run—scream out with the overwhelming happiness that threatened to burst straight from her chest. The first coherent thought she’d had was that she wished she could tell her mom.
She’d indulged an impulse for the first time that day, celebrating the rewards of her careful planning with a poorly thought-out permanent reminder.
“I found the closest tattoo shop, walked in, and got it.” She shrugged and opened her eyes. Dan stared at her intently. Moments from their night together popped through her mind: the hunger in the way he looked at her when they came together, his touch turning from gentle to greedy, the feel of his tongue, body, hands, against her skin. Heat flooded her cheeks.
“Why that tooth, though?” he asked gently, looking at Harper like she was the most fascinating person in the world. A foreign feeling danced in her chest from his attention, and she worked to place it.
Valued.
The way he looked at her made her feel valued. Interesting. Adored.
She wanted to wake up always feeling this way.
“I’m not sure,” she said at last. “The canines have always been my favorite. There’s something sharp and strong about them… I guess that’s how I wanted to feel. What I wanted to be in this phase.”
She blew out a breath, searching Dan’s face, looking for a sign that would tell her how much more she should give. His green eyes were soaking her in, drawing out bits and pieces of her before she could even grasp that she was willingly handing them over.
“It also has the longest root,” she continued. “I was kind of desperate to feel rooted too, I think. After my mom passed, my aunt and uncle took me in—they’ve always been so good to me—but being twelve and having them become my caretakers overnight left me feeling a little… disjointed. I felt like things could tip at any point and I’d have to start over again.”
Dan observed her a moment longer, and she could almost see the questions he wanted to ask sitting on the tip of his tongue as he wet his lips, but she knew he wouldn’t push. Harper couldn’t pinpoint the exact moment she’d started trusting Dan—whether it had been a specific smile, or one of the precious times he’d dropped his forehead to hers and laughed, or if he’d made a slow, steady invasion into her heart that now felt like it had an entire chamber dedicated to him—but she trusted him in a foreign, overwhelming way. It was the most comforting thing she’d found in a long time.
She pushed up to sitting, needing to break the intimacy of the moment before it broke her.
His flannel shirt was lying on the floor and she reached for it, sliding it over herself and enjoying the initial coolness of the fabric against her skin.
