Page 44 of Blueprints, Battlelines and Ballrooms
‘I can’t have children.’Now she had exposed her faults to him, she needed to unravel every wound, pull back every bandage.Show him all her messiness.
‘The fault might have been with your husband,’ he offered.
She shook her head.‘The fault will be with me.’
He gathered up her hands and buried them in his own, only to raise them to his mouth and breathe kisses into them.‘I have nine brothers and sisters.And now a niece.There is no shortage of children in my life.’
‘Do you not want a family of your own?’
‘Itisa family of my own.I want you to be part of it.I am lost to you.I want you as you are.Why is that so hard to believe?’
Why, indeed?Because whenever she’d been measured, she’d always been found wanting.Because she could always have been a different, better version of herself.A more compliant daughter or if not that, then a son or a wife who could undertake the labours of a house with ease or who could warm a bed.Because beingFlorencehad never been enough.
He gathered her close and rested his cheek against her chest.She pushed her fingers through his hair, and his curls wrapped around them.His exhalation was like a purr.He pressed his lips to her sternum so that his nose invaded the soft valley between her breasts, and when he nipped her skin, a small laugh bubbled from her throat.Alien and unchained, it glittered fresh and new in the room that had only known her anguish.
‘I, myself, am far from perfect,’ he said.
‘You are absolute perfection.Every inch of you.’
‘Not true,’ he said.‘I have a scar on my shin.And a burn on my arm from one of Elliot’s first experiments with magnesium.’He loosened his tie.‘I will show you.’
He only bothered with a few buttons before he tugged the shirt over his head, taking it and his undershirt in one pull.She traced his pectorals and the faint pattern of dark curls that covered his chest, marvelling at the way his muscles shuddered and bunched beneath her fingers.
‘There is nothing imperfect about you.I think this is a ruse to remove your own clothes.’
In answer, he nudged her chin towards him, then kissed her.Not with light kisses or consolatory, pitying kisses, but hard and possessive.He inhaled like he could breathe her.A small part of her weakened, ached, and unravelled.
‘It seems unfair that you are exposed, and I am not.’Trousers, boots, socks, the lot… all of it was gone in a few blinks.
‘How did you—’
‘I share a bedroom.There is a dozen of us to share washrooms.One becomes fast at these things.’
Beautiful man.Beautiful, naked man who towered over her and looked at her like she was the sunrise.She traced the lines of him.Down his chest and along the dark trail that ran from his belly button to the hair around his cock, which made no secret of his arousal.Even if the words that rumbled in his chest were a lie, this was not.
She slid her arms around him.It felt so good to feel his naked body against her own, to press her imperfect lengths against his flawlessness, his hardness against her stomach.She held him tighter, then winced.The small movement came with a rub and a pinch in her shoulder and a grumble at her back.‘Today is not a good day,’ she whispered.‘I want to lie with you, but I don’t think I could manage your weight.My back is tender, and my knees—’
‘Would you like me to make you feel good?’He brushed his thumb over her nipple, licked his finger, then circled the point.Such a small thing, but it felt like forgetting.The gaps in her body that weren’t tinged with pain roused and asked for more.
‘You don’t mind if I can’t take you?’she asked.
‘I have other thoughts,’ he rumbled, nipping kisses along her neck.‘Other wicked ways I have imagined you.There is more we can do.Let me show you how I want to love you.What could be.’
He pulled back the blankets.She steadied herself against him as she slipped beneath them.He joined her, and the warmth from their naked bodies bled into the sheets.Johannes, always so aware of the space he occupied, adjusted to hook around her.He propped himself on one elbow.
‘Don’t think about me.Just tell me what makes you feel better and what doesn’t.’
Tension wove its familiar tendrils along her spine, and the familiar sequence of pinching and pain pressed the tips of its claws into her.
‘I won’t make any demands,’ he crooned.‘But you need to trust me.Not just now.For always.’
Trust… trust what part of him?Where could she begin?Trust his fidelity not to break, his body not to hurt her, his patience to never wane?He smiled his slow, easy grin.The same smile he had shown her since the first day.She took a steadying breath.What could he want from her?Nothing, because she had nothing to offer.So why would he lie?She relaxed a little and sank into the pillows.Johannes sucked a nipple into his mouth.A rumble from him and a groan from her collided to fill the room.He flicked his tongue over the point.
‘I want you to remember.To always, always remember…’ His mouth travelled the breadth of her, her clavicle, her other nipple, the flesh of her breast, the curve of her ribs.‘That kissing you is its own reward.That tasting your skin is a pleasure unto itself.That touching you, having you for my own, learning you, is enough.Release that worry.You are enough.’
He stroked the length of her slit with confidence.Another moan, and Florence allowed herself to melt a little more.Those tender, torturous fingers of his… he circled until she groaned, until she dissolved into nothing but his touch, his breath, his body.She relaxed into his promise, held it, and found it as strong as stone.And when she widened her thighs, he slid his fingers inside her.Unravelling and selfish, she pulled his mouth to hers and kissed him through each needy, throaty moan.
‘More words,’ she gasped.‘I want the naughty words again.’
