Page 22 of Past Lives
I lean in and kiss her, desperate, deep. I taste the salt of tears neither of us has admitted to crying, and something breaks inside me—a dam, a lifetime of reserve. Hands on her face, I pull her to me, harder, until she is wrapped tight to my chest, and my mouth latches to hers. I want to memorize her, down to the metallic tang of her laughter, the silken edge of her tongue.
She shudders under my hands, and I feel her hips arch up, desperate for friction. The sheet falls away, exposing her wholly to me. I bend and take her nipple between my lips, feel it pebble instantly, and hear her gasp. I drag my teeth over the soft mound, leaving a pink mark, and she tugs my hair, demanding more.
“You’re mine,” I say, voice savage. I kiss a bruise over her collarbone, delicate as a signature. “I’ll never—fuck—never let you go again.”
She pants, gasping, twisting her body into me. “Say it again.”
I pin her wrists to the mattress and slide my cock against her thigh, aching for her. I want to rip her apart, devour every inch, but I force myself to move slowly, to savor the way she trembles under me. I press inside, slow, inch by inch, feeling her open around me, tight and impossibly hot. Her legs clamp around my waist, heels digging, every muscle straining to pull me deeper.
“You’re mine,” I groan, “and I’m yours. Forever.”
She arches against me, wild and desperate, her scream ripping through the room as her nails claw bloody furrows down my back. I pound into her mercilessly, her tight heat gripping my cock like a vise. Every thrust drives me deeper, conquering new territory as she writhes beneath me. When she bites hard into my shoulder, I growl and slam her wrists above her head, pinning her completely to the mattress. I fuck her with brutal precision, our sweat-slicked bodies crashing together, the headboard hammering against the wall like artillery fire.
I flip her over in one rough motion, yanking those perfect ass cheeks up to meet me. Her spine arches beautifully as I mount her from behind, watching my thick shaft disappear into her dripping pussy. Her tits bounce with each punishing thrust, and I reach around to pinch her nipples hard. When I finally explode inside her, it's with a roar—pumping her full as she convulses around me, screaming my name, her juices running down both our thighs in a filthy testament to what I've done to her.
I collapse beside her, chest to her spine, arms looped around her waist in a death grip. My cock still twitches inside her, our bodies joined in the aftermath. I rest my lips against the shell of her ear, tasting the salt of her skin, breathing in the musky perfume of our sex. My panic has abated, replaced by a bone-deep calm, as if all the ghosts of my bloodline have gone silent, satisfied by what we've just done.
We lay like that, tangled and sticky with sweat and cum, the room slowly lightening around us, the bloody sunrise creeping through rain streaks on the glass.
"You okay?" she whispers, her ass grinding back against me.
"Yeah." I trace the line of her rib with my thumb, then slide my hand up to cup her breast, still slick with my saliva. "Never better. Everything is better when you’re with me."
"I dreamed, too," she says, voice low and strange. "That you left me. I think you went to war and I waited and waited, but younever came home." She laughs, but there's a tremor in it. "I guess we're both a little haunted."
I draw her closer, and the need is sudden, acute—I have to be inside her again, to convince myself she’s real, that she isn’t a ghost who’ll vanish at dawn. I push her hair aside and kiss the ruby mark on her neck, the scent of her sweat and sex already working some ancient chemistry on my brain. She turns to face me, eyes wide and fearless.
“Again?” she says.
“Yes,” I rasp, and flip her onto her stomach, dragging her hips back until she’s bent near the edge of the bed. I kneel behind, marveling at the smallness of her waist, the dip of her spine, the generous curve of her ass. I slide in with one brutal thrust, and she shouts, wild, gripping the sheets.
I fuck her with a single-minded violence that scares me, dogged by the certainty that if I ever stop moving, ever let her out of my grasp, she’ll be gone—whisked away to some parallel world where she’s cold and dying and I’m lost and howling for her. I dig my fingers into her hips to anchor her to me, mark her, claim her. She comes again, shrieking, and I can’t last through that—her body rippling and shuddering, milking my cock. I come instantly, so hard I see blackness crowd the edge of my vision.
After, we lie on the ruined bed in a heap, her hair tangled in my beard, her breath moist against my throat. I rub her shoulder in careful circles and feel the tremor finally leave her body.
“Sorry,” I say. “I don’t know what’s gotten into me.”
She kisses my chin, then my lips. “You’re an animal. But a good animal.”
We laugh, and the sound is oddly fragile.
I should tell her more about my dreams, the certainty I feel that we’ve loved before. But something—a primitive superstition—warns me not to spoil it, not to name it for fear it will vanish.Instead, I hold her tighter, as if the crush of my arms could save her from any wandering void.
“Stay with me,” I say. “Please. Even if I’m an asshole sometimes.”
She drowses against my chest, a smile curving her lips. “I’ll stay. But you have to feed me breakfast.”
I grin. “Fine. Fine.” I check the digital clock—0807. “We have an hour until the continental breakfast shuts down.” I sit up, stretching, and the soreness in my body is sweet. I pull on boxers, pad over, and pour her a glass of Evian from the minibar. Hand it to her.
She eyes me over the rim. “You’re more beautiful than any man has a right to be,” she says, then blushes furiously.
“Thank you,” I say, awkwardly. “You’re—fuck, there’s no word. You’re. a supernova.”
She giggles and sets the glass aside. “We’re ridiculous people.”
“We are,” I agree, climbing back into bed and pulling her atop me. “But I think we’re perfect for one another.”
She straddles me, the heavy fall of her hair curtaining my face, and studies me as if she’s reading a blueprint for a building she’s about to inhabit. Her expression goes serious, almost haunted.
