Page 66 of Don't Go
I was very far from words. My forehead was against the wall. His forehead was against the back of my head. His chest was against my back. The wall was cool under my palm, and his hand was warm on top of my hand, and there was nothing in my head but his rhythm behind me and the sound of my own breath against the paint.
He gripped me — his arm around my waist, tight, then tighter — and the world narrowed down to a circle six inches across, and the circle held for three or four seconds, and then it broke.
We finished.
His weight came down against my back. He didn't move for half a minute. I didn't move either. Our breaths were coming in fast, and his arm was still around my waist.
He turned my chin with two fingers. He kissed the corner of my mouth. He turned me slowly until my back was against the wall again and my front was against him.
His hand started to move.
His thumb went across the side of my breast and stayed there for a beat. His palm went down the line of my stomach. Then lower. His mouth was at the side of my neck. I couldn't, just then, remember how I'd ever managed to have a thought about anything else.
I put my hand flat against the wall and let him.
When I came back to myself — both feet still on the floor, somehow, the wall against my back, my hands flat on his chest — I let my head fall against his shoulder and breathed into his collarbone for half a minute.
He held me up.
His hand was at the back of my head. The other was at the small of my back. We were standing against the wall outside hisbedroom in some state of undress I didn't want to inventory, and he was holding me up, and I'd just — I'd just done something I'd told myself I wasn't going to do, which wasn't the sex, the sex was on the deal. It was something I hadn't budgeted for —
I shut down the sentence.
I wasn't going to finish that.
I lifted my head off his shoulder. "Cross."
"Mmm…"
"Why did you change your mind?"
He went still.
His breath under my hand stopped for a second and hand at the back of my head didn't move. He took a second too long to answer, and when the second was done, I knew the answer wasn't going to be the one I'd thought I was about to get.
His mouth moved against my collarbone. "My dad died yesterday."
I went still and came off the wall.
I turned. My hands found his chest again, my arms went up around his neck, and his head went down into the side of my neck. I held him — actually held him, both arms — and his arms came up around my back and held me back, and we stood like that.
"I'm sorry."
He didn't answer right away.
"I'm so sorry, Beau."
His mouth was against my collarbone. "Yeah. Thank you."
He pulled back. He didn't let go of me, but he pulled his head up. He gave me a smile.
"It's okay." He breathed in. "I'm okay."
He wasn't okay. His eyes were tired around the edges in a way I'd never seen on a person before. I let him have it.
His hand went up into my hair. He held the back of my head. He let it go slowly through my hair, down to my shoulder, across my shoulder to the curve of the top of my back.
He didn't speak.
