Page 86 of Knights Like These
He doesn’t stop. His mouth finds the spot below my ear that makes my breath catch, and he learns it immediately—kissing it again, slower. My fingers grip his shirt, pulling him closer. He eases me back onto the bed, hovering over me, his weight braced on one arm. I look up at him, and his gray eyes are dark and focused.
“You’re staring,” I whisper.
“I’m looking at you.” His thumb traces my hip bone above the waistband of my leggings. “I’ve wanted to look at you like this for a long time, and I’m not going to rush it.”
His mouth returns to mine, deeper now, his tongue against mine. I arch up into him, and he groans as his hips press against me. I can feel him—every part of him—and the sound I make is embarrassing, but I don’t care.
He pulls my shirt over my head. I’m in a bra and leggings while he’s still fully dressed, which feels unfair, so I tug at his shirt. He sits up and pulls it off, revealing his broad chest and flat stomach, along with the bruise on his ribs. I run my hands up his abs, and he shudders under my touch. After two years of no one touching him, my hands on his skin make him shake.
“Syd.” My name comes out of his mouth, rough and low.
I pull him back down to me. We kiss, and his hand moves up my side, his thumb brushing the underside of my bra. I reach behind my back and unhook it because I’m done being patient. He draws it off slowly. And the way he looks at me—like I’m the answer to every question he’s ever been afraid to ask—makes my eyes sting.
His mouth moves down, exploring my collarbone, my chest, the valley between my breasts, my stomach. He takes his time, his lips and hands mapping every inch of me. When his fingers hook into the waistband of my leggings, he looks up at me.
“Can I?”
“Yes.”
He pulls them down slowly and presses his mouth to my hip, then to the inside of my thigh, and finally to the tattoo—the paper airplane. The fact that he kisses the tattoo first, before anything else, makes my chest crack open.
Then his mouth moves lower, and I stop thinking.
He is nothing like the boy I remember. That boy was careful and uncertain, and he finished before I did. The man is patient and focused; he knows exactly where to be and how long to stay there. The sounds I’m making are not sounds I’ve made before with anyone,ever, and my hands are in his hair, my back is arching off his mattress.
He doesn’t rush or stop, and when I come apart, it’s with his name on my lips and his hands on my hips holding me steady.
He kisses his way back up my body—my stomach, my ribs, my throat. He’s breathing hard, his eyes dark, and when he settles beside me, I lay my head on his chest. His arms wrap around me as I lie there shaking, listening to his heartbeat, which is racing just as fast as mine.
“You okay?” he murmurs against my hair.
“I—” I laugh, breathless. “Yeah. I’m very okay.”
“Good.”
I pull back to look at him. His hair is a mess from my hands, his lips are swollen, and he’s looking at me with something so naked and unguarded that I have to close my eyes for a moment.
I reach for his waistband, and he catches my hand.
“You don’t have to—”
“Archer.” I raise an eyebrow. “Shut up.”
He falls silent.
I show him what it feels like to be on the other side of that—to be touched by someone who has been thinking about it for half her life, who knows him, who isn’t going anywhere.
He’s not quiet. That’s what I learn about him tonight. He tries to be—pressing his face into the pillow, biting his fist—but the sounds come anyway, low and rough and involuntary, and every single one sends a current through me. When he finishes, his hand grips the sheet, his breath is ragged, and he says my name in a way I’ve never heard before—wrecked, grateful, and mine.
We lie in his bed afterward, my head on his chest, his arm around me, the house dark and quiet around us. The twins are asleep down the hall. The guest room door is open and empty.
I trace the paper airplane on his bicep with my fingertip.
“We were so young,” I say.
“We were.”
I press my lips to the tattoo. “We’re better at this now.”
