He moves his hands over me, stroking my arms, my shoulders, my back. This has become our ritual of comfort: touching, caressing, feeling each other. It’s not just a distraction. I realize that now; this will always be how we understand each other best.
Our movements slowly become more sensual, more desperate. Our legs twine together, and we roll over and under each other, across the floor, until I come to rest on top of him.
I sit up, straddling him. I can feel his bulge beneath me, and I move slowly against it. He groans and grips my hips while my fingers fumble at the fly of my jeans. A moment later, I have them off, and I lean forward and use my teeth to undo the button on his own pants.
I only slide them down to his thighs. I don’t have the patience for more. He’s ready for me, and I for him, and when I straddle him again, I sink easily onto his cock. Calder moans again and clutches my thighs. I begin to move up and down, and all the while I watch his face, watch the emotions play across his dark features. The pain is melting away, the life coming back into his eyes. I squeeze the muscles between my legs, and there’s a flash of pure lust across his face. His hands move from my legs and up across my body, slipping under my shirt to capture my breasts, which bounce with the rhythm of my movements. the site where Garrett contributesin to make
“Lily,” he rasps as he kneads me. I lean away from him, bracing myself against his thighs and letting my head fall back onto my shoulders. I gaze up at the ceiling above us, at the magnificent fresco that witnessed those very earliest days of our relationship. It’s as beautiful as I remember it.
I squeeze myself around Calder again, and he lets out a sound like a wild animal. When I drop my eyes to his face once more, a surge of pleasure moves through my gut. He’s himself again, wicked and wild and fully present, and his eyes lock on mine with a force that shakes me to my core. He releases my breasts and moves a hand up to my face. It’s the same hand I kissed and nurtured only moments ago. His finger teases my lips, brushing back and forth across my mouth until I relent and open it for him. Then he slips the finger inside.
My eyes never leave his. I slide my tongue along his finger, and then I close my mouth and begin to suck. He growls and bucks his hips, slamming himself up into me. My entire body burns with sensation, and I feel the pleasure building inside of me. I let out a whimper around his finger.
Calder’s eyes are so dark they’re nearly black.
“Turn around,” he commands.
I obey, letting his finger slip from my mouth before carefully shifting my body around to face away from him. I grab his ankles and lean forward, leaving Calder with a very clear view of my backside.
His hands clutch my ass as I begin to move again. He feels even better from this angle, and when he raises his hips against me, matching my rhythm, I let out a moan. My nails dig into his ankles, and he’s gripping my butt hard enough to leave bruises.
“Fuck, Lily,” he gasps.
I ride him like I’ve never ridden a man before. All the sex we’ve had this weekend feels like it was building to this, moving toward this final moment of pleasure and delirium. I cry out Calder’s name as I move against him, scream it and whisper it and sob it. I want to be his freedom, his release, his ultimate ecstasy.
Suddenly he sits up, clutching me from behind. One of his arms goes around my neck, the other around my hips, keeping our rhythm. He pulls my head back onto his shoulder so he can press his mouth against my ear.
“Come for me,” he growls. “My sweet, naughty Lily.” His hand slips down between my legs.
I suck in a breath as he begins to rub my clit.
“Come, my little minx,” he begs. “Come for me, and then I’ll fill you up.”
He twists my clit with a force that makes me cry out in both pleasure and pain at once, and that’s all it takes. Release sweeps through me, furious and crushing, and the last thing I notice before the sensation pulls me under is, once more, the beauty of the scene high above our heads.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
“This place will always be a part of you, you know.”
We’re sitting in the grass out on the lawn of the former Cunningham estate, staring up at the night sky. I have no idea what time it is—long past dinner, I’m sure, and probably far into the night—but for whatever reason neither food nor sleep interests me very much right now. I’ve even called my dad and told him I won’t be in to work tomorrow.
Calder doesn’t respond for a long moment.
“It’s not the house,” he says. “Not really.” He picks at the grass next to him. “I was never really happy with the idea of another family living here, but I told myself that at the end of the day, it would still be someone’s home. This—this thing they want to do… it destroys everything that made this house special.”
I can’t know the pain he’s feeling, but I understand in some small way. You expose the secrets of a place like this, and they cease to mean anything.
“But maybe it’s better this way,” he says. “Maybe this is what needed to happen to sever that last emotional bond. The sooner I accept that my old life is over, the happier I will be.”
“These things take time,” I remind him. “Lives change, and sometimes we don’t adjust immediately. But you’ll figure out where you need to be, what you need to be doing.” Your life still has meaning. To me.
My hand brushes against his on the ground. my phone beeps again.
“Lily…” He sounds like he wants to say more, but he stops.
“What is it?” My stomach clenches. I knew there was more to this story, knew he was keeping something from me. “What really happened with your father?”
“My father?”
Is he really going to make me spell it out?
“What’s the truth about the money?” I ask. “What was really going on?” I can’t bring myself to say “scandal” or “blackmail” out loud, not to him. But the time for secrets is past. I want to know the whole truth of his suffering.
Calder is silent. I find his hand in the grass and squeeze it, but there’s no response.
“Calder?”
“You know what happened with the money.” His voice is oddly quiet. “I told you. He made some bad investments.”
That doesn’t completely answer my question.
“Bad legitimate investments?” I ask. “Or…”
He jerks his hand away from mine. “I don’t believe this. You believe all that crap they’re saying.”