Chapter Twenty-One

Georgina

 

 

I wanted to drink in every moment, but my body rebelled. I was so exhausted and wrung out that I barely noticed the scenery as it went past the windows of the taxi. Blake took us to a large building on a quiet tree-lined street. I only saw pieces of it. Blake and I staggered into our room, fell across the bed, and went to sleep without even stopping to get undressed.

I woke up the next day to sunlight streaming in through the sheer curtains, and looked around with wide eyes. The ceilings were high and decorated with carved panels, the floors were polished hardwood, and the walls were painted a delicate blue-green, like the crashing water of the falls I could just hear in the distance. We were in the penthouse apartment of a posh B&B, set up in a heritage Tudor mansion. Blake must have made some decent money stripping.

The bed was huge, and as soft as I imagined the tops of clouds to be. The covers were silky and light but so warm. I could stay in there forever. I rolled over, seeking Blake. His eyelashes lay against his cheeks, golden-brown with stunning pale tips, just like his hair.

I knew the hair that lined his upper thighs was the same color. A birthmark on his right shoulder vaguely resembled a star, and a long thin scar from a bike accident marred his right forearm. I’d come to know his body so well. And his heart too.

He was kind, and intelligent. He was amazing in bed. He was a gentleman, in every sense of the word.

I lay there, looking at the shadows his eyelashes cast on his cheeks. I wanted to trace the curve of his jaw with my eyes. I wanted to remember the way his lips looked slightly parted, his breath a soft whisper over them. I wanted it all forever.

I imagined that he would stay handsome as he aged, and when he did finally leave the world he would be old and beautifully worn out from living and loving to the fullest. His face would look just like it looked right now while he slept—content and at peace.

How badly I wanted to watch him get older, see him get a little silver in his thick honey hair. The idea of forever, the impossibility of it and the yearning for it, made tears that dripped onto the sheets.

Blake stirred beside me, and I wiped those tears away as fast as possible. I didn’t want to be a cause of sadness or worry to him. Not now. Not today.

He blinked up at me and smiled, and my heart was even more his with every second.

“Morning.” His fingers stroked my throat and jaw and I shivered, needing his touch all over my body.

We were interrupted by a knock at the door. Blake grumbled. “I thought I’d ordered breakfast for ten in the morning.” He glanced at the clock. “Oh, right.”

He got up to answer the door, looking the very definition of ‘just rolled out of bed’, and it was the single sexiest thing I had ever seen.

A housekeeper with a French accent spoke with Blake at the door, then he took the tray from her and brought it in. He placed it on the bedside table, and the sweet smells of vanilla coffee and strawberry jam made me sit up in bed, alert with hunger.

We shared the steaming carafe of coffee, basket of croissants, crusty bread, and fruit-filled pastries. I didn’t care about crumbs in the bed or how much butter and jam I slathered over each bite. I savored every mouthful.

“You’ve got something on your chin,” Blake said.

My heart stopped. Lurched painfully. Tears burned in my eyes.

Black slugs churned inside me.

No. No. No.

He reached over, and with a thumb, wiped away a spot of strawberry jam.

I could only stare at it, confused.

“Wait, there’s still a bit more.”

I sat there, frozen, waiting for my body to be torn apart by darkness.

Blake took my coffee out of my hands and put it down, then crawled on top of me, kissing the jam softly off my chin.

“Are you okay?” he asked as he looked down at me, supporting himself with his arms.

I blinked a few times, bringing myself back to reality and dispelling the tears before they could fully form.

“Yeah. Yeah, I’m okay.” I’m okay.

“Just okay?”

I giggled at Blake’s exaggerated puppy face. “More than okay. Perfect. Deliriously content.”

“Then why do you still have these damned clothes on?” he growled.

Blake stripped away my clothes. I responded by relieving him of his clothing too. Shirts and underwear were flung all over the room, landing on leadlight lamps and velvet armchairs. When we were skin against skin, Blake threw the sheet over us. Sunlight shone through the white fabric, making our private world for two glow.

He lay his body gently onto mine from toes to chest, and brought his hands up into my short hair. He lifted my face to his, and his tongue touched mine then delved into a kiss so deep and heady that everything else spun away.

I ached with delight at every touch, and arched my back against the mattress, enjoying the hardness of his arousal pressed between us. He reached out of the sheets, fumbled with his wallet on the bedside table, and returned with a condom. I took it from him, carefully rolling it down over his long shaft, enjoying how he watched me touch him.

We shifted and rolled together between the sheets, and he pressed into me. My mouth opened in a cry he silenced with a kiss. My breath and his mingled, growing faster, as each leisurely thrust added to the slow burn of ecstasy building inside.

I lay there, rocking against him, wrapped in his warmth and his scent, in the sweet glow of joy that had crept over me. In that moment, we could have been in Paris, or back in my own bed, or on the moon. I could have imagined us anywhere, and at the same time it didn’t matter where in the world we were. I only needed Blake. I could stay in one room, one bed, in his arms forever. He was all I needed.

Then we weren’t in bed anymore. Blake lifted me out, carrying me by my thighs, my legs knotted around his waist as I moved up and down on him, refusing to break that connection, my arms around his shoulders and my kisses on his neck.

We moved like that into the bathroom, and he reached away to run the shower. My fingers toyed with the muscles of his chest as he turned back to me, lust smoldering in his eyes.

Once the water was steaming, he pulled us both under.

I gasped at his lips, drawing him closer as though I could consume him whole. The stream of the shower ran down between our mouths, hot water spilling around our tongues.

I fell back against the shower wall and he pressed me there, his chest to mine, his hands gripping tight under my thighs. The air was cool, making my nipples pucker and my skin rise into goosebumps, confused and excited by the contrasting splashes of hot water. Tremors ran through my body.

He thrust into me, driving me against that wall harder and harder, breaking me apart and making me whole again. Our cries sounded out over the gurgle and rush of the water. We both came within the very same moment, and I let tears of happiness and awe run down my cheeks, unseen under the fall of water surrounding us.

 

 

 

It was afternoon by the time Blake and I stepped out of our room. I could hear the low rumble of the falls, and they drew me to them, calling to a primal, wild part of my soul.

It was windy and a little cold, but we were only a couple of blocks away and we wandered down the streets, our hands linked, and smiles on our faces.

The viewing platforms were crowded with tourists, but in my eyes, only Blake, myself, and the falls existed. I stared out over them with my mouth open, the soft spray raining down onto us. The immensity of the falls, the sheer power and beauty, staggered my imagination. They were huge, bigger than I’d ever pictured based on photos I’d seen. My heart pounded with life and my blood sang a matching tune to the roar of water. I kept looking over at Blake, wondering if he was bored or if he thought I was being silly, but he wore the same smile as me.

We stayed there until it became dark and the falls were lit up with brightly colored lights like something from a fantasy world. It was intensely magical, and it gave me an amazing gift—inspiration for my art. There were ideas I had never considered before flying around my head. Shapes of passionate bodies and passionate water, fusing, merging in splashes of color. I was desperate to get back to our room and the sketchbook I had there.

Blake had made all of this happen for me. He’d worked so hard for this, and for me, and I had no idea what would be next, what else he’d have to do for me from that childhood list. He’d told me we had a booking for dinner, and I wondered if that was from the list, or just something we were going to do. I had become confused as to where free will ended and the list started. And, in my darkest thoughts, I still wondered if Blake really wanted to do these things or if he felt somehow obligated.

By the time I turned away from the sight of the falls, my bubble had completely burst. On our way to dinner, the realistic part of me thought it was time I reminded myself I had the results of a cancer test waiting for me. I’d almost forgotten. I almost felt like I was living a life free of that. I couldn’t forget though that getting that result was going to be painful.

And I wasn’t sure I could survive the pain that would come from a fall as high as the one I was about to crash-land from.