I don’t even know what time we finally fall asleep. We lost track of time entirely, up all night exploring every inch of one another’s bodies, unable to get enough of each other. The sex was slow, and fiery hot. Like we both knew we could take our time, finally, after so many desperate, grasping reaches for one another earlier in the weekend. Now, after all, we know we have as much time together as we want.

And I have a feeling it’s going to be a very, very long time.

I fall asleep sticky with sweat, dreaming about Darius’s mouth on my body, his hands exploring my waist, spreading my legs, stroking my pussy even as I wrapped both of my hands around his thick cock, stroking him until we were both moaning, eyes locked, hot as hell because we both knew now how much we felt for one another. That whatever this was was turning into more than just sex, more than a hookup. It could be something real.

I’m still dreaming about his hands running over my body when I wriggle a little in bed that morning, the covers still warm and snug around me, a hint of predawn light painting the curtains.

Then I realize I wasn’t dreaming at all, at least about Darius. I feel him shift closer to me, his hands sliding down my belly, over the smooth expanse of my thighs. I smile a little in my sleep and arch my hips back toward him, teasing, wriggling my ass against his crotch, where I can already feel he’s rock hard from morning wood.

“Good morning to you too,” Darius murmurs against the nape of my neck, chuckling softly.

“Mm, you know how to make a girl’s dream literally come true, Darius.” I glance over my shoulder, smirking at him. “I was just thinking about you.”

“Is that so? Funny.” He kisses my cheek, the edge of my jawline. “I was just having an incredibly sexy dream about you, too…”

“Hmm, imagine that,” I reply, but my voice goes breathy at the end, because his cock digs into the backs of my thighs as he trails his hands up the front, slow, teasing, his fingertips barely touching my skin in a way that makes me shiver from the top of my head all the way to my toes. I arch into him again, and he parts my thighs with one hand, at the same time arching his own hips to press the thick head of his cock between my closed legs. I moan and wriggle back against him a little harder, just as his fingertips find my pussy lips, and part them gently.

I’m still sore from how long we fucked last night, but he’s gentle with me to start, stroking along my slit in slow, soft strokes until I start to get wet again. Wet enough that his finger glides along my slit easily.

“There’s my dirty girl,” he whispers against my ear, and I turn to catch his eye with a grin.

“Tell me what you dreamt about,” I say, and his eyes flash hot as he chuckles softly.

“Well…” As he continues to stroke me with one finger, his other hand slips beneath me. I arch up a little to let him, and he brings his hand around to cup my breasts, his hands expertly massaging me, my nipple cupped in his palm, pressed against his rough, calloused skin. “We were back in that vineyard in the south of France. Only this time, all alone in that field, I caught you up and laid you down in the grass between the rows of vines.”

“Uh huh,” I murmur, my voice breathy as his fingertip brushes my clit. My body jerks with the sensation of electricity shooting through me. I manage to calm myself again, hold myself still against him. But it takes effort. Especially when he presses his thumb flat against my mound, and I can practically feel it as if he’s touching my clit, I’m so sensitive, so pleasurably aching from last night.

“Then I peeled off that pretty dress you were wearing,” he murmurs, kissing the nape of my neck. Then down along my spine, one vertebrae at a time. “And I kissed…” His tongue inches lower. “Every…” Lower. “Inch.” Lower. “Of your sexy, naked body…” His lips brush the middle of my back, before he sits up and rolls me over beneath him, facing him.

I reach up to wrap my arms around him at once, reflexive. But he doesn’t lie down along me. For a moment, he just hovers there, braced on his forearms, and gazes down at me. I can tell he’s appreciating the view, every bare inch of me. A lot of times I’d feel self-conscious in bed with guys, especially if they paused to stare at me for this long. I’d wonder what flaws they were seeing, if they were measuring me to see how I stacked up with the fantasies in their mind.

But not with Darius. With him, I can tell from one glance at his face that he’s fucking loving what he sees. That he wants more of me.

He leans down to kiss my clavicle, his tongue dipping into the little fold there, before he traces his mouth down my chest. “You are gorgeous, you know, Holly,” he whispers, just before his lips reach the little hollow between my breasts. “I hope you know how wild you drive me. Even when I’m not with you, I can’t get you out of my mind.”

I grin up at him. “I’d say sorry, but I’m not actually,” I reply. “Because you have the same effect on me, damn you.”

He laughs and dips his head a little lower, his tongue tracing gradual arcs over the top of my breasts, one after the next. “Mm, well… I have to say, I feel the same way, in that case. I’m always happy to play the part of your dirtiest fantasy.” He flashes me a wink, and then slides down my body farther, his cock pressed against the ultra sensitive skin of my inner thigh as he does. His tongue traces around my nipples now, in concentric circles growing ever smaller, ever closer to the center, like he’s zeroing in.

I wrap my arms around his muscular back, tracing the outline of his muscles with my fingertips. When his tongue finds my nipple, and he trails it over the tip in a slow, flat stroke, I shiver and tighten my grip on his back, my nails digging in ever so slightly. He moans softly against my breast, which makes me tense all over again from the pleasant sensations the vibration of his mouth sends shooting through my nerve endings. I trail my fingernails up his back, then back down, enjoying the way he arches against me, his cock digging harder into my thigh, even as his mouth closes over one of my nipples, and he starts to lick and suck me in an alternating rhythm, making me breathe harder, faster, as the pleasurable sensation builds.

My nipple hardens between his lips as he laps at me. Then, just as I’m arching my upper back to press harder against him, he draws away suddenly, making me gasp with want, as he kisses his way across my chest, his teeth nipping gently at the edge of my breast, in order to swallow my other nipple, teasing it the same way, his tongue swirling against the tip. His free hand slides up to catch my other breast, his thumb and forefinger rolling my nipple expertly between them, until my head falls back against the sheets, and I give myself over to the sensation, to his touch and the sparks of pleasure he’s drawing out of me.

When it feels like I’m reaching a peak, Darius draws back, flicks his tongue along the underside of my breasts, and kisses his way further south. His teeth nip gently along my upper abs. His tongue darts into my navel to curl against it, making my toes curl in response, a reflex I can’t even resist.

My hands slide up to bury in his hair as he reaches my mound. His mouth is gentle, even more so than his fingertips were stroking me earlier. He kisses me as if he’s kissing my mouth, his tongue exploring the flat expanse of my shaved mound, just above my swollen pussy, still aching from last night. I press up against him, urgent, and his hands slip lower, wrapping around my hips and then sliding beneath me. He grips my ass hard enough that I can feel his fingernails biting into my skin just a little, enough to make me gasp with pleasure, as his mouth shifts a little lower. He doesn’t touch my clit, not yet. He turns his face to kiss the inside crook of my thighs, one after the neck. Then he nestles his face between them, and flicks out his tongue to trace over my pussy lips, one after the next.

The warm, hot contact of his tongue makes me gasp again, and I curl my fingers through his hair, tightening my grip. I tilt my head to gaze down at him, and he flashes me a wink, gazing up at me across the flat expanse of my belly, the rise of my breasts.

“Fuck, Darius, you look hot as hell when you do that,” I murmur, and he chuckles against my skin, the vibration sending more shocks of pleasure through me.

His tongue parts my lips gently, eases deeper into my slit, and he trails the very tip of it along me, pausing once just to lift his head and grin at me. “You still taste as incredible as ever, you know.”

“Sometimes I wonder if your appetite is insatiable.”

“For you? Definitely.” He smirks again, and lowers his face to my pussy once more. This time, when his tongue enters my slit, he swirls it around, finds my pussy entrance, and presses the tip in. He draws it out again. Then back inside, a little deeper this time. He keeps going like that, gently, teasing me, until I have both hands fisted in his hair and I’m practically bucking up against his face, eager for him to tongue me the way I know he can.

His hands grip my ass tighter, and he pauses one more time to grin at me. “Did you want something, Holly?” he asks, amusement barely concealed in that damn knowing tone of his.

“Yes, Darius,” I reply, catching his gaze, holding it. “I want you to make me come again.”

He raises a single eyebrow. “I thought I told you you’d need to ask nicely in situations like this.”

My cheeks go red, and I narrow my eyes. But he just sits there, waiting, and damn him, he knows by now that I can’t resist him for long. More than that—I don’t want to. “Please, make me come,” I finally say, and his smile widens.

“With pleasure.” He bends down and this time, when he begins to thrust his tongue into me again, he doesn’t hold back. He flicks it in and out, faster, harder, the tip of his tongue curled and angled so it drags along my front inner wall, making my hips buck wildly and my heart beat so fast I’m afraid it might jump straight out of my chest. My head falls back as my neck, and my whole body, really, arches with pleasure.

“Fuck, right there, right there,” I hear myself saying, but it’s a vague and distant sound, almost like it could be someone else speaking. As for me, the pleasure is washing over me in heightened waves, too insistent to ignore or drown out. All I can think about or focus on is Darius, and that fucking tongue of his, and how hot it feels to tilt my head up and watch him tongue me hard and fast, his eyes fixed on mine, like he’s just as eager to watch my reaction to all of this as I am to watch him get me off.

Finally, when I can’t stand it anymore, I manage to murmur, “I’m coming.” My voice sharpens. “Fuck, I’m coming,” and Darius keeps up his same pace, relentless, lashing me with his tongue until I cry aloud, my voice echoing all the way up to the ceiling of our hotel room.

The orgasm sweeps through me, sending spots dancing across my vision, making my limbs tremble and my breath gasp. When it finally subsides, I collapse back onto the bed. But Darius isn’t finished. He keeps his mouth there, clamps it over my clit now, and carefully, oh so fucking carefully, laps along my clit with his tongue flattened into a single strong, hot, wet blade. He licks me until my pussy clenches again, and my hips tremble, and another cry escapes me, this one softer, more muted, as the second orgasm chases the aftershocks of the first.

I’m still vibrating from that, feeling like my fingers and toes are fuzzy from all the fireworks going off in my nerve endings, when Darius spreads my legs gently and lies between them, slowly drawing himself up my body, kissing my skin the whole way—my hips, my belly, my abs, my chest. Finally, his lips reach mine, and he kisses me long and hard, his tongue invading my mouth, still coated in my juices so I can taste myself on him, and the mingled flavor drives me wild.

“God I love making you do that,” Darius murmurs, finally, still smirking.

“I have to admit, I rather like you making me do it too,” I whisper, half-laughing, still breathless, my chest heaving as I recover.

When he pulls back, I realize his cock is between my legs, poised at my soaking wet entrance, thick and practically throbbing with want. It looks bright red, flushed with desire, and veins stand out along one side. It makes me want to reach for him, so I do, tracing both hands up the sides of his shaft before I form them into fists around him. It takes both of my hands to reach all the way around his girth, and I stroke him once, twice, before he reaches down to stop me, eyes hot with desire once more.

“I need to be inside you,” he says, and there’s such naked, hot want in his voice that I can’t resist him.

I let my hands fall to my sides, and he catches them, raises them up over my head to pin them above me with one hand, as he reaches down with his other hand to guide the tip of his cock to my entrance. He presses into me gently, slowly, but without relenting. Pushing deeper, centimeter by centimeter, inch by inch, until he’s fully inside me once more, stretching my walls, stuffing me.

“Fuck, Darius,” I whisper again, and he grins, eyes flashing.

“Have I mentioned yet today, Holly, that I love you?”

I stare into those deep, dark eyes of his. Pools I could truly get lost in. And my heart skips for a whole new reason, aside from just the sex. Because it wasn’t a dream, and it wasn’t some one-time thing, the way I so foolishly declared to him after our hookup in the shower. He loves me. And I love him. “As a matter of fact,” I reply, making a show of twisting to the side to squint over at the bedside clock. “I don’t think you have mentioned it today yet.”

“Well.” He smiles, and lies down along me, and with his cock inside me and his muscular body pressed along my length, his arms wrapped around my waist and mine around his shoulders, holding him close… I have never felt this close to anyone before. This much like our bodies had melded into one. “That’s lucky. Because I’ve been wanting to remind you.” He tilts my face toward his with a fingertip, holds my eye. “I love you, Holly.”

“I love you, Darius,” I whisper, heart racing as the words escape me.

He smiles, and draws back, just a little, and I cry out faintly in protest, missing the feel of his cock inside me already, wanting more of him. But he doesn’t leave me empty for long. He presses back inside me, a smooth, slow glide, given how soaking wet I am. “I love that fucking pussy of yours too,” Darius murmurs, and I grin, breathing in sharply.

“I have to admit, I fucking adore the way your cock feels inside said pussy. Especially—oh, fuck,” I hiss, because he’s drawn out of me and thrust in again, harder this time, faster, and my already sensitive nerves are going haywire. “When you… fuck me…” I manage to finish, between breaths, as Darius starts to rock back and forth, picking up his pace.

Before long, both of us seem to have lost our concentration. Our hands rove all over one another’s bodies, exploring, grasping, pulling, wanting. And he thrusts his hips against mine, drives into me again and again at a steadily increasing pace. I arch my back, raise up my hips to thrust them up into his, meeting him at every drive, matching his speed.

I’m getting close again, making involuntary little moaning sounds every time he thrusts into me, when suddenly Darius leans back and catches my calves in his hands. Keeping his cock buried deep inside me, he raises my legs and flips them over his shoulders, so he’s kneeling on the bed beneath me and my hips are raised in front of him, his cock now angled in such a way that with every thrust into my pussy, the tip of his cock drags across my front wall, right over my G-spot.

“Come for me, Holly,” he says, that dark, impossible to resist note of command in his tone once more.

He doesn’t need to tell me twice. A few more strokes at this angle, and I’m right there at the edge. I dig my fists into the sheets on other side of us, gritting my teeth as I cry out, my pussy clenching and releasing around his cock as the orgasm sweeps through me.

For his part, Darius doesn’t slow down, doesn’t hesitate at all. “That’s it, Holly, come on my thick cock, you dirty girl,” he murmurs as he just keeps driving into me, over and over, thrusting hard and fast until I can feel his cock stiffening and jumping inside me. I grit my teeth and clench my pussy muscles tight around him, even as I rock my hips in time with his thrusts, to drive back against him as hard as I can.

That’s enough, apparently. Darius growls and wraps both hands around my hips. He comes with a guttural sound, deep in the back of his throat, and I savor the look on his face, a look of utter release, white-hot bliss. At the same time, I keep thrusting against him, feeling his cum coating my pussy, searing hot inside me.

After a moment, Darius releases my legs, lets them fall back to the bed as he lies down alongside me and tugs me back into his arms. His body feels slick with sweat, but then again so does mine, and the whole hotel room smells like sex once more.

“I’ll bet the cleaning ladies hate us,” I point out, and Darius chuckles, his laughter echoing where I have my ear pressed to his chest.

He leans down to kiss the top of my head. “Well, that’s what they get for inviting two extremely dirty people to stay in adjacent hotel rooms this weekend,” he replies, a note of amusement in his tone.

I tip my head back to narrow my eyes at him. “Are you really telling me you didn’t orchestrate all of this? Our rooms adjoining was just some big cosmic coincidence?”

“It’s a mystery,” he says, still with that same amused tone, and I roll my eyes and pinch his side.

In response, he tickles me, and I fling myself away from him, giggling, until I finally have to beg him to stop. He does, and leans down to kiss my shoulder in apology.

But I’ve rolled away from him now, a fresh concern on my mind.

“What is it?” Darius asks, after a quiet moment. “You’re doing that uncharacteristic silence thing again. I don’t like it.”

I snort. Then I roll back to face him, biting my lip. “My family is going to be so furious at me when they find out about this, you know,” I say.

He shrugs one shoulder, nodding. “Mine too.”

“What are we going to do?” I grimace. “I wouldn’t be surprised if my dad decided to freaking disown me over something like this. I’m serious, that’s how much he hates your father.”

Darius purses his lips. Then, to my utter confusion, he breaks into a broad grin. “So?”

“So?” I grab a pillow from beneath me to fling at his head. He catches it, laughing, and I roll my eyes and shove myself into a sitting position. “So, wine-making is all I know. All I’ve ever trained for. All I’ve ever wanted to do, too. It’s my dream to one day run a vineyard. If Dad disowns me, I lose all of that.”

“Says who?” Darius tilts his head, studying me. “Holly, even if your parents were crazy enough to disown you over something like who you’ve decided to date as a grown woman—which, if you ask me, is frankly ridiculous, by the way.”

I snort. “Easy for you to say.” But I do smile a little. He’s right. It is kind of ridiculous. It’s not like we’re the Montagues and the Capulets, here.

“They can’t take away all the knowledge you already have. Or all the experience you’ve gained over your years of hard work. Not to mention the network you’ve started to build here this weekend. Your network, Holly. Not your parents’.” He reaches for my hand, catches it. “So, if it comes to it, you and I go into business together. We open our own vineyard.”

I laugh. But I don’t pull my hand out of his, either. “You’re crazy.”

“If anyone can succeed at this, it’s us, Holly. Together.” He isn’t smiling anymore. I realize he’s not joking. He’s thought about this, clearly.

And, I realize too, the more that I think about it… It does make sense. A weird, wild kind of sense. But sense nonetheless. “You and me,” I say, slowly. “Business partners.”

“Just imagine it.” He grins. “A Bantham and a Spring, working together for once. With our powers combined, nobody in the world could stand in our way.” Then he draws me toward him, and I fall into his arms for another kiss, and for now, all my worries about the future melt away.

In his arms, I feel like I could accomplish anything.