We made it.
The glowing edge of the sun had just barely touched the waterline when my bare foot hit the sand on Laguna Beach. I carried my sneakers on the tips of my fingers, walking straight past the Laguna Beach lifeguard stand with my eyes on the water. Emery followed a ways behind me along with Kalo, her tongue hanging out as she hopped around, flicking sand up with her paws in the process.
I paused when my toes hit the water’s edge, a shiver running up my spine when the icy water grazed my skin. I’d pulled on a sweater before we got out of the car and I wrapped it around me tighter, thankful for the shield from the breeze rolling in off the water. With the sun fading, the temperature was dropping fast, but it could have been twenty below zero and I still wouldn’t have moved.
It was the most beautiful thing I’d ever seen.
Whispy clouds stretched over the blue sky, their white puffs taking on pink and purple hues as the sun dipped farther away. Its orange glow spanned across the water, reaching all the way to the exact spot where Emery and I stood, its bright light softening more and more with every passing second. There were people all around us, some with their family, some on their own, some snapping pictures, some just sitting, watching. We were all strangers, but we shared that sunset together, that punctuation mark on yet another day, each of us hanging on to the sun’s whispered promise that it would return again tomorrow.
“I’ve seen more in the past week than I’ve seen in my entire life,” I whispered to Emery, and he tucked me under his arm, pressing a kiss into my hair.
“Is it what you expected?”
“It’s more.” I shook my head. “It’s like I can’t open my eyes wide enough.”
“I love the way you see life,” Emery said, his eyes on me instead of the sunset. “It’s like nothing has ever disappointed you, like you don’t have a reason to believe it ever would.”
I glanced up at him, the hue of the sun illuminating the different shades of gold in his eyes. “I’ve been disappointed before,” I argued. “But that doesn’t mean I have to expect to be let down again. Every day is a new day, you know? A new chance.”
Emery shook his head, knuckles hooking under my chin. “You’re something else.”
“You already said that to me once,” I reminded him, my voice just a breath as my eyes fell to his lips. “I’m not sure if it’s a good thing or a bad thing.”
He smirked. “Good.” And then, just as the last of the sun sank beyond the Pacific, he leaned down, pressing his lips to mine.
A moment. Frozen in time. A boy and a girl. A beach and a kiss. I was beginning to measure my new beginning with those little snapshots of time, filing them away in a mental scrapbook for safe keeping.
“Can I ask you something?” I said, pulling back after a while, a little breathless.
“Whatever you want, Little Penny.”
I smiled a little at the nickname, a blush creeping onto my cheeks before the question even left my mouth. “That night you left the concert with Emily… did you…” I swallowed, looking down at where my hands rested in the middle of his chest. “Did you sleep with her?”
Emery was silent, his thumbs rubbing small circles where my sweater gathered at my hips. “No.”
A breath of relief rushed out of me, and he chuckled a little. “I’m sorry I had to ask, I know you told me not to be jealous. It’s just… I also know what you said about casual sex, and we weren’t… well, we weren’t like this. So I know I don’t even have a right to ask. I just…”
“It’s fine,” he assured me, cutting my rambling short. “She showed me her record collection and then I left her place and wandered around Houston alone, because that’s all I wanted to be that night. Alone. Then I grabbed breakfast for us when the sun started coming up and, well, you know the rest.”
“Would you have slept with her?”
Emery swallowed, the lump in his throat bobbing with the notion. “Before you, maybe. But not after.” Then he lifted my chin again, his lips finding mine. “Never after.”
Those words, that kiss, it was the more than I could have asked for from Emery in that moment. It wasn’t a promise, but it was a confession, an openness I wasn’t accustomed to from him that I wanted more of. I could get drunk on it, that transparency, and I fisted my hands in his shirt, pulling him closer, savoring every drop.
Kalo didn’t let us kiss for long before she tugged against the leash still in Emery’s hands, making him grin, his mouth still on mine. “I think she’s hungry.”
“So am I.” My stomach growled with my confession, making Emery chuckle.
“I saw some food trucks up there,” he said, nodding toward the area where we’d found a parking spot. “I think there’s some sort of festival going on.”
“You had me at food truck.”
It was a busy Friday night on the beach, considering it was the middle of November, with local vendors and street performers gathering crowds in different areas on the boardwalk and grassy area beyond it. Emery and I took Kalo back to the car for her dinner first, before grabbing two giant slices of pizza from one of the trucks and perusing the vendor tables. There was beautiful local art and pottery, homemade soaps and candles, jewelry of all kinds, and t-shirt designers galore.
We wandered past each of them eating our pizza and enjoying the cool evening breeze before we stumbled on a man juggling sticks of fire near the volleyball courts. Kalo moved excitedly between our feet, trying to find the best view as Emery polished off his slice, but my eyes were drawn to a small table near the end of the boardwalk.
The woman manning the table smiled when our eyes met, waving a hand softly to invite me over. She didn’t look much older than myself, her skin a creamy white, though it was barely visible through the dark ink that painted her from the neck down. Her hair was jet black and shaved on one side, eyes just as dark, and even from where we stood I could see her ears were gauged open with metal rings.
“What do you say?” I asked, nudging Emery and nodding toward her. There was a cosmic sign hanging from the front of her table that read TAROT CARDS. “Want to see what the universe has in store for the last leg of our trip?”
I peered up at him, and he was already rolling his eyes. “You’re joking.”
“Nope. Come on, humor me.”
He shook his head as I slid my hand into his, already dragging him away from the fire and toward her table. “You owe me for this.”
“And what exactly do I owe you?”
At that, a salacious grin spread low on his lips. “I’d tell you, but there are children around.”
I laughed, smacking his arm before taking Kalo’s leash from his other hand. She hopped around in the sand the entire way up to the table, and once we’d reached it, I bent down to pet her fur and give her one of the treats I’d tucked in my pocket. Once she settled by my feet with it, the woman greeted us.
“Thanks for stopping by my table, I was starting to nod off over here,” she said. It was then that I noticed the bull ring pierced through the middle of her nose, the bottom of it grazing her top lip when she smiled. “I’m Melina. What are your names?”
“Aren’t you supposed to tell us that?” Emery piped.
I elbowed him, narrowing my eyes before extending a hand for Melina. “I’m Cooper, and this is Emery.”
“Nice to meet you,” she said, not seeming fazed in the slightest by Emery’s comment, though she did narrow her eyes at him before gesturing to the two small, cushioned stools in front of her table. “Take a seat.”
I sat in the chair on the left, Emery on the right, and I watched his skepticism grow more as Melina grabbed her deck of cards from the corner of the table.
“You don’t look like a psychic,” he said, giving her a once-over.
“And you don’t look like an asshole, but appearances can be deceiving, can’t they?” Melina smiled sarcastically, shuffling the cards between her hands as I stifled a laugh.
Emery lifted a brow at me. “Oh, you think that’s funny, huh?” he teased.
“I do. Now be quiet, you’re disturbing my chi.”
He chuckled, shaking his head like I was ridiculous and bending to pet Kalo on the head.
“So, you two want a card reading, yeah?” Her voice was light on the breeze, yet she held herself in a manner that demanded attention, her posture straight, chin high. If I could only use one term to describe her, it would have been badass.
“We would.”
“She would,” Emery corrected. “I’m just here to watch. And occasionally roll my eyes.”
“Emery,” I scolded.
Melina smiled, her eyes on her cards as she shuffled them before she met my gaze. “It’s all good. Let Mr. Macho Pants stay skeptical, if that’s what he wants. Receiving a message from the universe is a purposeful thing. If he comes into a reading with a closed mind and heart, he’ll receive nothing, and in turn feed his belief that nothing is all that exists.”
Emery eyed her then, but said nothing.
“Here,” Melina said, handing me the deck. “Shuffle ‘em up, buttercup. You can move cards around on the table, shuffle like a normal deck of playing cards, or whatever else feels right. And when you’re ready, hand them back to me.”
I did as she asked, closing my eyes and feeling the cards in my hands as I moved them around. I focused on centering myself, on opening myself to the possibilities, and then I handed them back to her with a calming breath.
“You practice yoga and meditation,” she mused when the deck was back in her hands. “You’re very spiritually open, and you identify with your zodiac sign.” Melina paused, tilting her head a bit. “You strike me as a very curious person, and a giving one, too. Are you an air sign?”
I nodded. “Aquarius.”
“Ah,” she said with a smile. “Makes sense.”
Emery’s attention had been pulled from Kalo and the beach to our table then, and he watched me curiously as Melina laid out the first three cards.
“These first three cards represent your past,” she said, spreading them a few centimeters apart. “This first card, The Five of Cups, it represents a great loss you experienced.”
A phantom pain numbed my left leg, as if it recognized itself in the card, and I massaged the thigh of it gently as she continued.
“But see how it’s reversed? That represents an acceptance of that loss. You were at peace very quickly, which allowed you to move on, and that brings us very symbolically to The Ace of Swords. Mental clarity. It seems that the loss you endured centered your mind to your innermost desires, to what you want most in this life.”
Bastyr.
Her eyes met mine briefly before her index finger tapped the final card. “The Two of Wands. The Wands are tied to the element of fire, which ties, of course, into determination. This card tells me that you took that loss and that mental clarity and you transformed it into a plan, into a strategy. You made a goal, or perhaps multiple goals, and you’ve spent a great deal of time in your life actively pursuing those goals over all else.”
I thought about the diner, about Bastyr, about how my entire life had been spent in Mobile, Alabama, just planning my way out. I’d saved up, I’d studied, I’d done everything I could on my own to make the journey to Washington.
My eyes found Emery’s, and he cocked one eyebrow as if he understood. He leaned in toward Melina, just a little bit, but enough to tell me he was curious.
Melina flipped three more cards, explaining that they represented my present, but when they were all laid out, her brows tugged inward as she studied them. “Interesting.”
“What is it?”
She shook her head, tapping the first card. “I’m getting ahead of myself. Let’s start here. The Page of Cups symbolizes a sort of messenger in your life, something or someone who brought you clarity in a new way. And since this card is followed immediately by The Fool,” she said, moving her finger to the second card. “I sense that this messenger helped you begin a new journey recently, one you’re on now. It can be a physical journey or a spiritual one, but either way, you are experiencing new sights, new experiences, and in turn, discovering new truths.”
I smiled up at Emery, who was still eyeing the cards skeptically, but he smirked in my direction anyway. “You saying I’m your Page of Cups, Little Penny?”
“I’m saying it’s possible.”
“Probably more likely that he’s a fool,” Melina murmured playfully, throwing him a wink.
Emery squeezed my right knee with one hand, sending a wave of chills up that thigh. He followed the line of them, his eyes trailing slow and purposefully up over the bare skin under my shorts, up more over the fabric of my sweater, until his gaze landed on my eyes, smirk still in place.
I flushed, ripping my eyes away and back to Melina, who was studying the last card with concern etched on her face.
“So, this is the card that perplexes me,” she said, tapping the final card. “The Seven of Swords. If it were turned the other way, if it were reversed for you and upright for me, then it would make sense — it would mean you were overcoming a challenge, breaking old habits and starting anew. But the way it sits right now, it symbolizes deceit.”
The color drained from my face.
“Now, this can be read in many ways, of course,” she clarified. “Someone could be being deceitful to you, someone you feel you can trust when actually you can’t. Or, it could be that you are partaking in sneaky behavior, acting in a way that you know is wrong for personal gain.”
Emery’s hand left my knee, the spot where his skin touched me turning ice cold as he stood. “Okay, I think it’s time I remove myself from the equation before I start making rude, sarcastic remarks.” He smiled as if it were a joke, but his eyes were strained as he bent to kiss my forehead. “I’ll take Kalo down by the water, come meet us when you’re done?”
I nodded, but my eyes were still glued to the card, to The Seven of Swords. If Emery were paying attention, if he believed, he would have asked me what I was hiding.
And I could never tell him.
So, in a way, I was relieved as he took Kalo and crossed the sand down to the water, and Melina sensed it.
“It’s you who’s hiding something, isn’t it?” she asked, though she didn’t wait for my response as she flipped three more cards and spread them out below the present ones. “It’s unlike you. You wear your guilt like a scarlet letter.”
I just swallowed, eyes scanning the new cards.
“Your future,” she said, setting the rest of the deck to the side. “The Lovers.”
Her finger tapped the first card, her long, pointy black nail resting there as she lifted her eyes to mine.
“This card can be taken in many ways, and most of us want to believe it means true love, that it symbolizes that fairytale romance we often dream of. However, this card is reverse for you, which shows me that, perhaps as a result of your present deceitfulness, you will quarrel with a loved one over an imbalance — different values, different beliefs.”
My focus stayed on the card, but I was all too aware of Emery on the beach, though he was the opposite — blissfully unaware, his shoes in his hands as he kicked through the edge of the water with Kalo barking and nipping at his ankles.
My heart ached.
“This next card, The Nine of Wands, again tied to fire. You will be tested, Cooper,” she said, and my eyes flicked to hers then. She seemed to be looking right through me, to my innermost self. “You must come into this test with persistence and determination to gain the outcome you desire, and it will not be easy. You may have to come to terms with a loss you didn’t foresee, one you can’t imagine, in order to move forward and emerge on the other side of this test.”
My heart raced under my ribcage, thoughts dizzying as I wondered what the test could be. My first thought was that it tied to Emery, to our time together. We hadn’t discussed what would happen when we reached Washington. In fact, I still didn’t even know where he was going, or if he’d stay. Was that my test? Would I have to give him up? Or was it the test of a new life, of Bastyr and a new job and a new home?
“This last card,” she said, sliding it just a little closer to me. “Is Death.”
My eyes jolted to hers, wide and no doubt showing the fear I felt at the indication, but she laid her hand over mine in reassurance.
“Calm down, it doesn’t mean a physical death,” she said, her voice low and kind. “But it does symbolize the end of an era, the death of a chapter, and perhaps even the death of who you once were. Something tells me that this test, whatever it is, will change you indefinitely. You’re on the brink of a new start, and how you begin this next part of your journey will depend greatly on how you walk into this test, and even more so, how you emerge on the other side of it.”
I scanned the cards again, heart in my throat, unable to do or say anything. My hands deftly reached into my back pocket and I pulled out the twenty-dollar bill I’d stuffed in there after purchasing our pizzas. I slid it over the table toward her, still in a daze. “Thank you.”
“Hey, don’t be scared, okay?” she said, ignoring the cash and squeezing my hand still in hers. She leaned down to catch my eyes. “Without the cards, I can still see your strength, your spirit, your light. Hold onto that, onto the person you are inside, and you’ll be okay.”
I nodded, a faint smile finding my lips as I squeezed her hand in return before standing. She watched me as I crossed the beach to Emery, and even when he turned to me with a goofy grin, Kalo covered in sand and water by his feet, I felt Melina’s eyes on me.
“Well, how does your future look? Are we going to drive off a cliff on the PCH and fall to a terrible death?”
I laughed, but it was dry and short. “Probably,” I joked, because it was easier than trying to explain the truth, to tell him the weight I felt on my shoulders after the reading.
I wanted to ask him right then what we would do once we hit our final destination. I wanted to know where we would go from there. But we hadn’t even discussed what we were, or what we would be. All I’d asked of him — all I could ask of him — was that he try. And in order to let him try, I had to give him room to fail, space to succeed, air to breathe.
I needed to have patience.
But I was finding out very quickly that patience was a virtue I did not possess. At least, not anymore.
We checked into a room right on the beach, our patio overlooking the water, and I took the first shower before joining Emery where he sat outside. The wind whipped his hair as he wrote in his journal by the small porch light, and I took the seat next to him, crossing my prosthetic over my right leg.
“She’s all yours.”
Emery finished his thought, dropping his journal on the table between us with a thud. “Good. I smell like wet dog and Vegas.”
“You should bottle that,” I joked, and he ruffled the fur on top of Kalo’s head as he squeezed past, heading inside.
When I was alone, I inhaled a deep breath, taking in the salty ocean breeze. There was no moon that night, so the beach was dark, but I could hear the waves rolling in over the rocks and the sand, and I closed my eyes, letting it all wash over me.
I hadn’t read Emery’s journal since the morning we left Colorado Springs, and even though I knew I should never read another page of it, my hands were in tight fists at my sides to keep me from doing it anyway. Nora had told me to be patient, Melina had told me my actions would catch up to me, and still, I wanted so desperately to know what he was thinking.
We’d had such a good day together, I hadn’t bothered asking him what he was thinking or how he was feeling about the night before. There was a line we crossed, one we jumped over willingly, and now that we were on the other side of it, I wasn’t sure how to act. It hadn’t just been a good day, it had been a new kind of good day — one with touches and kisses shared between us. It was a complete one-eighty from the day before, and now that I was finally sitting still, I felt the whiplash. I wondered what would happen next, not just when we got to Seattle, but when we woke up in the morning, too.
Today was a good day, but what about tomorrow?
I peered over my shoulder into the room, but it was empty, and I heard the faint sound of the shower kicking on through the open sliding glass door. My eyes found the journal next.
I reached for it, pulling the leather into my lap and running one thumb along the binding. Kalo whined at my feet, as if she, too, was telling me no, but I couldn’t help it. I leaned down to pet her long fur, and then I grabbed hold of the ribbon bookmark and opened to the latest entry.
His familiar handwriting filled only half of the page, and it felt like a welcome home sign. He hadn’t gotten much down before I’d come out and told him it was his turn to shower, but even the little that was there comforted me, a small glimpse inside his thoughts.
I wish I believed in something.
I feel stupid even writing that, being that I make fun of anything that isn’t science, but in a way, I wish I could believe in something bigger than myself. I don’t get on my knees and pray to anyone when I’m scared, and I don’t have any big man in the sky who I thank when something good happens. I don’t read my horoscope and I don’t study Buddhism. I guess you could say I believe in Karma, but really, I mostly just believe that some way or another, we’re all bound to get what we have coming to us.
Really, I don’t believe in anything.
We left Vegas today and landed in Laguna Beach for the night, and Cooper had her tarot cards read. The way she watched the woman read her cards… it was like she was hanging on to every word the woman said, looking for hints and clues as to how to make the next step in her life. I wanted to tell her she was the only one in control of it, but I could see it — she believed. And who am I to tell her not to?
Tomorrow we’ll start driving the Pacific Coast Highway, something I’ve wanted to do ever since Dad drove me a small leg of it when I was younger. Grams had it on her list of things she wanted me to do, too.
I haven’t been back to California since about the seventh grade. But this time, I’m not with family. This time, I’m with Cooper.
Something changed between us in Vegas.
That’s where the entry ended, and I stared at that last line with a mixture of emotions whirling inside like a tornado. It pained my heart that he didn’t believe in anything, that he walked through life feeling completely alone, but selfishly, I cared more about that last scratch from his pen.
What had changed between us?
I mean, I knew what I felt had changed, but was it the same as him? I turned back the page to the last entry before the one I’d just read, and it was dated the same day as when I explored the Grand Canyon by myself.
I kissed her.
I’m a selfish fucking idiot and I kissed her.
She’d never been really kissed, and we were standing there, looking at the mountains and the stars, and I couldn’t stop staring at her perfect lips and thinking what a shame it was that they’d never been kissed. I was thinking about how her lips would feel against mine, wondering if she would sigh and lean into the touch or blush and shy away. And instead of doing the right thing and keeping those thoughts in my mind, instead of letting it go, I kissed her.
And now I’m fucked.
Glen and I took a hike the next morning, when I was still high off her lips, off the way her hands shook as she touched me in the tent all night long. God, I wanted to do so much more to her. I had to fist my hands in her hair to keep them from wandering anywhere else. I knew if I would have started, if I would have touched her, really touched her, I wouldn’t have been able to stop.
But Glen got in my head yesterday morning. He told me he could sense that Cooper was a good girl, a strong girl, and he preached about how I needed to treat her right. He thought we were married thanks to a joke we were playing, but I wasn’t laughing anymore, not when he was telling me that nothing in the world matched up to a strong woman’s love.
Love.
Just hearing him say it nearly made me throw up. I can’t imagine ever being in love, ever being loved by someone else, and it was then that I realized that is exactly what Cooper wants. She wants someone who will hold her hand and kiss her sweetly. She wants someone who will ask her to spend the rest of her life with them, for better or for worse.
I’m not that person.
So, I did what I do best. I shut her out, shut the world out, and had what was possibly the worst day of my life sitting beside her in the car. I knew she wanted to know what I was thinking, and I also knew I’d never tell her. She’s the sun and I’m a black hole. I want to swallow her up and lose myself in her, but if I do, I’ll destroy her.
Maybe a small part of me thought she was what Grams was talking about, that maybe she could be what changed it all for me. But the truth is, I know I won’t find what Grams thought I would, not until I reach our last dot on the map.
Only then will I find peace.
I swallowed, eyes scanning the last of the entry with a newfound panic. What does that mean? What did his grandma want him to find?
I knew it had to be in there, so I didn’t even let myself focus on what he’d written about me or about love before I was flipping back through the pages, searching for the mention of his grandma. The first entry I found was him remembering the one and only time she kayaked with the family in Santa Barbara before she was too old, too fragile to do it anymore. I was only halfway down that page when Emery’s voice called from the room.
“I know we just ate pizza like two hours ago,” he started, and I jumped, slamming the journal shut and placing it where I’d found it on the table. Kalo popped up and ran inside while I fidgeted with my hair, trying to seem natural. Emery rounded the edge of the sliding glass door, leaning his head out. “But I’m kind of hungry. I was thinking about ordering Chinese to be delivered. The Chinese food on this coast is incredible. You in?”
I forced a smile, heart still in my throat. “I never say no to sweet and sour chicken.”
“Or beef jerky.”
“Are you judging me for my love of dried meat?”
He shrugged. “Just saying, I’ve got more empty packages of Jack Links in the back of my car than they have full ones at the nearest gas station.”
I laughed, picking up one of the cardboard coasters on the table and flicking it at him. “Smart ass.”
“Be right back.”
Emery dipped inside, and I listened as he placed an order on the phone before joining me on the porch again.
His journal sat between us like it had a pulse.
For a while we just sat there, our eyes on the blacked-out beach, the sound of the waves the only one existing between us. I didn’t even notice him move until the porch light above us went dark, too, and Emery bent to his knees in front of me, positioning himself between my thighs.
“How do you feel?” he asked as my eyes adjusted, just the bridge of his nose coming into focus at first. Though the moon was nonexistent, the stars still fought to shine through the clouds, and the lights from the hotels around us glowed to the left and the right of our balcony.
“I feel amazing.”
“No,” he said, his hands finding each of my thighs. He slid them up marginally, thumbs brushing the hot skin between them. “I mean, how do you feel. Are you sore?”
A tingle zipped its way up my legs from the point of contact where his thumb rested, like a shot of lightning injected straight into my nervous system.
“A little tender,” I admitted, my voice breathy and low.
His hands slid up higher, the cool breeze from the water rushing over the warm skin he left behind, leaving me covered in goosebumps. “I figured.” He paused, his fingers hooking in the band of my sleep shorts, and I lifted my hips before he could even tug on them. “I know you’re not ready to have me inside you again, not yet, but I can’t wait any longer to touch you,” he said, my shorts already halfway off as he pulled them down another inch. “Can I touch you, Cooper?”
A breathy yes left my lips as my shorts hit my ankles, and Emery yanked them the rest of the way off, discarding them on the concrete base of the balcony. His eyes were barely visible in the dark, but I knew they were hot on me as he hooked his thumbs in the waistline of my panties next, sliding them off without breaking eye contact.
His hands wrapped around the backs of my thighs and gripped my hips, pulling until I hung off the wicker chair, the cushion moving with me. Then he ran one hand down my abdomen, his palm cupping me as one finger slipped between my lips.
“Fucking hell,” he groaned, the pad of his finger skating down to my opening before running back up to my clit. “I make you so wet. It kills me.”
I couldn’t respond, could barely breathe as he tested me, just the tip of his finger entering me as I arched into him. I cried out, more tender than I realized, but wanting him nonetheless.
A groan rumbled low in his throat, his finger curling just a bit before he withdrew it. “Yeah, you definitely need a night to rest,” he said, but he was already kissing my thighs, his mouth on a direct track for my core. “Maybe this will speed the healing time.”
His tongue flattened against that most sensitive part of me, that little button that seemed to be the detonator for my orgasms the night before, and he ran it long and hot over the bundle of nerves. I gasped, hands reaching back to grip the frame of the chair as my legs tensed around him. It didn’t matter that I’d had his mouth on me the night before, that I already knew how it felt — I knew right then I’d never get enough of it, no matter how much he gave me.
He moved until my good leg was draped over his shoulder, the other spread wide, and his tongue lashed me again, swirling and flicking before he sucked the detonator between his teeth with a hiss. That’s the best name I knew to give it, that little spot he touched, that tiny ball of sensitivity that sparked an electric wave each time he brushed it. And he was an expert, knowing just how long to touch me there before it became too much, before he would pull back and flatten his tongue again.
My orgasm mounted even quicker than the night before, blood rushing to my core in a rising tide with every lick. I squeezed my eyes shut, writhing under his mouth, hips grinding up and reaching. But Emery took his time, and just when I was on the edge of release, he pulled back, blowing softly on the swollen skin.
I collapsed, legs falling to the side as the orgasm I was so close to left as quickly as it had come, but the rest didn’t last for long before Emery’s mouth was on me again. It was shocking, the sensation of being so close and then cut off, only to have it rush back with a vengeance as soon as he touched me again.
“Oh, God,” I whispered, and Emery sucked harder, his hands gripping my thighs.
“Tell me,” he said, words vibrating through me.
“I think…”
“Say it.”
My head spun, thoughts fleeting as the rush moved over me, and then all senses went numb before buzzing back to life at once.
“I’m coming,” I breathed, my cheeks flushing with heat at the admission, and it was those words and the slip of Emery’s middle finger inside me that sent me over the edge. He kept his finger inside, curling it over and over, deeper and deeper, his mouth crushing onto mine and absorbing my moans as I fell apart at the touch.
Overwhelmed.
That was the only way I knew how to describe how I felt.
I didn’t know what it was like to be touched like that, to be devoured, to be tasted like candy and worshipped like a goddess. Even after I was sated, Emery still ran his hands over every inch of my body, feeling and caressing, soothing and teasing, kissing his way back down.
Leaning up on my elbows, I gazed down at him just as he pressed a final, sweet kiss to my inner thigh. He helped me sit upright, my arms around his neck, and I kissed him with intent.
“I want to do that to you,” I said against his lips, my hands already trailing their way down his ribs. He was still kneeling between my legs, his own spread in a V, and when I ran my palm over the bulge in his sweatpants, he shifted forward, rocking into the touch with a groan. “But I need your help. I’ve never…”
I swallowed, not needing to finish the sentence. We both knew there were plenty of things I hadn’t experienced yet, but I wanted to with him. I needed to.
“If you wrap these perfect lips around me,” he husked, sucking my bottom one between his teeth. “I might actually fucking die.”
“It wouldn’t be the worst way to go.”
He smiled against my mouth, kissing me hard before using the arms of the chair to stand and pulling me with him. He lifted me easily, cradling my prosthetic at one side while I gripped the other with my good leg, our lips still fused together as he carried me inside. When we were by the foot of his bed, he dropped me back to the floor easily, his eyes somehow darker now that we were in the light again.
His hands trailed down my arms, the backs of his fingertips tickling my skin until they found my hands. I gripped his tight, using him for balance as I kissed him one last time before lowering to my knees, my eyes on his.
Emery swallowed when I hit the ground in front of him, already sliding his sweatpants down his legs. He was commando underneath them, and he sprang forward, hard and ready.
It was the first time I’d seen him — really seen him, or any guy for that matter. The night before, he was inside me, but I hadn’t seen him strip down, hadn’t seen the curve of the tip or the vein that ran hard and long down the length of him. I hadn’t watched as he entered me, inch by blissful inch, all of that disappearing within me. He’d encompassed me, wrapped himself around me, and I’d focused on his eyes, his lips, the two lines between his eyebrows.
Now that I saw him fully, I understood why I was sore.
I looked up at him, my hands braced on my knees as I waited for instruction.
“God,” he breathed, shaking his head as he gazed down at me. “Just seeing you like that… I can’t…”
His words faded and I bit my lip, scooting a little closer, one hand tentatively reaching out, but I paused.
“Touch it.”
It was just a whisper, a plea, and when I wrapped my hand around the middle of him, he groaned, thrusting into my grip. It was what I imagined the first hit of a powerful drug to feel like, the first rush of heat and high. Being the one to elicit that sound from him made me want to stay on my knees forever.
Following the rhythm of his hips, I worked him with one hand, fist tightening slightly over the tip of him before working down to his base. Then, Emery reached for my chin, his fingers trailing the skin there before they ran across my lower lip. I kept my eyes on him, looking for approval as I leaned forward and touched my lips to his crown.
“Christ,” he cursed, flexing forward more. “Yes, like that. Take me in your mouth.”
It was strange, that I felt so much power. I was on my knees in front of him, smaller in every way, but power radiated through me at the sight of him bending to my touch, succumbing to the feel of me.
I still held him firmly with one hand, the other bracing on his thigh as I leaned forward more, my lips parting. I took him in a little, just enough for my lips to cover the tip of him. Just that contact elicited another groan from Emery, and when I opened my mouth, sliding him inside me slowly with one hand still at his base, he shuddered.
“Fuck,” he growled, his hands reaching for my hair. He gathered it at the back of my head before letting it fall again. It was like he wanted to grip it but thought better, pulling his hands up to run through his own strands, instead. “I thought going easy last night was hard, I have zero self-control right now.”
I swirled my tongue along his base, sucking him before letting go with a pop and connecting with his eyes again. “Show me. Help me suck your cock, Emery.”
It wasn’t like me to say the words, but they felt right, they felt sexy and powerful as they rolled off my lips. I didn’t even blush, just gazed up at him as I lowered my mouth again, taking him inside.
Emery groaned, one hand finding the back of my head and the other wrapping around my wrist as he guided me.
“Use your hand where your mouth doesn’t reach,” he said, twisting my wrist a little, showing me how to move it in time with my mouth. When I pulled my mouth off and ran my hand over the wet tip of him, spreading my saliva all the way down to his base before I bent forward and took him inside my mouth again, he cursed. “Yes, God, yes. Like that.”
His hips pushed forward, slow at first before he picked up speed, and when he held my head in place and rocked into my mouth hard, I gagged.
“Goddamn, that was so fucking sexy,” he breathed, head rolling back again. I couldn’t understand how, my eyes watering a little from the feel of him in my throat, but Emery was only staring down at me like I was the one he came to worship and he was somehow on the other side of it, a lucky fool to be standing in front of a goddess on her knees.
I moaned, the sound vibrating through him as I took him as deep as I could. I held him there, letting him rock into my throat until I couldn’t breathe, my eyes watering more as I pulled back with a gasp.
“Fuuuuck.” He dragged the word out, his thighs tense, hand twisting in my hair. He was close.
It was the sexiest thing I’d ever experienced, to have him on the brink of ecstasy at my touch. He gently grabbed my elbow, the one tied to the hand on his thigh, and I understood what he wanted without him even saying it. I pulled that hand to join the first, working them both in time with my mouth. Another moan ripped through him, his hips flexing, the power I felt surging.
I used my hands to cover every inch of him, the parts I couldn’t reach, and when I could, I took him deep again. I didn’t know it was possible, but he was growing even harder in my grasp, the length of him stiff and firm. When I glanced back up at him, his eyes locked with mine for a split second before he squeezed them shut on a curse.
“I’m coming,” he groaned, and I didn’t know what I was supposed to do. I thought of pulling back, of finishing him with my hands, but he never pulled back when I was finishing. If anything, he gave me more. So, I did the same, and Emery guided one of my hands under him to where his balls rested. I cupped them, a little unsure, and when I rolled them, he moaned my name and rocked into my hands, my mouth, holding me there with another grunt as he came.
I loved it, the final rush of power, the way he lost control of himself in that moment as he caught his release. I tasted him inside me, a new taste that reminded me of my own on his lips the night before. And when he finished, all of his muscles relaxing as he looked back down at me, the sensitive tip of him slipping from my lips, I did what felt right.
I swallowed.
And Emery collapsed.
“Jesus Christ,” he said, almost a laugh as his back hit the bed. I wiped at the corners of my mouth and crawled up to lie next to him, resting my head on his heaving chest as he pulled me closer. “You killed me. I knew it.”
I chuckled, blushing now that the moment was over and burying my face in his chest. My mascara stained his chest, wet from my eyes watering, and I wiped it away with one thumb.
“You liked that,” he mused, tilting my chin up so he could look in my eyes. “It turned you on, being on your knees for me.”
“Yes,” I breathed, and he pressed his mouth to mine, kissing me with a stiff inhale, his hands sliding down to my ass and grabbing hard. He didn’t say another word, just kissed me until exhaustion took over, our eyes fluttering shut, bodies heavy and sated.
I don’t know how long we stayed like that before a knock sounded at the door, and Emery peeled me off of him long enough to answer. It was our Chinese food, but he just placed it inside the mini fridge, crawling back into bed with me and pulling the comforter over us both. I felt his hand move down my thigh, clicking the button on my leg until it popped so he could slide it off. He peeled the socks and liner off next, reaching over me to let them all drop gently to the ground, and then he wrapped his arms around me and tugged me closer.
“Goodnight, Little Penny.”
And it was. It was a very, very good night.