They kept the windows open. There was no AC yet; that had broken long ago and despite the autumn season, Oahu was still warm. Keilen dripped water over the newly stained hardwood floors, something he didn’t seemed concerned about. In fact, his attention was on Lily and the thick towel he rubbed over her shoulders and at the ends of her wet hair.

“Leave it,” she said, stopping him when he pulled the towel away to dry her legs. “I’m not worried about drying off. It’s so hot and the breeze is steady. It feels nice when it moves around the house.”

“I’ll open the patio door. It’ll keep the breeze circulating.” Keilen moved away from her, his wide shoulders flexing as he walked to the patio and pushed open the glass doors that led to the back of the property.

He was beautiful in the moonlight, his black hair slicked wet with ocean water and small droplets sliding over the deep curves and defined symmetry of his back.

Lily could watch him move in the dark, a shadow made of beauty; a danger you could not see coming and could not bring yourself to worry over until it was on you. He was light and dark just then—midnight and daybreak in his features, in the slow seduction of movement he managed without any thought.

“You’re beautiful,” she said, stepping off the bar stool next to his kitchen island, dropping the towel in the four steps it took to reach him. He didn’t reach for her. Keilen seemed too stunned by her words and the slow progression of her touch when it finally came to his face. “I’ve always thought so.” She moved closer, reach slow, but sure, fingertips gentle when she moved her touch over the strong contours of his face; the broad brow and high-arced cheekbones, to those luscious, tempting lips.

He stood still, seeming to like the attention of her touch over his skin, closing his eyes when Lily stretched on her toes to hold his face and kiss him.

“I’ve always thought you were…”

“Awkward,” she said, her laugh taking the edge off the self-directed insult. “Clumsy. Awe-struck?”

“I was going to say…sweet.”

“You wouldn’t have known that.” The reminder of how she’d been in high school no longer embarrassed Lily. She’d long-since exorcised the adolescent torture she’d endured. There hadn’t been time for self-pity and scars left by mean girls and high school bullies. It did no good to lament on the past when you’re focused on feeding an eleven-year-old on a hundred bucks a month in food stamps.

“You think I didn’t notice you?” Keilen asked, pulling her hand back to his face when she tried lowering it. It was a sweet gesture that took away the last remnant of nervousness remaining from her now sober mind. “I did. You were so sweet and shy, at first. You always looked, and I always noticed.”

“You did not.” Lily laughed then, because his expression was too open, honest. It was impossible for her to believe he’d paid enough attention to see her watching him behind those lockers.

“I did. Even my cousins teased me about my little fan girl.” Keilen’s smile stretched, and he grabbed Lily around the waist when she made a half-hearted attempt to walk out of the patio. He turned them both, slipping his large arms around her waist, nuzzling her neck and she pressed her back against his chest.

From this position, with the doors open, they could see the lifting waves and hear the splash of the current as the winds rustled harder, faster. “I was flattered,” he told her, smoothing small kisses on her shoulder, then up her neck. “You were young, so quiet, and anytime I looked around, there you were. It made me feel, I dunno, like I mattered to someone.”

“Keilen,” she started, glancing over her shoulder to look in his eyes. “You mattered to a lot of people. Everyone loved you.”

“Everyone loved what I did on the football field.” He pressed her closer, slipping his fingers to the nape of her neck, pushing her wet hair away from her skin. “But there was only one person who looked even when I wasn’t playing. Off season, summer, anytime I spotted you in town, at Zippy’s, on the beach, there you were with that pretty smile, watching. Waiting.”

Despite how they’d been around each other, how intimate their time together had been, Lily still felt the brush of heat warming her cheeks at his words. She had been waiting. Until she couldn’t wait anymore. Until she returned from school and found Keilen waiting for her. The turnabout had been incredible to her.

“You never spoke to me until…until that rugby match and even then that was only to ask if I was okay.”

Another kiss, this one slower, warmer, near the back of her ear, and Lily didn’t bother hiding the quick trembling that took over her limbs. Keilin caught it too, inching one hand up her ribs as though he wanted to keep her still. “How could I? You were too young then, until that night. Until you were directly in the way of the thundering meatheads. Couldn’t let anything happen to my little fangirl, now, could I?” Lily decided to ignore the pet name, though she liked it much less than all the sweet terms Keilen had used on her at the beach.

“Then,” Lily started, wanting to hear him recall it, wanting Keilen to finish the image of them together. If only for a second. “You stopped me and looked at me and I just couldn’t let go.”

“You weren’t so little then.” Another kiss and he shifted his palm, his thumb grazing the underside of her breast. “I wanted to kiss you that night. But you got away from me and Luka and Kona took me to a party out on Lanikai Beach. I was so pissed at them.”

Lily leaned back, loving the way he felt against her, the strong planes of his body, the scorching heat coming off his drying skin. She didn’t want to move for fear Keilen might step away from her.

“Then,” he supplied, lifting that hand up further. “I saw you at Tommy’s and my God, Lil you were a woman. Such a woman. So confident, still so sweet. I knew the second I kissed you that one night would have never been enough for me. And now…time has made you even more beautiful…” Keilen paused, shifting their bodies so she felt everything, so the hot pant of his breath teased against her neck, so that he held onto one breast while his free hand dipped to the wet fabric of her underwear. “But in these eyes…” He moved his head, catching her gaze. “There’s still that shy girl. She won’t ever leave you, I don’t think, but there’s someone else. Someone strong and fierce. Someone I want so badly.” Keilen leaned closer, licking her bottom lip, catching the low moan she made when he pinched her nipple. “Someone I want to be inside of right now.”

“Keilen.” The name was weak, came out on a low moan, and Lily didn’t care if she sounded pathetic. She was, only for him. She didn’t care if she sounded desperate, only he could make her feel that way.

“You want me to touch you, Lil?” He cupped her breast and slipped his fingers past the wet waistband of her thin, cotton underwear. “Here?”

She couldn’t answer. Lily couldn’t do more than shake in his arms, aware of the labored breath she made and the tremble that moved over her so fiercely she had to hold onto Keilen to stay up right.

Lily didn’t protest when he touched her, pulling her free from the bra and panties just to touch her, separate her from anything that hid her. She let him lead, gave him control, because it felt good. Because all the lovers she ever had before were not Keilen Rivers. Because only he could make her weak, make her needy and she’d never feel pathetic for that weakness.

“Say the word, makamae, and I’ll make you feel so good.” He leaned lower, mouth next to her ear, his voice low, sure, mesmerizing. “I’ll make you feel good everywhere. I promise.”

“Yes,” she panted, her mind hazed by lust, by fear and all the emotions she never let herself feel. Keilen moved his fingers deeper, between her lips, rubbing, circling so that Lily could only ride against him, hips moving, arm reaching behind her, to grab his neck as they rocked together.

“Lil...you’re on fire. You like that, don’t you? You like to feel me inside you? Just a little taste of what I want to do to you.” He moved his hand, getting his palm to her center, rolling her clit fast, until that grip on Keilen’s neck shifted as she rested against his shoulder, hips still moving, fingers twisting in his hair. “You do, don’t you, nani?”

“I…I do like it. I want…Keilen…” She lost hold of her senses, shaking at the twist of his fingers, the slip of another one inside her and Lily let go, arching, pulling down on his neck so that Keilen leaned forward, hand steadily moving and he took her mouth, swallowing each loud cry she made as she climaxed, tensing, squeezing against his fingers.

There was no time for a reprieve. Keilen was greedy, anxious and pulled himself free from Lily’s body only to turn her and tug her close. “I can’t be slow, not with you. I can’t wait. I…”

She understood, felt the same, and silenced Keilen with a kiss, snaking around his body without asking, unconcerned by what would happen tomorrow, by what would change between them. Right now, there was this moment and nothing else in the world. Nothing but the dream made real.

“Take me then,” she told him, lifted against him by those strong, sure arms. She fit around him perfectly—her legs on his waist, his hands holding her against him. “Take everything you want.”

He didn’t prepare her, that had already been done. Keilen simply kissed and touched; tongue inside her mouth, moving like a dance, fingers in her hair, guiding as he walked them from the hot space of the living room and into the cool, constant breeze on his patio.

There was a shift in the temperatures, but sweat still glistened on their bodies, against their warm skin. Keilen didn’t seem to notice. His attention was focused on Lily and how she pulled him down with her on the patio sofa when she stepped away from him.

It was like a dance, the two of them—action and reaction, coming together like it was natural, as though it wasn’t the culmination of decades waiting to fall away. And then, he slipped inside her.

She flexed her fingers against his skin as she adjusted, needing a moment to get used to him. It had been a long time, nearly a year, and Keilen was larger than she had expected. “Wait,” she told him, palm flat against his chest when he thrust deep. “Just a second.”

“Am I hurting you? Do…you want me to stop?” His voice was a little panicked, but Lily thought it wasn’t from disappointment.

“No. It’s fine. Just…go slow.”

“I’ll…I’ll do my best,” he murmured, arms straining as he moved. Keilen lifted to rest his right hand on the armrest. The other went to her hip, his fingers tightening in her soft skin.

“Lily…my Lily,” he breathed, panting hard, each sweet syllable of her name from his mouth like a melody, breathless and weak, but strong enough to affect her. “Hold me tight,” he told her, and she knew he didn’t mean for her to hug him. “That’s it. Just there.”

They went on that way for a long while, shifting, moving to accommodate his thick thighs and long legs on the furniture. Lily felt like flying, her body electrified by how deeply Keilen thrust inside her, how tight she felt around him, how he shifted her on top of him, then shifted until he was over her. She was sure her heart would shoot from her chest. She was certain he could not kiss her so sweetly and keep her wanting more, needing more; the desperate ache inside her only intensifying the stronger he moved.

“Keilen,” she whispered when she thought she might pass out. The air was thick now, the humidity thicker than it had been since the breeze had gone still. “Get on your back, please.”

He obliged and as Lily shifted, slipped on top of him, her breathing cleared. It was better this way, deeper, and Lily rode Keilen hard, reaching that deep, sweet space inside herself with every tight thrust she made on top of him.

“Lil,” he cried, guiding her hips, arching his neck as she sped, her hair brushing against his chest, her movements controlled but desperate; sweet but ravenous and then Keilen sat up, switching to the back of the sofa, Lily still connected and his mouth circling her nipple.

She struggled for a moment, the intensity of it all overwhelming, made her punch drunk, but Lily rode the wave, pressing against him, squeezing and tightening around him until they both cried out, shouts moving onto the still breeze, echoing across the property until they could not manage another thrust.

He would not let her go; head on her shoulder, cheek against one breast as his breath calmed, as he smiled against her skin.

Keilen held her as her heartbeat slowed, his hands against her back, his mouth at her temple until her breath settled to normal.

“Lil,” he tried, likely thinking she had fallen asleep as he held her. Maybe he thought she couldn’t hear him. Maybe he knew she could and didn’t care, but Keilen smoothed back the sweaty hair from her forehead as he kissed her temple, mouth warm, soft.

“Na'u `oe,” he told her, inhaling her scent, likely not expecting a response or a reaction.

She gave him one anyway.

“I am,” she told him, hugging him back. “I really am.”