I couldn’t stop shaking. Every touch Mark gave me was a shock to my system. I’d never climaxed that fast, and my orgasm lingered over the surface of my skin. I panted as he laid big, bottomless kisses against my lips. His body was a blanket of heat, his soapy, masculine scent covering me. I wanted to bathe in it. I indulged in the weight of his body as he pushed his hips down. The sensation of his hard length pressing between my legs sent shivers over my skin in waves, and I whimpered as his hand brushed across the taut peak of my nipple.
“Mark,” I said his name and his light brown eyes fixed on mine.
Gravity and all its principles wouldn’t have been able to pull me from his gaze. It was thoughtful, serious, and dark as he scanned my face. Anticipation wound around my fluttering heart.
“I love to watch you come.” He spoke in a rich, husky tone that curled my toes. He rolled his thumb over my nipple again and my hips bucked involuntarily. A rumble sounded in his throat as he took the pebbled skin between his lips and sucked. My fingers twisted into his hair as I arched my back, seeking, needing his mouth on my skin. I’d never been so responsive to touch, but with Mark, under his gaze, his fingers, and his lips, I was lit with millions of tiny lights. Everything with him felt multiplied, exponential, like every nerve ending belonged to him. I was the negative to his positive, and when we connected, sparks and feeling linked us together. He placed soft kisses between my breasts as his hand slipped between my legs.
“Mmm,” he mumbled against my belly. “So fucking wet.”
Two fingers pushed inside me and I rolled my hips, working myself against his hand. I was reaching the edge again, and the muscle in his jaw ticked as I contracted around his fingers.
“Oh God… God… please…” I didn’t recognize the lust-filled, almost painful moan that echoed in the room as goose bumps broke across my body.
My fingers gripped his shoulders, my bottom lip trapped between my teeth as my head fell back. Another moan pleaded past my lips when he moved his hand from between my legs. He hovered over me, his lips swollen from our kisses, and even though his cheeks were splotched with pink, he was the epitome of control as he asked, “Please what? Tell me what you want.”
Mark skimmed his thumb across my jaw, sweeping a strand of hair from my face, and the words I’d kept narrating inside my head, the sentence I would’ve never in a hundred years said out loud, tumbled from my needy lips, “I want to feel you inside me.”
Mark’s pupils flared as he stared at me with heavily hooded brown eyes. He kissed me, his lips moving in sensual waves against mine. After a few seconds, he rested his forehead on my shoulder. He took a few slow breaths and nipped my neck before he rolled off the bed without a word. I watched as his perfectly muscled backside disappeared into the bathroom. Confused I sat up, my heart banging against the confines of my chest. I’d been as vulnerable as I’d ever allowed myself to be…
I heard the tell-tale sound of a condom wrapper being torn open and my stomach dropped. This was happening. This was really freaking happening. It was absurd that I felt like I was losing my virginity for the first time all over again. Mark reappeared from the bathroom with an opened foil packet in his fingers. I had an IUD, but I didn’t feel like breaking the mood any more than necessary by discussing bloodwork and birth control.
He knelt in front of me on the bed. His tattoos danced under the light of the sun, the warm buttered yellow glow creating even deeper shadows on his defined abs. I had the urge to run my fingers along the ink, trail them down to the etched V of his hips, and as if he could tell what I was thinking, he lifted my hand.
The room was quiet as I moved to my knees and placed my hand on his chest. I could feel the drum of his heart under my palm, and he closed his eyes as I ran the tips of my fingers down to the sequence of numbers, the coordinates for Manchester. My heart squeezed as I remembered its significance. Mark was becoming more than just the physical fire I’d needed all this time. I really liked him, and this weekend, I was taking a risk, putting myself out there, and as his eyes opened, Mark allowed his steadfast confidence to slip. Vulnerability reflected inside the amber of his irises. I wasn’t the only one risking their heart. My stomach danced as he kissed me. His free hand palming the back of my head. Tender lips found their way to my cheek, to my jaw, completing his usual circuit until his mouth was on mine again. His kisses were slow as he teased me with feather light fingertips along my stomach, hips, and thighs. He groaned as I wrapped my hand around his length. He was heavy and hard, and his gentle kisses morphed into deliciously brutal bites and growls. I wanted the aggression. I wanted the Mark who fought his way across the ice. The Mark who came into this hotel room and practically cave-manned me onto the bed.
He grabbed my hips, his hands gliding to the backs of my thighs, kneading the muscle until the limbs around his neck went weak. In one swift movement, he lifted me, and I fell backward into the pillows. I watched without shame, in the bright midafternoon sun, as he rolled the condom over the thick head of his dick. My tongue darted over my bottom lip, and I found myself opening my legs for him. I’d spent too much time in the doll house, the sleepy recesses, allowing myself to think I wasn’t worth the effort, worth the heat and flames. But as Mark’s lips tipped into a crooked smile, his eyes appraising my body like it was a gift, I remembered what it was like to really feel free.
Mark placed his hands on my knees as he spread my thighs farther apart. His gaze kissed my skin, my breast, his regard scorching every surface as he leaned toward me. Our mouths met as he aligned our bodies. His tongue dipped into my mouth as he pushed the tip of his dick inside me. My fingers gripped his hips and I sucked in a breath.
His lips found my ear as he whispered, “Like this?”
He pushed hard and fast and I cried out as he filled me completely. He groaned and grit his teeth, his jaw pulsing as his eyes locked on mine. I was overflowing. He slid his body slowly from mine, repeating the hard thrust. My thighs ached as he continued his slow assault again and again. I felt every decadent inch of him, and when my eyes closed of their own accord, a flash of heat spilled over my body.
His hot breath was against my ear. “Want me to fuck you like this?” Mark tilted his hips and pushed himself even deeper inside me. “Christ, you feel… too good.”
My eyes opened and were met with his desire-addled gaze. His movements came quicker, harder. His rhythm no longer under his control, but driven by the way my body made him feel. Empowered… by the way his eyes begged mine, my legs curled around his hips, my heels digging into the flesh of his ass. He gripped the pillows on either side of my head, the tendons in his neck stretching as the sound of my moans, his grunts, saturated the air. A sheen of perspiration coated our skin as I met each of his strokes with a rock of my hips. His tongue plunged past my lips as we found a disjointed beat. My heart spun as he kissed me once and then again, his head falling to my shoulder, his whispers incoherent as he found his way to the ledge.
Mark’s body stilled and he grasped my waist, rolling our bodies as one. I was dizzy and my legs were shaking as I straddled him. For a flash of a second, insecurity cooled my pulse. My belly was on full display, every dimple, every…
“Fuck, babe, don’t stop.” Mark’s voice was desperate as he wrapped a strong hand around my hip, urging me to move with a less-than-delicate touch. His eyes devoured me as he murmured, “So perfect.” I tilted forward once and then back again. He groaned, “Shit… just like that.”
My hips started to rock and his free hand gently folded around my neck before it slid to my breast. His thumb dusted across the sensitive skin sending a jolt all the way down my body. He lowered his hand, his thumb circling, teasing me between my legs, and when he finally brushed against the right spot, I came undone. My hands fell to his chest, the full feeling inside me—overwhelming as I rode my climax. Mark sat up and kissed me as if he had no other choice, as if I owned his last breath. His hips jerked and he pulled our bodies together by gripping my calves and wrapping my legs around his waist.
My breasts were pressed against his chest, my belly against his stomach as he growled into my mouth. My hands were in his hair, there wasn’t an inch separating us when he came. Mark sucked in two erratic breaths, his voice gravel as he groaned, “Stevie...” His fingers pressed roughly into the rounded curve of my backside as he panted curses against my lips, guiding my body, working me against him, he pulled my bottom lip through his teeth. A shuddered pulse of electricity spread through my arms and legs. My lips were trembling when he pulled away. His forehead was creased, his eyes glossed over as he found my gaze. The pad of his thumb traced my upper lip and he kissed the imaginary line he’d drawn with eyes wide open. His kiss soothed the frantic butterflies in my stomach. His hands framed my face as he watched me come down from the high of him. He held us motionless, our bodies connected until our breathing synchronized.
His thumbs ran trails over my cheeks, my jaw, his fingers following suit down my arms, over my thighs and calves, massaging the muscles. When I shivered, he chuckled and planted another sweet kiss on my lips. I let my eyes fall from his, my nose nuzzling in the crook of his neck, inhaling the heady scent of soap, sweat, and sex.
His hand tickled up and down my spine, and I was content to stay like this for the remainder of the day. But the silence was broken by a growl of his stomach, and I laughed into his shoulder.
“You need sustenance?” I asked as I raised my head.
“I don’t want to leave this room.” His smile was playful. “Fucking ever.” He slapped my ass and I jumped. His jaw went tight, his spine rigid. “Holy shit, Stevie, you move like that again, and I’ll never let you leave this bed.”
“Promise?”
His smirk was boyish as he easily moved me onto my back, pinning me to the mattress. His eyes flicked to the clock on the nightstand. “I still have four hours.”
I laughed, but he kissed me quiet. The playful mood evaporated into the smoothed curve of his lips, and for the third time today, I found myself surrendering to the way his mouth commanded my body. Mark drifted the tip of his nose along my collarbone before rolling onto his left forearm. His right palm splayed across my belly as his eyes appraised me. “You are…” His cheeks filled with color. “Fuck, Stevie, I think you’ve ruined me for other women.” I shoved him in the chest and he laughed. “I’m not kidding.” His brows dipped and his eyes exposed me. “I’ll never say shit I don’t mean.”
“Okay.” I swallowed and brought my fingers to his lips. He kissed them and I rested my palm against the bristled scruff of his jaw. He leaned into my touch as I said, “I’ve never had sex like that before.”
I lowered my hand from his face and raised up onto my elbows as he asked, “What do you mean?”
“Hard… ” I swallowed around the weirdly timed lump in my throat. “Eyes open. It felt…” I struggled for the right word. Raw. Gritty. Unhinged. “Real.”
His fingers painted circles around my belly button. “Real.” He chewed on the word, a frown forming on his lips. “Can I say, I fucking hate that you’ve ever felt less than real? You’re beyond real. I know you were with him for a hell of a long time, but Stevie, you should get to feel everything, to have everything you want.”
I fought the ache forming in my throat as I whispered, “I’m finally seeing that now.”
Mark leaned down, his lips touching mine. “Good, because it’s the truth.”
He kissed me until the ache in my throat subsided, and the only burn I felt was from the stubble of his chin. He kissed me until I forgot that I’d ever felt like a paper doll, his lips showing me how “beyond real” I was. Mark kissed me until we’d both forgotten to breathe, until our stomachs reminded us that there were needs beyond this bed, until we could no longer overlook the red numbers ticking away on the nightstand clock.