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He shakes his head. “That’s okay, I’d rather you just tell me what they want,” he says.
I can’t help it. I pause instinctively as I feel my recently buried scepticism beginning to push its way up from beneath the surface, like mangled corpse bones breaching the dirt in a horror film. I look up at him and for a brief moment I’m scared that I’m about to see a little red flag waving behind his eyes.
Am I being crazy? I don’t need his number, do I? He hasn’t needed mine to contact me before, so I shouldn’t be thinking that it’s a big deal. In fact, I’m not sure that I’ve ever seen him use a cell phone at all. Does he have one? Does anyone?? Are cell phones even real???
He starts caressing my ankles. I shake off my insanity and recite the list.
“Okay,” he says, “It might take a little while but I’ll deal with it.”
His hands have moved to the soft, warm skin behind my knees, and I don’t want him to go anymore. I press my chest closer to his and the delicious heat from his pectorals plumes between us.
“I’ll pick up their stuff after breakfast and take it back to mine. I’ll be gone ’til around five.” I let out an involuntary whimper and he grins. He’s reverse psychologying me. He’s giving me the space that I originally asked for and now I want to have all of his babies.
He gives me a light kiss as his hands move up the hem of my sweater and down the back of my underwear. “Then I’ll come over and make you dinner. After we’ve eaten, I’ll take you to bed. And then we’ll do whatever you want. Wherever you want. However many times you want.” His eyes are blazing dangerously. “I’m not wasting a single moment anymore, River. I’ve had so long without you and now we only have days until our parents are back. And after that you’re going to go to a college that’s as far away from me as possible. I need you for as long as you’ll let me have you.”
I wince because that’s kind of exactly what I was thinking abouthim. I take a deep inhalation and stroke my palms up his biceps, then around his throat. He laces one of his hands through mine and holds us together over his pulse point.
I nod in agreement. He rewards me with another silken kiss.
*
It’s dark out and I’m in the middle of swatting up on First Year History college syllabi when Tate knocks at the door. And by ‘in the middle’ of it, I mean literally. I have every piece of History coursework that I have ever written surrounding me on the dining room table. I would have cleared it away so as not toflaunt it in front of Tate, particularly given the conversation we had before breakfast, but he’s half an hour early.
“You’re half an hour early,” I say. He responds by ducking down to kiss me and he pushes us back in through the entryway, lightly kicking the door shut behind him. His face is flushed and rosy, and his skin is icy cold. He cups his frozen hands around the warm skin of my neck as he glides his tongue into my mouth and a waterfall of shivers cascade down my tummy.
He shucks the grocery bag that is hooked over his elbow onto the floor as he manoeuvres us into the dining room, but, as he pulls away to say something, his eyes flick to the table behind me and his hard breathing pauses. He straightens up a little, rolling his shoulders back, and he swallows. He doesn’t move his hands from my throat. He simply glances at the papers littering the wood, not appearing to read anything but gathering the gist of the contents nonetheless, and then he looks back down at me with an unreadable expression. I kind of want to apologise and light my essays on fire, but I’m also glad that he thinks that I’m so indifferent. He strokes his thumbs up the centre of my neck and makes a contemplative humming sound.
I take a deep breath. “I was just about to clear up,” I say, my voice traitorously a few octaves higher than normal.
A slight smile tugs at his lips. “Okay,” he says, and, moving his palms to my shoulders, he turns me around. He wraps one arm over my collarbones and the other arm over my waist, squeezing me gently. The denim of his jeans is cold against my bare legs, and he dips his head to gently nip at the back of my neck. I’m rippling with shivers as he whispers, “Let me help you.”
He leans us forward, bending over me, and he begins to slowly pile up the documents. He slips his other hand from my waist up the hem of my sweater and then he rubs it over my bare tummy. I let out a littleoofas he reaches over to collect thepapers on the far side of the table and, on hearing me, he pushes us forward a little farther.
Two can play at that game.
I suck in a nice composing breath and ask him, “What did you do whilst you were gone today?”
He pauses, his palm hovering over the last couple of papers. I honestly refuse to look at the stacks he’s made, knowing that they are not in date order. He presses his cool lips to my jaw, kissing me softly before grazing my neck. “I got the stuff for the house warming,” he murmurs.
“Hmm, took you a while though. What else did you get up to?”
His chest swells against my back, hard muscles pressing me down towards the wooden surface. The hand on my belly slides upwards until it clutches the pendant hanging between the cups of my bra underneath the sweater. He tugs it lightly, his other hand leaving its perusal of the table to caress my hip. His voice is so deep that I feel it in my stomach when he replies, “I went to church.”
I try to lift myself up with my palms flat on the wood but he’s holding us tightly in place. “Did you feel the need to confess for your sins?” I ask, my tone a little bitter.
He’s surprised. “What? No.” He lifts up and guides me to turn and look at him. His brow is pinched together but his eyes are warm and kind. The rosiness staining his cheekbones is going to haunt me for the rest of my life. “We didn’t do anything wrong, River. I don’t want you to think that.” He runs his hand through his hair and then cups it around the back of my neck. “I just went to pray,” he says. “And to… light a candle.”
I watch him wordlessly as he rubs himself over me. Fingers, palms, arms. I feel like I’m being marked, quietly but with intent. “And who was the candle in honour of?” I ask quietly, hoping that my prying comes off as cutely intrigued.
“The Patron Saint of Keeping Me On My Toes,” he says, smiling and running one of my curls between two of his fingers.
“She sounds like a drag,” I say, hopping up onto the cleared tabletop and hugging Tate’s thighs between my legs. “You should move onto easier pastures.”
He breathes a laugh, a pleased glow shimmering over him as I press his body against me, and he settles his hands on either side of my hips. He’s warmed up exponentially. I can only assume why.
“I’m a sucker for pain,” he whispers, eyes burning mischievously into mine.
I uncross my ankles, raising one leg back, and then I kick it hard into the butt of his jeans. He jolts forward in surprise, shoving himself on top of me, and he groans at the contact. His body heaves against mine and his eyes are sparkling, amazed, wild.
