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Then I say fuck into the back of my own hand.
“Do not stop.”
He does not stop. He does not change one thing, because I told him not to, and because he listens better than any man I have ever been naked with.
My free hand finds his shoulder and it is the bad one and I know it is the bad one, and I do not take my hand away, and he does not move it.
“Hold me.”
His right arm comes up around the back of my thigh. I feel the catch in it.
He does not let go.
“Tight.”
I have his hair in one fist and the wall behind me and his mouth where I put it, and I come standing up in his hallway with the lamp on and both of my eyes open.
My breathing has not settled when I reach for my bag.
Colt is still on the floor with his back against the wall, and his eyes follow my hand while I open the inside pocket and touch the foil packet before I take it out.
His eyebrows go up. “You brought that.”
“Yes.”
“When?”
“This afternoon.”
After Tova left with Gabi I stood in a pharmacy with toothpaste in one hand and the box in the other, because apparently I still require camouflage from strangers who do not know my name. I bought both. The toothpaste went into the bathroom before he arrived. The box went into my bag.
He looks at the packet, then at me. Whatever joke reaches him does not make it out.
Good.
I set it on the table beside the bag.
“I was going to sleep with you before dinner.”
“That’s information I would’ve enjoyed having around the steak.”
“You managed.”
“Barely.”
He comes up off the floor and I step into him, and his hands settle at my hips this time with nothing tentative in them. I put my mouth against his. He kisses me hard enough that I have to take hold of his shirt to stay where I want to be, and he tastes like me, and he does not apologize for it.
His right hand starts higher and then changes course on its own and stays at my waist.
I notice. I do not praise him for it.
The stairs are behind him. I pick up the packet and close it into my palm and take his hand.
“Come upstairs.”
The bag stays open under the lamp. I start up before he can say anything at all, and my heels sound against every stair.
At the landing I turn back. His shirt is open, his hair is a disaster from my hands, and he is looking at me the way he looked at me in the hallway.
