His hand moves off my jaw, weaving through my hair and cradling the back of my head, angling me to deepen the kiss and causing my eyes to flutter shut. My head spins and my knees buckle, but he doesn’t let me fall. One arm releases me and wraps around my waist, pulling me tighter to him, so the toes of my boots barely touch the floor.
Desire rushes through my veins, and I sigh into him, my mouth parting slightly, and he doesn’t waste it. His tongue slides along mine, stroking and savoring and igniting an inferno inside me. I reach up and fist his collar, pulling him closer, the pain from my arm that’s trapped between us completely forgotten.
All I can feel is him.
His grip tightens, his fist clenching in my hair and I moan into him, the sound only fueling him more. He bends, notbreaking the kiss, as he picks me up so we’re on the same level, wrapping my legs around him and pulling me against his body.
A memory from the night in the pool flashes in my mind. It was the last time he held me this way, and now there’s no doubt this was exactly what was on his mind. As fast as the thought came, it’s gone again, replaced by the need to get even closer.
I clutch his jaw, his closely shaven beard prickling my palm and scraping against my chin as his lips and tongue continue to move against mine, sending chills down my spine with every movement. His grip tightens on my ass as he hikes me higher, and I tilt my hips into him, pressing myself against the ridges of his muscles.
Every previous thought I had about him, every worry, every perception, is shattered, only to be replaced with his feelings. Worry, protection, concern. He pours it into the kiss.
Is this why he’s been so domineering? Because he cares about what happens to me?
I weave my fingers through his hair, my nails scraping the back of his neck, which is met with a low grumble in his chest.
Then he tears his lips away.
As quickly as it started, he’s gone, and lowering me down until my feet hit the deck as he abruptly steps away.
“Fuck!” he yells as he turns his back to me, throwing his arms up and tugging at his hair. I stumble slightly, my balance thrown from the lightheaded daze that kiss left me in.
What the fuck just happened?
My chest heaves as I try to catch my breath, my mind still reeling as I watch the tension ripple through his arms and across shoulders. Lacing his fingers together behind his head, he stares out across the ship. He doesn’t move; he doesn’t speak. There’s only the rolling of the waves and the creaking of the ship in the silent night.
“Fuck,” he mutters under his breath, before he stomps toward the stairs and disappears below. Not a word or even a glance back as I stand here reeling, my lips swollen and tingling, and my stomach flipping over.
“Jorn!” His yell comes from somewhere in the ship, followed by muffled voices, then Jorn’s crow.
The solitude of the deck grounds me, and every part of this day rushes back. Now it’s my turn to pace.
Once again, my world on Dawnlin has been completely turned upside down. Everything I thought I knew, thought I understood, thought I felt, is brought into question yet again.
And then he does this.
He kisses me, then immediately regrets it.
The sinking feeling in my stomach tells mehemay have, but I didn’t, and that somehow makes it all worse.
I looked into Dane’s eyes today, watched as he and the others searched for me. I heard the way he spoke about getting me back, and convincing me again that he is right. There’s no doubt in his mind that I will come back to them, tohim, and that everything I’ve learned and experienced here is all a lie.
But I didn’t.
I didn’t go back.
I could have jumped out of the lookout again, ran straight into his arms, and been back at camp minutes later. Sig wouldn’t have followed that time.
I didn’t move.
The pull I felt to return to Dane when I was first taken by the Castaways has dulled, almost completely disappeared, the only remnant one tiny sliver of doubt from unanswered questions.
My mind spins as I pace, and my emotions are so overbearing that I’m starting to feel numb, except for the throbbing pain starting up again in my arm.
Footsteps pull me out of the reverie, and I look up to find Sig slowly approaching. Her clothes are changed, her limp gone. She takes in my face, which I’m sure looks as stricken as I feel, but there’s no judgment or question there, just a friend standing to support whatever I’m going through.
“Come on,” she says quietly. She extends a hand to me and I reach out to take it. “Let’s get that arm cleaned up.”
