“Luc?” She kisses my temple. My hair. “What is it? Why’d you send them away?”
I succeed in bringing one coral nipple to light and swipe it with the tip of my tongue. “I need to make you come.” And then I take her in my mouth. Her knees give, but I’m ready, shifting the hand from her bottom to the small of her back.
“Oh, God, Luc.”Millie is a soprano. I’ve never heard her sing, but her moan is high, airy, and light. Angelic. I hear heaven as I suckle her.
“Upstairs… bed… please.” Each word is an exhale, a desperate sound I recognize. I shift my hands back to her ass, mount the first step, and take her with me. Millie’s legs go around my waist, she clutches my shoulders, and up we go.
I don’t hear Clarence behind us, but I kick her bedroom door closed just in case. Then, holding her in one arm, I lock her bedroom door for good measure.
This belongs to no one else.
The reminder of this morning—Sam, Papi, the gossip and assumptions—makes me growl. I pitch us onto the bed. “I need to make you come,” I say again, sounding like a beast.
“Youneedto come,” Millie whispers, tugging at my shirt.
“No,” I grunt, but I let her pull off my shirt. I know she needs this. My skin on hers. I slip her out of her sweater. It was hiding a pale pink satiny bra, the color of her blush. It blends against her skin like a chameleon. I moan. “You’re going to kill me.”
She shakes her head. “No. Let me help you.” Her hands drop to my fly, but I cover them with mine.
“Not yet,” I rasp. “I need to—
“I heard you the first time,” she says, managing to pop the button on my jeans. “But it’s my turn.”
She doesn’t understand. How can I make her understand? “Please.” I move my hands to the waistband of her leggings. Millie doesn’t try to stop me. In fact, she lifts her hips, and I tug them down, taking the pale pink thong with them.
She’s got my pants unzipped and is pushing them halfway down my hips when I grab her wrists and drag them up by her shoulders.
“Please,” I beg, locking eyes with hers.
She blinks up at me. Her gaze softens and a little crease appears between her brows. “Luc, what is it?”
I shut my eyes. “Nothing, I—” But before I can put anything into words, she has tugged her right wrist free, and she’s cupping my cheek.
“Luc, my darling,” she says, gazing up at me, her eyes full of longing and concern. Herdarlinglands somewhere soft inside me. It hits me then that what I need—what I’ve been restless and edgy all morning, hell, maybe even all my life—is for her to love me. “Tell me what’s wrong.”
Dios la amo. God, I love her.
I can’t say this to her. I know Millie. She’ll run. It’ll freak her the fuck out. But this is what drove me here. What is driving me now to bring her to orgasm with my touch. Show her without words how I love her. Prove to her. To everyone. To me. That she is mine. This isn’t something empty. This isn’t what anyone else assumes.
“This is real,” I say instead.
Her eyelids flutter and a smile slowly spreads over her face. Her thumb strums up and down my cheek. “And that upsets you?”
“No,” I say, exhaling a laugh. I cover her hand with mine and close my eyes, loving the feel of her touch against my face. She’s held me this way a few times now. The first time was that night in her bed when she asked me to hold her. I took it as a sign that she liked me more than she was ready to admit.
Is that what she’s doing now? Does she like me more than she’s ready to say? Love me, even? Are we both trying to show each other that it’s safe?
“This is ours,” I promise her. And I know I’m promising myself. Reassuring myself that none of the rules and obligations—none of the expectations I’ve lived under for years—apply here. Anyone else can say what they want, think what they want. It can’t touch us.
As long as she is mine.
“Ours?” Millie asks, the look in her eyes searching, almost hopeful.
“Yes,mi amor,ours.” I reach behind her and unclasp the bra before slipping it from her. Then I kiss each breast, letting the desire to be inside her wash over me. Through me. It’s everything. And I accept the agony of it.
“I am yours,” I say, moving my mouth to hers. “You are mine.” I kiss her. “This is ours.”
Millie drinks my kiss, and then I feel her free hand slide between us. She closes around me before I can stop her. “If this is ours, then we need to share.”
