I lay limp and breathless on top of the sheets. “Huh?”
He laughs as his arm curves around my waist, drawing me snug against him until there’s no space between us, and my breaths even out in the crook of his neck.
“You’re being gentle with me,” I whisper.
“Yeah.”
“You don’t have to be.”
“It’s for me.” He presses a kiss to my temple. “There will be plenty of times I pound you into this mattress, but this first time…I wanted to love on you a bit.”
“Is there more tonight?”
Smiling, he nods. “If you want.”
“I do.”
His hand settles on my knee to coax my thighs wider, and his hips slot snugly in the space between. One arm braces beside my head, his muscles taut from the effort of keeping his weight off me as he feathers kisses down my neck.
“I love you, Elsie.”
I love him too, but I want his weight. I want all of him. His cock is hard against my stomach, and that’s not where I want it. He should be inside me, giving me the “pounding me into the mattress” version. I want him to lose control over me.
I hook a leg around his hip and nudge him closer.
“Sawyer,” I say, brushing my lips along his jaw. “I want you.”
My coaxing doesn’t speed him up. If anything, his touch is even more careful, his hand skimming every curve of my skin as he kisses me in between uneven breaths.
“When did you first notice me?” he asks.
I laugh softly. “Not at the first sighting of knee-high socks.”
“When, Elsie? I want to know how much time I wasted.”
“I noticed you—properly noticed you—the night you first took me to the community center. When you helped me out of the car.”
His head lifts. “I remember. I convinced myself I imagined that moment…when our hands touched…” A sad smile tugs at the corner of his mouth. “I could’ve had you then?”
“A different version of me.”
“Not the kick-ass chick who holds her own?”
I touch his cheek tenderly. “She only exists now because of you.”
He sighs against my cheek, pushing up inside me, his cock sliding deeper and deeper. I tip my head back to gasp in a deep breath when the last inch of him is inside me. My moan is much louder than his as he tortures me with painstakingly slow thrusts, but his fingers claw the sheets. He’s struggling to hold back. Why does he keep fighting this?
“Don’t be gentle with me,” I urge him. “You can be everywhere else outside this room. I love it out there. But not here. I want whatever you can give me.”
“Don’t you fuckin’ temp me.” He groans.
“Iwantit.”
He rises over the top of me, his mouth firming into a hard line. “Do you?” The next thrust of his hips is hard and deep. “You want it?”
God, yes.
I do.
