I pull her in the rest of the way, my hand sliding to the small of her back, fitting her against me until the cold can’t touch either of us.
She melts into me instantly, fingers curling into my jacket, then fisting the fabric at my chest. She’s afraid I’ll pull away. Her mouth opens under mine, warm and eager, and everything in me tightens. It’s an emotion I haven’t let myself feel in years.
Her kiss deepens, grows bolder, her tongue grazing mine. I slide my hand up her spine, feeling her arch into the touch.
The cold disappears.
The world disappears.
All I can feel is her mouth.
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
Faith
January 15th
Outside,by this lake, with the party still just about in earshot, all I want is for Dallas to strip me down. I want him to keep on kissing me, his hands to remain all over me.
I want to taste him.
I want to swallow the sound he makes when my hand fumbles at his belt, hungry and clumsy and entirely sure of itself in the dark. He’s shaking, and I still can’t tell if it’s nerves or night air or just too much wanting.
His tongue pushes into my mouth as if we’ll run out of time, as if every second without this is a second he’s owed. I break from him and bite his jaw, and already my palms are up under his shirt, mapping the bones, the bright heat of him.
He gasps when I nip at his ear.
“Oh, Faith,” he says, and I want to say it back, but mostly I want to get my mouth further south.
I kneel, twigs and leaves grinding into my knees, but I don’t mind because his hands are fisted in my hair now, guiding me.
I taste the salt of his stomach, lick the line of muscle that leads me to the prize, and he’s already so hard it aches to look at.
I open my mouth over his boxers, breathing him in through the cotton, and he moans like he’s dying. I laugh, low and wicked, and I pull the waistband down, his cock slapping against my cheek before I catch it in my hand.
For a split second, I meet his eyes. He’s staring down at me, mouth open, chest heaving beneath the night sky, and it shreds me, how much I need him to watch.
I flick my tongue around the head, taste the sharp slit, and he whimpers. Not even kidding, an actual whimper, and that’s when I know I have him, that I could ask him for anything and he would try to give it to me, right here, right now.
I swallow him down, slow, deep, and his hips jerk up. I steady him with my hands, and he curls forward, almost folding around himself, both of us shaking with it.
The noises he makes are desperate, thick-throated. His hand pushes against the back of my head. I want to make him lose control, to pour himself into me like it’s an act of worship, or maybe a last meal before the end of the world.
His fingers tangle in my hair, and he drags my head back just enough that I can look up. His eyes are wild, lit by the dashboard glow from the party and maybe some kind of moonlight I don’t even notice until now.
“Fuck, you’re gonna kill me,” he gasps, and I smile around him, teeth grazing soft, teasing, until his knees buckle and he makes this ragged, cracked noise that shoots through me, too, like if I just keep sucking I’ll explode with him.
I don’t let up, not even when his thighs clamp my head, not even when he half collapses against the tree, my name leaking out of him in pulses.
I want him ruined, open-mouthed, spent enough to forget who he is and who I am, and whether this is summer or forever or just a moment between disasters.
After, his hand finds my cheek, gentle now, thumb swiping the mess off my lower lip. I wipe my chin with the back of my hand, bracing for sarcasm, but he’s just staring at me.
“Holy shit,” he says, lashed with a laugh. “You should come with warnings.”
I shrug, heat crawling up my face. No one’s ever looked at me in that way. Like I’m dangerous, but also worth the risk. I feel this weird, weightless ache bloom through my arms and legs. I could run for hours, or maybe just collapse into the grass and let the bugs eat me alive.
It’s so stupid, my whole body is burning, and my mouth is sweet with him, but all I can think about right now is how no one’s ever wanted to keep me, and he looks like he might.
