I reach for Salvatore, and he surges over me like a wave himself. We fumble with his fly together. He kicks jeans and boxers off the end of the bed.
He slides his cock into his fist with a momentary frown of concentration I recognize—he’s conjuring a protective barrier of ephemera against consequences neither of us is ready for yet.
He doesn’t need to. Mom made sure I got an IUD right after I sparked with my original matches, not wanting me to add teen pregnancy to an already complicated situation. But I can’t tell him that either.
So many secrets. But the blare of desire resonates through me loud enough to drown out any lingering guilt.
I lift my hips, practically keening with impatience, and Salvatore drives right into me.
I’m so wet that he pushes nearly to the hilt in that first thrust, both of our breaths fragmenting with the movement.
Gods help me, he’s so big. But the stretch of accommodating him comes with the most delicious burn.
With my arms and legs twined around his massive frame, I sway to meet every measured thrust as Salvatore gathers momentum. He dapples kisses across my face, my neck, and my shoulders, murmuring every loving nickname he’s ever offered me and a few more besides.
We crash together again and again, until there’s nothingbut the pleasure careening through my body and the heat of him around me and inside me, tossing me high, letting me soar, carrying me with him as the bliss and our bond meld us together.
Even after my earlier orgasm, my release isn’t long coming. Salvatore slams home, and the dam bursts.
Pleasure floods me from head to toe. As I cry out and press myself even closer against him, he plunges in once more with a jerk of his hips and a hotter spurt inside me.
We stay there while we pant for breath, Salvatore braced over me, our skin slick with sweat. He lowers his head to kiss me again, long and lingering.
When he rolls us onto our sides, he tucks his arm beneath my head so I can use his bicep as an extra pillow.
“That’s just the beginning,” he says in his promising voice. “I’m going to spend half my life figuring out every little thing you enjoy and delivering over and over.”
A ridiculous thrill races through my sated body.
The vow doesn’t surprise me. Salvatore was always the match who reveled the most in our physical connection.
Matches can share bits of memories through skin-to-skin contact. The other Salvatore used to ask me to share glimpses of how I’d felt during our intimate activities, just to reassure himself of how much pleasure I’d gotten out of it too.
Maybe this version of him has more faith in my obviously enthusiastic responses.
I tuck my head closer to him, swallowing against a pang of my heart that’s almost painful. “And the other half?”
“The other half I’ll dedicate to making anyone who hurts you pay ten times over, a shíorghrá.” His grin grazes my forehead.
I nestle against his chest, sheltered for now in the circle of his arms. Salvatore’s breaths slow with sleep. I start to drift into a doze of my own.
He had a long night investigating on my behalf. And stillhe rushed to let me know what he’d found as soon as he could.
What he found…
I try to push the anxious thoughts out of my head, to simply enjoy the feel of my match’s body against mine, but the unnerving sense of recognition that hit me when I watched the video niggles deeper. Finally, I ease myself out of Salvatore’s embrace and pad out into the living room to find my purse.
He sent me the video like I asked. I bring up the clip, skip to the point where the woman comes up beside Kenneth, and zoom in as much as I can before their faces disintegrate into pixels.
It can’t be her. How would that make any sense? A coincidence that big between my two realities shouldn’t just happen.
And yet…
It’s awfully hard to forget the face of the first person you purposefully murdered.
Fifteen
Elodie
