Page 219 of Josephine and Clay

She’s writhing, hands fisted in my hair, and when she talks it’s all in broken gasps, a threat and a confession at once. “Don’t you dare stop.”

I nod against her thighs; I couldn’t if I tried. The ache in my bad leg is miles away, lost in the new ache everywhere else.

She tries to stay in control.

For a few seconds, she even manages it.

Then she loses the fight.

Her composure unravels all at once.

She comes so hard I think she might break me. One minute she’s jerking my head hard against her, grinding herself rough and wild, the next she’s grabbing my face, clinging, almost sobbing.

Her whole body bows up, rigid, and for a second, I think she’s going to punch me or shove me away, but she just lets the aftershocks ride through her, her whole body thrumming out its own storm warning.

When she finally lets go, she covers her face with both hands, laughing breathlessly and gasping, not sure if it’s a joke, a sob, or the sound of her finally letting herself want.

I watch the shiver and flush of her, the wildness settling into her bones, and it’s the most beautiful fucking thing I’ve ever seen.

She lies there, breathing, the two of us catching up to the moment. There’s sweat at her brow, a little bloom of color in her cheeks. She blinks at me from beneath the wild thicket of her lashes and somehow gathers herself enough to drag me up so our faces meet.

We kiss, slow for a second, and then she rakes my back with her nails, says, “Now you,” as if I could possibly hold out.

She wants me inside her. The part of me still capable of words tries to say something gentle, but all that comes out is a ragged, “Fuck, Josie.”

She grins at me from the pillow, face red and shining, and holds me steady by the base while she lines me up.

I ease inside her. She’s so wet and warm I have to stop and grit my teeth. My pulse kicks hard against my ribs. She fucks me with her eyes more than her body, the way she watches every flicker of pain or pleasure in my face.

Briefly I want to say ‘I love you’, but I bite it back, bite into her shoulder instead.

The old bedsprings creak with every movement, and the slippery wet noise every time I thrust into her. Her hair tangles in my facial hair, static crackles between us, and I angle my hips so she thrusts up for me, the tight heat of her making my vision blur.

When I reach underneath her, thumb circling the place where she’s swollen and sensitive, she nearly claws my shoulder off, and the helpless noise she makes vaults me right to the edge.

A tremor runs through her. Then another.

Her grip tightens. Her heartbeat is racing beneath my palm. Every breath comes faster than the last, and suddenly she's clutching at me with both hands, hanging on so hard it almost hurts.

She comes again, a rippling quake, head slammed back and teeth bared, fingers locked behind my neck like she’s holding on through a hurricane.

The release rolls through her in waves, each one stronger than the last. Her head falls back, her entire body arching as she clings to me, fingers locked behind my neck as though she's holding on through a storm.

Watching her come apart pushes me over the edge.

I’m gone.

I let myself go, come inside her with a coarse shout muffled against her hair, the heat and violence of it unspooling through the root of me until there’s nothing left, not even words, just the white out, the smallness, the hush.

We lie there, smashed together, panting. My limbs feel hollowed, my leg singing somewhere in the background.

Josie is limp, boneless, her face crumpled in exhaustion. I want to tell her I love her, that I always have, but instead I stroke the ridge of her spine, nuzzle her jaw as she drifts off.

Sleep ought to come easy for me after a day like this. But I lie on my back staring at the ceiling fan while my leg throbs in time with my heartbeat.

Beside me, Josie shifts closer in her sleep. Her hand ends up curled near her stomach, and my chest tightens.

Twins.