Page 100 of Till Death Do Us Part

I felt her tense up more, her breath catching, and she put her hand on my bare thigh, her fingers gripping firmly into me. My heart beat faster.

“I’m all yours if you want…”

She brushed her thumb over my skin before, with a strained breath, she reached up, took the hem of my nightgown, and put it back down. “Go to sleep,” she said quietly, and my stomach sank.

I should have said yes, should have gone straight to sleep and forgotten it. Instead, I said, “You don’t want it?”

She rolled over, facing away. “We have to focus on the mission. Early in the morning. We need to sleep.”

“Vera…” I swallowed back the bitter, ugly feeling, and I nodded, settling back into bed. “Okay. Sorry. Goodnight.”

She didn’t say anything. Not at first, anyway. At length, though, she sat up, legs slung over the edge of the bed, and she hung her head. Slowly, I sat up with her.

“Vera?”

“We should get rid of our contract,” she said in a cool, steely voice, and I felt myself splintering.

“Did I… do something wrong?”

The clock ticked in the corner of the room. Vera’s words were larger than life when she spoke. “I don’t want to fall in love, Elaine. I can’t.”

“Vera…” I welled up, pressing myself against her. “It’s okay to,” I whispered. “I’m also…”

“Don’t.” She shook her head. “You’re in the middle of a lot of shit right now. Your emotions are going to be running wild. Just because you feel something for me now…”

“It’s not like that. Vera, you’re not this monster you think you are. You’re a human being. You’re a woman. A woman who’s been hurt. A woman who’s doing the best she can.” My voice fell off into a whisper, eyes full of tears and stars as I looked at her. “A woman I’m falling in love with.”

She turned to me with tears heavy in her eyes, teeth clenched. “I’m damaged, Elaine. I’m broken. There’s nothing here to love. Just broken glass, and if you try to grab hold of it, all you’ll see is reflections of somebody else. And you’ll be left with nothing but blood.”

I took her face in my hands, cradling her as I whispered. “You’re wrong, Vera. You have your broken edges like we all do. And I’m not afraid to get hurt if I hold them.”

“Dammit, Elaine,” she whispered, and she kissed me, intensely, passionately.

I threw my arms around her, and I went with her as she pushed me down onto my back, her tongue touching my lips. I grasped her hip and held her down into me, and she moaned hungrily, rocking her hips against mine.

“Give me everything,” she rasped as she pushed my gown up.

“Everything,” I whispered. “It’s yours.”

“Elaine.” She growled my name in heat, desperation, want, and it rolled through my body in waves. She kissed me furiously and lovingly all at once, her hands claiming me not only as her lover but as her wife. She was rough and fast at first, shoving my dress up and ripping off my panties, and then she was slow, deeply passionate, her fingers teasing me as she held herself just up over my face, staring into my eyes.

She took my hand, and she guided it to the front of her pants. I gasped at the touch, moving to push my hand into her pants, to touch her, to please her.

We never did this, never… touched each other at the same time, mutual pleasure. It was always her making me come, or her making me pleasure her. This was different.

It was messy and quiet here in the low lights of the safehouse room, thin insulation meaning we had to be quiet, but it was real. Vera’s fingers against me… and the feeling of how wet she got from touching me like this, throbbing against my fingertips…

I gasped as my orgasm came on, and Vera picked up on it, and she bent down and kissed me, deeply, passionately. “Vera,” I whispered in between kisses. “I’m getting… I’m…”

“Come for me, darling.”

“Oh, God. Vera… Vera!” I cried out her name as the orgasm swelled up where her fingertips touched me, and I crested beautifully, riding the top of the wave before I crashed down into the warmth of her embrace. Of her heat on my fingertips. It wasn’t long before she buried her face in my shoulder and cried out for me not to stop, and I gave her what she wanted. Everything she wanted. She came hard enough I felt her throbbing under my fingertips, and she kept herself buried tightly against me even after she finished.

We fell asleep that night wrapped in each other’s arms, me breathing in her air as much as I possibly could, taking in every bit of her.

And when morning came, the bed was empty next to me.

Chapter 50