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Her breath caught. She knew he meant that in the physical sense. She knew he meant it in thewe are going to have so much sex because physical comfort is the best cure for this kind of despairway.
But oh--oh God did she want that to mean something else.
She closed her eyes for a moment. Searching for words, because it would be so easy to free fall into him now. Finally, she made herself lift her shoulder in something close to a shrug.
“With your daughter down the hall?”
He grimaced for just a moment and it was all the answer she needed. She shifted, preparing to pull away from him, but he caught her. His hand firm.
“Please. Come with me.”
She only went with him because the need for him was greater than her desire for self-preservation, she decided. He took her hand, leading her through the semi-darkness of the living room, to a short, dark hall under the stairs. Then they were in a smallish room and he was turning on a small lamp on a desk. The room was crammed with books. They were stacked haphazardly in shelves, and then in piles on top of the shelves and on the desk. There was a futon shoved in the corner. She looked at it and then back at him.
“You want to fuck me on your futon?” There was no sting in the words, though. If he said yes, she would do it because frankly, she wanted him to fuck her on his futon, if that’s what he wanted. He chuckled, shaking his head as though to say she’d gotten it wrong.
“I want you to stay. And I know you’re tired,” he said, indicating her body. He was right, the exhaustion after a breakdown was threatening to settle in. “I want to sleep with you. Fucking you hadn’t occurred to me. You know, yet.”
Then ...I get to love you for a while, he’d said.
This. This could be that.
She sighed, then nodded, biting her lip as he smiled. His expression achingly tender again as he lifted her chin to kiss her lips. Then he was opening the futon and she was curling into him, and he was pulling a worn, flannel quilt over them both. The last thing she thought as she drifted into sleep was his name.
Twenty-One
Shoshana came awake in inches. There was the feel of hard plastic beneath her fingers. She turned her head and saw that her hand was on a pair of thick-framed glasses. Then she was aware of a warmth against her back, an arm wrapped protectively around her body. Her eyes felt scratchy. Swollen.
A small lamp burned softly a little to her right. She shifted, arching her neck to see. There was a very corporate looking desk phone amid the piled chaos of the books and half-closed laptop and pens and sticky notes. The phone’s display showed the time in three-inch-tall numerals she could read even from this position. It was 3:23 in the morning. She’d been asleep for a little under five hours. She didn’t think she dreamed. If she did, she didn’t remember it.
She shifted again, this time trying to turn to look at the body of the man sleeping behind her. His arm tightened reflexively around her, and she couldn’t help the rush of affection this caused. She reached for his hand, fisted in the fabric of her tee shirt, and delicately prized it loose. Her fingers laced through his as she turned slowly onto her back, then her side. She didn’t want to wake him, but the urge to touch him was too great to ignore.
Her fingers ghosted over the rough stubble on his cheek, loving the way it rasped against her skin. He made a sound in his sleep, his head following her touch and she couldn’t help smiling as she sat up on her forearm to consider him. In sleep his brow furrowed, and she leaned forward, pressing her lips to the line, kissing it smooth. She felt his fingers spasm, felt the way he reflexively tried to tighten his hold on her again and couldn’t help the small thrill this gave her. Her lips pressed lighter kisses along the thick curve of his eyebrows, down the deep channels where his dimples would appear.
He turned his head, instinctively following her as she explored his face. Her hand rested on his chest, just above his heart, and she felt the beats as her lips just briefly touched his. She wanted to travel lower, to keep exploring his body this way, until he woke gasping with need, but she wouldn’t.
It felt too much like stealing.
She wanted him awake to enjoy the things she was doing to him. She wanted to be able to look into his eyes and see that yes, this was what he wanted, this, now was what he needed her lips to be doing.
She felt the moment when he woke, felt it in the quick inhalation of breath just next to her ear. Felt it in the way his skin tightened just the smallest bit under her lips. Shoshana lifted her head, eyes searching for his and the look of happy contentment in his face twisted something high and deep inside her. She nearly gasped at the feeling, even as he shifted next to her, one of his thighs edging between her legs. She let him, curling her leg over his so that their lower bodies were entwined.
“Hey,” he said quietly, his fingers sliding beneath the fabric of her tee shirt, finding warm, bare skin and then scratching her back lightly. It was a touch that teased as much as it was meant to soothe. She shivered against him, feeling her nipples harden in response to the gooseflesh that broke on her skin at the light caress. She nearly laughed against him, her own fingers curling around his arm, encouraging.
“It’s late,” she said, knowing she should be packing up her things to leave, that it was best she get out of his house long before it was a possibility that his daughter woke. Not wanting to cause problems. But oh, God, did she not want to leave this warmth.
“It’s early,” he corrected, his lips dipping to find hers. Shoshana made a soft sound against his mouth and he deepened the kiss, his hips moving against hers, his hand at the small of her back sliding lower, pressing her into him. She smiled against his mouth, loving this new sensation. She felt his arousal against her, nudging her body between layers of cloth and she rubbed against it, enjoying the feel of him and his sound of pleasure. David shifted against her, urging her back against the futon and she made a negating sound in her throat, pushing back.
He let her lead, falling back on the mattress as she moved to cover his body with her own.
“You’re so warm,” she said, her lips against his neck. “How are you always so warm?”
“Evolution?” he said, his fingers slipping further under her shirt to cup her breast. She grunted something that could have been a laugh as she struggled to pull his shirt free. It was difficult because he wasn’t offering anything in the way of assistance, content to lie still and let her explore his body at her leisure.
“A little help? Ridiculous shirt, it has no business being here,” she said, lifting up enough to catch his eye meaningfully as she tugged at the fabric. He laughed, shifting beneath her to lift his upper body, then lifting his arms so that she could tug the shirt over his head. She tossed it over her shoulder and gave him a pointed look before bending back to touch his skin.
“I don’t know what I could have been thinking,” he said, laughing as her lips closed over his nipple. Her fingers slipped into the thick patch of hair at his chest, nails lightly scratching his skin as he’d done to her earlier. He gasped, and her lips curled into a smile against his skin as she moved lower down his body. His hands were on her shoulders, fingers bunching in the fabric of her own tee shirt and she realized he was tugging it, trying to pull it off her body as she’d done to his. She lifted up, long enough to pull it over her head, and then went back to what she’d been doing.
David’s fingers found her breasts, both hands palming them as she placed long, open mouthed kisses down the line of his abdomen. His fingers toyed with her nipples and she bit lightly, her teeth scraping his skin just the smallest bit, but it made him gasp, his body moving beneath hers. She licked the place to soothe it and kept up her slow descent.
