She leaned over and kissed his belly in response, and his hands jerked her up until she met his mouth. He kissed her again, a sweet slide of his tongue on hers.
Then he rolled her onto her back and proceeded to show her how he put the E into endurance. He kissed her breasts with increasing pressure, going from gentle laves to hard suction. Her back arched against his mouth, but before she could peak, he released her and kissed his way down her stomach.
She wasn’t sure she wanted to simply receive pleasure at his hands. To do so would be to make herself too vulnerable. “Don’t make me wait.”
Intensity flashed through his eyes, but when he lowered his head again, she stopped him with the touch of her hand.
“Not…that way.”
His jaw locked, but he nodded, and the shift was so great, she felt the first crack in the earth that had been connecting them. She’d just set a boundary—here—in a space where there never had been any.
“Okay. Are we going to need a condom?” he asked.
There was hesitation in his voice, and she knew why. They both heard the distant cry of an earlier battle. Her demand for a child after Kim’s death. His refusal to give in to her. Her horrible excuse for leaving. Oh, how her lies had hurt them both.
“I’m not on anything,” she said quietly and gestured to her nightstand. She’d been too afraid to go on the Pill, which would have been akin to making a decision about him, about them before she was ready. It had been easier to buy the condoms—all she’d needed to do was pretend like they were the box of chocolate salted caramels she hid from herself.
After pulling out her drawer, he opened the box. She could practically hear his brain working, trying to figure out when she’d bought it. Buying condoms in Dare Valley would have set the gossips’ tongues wagging about her and Blake being back together, so she’d picked them up in Aspen.
Instead of taking out only one of them, Blake shook them all into his hand, like he was counting to see if they matched the product total listed on the box. A noise rose from his throat as he finally grabbed one and shoved the rest back into the drawer, satisfied there were none missing.
She knew he wondered if there had been anyone else. She hoped they’d never talk about that.
His brow was furrowed with tension now, and she realized it wasn’t just her arousal which was waning…his was too.
They’d never used a condom. She’d gone on the Pill after deciding she was ready to take that next step with him. It gave her a strange sense of sorrow to think about adding this new barrier between them.
“It’s only temporary,” he said, reading her mind in that keen way of his.
She glanced up at him. His brown eyes were troubled. It took her a moment to swallow the lump in her throat, but then she grabbed the package from him and tore it open with trembling hands. He reached out and took it from her.
“Here. Let me.”
When he was finished, he cupped her face, looking right into her soul. He didn’t blink. A pressure rose in her chest, and she clenched her teeth as a wave of powerful grief overwhelmed her.
No, don’t say it. Please don’t say it now.
“I love you,” he whispered. “I’ve never stopped.”
All her defenses came tumbling down. He was forcing her to face it now…the hurt that lay thick between them, the desolation that had bloomed inside her after she left. Squeezing her eyes shut so she couldn’t see the longing in his gaze, she pushed away and lay on her back.
“I love you,” he repeated, his voice stronger. “Look at me, Nat.”
Don’t ask me that. Don’t make me look.
Her eyelids trembled as she squeezed them shut even tighter. “Make love to me, Blake.”
There. I said make love, she wanted to say.
An audible sigh filled the room, and then he was gathering her body up, fitting it over him as he sat in the center of the bed. Her muscles tensed. During their marriage, making love sitting up, wrapped around each other, had been their favorite position.
And it was the most intimate one too.
She couldn’t do that with him again. Not this first time.
“I don’t want to do it this way,” she said, pushing against his strength, her eyes still closed.
His hands caressed her back in comfort. “But it’s our favorite, Nat.”
“I said not this way,” she pleaded, resisting harder now.
The hands holding her left her body. His body shifted, and she fell from his lap in a sprawl. When she opened her eyes, she saw him fling the condom aside.
“You don’t want to make love with me,” he accused with an alarming sheen in his narrowed eyes. “Why did you start this?”
Part of her wanted to cover herself. Without him touching her, she felt too exposed, devoid of all desire. “I want to,” she lied. “I just don’t want to do it that way.”
“Bull.” He shook his head. “Why did you even initiate this?”