Every Wrong Reason

There was only him and me and our naked bodies.

There was only the familiar heat that had always been between us and the scorching intensity as we took each other in a new way.

We’d had makeup sex before. We’d had huge fights before today and used sex to get over them.

But this was something completely different. This wasn’t an apology. This was war. A war of our bodies, of our wills… of our souls.

He took me right there. Right against the wall.

I wrapped my legs around him and he held me steady as he reminded me what it was like to have him as a husband. And at the same time, he revealed a side of him I had never known.

I clasped my arms around his head while he alternated between taking my mouth and taking my breasts. His short beard scraped against my skin in a familiar sting that I welcomed, that I loved. Our sweaty bodies moved together in a rhythm of something we had done countless times before, but it had never ever been like this.

Despite the newness, he still knew exactly what to do to get my body to respond to his. He knew how to touch me. He knew how to move inside me. He knew the moment I reached the brink of something shattering.

And then he knew how to push me over the edge and make my world explode.

I screamed out with the shock and intensity of an orgasm like none before this one. My fingers dug into his back and my thighs squeezed his waist, desperate to make this feeling last forever.

He followed after me, burying his face in my neck and sinking his teeth into the soft flesh there. The moment seemed to go on and on and on until he sagged against the wall and I collapsed in his arms.

When he set me on my feet, I was beyond dazed and more than confused. Not surprisingly, the anger had drained out of me and left me with a bizarre longing I couldn’t explain.

Regret and disappointment with my own behavior followed shortly and I didn’t know if I would be able to stand up against the force of these emotions.

I wanted to run and hide.

I wanted to cry again and never stop.

I expected that I would do both of those things.

Just as soon as I figured out what the hell Nick was thinking!

“Nick-”

“Don’t,” he growled and the depth of his tone made me shut my mouth immediately.

He jerked his pants up and buttoned them with furious movements. His gaze lifted to mine and the heat behind his eyes pierced me in place.

I was wrong. We didn’t need to talk.

We definitely didn’t need to talk.

We never needed to talk again.

We could just keep communicating like this.

Against the wall.

He grabbed his shirt and yanked it on. It was inside out and backward, but I was not going to be the one to point that out to him.

I stood there naked, awkwardly covering my breasts.

“Whatever you’re thinking right now, Kate, stop.”

“I’m not thinking anything,” I whispered.

“Don’t lie to me.”

The command was too brutal for me to ignore, “Okay.”

“I’ll let you be now.” His voice shook as if he were having a very hard time controlling himself right this second so all I did was nod. “I’ll call you tomorrow.”

I nodded again. Even though I mostly wanted to beg him not to. I wanted to beg him to forget this ever happened.

Even though I knew I never could.

Even though I knew I would remember the intensity, the soul-shattering connection… the profound desperation we’d taken each other with to my very last breath.

I would never forget this.

And I had a very disarming thought that this would be the time I compared every single other time to in my future.

But, damn.

Nick took a step forward and for one horrifying second I thought he was going to kiss me again. I couldn’t take any more. If he kissed me again, I would shatter.

He seemed to realize this and stopped himself short. “I’ll call you tomorrow,” he repeated on his way out the door.

“Okay,” I whispered.

Rachel Higginson's books