I cut in over him. “It’s not just that. It’s making myself different. Choosing how I look, for me. To be who I want to be. To look how I want to look, not how Caleb made me. That’s what I want, more than anything, I think.”
“And I get that too. But . . . shaving it like that is so extreme. There’s an in-between. A way to change your look drastically without going to that extreme.” He sighs, frowns. “I’ve known a few women who have shaved their heads. And I just . . . I don’t know how to put this without sounding a little like an asshole. It tends to take away an element of . . . femininity. Not that you can’t be totally woman, all woman without long hair, but to totally shave it off like you were about to . . . I don’t know. I have a friend who owns a fancy, high-end women’s salon. I can take you in to see her and you can get a professional haircut. Go pixie short, even. I just feel like if you shaved it on a whim, you might regret it. And that’s not something you can undo.”
“I—” A million thoughts batter at the insides of my head, each clamoring for expression. “I want to do it myself.”
“Do you trust me?” he asks.
I swallow hard. Do I?
“Yes,” I say.
Logan seems to sag with relief after that single syllable. As if he knows how huge that is for me to admit. “Then let’s head out. I have a plan.”
“But my hair?”
He smiles at me. “Just trust me, Isabel. I’ll take care of you.”
Then, suddenly, we are both aware that I am standing in front of the mirror, a towel wrapped around my torso. The end is tucked in at my cleavage, and now I have to clutch the thick cotton to keep it from falling open. And a glance behind tells me that he is nearly naked as well, wearing only a pair of loose shorts that hang at his hips, showing his sharp hip bones and the V-shaped indent of muscle low on his abdomen, teasing me with an almost-glimpse of his privates.
Our gazes lock in the mirror. My heart thrums. My gut tenses. My thighs clench, and heat rushes through me. Digit by digit, my fingers loosen their grip on the towel. This is déjà vu: me in a towel, Logan shirtless. This time, however, I know what lies beneath his shorts, and how it feels.
I release the towel, an intentional gambit. Stand naked in front of him. My breasts ache, my nipples harden. My flesh pebbles, tingles.
“Jesus, Isabel.”
“What?”
He shakes his head. “Just you. You are, literally, perfect.” His hands rest on the upper swell of my hips. “I’m standing here, staring at you, and I find it hard to believe that I get to touch you. That I get to kiss you. Make love to you. That I get to even look at you.”
Palms skate lower to cup my bottom, graze over the backs of my thighs, circle around front. I cease breathing as his touch drifts upward then. Misses my core by millimeters, carves over my hip bones to my belly. Up, cresting my diaphragm, and then his hands are full of my breasts, lifting them, kneading their softness and hefting their weight, and I’m not breathing still because his thumbs brush almost idly over my nipples. I have to gasp then, because he tweaks and twiddles my nipples until I’m thrusting my chest into his hands, and lightning seems tied by a live wire from my erect nipples to my core, each touch sending blazes of heat and lust coruscating through me.
“Your tits, Isabel. Fuck, they’re so goddamn incredible. I can’t . . . I can’t get enough of your tits. All of you, but especially your tits.” He squeezes them, almost roughly. “What would you say if I told you I wanted to fuck your tits?”
The sudden and unexpected vulgarity has me panting with need. I love his dirty words. Even if it’s hard for me to speak that way, I love hearing it. “I would say . . .” I have to swallow my embarrassment. “I would tell you to do it.”
“You would?”
I lick my lips, because they’ve gone dry with need. All the liquid in my system has gathered between my thighs. “Yes. Do it, Logan.”
I spin in place. My eyes lock on his groin, on his erection outlined in his shorts, and it’s so large and prominent it’s nearly protruding from the elastic waistband. I reach out, slide a forefinger under the waistband and tug it away from his body. Expose him, inch by inch. Tug the silky, stretchy material away, tug it lower and lower. Until his entire massive erection is bared for me. Testicles tight and heavy, dark, nestled at the junction of his thighs. He leans down, lifts my breasts—lifts my tits . . . I like that word, the dirtiness of it, the lustful juvenility of it—and mouths my nipple. I watch, stare down at him, at his loose, tangled hair and my dark Spanish skin splashed by the golden of his fingers and the pink of his lips. Watch him capture my nipple with his lips and tug it away.