I kissed her stretch marks, then I licked them. I didn’t care one bit about those tiny marks on her skin. They were a sign that she’d lived, that she was a woman, a mother. She was the mother of my baby. Those stretch marks made me love her more. I didn’t want to be with someone who didn’t know the full breadth and depth of the human heart, I wanted to be with a complete woman who knew the possibilities of life. I wanted to be with the mother of my son.
“I love these stretch marks,” I said. And then I said something that I hadn’t even meant to say. It was something that scared me. “I love you, Faith. I love you. And I’m going to show you exactly how much. I’m going to prove my love to you.”
Chapter 44
Faith
IT WAS THE CRAZIEST NIGHT of my life. At least, it was the craziest night since the night Jackson had left me in the desert twelve years earlier. I’d let him come on me, come inside me, we hadn’t even used protection. I didn’t want protection, not from Jackson. I wanted danger. I wanted contact. If he was going to harm me, I wanted to experience it.
We’d only just been reunited, but it felt like I’d been with him my entire life. In a way, I had been. I’d been his, even when he was gone. He’d woken up something in me long ago, and it had been asleep inside me during the years of his absence. Now it was awake again. He’d woken up the lust, the passion, the desire. He’d set free the fierce beast inside me.
For so long I’d given myself to my role as a mother.
Now I was remembering that there was more to my life, more to my purpose, than motherhood.
Wife and mother.
The two go together. A woman gives herself to her child, but she should also give herself to a man—a man who deserves her. And that’s the thing that Jackson had reawakened in me.
I’d been waiting for him so long, my body had been waiting for him, and now I knew he was back. I just prayed he was back for good.
There was always a risk with Jackson, always a danger, but I didn’t care. We were never meant to live our lives in complete safety. If we were, God wouldn’t have made the world so full of threats, so full of possibility.
“You love me?” I said.
I wasn’t even afraid of him anymore. I wasn’t afraid of what his body could do to mine. I could tell he meant what he was saying. There are certain things in life that cannot be faked. Those orgasms, those screams of pleasure, that complete surrender we’d made to each other in the heat of our passion, that was real. I knew that.
And I wasn’t afraid of what might happen in the future. That was the risk I had to take, and it was the risk I was willing to take.
“Show me what you mean,” I said.
“Show you?”
I looked into his eyes. “You said you wanted to conquer my like a marching army. You said you wanted to dominate me so completely that my body would know it was yours forever.”
“Yes, I did. And I meant it.”
“Then prove it,” I said. “Prove it to me so I know you’re a man of your word. Prove it to me so that I’ll never be able to doubt you.”
Something came alive in him then. I’d woken a beast inside him. He leaned down over my face, but instead of kissing me, he licked me. His tongue ran over my mouth and cheek. If he could have eaten me, I’m sure he would have tried.
“Flip over,” he said.
“Flip over?”
“You heard me.”
My heart skipped a beat. “What are you going to do?” I said.
“Stop talking,” he said. “It’s my turn to talk.”
There was so much I wanted to say but I obeyed him. I held my tongue.
“I’m going to do something to you that I’ve wanted to do again for twelve years, Faith Shepherd,” he said.
“I’m scared,” I said.
“Too bad. You challenged me, and now you’re going to lie there and take the consequences.”
“Jackson,” I said, nervously.
I’d never been so compliant in my life, but at the same time, I’d never felt so empowered. I knew that whatever he was going to do, it would mean something. It would change the world for both of us. It wasn’t just about pleasure, it wasn’t just sex, it wasn’t just fucking. This was bonding, in the full meaning of the word. This was a male, taking his female and fusing his body and soul to hers so that the seal between the two of them could never be broken by anyone.
I was nervous, but also thrilled. I wanted him. I wanted him hard.
“Get on your hands and knees,” he said.
His voice was firm, commanding. I did what he said.
Then I felt his breath on my butt. I stopped breathing. Despite all my bravado, I was terrified of what was about to happen. I felt his tongue touch the ring of my anus and I gasped. I’d almost forgotten what it was like to be with Jackson. He’d done this once before, and he was going to do it again. His tongue ran in tiny, rapid circles around my asshole, creating a stir of pleasure inside my body that vibrated excruciatingly.
“Jackson,” I whispered, but he was beyond answering me now. We had gone beyond words. The only things that existed were our bodies, the secret language between them, and nothing more.