Will’s lips brush against my cheek, and I feel his tongue tickle my ear, his teeth gently tugging on the lobe as he breathes softly, covering my skin in tiny bumps while my spine rushes with a sensation like morphine—numb and tingly all at once.
“Just how beautiful of a woman you’ve become,” he says into the tiny space above my shoulder. I feel his words travel down my neck, down my body, and I pull my right leg up higher, the sensation settling where his hardness teases against my center.
My eyes blink open, and his are waiting—adoring.
I bring my hands to his face, my cool palms pressing softly against his unshaven cheeks, warm with want.
“When you were eighteen, that summer…just before you left for State,” I say, stopping at the sight of his breath catching, his eyes moving just enough that I see this hint of hurt flash behind them. I run my thumb along his jaw, and he turns his face enough to the side so his lips catch my palm. He kisses it, never once breaking our gaze.
“I would have picked you,” I confess, my chest lifting with life, my lungs filling with the weight of every single word I just put there between us. I believe it. My heart knows it, and maybe it knew it all along. “If you would have kissed me. A hint, or sign, or…anything. Will…” I let my hands slide down his chest, pausing over his heart. “I would have chosen you.”
Seconds pass with his eyes on mine—the only movement the trembling sensation of his thumbs along my own over his rapidly beating heart. His lips fall to my forehead slowly, his eyes closing as he draws near, and I close mine.
“I dream it every night, Maddy. Every single night,” he says against me. He moves so his forehead is resting on mine, his body lifted above me, his weight held by his hands on either side of my body. I watch his chest move in and out with heavy, long-drawn breaths. “There is not a single day that has passed since I’ve met you that I didn’t know in my heart you were supposed to be with me.”
“You never said anything,” I say, touching his face. I lift his chin enough to look at me.
“You were happy. Evan made you happy, and that…” he stops, shaking his head lightly, breathing out a regretful laugh that quirks the edge of his mouth, a small dimple shadowed by his whiskers. “Maddy, there is not a thing in this world I wouldn’t have done to make you happy.”
His words land on my chest. They dig inside and squeeze my heart and stop my breath. So many things have twisted and turned since Will came back—since he came home. Our worlds have been on this slow decent, but they’ve collided together here and now. Our truths have tangled, and it’s clear now as I look at him that there is no going back for us. We will always be everything we’ve always been for one another. We’ll always push; we’ll always compete—he’ll always be my fire—but not without everything else, we are beyond those things. Not without this.
Will is deliberate as he moves his body flush against mine, my hands searching along his abs and around to his back, feeling every curve and ridge of the muscles that define his shoulders. His arms carry his speed while his back is where his strength is; I could spend hours tracing every bend along his frame. His hands move underneath me, pulling my chest tight to his as he rolls to his back and pulls me so I’m now on top of him. His hands slide up my sides, and his thumbs hook under my T-shirt as he drags it up my stomach and chest. I rise so I’m now straddling him and help him lift it the rest of the way, then slide the straps of my bra down my shoulders just before he takes over, unhooking the clasp in the front and gliding the soft cotton down the length of my arms.
Every movement takes time. I stand and pull away my shorts and panties while he watches, a heavy breath doused in desire leaving his mouth. Will slides off his jeans and boxers, discarding them over the side of the bed before his fingertips reach for mine. He guides me back to him, his hands letting go of mine when I’m near enough that he can touch my thighs. His fingertips slowly snake upward, and I blush as he pauses with his thumbs circling along the top of my legs, where my muscles are the largest. The curves he said he admired bring a devilish grin to his mouth, and he blinks slowly, his mouth hung open as if he’s ready to taste. His gaze moves to my eyes, and he looks at me with a rawness that warms my core.
I fall to him slowly, his erection hard against my inner thigh as I move down. His hand wraps around his hard thickness, and he guides himself into place just as I feel the heat of him against my center. As I sink onto him completely, my head falls back, my lips part, and I breathe out in pleasure.
Slow.
Tender.
Every single movement meaningful.