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  Really cool? I all but confessed I loved her and she thinks it’s really cool.

  I’m speechless. The wind has definitely been blown out of my sails, and I’m three seconds from confronting her on a level that I’m sure is going to make her uncomfortable.

  Before I can piece together what to say, she stands up, her hands fidgeting in front of her. “I’m going to go to your bedroom and get ready for you while you close up here. Don’t be long.”

  She rushes out past me, and she’s gone.

  I stand frozen for a moment, too stunned and hurt to move. Are we not on the same page? It’s so obvious that song was about her. I haven’t felt so rejected since . . . never.

  I’ve also never written a song for a girl, a song that makes me raw and vulnerable, and then played it front of her face either. Did I go too far? Was it too much, too soon?

  Yet, she’s still here—still in my house. Still wanting me to get naked with her. So maybe, somehow, she didn’t get what I was trying to say? What else can I even do to pave the way to telling her how I feel?

  Or maybe I’m the one who doesn’t get it. Maybe I’m the one who isn’t hearing her. She’s told me what she wants, over and over—she’s only here for the sex.

  The problem is we got close anyway. Both of us.

  And the only way I can see moving on from here is to address it head-on and hope she doesn’t disappear when I do.

  Chapter Seventeen

  Time to Show Him the (Back) Door

  Natalia

  He wrote a song for me.

  He wrote a beautiful, incredible song for me.

  He wrote a beautiful, incredible song telling me he’s falling in love with me (oh my God!), and I couldn’t do anything but run.

  I’m shaking as I climb the stairs to Nick’s bedroom; my heart is pounding like a bass drum in my chest. I’ve seen him perform before. Several times now, and it’s always a mind-blowing experience.

  But never was it like this. Never have I heard him pour his entire being into a melodic line, his voice at turns warm and raw. Never has he sung a song in front of me—to me—in the way he just did.

  Fuck! He wrote a song for me. I want to scream, to let loose all the million thoughts fighting for dominance inside my head.

  Inside his room, I stand in front of his mirror and let my messy bun fall loose. I finger-comb my hair while I try to grapple with my emotions. This guy . . . This guy!

  I’m so moved that I have to fight to keep my tears at bay. I’m moved, and yet I can’t let him see how much it affects me to have heard his talent wasted on me. Those words wasted on me. I stare at my own reflection, knowing now how he sees me.

  He loves me. He loves me when he shouldn’t. He loves me, and this has to be the end of us.

  Fuck, fuck, fuck!

  Pictures of us in public coming out was nearly a PR crisis, but it was manageable. It’s a very different animal when he wraps his feelings up in a bow and presents those to the public.

  I’m not just in a relationship, it seems. I’m in a serious relationship. And while I’m dizzy from the expression of his feelings, I also have my feet planted firmly on the ground. I know what the score is. We are so good in the moment together, but our futures are so far apart.

  If I’m going to author the story I’ve always wanted for my myself, as a wife, as a mother, then I’m running out of time. For Nick, time has hardly just begun. This isn’t anyone’s fault. It’s just that we’re in two different places on life’s path. Close for a moment, but then diverging. I can barely think about it without feeling heartbroken. But I have no choice.

  I’m going to have to hurt him too. I’m going to have to let him go.

  I wish I had something to leave him with, something as incredible as the gift he’s just given me, but I have nothing to give. No talent like he has to whip up a song or a poem. I can’t really act something for him. All I can do is try to make tonight be the best night we’ve had.

  “Nat?”

  I blink back my tears and turn to find him at the door.

  “Hey,” I say. I’d put the lights on dim to set the mood, so hopefully, he doesn’t notice I’m upset. I don’t want to ruin our night with theatrics. I shake out my hair and pull my tank top over my head so that I’m only in my bra. “You’re not close enough. Come here.”

  I cringe inside as I recognize that I’ve just parroted the words of his song. His beautiful, incredible, amazing song. Every word is etched into me already, running through my head, but I know I’ll never want to listen to it again after this. It’ll hurt too much.

  If he notices, he doesn’t say anything as he strolls slowly toward me. I reach out to start unbuttoning his shirt, and he puts a hand over mine, stopping me. “Can we talk for a sec?”

  No. Please. If we talk, we’ll end.

  “How about we talk without words?” I lean up to brush my lips against his. “I have a lot to say with my body.”

  He kisses me, but it’s a shallow kiss. Though he now has his arms around me, I feel the restraint in his touch.

  “I want to hear everything your body has to say, baby. Believe me. But I have some words my mouth needs to say to you too.”

  I kiss him again, desperate not to hear the words he feels I need to hear.

  “I like the things your mouth is saying right now,” I say in my most seductive purr, the one I know he loves, the one that never fails to make his jaw clench and his eyes dilate with need. I press my lips to his once more, licking along the part until he opens up to my tongue. At the same time, I palm his growing erection, coaxing him to give up his pursuit of a conversation. He really is big. But not too big for me, no.

  “Nat,” he says between kisses. “Nat . . . I need to tell you . . . that song . . .”

  I cut him off, suddenly inspired. “Nick. I’m trying to give you a present, and you’re making it difficult.”

  This piques his interest. “You are? I didn’t realize. What kind of present?”

  I don’t answer him with my voice. Instead, I take one of his hands and move it around to my ass. Low on my ass. I hope he gets the hint.

  He does.

  His eyes widen with surprise and awe, and no small amount of desire. “Natalia, I’m . . . I’m flattered. God, that’s not right. More than flattered. I’m awestruck. But. Are you sure that’s what you want?”

  I nod, completely sure. I’m improvising, but as soon as I had the idea, I knew it was exactly what I wanted to give him. A part of myself that I haven’t given anyone else. One thing that only he and I will share, one first to keep in my memory, safe from the cruelty of time.

  “I’ve never been more sure in my life,” I whisper, in case he wants vocal consent. I need him to know how much I mean it. Need him to read between the lines, to know that this is my response to his song, giving him my most vulnerable moment and trusting him to take perfect care of me. “I want to feel you where no one else has ever been.”

  The truth is, I already feel him where no one else has ever been. In parts of my insides that I didn’t know could feel. Is that simply a product of being so connected physically? Is this what happens when you finally have good sex?

  That has to be the reason. I can’t let it be any other reason than that.

  He hasn’t responded, and he’s studying me now. Trying to figure out where this is coming from, maybe, or trying to decide if the things he has to say can wait.

  I help him decide. “Please,” I beg. “I’m so wet. Please make me come. I need you there. I need you inside me there.”

  “The begging is really sexy,” he says with a grin. “I can never turn you down when you put that pout on your lips, and you know it.”

  “So you’ll . . . accept my gift?”

  “Damn straight, I will.”

  Finally, he kisses me with the hungry passion that I’ve grown accustomed to expect from him, the passion missing from his careful kisses of earlier. We claw at each other, frenzied and rushed. Relieved. Not j
ust about the postponed conversation, but to finally be here with him again, to get what I’ve been missing and fantasizing about every day we’ve been apart. I have his pants undone, his cock in my hand, and he has mine pulled down around my thighs before he breaks his lips from mine to place a long finger in my mouth.

  “Suck,” he orders. I do. I suck his finger like it’s the cock I’m holding. I take it in my mouth all the way down to where it meets his palm, back up again, giving it my tongue’s utmost attention the entire way.

  When he’s satisfied, he reaches behind me, sticking the tip of his wet finger inside my backmost hole.

  “Oh,” I moan. He’s touched me here before like this, but this is the first time that I know it’s a precursor to the main act and not just a sideshow. My clit throbs in response.

  “Keep making that sound, baby, and I’m not going to be able to take you slow.”

  “Take me however you want to take me,” I tell him. Because this will be the last time he takes me, and I want to leave him this gift. Want to give him this one thing that I am capable of giving him.

  He growls in response, and I jump into his arms, wrapping my legs around his waist. With my yoga pants around just one ankle now, my pussy rubs against his bare cock as he walks me to the bed and lays me on my back. He pulls my bottoms off all the way and tosses them to the floor before stripping off his own pants and shirt.

  “Take your tits out of your bra for me, can you do that? I want to watch you playing with those nipples of yours while I lick you crazy.”

  As always, I do what he says. I pull the cups of my bra down and hold one breast in each of my hands, squeezing them together while brushing my fingers over the rigid peaks.

  “You’re a fucking dream,” Nick says, gazing over me. “I’m so hard for you.”

  His hardness is evident, and my mouth waters at the sight of his cock at full mast. He doesn’t touch himself, though, and doesn’t let me touch him. Instead, he kneels down on the ground and pulls my feet to rest on his shoulders. He teases me, blowing a stream of hot air across the length of my slit, then follows the path of his breath with his tongue.

  He’s right—he is going to lick me crazy. I’m already fighting not to squirm, and he hasn’t even gotten to my clit.

  He takes his time getting there, but when he finally settles the tip of his tongue against the buzzing nerve center, I’m already halfway to orgasm. He lingers here, torturing me with fast and slow rhythms, taunting me with hard and soft pressure. I’m nearly insane when he finally sucks my clit in between his lips and starts eating me in earnest.

  And then he adds a finger. One slow dip in. Then out.

  In again, but not to the place he usually pushes his finger, but lower, in that other place I’m giving to him. It’s a shock at first, and I start to tense up before he’s even gotten in past my tight rim. Then what he’s doing with his mouth catches up to me.

  “I’m going to come!” I cry, and just as I fall into ecstasy, he shoves his finger in all the way, and damn! I’m coming hard. Pleasure rolls in waves down my body, leaving me a soft pile of mush.

  Nick chuckles at my state, that cruel bastard. “That ought to loosen you up. Get on your knees for me.”

  This is it. It’s going to happen.

  I’m suddenly nervous, but like he said, my muscles are loose from the incredible orgasm. I scramble to my knees, my ass facing his direction. I’ve hardly come down from my first high yet, and I’m already craving another. Nick pulls out a built-in drawer from under the bed, and though I can’t see quite what he’s pulled out, I can imagine what it is.

  My suspicions are confirmed a few seconds later when I hear the snap of a bottle lid and the sound of liquid squirting out. He claps his hands together, and, when I peek behind me, he’s rubbing his palms together.

  “Hopefully, this isn’t too cold,” he says, transferring the lube to my hole.

  It’s not too cold, likely because he warmed it up first, and a rush of gratitude runs through me. Nick is so mindful with me—how he takes care of me, how he’s always concerned with my wants and needs. I don’t know how I was lucky enough to meet this man, but I know I’m never going to take this time of ours together for granted.

  Once Nick has me—and his cock—slicked up to his satisfaction, I feel the bed depress, and I brace myself for him to kneel up behind me. I’m surprised when he crawls up to the top of the bed instead, and sits with his back against the headboard.

  He reaches his hand out to stroke down the side of my ribs. “Are you ready for this?”

  I nod, wondering if he’s ready for this. I’m fairly certain he’s in the wrong position.

  “Then come straddle my lap,” he says, his pupils dark.

  “But . . . aren’t you going to . . .?”

  “No, I’m not going to. You’re going to. I want you to be in control of this your first time.”

  “Oh. Okay.” I crawl up to him, more unsure than I was a minute ago. I’d expected him to be in charge. I’m good at listening, performing. Being the director? I have no idea what I’m doing. I’m out of my depth.

  Nick reads the hesitation in my expression. “I’m going to help, don’t worry,” he says cradling my cheek with his palm. “But I promise you’re going to enjoy it more this way. Plus, I can’t wait to see your face when I’m finally inside you.”

  My stomach flutters with a hundred butterflies. “That’s really hot,” I say, and I mean it.

  But it’s also not what I’d been counting on at all. I’d thought this would be dirty and filthy and that I could hide my face from him while he was pounding me from behind.

  Instead, he’s made this intimate.

  I feel vulnerable and shy when I climb across his lap. “Here I am,” I say, pretending I’m more confident than I am.

  “You don’t have to do this.”

  “I want to.”

  “You can’t know what this means to me. I’m so fucking lucky to be your first.” He kisses me, one hand bracing tightly behind my neck while my tongue tangles with his. We kiss and kiss, and I feel his cock getting even harder underneath me. He’s ready.

  And I’m ready.

  I break from his mouth and move to my knees. Glancing behind me, I position myself in what seems to be the right place.

  Nick takes his cock in his hand and lines his tip with my hole. “Now just sit back, and push down while you do. Go as slow as you need to. This is all you, okay?”

  “Okay.” I take a deep breath and then let it out. Then I lock my eyes on his and bear down while I sink slowly onto his cock.

  Nick’s face screws up as he hisses with pleasure.

  Damn he’s sexy. Now I’m glad we’re in this position so I can watch his face.

  His pleasure doesn’t detract from my own. “Oh,” I gasp. “Oh, that’s . . . weird. And good.” Really good.

  I pause when the flare of his head gets to the tight band of rings inside me. Nick starts to rub my clit and murmur praise. “You’re doing so good, baby. Take your time. Stay relaxed.”

  I do relax then, sitting all the way down so that he fills me completely.

  And wow. It’s . . . wow.

  I feel so full and invaded and whatever nerves he’s touching with his cock are directly connected to the nerves he’s rubbing with his finger, because all of a sudden I’m on fire. I’m hot and burning, the heat so consuming that I can’t tell where it’s coming from. It’s everywhere. He’s everywhere.

  “How are you? Are you good?” His eyes frantically search mine.

  “I’m good. I’m so good. How does it feel?”

  He almost laughs. “You feel incredible. You’re so tight and hot, like a furnace, and I’m not going to last long. But, baby? I’m going to need you to move soon.”

  Oh, yeah. That.

  I raise up and then fall back down on him, enjoying his moan as I do. I alternately kiss him and watch him intently as I repeat the action, over and over. I’ve never seen him so wrecked from
what my body’s doing to him. I’ve never felt so much incredible power over another human being. I’ve never felt so completely connected to Nick.

  Never felt so close.

  And I’m suddenly lost, falling and floating and so dizzy I don’t know what’s up and what’s down. I don’t know what I’m doing or what I’ve done, and it hits me that by giving this last part of myself to Nick, I’ve now given him all of me. Every single bone and cell and fiber of my being. Not just my body, but my heart and soul. He owns me now, even though he can’t keep me.

  My eyes are tearing up, and it’s only a few minutes before the revelation and the pleasure collide, and the strongest orgasm I’ve ever had rips through me, sending my body into convulsions. My vision goes white and my rhythm stutters and all I can think is, holy fuck! I never knew sex could be this good. I never knew a relationship could feel so good. I never knew I could feel this good.

  I’m still riding my climax when Nick digs his fingers into my hips and holds me in place so he can chase his own happy ending. It only takes four, five pumps and then he’s letting out a long, deep growl and filling me with his cum.

  Together we collapse on the bed, our limbs tangled around each other. We’re exhausted and spent, but we can’t seem to stop kissing. We can’t seem to silence the conversation our bodies are having. Can’t seem to stop telling each other everything we haven’t said before with our hands and our mouths and our tongues.

  I cherish it. I listen to it all. I silently say all the things in my heart, dreading all the words I’m going ot say out loud tomorrow.

  Chapter Eighteen

  More

  Nick

  I get it now.

  I get her. Last night, I’d been reluctant to put sex before the conversation that very much needs to happen between us, but this morning, in retrospect, I’m glad things happened the way they did. It gave me time to figure out what was going on in her head, and now I see she really did understand my song. Her gift to me proves that she isn’t clueless, and she isn’t feeling nothing. It’s not just really cool. She’s scared.