Page 103 of Salt Kiss
The clarity in her voice matches the clarity in her eyes, and I’m reminded of her words on the deck. That she wanted to protect me.
I might have been the soldier, I might be the bodyguard, but I am growing increasingly aware that when it comes to fortitude, to focus, Isolde is the stronger of us.
In fact, she reminds me of no one else so much as Mark.
I kiss her naked shoulder and take the water bottle from her hand. I guide her to lie down on the rug, tugging her dress all the way off her body until it’s a green pile on the floor by the altar.
And then I take a minute to savor her, to enjoy the sinful display. Her hair in a gold halo around her head and her swollen mouth and the pink tips of her breasts.
All of her, save for the soft handfuls of her tits, is lithe and lean, and as she shifts under my gaze, I can see subtle lines of muscle move in her stomach.
But there’s something delicate about her too—in the architecture of her collarbone and the crescents of her ribs, in her slender feet, with their unpainted nails. The soft gold covering her sex. She reminds me a little of her knife, the one with the gold-and-ruby hilt. Far too pretty for something so dangerous.
“Tristan,” she murmurs, stretching a little. “What are you doing?”
“Looking my fill,” I say as I kneel between her legs. “I want to see every part of you. Every slope and curve. Every inch.”
The corners of her mouth tilt, but she’s still looking at me with that serious, certain gaze. “It’s yours to look at.”
“Until your wedding day.”
I don’t know why I repeat her earlier words—I meant it to be teasing, but it comes out mournful and mean. But she doesn’t flinch.
She just nods and says, “Yes. Until then.”
I duck my head to hide my face, not sure what it might be revealing. I find the warm, wet washcloth I stole from the spa, and I bring it slowly and gently over the place I just used.
And then her thighs clamp together as she giggles, rolling to the side. I watch, fascinated, as the muscles move in her stomach, as her teeth flash in a wide grin, as she tries to stifle her laughter and then snorts as a consequence and then giggles even louder.
She’s ticklish between the legs after she comes.
I file away this information for later and then roll her onto her back and pin her with a spread hand on her stomach. She squeals the whole time I clean up my mess, and I’m laughing too, until finally I toss the washcloth aside and lay my body over hers. I cover as much of her as I can, not wanting her to be cold. Not wanting a single inch between us.
“Why do you like it?” she asks after I’ve kissed the laughter out of her. “Your cum in me, I mean.”
I brace myself on my forearms to look down at her. “I think there’s something depraved about it. About it being messy, risky. But if I’m being truthful, I’m not sure there’s anything behind it. It just gets me off.” I tangle my hands in her hair, rubbing the strands between my fingers as I stay propped above her. “What about you?”
“Me?”
“What gets you off?”
Something changes in her expression. “I think you can guess what it is,” she says.
“The pain?”
She nods. But she doesn’t offer anything about why she likes it, and I don’t push.
I lift off her and find the robe I brought from the spa. I help her into it and then tie the belt snugly around her waist. “Can I meet you in your room?” I ask. I don’t want tonight to end. I want to shower with her, cuddle with her, sleep with my arms around her.
She kisses my jaw. “Yes.”
Thirty minutes later,and we’re in her shower, which is palatially sized considering we’re at sea, and we’re trying to hush our laughter as the motion of the waves occasionally sends us pressing into each other.
I’m busy massaging shampoo into her scalp when she says, “Don’t quit when we get to Manhattan.”
My hands go still.
She turns to look at me, tilting her chin up to meet my stare. Soap runs down her shoulders. “That’s what you’re planning, isn’t it? To quit working for Mark once we arrive. To martyr yourself to your own sense of loyalty.”
