Page 60 of Where Your Scars Meet Mine
He pauses only long enough to rest his forehead against my lower stomach, hands still bracketing my thighs, breath warm enough to make me tremble again. Then his mouth lifts, the next kiss landing lower, brushing the edge of my underwear, my entire body jolting. My grip in his hair turns desperate. His hands clamp harder, holding me steady through the shock, forcing me to feel how real this is.
He never rushes. That’s what ruins me. If he were harsh, I could dredge up anger. If he were careless, I could slam a wall between us. Instead he kisses me like he understands exactly what each tiny reaction does to me, like he feels every shiver and decides to savor them.
By the time he stills, I’m breathing so shallowly black spots dance at the edges of my vision. He looks up, his face wrecked in a way I’ve never seen. Not taunting. Not cold. Not cruel. Just hungry. Wanting so fiercely it shows even through the pool-slicked mess of his features.
My free hand lifts to his cheek before I can stop it, my thumb wiping water from his skin while the other hand stays tangled in his hair. I stand there half-dressed and shaking in his room, as he kneels soaked and unsteady in front of me, looking at the broken parts of me like they’re the only thing he wants. For one fragile, reckless breath, I don’t move.
The air feels too tight for the heat gathering between us, too quiet for the sharp, uncontrolled cuts of my breathing every time his mouth grazes just above the waistband of my underwear. Each kiss is slower, deeper, less tease and more surrender, as if worship has replaced mercy.
I should stop him. That thought tries to surface beneath the shock and aching need. It just keeps losing.
His hands stay steady on my thighs until one shifts. The movement is so unhurried I feel every inch. His palm glides higher along the outside of my leg, fingers spreading over slick skin, drifting inward to trace the first line of my underwear. The touch is careful, reverent, which makes it worse. If he grabbed or shoved, maybe I could hate him. Maybe I could gather myself enough to leave. Instead his hand rests at the edge of me, letting that alone keep me trembling.
My breath snags, then breaks. A tiny sound slips out before I can swallow it. His mouth stills against my skin. For a heartbeat he doesn’t move at all. Then his thumb presses lightly at my hip as he looks up from beneath dark, wet lashes, gaze so focused it makes the heat between my legs turn painful.
“Just like that,” he says, voice low and ragged. The words wreck me. He says it like he wants every sound I have.
My fingers tighten in his hair. The hand on his cheek slides to his shoulder because I need something solid before my knees collapse. Every inch he’s touched feels lit from within, the thin line of my underwear suddenly feeling like the cruelest barrier in the world.
His hand traces it again. Not crossing. Just following. The damp fabric clings to my skin, his thumb dragging along the edge with patience that borders on vicious. My whole body reacts. My stomach clenches. My thighs twitch as if to close around him, another shaky breath tumbling out.
He feels that too.
God help me.
“Silas,” I whisper, but it doesn’t sound like a warning anymore.
Something in him tightens at the way his name falls from my mouth. Some final thread of restraint cracks. His lips return tomy skin, lower, slower, every kiss leaving heat burning in their wake while his hand stays poised at the edge, forcing us both to feel the anticipation stretching thin.
It becomes unbearable. It becomes why I don’t stop.
Water still drips from our clothes. My shirt clings damp and transparent to my ribs. We’re both a mess from the night and from each other, yet he kneels there as if the world has shrunk down to my scars and the way my body keeps betraying me. When his mouth presses right above the line of my underwear again, my head tips back, another rough exhale escaping me. Another small, humiliating sound escapes, his hands clamping harder around my thighs as if the reaction alone is enough to push him over a cliff.
He mouths at that narrow strip of skin again, lips slick with rain and my own heat, kissing so close to the edge that his upper lip brushes the top seam of my underwear. The fabric is saturated, clinging to me, the heat rolling off my body enough to make his mouth go wet with my moisture. When he drags his lips along that damp barrier, his breath hits the soaked cotton, and I feel the faint press of his tongue through it, a barely-there tease that steals my breath and leaves my knees buckling. Wet spreads across his mouth, my own arousal seeping through, slicking his lips. The knowledge of that alone makes me whimper. His grip turns vicious, anchoring me as he absorbs every shudder, every desperate tremor. He stays there, breathing me in, tasting me through that thin, damp line, and when he inhales, it’s like he’s pulling the heat straight out of me, letting it soak his lips until he glistens with the proof of how badly I want him.
“Fucking perfect,” he groans into me, voice frayed, the helpless whimper ripping out of my throat proving he’s undoing every defense I’ve ever built. His tongue slowly drags across the soaked cotton clinging to me, the sight slamming throughme harder than the feel. My pulse stutters so violently I think I might pass out. My hips jerk toward his face on instinct, chasing the heat of his mouth, chasing the drag of his tongue even through the barrier I keep promising myself I won’t let him cross. But he doesn’t need to cross it to devastate me, he just keeps licking, keeps breathing against me, as the wet warmth of him spreads across the thin fabric until his tongue glistens with proof of how wet I already am for him.
I force myself to step back, wrenching my body out of the heat of him even though every nerve screams to stay pressed to his mouth. The space I create feels thin, barely more than an inch, but it might as well be a chasm. He notices immediately. His gaze lifts, darker now. The moment our eyes meet a shift ripples through him. No anger. No frustration. Just raw, wired hunger that makes my skin prickle and my mouth go dry. My stomach still burns where his lips had been, each slow kiss lingering like he branded my scars with something molten instead of shame.
Then he drags his tongue across his mouth.
It’s such a small, ruined motion, a simple sweep from one corner to the other, but watching him collect the last traces of me from his lips detonates whatever composure I managed to salvage. I can see the sheen of my arousal on him even in the dim light, see the way his tongue catches it, pulling the lingering wetness into his mouth as if it belongs there. He savors it, slow, the sight hitting me harder than any touch. The knowledge that he is tasting me, savoring me, even as I retreat makes my knees wobble all over again.
“Silas,” I whisper, because his name is the only thing I can think to hold onto. “You’re drunk.”
“I know,” he whispers, his voice scraped raw. “But your taste is addictive.”
The words move through me in a slow, dangerous wave. Heat climbs up my throat so fast I have to press my palm flat to the center of his chest just to steady myself. His shirt is soaked through, cold under my hand. The practicality of that keeps me from tipping completely into whatever this is becoming.
“Take these off,” I murmur, forcing my voice to stay level. “Your clothes are drenched. You need rest.”
His jaw flexes as his gaze drags over me with enough weight that I feel it everywhere. My wet shirt clings to my stomach. My bare legs are cold. I am standing in his room half-dressed and trembling while he looks at me like he could devour the sight if I gave him one inch more permission than I already have.
“Please,” I say, quieter now.
Something in him relents.
I reach for the flannel first, fingers fumbling a little as I ease the soaked fabric from his shoulders. He does not help me, but he does not stop me either. He only watches, his eyes fixed on my face as the heavy shirt slides down his arms and falls in a wet heap at our feet.
