Page 52 of The Muse (Beautiful Magic 1)
The words glide out, all sensual and sure.
I meet her gaze, my body stilling, a wild hope racing through me. “Tell me what that is.”
She doesn’t tell me. She shows me. She slides her hand down my chest, along my pecs, over my abs.
To the waistband of my jeans.
I swallow roughly, my throat going dry, my body buzzing from the delicious contact.
And then from her eager hand sliding lower. I catch her hand, capture it in mine, and bring it to my lips, kissing her palm. “Are you sure? Now?”
She shoots me a sharp stare. “I’m positive. Do you not want to?”
“I want to. More than anything. I just don’t want to . . .”
“Break me?” she asks with an eyebrow arch.
“Well, you are magical. I’ve never . . . been with anyone like you.”
“I should hope not,” she says with a laugh.
I laugh too, loving that we can do that in this moment.
“Also, shouldn’t you be worried I’ll break you?” she teases.
I grab her head, tug her close, and bring my lips to her ear. “No. Just don’t break my heart,” I say softly.
She sets her palm on my chest. “I won’t.”
It feels like an unbreakable promise.
I pat the back of my jeans, take out my wallet to locate a condom, and she laughs.
“Eternal Muses can’t conceive.”
“Oh,” I say, filing away that tidbit. “I’m clean. Safe.”
“Good. Then put that away.”
“With pleasure,” I say, returning the protection to my wallet.
I shuck off my shirt as she fiddles with the buttons on her dress, and soon she tugs it over her head.
My heart stops.
Breath flees my body.
She’s gorgeous. More beautiful than I imagined, and I have definitely imagined this.
A lot.
We reach for each other at the same time, all hands and lips and hunger. Exploring each other’s bodies, mapping skin, traveling along curves and planes.
She’s eager, so eager, judging from the way she kisses me, from the frenzied way her palms journey over my chest to my jeans.
I push them off, and here we are.
Two muses.
One human. One eternal.
About to make love in Monet’s garden.
Inside a painting.
My life is so surreal.
She climbs over me.
Well now.
This view is even better.
It is incontrovertibly the best view ever as she slides on top of me. I loop my hands into her hair. “Come closer.”
She bends down to me, her lips brushing mine so gently, so sweetly, I am sure I’m dreaming again, or I’m really flying. I don’t know, and it doesn’t matter, but she kisses me like a song, like moonlight, like a sonnet.
Then, I guide myself into her.
And we both gasp.
And moan.
And wrap ourselves tighter around each other.
The ends of her hair brush across my chest, and a groan escapes my lips as she moves on me, rocking and arching, and holy art.
Holy muse.
This is the most surreal experience of my life.
A Muse is riding me in a painting.
Only it’s so much more than that.
She is full of yearning and fire and heat, and all I can think is if I were to die right now, if I were to be struck down for being with a Muse inside a painting, then really, all things considered, this wouldn’t be a bad way to go.
Because nothing is better than this. Nothing could be better than this.
Especially when I shift us, move her under me, gaze down at the woman I adore.
Yes, this is so much more.
Because as I thrust into her, as she curls her legs around me, as we kiss and pant and move, this is more than an art kink.
This is making love, and falling in love, and falling into each other.
We are racing and frenzied, as bodies collide, and my muse, my woman, arches her back, parts her lips, and comes apart beneath me.
I follow her there, losing myself to bliss, to pleasure, and I’m sure to pain.
Because I just don’t see a way for us to be together.
For her to ever be free.
I’m spent, and she is too, so we lie like that, in our oasis that can’t last, that’s about to be pierced by responsibilities and rules.
By all the things that bind us.
But I let the moment wash over me, breathing in this last bit of secret hideout-ness, breathing in Clio.
20
Hand in hand, Clio and I amble through the garden toward the blue irises where the painting opens up. If I walk any slower, I’ll be at a standstill. But as much as I want to stay with this woman—this Muse—I’d prefer it not be inside a painting. Especially the Renoir, where we’re at the mercy of Max-slash-Renoir and whatever blight is afflicting the other art.
No, I swore I’d protect Clio, and I can’t do that from in here.
Along the way, we walk across the bridge. At the top of Monet’s arched bridge, Clio nudges me with her shoulder. “What are you thinking?”
