Page 71 of Tears of Ink

He leans closer, his lips skimming mine, before shifting to my neck and running up the sensitive skin to my ear. “Trust me.”

I thrash against his hold, but he’s solid and I can’t shift him, not even an inch. Under his slender but broad frame is a steely strength I hadn’t even guessed at. “Trust me,” he says again, his blues holding mine.

“I can’t. It’s not that easy.”

His gaze is unflinching, his lips tracing maddening paths across my skin. “Trust me, Faith.”

There’s something in the way he says my name. Somehow it weaves all the tiny moments we’ve snatched up until now together. It’s him in his suit shaking my hand, it’s him in his sliders stood on my doorstep, him drinking in the kitchen alone, and him sitting cross-legged on his studio floor. His secret studio where he hides his soul.

A tear slips out of the corner of my eye. “You don’t know what you’re asking.”

His thumb rubs across my cheek, wiping the trail of water. “I want to set you free, Faith.” His words kill me. They slice me clean in half, pulling down my defences and my barriers. “Do you want to be free?”

Another tear escapes. I want to be free of the past, the hurt, the broken promises. I nod, and his mouth meets mine in a hungry kiss, and I allow myself to submit to the moment. He doesn’t release my hands and I’m desperate to touch him, to run my hand through his hair, to trace the muscles hiding under that navy shirt. He holds them tight, keeping the pace of our kiss under his control, moving his lips languorously slow, licking and nibbling, exploring my tongue with gentle flicks of his. “You taste so good,” he whispers in my ear, and just like that the emotional tidal wave is replaced with a wildfire.

I squirm, writhing my legs together under the weight of his body. He lets go of one of his hands, and I pull, testing his grip, but he still has the other firmly clasped around my wrist. His palm smooths down my arm, torturously slow. I note his eyes are on my ink, drinking them in as they swirl on my pale skin. His thumb runs along the inner edge of my arm and it sends a dart of desire straight to the heat between my legs. The hand smooths along the swell of my breast, his thumb gently circling across my nipple through my vest. I moan at the delicate, barely there touch. It’s butterfly soft, the briefest of caresses, but it’s more evocative than any touch I’ve felt in a long time. I arch my back when he lifts my top, exposing my stomach. I hold my breath and wait to see how he reacts to my skin. When he meets my gaze, there is something indescribable in his depths. I want it to be desire, but I can’t believe it. It could be worry, disgust.

“Stop thinking.” He grins, dipping his head to kiss my stomach, his lips working along the Celtic cross I have on my ribcage, across the butterflies with purple wings that are beating just as hard beneath my skin. He lifts my top and bra until my breast and nipple are exposed, catching the hardened bud in his mouth, gently sucking, and applying the slightest pressure with his teeth until I’m arching my back off the bed.

“Please let me go so I can touch you.”

He lifts his head, his dark gaze on my face. “I’ll let you go, but this is about you, not me.”

“What? no.” I begin to pull away, struggling to get him off me. “I can’t do that; it’s not how it works.”

He stops fighting me and does the simplest most beautiful thing anyone has ever done. He lifts my hands and kisses the sensitive skin on my palm. “I’m working out how it normally is for you.”

I don’t have anything to say and I turn my face away.

“Faith.” He turns my face back to his, planting a delicate kiss on my lips.

His kiss unlocks a secret door deep inside, and with a deep shaky breath I lay back on the bed, lifting my arms above my head. I watch as he gives a slow smile and then returns to the pattern of kisses he was planting across my midriff.

I won’t move. No matter what happens I won’t let myself run away. I close my eyes and give myself over to the sensation of his mouth on my skin. His lips are masterful no matter where they are. The stubble on his chin scratches and it’s almost as intoxicating as his kisses. His hand reaches back up for my breast, squeezing it gently, running the nipple under the palm of his hand. When his lips find it again, I stretch up and give him access to pull off my top and unhook my bra. He sweeps a gaze from under hooded lids along the various patterns over my skin and pushes me back down, kissing my other breast, sucking it deep into his mouth until fire shoots down to my core One hand palms down my stomach, unhooking the button on my trousers and slipping under the waistband. Normally, I’d pull away now, but I remember the promise I made to myself and hold my breath as his fingers slip under the band of my knickers, his middle fingers circling around my clit. Oh God. I scrunch the bedsheets in my fists as I fight the need to pull away, with an overriding ache to let him go further.

“Relax.” He presses his other hand onto my tummy and pushes me back into the mattress. I didn’t even know I’d bucked off the bed.

I close my eyes as he starts to sweep a steady rhythm in a circular motion. Every so often his fingers dip and dive, slipping between my wet folds, and each time he does I lift my hips to meet his touch. But before I can beg him to press deeper, to go some place I’ve never allowed anyone before, he settles back to a smaller, infuriatingly intense circle right over my clit.

I think I’m going to die. My breath is coming in short pants as I try to keep up with the movement of his hand. I want to fight it off. I also want to drown in the sensations forever.

I lift my hips, begging him silently to push his fingers further. My clit pulses and tingles as it loses his focus, and he dips one long finger inside me and then another.

“Oh God, Eli.”

His lips slant over mine and my breath rushes into his mouth in heady gasps. Another finger joins the others and I want to explode, then he twists them, finding a sensitive spot I didn’t even know existed. With every thrust he presses on the area and my gasped breaths become pants of exertion as I try to hold myself together.

“Let it go.”

I shake my head. “I can’t.”

His fingers aren’t listening, and they won’t stop their pounding explorations. I spread my legs wider, against all my own willpower. My body takes over, leading to places I never want to go.

A surging tingle begins in my toes and I push my feet into the sheets. It sweeps scorching hot up my legs. His tongue is in my mouth, his other hand holding me close as his fierce fingers push me over a vast edge. I cry and grunt at the same time, curling over his hand, clenching it between my legs as I shudder.

I can’t look at him, but he won’t move his damn hand. It’s still jammed up my vagina.

This is the bit when I walk away.