Page 39 of Resurgent
“Look.” He points to a constellation. “There’s the—”
“Southern Cross,” I finish for him. Smiling at his look of surprise, I say, “You showed it to me in Playa del Carmen. It was one of the things you’d crossed off your bucket list that weekend.”
He’s staring at me intently, and after a minute I start to squirm a little under his gaze. “What?” I touch my hair self-consciously. “Is something wrong?”
“No. I just felt something…familiar. Like a memory, but without any actual memories.” He shakes his head and laughs. “That made a lot more sense in my head.”
“So more like a feeling than an actual recollection?”
“Yeah. Exactly!” He pauses for a second, and then says, “Did I show you any other constellations that night?”
“I don’t know. Did you?” My tone is teasing, but part of me wonders if he’ll start to pull out some of those memories. They’re clearly in his brain somewhere.
“Brat!” He winks and grins before looking back up at the sky. After a long minute, he says, “I don’t really remember anything else. There’s something familiar about that one, but I don’t know the name of it. Hell, maybe it’s not even a constellation at all. But it looks like a Phoenix. Did I tell you about it?”
“You mentioned it briefly.” I try to hide my disappointment. What did I think? That just because he had a vague feeling of familiarity looking at stars with me that his entire memory would come flooding back—including our night together? “There really wasn’t much else. You told me how you used the constellations to navigate when you were in the Middle East. You showed me Draco, and the North Star, and the Big Dipper.” And he reminded me how to breathe by taking my breath away.
As soon as we’re inside the villa, Liam puts the keycard back in his pocket and says, “Lock the doors. I’ll be back in a few minutes.”
“Where are you going? We just got here.”
“I’ve got to go back to the lobby and make our flight plans for tomorrow, but I wanted to get you back here safely first.” Noticing my look of disappointment, he adds, “I’m sorry, sweetheart. I’ll be back as soon as I can, and then we’ll continue with our evening plans.”
With a quick brush of his lips across my forehead, he’s gone. I stare at the door, wondering what I’m supposed to do until he comes back. Get ready? And what exactly does one do to get ready for kinky sex? I take my time in the bathroom, brushing my hair, applying another coat of the mascara I picked up in town, and changing my white lacey thong for the black one. Sadly, my wardrobe is pretty limited. At least I splurged on sexy panties.
Eventually I run out of things to do. I consider pouring myself a drink, but Liam’s right. I need to be sober. I want to experience every minute of this evening.
Also, just like every other woman in America, I’ve read my share of romance books on the subject, and I know I need to keep my head so things stay safe and consensual. Not that I think Liam would ever hurt me—I wasn’t lying when I told him I trusted him with my life—but he’s experienced and I’m…well…not. His idea of kinky sex and mine might be totally different. In fact, given his penchant for pushing every boundary that he encounters, it’s a pretty safe bet.
Oh God. I need to make a list of what I want and don’t want! I read about it somewhere. There’s a name for it, but I can’t remember what it is. Glad to have something to do, I eagerly grab the pad of paper and start writing.
I’m so engrossed in my list making that I don’t realize Liam has come back until he’s standing in front of me, looking sexy as sin. He’s still wearing theslacks and button-down shirt he wore to the nightclub, but he’s unbuttoned the top few buttons of his shirt, revealing that smooth, well-defined chest of his. I suddenly have the urge to follow that line of hair that goes down the center with my tongue, all the way to his—
“What are you doing?”
“What?” I tear my eyes away from his chest. “Oh. Making a list.” He lifts his eyebrows. “You know, of things you can do. What I want, what I will do, what I won’t do…” The words tumble out of my mouth in a rush of nervousness.Dammit, Charlotte. You’re supposed to be the sexy ingenue, I remind myself. But I’m having trouble finding her right now. Especially with that look on his face. There’s a decidedly dangerous look in his eyes.
He holds out his hand. “Let me have it.” I hand him the piece of paper. His lips twitch as he skims my list silently. He pauses and looks up at me. “No anal? Seriously? You don’t know what you’re missing.” Oh my God. I knew it. He’s into way more than I’m ready for. Good thing I made the list.
“No threesomes?” Okay. He’s definitely laughing at me now. “Who do you think I’d share you with out here? The cartel?”
“Just covering all the bases,” I say defensively.
He turns back to the list. “No knives. No pain. No bruises.” He lifts an eyebrow. “No blow jobs?” This time he’s not teasing. There’s genuine surprise in his voice, and I don’t know how to tell him I’ve never liked a guy enough to be that intimate with him. I knew girls in high school who wouldn’t think of having sex with a guy but would give out blow jobs like candy canes at Christmas, but to me, it’s more intimate than sex, because it’s given for the sole purpose of his pleasure. Sex, on the other hand, is something you can separate yourself from without too much intimacy. At least, that’s what I thought before I met Liam.
Everything is different with Liam, including, I realize with surprise, my aversion to blow jobs. The thought of taking him in my mouth, of tasting him, of watching his eyes close in pleasure as his control slips away, is intoxicating.
But I have zero experience, and I’m terrified of doing it wrong, of gagging, of confirming his original belief that I’m a goody-two-shoes who doesn’t have any experience.
“I have a strong gag reflex,” I say lamely.
His eyes flare with a carnal heat at that. “You think that’s a bad thing sweetheart? There’s nothing sexier than a girl who chooses your cock over air.” Before I can formulate an answer to that, assuming I even could, he keeps going down the list. “Ah, this is a good one. ‘Go slow.’”
I can’t tell if he’s serious or teasing me, so I don’t say anything.
Meeting my gaze with his unwavering one, he slowly and deliberately rips my list in half, and then in half again twice more, and lets the pieces flutter to the floor. The look he’s giving me is decidedly predatory, and I take an involuntary step back. But my heart is beating faster, and I’m suddenly impossibly turned on.
“I know you like to know exactly what’s going to happen and how and when. But that’s not how it’s going to happen tonight. Tonight, it’s all or nothing. You give all the control, all the decisions, all the power to me. No lists, no rules, no overthinking it, no trying to orchestrate it all. You relinquish it all to me, or not at all.”
