Page 54 of Resurgent
Chapter Fifteen
Charlotte
“What do you think?” I twirl in front of Liam, the soft floaty fabric of the short, navy, strapless dress caressing my bare thighs. True to his word, he’d bought me several dresses at a small boutique in Semporna. I picked my favorite to wear for our last night in Malaysia.
“You look beautiful,” he says, his eyes shining. He stands and crosses the distance between us. “This dress is giving me wicked ideas.” Before I can ask what they are, he tugs the elasticized, shirred bodice down, and my breasts spring free. With a smile, he bends down and takes one into his mouth, the warm heat of his tongue flicking the tip until I moan. He sucks and tugs, then lets it go, admiring the now-rosy and erect point he’s made. “I love how responsive your nipples are to me.”How responsive all of me is to him,I think. He reluctantly pulls my dress back up, but makes sure he does it slowly so the elasticized fabric scrapes over my nipples erotically. I glance down. “I wasn’t going to wear a bra, but I may have to now.”
“Don’t you dare.” His smile fades. “We leave in the morning.”
“Back to Mexico?”
“Yes. But tonight is ours. I want to take you to dinner somewhere nice, take a walk along the beach. Enjoy our last night together before whatever happens when we get back to Mexico.”
An hour later, we walk hand in hand down to one of the restaurants at the resort. Mabul is small, and everyone is here to dive, but the nicer resorts like ours have capitalized on the touristy side of things and have a spa and several restaurants. Liam has made reservations for us in the nicest of the two, and we order wine and a selection of seafood, along with a few side dishes our waiter assures us are culinary favorites.
“Try this,” Liam says, lifting a piece of shrimp to my lips with his fingers. There’s something both sweet and erotic about the gesture, and on impulse, I take his fingers into my mouth along with the food. Even in the dimly lit restaurant, I can see his eyes darken with lust.
“I wish we had more time. The things I’d love to do with you…so many more things to discover together.”
“Me too,” I say.
After dinner, we take a walk along the beach. There’s something about the beach at night—the secret rhythmic crash of waves in the distance, the moon reflected on the black water—that makes me long for something more, something hidden deep inside me like a pearl just waiting to be discovered. Or maybe it’s just because it reminds me of Playa del Carmen. That night seems so long ago, and in so many ways, so different. Liam had been different. Dominant still, but not like he’s been with me this time… Demanding, ruthless even, in his need to possess me.
“Have you always been interested in kinky sex?” I ask him.
He’s quiet for a moment, considering. “I’ve always liked to be in control.”
I roll my eyes. “No kidding.”
He shoots me a sidelong glance and smiles. “Youdosee me in ways no one else does,” he marvels. He threads his fingers with mine and continues. “I’ve blindfolded girls before and tied up a few, and there was one pretty memorable and drunk time in Prague with some ice and wax, but to be honest, I’ve never had the dynamic we’ve had the last few days…or the craving to possess someone the way I need to with you.”
We walk silently for a few minutes, and then he says, “I’ve never met a girl like you—one who looks at you sweetly before giving you a devilish grin and destroying you with her submission, which is all the sweeter precisely because she’s such a control freak.” His voice drops. “One who gets wetter the harder she’s pinned.”
“Are you trying to turn me on? Because it’s totally working.”
His voice is gruff with need as he says, “All we have left is tonight, baby. I intend to make it count. I want to see you bathed in moonlight, and make you come under the stars.”
His words are an echo of that night in Playa that changed everything, and I search his face for a sign that he remembers.
“What?” he says, giving me that grin of his that makes my stomach somersault.
“Nothing.”
We make it back to the hotel, but we don’t turn on any lights, instead stepping out onto the deck over the water by unspoken agreement. He comes up behind me as he slips off first my dress and then my panties.
“You’re beautiful,” he says reverently. With my back pressed to his chest, we both face the dark ocean illuminated by a blanket of stars. His lips are on my neck, his fingers on my sex, and I’m already desperate for him to fill me, to make me his one more time.
With a growl, he scoops me up and lays me down on the cushioned chaise, his arm braced over me as he looks into my eyes, an inexplicable look on his face. “I wish we had more time. More time to explore your boundaries, and mine.” He nips my chin as his hand skims down my stomach. “I want to give you everything.”
“You already have,” I whisper.
Our lovemaking is different tonight, slow and sweet and filled with a certain finality that makes it even more special. I savor every kiss, every touch of his hand, every thrust, every cry as we come together half a world away from everything familiar, yet in this moment, he feels like home.
Afterward, we lie together on the chaise, our bodies touching, my head on his chest, looking up at the stars.
“There’s the phoenix,” I say, pointing to the constellation he’d shown me in Playa del Carmen, and again in Playa Nayarit. “Funny how we’ve seen it everywhere we’ve been. Like it’s some kind of omen.”
He sighs. “I hope so. I would love nothing more than to emerge from this whole debacle like the phoenix who was burned in the fire and rose up again from the ashes to start a new life. One where I’m not smuggling guns, or accused of double-crossing the government, or on the run from the cartel.”
