Love Will

  “I love your hair like that,” I tell her, cupping my hands over her ears and kissing her as soon as she lets me in. I close my fingers gently around her lobes, letting the tips of them hang loosely to her small, dangling earrings. “You look adorable tonight.”

  “You’re late,” she says.

  “The guys made me have dinner with them. If we’re gonna pursue something, it might make sense for us to exchange numbers before I leave tomorrow.”

  “Maybe,” she agrees playfully.

  “Your ears are cold.” I kiss her cheeks, working my way back to her ears and kissing each one multiple times in an attempt to warm them up.

  “Let’s move away from the windows,” she suggests in a whisper, linking her pinky with mine and leading me to the counter in the back. “Have you had dessert?”

  “I thought that’s why I was here…” She glares at me. “I deserve that. No, I haven’t.”

  “I made a cake.”

  “I like cake,” I tell her. “What kind?”

  “Chocolate with strawberry icing. You better like it because it’s my specialty.” She walks into the kitchen.

  “It sounds amazing.” I look down at the counter and read a page of the book that’s open at the spot where Shea had been sitting, then flip through a few pages until I see some familiar scribbles. “Holy shit!”

  “What?” she yells from the other room.

  “My book. You’ve got my brother’s book here.” I return it to its open page and jog into the kitchen to find her. “I thought someone had taken it, and my brother wants it to stay in the family, so thank you so much.” I remove the knife from her hand and kiss her again. “You just saved my ass.”

  “I told you that you shouldn’t donate it. I wasn’t going to let you leave it there. It’s a great book, too.”

  “Wait, so you’re actually reading it?”

  “Of course. I wanted to know what your favorite book was all about. And the notes you guys have added… you guys are brilliant. Which ones are yours? Wait, red ink, right?”

  I look at her, stunned. “Red ink, yeah,” I answer her softly.

  “I knew it,” she says with a smile.

  “How’d you know?”

  “The thoughts just sounded like you, that’s all. Some of them are so witty… and some, so profound that I just sit and think on them for minutes at a time. Just obviously Will. Make sure you take it with you tomorrow.”

  “Keep it,” I encourage her.

  “Your brother wants it in the family.”

  “Shea, I’ll get it back next time I see you. I want you to finish it, if you’d like to.”

  “I definitely want to. You really think we’ll see each other again?”

  “I thought that was the plan,” I tell her, confused. “I don’t want any other lovers, Shea. The thought of being with someone else is… weird to me, all of a sudden.”

  “How do I get the upgrade?” she asks, picking up the knife again and cutting into the circular cake that’s topped with chocolate-covered strawberries.

  “What’s the upgrade from lover?”

  “I don’t know… maybe girlfriend? Maybe it’s too soon to even be talking about this,” she says, shaking her head. “But you brought up exclusivity, sort of, so…”

  “It’s okay,” I say. “But isn’t girlfriend a downgrade? I thought lover would be an upgrade.”

  She stares at me like I’m nuts. “No. Girlfriend means there’s a commitment. Lover just means you’re casually fucking.”

  “No,” I argue, picking up a strawberry from the slice she’s cut. I hold it out to her, offering it to her, and she takes it willingly. I watch her lips close around it, which arouses me instantly, and kiss her before recalling that we were having a conversation. “No,” I continue, remembering my stance, “if you’re just casually fucking, you’re a fuck buddy or a sex partner. If you do it more regularly, then you bump up to girlfriend. But you go to lover because there’s feeling in the word lover. There’s no feeling in the word girlfriend or fuck buddy or sex partner.”

  “There’s feeling in sex partner. You feel like you’re a part of something…” she says, obviously not liking my definition.

  I scoff at her argument. “I feel like I’m a part of something when I stand in line to take a piss, but that’s not a feeling. There’s a feeling in the word lover. A genuine feeling: love.”

  She looks up at me seriously. “Do you love me, Will?”

  I put my hands behind her neck and rub her rosy cheeks with my thumbs. “There’s definitely the potential for that here, Shea.” My heart pounds.

  She grabs onto my shirt near my shoulders and pulls me toward her, kissing me once again. It’s one of the holy-fuck-I’m-about-to-lose-consciousness kisses. I put one arm around her waist and grasp onto the lip of the stove to steady myself as I feel my legs weaken. “You ever had sex in your kitchen?” I whisper to her once we break apart.

  “That’s a serious health code violation.”

  “What are they gonna do? Shut the place down?” I tease her.

  “I’m not closed yet,” she says to me. “Here.” She feeds me a strawberry, covered in chocolate and icing. After I’ve swallowed the food, she offers to lick the remnants from my lips.

  I pick her up and set her on the countertop and find a comfortable place between her legs, pushing her skirt out of the way and wishing she didn’t have the leggings on. As we kiss, I pull her into me closer, growing harder by the millisecond, feeling her tongue remove the sweet, sugary topping from my mouth.

  “Can we save the cake for later?” I ask her.

  “Yes.”

  “Want to go back to your place with me?”

  “Please,” she answers.

  There’s already a fire burning in her living room. The glow of it emanates a warmth and ambiance that summons us both toward it. I stop by her room first and grab all the pillows and blankets I can find. She helps me to arrange them on the floor. I take off my shirt first, but then look at her, wanting to focus all my attention there.

  Taking the black skirt in my hands, I bring her to me with it. Finding the zipper, I pull it slowly and push the garment down her legs, leaving her standing in front of me in what I now realize are long johns that are artfully disguised with a cute pattern and sexy cut that reveals part of her breasts as soon as I unfasten the top button. They’re form-fitting, revealing all of her curves.

  “This is fucking hot,” I tell her.

  “I had to stay warm,” she says coyly.

  “You know that’s not what I meant.” I unbutton the other two buttons, which go down to her sternum, exposing lacy lingerie underneath. “And I was not expecting this.”

  “Right?” she asks me, proud of her choice of clothing.

  I pull her pants down a little to try to figure out what sort of lingerie I’m actually dealing with. It’s a one-piece that splits down the front, connecting at two points with small ribbons–one at her sternum and the other near her belly button. Tiny, mesh bottoms complete the ensemble.

  “It’s like tomboy on top, and total sex kitten underneath. Fuck… I feel so ordinary.”

  “You’re anything but ordinary, especially when you’re not wearing anything at all, so… let’s just start there,” she suggests, undoing my jeans for me. I push them off my body and put my thumbs under the waistband of my boxers, pausing for a second.

  “Want me to do the honors?” she asks me.

  “If you want, sure,” I say, smiling. Slowly, she kneels in front of me, keeping her face angled up toward me, her eyes locked with mine. I thought I was already as turned on as I could be, but I feel myself straining even more to be freed from the confines of my underwear now, seeing her mouth so close to my dick.

  Am I gonna let her do this?

  Shea carefully undresses me the rest of the way. After I step out of my boxers, her tongue encircles my tip once, causing me to groan in pleasure, before I fall to my knees, join her on the blanket, and claim h
er lips with mine. She struggles to free herself, but I won’t let her go. I’d decided I wasn’t going to be hedonistic tonight. Everything we do tonight will either be for her pleasure or for ours together, but not for mine alone. I’d lived for years being a self-indulgent prick with other women. That would end tonight.

  Realizing she still has way too many clothes on, I pull away and look at her with a self-satisfied grin.

  “I want to do that for you, Will.”

  “And I’m not going to let you,” I tell her, not even looking her in the eyes. My focus is on her shirt, which I take the ends of in my hands and slowly pull over her head. “Oh, God, Shea… how do I…? How does it…?”

  “In the back,” she says. I put my hand on her lower back and lean her into it, kissing her neck, collarbone, and all the skin exposed by the lingerie. My lips move slowly, allowing my tongue to taste her body along the way. I swear she tastes like the chocolate-covered strawberries we were just eating.

  “Your pants have to come off.”

  “Okay,” she breathes, leaning back on her palms and letting me greedily pull off the other cotton garment rather forcefully. The cuffs at the bottom are tight over her ankles and make me work for it. She laughs in the process, her toes pointed like a dancer, her calf muscles tense.

  “Can I take a picture of you like this?” I ask her. “Just for me?” She nods, sitting up and swinging her legs to one side of her body. She releases the clip from her hair, shaking it out. It’s messy, falling in waves around her light-brown face, framing her dark-brown eyes. The fire glints in them when she angles her head slightly to the left, so that’s what I ask her to do.

  Naked as the day I was born, I artfully take a few pictures of her so I can remember exactly what she looks like in this moment. She maintains the sexy look in her eyes, showing me how much she wants me through the lens of the camera on my phone, so I don’t lose my arousal for a second. When I’m done, I toss my phone on the pile of clothes and crawl over to her, kissing her.

  “Thank you,” I tell her. “Now lie down.” She starts to lie back on the blanket. “No… on your stomach, please.”

  “Really?” she asks.

  “Really,” I confirm, getting a good look at her from behind after she settles her head against the pillows. The lingerie doesn’t cover her backside at all; it’s a g-string that blossoms into more frilly lace and mesh just below the two ribbons that hold the piece on her body. “God, I am so happy I asked you to turn around, Shea,” I tell her, palming her ass in my hands. “This is gorgeous.”

  “The teddy?”

  “You. Every fucking inch of you.” I lean down and kiss each cheek before letting my tongue loose at the base of her spine. As it works its way up her back, it only stops so I can unfasten the two hooks in the back, giving me a clear path to lick my way back down. Wanting to go further, I quickly figure out how to get the lingerie off of her. I need to remove the straps from her shoulders.

  They deserve some attention, too.

  This time, I plant soft kisses on her skin until I reach her neck, moving her hair to the side so I don’t miss a spot. I lie my body down against hers, steadying myself on one arm so that I’m not crushing her under my weight, but I’m close enough to feel all the curves and muscles; to know all the places I want to explore with her tonight.

  Shea moves her legs apart, allowing mine to rest between them. It’s a purposeful maneuver on her part. I can tell by the way she begins to grind her hips and her ass against me. It wasn’t my intention to take her this way–I’d only asked her to turn over so I could undress her–but I’m not saying I don’t want to. I really do want to.

  Distracted, I close my eyes and move with her slowly. I don’t think she can get off this way, but it must be doing something to turn her on because she starts in with her quiet moaning. It awakens me enough to remember that I’d wanted her naked. As I reach for the left strap on her shoulder, she shimmies out of it, and then the right one, too, wanting to be rid of the lingerie as much as I want her out of it.

  She pushes up on her hands and knees, letting me take the rest of it off of her, but fuck! I grab her waist and hold her upright, taking her breasts in my hands and kissing her neck. “I am out of control in lust with you right now,” I confess to her as I move one hand down her body. She flinches at the initial contact, but then sinks into the movements, allowing my fingers to do what they’re expertly skilled to do.

  She starts breathing heavily, the beginning of her orgasm, I already know the signs, but instead of letting it happen, she moves my hand away and lies back down on her stomach, reaching for my wallet. I hurriedly grab it from her, pulling out the first of a string of condoms and putting it on. I lift her hips slightly before entering her, knowing how to make this incredibly pleasurable for both of us.

  “Ahhh-aaa!” she cries out in two breaths.

  “Too much?” I ask, stopping all motion.

  “Ahhh…” she sighs again.

  “Say something else.”

  “Ohhh,” she says, only this time I can hear notes of satisfaction underlying her quiet exclamation. “Did you get… bigger?” she asks. “Is that even possible?”

  “Shhhhut up,” I tell her, pulling out a little before pushing myself back in slowly.

  “I’m not kidding.”

  “It’s the position. It’s best for deep penetration. Can we stop discussing the mechanics?”

  “So if I say go deeper…”

  I hitch her hips a little more and push against her.

  “Oh, fuck. Oh, Will. Ohhhh…”

  “Keep going?”

  “Shut up and keep going.” I chuckle and do what I’m told, watching as her hands grip tightly to the plush blanket she’s lying on.

  “Faster? Slower?”

  “Slow right now. I want to savor this,” she says.

  “I’ll go slow until I can’t, and I’m not sure how long that’s gonna be… if you had the view I had… fuck, Shea…” I ease into her again, punctuating it with a hard thrust that sets me ablaze and causes her to squeal. I lean down to kiss the middle of her back before I do it again.

  She’s the one that starts to speed things up. I’ve apparently found a spot, and she’s found a rhythm, and we go faster and faster, harder and harder, until her voice is hoarse from screaming my name and the tremors from my body are dissipating into hers. After I come, I feel like all the energy and heat that had been coursing through me have been transferred into her, and I roll over, wrapping my arms around her, shivering, cold.

  “Are you okay?” she asks me.

  “Freezing,” I tell her, barely able to get the word out.

  She squirms a little until I loosen my grasp, allowing her to turn to face me. When she reaches for the blankets, I release her and let her envelop us in the comforters, even though her forehead is dotted with perspiration.

  When she cuddles back into me, one arm and one leg draped over me along with more blankets than I can count, I realize we’re both sweaty, but I’m still drained of any warmth and trembling. She kisses me softly as we stare into each others eyes.

  “That must have been some orgasm,” she says to me.

  I nod my head, smiling, completely satisfied. “What about yours?”

  “You have to ask?”

  “Don’t answer my question with a question,” I urge her, pleading. “That’s deflection. That’s a negative response most of the time.”

  “I certainly didn’t mean it that way, Will.” She kisses me again, but keeps her eyes focused on mine. “I’m not going to lie, I was a little hesitant when you had me on my stomach. I always find more of an emotional connection when I can see into a guy’s eyes, and that heightens my pleasure.”

  “Okay,” I say, understanding. “I honestly had no intention of doing it like that tonight… not that I don’t like it that way. I obviously do. But I like being face-to-face, too. I totally get what you’re saying.”

  “You gonna let me finish answering yo
ur question, Will Spaceman?”

  “I thought you were done.”

  “Well, I’m not,” she says playfully, pressing her lips to the tip of my nose.

  “I’m sorry.”

  “It’s okay.” I’m finally starting to feel normal again as her body shares its heat with mine. “I will gladly alternate some sort of missionary and whatever the fuck you did to me tonight from now on if you can always make me feel what I felt because it was like every last one of my cells was surging into spontaneous combustion.”

  “Technically,” I say, “it wouldn’t be spontaneous because they’d be burning up due to an external stimulus… and that would be me.”

  “Is this what being with an astrophysicist would always be like?” she asks, narrowing her eyes at me.

  “The musician would just say, ‘Thanks for the fuck,’ and be on his way. Take your pick.”

  “So next time I should say, maybe… ‘surging into planned combustion?’”

  This time, I move in to kiss her. “I’m really glad you liked it, Shea. Don’t ever do anything with me you’re not comfortable with. Or what did you say? Hesitant to do? I’m an adult. I can handle rejection.”

  “I’m an adult, too,” she says. “I’ll say no when I need to.”

  “Okay.” I pull my hand out from under the covers and brush her hair back to expose her ear. “Who’d you get your ears from?” She rolls her eyes at me. “Don’t do that. I love your ears. Are they your mom’s or your dad’s?”

  “Dad’s… and they stick out too far.”

  “You know what I think? Have you ever really studied your ears?” She shakes her head at me as I trace around her right one with my index finger. “It truly is a perfect ear, visually. It’s all perfectly proportioned. The lobe isn’t too long or too short. The helix isn’t too thick or too thin. The tragus has a perfect arch.”

  “Are you making up words?”

  “No!” I laugh at her. “I took a few anatomy courses, that’s all. What I’m saying, though, is that these ears could be models for ideal ears, so you say they stick out too far, but I think they’re just a little more pronounced to show the world what an ear should look like. Sort of how you’d put a spectacular piece of sculpture on a pedestal or something in the middle of a museum.