He blinks down at me, confused, but I smile and shove him a little farther away, so I have room to move. I turn over onto my belly, and reach across the mattress for the box that I’ve stashed on the other side, the box my no-good interfering roommate sent me. Who I shall love forever and will be given cookies the next time I see her.
I shove the package of markers out of the way, dig past the package of labels and the box of garbage bags, fingers searching and fumbling as I feel Ash’s warm palms cup and squeeze my ass, sending a bolt of heat racing through my entire body. Then finally, finally I lay my fingers on what I’m looking for, and snatch it up. I pull myself up to my knees and turn around to face Ash, holding the condom out to Ash in victory.
“That’s what was in the box from Autumn?” Ash asks, laughing.
My face is on fire. “Shut up,” I say, and toss the condom at him. It hits his chest and falls into his lap before he can catch it. Leaning forward, I press my mouth against his one more time.
“You can either laugh at me,” I say, letting my eyes flutter shut, “or you can put that to good use. What’s it gonna be?”
Suddenly, he’s not laughing anymore. I open my eyes and find him staring down at me, an intensity in his gaze I’ve never seen before. My heart thuds in my chest, heat coiling in my belly, and he reaches out and wraps an arm around my waist, hauling me closer, drawing me into his lap.
This is such a bad idea, a voice in the back of my mind reminds me. It’s not going to last. All you’ll wind up with is a handful of memories and a truckload of heartbreak if you let this happen.
Shut up, I tell the voice as I press my mouth to Ash’s, tangling my fingers in his hair again. He flips me back over so I’m on my back again, his weight a solid, heavy warmth pressing me down into the mattress as he runs his hands over my body.
“You are so fucking hot,” he murmurs against the skin of my neck, trailing kisses as he begins to trace a path down the front of my body. I squirm beneath his touch, fisting my hands in his short hair and tugging.
“Yeah,” I say. “God. Yeah, you, too.” I can’t get enough of him, of his skin against mine. We’re a tangle of hands and arms and flesh gliding hot against flesh, whispered words spoken against sweat and skin.
Then he grabs the condom from where it has fallen in the tangle of blankets, and tears it open as I pull his boxers down his hips. He kicks them off and they go flying over the edge of the bed and disappear from sight just as he reaches down and rolls the condom on. .
And then he’s pressing into me, and it’s hot and slick and a million different feelings all at once.
“Yes.” I breathe the word against his mouth, and as we move together, his lips claim mine once again.
There is no more talking, after that.
***
“So . . . ” Ash says as we lay there afterward, flopped on our backs on the mattress. I’m panting so hard, I can hardly catch my breath. I turn my head and watch as he shifts around so that he’s lying on his side, gazing down at me.
“Mmmhmmm?” This . . . this was amazing. This wasn’t the adolescent fumblings I’d shared with Brick, or the handful of drunken hookups I’d had during freshman year at college. This . . . This was better.
He trails the backs of his fingers up my side. I’m still buzzing with sensation. It feels amazing.
“I just wanted you to know, that this wasn’t . . . that this wasn’t just . . . you know . . . a one-time thing. At least, for me.” He’s staring down, straight into my eyes, and I feel a warm rush through my chest, giving my heart a little lurch. “It wasn’t for me,” he says again, and reaches up and cradles the side of my head with his hand.
I raise my hand and let my fingertips slide across his cheeks, up to his hairline, to tangle behind his head. And I can’t stop smiling as I pull him down to me. I kiss him, and tug him closer to me, press my body up against him as our mouths move together.
Our lips part and my eyes open and I’m looking straight at him when I answer. “It wasn’t just a one-time thing for me, either.”
A little smile tugs at the corner of his lips. “Promise?” he says, but it’s hesitant. Unsure. And his eyes drop from mine. His body tenses. And suddenly I realize that he’s bracing himself for me to shake my head or laugh it off. He’s bracing himself for rejection. My heart does something traitorous in my chest, and I struggle to swallow over the lump that’s forming in my throat.
“Hey,” I say, reaching out and touching the edge of his jaw, tugging his face back up so that he’s looking me in the eye. His gaze flickers back and forth across my face, catching my eyes over and over again as I do the same. I want to look at every bit of him, all at once. I feel like I could look forever, and it still wouldn’t be enough. I lean forward and press my mouth to his. “I promise,” I whisper as we part, and he smiles but even then it doesn’t quite meet his eyes.
“Hey,” I say again, because he’s not getting it. He doesn’t believe me. So I do the only thing I can; I bring my left hand up between us, holding my pinkie out to him. That makes the half-smile he was sporting turn full-fledged, and we’re both grinning like idiots as he reaches up and links his finger with mine and we waggle our linked hands back and forth, cementing the deal.
Then I kiss him again, just to make it official.
Chapter 16
Ash
This…this is nice.
Fuck. There’s that word again. Nice.
Before the crash, before everything that happened and all the shit that followed, I’d never really thought about what I wanted my life to look like. And when I did, what I brought to mind sure as hell wasn’t this. I always thought I’d be some famous goddamn artist, drinking and doing whatever drug I could get my hands on, living my life in the moment.
But this moment, this single snapshot in a day with Star, it’s nice. Spending our day together, fucking in her bed, dozing off next to each other. It’s nothing I’d ever thought I’d want for the long term. But now that I have it, I don’t want it to end. Five years ago, if someone had told me that this would be the fucking highlight of my life, I’d have laughed my ass off. I was an idiot five years ago. Star, these moments I have with her? They make me want more. They make me want to do better. To be better. Hell, just being here with her, walking my stupid mutt down the road with her next to me, it makes something in me tug. Like there’s a fishing hook looped behind my navel, and every time she turns her head and smiles at me, I feel drawn toward her, like she’s reeling me in.
We’d woken up this morning like we had for the past two weeks, in bed next to one another, me trailing my hands over her body, though her hair, her nuzzling into my chest, clinging to me like I’m something important. Something special. I’ve never felt special to anyone before. I kissed her head and run my fingers down her naked skin, over all the colors and designs she’d let me mark her with after we’d had sex. Her body was this gorgeous canvas, covered in my sketches. She was fucking beautiful.