Page 77 of A Wedding in a Week

It’s damp and driving.

Hot and hurried.

We skid and slide and brace against whatever’s closest, fucking against the bath, Marc grasping its edge to push back as hard as I slam in. Against the sink too, Marc clambering upright again, and I stand, or stagger, my head spinning, but I get to see his face reflected, so I go slower, taking in how I must feel this deep inside him. I knock his legs further apart and grind so he clings to the taps, white-knuckled, but I see so much pleasure. So much passion for me. He’s the opposite of passive, and thank fuck my heart is sturdy.

I also spot a grimace and stop, spitting into my hand to slick my cock, but Marc finds lube and that’s even better—I ease back in, going slower, feeling so much more than pleasure as he takes all of me.

I’m made for this.

For him.

It’s never been better.

I want it to last until Marc curses, and our eyes meet in the mirror. Like every single time that I try to list what I see in his gaze, hazel isn’t enough. Liquid doesn’t cut it either.

It’s love, and I’m falling, but Marc falls with me, and we’re back where we started on the floor, only this time, he straddles me.

“Harder, Stef. Like you mean it.”

I give him what he asks for, what he needs to stop thinking, but he must see what I need too—we finish with our mouths fused, my cock so far inside him it must nestle next to his heart.

I feel it beating, or maybe that’s his orgasm pulsing.

I pulse too, filling a condom I never expected to find or use in a duke’s bathroom, but Marc clenches around me and I stop thinking of anything at all for long and blissful moments where there’s just us in our bubble.

It doesn’t pop yet.

We lie inside it, Marc wiping his come in lazy circles on my belly. Then he shivers, his nipples tight and hardened, and I roll away to refill the bath for him.

“Get back in and warm up.”

Marc does, yawning while I right the wreckage of this bathroom.

He yawns again when I join him. Before I slide in behind Marc, he asks, “Pass me my phone?”

I do and steam curls as he checks it, his exhale another long huff of relief. He lets out another after laying back against my chest, and that’s better.

I hold Marc, both of my arms locked around him, and I don’t know how long we soak there, saying nothing. Long enough for candles to sputter and burn out, or maybe that was down to our splashing. All I know is that we’re in the dark again when his head against my shoulder tilts to the side.

I follow his eyeline to the open window.

“No stars,” he murmurs into the night. “Not like at home.”

He’s right. This night sky is a canvas washed amber with light pollution.

“But they’re still there, aren’t they? Above here and Cornwall,” he asks even though he must know the answer.

I nod, and here comes what he really needs to tell me.

“I used to count them. Never managed to finish. Now I don’t know when I’ll see them again.”

My heart hurts, but I say this. “You can count them again when you’re ready.”

“But what if—”

“When you’re both ready,” I repeat, picturing an egg timer, its sand not falling but suspended. “I’ll be waiting.”

27

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