Page 85 of The Paradise Problem

“I’m not—I don’t have—”

“You don’t have condoms hidden somewhere in this kitchen?” I joke, my voice tight and broken at the feel of him jerking inside me.

His answering laugh is distracted and soundless, a gasp in reverse as he pulls all the way out. “No.”

“I’m not feeling responsible,” I admit.

“Me, either, but we can—”

I pull his mouth to mine, kissing him messily, hungrily, whispering the truth against his lips, that I’m on birth control and also? I wouldn’t fuck a single person in LA without a condom, now or ever. “I want you.” I suck his lip into my mouth, roughly dragging my teeth over it. “I want this.”

He closes his eyes, kissing me before speaking the next words against my mouth. “If you tell me to stop—”

“I know.”

He sends a big hand down my leg, cupping my calf, gripping an ankle, and with his free hand holds himself to ease in again and back, an inch at a time, his jaw tight, eyes trained on the progress. West holds his breath, transfixed as he works himself slowly into me, but I’m gasping; I’ve never felt anything like this, never been so excessively full. I reach back, flattening my palms on the counter so I can lift my hips and help him get there, working my body around him. With a bursting exhale, he groans, pulling me back to his chest, and he’s all the way in, finally. I wrap my arms around his neck, silently asking for a minute to figure out how to fit these deep, gasping breaths and him inside me at the same time. But then the tension leaves my body and all I know is the blinding need to feel him moving.

“You okay?” he asks, his lips to my jaw.

“I just need—”

He covers my mouth with his when my voice breaks off, pulling out in a slow drag, pushing carefully back in, and out, and in, and out, again and again, deeper on each pass until he’s thrusting in earnest and I’m positive I’ve never felt anything so consuming in my life. My skin is fire, brain haywire as he bends, licking a long streak of heat up my neck, stopping at my ear. “Wrap those long fucking legs around me.”

Delirious with need, I do what he says, sliding my thighs around his hips, locking my ankles behind his back. Instinct tells me to squeeze hard and I’m right; he is overcome, thrusting rougher with the constraining grip of my thighs.

I reach down, feeling where he’s moving, feeling the heat and slide, and he encourages me with a quiet “Yeah,” moving faster, watching my hand as I touch myself. I’m torn between chasing this sensation and giving him everything I can: those sharp tugs on his hair that seem to unravel him, the scrape of my nails down his back. But when I move my hand, he catches my wrist, protesting. “No. Don’t stop.”

I meet his eyes, but they fall closed when he leans in to kiss me, messy and wet. “I liked the way your nails felt.” He laughs quietly, somehow both wicked and shy. “The way they—”

“Tell me.”

“The gentle scratch. On me.”

I’ve been right there, right at the edge of falling, and the spiraling heat of his words sends me closer, my fingers moving even faster, not only chasing my own pleasure but trying to reach him now, to tap against him as he moves, to give him the tiny, delicious licks of pain. He nods, wordless, lips soft and parted as he fucks me and I have the thought that he’s the most amazing combination in one man: gentle and rough, intuitive and steely, grounded and broken, but before I can look at this more carefully—before I can put the pieces together about why I’m thinking more about the man than about the pleasure he’s giving me—my orgasm blindsides me, a wrecking ball flung violently sideways. I cry out in sharp surprise, clinging to West with my free hand, cupping his neck and holding his head to mine as it tears through me.

He works me through it, fast and hard, and only when I fall forward, clinging to him, does he slow to take my face in his hands, kissing me with velvet seduction, sucking on my lips, licking at me, inhaling my jagged, panting breaths. He whispers into my mouth, “You good?”

I laugh in response, euphoric.

“Sore?” he asks.

I shake my head in his cupped hands, and he releases me, gently pressing a palm to my breastbone, coaxing me to lean back onto my elbows. With leisurely shifts of his hips, West fucks me slow while his big hands roam all over me, caressing my breasts and throat, lips and cheeks, stomach and hips and thighs. But eventually, I feel the urgency rise in him, the growing tension of his torso. Setting one hand gently at the base of my throat and using the other to grip my dress around my waist, he begins in earnest again, eyes fixed on the most perfect coordinate in the world, the place where he disappears inside me.

It’s the kind of raw, honest sex I’ve never had before and will want desperately again, but I’m too distracted to commit to the mental focus I’d need to come a second time. Instead I watch, rapt, as his pleasure plays across his features, watching the way concentration pinches his brow, watching the sheer power of his lovemaking. I am a starving dragon, deprived and obsessed, inhaling every one of his tells: his grip growing tighter, forming a fist around the fabric of my dress; his jerking, rough breaths; those rare seconds he squeezes his eyes closed, wincing in pleasure. And when he makes a sound—a new one this time, deep and warning—a desperate, aching awareness rises in me. I gasp out a pleading yes and West’s eyes turn up to my face, his focus on my lip trapped tightly between my teeth, his pace turning furious for a blurred, euphoric handful of seconds. With a groan he drops his gaze again, sending his hand between us as he jerks out of me and sends his pleasure pulsing across my skin.

Wild victory tears through me as he stares down at my stomach, gasping, and then bends over me, resting his sweaty forehead to my chest. “Holy shit.”

I dig one hand in his hair, dizzy with relief and lust and infatuation, scratching lightly at his scalp while he heaves in sharp, jagged breaths. Finally, he tilts his face up, stretching to kiss me, slow and adoring.

“You okay?” he asks.

I can only tell him the truth. “That was the best sex I’ve ever had.”

He smiles, kissing me again. “Yeah?”

I nod, and for a few perfect seconds, we share the same breath, kissing like we’ve done it for centuries.

Pulling back, I reach up, pushing his sweaty hair off his forehead. “Definitely worth burning the shit out of the pizza.”

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