“Touch me.”

She sits up enough to pull my thong down my legs. I squirm and squeeze my eyes shut again.

I’m totally naked now. She can see all of me.

My breath comes out in shuddering gasps as I lay there waiting to feel her fingers on me, but the moment never comes. After a few more breaths, I crack my eyes open.

She’s staring at my body, her eyes roaming over every inch of my skin, and there’s a tenderness in her face I’ve never seen her look at anyone else with, not in all the years I’ve known her.

In that moment, I know that if we’re going to do this, I want us to do it right.

“Moira, wait.”

She freezes and then meets my gaze.

“Should we stop? We don’t have to—”

“I want to. But first...” I take the deepest breath I can manage. “First I want you to kiss me. Please.”

She could smirk. She could pull an ‘I told you so.’ She could tell me to beg harder than that.

Instead, she leans over me and cradles the side of my face in her hand.

“I want to kiss you so bad,” she whispers.

Then she presses her mouth to mine.

The kiss is soft at first—softer than we ever went in the hallway. It’s slow too, with a curiosity that verges on hesitant, like we’re trying out a language we’re not totally sure how to speak yet.

She tastes as good as I remember. After a few minutes, I can’t help darting my tongue out to taste the inside of her mouth, just for a second. She whimpers and deepens the kiss, her tongue slipping between my lips. I clutch at her back, and she puts enough space between us to cup one of my breasts and squeeze without breaking the kiss.

I moan into her mouth, my hips bucking up of their own accord. She trails her hand lower, over my stomach and all the way to my thigh.

I pull my face back from hers just long enough to murmur, “Please.”

She keeps kissing me for a few minutes, her fingertips digging into my thigh, before she rolls onto her side and settles herself so we’re lying face to face on the blanket. She pushes my legs farther apart and then starts tracing my inner thighs. Goosebumps break out all over my body.

“You’re beautiful too, Kenzie,” she says, the words laced with reverence.

We both moan when she parts my folds with one of her fingers. She twists to press her face into my shoulder, swearing as she traces up and down the length of me.

“Fucking hell. You are soaked.”

“I want you.” I’m too caught up in the jolts of pleasure surging through me to be anything but honest.

She slips a finger inside me and starts to thrust. My eyes roll back, and I bite my lip so hard it hurts.

This is what I needed.

“Kiss me again,” I say, my voice reedy. “Oh god, please. Please kiss me.”

I want my tongue in her mouth while her fingers are inside me.

She brings her mouth to mine, adding a second finger as she does and using her thumb to stroke my clit. I gasp into her mouth. I can already feel my muscles tightening and clenching, the moment of release building inside me.

Her hair hangs around us like a curtain, blocking everything out but her. She’s moaning too, and she starts to thrust harder, taking me—fucking me—and spinning me farther and farther out of control with every flick of her thumb.

I’m edging towards some dark unknown, my toes curled around a towering cliff with no bottom in sight.