Page 109 of Daydream

He walks over to me as I stand, his hands tug at the bow keeping my sweatpants tight, and his mouth captures mine delicately. “I love art, too.”

He’s careful as he walks me backward, pulling my T-shirt over my head and letting my pants drop. His hands link at the back of my neck and I realize he’s taking off my necklace. “No,” I say, my hand clamping over theHprotectively. “It’s bad luck if I take it off.”

“Do you want it to get ruined by body paint?” I shake my head. “Nothing bad is going to happen because you took it off.”

Weirdly, it’s taking off the necklace that makes me feel the most exposed, and not the fact he’s stripped me down to my underwear. He disappears into the bathroom and reappears with a foil packet and throws it beside the canvas. Picking up the paint bottles from the floor, he breaks the plastic seal binding them and asks me to pick a color. “Purple.”

Henry puts the others on the floor and has me take a few steps backward so we’re both standing on the protective sheet. “I’m going to take my underwear off and then yours. Are you good with that?”

I nod, my body feeling extra jittery. I feel like I’m watching his every move with the most intense interest. He’s already getting hard when he drops his boxers, then my panties, and when he undoes the clasp of my bra and slides the straps over my shoulders, my nipples stiffen.

“It might be a little cold,” he says, opening the lid of the paint bottle. He gives me one last fleeting kiss before squeezing the bottle onto my chest. I flinch a little and goose bumps spread across my skin. The paint begins to run; he catches one droplet with his thumb and presses it between my collarbones. “No bad luck,” he says as he signs my skin with the sameH.

I pick up a bottle from the floor, not even looking at the color as I open the cap and squirt it against his chest. Henry takes it from my hand and squirts it across my legs.

The pattern continues. Laughing, grabbing, painting, kissing. He maneuvers us down to the floor, the paint he squirted against my ass sliding against the fabric. His hands cup my breasts, leaving large blue handprints. The blue swirls into the pink as his thumb grazes my nipple.

We compare who has the cleanest hands, and when I win, I rip the foil and roll the condom onto him. Even with all the practice,there’s still a split second where I think I’m not going to be able to remember how to do it.

He lines himself up, and my body melts when he pushes in gently. “You feel so good,” he whispers, his hands planted firmly beside my head as his hips move against mine.

Everything about him feels perfect.

I whimper in protest when he pulls out, sitting on his heels as he reaches for more paint. Holding my leg up by my foot, he takes off the lid entirely and pours the blue paint from my ankle to my knee. He repeats on the other side with red. “What are you doing?” I ask, sitting up on my elbows to watch him hard at work.

“Blue and red make purple. Get onto your knees.”

“Yes, Captain.” The way he glares at me is worth it when I move onto my hands and knees and he pours more paint across my ass and slaps it. I follow his lead when his hands push my shoulders down until my chest is touching the canvas.

Henry takes hold of my hips, moaning loudly when he sinks into me again.

The sound of paint splashing as his skin slaps against mine is pushing me toward the edge. Putting my cheek flat on the ground, I reach back for his hand. He’s holding it tightly when we both come, collapsing onto the material.

There’s a period of silence, as there always is with us while we try to return to earth from the stars. I didn’t realize I could feel like this.

“Halle,” he says gently.

“Yeah?” I respond, my heart hammering in my chest.

“You have paint on your cheek.”

The hammering slows down. “Thanks for letting me know.”

THE SHOWER TAKES TWICE ASlong as the art because we’re so dedicated to making sure no paint is missed.

I’m pretty sure I’m going to be finding specks of purple for a long time. “I need to go home and clean up for my parents arriving tomorrow,” I yell from his bathroom as I pull on one of the Titan T-shirts with his name on it.

Henry appears in the doorway, his pants low on his hips while he rubs body butter across his chest and biceps. “You can’t go outside with wet hair. You’ll get sick again. I only just made you better.”

“That’s a myth. I’ll be fine. And if I’m not, I’m kind of a big fan of you looking after me.”

He frowns. “At least put it in a nest or something.”

“It’s a real good job you’re so pretty because you sure can be bossy.” Reaching beneath the bathroom counter, I find his box of stuff. There’s a tiny label on the front of it that didn’t used to be there: Halle’s. “I missed a chapter.”

“What? Of your book? It’s probably because you get distracted so easily.”

“No, not my book, and don’t even get me started on who gets distracted easily. I missed a chapter where you put my name on this stuff.”

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