Page 112 of The Cost of Forgetting You

“Flip over.” He slips away from me and grabs my hips, guiding me into position. He gathers my hair in his fist and pulls, arching my back with the movement. “Just like that.”

When he enters me again, my entire body reacts. I feel him so deeply I forget how to breathe. How to speak. I forget everything except him and the sensation of his body moving within mine, building that fire in my core till it burns so hot I’m certain I’ll combust.

“Do you want to feel really good, baby?”

“Yes!” I already do.

“Mm, I knew you’d be so good. So willing.” His hand cups my ass and he spits. I feel it land between my spread cheeks. His thumb strokes through it and then presses into my ass.

Oh. Oh.

I arch into the sensation, so wholly new. So fucking hot.

“Look at you,” he moans. His thrusts strike my core, and as he plays with my ass with one hand, he uses the other to reach around and stroke my clit. “You’re mine.”

At that, I do combust.

I buck wildly against him, feeling him everywhere. He’s staked his claim on every inch of my body and I unravel for him, screaming his name over and over. He loses his pace. His thrusts are harsh. Erratic. Then he plunges into me and lets out the most guttural sound of pleasure as he collapses over me, utterly spent.

I’ll be chasing this feeling forever. I already know it. One time isn’t enough.

He slips from me, and I’m so empty I ache with it. I want to weep. Now that I’ve had him, I never want to be without him. It’s a dangerous feeling. Yet I can’t escape it. It’s everywhere. He dropped a match in the middle of a forest, and now that fire is marking everything in its path.

I go limp against the mattress. After he discards the condom, he joins me, completing me like the answer to a question I’ve been asking my entire life.

I don’t know how long we lay there, the only sound our mutual breathing, before he buries his face in my neck and whispers my name against my skin. When Truett says it, it doesn’t feel like a sin, the way his grandfather’s stories once suggested it was. It feels like a prayer for every good and holy thing. For once, suspended in this moment with him, I almost believe I could be that for him.

I tuck that thought away in my heart. Maybe there it’ll be safe from reality, which always has a way of ruining the things I love most.

I turn over in his arms, taking him in, in all his disheveled glory. His hair is wild from my fingers, eyes heavy with the remnants of desire. He smiles at me. “What are you thinking about?”

Gingerly I trace the outline of his ribs, drawing a shiver from his skin. “What are these?”

He lifts his arm to get a better look. “Carnations.”

The inked skin dips beneath my touch. I note each frayed petal. The ribbon that binds the stems together. “What is it for?”

His gaze finds mine, and it’s suddenly so heavy, so raw that I’m tempted to look away. “I got it because it reminds me what’s most important in life.”

My throat dries up. The way he’s looking at me. Waiting. His muscles drawn tight with anticipation… No. No way. “Tru, you didn’t.”

His seriousness breaks into a smirk. A dare if I’ve ever seen one. “Didn’t what?”

I almost back down, but I know what I saw in his gaze. What I felt. “You did not get a tattoo for me.”

He lifts a brow. “I never said it was.”

A blush blooms on my cheekbones. How stupid. How embarrassing of me to assume. I flop onto my back and cover my face with my hands, wishing this damned mattress would swallow me whole already.

Strong arms envelop me. Draw me in close. When I peek between my fingers, Truett’s smiling down at me. He plucks one hand from my face and then the other, trapping them at my sides with a firm grasp. “I never said it wasn’t either.”

“But—”

My objection dies on his lips. His mouth covers mine, teasing and tasting my embarrassment. My confusion. My hope.

He retreats slightly, only enough that breath can pass between our mouths. I still feel the brush of his lips as he speaks, like his words are my own. “Like I said, the tattoo is a reminder of the most important things in my life, of which you happen to be one.”

He buries his face in my neck, planting kisses like he plans to stick around and watch them bloom. I tilt my head back, giving him better access. Enough space for a garden of carnations to grow, if he wanted. Because Truett Parker got a tattoo for me, and I’ve never felt more remarkable.

---