Page 92 of The Cabin
“What did you mean by wanting me to lead us there? I mean, I guess I know what you mean, but…explain it anyway.”
A shrug. “Just…stop holding back your dumb growly male hormones.”
I nod. “I can do that.”
We just sit beside each other for a while. She’s waiting for me, now.
I think she was expecting me to turn half feral or something. Instead, I cup her face and I kiss her. I leave it slow, like the first kiss. Gentle. Exploring her mouth, stoking her desire.
Her hand slides up around my neck and she turns toward me, I bury my hand in her hair. Still familiar territory. Nadia slides her thigh over my legs and straddles me, and except that once, that first kiss, she’s never done that. I like her weight on me, her softness against me, in my arms. I cradle her face in both hands and hold her close, kiss her until we’re breathless, and then we trade breaths and breathe each other.
Now, I let myself explore. I let the ravening beast I’ve kept so tightly chained inside me off the leash, a little. Let my hands drift down her arms, to her hips. She lifts, sitting on her knees, and her hands are in my hair and knotted, tugging, and god I like that.
I don’t anticipate anything she does, because I’ve never done any of this with her, and not with anyone in, now, over four years. The anniversary came and went, and that was one of my quiet, solitary days out on the fishing boat, catching nothing but a day of memory and mourning, and it still hurt as it always will, but there was more to life now and it was okay to put it away again, to look to shore and see Nadia standing on the dock, waiting as I row in.
I let my hands fill themselves with her curves, coursing over the bell of her hips and pausing there, and then rounding over the swell of her backside and she moans as I clutch her butt, and her hands dig into my shoulders.
She settles to sit on me. Pulls away enough to meet my eyes. “This feels good.”
“Yeah, it does.” I hold her gaze. “More?”
She unbuttons the four buttons of my wool sweater. “Yes.” A pause, her fingers going into the open V, touching my chest over the thin cotton of my plain white T-shirt. “More, please.”
I stand up, and her legs latch around my waist, and I walk with her to her bedroom. Stop just inside, assessing her reaction. Her reaction is to reach over my shoulder and swing the door shut behind us.
Then, she slides down to stand in front of me. Pushes up the hem of my sweater, lifts up on her toes to pull it off over my head and my arms, which I raise for her. She takes my shirt with it, and I think she likes me in nothing but my jeans.
She’s wearing a cashmere sweater the same lavender as the daisy on the table at our first and only date. Under it, light wash blue jeans, low-ankle black boots. She’s watching me, waiting for me again.
“Quid pro quo,” she whispers.
I curl my fingers in the hem of her sweater, and she lifts her arms. I peel it off her, and the cashmere is downy, impossibly soft. She’s wearing only a black bra underneath. She spills out over the top of the lacy cups. I swallow hard at the vision of her.
“You’re so beautiful, Nadia,” I murmur.
Her smile is giddy, pleased. Her hands roam my bare chest.
I lean down to kiss her, but she touches my lips with one finger, stopping me. “Not yet. I like this step of the process. If I kiss you, I’ll close my eyes, and I might miss something. I don’t want to miss anything.”
I sing a few bars of “I Don’t Want to Miss a Thing” by Aerosmith, and she smiles, laughs. “I love how you always have a song for the moment.” She said it, and we both realize it. Her eyes are wide, searching. “I don’t take it back.”
“Good. I wouldn’t want you to.”
She bites her lower lip. “Nathan?”
“Yeah.”
“Kiss me after all?” she breathes. “I’m nervous to go any further, but I want to. Kissing you makes me feel bold.”
I put my hands on her lower back, warm flesh under my eager palms, and she makes a sound in her throat as my lips meet hers and my hands caress her lower back, over her bra strap and across her shoulders. Her breasts press soft against my chest, and I feel everything inside me rising, expanding, wanting, needing.
She feels it, the hardness of my need standing rigid between our bodies, and she murmurs again, pressing more closely to me. Hips to hips. Chest to chest.
