Page 74 of Power of the Mind

But I stayed silent.

Beside the bed, as he carefully freed me of my clothing one piece at a time, I didn’t speak.

When he stripped off his clothes and kicked them into a pile on the floor, I watched without saying a thing.

When he moved closer, invading my bubble, when his hands touched my bare skin, I held my breath and remained mute.

I would not flinch away. I would not dodge his advances.

Tallus spent a long time exploring my body with his hands. The sensation was electrifying,intense, and overstimulating. I wanted to ask him to stop and give me room to breathe.

I didn’t.

My mouth simply wouldn’t work. Maybe, subconsciously, I didn’t want him to stop. Wasn’t this what I’d been fantasizing about for months? Years?

A lifetime?

To have someone give a shit. About me.

“Relax,” he whispered into the air between us. “Your muscles are insanely hot, Guns, but they’re in a constant state of flex. That can’t be healthy.”

He was right. I was wound tighter than a spring, but no matter how desperately I wanted to, I couldn’t obey the command.

He didn’t remind me again. Perhaps Tallus understood the impossibility of relaxing when someone was this close to me, touching me tenderly.

Touching without fists.

Without weapons.

Touching like they meant it.

Lovingly.

But I couldn’t remove the armor I’d spent a lifetime building to protect myself.

Tallus made a point of tracing every contour, every curve of my protruding muscles. He paid them individual attention like he had special knowledge or insight into how intimately those gains had become part of my survival. Without the positive outlet of a punching bag or lifting weights, I’d have self-destructed ages ago.

With two fingers, Tallus climbed each ridge of my abdomen like a ladder. He followed the dips and valleys along my sternum to my chest. He skied the hard mounds of my pecs on both sides with the skill of an Olympic athlete. With splayed palms, he surveyed the path of hills that were my shoulders, lats, triceps, and biceps.

He paused for a long time on the tattoos inked into my left forearm, Chinese characters I knew he wanted desperately to read but couldn’t. He’d asked about them several times, but I’d always dodged the question.

My dark arm hair masked their detail, but Tallus brushed his thumb over the surface, shifting it this way and that so he could see, so maybe, just maybe, he could understand them without my having to explain.

Someday, if I found the courage, I might reveal those secrets. If we lasted past tonight. Surely, Tallus would come to his senses before morning and know anything further between us was impossible.

Finished with his exam, he slipped his hand into mine and guided me to the bed. It loomed in the cordoned-off area of my homestead, both beckoning and threatening.

I didn’t know how to do this.

When I dug in my heels, when I refused to go farther, Tallus moved in behind me and pressed his warm, naked body against mine.

I closed my eyes and tried to remember to breathe as his mouth moved against my back, and he branded me with gentle kisses along my spine. “Lie down,” he whispered. “On your back. In the middle.”

“Tallus.” It was a croak, not a word.

“I’m not asking for more than you can give me. But I’m not fucking on a couch anymore. We’ve moved beyond that, Guns. I’m not doing this hands-off, either. I’m going to help myself to every part of you. I’m going to touch you the way I hope you someday touch me. And if all you can do is lie there and enjoy it, that’s okay.” Another soft kiss near my shoulder. “You’re safe with me, Diem. I won’t hurt you. You can trust me.”

But if I couldn’t trust myself, how could I trust anyone else?

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