Page 45 of When the Angel Falls First

His muscles rippled down his body, and I feared I’d fall off the dictionaries right there and then, nearly fainting at the realization that I finally had him. After so long, I worried this was just a hallucination. But the heat of his skin on mine was too real to deny.

He wrapped his arms around me, keeping me steady as he lowered me to the reading bench in the corner.

His cock teased my entrance for way too long, need and pleasure making me impatient. He teased me mercilessly, running the head along my folds without quite giving me the pressure I craved. I bucked my hips, silently begging for more as I kept my fingers tangled in his golden curls.

I moaned and arched my back as he carried on, circling and dipping inside of me slowly. It was electric, sending shockwaves through every inch of my body. I held my breath as he continued to explore, building a rhythm that had me squirming in his grip.

“Mine,” he whispered hoarsely as he pushed into me at last, and I was sure I had just shot into the stars. He continued, going deeper with every thrust, and I let out a moan at the fullness. He was stretching me in the best possible way. The sounds of our heavy breathing filled the air, punctuated by the occasional whirr of a car going by.

He held me close as he thrust faster into me, tangling his tongue with mine as I let my nails dig into his back. Each push took me somewhere new until our bodies were one, chaotic and perfect and somehowmoreat once. My core clenched, and I screamed my release.

“Yes,” he moaned as my screams turned hoarse and he pulled out slowly, leaving me feeling too bereft, too empty. “That’s what you needed.”

“Me?” I wasn’t letting him get away with it. I wrapped my hands around him, the thickness of his cock throbbing as I stroked it, watching his eyes. “What about whatyouneed?”

I could tell he was seconds from exploding. His shoulders pulled forward as his breathing quickened, and he moaned my name as he came, staring deep into my eyes as his cum spurted over my belly, painting me with his release.

He rested his head against my chest and breathed heavily. As I stroked his hair, I had exactly zero thoughts running through my head, for the first time in—well, possibly ever. I didn’t want to think. Thinking would only bring me back to reality, and I still wasn’t sure what was happening here.

Caleb lifted his head and then gazed down my body. Sticky warmth that felt cool as he pulled off me.

“Let me help.” He inhaled and then blew along my skin, chest to stomach, and I braced for the cold. It didn’t come. Instead, all traces of his orgasm disappeared, leaving nothing but pleasant warmth and the tingle of goosebumps in his wake. He ran his finger along the place it had been. “Like new.”

Like it never happened,I couldn’t help thinking and gulped as anxiety started to creep in. I didn’t have the will to move, too afraid of the passing time, of what would come next. Was he going to tell me this meant to him as much as it meant to me, followed by a big “but”?

“Sweet Josie.” He kissed my cheek and then reached into empty air, where my clothes suddenly appeared in his hand. He lifted my foot, gently passing my panties over one, then the other.

He was taking care of me, which was sweet. So why did I feel like he was also saying goodbye?

He half-smiled, a huff of air escaping his lips. “That was… something else. If only the world were different, my perfect girl.”

There’s my answer.

The weight of responsibility in his tone told me everything, and he wouldn’t meet my eyes. That stung.

“Right, right. This was for old time’s sake. For getting it out of our system!” I said with a little too much enthusiasm. Anything to cover up how I really felt. Like he was oxygen, and I was suffocating. Like he was the sun, and I was the moon, trailing him for eternity but never catching him.

He had made as much clear to me even without a word—I was the one who had gotten carried away with… what exactlywasthat? I had never felt something so intense, a driving force that I knew came from deep within me.Us. Seven years of asking, “What if?”

The look on his face told me all I needed to know. What had just happened between us was nostalgic, a throwback to what we had been, and not what we might ever become. I swallowed a sob that threatened to escape me. I wouldnotbe the girl I was seven years ago, pining for a love I couldn’t have. I had changed. My heart longed for Caleb, and I might never be the same. But I wouldn’t let him see that now.

Caleb’s jaw was set in that determined way I knew too well. There was sadness etched in the lines around his eyes, a heaviness in every slow, deliberate movement as he redressed me, as ifeach move was an effort against a tide of disappointment. He was trying to hide it, of course—he always did—but I saw the fragile cracks beneath his calm façade.

Whatever was holding him back from me, this chasm between us, couldn’t even be addressed until he took care of the brokenness in him from losing his wings. The fear in his voice as he’d described what his future would be without them was enough for me to dampen any disillusionment I felt now.

I owed him. He did his part at Nana’s birthday, and now it was my turn to come through. Even though watching him covering up his own cracks was fracturing me inside.

Which was easier now that we were fully clothed. We could pretend that whateverthatwas didn’t really happen. Not in this plane of existence.

“So…” I sucked in a deep breath. “There are couples relying on you to set their future straight, and you”—I avoided sayingneed me—“want my help.”

He let out a long breath, relief at my change of subject clearly setting him at ease. “Exactly. The biggest challenge right now is getting this next couple, Jonathan and Kim, to just be in the same place at the same time.”

I frowned, knowing what I now did about his capabilities. “Why is that so hard? Can’t you just, I don’t know, manipulate their schedules or something?”

Caleb sniggered. “I wish it were that simple. They’re like magnets facing the wrong direction. They just refuse to be in the same vicinity, and they’re running out of time.”

The image he painted was almost comical—two people unwittingly avoiding each other while an exasperated cupid tried to push them together. But behind the humor was a deeper struggle, one that Caleb was bearing the brunt of.

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