Page 107 of Shadow Dance

“I have an idea,” he says, strained, his fingers digging into my skin as I start to sink slowly down. “Oh fuck, Maeve.”

“Yeah, fuck Maeve,” I agree, adjusting as he stretches me.For God’s sake.Will I ever get used to him?“Fuck Maeve like you haven’t seen her in half a year.”

“Don’t ask for things you can’t handle,” he says with a husky laugh, running his hands up and down my thighs.

“Who says I can’t handle it?” I taunt, resting my hands on his chest as I ride him.

“Fuck around and find out,” he murmurs, his hands sliding up to my waist. Plucking me off his lap, he tosses me onto my belly and pulls my hips up so my ass is in the air.

“Cruz,” I squeal, my giggles turning to moans when I feel his hand, and then his tongue, between my legs.

Spreading my pussy wide, he licks and sucks it until I’m a gasping, shaking mess, coming all over his fingers and his tongue. Rearing up behind me, he grabs my hips. “You sure you can handle it?”

I moan into the sheets. “Yes!”

Holding me still, he thrusts into me so completely that I slide up the bed. “Is this what you want?” he pants, grinding into me real dirty and slow. “To make up for all that time you couldn’t have it?”

He feels unbelievable.

“Were you ever scared?”I ask, tracing my fingers over his arms in the dark.

“Back in Oakland? All the time.” He huffs softly. “You have to be. Keeps you on point.”

“Was it hard having to lie all the time? How’d you keep stuff straight?”

“It was my job. I’d been doing it for years, you know? I got good at it,” he says. “My life depended on it.”

“A little too good at it,” I say. “You could be really hard to read, especially in the beginning.”

“So were you,” he says, poking my belly.

I catch his hand, cradling it. “That’s probably true.”

“Especially when you were coked up. Man, I hated that.”

I bite my lip. “I know. I stopped doing it because I knew you hated it.”

“I guess I can tell you now, I liked you from the very beginning. I thought you were beautiful.”

I freeze in surprise, my brain running through the memories. Howcan that be true? I remember what he was like when we first met, and he couldn’t have been more indifferent. “Really?”

“Yeah. You couldn’t tell?” he asks, and I can feel him looking at me in the dark.

“Not at first, no.”

“Probably for the best,” he says. “What did you think about me?”

“In the beginning? I hated how good looking you were,” I admit with a yawn.

He laughs at that.

“I resented you a little too, though. The whole situation. I didn’t like having a babysitter, even if it was a cute one.”

“I could tell,” he says. “I didn’t blame you.”

“So, what do we do now?” I ask. “Where do we go from here?”

“I don’t know. Do you want to try and do this?”

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