“I don’t know how to braid,” she pointed out in a quiet tone through a shy smile. “If you can’t tell, I’m not exactly the epitome of femininity.” She gestured toward the combat boots sticking out of her closet.
“I didn’t notice,” I joked, running my fingers through her hair and kissing her forehead.
I’d learned to braid hair long ago. Lexie didn’t have a twin sister. Instead, she got me. She had me braiding her hair, and I had her building treehouses. It was how we worked. We had friends, but we were always a bit different from everyone else. It’s said twins share a bond like no other, and we weren’t any exception to that rule. We didn’t always see eye to eye, but growing up we could always depend on each other. Now, not so much. I knew I was a pretty shitty brother to Lexie, but I didn’t want to plague her life, and that was what I’d be doing if I were a constant in it. I chose to distance myself from everyone, because it was better for everyone else.
Nervousness crawled into my veins as I turned Eris around and set her onto her bed. I climbed onto the bed behind her and ran my fingertips up her arms and goosebumps shadowed their path. Once my hands found her hair, I raked my fingers through a few times and tried to suppress the heartbeat in my throat. I shouldn’t have been this turned on by touching her hair, but I was.
I took my time braiding the top, but the closer to the end I got, the faster my fingers moved. Her hands inching up my thighs may have had something to do with the change in pace. I snagged a hair tie off her nightstand and hastily wrapped it around the end of her hair, needing to free my hands.
She raised herself from the mattress and lowered down onto my lap. A throaty groan left my lips and I took the end of her braid into my palm, pulling it to the side to access her neck. A loud moan left her lips when I did this, so I didn’t let go. She swayed her hips on top of mine, and I knew it would be some time before we left. This was how I ended up staying. We couldn’t get enough of each other. We’d been untainted by the world, with the exception of Lexie’s interruption, and I was afraid once we left her house, the moment would pass. I was afraid she’d remember I wasn’t worthy of her.
My tongue trailed her neckline, wanting to rid myself of those thoughts. Her pulse pounded beneath my tongue, and I slightly tipped her mouth to mine by guiding her braid further sideways. Her heavy breaths matched my own as she lifted herself, allowing me to remove her shorts, and then I did the same with the pair of basketball shorts she’d let me borrow. The thing about us was I knew neither of us could save the other from whatever demons each of us carried, but one thing we could do right was this. Sex. It was phenomenal. Unquestionably the best sex I’d ever had was with Eris. Each time was better than the last.