Page 30 of Refuge for Ailsa

When he broke the kiss, she smiled. “Tav, I want you. Please?”

“Inside you?”

“Yes. Oh, god, yes.”

As slowly and gently as he could, he rose up and crawled between her legs, then pressed her thighs upward. She was soaked, and slipping into her was like sliding into a silk robe. Her channel throbbed around him, and Tavish started a slow, rolling stroking, going deeper and deeper, stilling, and pulling back, only to do the same over and over. Rocking his hips forward, he leaned down and kissed her again, waiting until she wrapped her arms around his neck and kissed him back. When he pulled back, he smiled down at her. “Good?”

“Oh, so good. You make me feel like a princess, Tav.”

“My princess.”

She sighed. “Your princess.”

“Tell me if I’m going too fast for you, okay?”

“Okay.”

The strokes grew a little faster and a little more insistent, but he kept it as gentle and slow as he could, even though his need grew. God, he wanted to empty himself into her. For a split second, he realized he hadn’t rolled a condom on, and then, just as quickly, he decided he didn’t care. He trusted her, and he was pretty sure she trusted him. He rocked his hips into her a little more forcefully, listening to her groan and gasp, and he watched her face, saw her eyes close, saw her tongue wet those beautiful lips, and he came undone against her, straining to go deeper, to lose himself in her.

When he stilled, he opened his eyes to find her staring straight into his. All he could do was smile at her. He was stupid in love with her, and he knew it, but he didn’t care. The knuckles of his right hand brushed down her cheek and she smiled back. Her hands grasped his wrists and she kissed the palm of first his right hand, then his left. Tavish was overwhelmed with the depth of his feelings for her. How it had happened so fast, he wasn’t sure, and he didn’t care. They were together, and he couldn’t remember ever being happier.

Dropping beside her on the mattress, he reached for her, and she pressed her cheek against his chest. “Oh, god, that was so good, babe,” she whispered to him.

“Yeah, it was, wasn’t it?” Letting a finger trace up and down her upper arm, he relaxed and kissed the crown of her head. “Listen to me. You listening?”

She nodded against his skin. “Uh-huh.”

“Ailsa, there’s fucking, and there’s making love.”

“You just made love to me.”

“Yes. But it’s my job to know when you need a royal fucking and when you need to be held and cherished. It’s my responsibility. I have to try to read you, to read what you need and when, and if I get it wrong, I need to be told. If I start getting crazy with you and you’ve had a hideous day, a day when nothing went right and half the people who came into the store made you want to cry, you need to tell me. I think I’ll get it right most of the time, but if I get it wrong, you need to say something. Regardless what you might think, this is foryou. I wantyousatisfied. I wantyouto get what you need.” There was something he needed to tell her, something he’d never told another living soul, and it seemed like the right time. She was the right person. “There’s something you should know, something nobody else knows.”

“Yeah?”

“When I was twenty-five…” He stopped. How would she take it?Go for broke, he told himself, and started again. “When I was twenty-five… When I was twenty-five, I… I had an affair with my graduate professor.”

“You’re kidding.”

“No. I’m not. Not my finest hour, and I’m not proud of it. But I have to say, she taught me a lot. A lot about a woman’s body, a lot about a woman’s satisfaction, just… a lot. Honestly, I owe her. I really do. I always wondered why I did that, why it happened. Now I know.”

“Why?”

“Because all those things she taught me, I see now that I’m going to need them with you. I’m going to need to know how to be a lover sometimes and a hard-ass motherfucker other times. I need to be able to tell what you need. She taught me all that and, right this second, I’m really grateful.”

“Wow. I mean, wow. I can’t believe you told me that.”

“I want to always be truthful with you. Always. You also need to know that I broke up with my college girlfriend because we’d gotten wrapped up in threesomes and foursomes until she wouldn’t even have sex with me without having at least one more partner there.”

“So you and her and another woman, or two, or?”

“No. Me and at least one other man. All men. And there came a time when I couldn’t handle being one of three anymore. I needed to be special to somebody, and I wasn’t to her. I was just a cock to fill a hole. It hadn’t started out that way, but it ended up that way. At first it was hot, but… Just know if that’s ever something you want, I won’t want it. Ever again.”

“No. I only want you, Tav. I’m not interested in any of that.”

“I mean, I get it. I’m sure it was great for her. The first dozen times, it was really hot watching somebody else fuck her while I was fucking her too. But then, it wasn’t hot anymore. I just felt… inadequate.”

“You’re a lot of things, babe, but you’re not inadequate. You’remorethan adequate, at least for me.”

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