Page 90 of Insolence
An identical design glows on the back of both my hands, etched in bluish-white light almost like a tattoo. It looks like astylized diamond shape, full of filigreed curly cues. Ornamental and hypnotic, something about it is wrenchingly familiar.
So familiar, it’s as if a key turns, unlocking a door in my mind. The door doesn’t exactly open, but it’s… definitelyajar.
A narrow beam of light filters through.
With it, a vision rushes in.
The backs of my hands glow in my vision, and it’s so damn beautiful. Suddenly it’s not one vision anymore but dozens.
Like parallel mirrors, my glowing hands replicate in front and behind me, stretching on and on.
“We hold pieces of each other, Tiss,” sighs an otherworldly, feminine voice. It fills my head and tugs on my soul, flooding me with a sense ofrightness. Flooding me with love that feels older than time itself. “I will always, always love you. You are now and will forever be mine.” The words sing through me, more intimate than the sweetest orgasm, more beautiful than a brilliant sunrise or a fanciful dream.
Pure white light washes my vision. Slews of simultaneous climaxes tear through me in jaw-dropping waves. Shocking and magnificent at once, it’s soon too much to withstand. I worry I’ll black out from the pleasure.
I stop moving, caging in a softly gasping Sadrie with my arms. An endless abyss swirls around us, so densely black and all-consuming that for a moment I swear I’m choking on it.
Before I can make sense of what I’m seeing, the vision collapses. The abyss compresses in on me before exploding in a shower of stars. Everything goes dark before I’m jolted to the here and now with a world-rending clatter.
Normalcy slowly returns. Everything is as it should be, other than the fact that I’m shaking and sweating, my stomach threatening to drop out of me. I peek at my hands, but the glowing designs are gone—if they were actually there to begin with.
What the hell kind of sex makes the universe implode?
“Sadrie?”
Her body is limp, her eyes half-closed and rolling back in her head.
“Oh, gods, are you all right? Hey, Sadrie.” I stroke her flushed cheek. “Talk to me, sweetheart.”
“Ohh, myyy godssss,” she drawls. “Whatwasthat? What did you do to me?”
“Everything you asked for,” I grin.
Her gaze swims in mine for a moment. She inhales deeply, her arms and legs going slack. A bright red welt is rising on the side of her neck, and I can’t help but admire it.
I adjust my position to kneel beside her. “Sadrie,” I whisper, caressing her cheek and forehead.
“Nnneeed sleep,” is the last thing she utters before rolling over and pulling the covers over her.
“Isn’t the bed, um, sort of wet? That can’t possibly be comfortable.”
She waves me away, her hand dropping to the mattress. Sleep tugs at my own eyelids, and I can’t fight the urge to curl up beside her.
Strangely unbothered by the possibility of a lights-out check and completely numb to my likely strained and screaming arm, I drop a kiss on her temple and burrow beneath the blankets.
She’s irresistibly warm and soft in my arms. She gives a contented moan before her light snores take over. For what feels like the first time in my life, sweet satisfaction claims me. Sleep hooks its claws in, pulling me under.
Chapter 28
Itissa
Ablushing dawn peeks around the edges of the curtains when I awaken.
My nostrils twitch, overly sensitive to every clue, every drifting fragrance molecule. Sex hangs heavy in the air, reeking of musk and sweat.
The smell of my favorite fried breakfast sausages bleeds through the sex fog, somehow wafting from the opposite side of the building, four floors down.That’s a first.
What I don’t smell is the soft, powdery perfume of Sadrie’s skin and hair. I’m alone in bed.
