Page 65 of Fireworks Flame
So there’s no explanation for sliding out of bed as quietly as a thief in the night. I sneak on tiptoes past Simone, asleep on the couch. The moonlight shines on her open mouth, glinting off the strand of drool that connects her face to the throw pillow. I shiver, a draft from the open window causing my bare legs to prickle. This is a mistake, but I can’t help myself. I try to convince myself I just want to clear things up, but it’s not quite believable.
My eyes flicker back to Simone when I knock, and again when Deiss eases his door open, his brow furrowed. I press on the door to open it further and slide inside, but he holds it firm, blocking the gap with his body. I choke at the sight of his bare chest and the two etched lines that arrow into his boxers, then cough awkwardly to cover it.
“I couldn’t sleep until I apologized for making things weird. I’m sorry about tonight,” I whisper. “Can we just forget it happened?”
His eyes drop to the cleavage popping out beneath my tank top, then dip down past my tiny shorts to my bare legs. Slowly, he drags them back up.
“No problem.” He curves a hand around the back of my neck, causing my heart to pound in my chest. Warm fingers tug me forward, and his head dips toward mine, hovering just long enough for me to pray he won’t stop. Then his mouth is on mine, shocking me like an electrical current.
I feel his kiss in every part of my body, my skin lights up with it. His scruff scrapes at my chin and his lips burn against mine. He tastes like safaris and concerts and all the things I’m only just discovering are right for me. My arms go around him, nails digging into his bare skin when he deepens the kiss. A moan escapes my throat, and he pulls away, leaving me blinking up at him in dismay.
“We should probably forget that happened, too,” he whispers, his hand still in my hair.
My heart falls into the pit of my stomach.
“Or...”He grins dangerously.
“Or.” I exhale the word determinedly. I don’t care how bad it might be for our friendship or my heart. It all pales in comparison to the heat of his mouth on mine. “I vote foror.”
I barely get through the words before he’s lifting me up, wrapping my legs around his waist, and dragging me into his room. Our mouths collide as he pushes the door shut with my back. His hands grip my butt as mine explore the muscles in his back, and he doesn’t stop kissing me, not even when he carries me across the room to his bed.
We make out like horny teenagers—stroking and licking and grinding until I’m panting—maybe because this moment has been building since we were. But then his head dips and doesn’t come back up. That gorgeous mouth of his keeps traveling downward, tracing a trail of fire the length of my body. The world goes hazy as he slips the straps of my tank top down,nudging it down with his chin as his tongue swirls patterns against my breasts. Scruff scrapes the tender skin, and the silk of a million tiny licks soothes it. I hum my pleasure, feeling like an instrument he’s bringing to life.
The sound in my throat gets louder still as his mouth drops lower, skimming my waist, then my thighs, then up again. He breathes heat against the flimsy material that covers me, and I groan with aching desire. My hands go to his head, tugging him forward like they’ve forgotten a lifetime’s training of holding back, and I’m rewarded by his fingers sweeping the layers aside and sliding his tongue in their place. My body disappears, leaving behind a sea of sensations. I am a sky filled with pulsing stars.
I buck beneath the building pressure, whimpering when he pauses long enough to pull my panties and shorts down the length of my legs. He stills at the sound, settling on his knees down by my ankles. I lift my head to look at him but catch sight of myself instead, splayed out ridiculously, my tank top around my waist like a deflated inner tube. My legs are spread apart like I’m awaiting an exam.
Embarrassment hits like a bucket of ice water, dumping over me and extinguishing all of my heat. Never have I so completely lost myself. Years of performing perfunctorily in gorgeous, expensive lingerie, and the one time it really matters, I’ve shown up like a pig at the county fair. I cringe and tug my knees together.
“Don’t,” Deiss says in an unrecognizably gruff voice.
I look up apprehensively and discover his eyes scanning the length of me. They’re dark beneath his furrowed brow, filled with reverence like he’s discovered a priceless piece of art. His fingers run across my leg in featherlight strokes before he liftsit to press a kiss into my ankle. He’s shadowed in the weak light that leaks through the window, dark and mysterious and impossibly gorgeous.
“I like you like this,” he says, “all wild.”
Slowly, he slips my tank top down the length of me, his fingers stroking my hips as they pass and then my thighs. He works his way slowly back up, kissing every inch of me until the world goes hazy again and I’m too filled with pleasure to think of anything but the feel of his mouth against my skin. When his body covers mine completely, he cups his hand beneath my head like I’m something precious.
We kiss slowly this time, not like two people hurrying to make up for the past but two people desperate to hold onto the moment. I press into him, warm and delicious. And when he finally pushes inside me, I feel just as out of control as I did when we started, but in an entirely new way.
“You’re amazing,” he murmurs into my shoulder after we’ve collapsed, intertwined and satiated, onto our backs. “I’ve always been so in awe of you.”
“No, you haven’t.” I don’t want his pillow talk. It just reminds me this is normal for him. While I’ve never experienced anything like what we just did, I have to assume it’s always like that for him. After all, heisthe one who provided the experience.
“I have.” He strokes my arm lightly, tracing a line from my wrist to elbow. “I used to study you all the time back in school, trying to figure out how you could be so untouched by it all. Everyone else on campus was copying each other, playing their roles as college kids, but you knew exactly who you wanted to be.”
“But I didn’t.” The confession slips out, even though I’d likenothing more than to let myself believe the pretty picture he’s painted. “I only knew who I wassupposedto be. I was trying to be perfect.”
“You think I don’t understand that?” He leans over and presses a soft kiss against my shoulder. “I’ve been watching you for eleven years. But you’re missing the point. I was in awe that you tried so hardfor yourself. You weren’t attempting to be perfect so the other girls would be jealous or the boys would want you. You hardly seemed to notice what anyone thought of you at all. It was your own standards that dictated who you wanted to be, and I thought that was inspiring.”
“But you told me to get off the treadmill,” I argue.
“I suggested it because nobody needs you to be perfect, including you.” The corner of his mouth quirks up. “But I certainly didn’t tell you to do anything. I’d never dream of telling Olivia Bakersfield how to behave.”
I laugh, but my chest swells in a way that’s almost painful. This feels like yet another twist I’m unprepared for. First, the closeness. Then, the lust. Now... whatever this is. Deiss’s appreciation of me? His ability to see me so clearly and translate my flaws into something I can be proud of?
It’s overwhelming. Even my mother, the one person who’s always known me, chose to pretty me up with makeup so she could view me through a filter. I don’t know how to face someone who’s managed to see through it all. Even if Deiss does seem to appreciate what he’s uncovered.
“I like you.” I blurt the words out, flinching as they hit the air.Neverevershow your cards first.“I don’t know what any of this means to you, but I do. I like you so much.”
