Page 159 of A Dead Girl's Guide to Living
She let out a long breath, as if resigning herself to whatever she’d already decided in her mind. When she spoke, her voice was nervous.
“Look, I—I haven’t really ever been with anyone… like, you know,” she muttered. “Alexis and I… it was all very G-rated. I feel like—I feel like I’m going to mess something up. Like I’ll do something wrong, and you’ll think I’m—”
“Hey.” I cut her off, and her rambling stopped. “There is nowrongway. There’s nothing to mess up. There’s just us, and whatever feels good.”
Her silence was nearly stifling, but she nodded once, as if trying to accept my words.
“We don’t have to do anything you don’t want to,” I told her gently. “I would never want you to feel pressured… or like you had to do anything. We can take this as slow as you need, Ellis.”
“And if I want to?” she asked after a beat.
I swallowed my own growing nerves. “Then we can.”
She shifted again, and I felt her hand at her chest.
“I—no one has ever… ” She cleared her throat. “No one has ever seen my scar except my medical team and my mom. It’s big. It’s obvious. It’s not like a cute freckle or some badass-looking thing. It’s a pale pink reminder that I broke—almost fully—and that I needed parts of me replaced. It’s not sexy. Ihateit.”
I cracked inside for her—at the raw vulnerability in her voice, the shake in it as she spoke. I knew her clothing was carefully chosen. I’d seen those subtle glances downward when she wore a V-neck sweater. She made sure it was covered and out of sight.
Because she hated the reminder, and everything it stood for.
“It’s part of you,” I said. “And you’re—” My voice nearly caught with the emotion building in my throat. “You’re beautiful. All of you. There’s nothing about you that’s broken to me, Ellis. All I see is strength when I look at you. At someone who’s had to overcome more in one lifetime than most do in twenty.”
She said nothing, but her hand had loosened its death grip on my shirt.
“I know that you avoided life because you thought, what’s the point in living it?” I said gently. “I get why you stopped. I understand why you didn’t want to bring anyone into it. And now you’re dealing with all the weird, awkward shit most of us get past in our mid-to-late teens, and it’s okay.”
“Well,” she muttered weakly, “I’m behind on a lot.”
I found myself grinning. “We’re all doing life at our own pace, Ellis. If you try to measure where you’re at against where someone else is, you’re destined for failure.” I licked my lips. “Just remember, above all, I’m never judging you. I’m in awe of you, even if youhatethat. I admire you. And I want to learn everything there is to know about Ellis Langley.”
She shivered in response to my words, and I felt something shift in the air as her hold on my shirt tightened once more. She moved closer, and I could see her faintly in the darkness, the small spill of light from the cracked curtain showing me the raw vulnerability on her face.
“All right,” she whispered.
And then her lips were on mine.
ELLIS
Tip #25: Love is when someone kisses the part of you you’ve been hiding.
Iallowed the kiss to deepen, choosing now instead of someday and felt it bloom past its tentative start—that slow pressing of two nervous mouths. Dove radiated heat, and her hand slid around my back, fingers spread wide, anchoring me to her. I leaned in closer, my lips parting just enough to let her in. The moment I did, everything seemed to shift into a low, growing ache curling within me, hot and desperate.
Dove shifted, rolling us so that I was pressed beneath her, her body warm and flush against mine. Her leg slid fluidly between us, pressing against me, and I gasped into her mouth, my lower body jerking in surprise at the contact. She grinned against my lips, and I became acutely aware of everything in that moment. The way her hair tickled my cheek, a few tendrils brushing against my skin; the way her lips moved against mine, warm and insistent, coaxing desire out of me in such an expert way that I wondered how much experience she actually had.
She braced one arm beside my head, her other hand gliding down the side of my body, curling around my hip, her thumb brushing the strip of exposed skin between the hem of my pants and my shirt.
I raised tentative hands, letting them rest at her hips briefly before sliding a fraction under her shirt, feeling the hot, smooth warmth of her skin. She made a soft sound in the back of her throat as she gently bit down on my lower lip. A gasp escaped me as my hands moved, tracing the defined lines of her stomach—the muscles she so often hid beneath oversized shirts twitching at my touch.
My fingers stilled just under the swell of her rib cage, partially paralyzed by nerves, unwilling to go further. This was about as far as Alexis and I had ever gone; whatever came next was foreign territory to me.
Dove’s lips broke from mine, and she lowered her head, kissing softly along the line of my throat, her breath warm, her movements deliberate. I found myself arching into her instinctively, my hands sliding back to her waist, gripping a little tighter. Then she shifted her knee, grinding it deliberately between my thighs.
I groaned softly at the feeling, the sound startling me.
I felt Dove’s lips curl into a smirk against my neck before her teeth grazed a spot just beneath my jaw—the flesh there soft, sensitive—and as her teeth raked along it, I trembled, pressing into that well-placed knee, my nails curling slightly into her sides.
She let out a soft chuckle, pulling back slightly as those searching brown eyes seemed to stare into my soul.
