Page 66 of Only One Bed: Anthology Vol. 1
With his free hand, he grabbed the remote and then they settled down to watch a film with less gore than she’d feared but a hell of a lot of jumpy moments. After one particularly startling scene, she buried her face in his shoulder, half-hiccupping with laughter that was not at all in any way covering the fact that she’d squealed far too loudly for her own liking and had almost thrown the glass of water that he’d brought her at the screen.
It was at that point, however, that he seemed to give up all pretence of watching the film. Moments of stolen glances put aside for a single finger under her chin, dancing eyes meeting her own embarrassed ones, and this time she was the one who kissed him. Who leaned up into his space and captured those laughing lips. And she’d captured his softness as well as his laughter. There’d been a split second where she felt as if she’d fall, Alice-style, into the kiss. Falling down down down until she landed in a space where her heart took up an echoey beat that reverberated around them both, where she became too big or too small to ever really fit back into the real world again. Fuck White Rabbits, this kiss was her pathway into Wonderland.
And then it had shifted, his hands cupping her face with an urgency that seared her skin. Branded her with fire. Her hands mirrored his until they ran through his hair.
One kiss. Two. Three.
It was seamless, the way that they deepened the kiss. Both of them caught up in the intensity of the closeness, of the emotion of it. They paused for a moment, taking shallow breathes that ghosted, the lips were mere millimetres apart and she realised that she was halfway across him in a weird up-on-her-knees and splayed-across-his-front way, without actually straddling him. She shifted awkwardly, almost toppling over until he caught and righted her.
“I’m a little clumsy,” she explained, brushing her hair from her face and looking away.
He leaned in and kissed her gently. “You can be clumsy with me any day.”
The gurgle of laughter that pealed from her made him smile, and he tugged her further onto his lap. “Wouldn’t want you to fall again.”
She grinned and shifted ’til she was comfortably astride him, trying not to let out a gasp of delight as she felt him hard against the seam of her jeans. “I wouldn’t want to fall off this.”
There was a momentary pause where they both seemed torn between more intense making out and just full on laughter and before she added, “God I’m bad at this.”
“Not at all.” He pulled her closer as she put her arms around his neck. “You. Are. Perfect.” Each word punctuated with another kiss until she leaned in and stole all his sentences. There was a slight desperation in their kisses this time, a need to get as close to each other as possible, the freedom of having a private space emboldening them both. His hand skimmed the edge where her shirt met the top of her jeans, and she found herself hitching it up, before pausing and whispering in his ear so he didn’t see her blush, “Can you…?”
“Can I what?” Each word buffeted against her neck and she gasped once, and then again as he traced the curve up to her jawline with his mouth. “Tell me, what do you want me to do?”
The words burst from her in a rush. “I need your hands against my skin. Please. If you don’t mind–”
But before she could even finish her request his hands were cool against her skin, teasing, coaxing little gasps and moans from her as they ran up her side and back. A questioning glance as her top ensnared his hand, and then she reached down to hoist the shirt up and over her head, laughing as it got her glasses got on the way.
When she’d finally untangled herself enough to look back at him, her breath caught in her throat. The look in his eyes, darkened irises that drank in every single inch of her curves, made her blush and want to both cover up and take more off.
“What?” she asked, the questioning sounding almost defensive.
“You’re just so…” That pause seemed like a lifetime. “So beautiful.”
“Yeah yeah, flatterer.” But she felt warm inside, even if she didn’t know how to tell him how much those simple words meant. That he wanted her, all of her, with her big arse and her big tits and her clumsy attempts at stripping.
He laughed at – no, with – her, and she leant in to kiss his right cheek. He swallowed and she ran her hands down his front. “Your shirt. I mean, can I take it off?”
“Of course.”
One swift motion and it was up and over his head, and as it floated down to the floor beside them, he sat up, shifting so that they were face-to-face, chest-to-chest, the sudden skin contact warm. Almost as warm as her core as she felt his cock rock up against her. She wondered whether her longing was painted in broad strokes across her face, whether he could tell that she just wanted to lose herself in the warmth of his touch until everything blurred together in the slick heat of their longing for one another.
His hand was tentative against her breast, a searching gaze looking for an acquiescence that he found in her eyes, before his fingers traced the edge of the bra cup, dipping in and grazing against her nipple in a way that made her cry out. Previously, she’d always felt incredibly self-conscious about how sensitive she was, the fact that she couldn’t control or moderate her reactions, but this time was different. This time she found herself relishing being able to show him exactly how much she liked this. How much pleasure his fingers were bringing her. Because fuck if he didn’t have magic fingers that coaxed all manner of sounds from her throat, his pupils darkening when she reacted.
And she savoured each moan and gasp he drew from her. Let that tight control over herself go until she was loose-limbed beneath his touch.
She slipped a hand down between them to feel the hard outline of his cock through his jeans and grinned at the curse he muttered against her neck. It was affecting them both then; this all-consuming passion had hit him just as hard as it had her. There was something very satisfying in that, in the knowledge that this wanting, this need, was mutual. That it wasn’t just her losing her mind over something as simple as a make-out session on a couch.
Another kiss, more fumbling, and then, as they both came up gasping for air, a slowing down. Not an awkwardness as such, but more a wave of shyness that crashed over them both in a sudden about-turn.
They laughed softly, averting their gazes before sneaking looks at the other under lowered lashes.
“I had planned on feeding you before getting into your bra.”
She snorted. “Well, it’s never too late for food.”
She wasn’t sure quite whether this was a rejection, or just a postponement, but when they got up to move to the kitchen, he slipped his arms around her, hugging her close, before ushering them through to the other room.
This was intimacy of another kind, casual laughter together as they heated the food he’d prepared – tasting the sauce for the pasta, grating cheese and grabbing cutlery from drawers. It spoke of an easy comfort between them, and made her realise how much this meant to her. Cooking together, for each other, seemed such a key tenet of affection, proof of something more than people merely passing through each other’s lives.
