Total pages in book: 151
Estimated words: 148238 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 741(@200wpm)___ 593(@250wpm)___ 494(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 148238 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 741(@200wpm)___ 593(@250wpm)___ 494(@300wpm)
Spurts of white ribboned onto his black T-shirt, arching through the air with every pulse of his hips into my hand.
It both scared and thrilled me. I wanted to do it again and again. To force him to relinquish control to me—to trust me completely.
Arthur dragged me back, his hand clutching my hip as his thrusts lost uniformity, driving relentlessly and punishingly. An orgasm sparked, half from him taking me now and half from us in another time.
Art’s fingers felt amazing inside me, but his thumb was the magic.
My pussy rippled around his digits as the first band of whatever teased me responded to his hesitant touch. I cried out as he thrust and rubbed, the combination of the two sensations driving me up, up and up.
“I want you to let go, Cleo. You made me come. I want to do that for you.” His lips landed on my cheek, then chin, then throat, spreading fire through my blood.
His finger hooked upward, pressing against a spot inside that wasn’t flesh and blood but magic and love-laced.
“Oh God. Art, yes.” I wanted to beg him for more, to never stop, but he knew what I wanted.
His wrist jerked up and down as he drove his finger harder and faster into me. My hips bowed up to meet him. I lost all pretense of shyness and demure young woman and gave myself in to the grip of sin.
This was where I belonged. Here. With him.
“I’m—I’m—” I didn’t know what I was. Shattering perhaps? Splitting into two as my core tightened and tightened until I thought I’d combust.
“You’re coming, Buttercup. Give it to me. Give me your first.” Art’s lips took mine, his tongue thrusting in time with his finger.
I couldn’t hold on any longer and my body demolished beneath his touch, imploding on itself before shooting outward in a billion tiny rays of heaven.
“God, I’m coming…”
I couldn’t help it. The memory of that time drove me to the point of detonation.
“Fuck, wait for me. Wait!” Arthur picked up his pace. Our breathing matched—tattered and broken as pleasure became too much for single cells to feel. He was the perfect maestro—giving my body no choice but to reach the pinnacle of release.
His fingers dove into my hair again, his elbows digging into the sand by my ears as he drove himself as deep as possible.
Then he came.
Shuddering and trembling, cursing and panting, he set off my own explosion.
Tiny comets shot from my core and into my heart, and every crash of pleasure gave more of my soul to him. He gave me another piece of himself, too, but stole so much more in return.
Our hearts thrummed to the same beat as we finally calmed and our lovemaking ceased to a gentle rock.
I would always keep what happened here tonight locked away inside—just like that first time. I would hoard it like a priceless gift. Arthur was mine. As much as I was his.
It was fate.
My heart fisted with pain at the thought of never experiencing our first times together. A brown-eyed boy I still couldn’t remember had taken mine in awkwardness and dissatisfaction, and Arthur… I couldn’t think about Arthur giving up something so precious to a whore.
But that was in the past. I never wanted to be with another man. Ever.
Arthur was it for me.
For life.
“Tell me about the tattoo. Apart from the equations and the poems I recognize, I don’t understand it.”
My eyes opened to find Arthur propped up on an elbow, his silhouette cast in silver by the moon.
We must’ve drifted for a while because the moon had moved from where it had been while I’d been on my back with him between my thighs.
Arthur’s face filled with pain. “You lived an entire life without me. I—I want to know what you did, who you became without me by your side.”
Hating myself all over again for the pain I’d caused, I murmured, “There’s nothing to tell. It’s a mix of everything and nothing.”
He frowned. “That doesn’t make sense.”
“It means nothing compared—”
“It means that—”
We stopped, smiling at each other in silence. We’d always done that—jumping over each other, trying to talk at the same time. Little things like that were starting to come back.
I wanted to squeeze him in joy.
He ducked, pressing a delicate kiss to my temple. “Go on…”
I searched my body for something that made sense. The tattoo was undeniably beautiful and fantastical, but really it hadn’t helped link me to a past I couldn’t remember.
“I suppose I wanted something pretty to cancel out the ugliness of my scars.” I shrugged. “I was told I might never remember. In a way, I hoped the pain would jog something. That each tattoo would somehow magically unlock everything hidden inside. Silly, huh?”
Arthur shook his head. “Not silly at all. I wish it had worked—then you might’ve come back to me sooner.”