helping him with the dishes.

He washes them in the sink and I stand next to him with a cloth. Our arms brush, and my body is so tightly wound from his proximity.

We work in complete silence.

I imagine he feels it too, this heavy cloud of tension that fills the room, the spaces between us, my mind and his.

There are a few things that have been left very obviously unresolved.

He passes me a dripping pan and our fingers make contact, just a tiny bit.

I tilt myself, barely, at an angle so more of him touches more of me.

He reaches over to grab the soap, leaning just a little closer.

It's maddening.

He turns the dishwasher on and then that's it. Nothing more to do. No distractions we can use to keep delaying.

I lean my hip against the counter, watching him.

It takes him absolutely forever.

And then, he turns, towards me.

We look at each other, and there isn't any pretending anymore. My heart just pounds, my breaths are shallow and my skin is alight and I have never, ever wanted to be touched as much as I do in this moment, by him.

His gaze catches mine, so incredibly dark, and the spell breaks. "Rosalyn." It's low and heavy and so rough. Asking.

"Nero." Pleading.

I don't know who moves first. Slowly, my hands rest against his chest and his fingers float upwards to clutch my face and our lips find each other. His mouth is soft and tender, needy, lingering. His touch sends heat through my veins and brings me back to life.

We take our time, because we can. My fingers thread themselves into his thick hair, his hands grip my hips, drawing me flush against him.

He takes every sigh, every whimper, tugging gently at my lips and twisting his tongue with mine. Burning, slow, so intense. Necessary.

We press together so tight there's no space, no room to breathe or think and that's fine because the only thing that matters is this, him.

My knees go weak as I melt into him, and if he didn't hold me so close I would fall to the ground.

I slide my hands under the hem of his shirt, brushing the skin at edge of his sweatpants, and he leans into my touch. My fingers trail a soft line over the planes of his lean chest, up and up, and he lets me push his shirt over his head, onto the floor.

There's a tug, low in my gut, heat between my legs, every part of me just wanting. Wanting him.

And from the way he touches me, kisses me, all fire and soft and rough and tender at the same time, I know he wants me too.

It doesn't take long for me to feel him, hard, against my stomach, and I can't help the moan that escapes me as I press closer. He lifts me up onto the counter and the stone is cold on my bare skin. I wrap my legs around him, he holds the sides of my thighs, my fingers curled into his hair holding him to me, getting rid of whatever space exists between us.

We grip each other so close that I can't stand it, I need more, and I know he does too. His lips trail a soft path down my neck, and he buries his face into my shoulder, feeling me against him right there, too many layers between. "Shit, Rosalyn," he mumbles against me, hands clutching my hips, keeping us touching and breathing and panting to a point where I can barely think. "Are you sure you want to do this?" He says it because he cares but the heat coming off of his skin and the incredible darkness in his eyes and the tight bulge in his pants all want me to say yes. Yes yes yes.

I'm so flushed as he holds my cheeks softly in the palms of his hands, the tip of our noses brushing, our gazes full of flames, and there is no way I am leaving here anytime soon.

His eyes flutter shut when I run my hands across the front of him, slip my small fingers beneath the waist of his pants, watch, fascinated, as his heavy breaths make the muscle rise and fall, his nipples so dark against his golden chest.

"Dolcezza," he growls. I'm teasing him, and he knows it. He presses his forehead against mine.

Slowly, I take his hands, guide them down, along my shirt, over my taut breasts, to the hem of thin fabric bunched around my waist. I use them to push the edge of it up, his fingers brushing my skin ever so lightly, making me shiver. I lift my arms over my head and he tugs it off, letting it drop to the ground.

I sit there, bare except for a thin pair of panties, and the air is cold but his face and his gaze on me are so incredibly hot that I can barely breathe. I ache, for him to touch me. But he just stands back, staring, taking in every inch of me. I bite my lip, run a hand through my tangled hair.

And I wait, wait, for him to put his hands on me, but he doesn't. Not yet. He meets my eyes, and in them I see everything, every desire and need and regret and yeah, he wants me as bad as I want him.

But this is real, and he knows it. He wants me to know it, too.

My legs dangle from the edge of the island and I tilt my head to the side, just a little, and he looks like he's trying to decide whether or not he can actually have me, here, now, as I sit almost naked in front of him on his kitchen counter. Whether it's really okay.

"Please, Nero?" Just a breath. Oh so innocent.

He takes me in, from the top of my head to the tips of my toes. The look on his impossibly beautiful face is so raw that I feel my insides tighten, feel the dampness that has soaked through my underwear.

He closes his eyes, his lips parted, just a little. It looks like every last shred of his self-control is focused into saying, "Tell me that you're sure."

And my heart melts, just a little. "I'm sure, Nero."

Those dark, sparkling, sinful eyes capture mine, and we stare at each other for a long, heavy second, our bare chests rising and falling rapidly with our shallow breaths.

And then before I can think, he's touching me again, his rough hands all over my bare skin and his chest pressed deliciously against mine and his mouth devours me, steals every last breath I possess.

I don't think that I have ever felt someone want me with the same intensity, that I have ever wanted anyone before, like this.

And his fingers press into the back of my thighs, and I find the edge of his pants and push them down, and as soon as he steps out of them, he lifts me up, my legs wrapped tight around him, and carries me into his room, to the messy bed we slept in, together.

With my back to the mattress, he hovers over me, his bareness and mine pressed together so that every part of my skin burns, all the way to the center of me, wanting him.

And then he pulls his mouth away from mine, lets it trail down my neck, across my collar. It's just a whisper but he's teasing and I can't help it when my body arches upwards, into him, and then his hands hold the sides of my chest, and his thumbs reach out to brush against the tips of my breasts, and oh I let out wanton sigh, and all I see against my closed eyelids is a searing light.

And just when I thought it couldn't get any better, he puts his mouth on me, and I cry out softly because with his lips and tongue and fingers on my nipples, the space between my legs is soaking wet with a need for him.

I peer down at him through thick lashes, and he rests his chin between my breasts, looking back at me, gives me a small, dizzying grin that would totally make me faint if I wasn't so aroused. "You are so beautiful, Rosalyn," he whispers against my skin.

I could never believe something like that, coming from him in all his gorgeous, stunning perfection. Except that every part of his face and his eyes and his hands on me tells me that he means it.

I have to squeeze my legs together, to ease the slick ache. And he trails his nose down, down, over my stomach, his lips grazing my belly, and he holds my hips against the sheets to stop me from shaking. And then, oh, he reaches the soft, sensitive skin right above the edge of my panties, touches me lightly with his fingers, his mouth, and then, just when I think he's going to touch me right where I want him, when I'm practically shivering, he slides away, to my toes.

He looks at me, a dark kind of laughter in his eyes, because I'm dying from how much I need him there, and he knows. So he places a light kiss on my ankle, trails his lips up the side of my calf, the back of my knee. His hands grip me gently to stop the squirming.

A kiss just inside my thigh. I arch my leg a little, my foot flat on the bed, and I can feel his breath at the apex of my thighs, and then—oh, fuck. His mouth is on me through the dark lace, and the sound I make is like a strangled cry.

"Nero," I whimper, and because he's not cruel, not to me anyway, he's quick as he tugs off my underwear, slides his off too.

I wait, flushed and warm, as he digs through a drawer, finding the foil packet and he's so fast and then he's perched above me, the tip of him brushing me, right there.

He kisses me, looks at me, asks me silently again, with his eyes. At this point, I can barely think much less speak, so I kiss him back, so hard, and I part my legs and tilt my hips upwards and I don't want his fingers or his mouth, I want him, and he whispers my name, I look straight into those consuming eyes, arching against him, almost begging, and then he slides into me, so deep because I'm so, so wet, and I cry out his name, and it's ecstasy.

And he knows exactly what he's doing, oh, oh, between his hands, his lips, the slow thrust of his hips and I guess I do too, with my fingers tangled in his hair, running across his warm skin. He fills every inch of me, and I'm so damn tight around him, and it takes less than a minute for the pleasure to build to a point where I can't handle it and everything bursts into pure bliss, over and over and oh and I cry out his name, his face buried in my neck. I have never come so intensely, so hard, so completely, ever before. It's shattering.

His climax isn't far behind, and when he's finished he breathes, "Rosalyn," like a prayer into my skin, and it is the most incredible sound I have ever heard.

•§•

. Twice. Three times.

I never want him to stop touching me, and he doesn't disappoint.

His hands slide across my skin, his lips are tireless, he is so strong and lithe and I just can't get enough of him. Of us, pressed together.

After another searing orgasm that leaves every piece of me weak, I tuck myself against him and he wraps an arm around me, and with our bare limbs gently tangled together there isn't anything more I could want.

"Rosalina." He sounds a little dazed, and I bet I do too.

"Mm."

His fingers trail lightly down my hip and my face rests against his shoulder and as he speaks it rumbles, I feel it melt through me. "I don't have any more condoms, carina."

When I laugh it bubbles across his skin, and it makes him smile a little too.

But we are both too tired to even move a muscle, let alone have each other again.

So he holds me, I hold him. Gentle kisses to the top of my head, my breaths soft against his neck, our skin stuck together with a thin sheen of sweat.

And even after everything, I feel like I could stay in his arms forever.

***

A/N

If that doesn't earn me a comment or two then I don't know what will. What did you think? Worth the wait?

xoxo Ami

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