Just a Heartbeat Away

by Cara Bastone

  She gasped when he grabbed her firmly by the hips and rolled her. Somehow, Via ended up on her hands and knees on the bed straddled over his head. She looked down at him, self-consciousness rising in her until he gripped her ass and dragged her down to his mouth.

  Any protesting she might have done immediately dried up at his first, hot contact. He didn’t go in for the kill. At first, he simply tasted her. Via’s legs tensed and trembled on either side of his face as he slammed his eyes shut and slipped his tongue inside her. His hands tightened on her ass as he groaned, a helpless, captive noise.

  “I knew it,” he groaned against her. “I knew it.”

  Were she capable of words, she might have asked what it was that he knew. But all she could do was grip the sheets and hang on for dear life. His tongue was dangerous, deadly, insistent. He sucked and pulled, swirled and circled. He was by far the most skilled lover she’d ever been with and she knew why—he was creative. He was practically playing in her. Gripping and paying attention and enjoying himself. She dropped her head to watch him and saw his eyes were trailing their way up her body, immensely appreciating the view. His feet were planted and his hips were working upward in the air. He was so hard, he was pulling the waistband of his underwear up and away from his body. It was that sight that had Via rearing back so that she sat up tall over him. He didn’t stop eating at her, but his hands went instantly to her breasts.

  She trembled, spread even wider and laced her fingers through his as he worked her nipples. This orgasm caught her by surprise. He almost tricked it out of her with some fancy dance step of his tongue that he did over and over once he realized that she’d pulled tight, that her eyes had gone wide and unseeing, that she was somewhere off in the stratosphere, tasting stars and shivering in the cold heat left behind by an asteroid.

  She collapsed to the side, halfway on top of him. She was breathing hard and sweaty, her vision covered by the comforter. She was trembling, laughing, slicking her hair back from her face.

  “What’s so funny?” he asked, out of breath himself. He patted down the covers so that they could see one another.

  “Nothing.” She looked at him. “Everything. Dark chocolate.”

  He grinned and reached for her. But with a surprising burst of energy, she was rearing up and reaching for his underwear. She pulled them, quick as a flash, down to his knees and halted, full stop. She couldn’t help but gape.

  Because, Mamma mia.

  She reflexively looked down at his feet. Yup, those were ginormous, too.

  He kicked off his underwear all the way. “You look worried.”

  “No, I’m...” She didn’t know what she was. “Really turned on. That is the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen.”

  “Come on.”

  She was utterly delighted when he blushed and the body part in question grew another half inch. Acting on impulse, and because every part of her was dying to, she leaned down and licked all the way up his shaft, circling the head.

  “Holy—” He lunged upward and gripped her by the shoulders.

  “No?”

  “Yes. A fucking million percent yes.”

  She smiled and knelt over him again. He leaned back on his palms and she felt his eyes on the side of her face as she pursed her lips and took him through the soft barrier of her mouth. She worked her tongue and swallowed him down as far as she could. Her eyes fluttered closed and she felt the light feather of his fingers pushing her hair off her face.

  He threaded his fingers into her hair, and Via was thrilled and turned on when his breath washed over her in violent gasps. When his hips began to lift an inch or two off the bed, he gently pulled her off of him and dragged her into his lap, where he dropped his forehead to her shoulder and just hugged her. He held her tight and breathed so hard, the skin on one side of her body went alternately hot and cold with his inhales and exhales.

  When he pulled back, she got a good look at his eyes. Dilated and desirous. “Via...”

  “Yes. Yesyesyes. Right now.”

  He smiled, came back to himself just a touch. His hand struck out to his nightstand and fished around for a condom. He came up with an unopened box and the sight of it warmed something in her. Instinctively, somehow, she just knew that he’d bought these for her.

  She tipped his head back and kissed the hell out of him. Even though the distraction slowed his hands down, she didn’t care. She heard him open the condom, felt him reach around behind her back and sheathe himself. His hands came to her back and he did that one-after-the-other endless rub that simultaneously soothed and just about destroyed her.

  Via made sure his eyes were on hers when she rose up on her knees. She reached between them but didn’t look away from him. She guided the wide head between her legs. Via lowered herself down as Seb held himself perfectly still. His eyes were dilating and retracting, his mouth slung open, his face tight and loose at the same time. She took him in an inch and breathed. Goddamn, the man was big. She swiveled her hips and took another inch. Little by little, she worked herself down on him until there was a final two inches to go and apparently, Seb had hit his limit. When she pushed down the final time, he thrust his hips upward and they both gasped, frozen, said each other’s names.

  “Oh God,” Via whispered. Her fingers were on his shoulders as her head fell backward. But then his hand was at the base of her head and tipping her back forward so that he could see her face.

  She lifted up and then back down. They gasped and reached out for one another. There was so, so, so much friction as they clutched each other. She felt like she was touching damn near all of him. He hugged her so tight and she’d never felt safer or more desired in her entire life. She’d never in her life been made love to like this. Like it truly mattered. Like she mattered. There was no vanity here. No self-consciousness. This was about connection. Delicious, unending connection.

  Suddenly, Seb gripped her around the waist and scooted them backward so that his back rested against the headboard. His hand fell between them and worked at her clit.

  “I want you to come again,” he growled, his head falling back onto the wall behind him.

  “I came so much already.” She figured it was probably his turn.

  “Again.”

  She faltered in her movements, taking him all the way in and pausing. “I can’t usually...during...never, actually.” She really hadn’t intended on divulging that piece of information, but it seemed to light some fire inside him.

  “Try,” he said. “Just try.” He spread his arms out along the headboard and her mouth watered at all that muscle, those long arms, the chest hair on display for her. “I’m not going anywhere. Just try.”

  She knew what he was telling her. That he was a grown man who could control himself. That he wasn’t going to go off like a rocket after three strokes. That she could work herself against him and really see what was what. The thought simultaneously thrilled and terrified her. But this was Seb. All handsome and plain and gray-green seagrass eyes. She trusted him. And that’s what it all came down to.

  Via lifted herself and slid back down. Feels good but not quite it. She swiveled on him. Closer. She jutted forward, took him all the way to the hilt and circled. Yeah. There it is. She found a rhythm, and judging from the pained/blissed-out expression on his face, it was working just fine for Seb as well.

  She gasped and planted her hands on the wall behind him as she rode and rode. At first, he seemed content to just watch, but as she built, his hands came to her hips, up her back, her breasts and neck, her hair.

  When she broke, her eyes wide and amazed, her body trembling like he’d hooked her up to a live wire, he let her shake herself out and then bowled her over and onto her back.

  “Thank fuck,” he growled, half laughing as he braced his feet against the headboard and pushed forward. “You were killing me.”

  He arr
anged her legs around his waist and braced himself on either side of her head. He was restrained gorgeousness, wild pleasure, an animal, a god. The lamplight lit him from the side as he pumped into her, the bed shaking on its legs and his noises of blurred ecstasy filling the room.

  “Everything,” he said into the skin of her neck. “Everything.”

  He tightened and pulled back to look in her face. Via had the distinct pleasure of watching Seb spiral out, unravel and come apart at e.v.e.r.y. fucking seam.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  “WE’RE NOT GOING to sleep yet, old man.”

  Seb cracked an eye at her, blocking out the light with his biceps. “Just a catnap.”

  “Nuh-uh.” She sat up, pulling at his arms. “No sleep. It’s only 8:45 at night. I’m feeding you instead.”

  That had him pulling his arm away. “What are you making?”

  “Come and see.”

  She slid all the way down his body to slither out of bed, and it was that more than the promise of food that had him lumbering to his feet. She walked, buck naked, out of his bedroom. He had to follow the woman who’d just destroyed him. Destroyed him and remade him. Seb sat up on the edge of the bed and realized that for the first time in three years, he didn’t feel like an imposter in his own romantic life. He wasn’t acting or faking it. He was exactly where he was supposed to be.

  He grabbed his briefs off the floor and joined her in the kitchen, squinting against the bright kitchen lights. He watched as she grabbed his T-shirt off the ground and slipped it on, fishing around in the fridge for food. Seb simply couldn’t believe that he got to touch her. He’d been waiting for her for so long that it still almost didn’t seem real.

  Seb took a seat at the barstool and watched while she started making pancakes. He could watch her clean a toilet, and he’d still be amazed at her grace. It felt strange to be anywhere but the bedroom. But especially in the kitchen, after their conversation there. The intensity of it still rang in the air.

  “How are you feeling?” she asked him, apparently sensing the same thing. “After all, you know, that?”

  “All what? The sex?”

  “Uh, sure. But I also meant after my total and complete freak-out.”

  He rose and went to her, standing behind her while she flipped pancakes at the griddle. His hands slid under the T-shirt she wore and he hugged her back against him. “You weren’t the only one that freaked out. And I feel...like I just ran a race. You know that loose feeling in your chest? Relieved and tired and healthy.”

  She turned to him, her eyes cautious. “It’s not going to be the last time that happens, Seb. I’m not always happy. And I’ve been lonely for so long that it’s changed me. Made a real impact on who I am. It won’t always be as fun to be with me as it might feel right now.”

  Seb reached out and flipped off the stove. He picked her up by the hips and walked her into the living room. He sat her down on the couch and crouched in front of her. “Via, I can’t help but feel like you’re stating the obvious here. Let me just be really clear, okay? I understand that you are a complete human being, with a lifetime of complications going on inside you. I’m not looking to carve away the hard parts. I’m not looking for three-quarters of a person to be with. I want the whole thing. All of you. I want a real relationship. Where sometimes your shit gets in the way and sometimes mine does, and we’re patient and we talk about it. I don’t expect you to be issue-free. And I definitely don’t expect our love for each other to just magically dissolve our respective hang-ups. All I want is to keep growing. To keep growing alongside someone I can lean on and who leans on me. And to argue and hold each other accountable and celebrate the good stuff with and make love to and come home to.”

  He was breathing hard and gripping her knees. She reached forward and just like that, she was the one comforting him.

  She slid forward so that she was wrapped around him, mostly in his arms and mostly off the couch. “You said love.”

  He leaned back and took her with him so that she sat on him and he sat on the floor. He made sure to hold her eyes with his. “I don’t know what else it could be.”

  “You love me.” It was half question, half disbelief. “You’re sure?”

  He tightened his hands around her; he wanted to laugh but could sense the seriousness of the moment. He cast around for a way to explain it. “Via, I’m positive. I’d suspected it for a while, but I knew it the second I walked up to the Botanic Gardens before the wedding. I’ll never forget seeing you in that green dress for the first time. It was like being hit with a hatchet. A clean hit. Right down my center. I got changed from one person into two.”

  “What do you mean?”

  Well, she was really gonna make him spell it out.

  “I mean that before that, everything about me was easy to keep track of. All in one place. And then you happened, and now half of me is walking around in here.” He tapped a heavy finger over her sternum. Like she wouldn’t break. And he knew she wouldn’t.

  “Oh, Seb.” She was looking at him now, with such tenderness it almost alarmed him. He was hit with the sudden urge to make sure she understood. Everything.

  “I wasn’t a good husband to Cora,” Seb whispered, the words like bitter poison on his tongue. Via was simultaneously the last person he wanted to say this to and the only one he ever could. “But I’m stronger now. Better now. I understand so much more about the world. We’ll figure it out, Violetta. We just have to try together.”

  “Seb, I’m in. I’m really, really in for this.”

  “Me, too,” he replied hurriedly, the words tripping off his tongue in relief and rising giddiness. “I mean, obviously I am.” He laughed and exhaled and slammed his eyes shut. I’m in. Her words repeated themselves in his head. He held them tight, like gemstones in a fist. He was never letting them go.

  * * *

  VIA’S WETNESS WAS pressed against his underwear and she ached for him. They’d just had each other, and somehow she needed him again, so badly. It was the complicated expression in his eyes that did it. She’d watched him reassure her and awaken a fear of his own all in the same speech. They were two complicated people who were marked by the losses in their lives. But she hadn’t lost Seb. And he hadn’t lost her. They were here together and she wanted to, needed to, show him that.

  Via leaned her forehead against his and trailed her hand down his chest. She danced her fingers at the waist of his underwear, and his breathing became jagged. His hips, under hers, pushed up into her and she felt him waking up.

  Emboldened by the desire she saw in his eyes, Via slipped her hand into his underwear. He was very large and getting larger. Her breath caught as she pumped him in her hand. But the dang underwear was in the way and she rose up a few irritated inches and jerked them down to the middle of his thighs. He chuckled at the frustrated look on her face, but the laugh died when she sat back on his lap and pumped him again.

  He was spearing up between them and Via needed something to lubricate him. She spit onto him and he swore a blue streak, covering his eyes for a second like the sight was too hot for him to even watch. But he was huge, and it wasn’t enough. So, in a move she’d never even considered executing before, she dipped her free hand through her own wetness and used it to slick his erection. She smiled when his hands went into fists where he leaned back on them.

  “Fuck, Via. You gorgeous—gah—just like that. I can’t—oh fuck.”

  He was huge and practically vibrating, speaking gibberish, and she was making him like that. She was the one doing this to him. She felt a whippy power curl out inside of her. She understood, in that second, what he’d been describing. That this was what sharing the wheel felt like. Sometimes he drove and sometimes she did. And right now, she was driving.

  She rose up on her knees and guided the head through her wetness, swirling it in a tight circle around her clit.


  Seb’s breath washed over her and she felt his knees rise up behind her. “Condom,” he bit out.

  “Where?”

  “Bedroom.”

  “Fuck.”

  He smiled a helpless, tortured smile at her curse. “Are you on birth control?”

  “IUD,” she responded immediately. She understood what he was really asking, and boy howdy, was she on board.

  “I’m clean,” he gritted out. “I got tested a few weeks ago after—”

  She slapped a hand over his mouth, suspecting he might be about to reveal something about someone else he’d slept with. Yeah. She was not a jealous person, but now was not the time.

  “Me, too,” she told him and sank down onto him, taking him in one long, hip-circling downward press that sunk him to the hilt and brought them face-to-face.

  Seb groaned, making a noise like he’d been shot. Via loved it. The ravenous look on his face. His hair messy. She flexed on him, made him make the noise again.

  “You look wrecked,” she told him, rising up and taking him in all the way again.

  “Ah—damn—I am wrecked. You’re wrecking me.”

  She got in one more stroke of her own before he gripped her hips, fell onto his back and started pumping up into her from below.

  Via was no virgin, and she’d watched a little porn here and there. But she had never seen something like this before. Sebastian Dorner, big bones and chest hair and flexing muscles, the tendons in his neck standing out as he grimaced against the pleasure. His stomach wasn’t extremely defined, it was more a solid wall of muscle, but as he flexed himself up and into her, she saw a hundred different ridges and shadows she hadn’t noticed before. His hips were taking them a good six inches off the ground with every stroke.

  Via hinged forward, her mouth falling to his chest, and took everything he was giving to her. Seb braced a hand on her tailbone and growled when she bared her teeth and bit his chest. She’d meant it to be a sweet little bite. A kiss of pain to remind him who he was with. But he swiveled his hips, and the new angle he was hitting had her entire body clenching. Her jaw closed hard on his pec and she screamed her pleasure.