Eyes Wide Open

by Raine Miller

  13

  ♥ Ethan scooped me off the couch and into his arms. I lifted my eyes and got that wave of emotion again as his blues found me. I loved him so much I knew the fear. I’d heard others speak about it. I’d read about it in books. Now I understood. The fear that you have when you finally give your heart away to another person. It makes you very vulnerable to loss. If you never love anyone, then you’ll never be hurt when they don’t love you back or when they leave you.

  I finally had the practical experience of understanding.

  It sucked.

  Ethan sensed my newfound knowledge, I think. He studied me with intuitive eyes that looked very dark blue at the moment, and ducked his head down to meet my lips. He kissed me there in front of the window while holding me naked in his arms. I melted into him and gave in to my goddamn emotions.

  He carried me down the hall to the bedroom and broke the kiss to lower me down to the bed. He saw.

  “Oh, oh, baby . . . don’t cry,” he whispered, cupping my face and settling against me.

  I couldn’t help it. There was far too much inside me to leave it there. “I just love you so much, Ethan,” I blubbered and then closed my eyes in an attempt to find some small sliver of sanctuary from my emotions.

  He took over, stretching out against me so that our bodies aligned from head to toe when he started kissing me. Everywhere. “I love you more,” he whispered as his lips trailed over my tears and brushed them away. He moved on to my jaw and then my neck and throat, the warm draw of his tongue over my skin settling me into some control over my urge to weep.

  “I know what you need, and I’ll always be here to give it to you.” His hand reached up to weave fingers into my hair as his mouth closed over a nipple and sucked. And just like that he took me away into another world. A place where I was cherished, and where I could forget about a time when I never dared to dream about being loved like this.

  Ethan alternatively flicked his tongue between my nipples, pinching with his lips, pulling them up and hardening the tips to sharp aching points as he held my hair in a firm grip. The tugging of my hair arched my chest up to meet his mouth. I needed what he did to me. So very badly.

  When he lifted his head from my breasts, I protested the loss of his mouth on me and the pleasure it gave. He wanted to look at his handiwork. Ethan loved to look at our bodies during sex. There was no part of me he hadn’t had a good look at or touched in some way. It gave me confidence when he looked and I knew he liked what he saw.

  “Does that feel good when I suck on your beautiful tits and make them hard?” He tugged on my hair.

  “Yes! I love when you suck them.” I was starting to feel desperate.

  “Do you love it when I bite them?” He clamped his teeth over one, not hard enough to hurt badly, but enough to give me a jolt of ecstasy along with a twinge of pain that brought out a moan.

  “I think I take that as a yes,” he muttered. “You’re so fucking gorgeous when you make sounds . . .” He bit the other nipple, making me gasp and craving much more. Ethan had shown me, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that I was indeed a sexual creature. When he got me into this state even I would class myself well into the category of nymphomaniac.

  His hand left my hair as he reached down to open my legs wide so he could stare at my pussy. “But this is what I want now,” he rasped, stroking over my cleft, spreading the slick wetness from my earlier orgasm backward to lubricate my other opening. We’d been working on this for a while, and Ethan was taking his time in getting us there. I’d never done anal sex with anyone else; he would be the first. It felt nice to be a virgin in this way and give something to him that wasn’t going to go to anyone else.

  He pushed two fingers in and lifted his eyes as he did. “I want this, baby. I want into every part of you because you’re mine, and you always will be.”

  The sting of pressure filling me up made me flex against the invasion. “I know,” I panted against his lips brushing mine. His words only helped me to feel more of what I needed to know from him, I focused on that and let myself go to a good place in my head. You’re mine, and you always will be.

  “Relax for me. Let me in here, and I’ll make it feel so good.” He started stroking with his fingers slowly, working in deeper with each penetration. “Baby . . . so fucking tight. I want to claim this tonight.”

  “Do it,” I breathed, rolling my head to the side, “I want you to . . . finally do it . . .”

  Ethan took hold of my chin, turning me back to face him as he pressed his fingers farther inside me and took possession of my mouth with his, thrusting his tongue in deep with forceful swirls. “I love you,” he said harshly. “So much I don’t know what to do with myself most of the time, but I do know what I want to do here.” He withdrew his fingers, then slid them back into my virgin asshole.

  I cried out from the intensity of the slide as it burned a path straight to my center.

  “I have to know every bit of you, Brynne. I’m greedy and I have to have it all, baby.” He started a slow rub of my clit with his thumb in tandem with his finger penetrations. “I have to be inside your beautiful, perfect ass because it’s you and I have to know what it feels like to be there.”

  I shuddered beneath him and his touch, incapable of much more than a simple yes. The second I uttered my agreement, he pulled off me and turned me over. He took his time arranging me as he wanted. My hips were tugged back so I rested on my knees. My arms were stretched forward and made to grip the headboard. My knees were spread farther apart, and then . . . nothing. I could hear him breathing, and knew he was studying me again. My Ethan had a touch of voyeur kink in him and it only served to make me hotter knowing I was fulfilling his fantasies.

  I hung there in anticipation when he covered me, his chest pressing onto my back, his mouth at my ear. “Are you sure?” he asked with a warm brush of his lips and then a lick just below my earlobe.

  “Yeeees,” I shuddered out my answer on a long breath.

  His lips met the back of my neck and swept down my spine in a worshipful caress. The closer he moved toward his destination, the more my body lit up in sensations building low in my belly. I started to shake.

  “Easy, my beauty, I got you.” He pressed a hand to my lower back and then smoothed over one cheek. “You are exquisite like this,” he murmured as his hand rolled up the other cheek to grip my hip. “Utterly exquisite and perfect.” I felt him shift his weight around behind me and heard the side-table drawer slide open. Slick drops of lube met my skin as he worked it around. “Breathe for me, okay? I’m going to take care of you so good.”

  I nodded to let him know I’d heard but I couldn’t speak. All I could do was suck in air and anticipate what would happen once I felt him there.

  The tip of his cock bumped through my folds and slid deliciously along my clit, sending out sparks that made me thrust back for more contact.

  “Yes, baby. You’ll get it.” The blunt head of him pressed forward on me. The pressure was intense, and I couldn’t help the contraction of my muscles. “Relax and breathe.” He gave another push and the tip of him was in, my opening stretching to accommodate his size. “One more, baby. Almost there. I’m going in slow but steady, okay?” His hands held my ass as his cock moved deeper, propelled by a desire on both our parts to complete this union. There was some pain, but it was a very erotic sort of sensation that released something inside me. I wanted to feel it. I really did. I needed to understand, so I needed to give myself to Ethan more.

  The immense pressure building as already forcing a response within me and taking me forward for an orgasm. I pushed backward on his cock to let him know it was okay to keep going. “Ahhhhh . . . oh, God,” I said, shuddering as he pressed forward again, the stretched feeling increasing to the point of pain until it seemed impossible, my body burning up. Then suddenly a give as he filled me up completely on a stinging thr
ust that took him all the way home. I closed my eyes on his shout and froze at the sensation.

  “Fuuuck, you feel so good!” He held himself still and caressed both sides of my ass with his hands. “Baby . . . oh, fuck me . . . okay?” He was having trouble with words and I certainly understood that. I was having trouble holding still, and could feel the shakes returning. The convulsions weren’t pain-induced, but involuntary reactions to the incredible assault on my erogenous zone. There was minimal pain because Ethan had prepared me slowly for this experience, taking me with care, as was his way with most everything. “Look at you, shaking.” He stoked my hips reverently. “I’ll stop if you tell me to. I never want to hurt you, baby,” he said clearly but I could hear the strain in his words. “You feel so crazy good, I’m—I am—fuck, it’s so good!” I could tell he was as affected as I was, hanging there suspended, waiting for the other to share. Ethan and I had always connected very honestly when it came to sex. I don’t know why everything was so easy, but it was and it always had been so.

  “I’m—I-I’m okay,” I stuttered, “I want you to keep going.”

  “Fuck, I love you!” he groaned harshly.

  Ethan withdrew slowly, the drag sending more of those sensory sparks down my center, and then thrust back in deep again. Each penetration slow and controlled. Each joining a little deeper than the one before it. I was shocked at the intensity of the pleasure building inside me as he picked up the pace steadily. His hands held me secure and his cock owned me in the last and final way possible.

  As everything built low in my core, racing toward something explosive, I could tell Ethan was in the same desperate condition as I was. He began to start in with the dirty talk and the heaving breathing as he slipped a hand down over my clitoris and rubbed in a circle.

  His touch to that little bundle of nerves sent me over the edge. “I’m going to come!” I sobbed. As I bowed my head down into the sheets to brace for the onslaught, I felt him swell to inhuman hardness inside me as his cock continued on in a relentless rhythm.

  “Oh, FUUUUCK!—so am I!” he bellowed through the tight thrusts that connected us over and over again.

  I convulsed beneath him and blew apart, utterly boneless, and only able to hold on as he kept on with his purpose. A moment later I felt him leave me and flip me over, my body still reeling with the most explosive pleasure I’d ever experienced.

  “Eyes!” he barked.

  I opened mine and latched on to his fiery blue orbs. The sight of him was magnificent to behold. He looked like a pagan god, slick with sweat and all straining muscles as he kneeled between my legs, gripping his cock, and ejaculated all over my breasts and throat.

  He was so very beautiful in that moment.

  Sometime later I heard the bath running and opened my eyes, my body heavy with sleepy satisfaction. Ethan was right there watching me, all intense and serious in his expression, his fingers trailing through my hair.

  “There she is.” The hard lines softened as he leaned in to nuzzle over my lips. “You get sleepy after I make you come.”

  “I think I needed a little nap after all that.”

  The frown returned. “Too much? I’m sorr—”

  I shut him up with my hand over his mouth. “No.” I shook my head. “If it’d been too much I would have said.”

  “Did it feel good?” he asked carefully, a worried brow creasing his beautiful features.

  “Oh . . . yes.”

  “Did I hurt you?” The sound of concern in his voice melted me even further.

  “Only in the nicest way,” I told him honestly.

  The furrow disappeared and a look of relief replaced it. “Oh, thank holy fuck!” He lifted his eyes upward like he was saying a prayer and then trained them back on me, which was absurd, really—thanking heaven for anal sex with an f-bomb declaration of gratitude when I’d given my blessing?

  “Because I really want to do it again sometime.” He looked so very relieved, and possibly even a little smug about me. I was glad to have made him happy and comforted to be shown, yet again, how much I could trust Ethan with my heart, and my body. He excelled in taking care of me. I hadn’t really seen just how much he wanted to, and just how good he really was at doing it. Sexually and emotionally.

  Ethan was brutally honest about stuff, sometimes so much so I blushed outwardly for his frankness. Inwardly though, I knew it was part of the reason he worked so well for me. I had to laugh a little at him too. Only Ethan could get away with sounding sweet about his hope for more backdoor sex for us and not have it come out crude and harsh.

  How in the hell does he do that?

  My kinky, foul-mouthed, romantic gentleman lover.

  The perfect combination, in my opinion.

  “Okay . . .” I told him, and leaned forward for a kiss.

  He kissed me for a while in his gentle and precious way, as was typical. I looked forward to the after-sex kissing session. Ethan always wanted to kiss me after, and it always felt like he was making love to me again, only just with his lips and mouth. He pressed into me from above and held me underneath his hard body, his hips settled in between mine, his lips all over me, my lips, my throat, my breasts. He didn’t stop until he was good and satisfied either.

  Ethan knew how to demand from me. And I am quite sure his instincts are just that basic—hardwired primal directives that he cannot help but to answer. I’m sure about him, because it works the same way for me as well. I want to accept him, and submitting during sex is a way to give Ethan those things he asks me for so candidly. It gets me hot too. I love the things he says and asks from me when we’re in the heat of fucking.

  He lifted his lips away and looked over me with glassy blue eyes. “I love you so much it scares me sometimes. No . . . it scares me most of the time.” He shook his head idly. “I hate leaving you alone here so much. It’s not right.” He sighed heavily. “I hate it so badly. I get—I just turn into a sort of raving madman, and I hope it’s all not . . . too much. That I’m not too much.” He touched his forehead to mine. “I see you and I just have to be with you like this.” He trailed a hand over my breast and cupped it over the now dried effects of his orgasm, which looked to have been mostly wiped off me at some point. Maybe he’d done it while I dozed. I’d been so out of it from that cataclysmic climax he’d given me, I had no idea.

  “Well, I’m not complaining.” I held his face. “I like your version of a madman, if that’s what you call it, and just so you know, I was lonely tonight, missing you and feeling worried about everything, but then you came home looking like you would die if you didn’t have me, and . . . well, it was just what I needed to make me feel better. When I’m alone with my thoughts, I tend to start worrying about things that I shouldn’t. Doubt creeps in. You are the first person to really help me with all the doubt. You just erase it all when you touch me and show me how much you want me.”

  He just stared, his eyes wide. “Are you real?” he whispered, brushing up my face with the back of his fingers in a cherishing caress. “Because I’ll want you forever.”

  Ethan had asked me that question before and I loved it. “When you say things like that my heart beats faster.”

  He put his hand over my left breast and held it there. “I can feel your heart. It’s my heart too.”

  I nodded. “It is your heart, and I am very real, Ethan. I’ve wanted everything we’ve ever done together, and you own my heart now.” I touched his face in the same way, just inches apart, drowning in his eyes.

  Ethan sighed heavily, but it sounded like one of relief and not of worry. “Come on, my beauty, have a bath with me. I need to wash you and hold you for a while.” He picked me up and carried me into his travertine masterpiece of a bathroom, and helped me into the tub. After he settled in behind me, I stretched back and rested against his firm chest. His arms came around to swirl water up over my breasts and shoulders
.

  “I called Benny tonight,” I offered after a moment.

  Ethan soaped up a bath sponge and drew it up my arm. “How is Clarkson? Does he want to take more pictures of you?”

  “We didn’t talk about that.”

  “But he will.” Ethan’s response was nothing new. He didn’t like me modeling, and he really didn’t understand how much I needed it either. I wasn’t in the habit of throwing it in his face because I didn’t want him getting all upset and unreasonable again. Every time I went for a photo shoot he got irrational, so it was easier to just avoid reminding him.

  “I think Ben’s getting suspicious, and I’m sure Gaby would be too if she’d seen me in the flesh, but we’ve only spoken on the phone.”

  Ethan drew the sponge over my neck. “It’s time to tell them, baby. I want it announced and it has to be something big. I know that much.”

  “Big how?”

  “London press? Celebrity guests? Posh planning?” I stiffened in his arms. He tightened his hold around me and whispered, “Now, don’t panic, okay? Our wedding has to be an . . . event that will be newsworthy enough so that everyone knows about us.”

  “Like the senator?”

  “Yes,” he paused, “we think that Fielding is dead too. He’s been missing since the end of May.”

  “Oh, God! Ethan, why didn’t you tell me?” I jerked forward and turned halfway around to look at him accusingly.

  He tightened his hold around me and pressed his lips to the back of my neck. He was attempting to soothe me, I suppose, and lucky for him his tactics usually worked. Ethan was able to settle me down with just a gentle touch.

  “I just got confirmation, and when I first suspected it we were at Hallborough, and you were so desperately sick . . . Don’t be angry. I had to tell Neil about us too. He knows we’re pregnant. And before you get mad about that, you should know he’s very happy for us. You know everything there is to know, Brynne.” He kissed my shoulder. “No secrets.”