by Mimi Strong
Luca chuckles. “If she shaves her head and takes an interest in the tambourine, I’ll get worried then.” He leans over and plants a kiss on my lips. I don’t like the taste of coffee, except for on Luca’s mouth. I could taste that all night.
“Meenie’s always had trouble with relationships.”
He sips his coffee, listening without commenting.
I continue, “When we were eight, she’d hold boys down and kiss them. I swear this one family moved away from the neighborhood because they thought she was bullying their son.”
Luca fights a smirk. “She’s quite the girl. I like your sister, and not just because she reminds me of you. She’s got a good heart, and she cares about other people. You know, I’ve got a mechanic at the shop who might like what she has to offer.”
I reach up and pat his chest. “You’re the one with the good heart.” I keep rubbing, enjoying the ridges of his muscles under his shirt. He grabs my hand and kisses my fingertips.
“It’s too early to pull out the bed,” he says.
“Tease.” I pull my hand away.
“We could watch some TV, or we could put on some music and play that Scrabble you have in the closet.”
I jump up from the couch and race to get the Scrabble board. Muffin leaps into action like we’re having a fire drill and scrambles out the open window. Tail held high, he crosses the back lawn to the main house.
When I come back to the couch to set up the board on the coffee table, Luca’s staring at me with a look of adoration on his handsome face. His blue eyes are full of love.
“You look happy for someone who’s about to get his butt kicked,” I say.
“Tina, you know I’d do anything for you, right? And that includes playing badly to let you win.”
“You’re so bad.” I put my hands on his shoulders and wrestle him back so he’s lying on the couch with me on top of him. He grabs my butt and grinds me against him as he kisses me deeply.
After a moment, he pushes me away, growling, “It’s still too early to pull the bed out.”
I pull away from him and look into his eyes. “We don’t need the bed. You can just take me over to that wall again.”
He grins. “I almost got a butt cramp.”
I cover his mouth. “Don’t say that! Now I’ll be thinking about butt cramps when you’re making love to me.”
The words wash over both of us at the same time. Making love. I said it.
“Tina…”
I pull away, sit up, and grab for my cup of tea, playing it cool.
He sits up and puts his arm around my shoulders, so I can’t get away. “You’re absolutely right,” he says. “I do make love to you, and it’s because I love you.”
It’s hard for me to swallow the tea, because of the lump in my throat. “I think I love you, too,” I murmur.
“Of course you do. You wouldn’t drive me around like my personal chauffeur and let me leave my chest hair in your tub if you didn’t love me.” He kisses the side of my face and nuzzles around my ear. He growls, “You wouldn’t do that special thing you do, if you didn’t love me.”
I giggle and squirm. He’s referring to a pleasuring technique that I’m ashamed to say I read about in Cosmopolitan. Many of their tips are downright ridiculous and could lead to an embarrassing doctor visit, but sometimes you get a good one.
I kiss him, feeling my temperature rising, then pull back. “It’s still too early for me to do that special thing. You said so yourself.”
He looks down at the Scrabble. “Then let’s find a way to pass the time. Are you finished your tea? Let’s open that wine Rory gave us, the pinot grigio.”
I slurp back the rest of my tea. “Game on.”
Our Scrabble game keeps getting interrupted by makeout sessions. Luca and I playfully argue over what time is a reasonable hour for two adults to go to bed.
He’s got his hand up my shirt and is making a very good case for right now being the right time when there’s an impatient knock at the door.
I run and pull the door open to find my sister.
She peers around my shoulder. “Did I interrupt your coitus?”
I resist the urge to strangle her. “Meenie, don’t say that word.”
She rolls her eyes. “You and Rory and your word hang-ups.”
My eyes bulge out when I realize she’s wearing her I ♥ BJ shirt. It’s an ‘I Love Beijing’ shirt, but it sends a mixed message. I shake my head. And the girl wonders why she doesn’t have a boyfriend. Where do I even start?
Meenie wrinkles her nose at the mess of laptops and Luca’s stuff on the dining table. “You guys could take over the big house if you want.”
Luca and I assure her we’re just fine in the cottage. She helps herself to the open wine and joins us in our Scrabble game on the coffee table.
I look over at Luca, who’s just read Meenie’s I ♥ BJ T-shirt and is having a hard time keeping a straight face. I would apologize for my sister barging in, but he seems happy enough.
I guess that because he didn’t grow up with any siblings, let alone girls, this is still a novelty for him. I’m glad he’s having fun, because I can imagine us all having holidays together, and it’s a nice picture in my head.
Tonight’s going well. We had a nice dinner, I had a solid nap, and we said we loved each other. Life is good.
Luca wrestles the wine bottle from her to refill his own glass. “Your sister was telling me you’re in a club Tuesday nights. I hope it’s not the kind where you sign over all your personal possessions.”
She gives him that look she used to give other wrestlers in high school, before she knocked them to the ground—sometimes in the cafeteria.
“It’s a group for people who have problems,” she says. “Not that I have problems myself. I thought it was a Weight Watchers group, but now I still go because it’s fun.”
“That’s nice of you,” Luca says, grinning.
“There’s a new guy at group,” she says, getting a shy smile. I haven’t seen that kind of smile on Meenie’s face in a long time. She’s got a crush on someone, that’s for sure.
She lets out a girly sigh, staring dreamily into outer space. “He’s a total jackass. He’s rude and crude, and he dresses like a department store mannequin. He smells like—don’t take this the wrong way, Luca—but he smells like citrus and chocolate and balls.”
Luca is hanging on her every word. “Why would I take that the wrong way?”
Meenie explains that the new guy is way hotter than Luca. She then goes on to describe him, in detail. I get a really bad feeling from what she’s telling us, so I try to make it clear that she should take her therapist’s advice to stay away.
“I disagree,” Luca says, then he goes on to talk about fate and destiny. He doesn’t know my sister’s background, so he doesn’t know he’s throwing gas on the fire.
I try to focus on my letter tiles and words, letting them talk. My sister has a defiant personality, so if I put my foot down and come out against the guy, she’ll only want him more.
Neither of them is trying to play the Scrabble board strategically, so I beat them easily. Meenie gets all cranky and tosses the board on the floor “by accident.”
When she’s in the washroom, I whisper to Luca, “She’s a sore loser. Sorry I didn’t warn you about that.”
“It must have been fun growing up with a sister,” he says.
“You can have her.”
“When we get married, she’ll be my sister.”
The wine has made my ears not work as well, but he definitely just mentioned marriage. It was in the abstract, but still. Wow, this guy moves fast.
“My family is all yours,” I tell him.
Grinning he pulls me in for a kiss.
We’re interrupted by Meenie, stomping through on her way to the front door. “At least wait until I’m out of the house!” she says, pretending to be scandalized.
“I love you, sis!” I call after her.
Sh
e blows me a kiss and stumbles out drunkenly.
As soon as she’s gone, I jump up and zip around the place closing all the blinds. I turn off all the lights, except for the small one in the kitchen, which will cast enough of a glow to keep us from bumping into things.
Luca tosses the cushions off the sofa like he’s trashing a hotel room to find a suitcase of spy money. He folds out the bed, strips, and climbs on, completely naked except for his cast. Even in the dim light, I can see the tension in his body as he watches me, anticipating my touch.
“Bed time at last,” I say, walking toward him and undressing, taking my time.
His eyes stay on me, drinking me in as I slowly take off my clothes and then my underwear. He looks at me like I’m perfect, and that appreciation is even more intoxicating than the wine.
I climb onto the foot of the bed, moving like a wild jungle cat after her prey. He isn’t asking me to do that special thing, which only makes me want to do it more.
Being mindful of his injured foot, I slowly kiss my way up along the tops of his thighs. I smell his musky skin between his legs, letting his scent further infuse me with lust.
With a feather-light touch, I slide my naked body up along his. I gently kiss, lick, and bite my way up his chest to his neck. He moans with urgency as I nibble his earlobe.
I slide back down again, dragging my body over his until I’m settled between his legs. I nibble the skin at his hip bones, then move toward his center.
“Oh my, what’s this?” I coo, acting like I’ve never seen such a thing.
“I don’t know,” Luca says, playing along. “The cast on my foot must be doing something to my circulation and causing swelling over here, in this general area. Honestly, it’s never done that before.”
I drag the tip of my tongue along his length. I hear his breath catch in his throat as I reach the tip and circle around.
“It’s all swollen and hard,” I say, smacking my lips.
“That's quite the sound,” he growls.
“You mean this?” I lick my lips and smack them noisily.
He lets out a low, lusty groan. I smack my lips a few more times, in between licking him and taking him into my mouth.
We don’t have any music playing or noisy distractions, because this is the special thing he likes: lip-smacking noises while I administer First Aid to his swollen appendage.
As far as kinks go, this is definitely something I can work with.
I keep at it, feeling his tension build until he’s like a volcano.
When he can’t hold back any more, he reaches down, grabs my shoulders, and pulls me up. We kiss while he grabs one of the condoms we keep in a hidden pocket inside a pillow and hands it to me.
I’m getting better at this task, thanks to plenty of practice. I know how to wrangle the shark into the Ziploc bag, so to speak. The key is checking that it’s not upside-down.
Once it’s in place, Luca moves himself up on the bed until he’s sitting up with his back against the backrest of the sofa.
“What are you doing?” I ask, shaking my head.
“I’m thinking about our first time, how you climbed on my lap and lowered yourself onto me. You drove me crazy, like you always do, but that’s when I knew then I was in deep, deep trouble.”
I move up toward him and straddle his lap, his hard length pressed between our stomachs.
“You haven’t seen trouble yet,” I say with bravado.
He bows his head forward and sucks the sensitive skin on the side of my neck. He shifts his body and slips his hand down between my legs.
I gasp as he pushes one thick finger inside me. I rock against his touch as he slides in easily. He starts doing that magical thing he does, which is simply touching me with sweet, gentle passion. Everything he does feels amazing, and soon I’m gasping, desperate for more.
I rise up on my knees, guide him into place, and sink down upon him. I’m wet, but it still takes some movement and patience to accommodate him. He fills me, and transforms my body to a tingling extension of his. Or maybe I’m not an extension, but the missing part, the other half of the equation that makes us both whole.
“I love you,” he whispers, his hands on my back. “You don’t have to say it if you’re not ready, but I can’t hold back anymore.”
I lean my head forward, my cheek touching his.
My lips at his ear, I say, “Luca.” My pulse quickens, and I’m full of radiance. “Luca, I love you, too.”
Deep inside me, I feel a spark that grows. My body takes over, and I’m rising and falling in rhythm, making love to him. He grasps my back, now feverishly hot.
We keep moving, as one, and as two, then one again.
I love you.
One of us says it again, but I don’t know who.
I don’t want this moment to end, but of course the instant I think that, I start to come. Luca shakes inside me, lifting his hips to keep us moving even as my body goes still, pulsing with pleasure.
His hand slides up my back, grabs a handful of hair near the base of my skull, and pulls my head back.
My mouth opens, and my soft cries of pleasure get loud and fill the room. He kisses my neck and holds me tight, burying himself deep inside me. He groans and loses control.
He releases my hair, and his hands slide down my back slowly, his fingertips easing my tension and spreading the pulsing pleasure through my whole body.
Perfect.
Once we’re finished moving, we untangle casually.
The awkwardness that sometimes happens after sex isn’t happening. Not with Luca. Everything feels right.
He retreats to the washroom first, and I join him after a few minutes.
When I walk in, he kisses my forehead and hands me my toothbrush.
“Hang on,” he says, his blue eyes relaxed and sleepy. He grabs the toothpaste and squeezes a tiny dollop onto my toothbrush.
“I’d like a little more, please,” I say.
He squeezes a huge blob onto the brush.
“That’s too much.” I shake my head.
He grabs his own toothbrush—the blue one—and takes back some of the toothpaste for himself.
“Perfect.”
He grins and starts brushing his teeth.
A thought occurs to me: This is what making love means. You have sex, and then you brush your teeth together. You don’t do this with someone you don’t love.
I’m happy.
Chapter 25
We pull the bike into the hospital parking lot. Luca’s arms are wrapped around me, and I’m the one steering the bike.
Luca says it’s my bike now, but I think it’s too early in the relationship for such extravagant gifts. We’ve only been back together for a few months, but by the way things are going, I’ll probably relent and start calling it my bike soon.
The doctors didn’t want Luca riding while his foot was still in the cast. They did say he could go on a few rides, but only if someone else drove. I think that suggestion was a joke on the doctor’s part, but Luca called a friend that night to set me up with lessons.
I like riding. I like the rumble of the engine, and the way leaning from side to side for balance feels like your whole body is connecting with motion. It’s great exercise, too. I could never have muscles like Luca’s but I’m building strength and balance.
And I look really hot in black leather pants.
Luca hops off the bike on his boot side and waits for me to get under his arm. The bad part about taking the bike anywhere is there’s no way we’re taking the crutches. People already stare enough as it is, with a girl in front and the guy with a big cast on his foot.
We hop our way into the waiting room and take a seat.
Luca is excited about getting the cast off. We brought with us a new pair of boots that lace up, so he doesn’t strain the mending bone.
I pick up a magazine, and Luca sighs.
I put down the magazine again and turn to him. “What’s going on?”
; He grins. “My foot is aching a bit. Slide over here and give me some sugar.”
I glance around the waiting room. There are a few people reading magazines, pretending they didn’t hear him.
This has been our little game for the last several weeks. He only took painkillers for the first two days after the accident, then he switched over to “natural” painkillers. The treatments involve me kissing or massaging him, or the other way around. I can’t say I mind the “natural” approach at all.
He puts his arm around me and steals a long kiss. His lips ignite my passionate feelings instantly. I pull away quickly, before I embarrass myself by moaning in public, here in this hospital waiting room.
He leans over and nuzzles in my ear, “Let me see it.”
I turn and give him a shocked look. “I’m wearing jeans,” I whisper.
He rolls his yes. “I mean your little O face.”
My cheeks feel hot. “Have you lost your mind?”
He tugs up my shirt, exposing my midriff. “There it is,” he says.
I yank my shirt down. One of the ladies across from us smiles. She probably thinks I’m having a baby—which I most certainly am not. I’m on birth control now, and while having a baby is definitely an option for the future, it’s not happening just yet.
He pulls my shirt up again and says, “O face.”
I pull it down again. “What’s gotten into you? What O face?”
“This one.” He lifts my shirt and points to three little freckles that form a triangle above my belly button. “Eye, eye, nose.” He pokes my navel. “Mouth. See? It’s a face, and the mouth is open like it’s saying O.”
Suddenly, a whole bunch of things make sense.
“Is that why I catch you talking to my stomach sometimes?”
“Do I do that?”
“Yes, you do.” I shake my head, letting out a small laugh of relief. “I thought maybe you were obsessed with getting me pregnant or something.”
He pulls back, his eyes wide. “Easy now.”
“Well, what was I supposed to think?” I tug my shirt back down. “Not that I even want that sort of thing right now.”
