Fractures in Ink

by Helena Hunting

  I left the note card where it was and headed to her bedroom, which was now ours. We’d set up the frame of my king bed and put on the mattress, but it was covered in bags of my clothes, and we needed to find the sheets.

  I kissed the back of Sarah’s neck as she opened a box and looked inside. “I vote as soon as the bed’s made we have a naked wrestling match.”

  She tilted her head, encouraging me to keep up the kissing. “I think that’s a fantastic idea, except I’d like to shower first.”

  I sniffed loudly and wrapped an arm around her waist so she couldn’t get away from me. “You smell good to me. We can shower after.”

  “I’ve been running up and down the stairs all morning, I’m gross.”

  “You want to get cleaned up so I can make you dirty again?”

  “When you say it like that…” Her sarcasm made me smile.

  She wore a pair of cut-off jean shorts and an oversized shirt that slipped conveniently off her shoulder, exposing pale skin now dotted with freckles, thanks to time spent in the sun. I kissed the bare expanse and sucked lightly. “You taste good, too.”

  “Probably not where it counts,” she muttered.

  I chuckled. “You looking for full service today, huh?”

  “Full service is my favorite.”

  I pressed my hard-on against her. “Better hurry up then, or you’re not gonna make it to the shower before I get you naked.” This time I nibbled my way from her shoulder to her ear.

  Sarah reached up to hold on to the back of my neck, clearly not interested in stopping. I took advantage and slipped my hand under her shirt, tracing her taut stomach. A tiny moan passed her lips, and she pressed her ass against my hips. But before I could get my hand under her bra, she twisted away and sprinted out of the room.

  “Where are you going?”

  “To shower!” she called back. “You should come too if you’re looking for full service!”

  I left all the bags on the bed and pulled my shirt over my head. My basketball shorts hit the living room floor. The shower was already running and Sarah was in the process of getting naked when I entered. I closed the door as she slid her shorts down her legs.

  I let out a groan, taking in the toned, curvy expanse of skin. “I get to see this every damn day now.”

  Sarah’s eyes dropped to my cock, which was sticking straight out. “You seem pretty happy about that.”

  “We both are.” I gave my dick a pat.

  She opened the curtain and stepped over the rim of the tub, making room for me by backing into the spray. The pipes groaned, the sad stream petering out to a trickle as it ran over her hair and down her chest.

  “I’m making it a priority to get this fixed. I don’t know why you haven’t said anything to Cassie. She’ll get it taken care of no problem.” I tapped the showerhead. The gentle rainfall picked up for half a second.

  “It’s not that bad. At least it doesn’t feel like my nipples are being pelted with pebbles.” Sarah reached around me for the shampoo, grazing my erection with her hip.

  “That sounds unpleasant.”

  “That’s how your shower felt. Like machine gun water pellets.”

  “Now it’s just a little tickle.” I cupped one of her breasts and circled the tight peak with a finger.

  Sarah fumbled the shampoo, and it dropped with a thud, skidding toward the drain.

  “I’ll get that.” I shifted her around so I could retrieve it and ended up level with her crotch. I couldn’t pass up the location. I handed her the bottle and grabbed her hips, looking up as I pressed my lips below her navel.

  Her lids lowered as she watched me kiss my way down.

  “I need to get clean,” she murmured, like a warning, but the fingers she ran through my hair didn’t pull me away.

  I found the bar of soap and ran my palm across it, then slid my fingers between her thighs, rubbing her clit a few times. “Clean enough for me.” I cupped my other hand under the spray, then splashed her before I licked her.

  This time she pulled on my hair, dragging my head up. “So dirty.”

  “So tasty,” I countered, sucking on the skin above her pelvis. I didn’t push it though. I knew Sarah wouldn’t enjoy herself nearly as much if she was self-conscious. So while she washed her hair, I washed her body, which proved to be quite distracting to her, likely because I spent a long time on very specific body parts—ones that elicited orgasms. She was pretty well boneless by the time I finished. I gave myself little more than a quick rinse, mostly because there was a good chance I’d need another shower by the time we were done.

  I turned off the water and grabbed a towel, drying Sarah while I kissed along her neck to her mouth. “Ready to get sweaty again?”

  “Only you get sweaty; I get dewy.”

  I backed us out of the bathroom, bumping the doorjamb with my shoulder. “Is that right? So does that mean I smell bad, and you smell like a delicate flower?”

  “Pretty much. You’re about to walk into the wall.”

  I angled us to the right to correct our course. “You do realize how unnecessary the shower was, right?”

  “I feel better about full service when I’m fresh.”

  “You mean dewy?”

  I went for her mouth, and she turned her head away, covering my face with her palm. “Ew!”

  “Not ew. I fucking love going down on you. Wanna know what I love the most?”

  “Not if you keep calling it dewy.”

  “You’re the one who started that.” I walked us sideways into the bedroom. I didn’t let go of Sarah as I shoved my bags of clothes on the floor and knocked some boxes off along with them. I spotted the black garbage bag that contained my comforter.

  Still kissing her, I snagged it with two fingers. I tore it open and did a half-assed job of tossing it over the mattress before I laid Sarah on top.

  “If you weren’t so impatient, we could be doing this on a fully made bed,” Sarah said.

  “Yeah, but then I’d have to wait to do this.” I shouldered my way between her legs and dipped down, gliding along her slit with my tongue.

  I was rewarded with one of her breathy gasps, so I did it again. Sarah’s hand went into my hair, and she lifted her hips, seeking exactly what I wanted to give her. I kept licking at her, soft strokes of tongue that pushed her higher, making her gasps louder and her sweet moans more frequent.

  I wasn’t in a rush, so I settled in, taking her close to the edge, then backing off enough to keep her there without pushing her over.

  “Chris,” she groaned my name on my next feather-light stroke.

  I lifted my head. “Yeah, baby?”

  Her cheeks were flushed a deep pink, along with her lips, because she’d been biting the bottom one, as was typical when she held back the little noises she made when she was close to coming.

  “Please,” she whispered.

  “Please what? Aren’t I giving you what you want?” I flicked her clit with my tongue.

  Her mouth dropped open, and she propped herself up on an elbow, watching as I did it again.

  “Feel good?” I asked.

  She nodded and another quiet groan escaped as I kissed her clit, a barely there brush of lips. She flopped back on the bed and huffed, lifting her hips at the same time. I almost laughed, except I knew better than to piss her off.

  Sarah could be super serious during sex, and quiet. While I didn’t have a problem with either, if we were going to be doing this on a much more regular basis, I figured we could throw in some fun.

  “You know, if I’m not doing it right, you can tell me. It won’t hurt my feelings.”

  She tried to give me a look, but I went ahead and gave her a nice long tongue stroke, and her eyes rolled up. Then I slipped in two fingers, because I was pretty much done with foreplay. But not until Sarah came, which happened on the next finger curl combined with a nice, firm lick.

  Her legs almost closed on my head, but I brought up my free arm and held the left one o
pen, just in time to catch the sweetest and probably the loudest moan I’d ever heard from her as it tumbled out of her pretty, sexy mouth. A violent shudder surged through her, and she bucked against my mouth and fingers.

  I let her ride it out before I licked a line up the center of her stomach, pausing to suck on each delicate nipple.

  “Did I do it right?” I nipped at her chin. “It sounded like maybe I did it right.”

  Sarah pursed her lips. “Don’t make fun of me.”

  “I’m not making fun.” I kissed her softly. “My favorite part about going down on you is watching you come. Just before it happens, you always bite your lip and try to hide in your shoulder, like you’re keeping all that sexy to yourself. It’s okay to let me know you like what I do to you, for you.”

  “I know.”

  “Then you should just let it out.”

  I traced the contour of her bottom lip, and she opened her mouth, letting me slip my finger inside. She bit down gently, her warm tongue swirling.

  Sarah hooked a leg around my waist and released my finger. A small, devilish smile tipped her mouth. “Maybe you need to give me a reason to.”

  “I thought I just did.”

  “Here I thought that was a warm up.”

  “Warm up, huh? That sounds a lot like a challenge.”

  She was slick and hot, and I groaned at the feel as I settled between her thighs. I rolled my hips, once, twice, a third time. Sarah pulled her leg up until I felt her knee pressing against my ribs.

  “You should definitely keep doing that,” she breathed.

  “What’s gonna happen if I don’t?”

  “Nothing good. Kittens will cry, a unicorn will expire.”

  “That sounds awful.” On the next hip roll I slid down and Sarah let out one of her breathy gasps. Before my brain could catch up with my dick, she put a hand on my lower back and pushed down as she lifted her hips.

  The sound that came out of her was half whimper, half sigh. She stared up at me with wide eyes that were anything but innocent as she clamped her legs around my waist and locked her feet. “Stay.”

  For a second I didn’t understand what she meant. Clearly I wasn’t going anywhere since all my stuff was now in her apartment. And now didn’t seem like the best time to have that conversation anyway, considering our current position. Intense, amazing sensation made my brain slow to process why it felt so damn good.

  “Shit.” I wasn’t wearing a condom.

  “Please stay.” She held on to my shoulders, and her lips connected with my chin before she sucked my bottom lip.

  I closed my eyes, unable to focus the way I needed to because I really didn’t want to say no. “Just let me get a condom.”

  “We don’t need a condom. I’m safe. You’re safe. Just stay with me. Love me.”

  It was those last two words that broke me. We’d been circling emotions for a while now. The feelings were there, the walls had come down, but the words were unspoken. I wasn’t sure if she was waiting for me to say them or I was waiting for her.

  “Isn’t that what I always do?” A shiver ran through her as I slid an arm under her. I considered for a few long seconds the ramifications of going without a condom. My first instinct was to panic, but then, we were adults, not kids with no concept of the repercussions. And she was right, we were safe in all the ways that counted. We were each other’s and no one else’s.

  Tilting her hips up farther, I started a slow grind. Sarah matched my rhythm, her nails digging into my back as I picked up speed. Those sweet, sexy moans of hers grew louder the faster I went.

  When she came, her eyes stayed on mine and my name was a raspy cry. I didn’t falter, just kept going until my own orgasm punched me in the spine. After I came, I rolled us over and pulled Sarah on top of me so I wouldn’t crush her.

  Her wet hair was a wild, tangled mess in the back, compliments of all the thrusting. Getting a brush through it wasn’t going to be easy without another round of conditioner to loosen up the nest.

  “Chris.”

  “Yeah, baby?” I smoothed a hand over the back of her head, to see if that helped.

  She rested her chin on my chest. “Thank you.”

  “For what?”

  “For loving me.”

  “Are we still talking about the sex now?”

  She bit her lip. “We don’t have to be.”

  “You telling me how I feel about you?”

  “Is that how you feel about me?”

  God, the look on her face. I couldn’t understand how she could still be so uncertain. Now that I’d come around to her way of seeing things, I was looking to stay as long as I could. “You don’t already know the answer to that? Or are you waiting for me to say it so you can?”

  She dipped her head and kissed my chest before peeking back up at me. “Tell me why you stayed.” It was barely a whisper.

  I laughed. Anything to get it out of me first. “Because you asked me to.”

  She tried to hide her smile. “Why else?”

  “Because you love me.” Her tiny grin faltered for a second until I continued. “And I love you.”

  The smile that lit up her face was totally worth backing down for. “I knew that.”

  I locked my arms around her waist. “You’re not gonna say it?”

  She pushed up on her arms and took my face between her palms. “I love you.”

  And then she kissed me so I could feel her love as much as I could hear it and see it.

  EPILOGUE

  Chris

  I finished with my last scheduled client early, which meant I had extra time to prepare for my session with Sarah.

  Tonight I would give her the present she’d asked for as soon as I moved into her place and we finally owned how we felt about each other. Sarah had also finished her internship today, and her supervisor had offered her a full-time position before she could even walk out the door. The guy she’d be replacing was some douche who kept screwing the interns and secretarial staff. He’d left a lot of half-finished, half-assed projects for her to manage. Finally, with Xander facing deportation and Sarah completing the last of the requirements for her degree, she was clear of the propriety clause.

  We had a lot to celebrate, but instead of doing what normal couples did—dinner, or a night out—Sarah wanted a tattoo. The one I’d designed, and redesigned five times since then, was laid out in the private room, along with the ink. It would likely go on her ribs, but we’d decide that together, like we did most things these days.

  The small key was symbolic of a lot of things—the unlocking of her future, the doors she had yet to open, the ones she’d already closed—but also a reminder of how we’d shared and unshared the keys to our separate apartments before we’d finally been honest about how we felt and grown brave enough to do life together.

  I still had another forty-five minutes before she was due at the shop, so I texted to let her know she could come now if she wanted. When I didn’t get a message back right away, I figured I’d go home—I loved that I could call it that now. In the short time we’d been living together, it already felt more that way than any other place I’d ever kept my stuff.

  If I was lucky, she’d be in the process of getting ready for the session. Based on the wood I’d been sporting on and off all day—it sprung up quite literally every time I thought about our session—I had a feeling the tattoo was going to be followed by some intense loving. Or preceded, depending on whether or not I could wait until after the session to get my girl naked.

  On the way up to the apartment, I stopped to check the mail, mostly because Sarah only did it once a week, and our box kept getting jammed up with flyers and junk mail. Today there were a couple of letters: one from the bank, another from her school, and one that looked like a card.

  I’d already bought a suit for her commencement next week. I’d suggested she let her mom know, which she reluctantly had, but then her mom was off on some month-long holiday in Europe with her newest bo
yfriend, so it hadn’t mattered anyway. It made me sad that someone who should be there celebrating with Sarah was too busy with her own bullshit. But sometimes that’s how it is. We don’t choose our family, but we choose the people we love and let love us back. I finally got that.

  In the weeks since Ivy had moved, my mom had finally found the backbone she’d been missing—maybe because she didn’t have a shield anymore, or maybe she realized she’d lost all the people who cared about her because she hadn’t returned that care without conditions.

  Whatever the reason, she’d called me last week to tell me she wanted to make some changes, starting with leaving John, not that there was much to leave at this point. He’d been gone more and more since he’d run into whatever trouble that was. But this made Mom’s decision simpler to execute. She could get out while he was away on one of his trips, as long as she didn’t back out.

  I’d hooked her up with a free lawyer, and we were working on a plan. Life would never be easy for my mother, but if she could stay away from the chaos and the abuse, maybe she and Ivy would have a chance at rebuilding their relationship. So far Ivy had talked to her a couple of times on the phone, with my prompting and supervision, but she wasn’t ready to see her. When she was, I’d be there, if she wanted me to.

  I let myself into the apartment, half expecting to find Sarah stretched out on the couch, or at the kitchen table working on some project. Papers covered the coffee table in organized piles, but she wasn’t in the living room.

  I kicked off my shoes and passed the open door to the bathroom. She wasn’t there either, so I headed for the bedroom, which was exactly where I found her—with her ass in the air and half her body under the bed. She wore a pair of shorts that did a phenomenal job of hugging her curves.

  “This looks like a really awkward new sex position.”

  A box came shooting out from under the bed. I cringed at the loud bang followed by a shriek. Sarah backed up on all fours and shot me a glare, rubbing the top of her head.