Total pages in book: 60
Estimated words: 57240 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 286(@200wpm)___ 229(@250wpm)___ 191(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 57240 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 286(@200wpm)___ 229(@250wpm)___ 191(@300wpm)
My heart squeezes when she says my love.
My love.
When my time on this earth comes to an end, I will go peacefully if all I can hear is those two words, spoken in her clear, beautiful voice.
My love.
“Of course it’s a yes,” she says. “I couldn’t imagine a future without you anymore than I could imagine living on Mars.”
I grin at her, my heart swelling. Christ, I love this woman. “No more talk of living on remote, weird, isolated places. God. Let’s eat.”
We dig into our food and make short work of it. It’s so damn good to be eating familiar food again, food that I didn’t have to hunt and forage for and prepare myself. It feels like heaven, just sitting here with Harper, eating.
We don’t make our decisions about tomorrow. We revel in today. For after all we’ve been through, this is what we have.
We shower together, and take pleasure in the hot stream of water, the billows of steam and luxurious soap. We did the best we could on the island, but nothing was like this. I swear to God I’ll never take a hot shower for granted again.
“How long do you think it lasts?” I ask, drawing her close to me in the steaming hot tub.
“I was wondering the same,” she says thoughtfully. “You mean the… conditioning, or whatever the hell it was they did to us, don’t you?”
How much of it’s because of what Morose and the others conditioned us to desire?
“I don’t know,” I tell her. “But it doesn’t feel like it did on the island. Does it to you?”
“I don’t know either,” she says with a shrug.
“I guess the question is, then… does it matter? If we’re together now, and we’re off that island. Does it matter what makes us want each other, if we’re as committed to each other as we are?”
“It does,” she says logically. “Because… what happens when that all fades?”
I hold her to me, running my hand up and down the length of her back to her ass. I squeeze, and she comes up onto her toes, moaning and hissing in my ear. “God, that feels good,” she says, like I’ve just given her exactly what she wanted. “God, Cy, I missed you so much.”
“Every relationship has a point when the blush wears off,” I tell her. “When something fades… people have babies and get stretch marks and wrinkles. They work long hours and pay bills and get up in the middle of the night with crying babies. That’s gotta be kinda the same, isn’t it? Learning how to love each other when everything fades?”
She smiles. “That’s a very good point,” she concedes. “I bet it’s really very similar.”
“So what then?” I ask. “Where do we go after that? What happens next? I think we rely on commitment at that stage. At least in theory, that sounds about right.”
Coming up on her toes, her smaller body aligned with mine so my hard cock presses between us and her full breasts kiss my chest, she encircles my neck with her arms. I swallow hard. It feels so good to be back with her. So right.
“Yes,” she says. “You’re very wise, Mr. Kaufman.”
“Oh, I like that,” I say. “Maybe you should call me sir.”
“Let’s not carried away,” she begins, but a swift slap to her ass makes her amend. “Yes, sir.” She grins. “Okay, yeah. I like that, too.”
And then my mouth is on hers and I’m sighing into her, breathing her in while the hot shower lashes against our bodies. Steam rises around us, cleansing and healing, as I kiss her. I glide my tongue into her mouth, and she moans, moving her body against mine so the friction drives me wild. I cup her breast and run my thumb over her hardened nipples, making her moan and wriggle against me. I know what she wants. I move my hand lower and cup her pussy with my palm.
“That’s it, baby,” I whisper in her ear. “Take what’s yours.”
She presses her mound against the heel of my hand, and I let her grind into me while I take her other nipple between my fingers. “Work it, Harper,” I whisper. “That’s my girl.”
The sweet comfort of familiarity washes over me. I’ve memorized the luscious, most private hills and valleys of her body. I’ve brought her to climax so many times, I know how her breath hitches, the way her chest flushes, the fluttering of her lashes when she gives way to pleasure, and hell I want to revel in all that again. And again. And again.
Her head drops back when I slide my finger through her swollen folds. She’s so wet, I groan out loud. So much for waiting. I couldn’t stop myself now any more than I could stop a stampede.
I work her clit, and pinch her nipples, then lower my head to her neck and kiss the slick, sweet skin. “I love you, Harper Lake,” I whisper, working my fingers harder and faster.