“It’s not an either/or. I intend for your life to be nothing butand.”
“You’re going to spoil me.”
“Yes. I am.”
One final twitch and the dress landed on the floor in a puddle of silver and stardust, leaving me naked. Well, except for my nipple jewellery—a silver bar with multicoloured leaves dangling from it, and a simple pink glitter barbell—and the rainbow flower unicorn boxer briefs it had seemed a good idea to put on earlier. Not that they lasted long. Caspian hooked his thumbs under the waistband and peeled them off me, before spinning me round again to face him.
His scrutiny was, to say the least,intense—his gaze sweeping over me as if he wanted to claim me by the power of looking alone. It was actually a bit of a struggle, at first, to let him see me: my pretty-ish, ordinary-ish, flaw-speckled self. My knobbly knees. The chipped polish on my toenails. My skinny hips and the touch of softness at my tummy because I liked gelato way more than I liked the gym.
“My beautiful Arden,” he said. “My love. My treasure. My perfect boy.”
I wanted to tell him he’d made a mistake. That I was nobody special. But then I remembered: Caspian had never lied to me. And I was all those things to him. “Yes,” I gasped. “Please touch me. Show me I’m yours.”
“Your back?”
“Can take it.”
Once upon a time, he would probably have insisted otherwise. But tonight he just lowered me onto the bed—which, I won’t lie, made my shoulder scream bloody murder, but it was a price I was more than willing to pay to be able to watch him. Especially when he came crawling over me like some great predator, eyes ablaze with hunger and tenderness, and a purity of need he had always tried to hide from me.
Since we were only just beginning to rediscover our boundaries, I lifted my arms above my head and curled my fingers round the slats of the headboard. It was voluntary vulnerability, but…yikes. I’d forgotten how deep such choices could take you. Especially when you felt about someone the way I felt about Caspian—as if there was no corner of me I wouldn’t yield up to his pleasure. For his taking.
At the gesture—at the offering of myself—Caspian gave this helpless groan. And fell on me like a wild beast, his hands everywhere, stroking and caressing, marking me not with cruelty, though, honestly, I would have been okay with that too, but with love. There was very little finesse to it, especially from a man who knew my body well enough to bend me to his will with ease, just a raw desire to touch me—to feel me writhe and shake and come alive beneath his palms.
“I missed you,” he whispered. “I missed you. I missed you.”
“I missed you too. So much. But I’m here now. And I’ll never leave you again.” Wait. That was aterriblething to say. “I mean, unless we grow apart or our lives are no longer compatible or one of us falls in love with someone else or something.”
“I know what you meant.” Smiling, he kissed me, his mouth sweet with the promise of laughter.
My fingers were starting to ache—nothing I couldn’t endure, but it reminded me of other, older hurts. “Caspian, it’s okay if you can’t, but I’d love to see you. Will you take your clothes off for me?”
He drew in a sharp breath.
“I honestly don’t mind if you—”
“Of course I will.”
Climbing to his feet, he began to strip. At best, it was efficient. At worst, self-conscious.
“I get that, for you, your body isn’t a source of joy,” I said, “but it is for me. I guess I just wanted to tell you that—so you understand what it means when you choose to share it.”
“I wish I could give you everything.” He joined me again on the bed, this impossible paragon of masculine beauty, who was more mine than he had ever been his own. And looked so heartbreakingly uncertain, right now, despite the fact I was stretched out like a spatchcock and drooling precome onto my own stomach.
“What do you mean?”
“You…you know what I mean.”
I guess I did. I’d hinted to Caspian once before that I might enjoy it if we flipped sometimes, and he’d made it pretty clear he wasn’t up for that, but I didn’t think he’d remembered. Let alone been dwelling on it enough that he believed it was a problem for me. “Oh, Caspian, that’s not everything. That’s nothing.”
“It’s something to me.” He covered my body with his and I tucked my knees against his flanks, offering him some small shelter. “It feels like failure that I…that Ican’t.”
“It’s okay to be into some things and not others. For all you know, this could have always been your preference.”
“But what if he…”
“Maybe he did. Maybe he didn’t. Who you are now is all that matters. And I love you, and I want you—this you, the one who’s offered me his heart, and a life, and a home. Not some hypothetical you who could have existed if things had been different.”
Caspian ducked his head, a deep shudder running through him. “I want…I want you to touch me.”
