And I couldn’t find it in myself to want it any other way. Not tonight.
I swept my fingers into his hair, pulling his mouth back to mine, letting our bodies do the talking. Car angled himself in a way that made each thrust brush against my clit, each pull back making me desperate for more. The ends of the barbells along his cock rubbed against my walls, and his breathing turned ragged right as another orgasm started to rise. My fingers fell from his hair, gliding like a soft whisper down his neck, then his chest and onto the hard planes of his abdomen. His muscles twitched and shook above me, around me, inside me.
I broke our kiss to glance between our sweat-slicked bodies, and the sight alone drove me closer to the edge. I bit down on my lip, our eyes locking once more. He shifted his hold under my leg, resting it over the crook of his arm as his thrusts picked up in pace. The same arm holding up my leg snaked over my thigh, and when his thumb circled over my clit, I let out a cry.
He drank in my cries, chasing his own release. When he slowed, he kept kissing me, moving to the corner of my lips, my cheek, and then my forehead as his cock pulsed deep inside me.
Car slowly rolled off, then took me in his arms, guiding my back to his front. His fingers drew lazy circles over my stomach, the calloused tips and the soft kisses he started planting down my neck soothing in ways I’d be lying if I said I’d forgotten all about. Only now, he was a full-blown man, and my chest ached thinking about what I’d missed out on over the past ten years.
His cock hardened behind me, pressing into my ass as I curled back against his welcoming hold. I couldn’t help but laugh, and the way he held me tighter to him as he chuckled while kissing my shoulder made me realize one thing—
No amount of time or space would have ever taken him away from me, because Carver Roland felt like home to me, too.
28
Lyra
The Patient
Carver’s rooster woke me up again, only this time, I wasn’t all too mad about it. Normally, I’d just fall back asleep, and with Car’s arm around me, that’s all I wanted to do.
The alarm on my phone blared from the nightstand minutes after the bird quieted. Carver didn’t budge, but that wasn’t surprising after the night we had. He wasn’t kidding about not getting any sleep. My thighs clenched at the reminder of our night of passion. We made love so many times, I couldn’t even count the number of orgasms he ripped from my body. It was like he was trying to make up for lost time, for every night I hadn’t been here, where I belonged, by his side.
I peeled his fingers slowly from my hip, smiling at the blue butterfly before I released his arm and stretched my legs to the floor, one-by-one so no movement would wake him.
I turned my head over my shoulder, looking over the man who seemed so animalistic, so devilish in his waking form, yet so peaceful and almost childlike as he slept with a soft curve to his lips. I slipped my feet into my boots, then threw on his shirt, securing it around my waist with his discarded belt on the floor. I still had no pants, hadn’t thought to go on a whole shopping spree the day before, but this would do.
The guy I was going to see next wouldn’t know the difference, anyhow.
I toed my way to the front door, grabbed my keys from the rack, and hopped into my car—mycleancar. When the heck had he found the time to clean it without me knowing? Blowing a kiss to the bedroom window, I put the car in neutral, letting it roll backward down the driveway, only starting it when I was sure the noise wouldn’t wake Car.
He deserved his rest today. I just hoped I’d be back in time to slide right back into bed with him before he’d notice I’d left. It was better for him not to ask questions about the errand I’d been putting off since I’d gotten back to town.
Only twenty minutes away, on the other side of town, I parked my car in the rather empty lot. Tropical palm trees and firebushes—a great plant for attracting butterflies—filled the mulched beds in front of the beige stucco building. A pair ofHeliconius charithonia, or zebra longwings, danced from flower to flower, settling some of my nerves.
It had been so long since I’d thought about butterflies in a peaceful way, but now, the world seemed brighter. Pleasant, even. Every piece of my former collection—the one I’d left in my hurry to leave Alliston long ago—came flooding back to me. Memories seized my heart like Car had done the night before, only this time, I didn’t want to cry from anger or sadness. Those empty spaces inside me were filling rapidly, pointing out just how empty I’d become since I’d left.
That sudden shift, like turning on a long-forgotten light on the darkest of nights, made me sway briefly as I watched the two butterflies circle each other before landing on the same leaf—their decision made so simply.
I snapped back to reality as I stepped through the automated glass doors, the smell of hand sanitizer, cheap coffee and aspartame clogging my throat. A perky woman smiled widely as I approached the front desk, her pink scrubs and tied-back hair completely contradictory to her field of work.
“Welcome to Alliston Springs Hospice Center. Checking in to see a guest?”
“Um…”—I squeezed on the strap of my purse—“Yeah.”
“Do you know the room number of your guest, or—”
“Walker,” I blurted. “His last name is Walker. They said he was moved, but I don’t remember the number.”
“ID?”
I sighed and shuffled through my purse, pulling out my Georgia ID. She scanned the card, then frowned and squinted her eyes.
“Dyed my hair,” I clarified.
She beamed. “I love the brown on you. Matches your eyes.”
I hesitated on the eye roll and could almost hear Car covering laughter all the way from home.Home. “Right. My husband thought so too.” It came out so naturally, so effortlessly, that it warmed my chest.
