“I’m listening, I swear,” I said honestly. “I kind of spaced out listening to the sound of your voice and missed the words you were saying.”Good save, Riker,I congratulated myself when that elicited a little forgiving smile from Elena and a reopening of the notebook. I wanted to listen, I really did, but there was something I wanted more. I just didn’t know if Elena did yet.
“Okay. Maybe one or two more?” Elena suggested. “Sorry, there are a lot. I’ve had this notebook for a long time, and I just add to it whenever I have an idea.”
“Read as many as you want,” I urged. “I’m not going anywhere.”
Elena’s clear voice floated over the beach, and she focused on her notebook, unaware of my devious plan. It started with a hand on her shin, an innocent place that warranted the glance and smile as she continued to read. But then that hand began to move, following the sound of her voice toward her body, sliding across her thigh with no more strength than the gentle breeze.
Now, she gave me a new look, quick and furtive. This look didn’t want to be caught and receive a look back.
I did catch the look, but I had more important things to do than confront it. Things like caress the thigh under my hand and prop myself up on my elbow so I could place a pattern of feather-light kisses everywhere my hand touched.
During one of those kisses, I smiled into her skin. Elena had caught onto the game now. She still read her poetry, but now she leaned into my touch, begging for more but refusing to give in. Her body dared me to continue, betting that she could finish her poems under the influence of my touch.
Betting against me had never done anyone any favors. I redoubled my efforts, wrapping my palms around her still-damp bikini to hold her in place while I put everything I had into being irresistibly teasing. Elena was obviously into it, so I risked that last check to just make sure this was what she wanted before I went all out – I slipped a hand between her legs.
Honestly, I thought that would do it. I had been so sure that she would put down the notebook, and I would win the unspoken bet with this move – that, or receive a scolding.
She did neither. She reacted with a sharp intake of breath and then went right back to reading.
That wouldn’t do. That wouldn’t do at all. I hadn’t intended to tease myself so badly, but that was what had happened, and now I wanted Elena more than I had ever known was possible.
I made the executive decision that Elena no longer needed her bikini. Since removing the bottoms was impossible with her legs crossed, I simply uncrossed them by wrapping my fingers around her ankles and pulling her into me. I doubted the surprised squeak she let out was part of the poem she was still stubbornly trying to read.
I was just finishing working off her bottoms and planning my next move toward the bathing suit top when Elena broke, nearly breaking me in the process. Pale legs caught the light of the lantern as she kicked off the garment, nearly catching me in the jaw in the process, and it was my turn to be surprised when Elena literally threw herself at me.
I had just enough wherewithal to slap the switch on the lantern and plunge us into darkness before her lips found mine with the force of desire. Gone was the game and gone was anything else that had been keeping us apart. We had waited for this, spending so long getting to know one another and making sure the fit was right, letting the tension build higher and higher every day.
That tension had finally come to a breaking point and taken something between us down with it. Elena’s arms locked around my body and her nails gripped my skin, little pointed warnings of what would happen to me if I even tried to break our deep, passionate kiss. I wasn’t going anywhere. I had lost a hand somewhere in red hair wet from the sea, and if I moved the one from between her legs, she would stop making those oh-so-intoxicating sounds.
I had wanted to do something cute and teasing like use my teeth to take off her top, but no patience remained between us, and I only had to make a move toward the piece of clothing before Elena pushed my hand away and tugged it over her head. She didn’t try to push my hand away when I reached up a second later and found the little sensitive bump on her left breast, already brought to fullness by the water and my teasing.
The grip that tightened in my hair when I broke the kiss scolded me, but loosened approvingly when I lowered the tongue and lips I had been using to kiss and put them to use where my hand had been. The blanket stretched underneath us as Elena took a fistful of it, breathing quick, heavy breaths as I took in the taste of skin tinged with salt.
Elena felt like she looked. Her body shivered and moved under my hands, reacting to my touch the way she hung on my words when we talked, but I knew that any second she could do something to flip the tables on me and remind me that she would never, ever let me make all the decisions. I didn’t intimidate her. I didn’t control her, not even now when she wanted me so badly that her hips couldn’t stay still.
Not that I could stay still either. Everything about her drove me crazy. I wanted to touch every part of her at once and make her feel as good as she made me feel every day I got to see her.
Normally, I liked to take things slowly. Play around, explore, ramp up the anticipation, do one or two of the tricks I had learned to make a woman plead with me, take my time and learn what I was working with – after all, everyone was different, every woman liked different things.
Elena and I had already taken things slow, and neither of us wanted to wait any longer. Elena’s hand followed mine down to the waistband of my swimming trunks, tracing my fingers as I deftly untied the string.
Underneath, Elena found me very ready for what was to come. That didn’t stop her from using a hand curiously, moving up and down to feel what I had. This was far from my first time, but her touch had me wriggling nearly as badly as her.
With her hand wasn’t how Elena really wanted to feel me. She was ready, I was ready, and if I didn’t listen to our combined need soon, I would lose any sense of reason I had and operate off pure instinct. I didn’t want to do that. I didn’t want to disappear fully into the pleasure, because if I did, I wouldn’t be able to make sure Elena was enjoying this just as much as me.
With Elena underneath me, her fingers gripping at my sides, I gave in to us both and slipped inside her. Warmth tightened around me, and Elena’s moan spurred me to skip a few gears and give in to a faster pace, one that lessened the aching need. The blanket rubbed against the sand with a rhythm, helping me keep time as the sounds we made together drowned out the waves. I bit my lip when Elena’s fingers dug into my shoulder blades then scraped down to my hips, leaving burning lines of sensation. Her hands followed my back and forth motion, urging it to be harder, faster. Holding back wasn’t an option for either of us.
I could feel it coming, but I held off, determined to hold onto the archaic value ofladies first.I managed it, but only just. Elena’s long, high-pitchedohmarked the sudden change in her body as she tensed…and that tension tightened her around me, pulling me over the edge with her.
Our shared, sustained burst of energy finally spent, Elena and I lay on the blanket together, trying to reclaim lost breath. A wild night faded away, returning to a peaceful one, and the waves slowed from crashing breakers to gentle swells.
“Do you-” I coughed, my throat dry for some reason.
“We should get back in the water,” Elena agreed. “And then shower. And then sleep.”
“Definitely.”
Neither of us moved.
