She slides warm, smooth, soft hands along my sides, around to my back, leaning into me, her clothes wet and cold against my chest; up my back, and down, and back up to my shoulders. Down my arms, back up to my shoulders, to my pecs again.
"So big," she whispers. "So strong."
There's nothing to say to that. My heart is crashing in my chest, and my stomach is flipping. My cock is an iron bolt in my jeans, which I struggle furiously to ignore.
She finally takes my hands in hers. Looks up at me as she guides my hands to her waist. "Will you help me?"
"Do what?" I ask, knowing what she meant, but feeling stupid for thinking it. There's no way that's what she means. Not me.
Her smile is teasing, kind, amused, eager. "With my wet clothes."
Her thin black hoodie is unzipped; I peel it down her shoulders and let it join my T-shirt. She waits, gaze expectant on mine.
I lick my lips, so unsure, so nervous, filled with so much raging need and desire and pent-up everything that I don’t know what to do with it. I slip my fingers under the hem of her shirt, and then hesitate.
She nods. "Go ahead. It's okay."
Swallowing hard eyes again, I peel her pale purple tank top up; she raises her arms over her head as I tug the wet garment off.
"My turn, now," she whispers. "You okay?"
I nod. Dip my head to one side, shrugging. "Little nervous."
"It's okay. So'm I." She gazes up at me with a look I can’t quite decipher—soft, tender, sexual, affectionate, apprehensive…aworld of emotions. A universe. One that mirrors my own, I suppose. "We're in this together."
"Together," I echo.
She steps close to me, breasts bulging against the wet fabric of her black sports bra, pushing against my chest. Rests her hands against my pecs. Steps closer yet, smashing herself against my front, and every inch of her soft curves mold against my frame. She rests her chin on my chest, and looks up at me.
"I want to kiss you, Bear." She licks her lips. "But not yet."
"Why not?" The question emerges unbidden.
"Because I won't want to stop, won’t be able to stop. And I want to take this one step at a time." She turns her head so her cheek rests on my skin, and my hands lift on their own to cradle her shoulders.
Drift down to the hot bare flesh of her waist; at my touch, she shivers, gasps. "Your hands! They're so warm. And…rough."
She leans back—just her torso, not her lower half—and pulls my hands around, examining them one at a time. Traces my calluses—the ones from the barbell along the pads just beneath my fingers, the ones on my palm and heel from swinging hammers and using shovels without gloves. My hands are similar in texture to cinderblock.
"Sorry," I mutter. "Probably don’t feel good.”
She smiles, shaking her head, and puts her cheek to my palm. "No. Not at all. Just the opposite, actually."
I frown down at her. “Really?"
She nods, pushing my hands downward to her waist. “Really. I mean, yeah, they're rough, but…" her cheeks flare with a bright blush. "I…I like how it feels."
I caress her back below her bra strap, her shoulders above it. "You like this?"
She nods. "Very much."
"So fucking soft," I growl, heart clogging my throat.
She nibbles her lower lip. Steps back from me an inch or two, looking down at my jeans and boots. Up at me, nerves apparent in the way she searches me. “Um…okay, " she whispers. "Boots." I bend to unlace them, but she pushes at my chest. "Let me, please."
"Uh, okay?" Again, my statement emerges as a question.
She crouches, her slender back rounding, the curves of her chest, waist, and hips like the body of a violin—not just any violin, one of those special ones. Stradavary-something.
