Deeper (21 page)

He’s a beautiful man, and he’s even more beautiful because he’s mine, for now. I’m growing closer to him, caring more. It’s not love yet, but how much further can I go before I have to call it off? Before I betray William? It’s a question I’d rather not think about right now. Right now I’m just going to enjoy him, whether I deserve it or not.

He rolls his eyes at my gawking and takes off running. Out towards the waves. “Come on, Rain! Just gonna look all day or are you going to do something about it?”

I want to do something about it. There’s lots we can do, other than sex. I won’t let it go farther than I’m allowed.

I shed my cover up and walk out in my bikini. The waves are cool, almost too cool as they hit my knees. I pull my hair out of my ponytail, and a wave crashes in front of me, blowing ocean breeze my way and whipping my hair around my face

Knight, who was watching me and walking backwards in the waves, stops and stares, eyes sparkling in the sun.

For today, it’s just me and him and the water. Today there’s no William, no Camille. Just me and him and the sea and the waves and the sky and the sand and the air. Like we’re the only people in the world. I’m almost to him when I mess up a jump over a wave and it takes me down. It’s cold and strong, and I relax into the curl of the wave, let it hold me in its arms as it turns and twists. It’s like being in a washing machine, and I come up choking sand. Knight’s arms come around me, steadying me. I wipe sandy hair off my face and spit out salt water, and he laughs.

I splash seawater at him. “Something funny, Knightly?”

His eyes narrow on mine, becoming a darker, deeper blue. “Knightly huh? So now you’re allowed to use my given name?”

“Yup.” I back up, then take a deep breath, and go under. I go to the bottom. There’s no undertow today, so it’s safe to swim down here. I swim to the part of the water where the waves no longer crest, but just roll gently, lifting you off your feet and then setting you back down on the tips of you toes to rest until the next swell. I whip my hair out of my face by shaking it a few times, and Knight surfaces next to me.

“Trying to escape huh?” He reaches for me, pulls me against his chest. I lift my feet and float against him. He can stand flat here, I can’t. When a swell comes, he jumps, still holding me, and we rise, keeping our heads above the water. It’s my favorite part of the sea, the best mix of gentle and powerful.

He turns me to him, and I wrap my legs around his waist, just to anchor against him. I put my hands on his shoulders and we look into each other’s eyes. I can’t imagine anywhere or any time that could be better than here and now with him.

“You did promise we’d kiss under water,” he says, wetting his lips.

“Yes, I did.” Yes, please.

He puts his hands against my head and the small of my back. “Take a deep breath.” He covers my mouth with his in a tight seal, then, with a cold whoosh, he submerges us both, deep in the waves.

So many sensations hit me at once. The cool oceanic pressure pushing us forward in the water, and up and down. His mouth to mine, and the way our mouths feel so much warmer in contrast to the cool water surrounding us. We are weightless, suspended here together. It’s silent, aside from the pounding of my heart and the sounds of the sea. It’s so intense being locked here like this, utterly alone, utterly together.

He takes me to the surface and we both take a breath. Then I wrap my arms around his shoulders and he takes me under again.

This boy is taking me so deep. It’s deeper than I ever thought I could go. He presses me down, almost to the sand, keeping his lips tight to mine. He keeps everything else out. Everything is distant and quiet except for the feel of his tongue searching and claiming my mouth and the insistent protective seal of his lips on mine.

His hand is in my hair, stroking my back, warm caresses in an ocean of cool. In the quiet of our mouths together, alone in the sea, I can almost hear the feelings between us. It scares me.

I push against him and he takes me to the surface. When we break we both gasp for air, and he smiles at me, lips red from pressing to mine. He tastes so good.

I run my hand over my lips, wiping away the salt water there, feeling the way they are lightly swollen from his kisses. Even my own touch tingles now. I sigh.

“Hey, that’s my job,” he says. He grabs me around the waist to swim out a little further, because the waves have pushed us closer to the cresting area.

He stops, and pushes off to tread water as a wave carries us high above the bottom. He scoops me up under the legs and cradles me against him to lean in for another kiss. This one is salty, and some water splashes around and between our lips as another wave hits. But it doesn’t stop us.

The cool sea breeze around us just makes me more aware of the potent heat between us. I wrap my legs around him for real. I want to be close to him, in every way. I pull his muscled body to me and think that it’s wonderful to be with a lifeguard. Someone who swims as well as me. Someone I can kiss under water.

He pulls me tighter against him, running his hand over my back in a thrilling trail down my spine. He lowers his mouth to the hollow at the base of my throat and presses soft kisses there. My head falls back as pleasure sweeps over me. I bury my hands in his hair and pull him tighter against me with my legs. I can’t get enough of him. The feel of him.

I want to go deeper. I press a light kiss to his surprised mouth before dropping down into the water in front of him. I press my lips down his chest, kissing him and the ocean between us, enjoying the frictionless way I can move down to the line in the center of his abs, feeling my way in the water, enjoying the contrast of his smooth skin and the rough sea around us. I hold his waist against my mouth. I’m almost to the top of his shorts when he pulls me up, looking into my eyes with his own. They’re burning.

I know we’ve probably gone too far. I wasn’t supposed to be happy again. I shouldn’t be this sexual with him. It’s only leading to a big stop sign that will hurt us both. But he knows the rules, and he’s still here with me. Still making love to me in the water. And I can’t help wanting to taste him. More and more and more. If he wasn’t holding me up, I’d be drowning.

There’s so much I want to do to him. With him. If I wasn’t broken. If we weren’t broken. Here in the water, I feel so whole. It’s a lie but here with the wind beating down on us and the waves synching with our rhythms, it’s a lie I can believe. It’s okay to be happy, it’s okay to feel wonderful, and it’s okay to love and be loved.

Just for this moment.

He holds my face and brings me in for more salty kisses, and as he trails down my neck, I look up at the horizon behind us and let the sun beat down. Just let me feel heaven for a while longer. I’ll go back to hell later, I promise. I pull him closer.

Just a little more.

Is this heaven? Because it feels like it. After four years of hell, it’s like warm rain falling from clouds over the desert.

I rain kisses over her neck, her shoulder, worship each part of her and feel her move in the waves against me as we roll with the water and the sun beams down. The wave dips and I plant my feet, it rises and I push off. It’s a rhythm that’s building between us, and something is rising inside me, steady and powerful.

I’m so powerful now, holding her in the water, surrounded by the turmoil of the ocean. Her eyes open and shine up at me, then close again as her head tilts back in pleasure. It’s some kind of heaven for me, some kind of home, and it’s been so long. I hold her legs around me and smooth my hands along her back. I need more proof that she’s really here with me. Cleansing me. Healing me.

Rain.

I don’t know where the limit is. I don’t know when she’ll tell me to stop. I just know that the last few days are melting away, the stress of the last few years, it’s all melting away as I make love to Rain in my arms.

She’s so damn beautiful, her body is lithe, her breasts rise with each breath and are kissed with tiny droplets of water that dot her neck and face, making her glisten and glow all over in the sunlight. It’s an image that will never leave me. Long after this ends, long after she leaves me because she can never give me the love I want from her, I’ll remember her like this.

The warmth of her body beside me, the warmth of her mouth and her kisses, the warmth of her breath as she sighs against me.

The feeling of kissing underwater.

The feeling of holding her mouth to mine as we hold our breath together and let the power of the planets sweep water all around us.

Something cosmic and eternal surrounds us here. I’m linked with her, and I never want to let go.

Rain. I love her. I know it for certain now. She pulls me closer with her legs, her long beautiful legs, and all of my memories of her meld together. I realize how much they have replaced the painful memories that used to fill me. Now my mind is full of Rain, watching me in the firelight of the bonfire when we first met, staring at me across a backboard, yelling at the guards, taking on a sex offender by herself, always sacrificing herself for someone. I run my mouth over her shoulder, biting her gently at the end. She sighs. She’s mine.

I run my hands over every part of exposed skin. I want to feel all of her.

I love Rain, I love her, and I’m glad she can’t hear me. I lift her up in the water so that I can kiss her again. I could kiss her forever. The sound she makes against my mouth urges me to go further, but I’m happy just here, taking her mouth again and again, caressing her lips with my lips, her tongue with my tongue, as she moves in my arms.

This is power. This is life. I hold a kiss as a wave unexpectedly clears over our heads. I seal our mouths and take her down with me fully, and can feel her pulse against my hand as I caress the side of her neck, hold her there to keep her steady with me.

The cool water emphasizes the hot void of our mouths, and I move my hands to her hips to pull her tighter against me. We surface again, and break apart only to come together.

It’s hot, but it’s a slow burn. I want to make her burn forever. I want to stay here with her until the sun sets over us, painting the world in dramatic, beautiful colors. I want everything, and I want it from a girl who has already told me her limits.

I want to be on top of her, and I’ll need the beach for that.

I walk forward in the waves, still kissing her, but taking her out of the water.

She simply wraps her arms around my neck and continues to kiss me, hitting me deeper and deeper inside. I’m in too deep now.

I break our kiss so I can focus on carrying her to our towel. I set her down for a moment, roll our stuff up, hand it to her, and pick her up again. I carry her up the path to the parking lot. She’s not heavy, and I’m burning for her. I’ll stop the moment she asks me to, but I hope she doesn’t ask me to stop.

Our car’s off to the left, but I curve towards a little alcove hidden by trees. I set her down, lay our towels out, and then sit, waiting for her to join. She sits next to me, dazed, water dripping from her hair, running down her face in rivulets that shimmer in the sun that comes through the trees surrounding us. It’s almost spiritual, being here with her. Like maybe we were always meant to be here together, like this.

I lower her gently on the towel beneath me, pinning her hands with mine, studying the reflection of the trees above us in her beautiful blue eyes.

“Rain, you’re so gorgeous. So beautiful to me.” I move my hands against hers gently, making sure she’s okay with this level of dominance.

She smiles up at me. It still doesn’t feel real. She needs to tell me to stop now, before I can’t anymore. Maybe I’ve already gone too far.

I kiss her. Kiss doesn’t even describe it. I meld with her, explore her, show her she’s mine, promise silently with the firm press of my lips to hers that I’ll always protect her.

“No one else can ever do this,” I murmur against her mouth.

“Do what?”

“This.” I move to her ear, run my tongue along the delicate inner shell, then taste the outer and she rewards me with a moan. “Only me,” I say. “Only give this to me. Only be like this for me.”

“I will. Knight, don’t stop.” She digs her nails into my shoulders, and I relish the pain because it’s proof of how intensely she’s feeling me. I love the feel of my thighs over hers as I straddle her, the feel of her soft hips under mine. But it’s not just passion, it’s the woman I love. That makes this so much more powerful.

I take the lobe of her ear between my teeth and suck gently. She lets out a shocked gasp. I feel like I’m giving her so many firsts. And she’s waking me up inside.

My hands move lower, hoping to explore the soft flesh of her stomach. My brain short circuits, it actually burns when my hands touch the soft swell of her belly. So different from mine, so yielding. It’s been so long since I’ve been with something so soft, and it’s so wonderful I could cry.

But I’d rather continue to give to her. Give until she can’t resist any longer. I move my lips down to her collarbone, kiss along it and feel her hips rise to meet mine. I move with her and love feeling how close we are, how intimate this is.

It hasn’t been years, only a summer, but I truly feel like I know her. She has become a part of me, and she’s soldering herself to my soul with each sigh and each touch. I’ll never be able to break away after this.

I’ll stay with her forever. Protect her forever.

I love her. I almost blurt it out between kisses on her neck. I almost ruin everything.

I don’t even know what I’m feeling anymore, or if I should be feeling it. So much is swirling inside me and each time Knight touches me it’s like lightning. My mind blanks like I’ve been flooded with electricity. I love the feel of his huge shoulders, taking my nails without complaint, letting me hold on as tight as I can.

I love the feel of his abs as I run my hands over them. Firm and hard underneath my fingers. I want him. Want want want!

“Knight,” I murmur, between the breaths that are getting increasingly heavier between us. “Knight what are we doing?”