Perfectly Unmatched (28 page)

He lies down next to me and kisses my mouth, soft and incessant, until it’s like I’m breathing him in and out, my body twisted tight to his, my heart beating and my lungs bellowing in a pattern he sets. His arms are locked around me, anchoring my body close to his body. He lets my hands run crazy, touching and pulling at his skin like I can’t possibly grab enough, like I’m making up for what I won’t be able to do in the future and didn’t do enough of in the past.

“I love you,” I breathe into his mouth, down his throat, low and deep where he can keep the words inside him.

He finally pulls back, just enough so our lips rasp against each other’s, our noses barely graze,
our eyes can’t quite focus. “I love you, Benelli. Always. Through everything. Do you understand?”

I nod because I can’t force a verbal agreement past the lump in my throat, and he’s back to his never ending cycle of kisses. It’s strange how they can evolve, how
we
can evolve, how our love can evolve in just a few seconds.

What satisfied our bodies before we re-declared our feelings isn’t doing it anymore. The kisses that satiated every physical and emotional need are now cruel teases. The lock of his arms was a focused comfort a few heartbeats ago; now it’s a muscled bond that crushes me too tight, keeps me from accessing what I need.

There’s a tremor, an explosion, a switch flipped and we’ve gone from gentle to wild, nipping lips, dragging fingernails, digging fingers deeper into every curve of skin, crushing bodies so close and so frantically, it’s bruising and pleasing and not enough...never enough.

“More,” I beg, and he slides down, the crisp hair of his arm rasping against the creamy skin of my stomach, the bumps of his wrist rubbing at my inner thighs, and slips inside me, finally, his fingers quick and determined, his mouth coasting down to follow the buck of my hips. It’s a distance of only a few short inches, and
it’s miles too far. I tug on the muscled column of his thigh, reposition his hips, and we’re intimately positioned, the length of him in my mouth and sliding, long and hard, against my tongue.

The covers bunch and pull tight against the curve of my ass as he grabs them in his fists and yanks, the muscles in his arms taut and shaking as I lift my head and draw him in, the salty, firm pressure mixing perfectly with the velvet suction of my mouth, my lips, my greedy, licking tongue.

He bites gently along the insides of my thighs, the silky brush of his hair butting against my skin as he nuzzles my skin, sinking his mouth and tongue into me, along my folds. Just when the rhythm goes from frantic to chaotic, he rips his head away, pulls his hips up and leaves my mouth empty and ready for whatever different, more, something, him.

The lean, muscled length of him glides over me, and we lock eyes, lock hands, twist our legs tight, set our mouths against each other’s, and then he thrusts deep into me, jarring our bodies into twining, knocking, wrangling, desperate knots of limbs pushing and pulling like there’s a finish line we’re racing towards and away from at the same time.

I feel like I can count the strokes until I tremor and constrict around him, but I’m always one away, like I can’t stand to pry open my fists and brain and heart and let go with him.

His mouth tugs at mine, his face nuzzles my neck. “Open your eyes.”

I shake my head. He thrusts harder, deeper, and my body quakes, but doesn’t give in.

“Open your damn eyes,” he orders, his voice gritty and husky as it skids on his words.

“Can’t,” I gasp, my legs wrapping around his waist, pulling him closer. I can feel the muscles of his perfect ass strain to pull back from my hold so he can press against me, torture me to the perfect place he wants me at.

I want me at.

I just can’t...I can’t...

“Open your eyes,
Benellli,” he growls. “Open them. I love you, look at me, I love you.”

I have no intention of opening my eyes, but his words tug at something uncontrollable in me, and, when my eyes fly open, all I see is his face, his eyes staring into mine, his mouth moving from a straight, frustrated line to a sudden, quick smile.

My fingers dig into his shoulders, I burrow my face into his chest and let everything in me shake and shudder around him. I am unraveled, ignited. I feel exactly the way I used to feel as a kid at the lake, running like mad to the end of the dock for that single, sweet arc over the water, that moment of flight between the solid ground and the splash of the water, and right now Cormac is the slatted wood of the dock, the weightless flight, and the cradle of the waves lapping in the sun.

I pull against him, hold tight for a single still second, then another, and one more before everything rocks, and I’m shaken from my core out, my body released and reconstructed.

There are other tenants in his apartment who would be home during the day. There are people on the street, just outside the open window. But my body is sure we’re alone in a universe we created solely for the two of us, and I scream, plastering to him and shaking hard and long against his laugh, his hold, his unconditional love.

Unconditional unless he tugs it out of my clenched fists when this is all over.

He peels me back from him, the sweat glistening on our bodies, but his smile falls when he sees my face. “Why do you like that?”

“Like what?” I choke, my dread slowly filling my throat.

He sits up, tugging me on his lap, smoothing my wild, tangled hair with his hands. “Why do I have this terrible feeling that you’re about to break things off with me?”

I’m so shocked the question I’ve been dreading asking him just popped out of his mouth, and I’m doubly shocked that it sounds amused instead of distraught.

“Do you think that’s funny?” I ask, not angry, even though my voice tricks my ears into believing I might be.

“I think it’s funny if you think that’s a possibility.
Because I’m not going anywhere.” His smile starts at his lips and works its way right up to his eyes, which are alight with laughter.

“But you called...” I frown when his laughter descends from his eyes to his lips and he’s directing it at me. “What are you laughing at?”

Now the hilarity dims slightly. “We used to laugh.” His eyebrows raise. “A lot. Do you remember that?”

I nod. “Are you saying we don’t anymore?”

“Do we?” He’s using his teacher voice. The one I hate. Because it’s always right. Damn it.

“Sometimes things are stressful,
Cormac. Not everything is always so damn hilarious all the time.” I kick a foot out and examine my toes.

The first thought that runs through my mind is that if my mother sees them, she’ll send me out to get a pedicure because they’re chipped. And that’s not okay.

That set of facts makes me laugh.

Cormac
sits up straighter. “Something funny?” he asks.

“My toes,” I answer, and laugh again, but it’s a little wilder than straight funny.

He tilts his head and looks at them. “Same stubby little toes as always,” he observes.

Which makes me laugh harder and faux punch him in the arm.
“They’re
not
stubby. They’re petite. Do
you
ever think about what anyone else thinks about your toes?” I ask.

“Absolutely never,” he says, leaning back on his hands. “And you? Do you often think about what other people think about your toes?”

“My toes and everything else.” I smile sadly at him. “I just summed it all up, didn’t I?”

He puts his arms back on the bed and pulls me back, kissing my temple. “Yes.”

“Are you ready to run away screaming?” My voice is tiny.

“Never.
I love stubby-toed girls.”

I turn my face into his neck and breath deep, willing myself to catch a trace of ink and books. I don’t, but...I believe it will be there.
Soon.

I pull up and look down at him, drawing a finger over his lips, his eyes, his hair. “You can’t stop. You can never, ever stop.”

“Stop what?” His lips tickle under my fingers.

“Studying.
Reading. Writing.” I gesture to his desk, his shelves, all the things that define him. “All this. You can never stop any of this.” I bite my lip and feel the clamp of a headache that no amount of aspirin can combat. “Ithaca is getting older. Maybe she’ll meet someone who can do this for my family--”

“
Benelli,” he interrupts. I look at him, his eyes fixed on my face. “I love studying this crazy stuff. But I don’t love it more than you. I don’t love anything more than you. And I’ll do what you need, whatever you need, anything, to make your family situation...
our
family situation work. These books, these papers, aren’t my life.
You
are. You are my life.”

He gets down on his knees, the sheet wrapped around his waist, and I’m...naked. My hair is a rat’s nest. This is...

“This isn’t how I wanted to do this.” He chuckles and shakes his head. “Which is ironic, because the reason I called you here was because your father was trying to plan this. And, listen, he’s a good guy, and I respect him. Sincerely, I like him. And he can tell me how to dress and how to work and all that. But he’s not going to tell me how to love you. Because, I swear to you, there will never be a man who will love you the way I love you.”

He grabs a box off his bedside table and holds it out to me. “This belonged to my grandmother, and I loved that woman. She was the one who got me my first book of Greek mythology when I was a little guy. She started it all. I know it’s not as big and fancy as you deserve. But I feel like she loved me for exactly who I was, and I never really thought I’d find another woman as brave and confident.
Until I met you. So I want you to have this.”

He opens the box and there’s a shining canary diamond in a simple white gold band.

“Your parents will kill me, your father especially. And I promise, I will re-enact the whole damn thing in front of your family like they want with the dinner and flowers and party and toasts and even the little group of guys playing violins. I promise, and I know they want all that because they love you and want to share this. But right here, now, I just need this, just for the two of us alone. Benelli Youngblood, will you do me the great honor of agreeing to be my wife?”

“This...this is why you called me?” I ask, reaching out for the ring and pulling my hand back.

He grabs my fingertips and runs a thumb over them. “Yes. Well, I was going to get you to come back to the woods with me. There’s an amazing merlot chilling on our rock. And a picnic basket. And a second merlot. But you seduced me, you vixen! And the moment was too good to pass up, so...”

“You weren’t going to break up with me,” I declare, and his horrified face is answer enough. “You weren’t going to ask me to argue with my dad. You weren’t going to tell me that you couldn’t change.
That you couldn’t handle this.” I’m laughing now, relief and glee and happiness coursing through me in a warm, sweet gush.

“Well, I was a little angry over your dad trying to tell me how to propose. But that was because I thought his suggestion was wildly unromantic...way too overdone and public. Yet here I am, proposing in a
bedsheet in my crappy apartment. So, there’s that.” His goofy smile falters. “Also, there’s the fact that you didn’t answer. So. Are you going to answer?” His hand shakes a little.

I throw my arms around this incredible man, this man I love with every shred of my being, this man I love right down to my chipped toenails, and I kiss him so fiercely, the sheet falls away, and we’re heading right back to the place we came from before his proposal.

“Yes. Yes, I’ll marry you. Yes, I love you. Yes. You. I love you.” I’m whispering a thousand things in his ears, promising him that I’ll take care of everything, that I’ll make this all work, because I will. I will.

He slides the ring on my finger and I feel bound to him, powerful and protective of this man, this gorgeous, honest, funny man who would give up everything for me.

Except that he won’t.

Because I won’t let him.

I’m Odysseus, about to pick up the bow and draw it back, about to push away the fear that I may not be strong enough to do it, because I have no choice. I have no choice if I want to keep the man I love.

And, in his arms, I feel my truest, bravest, strongest self unfurl.
Finally.

Cormac
7

There should be a certain poetic justice in my getting to haul
Lala’s drunk ass home from a bar, but the reality of holding her limp form over my shoulder is decidedly unsatisfying.

I’m not sure where her house is, so I bring her back to the Youngblood compound, still decorated for the engagement party from the night before with masses of bright flowers and strands of twinkling lights, dozens of glasses with varying amounts of wine left on every conceivable surface, classical music still wafting from the home surround-sound system. I move back to the girls’ rooms, and knock on Ithaca’s door lightly. She opens it, her face pale and her eyes red-rimmed, light hair pulled back in a tight bun.

“Cormac.” She doesn’t frown, which is an improvement over her usual reaction to seeing me. “Is that Lala?” She narrows her eyes at Lala’s very barely covered backside.