There’s a low sound in Peter’s throat, and suddenly I’m off the stool and into his arms and we’re climbing the stairs. Suddenly we’re in what must be his bedroom. The bed looks enormous and inviting, but I’m caught on the fact that he’s holding me again.
This time there’s not pain to distract me, my brain isn’t trying to tell me to ignore the firmness of his chest. I’m close to him and so utterly aware of his hands. My own hand is draped around his shoulder, playing with his hair. Setting me down on my feet, he takes my face in his hands and presses his forehead to mine.
The moment hangs in the air, the perfect bridge between the present and past, and that feeling doesn’t disappear when he pulls away.
“The Thai place is close by,” he says, “and they’re fast. They should be here in just a few minutes. Wait here. I’ll be back.”
He doesn’t say more, but when he tangles his fingers in my hair and tilts my face up to meet his, his kiss tells me everything that he left unsaid about what would happen when he came back.
Peter tears his lips from mine like it might kill him, and leaves the room before I can blink. I sway on my feet a little, still recovering. Wow.
I take the moment to look at his bedroom. Almost the opposite the rest of the house, it’s decorated dark and richly, with thick carpet and a bed that has to be a custom frame for how large it is.
The large windows he has look out over the neighborhood, with a pleasant view of waving palm trees and the sky glowing with city lights. Behind me, downstairs, I hear the doorbell ring. That’s the food. My stomach tightens, because that means that Peter is coming back, and then everything after.
I wait, holding my breath, until I hear his footsteps on the stairs. He looks like a different version of himself: sharp and unyielding and hungry, and he doesn’t miss a beat crossing the room and pulling me firmly against him. He takes my mouth, and this kiss is different. It’s overwhelming with everything that he’s been feeling since he saw me again.
This kind of passion is the kind you can fall into and never come out of. “We’re not leaving this room until I’ve relearned every inch of you,” he says.
I swallow. “That’s a lot to learn.”
“We’ve got all night.” His hands stroke my shoulders, and the buzz of vodka in my veins is the thing that is keeping me from shaking with nerves.
Peter’s thumbs hook under the fabric of my dress and pull it aside, letting it fall. It’s enough that the entire dress slips down to the floor, and suddenly I’m in nothing but panties. His eyes devour me, and I think I might combust from the heat.
With gentle hands, Peter guides me to the bed and lays me down, and I can’t help but notice the symmetry between our first time doing this, and our first time doing this now. His lips fall on my neck, in that perfect spot, and I close my eyes.
It’s like we’ve never been apart. He finds those spots on my body that make it sing like he’s been practicing this whole time, and I respond to him. His mouth leaves trails of flames across my collarbone and down to my breasts.
The sound he makes when he covers my nipple with his mouth is almost feral, and I moan because yes, it feels perfect, pleasure spiraling outward from his lips and downward and upward and I’m so wet with need that I’m squirming underneath him.
His hand falls on my chest between my breasts as he switches sides, and he laughs. “Squirm all you want, it’s not going to make me move any faster.”
So that hasn’t changed, at least. Peter always took his time during sex, and it was always amazing. The edge he has now, telling me exactly how it’s going to be, is once again a reverse of how it used to be. He always used to ask. But if he asked now, I wouldn’t know how to answer. So I sink into his confidence, and something in my mind eases.
He teases my nipples with his mouth until they’re so hard that they’re aching, and even after that, he uses his fingers to pull and pinch, and my hips are bucking up into him wanting more, needing more. Please.
I asked out loud. Begged. But Peter shakes his head. “No.”
He’ll give me that pleasure, I know it, but I’m going to pay for it. I’m going to pay for the ten years we spent apart with his hands on my body, with exquisite torture while he lives out every fantasy he’s had.
I’m going to love every second.
Sliding his hand down my stomach, Peter slips his hand into my panties, and I’m so wet that his fingers come back slink and shining. He traces them on my nipples so they’re wet too before he licks it off, and watching him do that makes me shake with arousal.
“I’ve always loved the way you taste,” he says, voice low and rough. He cleans his fingers after he finishes with my breasts. “I could drink that every day.” His eyes flash to mine. “Maybe I will.”
I try to say something in response, but nothing comes out. It’s all too much, and not enough.
Peter’s mouth returns to my skin, and it’s moving again, downward and downward, lips leaving a trail across my stomach and around my belly button until he’s nipping at my waistband.
He slips them off, and for the first time in ten years, I’m naked with him. I feel that familiar blush rising to my cheeks. This doesn’t get any less vulnerable with time, and I close my eyes.
I feel him move, and then feel his breath. “Amber.”
“Yeah.” Opening my eyes, his face is right there.
“You don’t need to hide from me.”
I nod. “I know.” And I do know that, I do. “It just feels like so much.”
Peter’s eyes study me in that way he has, like he’s searching for something that only he can see, and I have to wait for him to find it. Suddenly he leaves, climbing off the bed and strips off his clothes with ruthless efficiency. I’d seen part of him, we’d all seen part of him that day on set, but the whole package is…breathtaking.
And I don’t just mean his package.
Which of course, is breathtaking. He’s fully hard, his cock jutting out from his body like a declaration of everything he’s been saying and doing. It’s bigger than he used to be. Everything about him seems like it’s bigger than it used to be. Harder. More defined.
Rolling on a condom, he returns to the bed and hovers over me, kissing me until I’ve forgotten that I was nervous and blushing and I’m pulling him closer instead.
Reaching between us, he fits himself against my entrance and budges his way inside, pushing and pushing, not stopping until he’s seated as far as he can go. And then he lowers himself onto me. His weight takes my breath from my chest, but I remember this. He used to calm my thoughts with all of himself.
“I think this time it has to be different,” he says. “It can’t just be you first or me first. This time, the first time, it has to be together.”
That’s what clicks. “Yes.” We’ve been too far apart for too long and I need something to prove that even though we want this, we still work.
“Though fair warning,” he says, a feral smile on his face, “I’m going to taste you tonight. More than once.”
I swallow. “Be my guest.”
He chuckles, but then he starts to move and neither of us is laughing anymore. We’re both breathless, gasping with this feeling that’s both new and old and familiar and exquisite. Pleasure bursts from me with every stroke, and Peter doesn’t take it slow. Neither of us can handle that. We need this. Now.