Chapter 17

Is anyone out there? seems like everyone's coming down with some kind of flu these days so I want to put some warm thoughts out there for you...

“You’re still here,” he mumbled drowsily, his eyes still closed as his arm closed around her shoulders, pulling her closer.

“I don’t think I could walk out of here, even if I wanted to,” Mya chuckled as she traced imaginary patterns on the middle of his chest with the tip of her finger, raising gooseflesh wherever she touched him. Sidney smiled and let out a contented sigh, his hand sliding down her back, down and down until he had a good grip on her ass. She flinched, waiting for another slap but he only growled and pulled her closer. “Again? Don’t you ever get tired?” she whined, wondering if her exhausted and pleasantly aching body could take another round of his athletic and urgent love making.

“I’m out of practice. I’m just making up for lost time,” he yawned, pulling her body up and onto his. She felt him, hard and ready against her stomach and wondered if she had the will power to say no even if her body couldn’t, no, wouldn’t deny him.

“I don’t think you need practice,” she whispered, offering her lips instead, which he took without even opening his eyes, his tongue sweeping along hers’, making her shudder, making the walls of her pussy clench in anticipation. No, she thought dreamily as he kissed her languorously, she probably didn’t have enough willpower to deny him anything. Not after last night, she thought as he rolled her over and pinned her with his body, finally opening his hazel eyes and gazing down at her with that look on his face, the one that told her that there was nothing in the world he wanted to be looking at more than her. It made her heart beat triple. It made her throat close. It made her eyes well up.

“Are you trying to flatter me? Because if you are, you don’t need to,” he whispered, dropping soft, warm kisses onto her collarbone, the hollow of her throat.

“I think you know how much I want you,” she replied, her voice turning husky with desire as her body welcomed him, pulling him in slowly, her muscles working to accommodate his length and width. “I don’t think I need to tell you how good you make me feel,” she added, drawing a breath in sharply between her teeth as he began to move within her. Her body was tender and just a little more than sore from their multiple frantic joinings the night before.

“Do you want me to stop?” he asked, his voice almost a groan as he bit down on her earlobe, his hot breath causing a delightful prickling sensation over her ear and down her neck, making her squirm.

“Noooo,” she moaned, wrapping her legs around his thickly muscled thighs which reminded her of tree trunks, pulling him deeper. “Noo,” she repeated, wrapping her arms around his rib cage, dragging her fingernails up his back and then it was his turn to let out a breath in a long hiss as she raked her fingernails over the wounds she’d opened on his back the night before. He wasn’t the only one that could leave marks.

He was gentle and slow, nothing like the rough and tumble sweaty and urgent thrusting of the night before. Not that she’d been complaining. They seemed to fit so well together, and he seemed to know what she liked without her having to give him specific and explicit directions. Not that that had stopped her either, she thought as she stretched her neck, inviting his strong white teeth to graze upon her thin, pale skin.

He accommodated her request, just as he’d done with every other muttered or screamed out demand, biting down on the curve where shoulder meets neck, causing her to cry out and buck beneath him. Like a good Bronc rider, Sidney held on, the mass of his body holding hers’ down, controlling their movements, the depth and speed of his thrusts carefully controlled, as if to fend off the moment of climax for as long as possible. Where last night he had been like a speeding train, rushing towards the inevitability of a crash, now he was like a rocking horse, gentle and tame and oh...the look in his eyes....

She kissed him, pressing her lips up against his, shutting her eyes tight and focusing on all of the sensations, all of the sensuous and delicious messages her nerve endings were sending to her brain. Even the little ache in her hipbones, the exquisitely sharp pain in her neck, the pin prick of pain in the muscles clenched around him, all only served to heighten the overall experience. It was like being taken to a higher consciousness, like he was a drug and she was completely stoned.

If this is being stoned, Mya thought as she nipped at his chin as he let out a long, low growl, let me have this drug every day.
_______________________________________________________

He wanted to hold back, he fought it, but damn she felt too good, wrapped around him, holding on to him, her body moving in time with his. The soft press of her breasts against his chest, the almost painful way she dug her nails into his back and the way her hips rocked in time with his, the way she pulled him deeper, her breath catching in her throat as he bit down on her shoulder, tasting the saltiness of their mingled sweat on her skin.

She made him feel so damn free. He didn’t feel like he was going to break her, like something he was going to do would hurt her. He didn’t have to think, he could just feel, just react. Sort of like when he was out on the ice, when it was all about instinct, all about the feel of his stick, the sound of the other skaters on the ice. This was like that.

Every other time he’d been with a woman, either he hadn’t cared about how she felt or the opposite had been true, he’d cared too much. Oh he cared how Mya felt, but he was under no illusions as to the effects of what he was doing. She held nothing back. She knew what she wanted and was damn sure going to ask for it. Not that she had to ask.

He wanted to do all of those things to her, and then some.

There were things he wanted to do now...but they would have to wait for later he decided as her entire body shuddered around his and her eyes filled at once with tears. He would have been afraid of those tears once, but Randi had explained those tears to him. They were good tears, the kind of tears a woman couldn’t help when the orgasm was so strong.

He kissed them away, laying gentle kisses on her cheeks, her eyelids, holding her close, holding himself still while she trembled in his arms. He waited until she too became tranquil and relaxed before moving again, making long, slow strokes while he held her gaze, while he looked into her green eyes and fell, hook line and sinker. This woman had him now, whether he liked it or not, whether he was ready or not. She had a hold on him, like a death grip on his heart and as she offered her lips up to his, and just before he lost himself in his own orgasm, he whispered it against her lips.

“I love you,” he admitted in a whisper as she reached up to touch his cheek, her fingertips gently brushing along his hairline before she dug her fingers into his hair and pulled his lips down over hers’.

“You don’t have to say that,” she whispered back, holding him tight as he grunted, losing himself inside of her, burying his head in her neck as her body sucked at his.

He could argue, but it was better not to. Not now.

After all, maybe she was right. Maybe it was just the sex talking. Maybe it was too much too soon. Maybe it was better not repeated. So he let it go as he collapsed beside her, his arm thrown over her waist, his face buried in the pillow, his eyes shut tight against the black dots that swam in his vision.

He was going to need something to eat soon and he was going to have to suck back some water sooner than that. He was on the edge of dehydration and he was tired, so tired, but a good tired. A game seven kind of tired.

“I can’t believe I have to go to practice soon,” he muttered into the pillow as he felt her snuggle close to him, her fingers digging into his shoulders, easing the ache that had settled between his shoulder blades as he’d held himself over her. Not that it had been hard work. It had just been...well a few times anyway he thought with a private grin.

“What is with early morning practices?” she chuckled, crawling over him, straddling his lower back and really digging her hands into his aching muscles. “It’s not even light out yet.”

“Mmm, I guess you get used to it and it could be worse. In bantam, practice is like five in the morning,” He laughed when she made a derisive sound in her throat and stopped massaging him. Even though he felt like he could let her do that for hours, and wanted to ask for more, he rolled over beneath her and pulled her down on top of him. Her hair fell around his face in cascading waves as she grinned down at him and he reached up and brushed it back behind her ears. “You’re beautiful,” he breathed, running his fingers through her unruly hair.

“Are you kidding?” she made a face and wrinkling up her nose. “I’m all sweaty, my hair must be a complete fucking mess...,” she reached up to straighten and he grabbed her wrist, pulling her hand down to his lips and kissing it.

“You’re perfect the way you are,” he repeated, feeling his heart skip a beat in his chest as she rolled her eyes before pressing her lips down over his.

“When do you have to be at practice?” she asked at long last when she came up for breath. Sidney yawned and stretched and then settled back into running his fingers through her hair.

“Eight,” he sighed, thinking how much he’d rather stay in bed with her all day, even if they were both starting to smell a little on the funky side.

“And I have to be at class at nine thirty and then at work for the lunch crowd...,” she muttered, almost to herself as she rolled off of him, sitting at the edge of the bed, stretching her arms over her head. For a moment Sidney lay there, admiring the curve of her waist, the tone of her back and the dimples at the small of her back, but then something she said had him sitting bolt upright in bed.

“Work...you don’t mean at that...that bar?” he asked, tentatively. He watched her square her shoulders, watched her roll first one and then the other before she got up and grabbed one of his t-shirts and tugged it over her head.

“I do, and we’re not talking about that right now,” she replied quietly but firmly, wincing as she sat down on the floor to tug on her leggings.

“You can have a shower here,” he snapped, feeling impatient as he got up and went to stand over her, offering her a hand up, “and I thought we talked about this.”

“I’d rather wear my dirty clothes home, in a cab if you don’t mind, rather than wash and put them back on. And no, we didn’t talk about it. You said some stuff I wasn’t really listening to because you were kind of being an ass at the time,” she added, using that same stern but even tone as she pulled her leggings on the rest of the way before wrapping her dress and underwear up in a ball. Only then did she turn her attention back to him. “Are you going to call me a taxi or am I?”

“I can run you home,” he muttered, feeling his chest tighten as he thought about her dancing...for other men, as he thought about that body that he’d worshipped all night, that even now, in his t-shirt and a pair of simple leggings had him feeling like he could make love to her again and forego practice for once. “But we need to talk about this. I....” Her fingers pressed against his mouth and then she replaced them with her lips, kissing him softly.

“No, we’re not going to have an argument and ruin this. This is good. I’m a happy little bunny right now and you are not going to ruin this again,” she stated simply, smiling up at him. “Now you’re going to go have a shower. I’m going to go do my walk of triumphant shame out to a cab and then you’ll call me after practice and then maybe we’ll see if there’s enough left of you for me to jump when I get off work tonight. Agreed?”

Sidney didn’t like it. Not one little bit, but he nodded, mutely, letting her kiss him once more and then watching her sashay out of his bedroom. He even listened to her make the call to the taxi company while rummaging through his fridge before he forced himself to go into the bathroom and lean in to turn on the water.

He stood there on the bath mat, thinking about turning off the water and going out into the living room to argue with her, to tell her that she couldn’t go back to that bar, that if she cared even a little about him that she wouldn’t, but he didn’t.

Instead, as the steam filled the bathroom, he watched that little heart appear on the glass and felt his heart quicken in response.

Sidney reached up to wipe away the reminder of the other woman, his other love but his fingers stalled in mid air, hanging there, refusing to obey his mind’s command.
It was a reminder, not just of her but of what they had. It was as if she was telling him to have a little patience. It was as if, from the other side of the veil Randi was telling him that there was more to love than control and to remember there had to be give and take. To remember that sometimes love just hurt.

So Sidney kept his thoughts to himself as he turned and walked back out to the living room, finding Mya walking towards the door with a piece of bread in her mouth, tucking her cell phone into her purse. He pulled the bread out of her mouth and pressed his lips against her mouth in its place. He kissed her hard. He kissed her, and tasted the peanut butter on her tongue. He kissed her until he couldn’t breathe and then he kissed her cheek and patted her ass before turning and heading back to the shower, knowing full well she was watching him go with a mixture of surprise and lust on her face.

It was going to be hard, sure it was, but he wasn’t the type to give up and he was also learning not to just flip out at the first obstacle. He was actually pretty proud of himself as he climbed back into the shower. He wasn’t going to whistle like Max would but he gave the small heart drawn on the glass a wink and a smile, as if to say, thank you, before closing his eyes and sticking his head under the spray.