First Night: (5 page)

Eventually, Gabriel rested between my widespread thighs. Propped up on his hands, he could do nothing to hide the proof of his desire for me. My mouth went dry as I felt the hot, thick shaft against my inner thigh.

I almost cracked a joke about how happy he was to see me, but the time for humorous games passed as razor-sharp awareness for the other nicked us.

“Touch me.”

So I did. I closed my hand around him, impressed at the thickness and length of him. Curiosity overcame shyness and I set out to explore Gabriel’s body—which suited him just fine.

I marveled over how soft his skin was in some places, lightly furred in others. Although his frame carried the slimness of youth, I could tell he would fill out impressively one day, becoming even wider of shoulder while still retaining a narrow waist.

Soon Gabriel joined in the exploration. His hands skated gently down my body, settling on certain areas with marked intention. The rarely noticed spot between hip and thigh were especially sensitive to the feather-soft touch his lips.

My shyness melted the further his mouth moved to my core. I always thought I’d clamp my thighs closed to an oral invasion, afraid of how I’d taste and a thousand other things all to due with an overly-developed sense of modesty.

With Gabriel none of that existed. I was open to his exploration.

It was decadent, glorious…every adjective possibly used to describe bliss—I experienced it.

Gabriel slid over me. His mouth greedily drank down my pleasure cries. Once I caught my breath, he started over again. Gabriel brought me to my peak again and again.

I lost count of how many times I moaned his name or how intimately he mapped the curves of my body and how well I responded to his kisses to those spots. Eventually, Gabriel reached into his side drawer and I heard the rip of plastic.

It was time.

My body was too relaxed to tense up. I welcomed him into my arms and held onto him as he carefully positioned himself. Soon Gabriel pressed deep, deeper inside. I let out a hiss as I struggled to accommodate him. He immediately stopped, concern reshaping his face surely as his body was reshaping mine.

“Are you okay? Do you want me to stop?”

“No! Please…keep going.”

Gabriel pressed forward and then retreated. He kept his strokes shallow until I finally arched my hips beneath him, eager for more. Our mouths hungrily found one another and then we truly began our dance.

And nothing could’ve truly prepared me for what it would be like.

Limbs wrapped around his waist, straining harder and harder still while moisture gathered between my breasts and the small of my back. Entranced, I couldn’t look away from the sight of Gabriel becoming one with me.

I felt the tantalizing tease of release. Rolling my hips, I gasped when his hard thrusts found the perfect angle. Gabriel’s arm settled beneath me and pulled me tightly against him. It was exactly what I needed.

“Gabriel!” I couldn’t stop calling out his name as each wave rolled over me longer and harder than the last.

Responding to my climax, Gabriel moaned loudly and then his powerful body stilled over me for an incandescent moment. Everything that mattered, that would
ever
matter, was right here.

Afterwards, his beautiful eyes had welled with tears as he looked down at me. “Thank you, Emma, for making my dreams come true.”

I was smitten.

Even more so when we made love again. And again.

SEVEN

Dressed in just Gabriel’s dress shirt and sitting at the kitchen island, I swung my feet while eating a bowl of ice cream. “No wonder girls slap your face in the hall after you break up with them.”

“Pardon me?” He leaned against the end, tuxedo dress pants hanging low on his hips without a belt. Gabriel was dashing and all the more delicious because of his dishabille.

“You make love to a girl until she barely remembers her name and then feed her ice cream. It’s perfect.”

Gabriel’s mouth pinched. “I’ve never done this with anyone else.”

“What?”

“This,” he gestured with his spoon. “You’re the first.”

“Bullshit.”

“Look, I know you think I’m a man-whore—”

“Well, because you are.”

“All right, I’ve been that way but honestly I’ve never much spent time with my partners—”

“Girlfriends.”

“
Partners
after we finished. That’s not what we were about.”

I took another bite, studiously avoiding his gaze while he did the same. Since I introduced the subject it was only fair I was the one to ask, “Are you feeling as awkward as I am?”

“More so.”

“Should we change the subject?”

“Please.”

I found another topic of discussion—school work. We chatted about the different classes, saying nothing of importance as we found our way back to comfort again.

Then it was my turn to feel odd and a little raw. Karma perhaps?

“I liked your dress, Emma. Where’d you get it?”

I swallowed my ice cream, taking the precious few moments to decide what I should say. It was a perfectly innocent question, after all. Gabriel’s tuxedo had obviously been tailored to fit his frame and wasn’t something found on a rack, but it just didn’t seem the same at all.

“I had it made.”

“Really? Who did it?”

Although I trusted Gabriel more than I did a month ago, I still had to quickly gauge his expression and see if it held more than curiosity. “My mom knows someone whose daughter sews. She did it.”

The somebody being Carla, a very nice woman who worked on the same cleaning crew as my mother. Her daughter was only a year older than me, but she’d been sewing since she was ten. Nita loved design and wanted to one day work in a fashion house.

We were similarly ambitious in that way.

I wondered if my answer would have Gabriel withdrawing his praise for the dress since it didn’t come from an exclusive designer or boutique. I wanted to know, in fact counted on it changing his opinion.

Gabriel smiled. “She does wonderful work, Emma. No one else had a dress like yours. It had Grecian flair, clean, simple, and elegant. You weren’t a walking sequin like everyone else.”

Shocked at his unexpected response, I sought to hide my feelings in a tease. “You have quite the opinion on fashion. I never pegged you to be a fashionista.”

“I’m a man of many surprises. It makes life interesting that way.” Gabriel took another bite of ice cream after saying, “I hope you continue to have her design other dresses for you.”

He was completely serious and not just being polite.

Gabriel continued eating his ice cream, oblivious to the reshuffling of walls happening in my head space. I was typically silent around him because I watched everything I said, always considering the possible reaction to my words because of how different our worlds were.

He didn’t see that because he wasn’t
just
like them. He was different.

“What’s on your mind, Emma? You’re frowning again.”

I shook my head, bewildered and helpless to make sense of it all. “You’re not like anyone I’ve ever met.”

Gabriel cast me a smoldering glance. “You’re just figuring that out?”

“I guess I am.”

He took my bowl away from me. “Hey! I wasn’t done with that.”

“I’ve got something better. Promise.” Gabriel rinsed our bowls and utensils, putting them neatly in the dishwasher.

I thought to prod and point out how surprised I was that he even knew what a dishwasher was, much less how to load it. Before I would’ve. Now…

Now was different.

Gabriel tossed me a wry grin and a wink as he made his way to the fridge. He pulled out a large silver bowl rounded with large plump strawberries. Next came a slightly smaller bowl of cream.

Fresh cream.

“I hate to be a bother, baby, but can you hold this please?”

Taking the delightful sweet from him, I couldn’t resist dipping my finger in and sucking it into my mouth. It was heaven. Once I opened my eyes again, I caught Gabriel staring at my lips.

“Sadist. Definitely a sadist.” He then placed the strawberries back on the counter, as well as the cream, and asked me to wait while he went to grab a bottle to go along with dessert.

It was only a few minutes before Gabriel came back with a bucket filled with ice and a champagne bottle.

“Do I have to remind you you’re not old enough to drink?”

Gabriel kissed me soundly before answering, “Come on, Emma. Live a little. It’s quite fun sometimes.”

I wrapped my arms around his neck. “Are you suggesting I’m boring, Gordon?”

“Not at all! Only except, you know, when you’re boring.”

I gasped in mock-outrage. “That’s it! No more kisses for you, Gabriel.”

“None?”

“Nope.”

“Not even a little?”

“Not even a little.”

His full, kissable lip jutted in a pout before curving into a naughty grin. “If you won’t kiss me then maybe I can just kiss you. How about here?”

I lifted my chin, helping him kiss my neck as much as he wanted. “Hmm, why don’t you keep doing that a bit longer so I can decide?”

“You mean like this?”

“Yes, just like that.”

Our kisses inevitably led to other things. Naked things. Gabriel proved that strawberries and cream were indeed a better treat, especially as he ate them off intimate parts of my body.

Gabriel’s tongue tickled my skin as he lapped up champagne from the small of my back. He kissed me into submission before hauling me over his shoulder and carrying me upstairs into his marbled shower.

It was primal, raw, playful, and glorious.

When we weren’t physically filled with each other, we whispered some of our secrets.

“Why do you work so hard, Emma?”

“Why don’t you?”

“Seriously.” Gabriel reached out and moved the hair off my face. “Why?”

I sighed. “Because when you come from where I do, Hope is in short supply. School gives me focus. It gives me…” I floundered, searching for the right word that was there all along.

“Hope.”

Mirroring his smile, I nodded. “Yes.”

“What do you want to be when you grow up, Emma? Don’t act like you don’t already know.”

“You’re going to laugh.”

“No. I won’t. Promise.”

“Okay. An analyst.”

Gabriel’s eyebrows rose high. “Really? An analyst.”

“An analyst. Boring, right?”

Gabriel smiled, soft and sweet. “No, it’s perfect. You’re going to be the best analyst ever because you can’t be anything else.”

“An analyst?”

“No. Perfect.”

Gabriel kissed my shoulder, then my neck, then my mouth, and then we danced again.

Later he rested his head against my chest, purring as my fingers stroked his baby-soft hair. “Why do you do it?”

“Do what?” he murmured sleepily.

“Surround yourself with people you don’t care about.”

His body tensed for a fraction of a second. “Status means everything, don’t you know? I’m just another incredibly shallow fellow. Don’t give it much thought, baby.”

“Cut the crap, Gabriel. You’re more than that, than them.”

“It’s kind of you to think so.”

“It’s not me being kind. It’s the truth.” I yanked his hair for good measure.

“Ouch! You can be such a bully, Emma.”

“Don’t change the subject.”

“Then don’t pull my hair out…at least not like that.”

“Gabriel.”

“Emma.”

I yanked his hair again.

“Okay, okay.” Gabriel cleared his throat. “What did you ask again?”

Oh, this silly boy! “Why?”

His grin faded away as if it never was. “Why do I hang out with people I can barely stomach? Because I have to…and because…I don’t want to be alone.”

“Being alone isn’t so bad.”

“I’m not as strong as you, Emma. I don’t want to be alone.”

Pity stirred my heart. “Everyone loves you, Gabriel. That’s why a crowd is always around you following you wherever you go. Remember how the Varsity Cheerleaders decorated your locker and every class you’re in when you turned eighteen? I can’t imagine you’ll ever have to worry about being alone.”

“Emma, you know as well as I do that those people aren’t around me because they
like
me. They’re around me because they
want
something.”

“What?”

“Everything.” Gabriel lifted his head up. Staring into my curious gaze, he whispered, “You don’t want anything from me at all. And the oddest thing is I wish you did. I’d give it all to you, Emma. Whatever I have would be all yours.”