Deep End(67)

The opposite, really.

“I smell like you.” I’m boneless. Lazy, as though coming out from centuries of hibernation. “And the stuff we did.”

“Exactly my point.” Another soft nuzzle. His arms tighten around my torso, crossed, pulling me deeper even though there’s no air left to fill. “Do you always thrash around in your sleep?”

“I thrash around?”

I feel his nod against my nape, followed by a light kiss, followed by a scrape of teeth, followed by a mumbled “Had to restrain you.”

“I had no idea.” Josh never mentioned it. “It does explain the state of my bed every morning, though.” I attempt to turn. Lukas won’t allow it, but I feel how hard and warm he is against the lower curve of my ass. He doesn’t seem impatient about it—nothing about the way he’s holding me broadcasts anything but a hug, but . . . Are we going to have sex again? Do I want to have sex with him ag—

Yes.

Undisputedly, yes.

Before, though, I should clean up. “May I go to the restroom?” I ask jokingly.

He pretends to think it through. “If you must,” he says, a low, put-upon rumble that has me laughing, and him kissing my cheek again, and then, after a too-lingering moment, letting go. I sit up on the edge of the bed, facing away from him, and—

Ouch.

I twist my fists into the sheets, because it hurts. There’s a sharp ache right behind my belly button, and where my thighs meet my abdomen. Muscles worked too hard and too long.

I hide the flinch in my step and close the door behind me, cheeks burning. The thing is, I’d hate for Lukas to decide to hold back next time. I need him to spare me no quarter and never hesitate. But when I look at my naked body in the mirror, I nearly gasp. I trace the map of what we did last night on my skin like it’s a pilgrimage: the red abrasions of his stubble; the bluish bruises on the edge of my left breast; a purple coin blooming on my hip bone; chapped, swollen lips.

Wrecked.

I look absolutely wrecked. I look like I’m something that belongs to Lukas, something he handled with strength, something used in precisely the way I asked for in that damn list. No more, no less. Brought to the edge and no further.

Warm satisfaction blossoms in my stomach. This is it, the feeling I’ve been chasing. Not just the orgasms and the pleasure, but this sense of compatibility. My needs, met by Lukas’s. We match, I think. The relief of knowing that the things I want are complementary to someone else’s almost overwhelms me.

When I collect myself enough to go back, I find Lukas right outside, leaning against the wall. He put on a pair of gray joggers, and holds a glass of water in one hand, a gel capsule in the other.

I recognize it from decades of muscle soreness: Advil.

So much for hiding anything from him.

I make no comment and swallow it. He looks at my naked body, at what he’s done to me, like I’m some kind of Olympic medal. Hungry, proud, eager. Other things I can’t disentangle from the intensity of his focus.

His hand lifts to brush against the bruise on the side of my breast. “Is this the point where you look contrite and say that you’re sorry?” I ask neutrally. Truth is, I’m afraid. What if he regrets it? What if I’m too much?

He says nothing. His thumb presses into the mark at my waist—a perfect match. Lock and key. “Should I apologize about these, too?”

I huff a small laugh. “You don’t sound apologetic. ”

“Because I’m not.” He shrugs, and it hits me like a freight train, how attractive he is—not because of the muscles and the bone structure, not in general, but to me. Because of who he is, and who I am. “You love to be hurt, Scarlett. Just enough pain that you won’t even think about not doing what I ask.” He leans down. His skin is rough against my cheek. “I love giving that to you, and I’m going to for as long as you’ll let me.”

I shiver. Not in fear.

“Drink all of that,” he orders, and after the glass is drained, he picks me up and sets me on the edge of the bed.

“I should leave before your roommates wake up.”

His lips tighten, displeased, but he nods and plucks my top from the floor. “Arms up,” he instructs. I obey, trying to remember the last time someone dressed me. It feels nice.

“Lukas?”

He glances at me.

“Am I doing it right? This whole . . . thing.”

He knows exactly what I’m asking, but he continues shaking out my skirt. His reply is unrushed. “I don’t know if it’s right, but this is . . .” His mouth flattens. “You are exactly what I wanted.” The skirt drops, forgotten. “I think . . .” He’s so rarely hesitant, or lost for words, I almost don’t recognize his confusion for what it is. “I’d imagined it a lot. Ever since I became aware of sex, before I had a name for it. And I’d hoped that it would feel good, but this . . . I just didn’t know it could be like this.” His jaw works, like there are words he wants to say that won’t come out.

“The stuff on the list.” My tongue is too thick in my mouth. “You can do it. All of it. You don’t have to hold back.”

He looks down at my body, amused. “Does it feel like I’m holding back?” It’s gentle but fast, the way he presses me down on the mattress, one wide palm warm against my sternum, hot through the thin cloth of my shirt .