Page 47

"I don't want one night with you, Nora," I whispered against her ear. "I want all the nights with you and that's what makes this so difficult."

She sobbed harder then, nodding through it though her body only trembled more. I slipped my hands under her arms and hoisted her up like I used to do. She moved with me, with the fluidity of a dancer, to latch on to me and crossed her ankles behind me. I carried her over to the sofa to sit with her in my lap as I fought the pressure that built behind my eyes. My heart battled with my brain, logic fighting feelings. For as much as I wanted her, wanted this, I knew it was a stupid, horrible, and terrible idea. Not because of who we were, but because of how it went down last time.

She settled against me, sniffling softly close to my neck while urging my jacket from my shoulders. I let her, and she brushed her lips over me. I closed my eyes, allowing the gesture to spark the goose flesh that coated my skin for a fraction of a second before pressing my index finger to her lips.

"Please," she whispered, kissing it as tears leapt from her lashes to leave searing droplets on my skin.

"Please what, Nor?" I smirked when I asked, leaning into the landslide that would be my demise.

She peeked up at me, her vast pupils shimmering in the dim light emphasized by her tears. A small smile curved her pink lips and she whispered, "Make me purr."

I chuckled at the enchantment that took her to my bed on her last birthday. "Is that what you want, kitten?"

She nodded, her pouty lip poking out. "Yes."

Warmth poured over me, coating me in liquefied heat that only Nora ever seemed to douse me with. I placed a gentle kiss between her eyebrows, and she closed her eyes, the tension leaving her with a single exhale.

I made the conscious decision, the same way I did the first time which started us down this avalanche of heartache. It was me then, and it was me now, but denying her, pushing her away and seeing that hurt in her face, broke me more than the giving in ever did.

I unzipped her boots, one after the other, and once freed, she curled up tighter against me. I chuckled and slipped my hands under her rear before standing.

"This time in your bed." I nibbled her ear and she shivered in my arms. "Not mine."

Again, she nodded, her entire body trembling while she hugged me around the neck. She peppered my shoulder with kisses before I lay her down on the neatly made bed. Her smile replaced her tears, and she gnawed her lip when she gazed up at me. Tears kept her eyes glassy, but her rosy cheeks and relieved expression left her without any grimace of pain. I pushed her shirt up, grabbing her roughly before kissing her hot stomach and sucking her skin between my lips.

A laugh that turned into a giggle escaped her when she slunk out of her shirt, her hands falling to my hair after. Her playfulness returned, tangled with the coyness that destroyed any reserve I kept behind the dam along with my heart.

"Are you wearing panties under that skirt?" I scowled at her, reaching under the fabric to grab hold of her silky undergarments. "I thought we had a rule about that."

"I've been naughty about it," she said, squealing when I yanked them down like a magician pulling a tablecloth out from under an entire place setting. Her laughter rang out, striking chords of joy in my heart when happiness replaced the sad that became the undercurrent of our times together of late.

"So naughty." I ditched my jacket, tossing it to the floor as I crawled over her.

Her smile became an endless source of fuel to my fire. She popped the buttons of my shirt, revealing my usual tank.

"Are you breaking rules? No touching." I leaned down and nipped the end of her nose.

"Just a little?" She pouted at me, but I swatted her hip enough to make her yelp.

"Nope." I snagged the button on the side of her skirt, then tugged the zipper down after. "No playing if you break the rules."

Her teeth grazed her lip again when I freed her from her skirt. She let her legs fall open when I knelt between them, her hand falling to her quivering belly. As always, her completely bare pussy, pink and swollen with arousal, glistened for me already and I'd hardly played with her at all. She leaned up to unfasten her bra, then wriggled out of it. She lay there, on her back, watching me with twinkling eyes and a bashful smile that made me want to break my own rules about kissing her.

"What are we going to do about a naughty kitten, Kitten?" I affirmed it then, her nickname and my desire for her in a single statement. My own arousal burned in my jeans, forcing the piercing of my clit to rub against me in my favorite way.

"Something…" She whimpered, her toes curling when I ran my hands down her inner thighs.

I dropped down over her in a freefall, catching myself in a push-up an inch from her face. She gasped and flinched, but shivered hard when I thrust my pelvis against hers.

"What kind of something?"

"Everything." Her breath left her in hot puffs against my face. "All of it."

"There's something I never got to properly do to you," I crooned, my voice dropping to husky tones when my own arousal escalated.

"Wh-what?" She gulped, her gaze locked on mine. She curled her hands against her chest, her index finger grazing the exposed flesh of my neck.

"Spank that beautiful, round, delicious ass." I grabbed her hips, pulling her to me. "If this is our just one time event, what do you think about me taking you over my knee?" Her lashes fluttered when I ground my pelvis against her again.