Page 94 of Madame X

Your forehead touches mine, and you are gasping for breath. Crushing me with your weight. “Jesus, X.”

You try to move off me, but I cling to you.

“Don’t leave, Caleb,” I whisper.

“I have to—I’ve gotta go.” You are not you, anymore.

You are starting to close down. Perhaps, becomingmoreyou. Or... less you. I don’t know. Is the real you the tormented being I glimpsed trapped behind the shadowy veil of your eyes? Or isthe real you the brusque, icy, efficient, impersonal creature of tailored suits and expensive cars?

I grip your wrist with one hand, lock my thighs around your waist and hook my heels around your backside, keep you firmly against me, in me, even as you soften. With my other hand, I do something I’ve never done before: I touch your hair. Feather my fingers through inky strands.

“If you leave now, Caleb, all of this will be for nothing. You’ll undo whatever that was we just shared.Thatwas sharing something. Isawpart of you, Caleb.”

“Fucking hell, X. You don’t get it.” A rough growl, a curse from you, so uncharacteristic.

“No, I don’t. But... stay anyway. Relax, just for a moment.”

You are tense for a moment, a sculpture of granite. And then, slowly, you melt, soften, and you dip a shoulder to the bed, twist to your back. Gradually, as if completely unsure if you’re doing it right, or evenwhatyou’re doing, you lay your head down on the pillow beside me. Drawn out of me, your manhood is slack and wet against your thigh. I feel your essence leaking out of me, but I don’t dare move, don’t dare to even think of it. I lay next to you, hands stuffed under the pillow, on my side, facing you.

This feels like curling up next to a lion in its cage.

You reach out a hand, and I tense, cease breathing.

But all you do is touch me, a single forefinger stroking upward from my thigh to my hip, over my waist, up my ribs, to my breast.

“You are beautiful.” A murmur, as from the bottom of the turbulent dark sea.

“Thank you.” I shift to the side, drape my arm behind me so your tentatively touching finger can brush from breast back down to my hip.

I dare touch your bicep. The lion twitches, and I know I could be devoured in a split second.

A game of touches, exploration of mutuality: a fingertip to my nipple, my palm sliding from knee to jagged hip bone; tracing my backside, following the curve from outer edge of hip to inner crease and up my spine, my fingers on the furrowed field of your abs.

You do not speak, and I don’t dare break the magic of this. It is too fragile.

My eyes droop, weigh heavily.

Touch skates over me, hesitant and gentle and smooth and slow.

I drift, and drowse . . .

And sleep.

Chapter 18

Iwake alone.

Silence.

“Caleb?”

Nothing.

Dawn streaks through the window. I look to the left, and see that my closet door is open. The racks are bare, not even a hanger in sight.

My throat seizes. I leap out of bed, headed for my library.

It is there, intact.