Page 83 of The Souls We Claim

“Little cockblocker.” I stroke Ari’s cheek gently.

“She waited until we were done. Perhaps she doesn’t deserve that title.”

I kiss her, harder this time. “Who says I was done?”

Ari brushes her tongue against mine. “At least she isn’t crying.”

“If she’d woken up five minutes earlier, I might have been.”

Ari laughs, and I follow, my cock still deep inside her.

Guess that’s the perfect balance of life.

“So, Daddy, huh?” Ari asks.

I run a knuckle along her cheek. “It’s a kink. Not something I need all the time or out of bed.”

“Technically, we aren’t in bed, right now.”

“Brat. Does it bother you?”

Ari shakes her head. “Not at all. It was hot. And it was nice to feel…”

“Feel what?”

After everything we just did, her cheeks still blush. “It’s complicated.”

I reach between us and pull out of her. “Tell me.”

Ari sighs as I raise her to sitting. “There was something freeing about it. Feeling cared for, that I was important to you. That I was being a good girl for you, doing something I knew you would be proud of me for. That you were teaching me how to be with you in that moment. It was like a different level to just sex. More intense. Does that sound weird?”

“No. It doesn’t.” I kiss the tip of her nose. “It sounds fucking beautiful.”

“I bet I look a mess now. I’ll need to change,” she says.

“Not at all. I want you to wear this.” I finger the straps that go over her shoulders.

She glances down at the crotch of the suit. “Really?”

“Definitely. Do the best you can to clean it up, but I love the idea that we just totally marked it, and you’re going to wearit anyway. Plus, no swimming in the clubhouse yard, so your shorts will cover it. Will you do it for me?”

Ari touches my cheek. “I have a feeling there isn’t much I wouldn’t do for you.”

“Because you want to though, right? I know you did shit for your cunt of an ex because you were scared. It’d fucking kill me if you were scared of me.”

She wiggles to the edge of the table and kisses me softly. “You’re teaching me the difference. I can’t explain it. I feel like I could say no and you’d stop. And I want the kind of co-existence you do. It’s like something inside me responds to something inside you. And circumstances, and death, and babies, and life…nothing seems to turn down what I feel for you.”

I lift her down so her feet touch the floor. “I’m feeling you, Ari. Like, really feeling you too.”

She blushes and reaches down for her shorts. “Good. Because you keep…you know…doing that…and I’m not going anywhere.”

I love the way she can’t bring herself to put words to what we just did. “Go get cleaned up, and I’ll go get Lola ready, and then we’ll go together to the barbecue, yeah?”

“Together sounds good,” she says.

As I walk behind her when we make our way up the stairs, I can’t help but agree.

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