His throat convulsed. Tears sheened his eyes.
Bowing his head, he pressed his forehead to my breastbone, and I stroked my fingers through his hair.
“Valda,” he whispered. “I argued once that we should let you go. That holding onto you, that not letting you die…we were being selfish and thinking only of our own needs.” The agony lacing the words added to the weight as his shoulders shuddered. “I was being selfish, and I struggled…”
Threading my arms around him, I pulled him more firmly against me. Wrapping my legs around his hips dragged him closer, until his full weight blanketed me and I gloried in the contact. Pressing my lips into his damp hair, I squeezed him tighter.
“You never lost faith,” I whispered. “That faith sustained me as you fought for me, Andreas.” Raking my fingers through his hair, I searched for the poetry of words Hatch or Oz could always find so much easier than I. Even Dirk and I communicated in far more blunt terms.
Andreas had always been different, we offered each other challenge and succor in equal measure.
“You fought for me the only ways we know how. You challenged me,” I whispered, as I rifled through my memories. “You held yourself aloof from the shell of the woman I’d become. You wouldn’t be satisfied with anything that wasn’t wholly me…”
He lifted his head at that, his gaze piercing mine. “I would never take advantage of you. Your wit and fierce spirit are even more attractive to me than your body.” The last included a drag of his gaze to my breasts and the grind of his hips to mine. “Believe me when I say your body is the temple I will always worship.”
Eyebrows lifting, I traced my fingers over his expression. “Then let go of your pain or give it to me…”
He stared at me.
“I mean it,” I ordered him. “You carried each other, and you linked me to life with your love. Now let me carry you, and we will find them.” The last was a promise. I would not stop until I had Dirk and Hatch back. Then we would go for Oz. The more I recovered, the more I didn’t believe his excuses for leaving. But right now, I had Andreas and he needed me. “Give me your pain…give me your grief. Let me have you.”
The moment elongated. The seconds seeming to expand into an eternity, and then a full body shudder racked him before his mouth closed over mine. The time for words was done, and he poured so much of himself into that kiss, I almost forgot how to breathe. The stroke of his tongue was relentless, pushing against mine, even as tears sparked in my eyes for the riot of emotions ripping through us.
He jerked away from me only long enough to strip off the pants he’d pulled on after the shower, and then he hooked his fingers into my leggings and peeled them down. I preferred looser clothing, but they were so soft that even the stroke of them rolling down my legs sent eddies of sensation across my nerves.
The heat in his eyes scorched my skin, and then he lifted one foot and pressed a kiss to the inside of my ankle. The earlier tears flooded my eyes as he made a point of kissing his way up my legs. Every brush of his lips was a devotion that twisted my heart tighter and yet filled my soul.
When he reached the apex of my thighs, he nudged them wider and then pressed an open mouth kiss to my pussy, spearing me with his tongue, even as his nose brushed my clit. I closed my eyes as I fisted his hair. As much as I wanted to touch him and dig my fingers into his skin while I sucked and licked my way across him, he needed this.
He needed the control so he could empty all the loss and loneliness of the last few years. The pleasure spiraling out from his caresses pulled my belly taut, and then he locked his lips over my clit in a hard pulse of suction that shoved me right over into an orgasm. It struck with such ferocity, a scream tore out of my throat and my hips bucked upwards. I yanked on his hair, but he was relentless as he pushed me through the first and into the second.
When he thrust a single finger into me, I curled upward, and he pressed a hand to my abdomen to press me back against the bed. Then he worked a second finger in, and while I longed for his cock, even amidst the torrent of pleasure he unleashed, the pressure of his fingers stretching me offered a pinch.
Fuck.
A thought crashed through me I hadn’t expected. How many years had I gone without sex and then…
“Andreas,” I whispered his name on a ragged breath, and he scissored his fingers, stretching me again before he lifted his head to stare up at me. His eyes were dark pools of his need, and his cheeks damp and glistening.
“Hurts?” The husky worry on that one single word threatened to melt me all over again.
“It will, a little,” I warned him, trying to catch my breath. It was almost impossible when pleasure and need vied for my attention equally. He skated his thumb over my clit, drawing circles as he glanced down at my pussy once and then back up at me. “Yes,” I answered his unspoken question. “I think it healed everything.” Did I think it had repaired my hymen? Unlikely, but the reset had tightened everything up.
Surprise flickered over his face, and then something wilder and fiercer as he added a third finger, and the stretch, while not unbearable, definitely pushed it. I bit my lip to try and hold back a groan.
“Don’t,” he demanded in a lust-filled voice. “Let me hear you, querida, mi amor, scream to the heavens. Let everyone hear you.”
Then he put pressure on my clit and thrust deep as he curled all three fingers, and the orgasm hit me like a tempest. Head back, I screamed this time, sobbing with the pleasure he wrung from me. Somewhere along the way, my vision whited out, and I only came back to myself to find him hovering over me. His damp fingers cupped my cheek, and the weight of his cock pressed against my pussy.
Only when my eyes opened and focused on his did he begin to press forward. The pressure of his cock spearing into me was so much more intense than his fingers. A litany of Spanish fell off Andreas’ tongue, the tone a caress and the words likely endearments. I could hardly breathe around the weight of him as my body stretched for him.
There was no pain, not like the first time I’d had sex. No, this was more like coming home and becoming more all in the same breath. Then his lips were on mine, and my thoughts danced away as he thrust until he was fully-seated. I barely had a chance to get used to him before he dragged his cock back and then pushed home again.
A raggedy, keening sound tore from me, and then I wrapped my legs around him so I could properly leverage myself. With his next thrust, I arched to meet him and he ground against my clit. His moan vibrated against my lips, and I welcomed the sound as we writhed together. He’d gone for a slower pace, but it lasted only two more thrusts before a frenzy seemed to seize him.
Digging my fingers into his back, I held on as we came together again and again. The spiral of tension snapped taut once more. His hips stuttered, a warning that he was close, and his grip on my hip and his hand in my hair were both tight to the point of bruising.
“Look at me,” I demanded in between hungry kisses. I wanted to see him fall apart.
I wanted to fall with him.
A prayer fell from his lips as he dragged his eyes open, and the look in them sent me over the edge. I fought to keep my eyes open, even as white edged my vision, and then his face locked in a rictus of ecstasy and he chased me over.
Time lost meaning as we clung together in a sweaty mess. He didn’t roll away, staying buried within me, even as he began to soften, and I treasured this closeness.