when I lay my hands on the small of her back. No wonder everyone is staring. Her tattoo is on display.
“Hi,” I whisper and lean down to drop a kiss on her mouth. She presses her body into mine and I growl into her mouth. But I break our kiss.
“Surprise.” She gazes at me.
“Indeed. Come on, let’s sit.” I take her hands and we walk back to the table I’m sharing with my brother, my advisor and his family. We make introductions and I can’t stifle my chuckle at the look of surprise on Regan’s face when Hayes stands to pull out her chair. Hayes has always been great at pivoting. But this has got to be a record. Maybe fatherhood has mellowed him out, or maybe he really can see how much I love her, but either way, I’m glad.
She joins us at the table, and I introduce her to everyone she doesn’t know. Confidence squeals and jumps up to wrap her arms around her neck, Regan laughs out loud and hugs her back.
It’s an amazing evening. She shines brighter than anyone else in the room. We dance all night, except for the one that Hayes cut in for. Dancing is also something he never does. They didn’t hug when they were done, but they were both smiling when they came back to the table.
On our way out, we stop to use the Photo Booth and we create our infamous pose - the kiss, my hands palming her luscious little ass, my mouth devouring hers. The Jezebel tattoo is clear as day and this time, we make sure that my face is, too.
On our way home, I post it to my IG feed with the captions. “Call her Jezebel if you’d like, as long as you also call her mine. #Thosearemyfuckinghands.”
Later than night, Regan shares my post in her story, and she captions it, “This is us—Wicked, Wanton, Wild and really fucking happy.”
Mine
Regan
We take our time coming up the stairs. Stopping every few steps to kiss, or nibble, or stroke and when we finally reach the landing, I am in a frenzy of need.
I grab his tie and tug him back until I hit the wall. “Woah,” he chuckles, his breath warm on my lips before I take his mouth with mine. His mouth is hot and slick from our marathon of kissing, and I groan at the slide of his tongue back into mine. I pull at this suit jacket and he lets go of me long enough to shrug it off.
“Yes, take off all these stupid clothes, right now,” I command and turn my attention to the waist of his pants.
He grabs my hands, pulls them away and suddenly the warm weight of his body on mine is gone. My eyes snap open.
“Don’t move, I’ll be right back,” he calls, his hand slipping from mine for the first time since we left the fundraiser.
“Where are you going?” I ask as the top of his head disappears. He doesn’t answer me. Frowning, I peer over the banister frowning when only the sounds of retreating footfalls greet me. And then, my smile makes a miraculous recovery as my gaze sweeps up the staircase. After our make out session on the way up, I’ll never look at a staircase the same way.
I turn to take in the room that takes up the entire top floor of his townhouse. The floor is covered in the gleaming blond hardwood. The windowless walls are white and bare. The ceiling has a huge tray in the center. The walls are completely bare. There’s no art, no bookshelves, in fact there’s only one piece of furniture in the entire space.
Right in the center of the room, directly beneath the tray ceiling, is the biggest bed I’ve ever seen. Draped in a simple white comforter and dressed with a mountain of plain white pillows it sits right below the center of the opening the ceiling. I rush toward it like a shipwreck survivor would swim toward land and dive on, landing on my back in the middle and all the air leaves my lungs. The tray is a window, opening up to the dazzlingly dark, diamond crusted night sky. The pane of glass set into it so clear, that from here, it’s like having an unobstructed view of the heavens. I can’t believe this is what he falls asleep to every night.
I can’t believe I’m going to fall asleep here, tonight.