down the sides of the canyon walls.”
* * *
“I want you,” she said simply. Visiting the cemetery that day reminded her that the past was gone. The future was just a dot on the horizon. Today was all she had and she wanted Creed.
His arms tightened around her. Today, she reminded herself again, was all she had and she wanted Creed to make love to her. She wanted to feel the excitement of sex. She wanted to see if the afterglow she’d read about could be a reality with the right man. She wanted to make memories that would keep her warm when he was gone. And she didn’t want to think about him not being there.
His arm moved from her shoulders to her butt, cupping it gently.
“Lie beside me,” she said.
He stretched out beside her on a sofa that was barely big enough for them.
She smiled and straddled him, kicking the cover off to one side and lying on top of him. There was noise in the background from the movie going, but it was a blur when she deftly removed her shirt and bra and unbuttoned his shirt.
“I love the way your chest feels on my boobs,” she said.
“Do you have any idea what you do to me?”
“You do the same thing to me,” she told him. “Every nerve in my whole body is tingling.”
“Well, my body is hot as hell. It wants you too, Sage.”
“Then let’s give it what it wants.” She undid his belt buckle and unzipped his jeans. “Time to come out of the clothes. We’ll cover up with the quilt.”
“I don’t need any covers. I’m really hot,” he said.
She pointed across the room. “Yes you are, darlin’, but we can’t have sex in front of the children.”
“Then we’ll cover up with the quilt,” he said.
They quickly undressed and she gave a hop and wrapped her legs around him. He caught her with one hand firmly on her naked butt and the other around her waist.
He backed up and sat down and she wiggled until he had slid inside her. Then she tasted his lips. She didn’t kiss him with a passionate force but tasted gently, feeling the heat rising and meeting throbbing desire as she began a steady rhythm.
The quilt was around them. She wasn’t sure when he’d wrapped them into a cocoon, but only their heads were visible. They’d gone from kissing to truly exciting sex during the first ten minutes of the movie. She wondered if the credits would roll before they finished.
He flipped her over on the sofa and took control of the rhythm, speeding up until she thought she’d fly right off the top of the mountain, and making love to her with his fingertips and his tongue. And then he would slow down and gently kiss her eyelids, her ears, and the tip of her nose.
“Tell me what you want, Sage,” he said hoarsely.
“I want you to never stop. You are doing everything I want right now,” she said.
He grinned and she reached up to touch the corner of his mouth.
“You have a sexy mouth, Creed. But your eyes are your… oh my God, don’t stop doing that with your fingers.”
His fingertips teased the soft skin below her ear. “Like this?”
“Dear God.”
“Don’t tell Him. Tell me.”
“Yes, yes,” she said.
His mouth covered hers in a blistering hot kiss. “And this.”
In her other relationships there had been no sweet talk—just a few kisses, shed the clothes, get it done with a couple of oh, babies muttered, and then he would collapse on top of her. Afterwards there was very little cuddling because he fell asleep or wanted to get right up and make sandwiches or order pizza.
She loved the sweet-talking. She even loved the loud music playing on the television as the movie kept running.
“I feel like I’m making out in a movie theater,” she gasped.
“Darlin’, they don’t have sofas in the theaters I went to.”
She smiled and bucked against him.
“Now?” he asked.
She raked her nails across his back and wrapped her legs more firmly around his waist.
“Please, now!” she whispered.
“I’m not ready for it to be over,” he said.
“It doesn’t have to be over for good, just this time!” Her voice sounded squeaky in her ears.
One firm thrust and she felt herself floating, then the afterglow settled around them like warm sunlight. He shifted his weight until they were face-to-face on the narrow sofa and he pulled the quilt more firmly around them.
“Sleepy?” she asked.
“Too fired up to sleep, darlin’.