taper toward his hips even more dramatic. He had more hair, too — not too much, but the smooth chest of a boy was gone, replaced by dark curls that started, lightly, at his throat and led her gaze down, inexorably, to the manhood that still strained for her.
Suddenly, she didn’t want patience either. She pushed him flat and moved over him — something else they hadn’t done when she was nineteen and too naïve to guess that she could find pleasure without being on her back. He was hard enough, and she was wet enough, that it was no test at all. She used her hand to guide him to her opening and slid down his shaft, feeling herself stretch as she took him to the hilt.
Nick burned for her. He had asked for worship, and he was getting it — but it felt more like an attack than a seduction. He put his hands on her hips, trying to get her to move faster, but she shook her head wickedly and pushed them away. “Patience,” she whispered again, leaning forward so that her hair fell around them like a curtain. “Let me worship you.”
He slid a hand up to her breast, and she accepted that easily enough — although it annoyed him that she had somehow stripped him naked without removing anything of her own. Even her shoes were still on, and he felt the heels grazing against his legs. He didn’t care, though. He didn’t care about anything except the feel of her stroking up and down on his shaft. He closed his eyes and dropped his hands, hoping that he could last long enough that she might find her pleasure too, but knowing it was a losing battle…
Until suddenly, shatteringly, she stopped. His hips surged up automatically to try to recapture the momentum, but she held fast. He opened his eyes just as she bent over to look him in the face. “Beg me, Nick,” she whispered.
It was an echo of what he had done to her the night before. And it wasn’t how their game was supposed to be played. But neither his heart nor his cock cared to put up a fight. “Please, Ellie,” he grated out, mad at her, mad for her. “Finish.”
She slid up, then down — and stayed down. She tilted her head. “That didn’t sound like begging.”
“What do you want me to say?”
She wiggled a bit, as though she were settling in for a story. He groaned. She wiggled again — she seemed to know just how much she needed to move to keep him on edge without letting him go over it.
Then she smiled. He didn’t see any worship on her face. He didn’t see any love, either. Despite the fact his cock was buried inside her, she was just as impenetrable as she had been an hour earlier. Her voice, when she spoke again, had all the condemnation of a priest calling an Inquisition. “Say you love me, Nick.”
“Love you? Love you?” Something primal snapped, and even though he knew she’d pushed him into his anger, he couldn’t stop. He reared up, flipped her on her back, and drove into her. “I hate you. I loathe you. I despise you. You destroyed me, Ellie. How could I ever love you?”
He couldn’t speak anymore. He could only plunge into her, mindless, savage, needing the satisfaction of her body so he could stop his awful thoughts. She moaned, and he felt her tighten and shudder around him, but he was too far gone to care whether she’d found her pleasure. He buried himself within her and came, hard, before collapsing. He had just enough presence of mind to roll them onto their sides so he didn’t crush her before his energy ran out.
When he could think again, he found Ellie leaning on one elbow, stroking his hair and gazing at his face. She didn’t seem upset by anything he’d said — a little sad, perhaps, but the tears he’d planned to take from her that night were nowhere to be seen.
“You destroyed me, Nick,” she whispered. “But if having you was a sin, I will never repent.”
He’d thought she had smashed his heart a decade earlier. But some piece of it must have survived, because he felt it break again. He brushed his hand across her face and felt a track of moisture on her cheek — her tears weren’t visible, but there had been at least a few in