This is chocolate. An entire cake of it, indulgent and delicious.
His fingers brush my temple, tucking wisps of hair behind my ear. Repeating, with each stray curl. Languorous stroking with no destination at all.
His hand spreads and slides into my hair, his fingertips massaging tight circles on my scalp.
I groan, or maybe drool. A head rub is one of my favorite things in the world, and to have one show up like this with no warning is doing the same thing to my blood sugar as chocolate cake. I arch into him like a cat, one that wants so much more of this stroking.
He chuckles and fists my hair, tugging gently. My entire scalp croons at him. More.
His fingers keep working, five points of delicious pressure. My curls try their best to entangle him, but he somehow sweet talks them into giving way. He circles down the back of my head, cupping it, rubbing the nape of my neck.
My fingers knead his chest. My lioness, showing her approval. And besides, it’s a very nice chest. I don’t know if the rules of this game involve touching him, though, and finding out would take energy I don’t have. I’m too busy being putty.
His hand takes a detour down to my waist and up under my tank top, continuing the massage down my spine. I groan as he travels over the muscles between my shoulder blades that are always tight. When he gets to my waist again, he keeps heading slowly down, dipping under the waistband of my yoga pants. My brain tries to tell me we just crossed some kind of line, but his fingers don’t agree. They splay out over my ass cheek, his thumb finding all kinds of spots that whimper and release under his touch.
This isn’t at all what I expected from him, but I surely don’t want him to stop.
His fingers gentle. Not massaging now. Wandering. Low, stroking circles, tracing the bony part of my hips, sliding down the front of my thigh as far as my pants will let him go, then picking a new direction. A random one. This isn’t a little preliminary foreplay before he heads between my legs. He’s exploring. Doing exactly what I asked for, but I realize I’m astonished to actually be getting it.
That says something sad—and also enlightening. Which I’ll think about later. This moment isn’t about being in my head, it’s about being in my skin and relishing the touch of a man with no agenda, real or imagined, that’s asking me to go anywhere but here.
His thumb plays with the hills and valleys around my hipbone, seemingly fascinated. It takes me a while to realize my hips are moving, gently rocking against him. Expressing desire I hadn’t even realized was there.
But it is, of course. To be explored like this, appreciated like this, is as sexy as it gets. I ease off a little. Quiet my hips. I asked for a swim in light desire. My motions feel needier than that, and it shouldn’t be me who throws us into territory I didn’t want to enter.
There’s an odd sound near my head, and it takes me a moment to realize the man I’m lying on is growling.
I go entirely still. Confused.
His hand cups my ass cheek. “Move as you like, woman. I’ve a fondness for all your small sounds and wiggles.”
That just takes the looming awkward place inside me and makes it bigger. I try to get around it, because the last thing I want to do is dump us out of the hammock, but it grabs onto me with sticky fingers and refuses to melt away.
His fingers slide out of my pants and under my chin. “Tell me.”
Bossy voice, bossy words—gentle heart. “I didn’t realize I was making so many. I’m embarrassed. I don’t want to be, but I am.”
“That’s just fine.” His hand slides back into my pants. “I’m happy to touch and stroke you while you feel aroused and embarrassed. You don’t need to manage anything, not how you move or how you feel or the small squeaks you make when I find a tender spot.”
His words ease something in me. Something I can’t quite get ahold of, and I think it might be important, but his fingers are doing their magic again. Telling me to save my thoughts for later.