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Caitlin propositioning me is the stuff of my dreams.
Last night, when she wanted to join me in bed, she only wanted my body heat. Now, however, she wants more.
Wait a second. My mind must be playing tricks on me. She didn’t really say that, did she?
“Did you just say you want to have sex with me?” I ask.
I wish I could see her face, but I can’t, not in the darkness of my bedroom.
“I did,” she replies, “but don’t worry. It’s just sex. It doesn’t mean anything.”
That’s precisely the problem.
I want it to mean something, unlike with any of the women I’ve slept with before.
Earlier, I told her she was beautiful. I was this close to confessing my feelings for her, unable to stand how she was talking about picking up a guy at Eugene’s New Year’s Eve party. However, I put my many years of practice at hiding my feelings to good use, and I managed to keep my mouth shut.
Okay, that’s not true.
I managed not to tell her my feelings, but I kissed her, and I did not keep my mouth shut when doing that. For so long, I’d dreamed of holding her against me and pressing my lips to hers. In far more romantic scenarios than what ended up happening.
But it was amazing nonetheless.
I love her. If I sleep with her, I want it to mean something; of course I do.
Yet she thinks I want the opposite.
I wish I could tell her everything, confess I’ve been in love with her since she knocked me to the ground and pulled a first aid kit out of her knapsack. There was something so endearing about that first aid kit, and I have the same feeling in my chest now at the practical note in her voice. She sees us as being friends who have sex—just once, or on an ongoing basis? I’m not sure, but she sees it as a practical solution to, well, being horny.
So sex is on the table, and I think our friendship will survive it, but if I reveal my feelings, everything will get really weird. Although she wants to sleep with me, that doesn’t change the fact that I’m not her type when it comes to a relationship.
This is not how I’d dreamed things would happen.
But I’m a weak man. The woman I love wants to have sex with me? I’m going to give her exactly what she wants, even if it’s not everything I desire.
I’m going to rock her goddamn world.
Unfortunately, I’ve gone too long without speaking, and Caitlin thinks I’m not interested.
“Sorry,” she says, “forget I ever—”
I cut her off with a kiss.
When my lips meet hers, it’s electric. I feel like sparks are flying from my fingertips as I stroke the soft skin of her cheeks and slide my hand down to her neck. I press myself against her and feel her curves against my body, even through all those layers of clothing.
“Let’s do this,” I say, as though I’m talking about making a gingerbread house, rather than something I’ve desperately wanted for a dozen years. “I want you naked, but if you’re going to get too cold—”
“Naked is good, but we’ll have to stay under the blankets.”
“I can work with that.”
I slide off the Rudolph sweater and toss it to the ground, followed by the long-sleeved T-shirt of mine that she’s wearing underneath. Then I turn on the lamp beside the bed, because there’s no way I’m having sex with Caitlin in the dark.
She instinctively crosses her arms over her chest.
I’m not used to Vulnerable Caitlin. I’m used to Caitlin taking on the world with her incredible work ethic and intelligence and charm.
“I haven’t been in bed with anyone in a long time,” she says quietly. “I know you’ve been with lots of women, and—”
“Not as many as you think. And you should never doubt that I think you’re beautiful and sexy, even if I never told you that until tonight.” I rake my eyes over her bare chest. Her breasts aren’t large, but they’re lovely, and her nipples are pebbled right now, whether from the cold or her excitement, I’m not sure. “You’re special to me,” I say quietly, not sure if I want her to hear. “Like no one else.”
I place my hands on her sides and stroke my thumbs up the slope of her breasts and over her nipples. To my satisfaction, she whimpers. Then I set my mouth to one nipple, rolling my tongue over the tip as I stroke her other nipple with my hand, dragging another whimper out of her. Instinctively, she moves her hips up toward me, and I get even harder.
My sweatpants are loose on her, and I easily slip the tips of my fingers inside the waistband, waiting for her nod before I continue further. When she gives it to me, her pretty lips parted, I slide my hand into her panties and draw my middle finger along her slit.
Oh, fuck. She’s wet for me.
My cock desperately wants to be inside her, but I also want to give her pleasure before we get there. I want her mindless, begging me to take her. I want her to shatter in my arms. We might only do this once, and I want it all.
I slip my finger inside her, and we both groan.
“Good?” I ask, running my other hand through her hair.
She nods.
“You just tell me if there’s anything you want, at any time,” I say.
“Well, there’s one thing...”
“Yes?”
“I was hoping you’d go down on me. You know, if you’re into that.”
“Of course that’s part of my plan. I don’t know if I should be offended that you thought you had to ask.”
She chuckles, but then I press my finger deeper inside her, and she groans. It sounds just like one of the groans she made in her sleep last night.
I grin and slide my head under the blankets and down between her legs. I pull out my fingers and give her one long, slow lick.
She grabs my hair, holding me down, keeping me where she wants me.
I love it.
In fact, she’s gripping my hair tightly enough that there’s a bite of pain, but I like that. I circle my tongue around her clit, then over her entrance. She bucks her hips toward my face, and I love that, too. I thrust my fingers inside her again and continue to pleasure her, reveling in the feel and taste of her.
God, she’s amazing.
And this is real, utterly real, so much better than all the times I imagined it.
Her breathing becomes jerky, and I grab her ass and press her against my mouth, the better to ravish her. I feel her muscles tense, and then she comes apart in my arms.
I glance up. “How was that?”
In response, she pushes my head back between her legs, and I give her exactly what she wants. She squirms against me, and it’s not long before she orgasms again.
As she shakes and shatters and cries out in my arms, I wonder, just for a moment, if maybe I’m enough for her. If I can give her what she needs outside the bedroom, too.
That never seemed like a possibility to me before, but for a flash, it is.
Caitlin is pawing at my shirt, trying to take it off, but her movements are clumsy. I save her the trouble and whip it off myself, and the noise of appreciation she makes is gratifying. She runs her fingers over my pecs and abs as though I’m a work of art, made just for her.
Anything for you, Caitlin.
But I don’t reveal any of the feelings that I’ve kept bottled up inside for so long. Instead, I smirk and say, “See anything you like?”
“I knew you were fit, but I didn’t know you looked like this.”
I take off my pants next, and she stares at the bulge in my boxers. Hungrily.
It’s still hard to believe this is actually happening. Tentatively, she reaches inside my underwear and wraps her hand around me. I hiss out a breath.
“You’re so...so...”
She can’t find the words, and I know what that’s like.
Caitlin Ng is touching my cock, and for once, this isn’t just a fantasy.
As she slowly slides her hand up and down, I slip my fingers between her legs again and find her soaking wet. It’s easy to push three fingers inside her, and she groans once more.
“Wes, please.”
“Please, what?”
“Fuck me. I want you to fuck me.”
Jesus. I love hearing her talk like this in bed.
I reach into my bedside table for a box of condoms. It’s buried under a few other things. Contrary to some people’s beliefs, I don’t have a different woman in my bed every couple of weeks, and it’s been a while since I’ve used this box.
I rip open the foil packet and roll on the condom. I raise myself over Caitlin, rubbing against her slit a few times.
“Ready?” I ask.
She nods, and slowly, I push inside. I watch her face as I do so, watch as her lips part and her eyes flutter closed and her hands clench the sheet.
She feels exquisite. Outside the bounds of even my overactive imagination. I move inside her, deep and slow—I can’t go fast, or it’ll be over too quickly. We’re underneath the quilt, cocooned in our own little world, just me and Caitlin, our bodies joined. Nothing else matters.
“Good,” I murmur, and I can’t help a low chuckle when she nods eagerly.
I bend down so I can kiss her lips once more. I shift down her neck, and she arches for me, letting me suck on her sensitive skin before I take her nipple in my mouth again.
It’s overwhelming to have her after so long, but the most important thing is to make it good for her, to make it the best she’s ever had, so that if I can give her nothing else, at least I’ve given her that.
As I rock my hips inside her, I lower my chest to hers and feel the expanse of her skin against mine. I slip my hand between her legs to touch her clit, and her back arches, and...
“Wes!” She cries my name and holds me tight as she comes around me, and I’m a goner.
I growl and finish inside her, everything inside me expanding and then exploding.
I quickly go to the washroom to clean myself up before returning to her. Again, I’m the big spoon, but this time, we’re both naked.
She giggles. “That was so much fun. I can’t believe we did that.”
I can hardly believe it, too.
“I’ve never slept with a friend before,” she says.
“Neither have I.”
She regards me for a moment. “Why do you never have a girlfriend?”
“I’ve had girlfriends.”
“They don’t last long, though.”
It’s on the tip of my tongue to confess everything. How I fell in love with her, and how that only grew as I got to know her better. The way I think everything she does is amazing.
But it’s a stupid cliché to say “I love you” right after sex, isn’t it?
Unlike before, I have some hope, but I want to exist in this dream world for a bit longer. Before things really change, for better or worse.
“Let’s not talk about that now,” I say, holding her tightly in my arms. She wiggles her ass against me again, and I know it won’t be long before I’m ready to go again.
Five minutes later, however, her breathing slows and she’s asleep. I inhale the scent of her hair—something floral and sophisticated—and hold her close as I join her in slumber.
* * *
When I wake up, it’s four thirty in the morning, and the light is still on.
“Morning,” Caitlin says.
“Morning?” I say. “It’s basically the middle of the night.”
She giggles. She’s been in such a giggly mood this weekend. Just for me.
I kiss her again, hoping she likes morning/middle-of-the night sex. As soon as she kisses me back, it ignites a fire within both of us, and our hands are all over each other. It’s not long before I roll on a condom and push inside her from behind. At first, it’s rapid, her on all fours and me pounding inside her over and over, but after she orgasms, her legs slip so she’s lying on her stomach, and it’s deep and languid and luxurious.
Afterward, I hold her once more, and she says something unexpected.
“I’m lonely,” she admits. “Work...it’s all I have. When I come home from the office, I have no one to talk to. When I have a free night, I spend it watching movies alone.”
“You always have me,” I say, which is as much as I can admit right now.
“I’ve enjoyed this weekend. I needed it. Thank you.”
As I smile against the back of her neck, I realize that, in my twelve years of wanting her, I’ve made an error. I’ve thought of her as a perfect, untouchable goddess, but she’s human, too. Her singing voice is absolute shit, and she snores when she sleeps, and she puts too many sprinkles on her shortbread cookies, and she’s lonely. This weekend, in addition to making my fantasies come true, has also been very real, inflatable T-Rex costume and all.
I can make her laugh and bring her to the peak of pleasure. I would do anything for her.
Maybe I’m exactly what she needs. Those other men she dated, the ones who are nothing like me? Maybe they were all wrong for her.
She kisses my forehead. “Can I ask you a question?”
“Of course.”
“What’s with all the Christmas stuff? The cookies and gingerbread house and orange pomander balls...”
Not the question I was expecting.
I don’t know what I was expecting, to be honest.
“Do you always do that?” she asks.
I exhale. “My mom had a health scare.”
“Oh my God. I had no idea. Is she—”
“She’s fine, but there were months of uncertainty.” I run a hand through my hair. “She always did everything for Christmas, but this year, we’re not letting her lift a finger, and it’s going to be amazing.”
I hug Caitlin, trying to say everything I feel with my body. Once again, she falls asleep in my arms—I can hardly believe this is becoming a regular occurrence—and I run my fingers through her hair, careful not to wake her. It’s five in the morning, but I want to stay awake, to savor the feel of having her here with me.
You have to appreciate what you have. That’s what the past few months have taught me. And I appreciate the hell out of having Caitlin Ng in my bed.
You also have to go for the things you want in life. Being with her, really being with her, isn’t outside the realm of possibility.
When it’s morning for real, I’m going to tell her the truth.