Put Me Back Together (42 page)

Lucas was standing in the stall with his back to me, letting the water pour over his body. And what a body it was. True, I’d seen him naked before, for about a split-second that day in my apartment. I’d never before had the chance to really look at his body and admire the tight muscles, the broad shoulders, the tight, sculpted ass. I kept blinking, sure what I was seeing couldn’t be real.

How does he do it?
I wondered to myself.
He doesn’t even go to the gym!

Then he took the soap in his hand and started rubbing it over his torso, and suddenly the bathwater was sloshing onto the floor as I got to my feet in a rush.

To hell with letting myself recover. Lucas couldn’t possibly be expected to wash that whole body all by himself, and the shower stall was more than big enough for two.

With a wicked grin I stepped out of the bathtub, nearly slipping on the waterlogged tiles, and pulled open the shower stall door.

Blinking in the spray, it took Lucas a second or two to take me in, standing utterly nude before him. Then I watched his eyes turn dark as they wandered down my body. I was surprised to find I didn’t feel afraid or even nervous. I knew what I wanted, and he was right in front of me. As I smiled and stepped into the shower, Lucas dropped the soap. It clattered around our feet as I closed the distance between us and pressed my skin against his.

“I bet you thought this was my plan all along,” he said as I ran my hands over his chest, and then farther down to that place I’d never touched.

“Nope,” I replied, my lips against his cheek, “I’m pretty sure this idea is all mine. But it’s a good one, don’t you think?” My fingers closed over him, making him gasp and grip me against him.

“Oh God, yes,” he said, and then his lips met mine.

His skin was gloriously slippery and after a few minutes under the spray mine was, too. I luxuriated in the feeling of my breasts slipping against his chest and his hands running through my hair and over my back, then dipping downward to cup my ass, pressing me into him in delightful ways. Snatching up the bar of soap, I started lathering his chest, but quickly lost the bar to Lucas.

“I don’t think that bath got you clean enough,” he teased as he lathered up his hands then let them slide over my breasts. I arched into him automatically, crushing his lips with mine, my tongue probing into his warm mouth suggestively. “I see we’re in agreement,” he said against my lips.

“Oh, I agree, I agree, I agree,” I said as his sudsy hands made their way across my stomach and then farther down, causing me to let out a low moan of pleasure.

When I copied his gesture, letting both my hands slip along the length of him, he pressed me back against the wall, his every muscle tensed. He groaned loudly as I did the same thing again, more slowly this time. He began to lavish his appreciation on my neck in such a way that for a second I was literally seeing stars.

“Maybe we should take this to the bed,” I gasped, and Lucas nodded mutely before picking me up right then and there and stepping out onto the tile.

I giggled. “But maybe we should rinse off all the soap first,” I reminded him.

“Oh, right,” he said with a laugh, setting me back on my feet and shaking his head. “I can’t think straight when you’re naked,” he said into my ear as we let the water wash over us. “I think you’ll have to be in charge of all major decisions for the rest of the night.”

“Does that mean I get to decide where you put your hands?” I said, taking both of his palms and pressing them to my butt. “Or your mouth?”

I gently pressed down on his shoulders until he was crouching slightly in front of me, his lips grazing my nipple. It wasn’t a position he could hold for long, so as soon as we were properly rinsed of soap we stepped out of the shower stall and he lifted me onto the counter, which placed me at just the right height. He continued nuzzling my hypersensitive skin for an eternity before finally taking my nipple in his mouth, and I actually screamed at the sudden release of tension. Slapping a hand over my mouth, I stared down at him, my cheeks burning with embarrassment, but the sound of my scream only seemed to invigorate him. His hands gripped my hips as he continued what he was doing, turning now to the other breast. Water dripped off of us both, creating a pool beneath us as I gripped his shoulders and leaned my head back, my body trembling under his touch.

Eventually I began to shiver, even in the steamy bathroom, so Lucas wrapped a towel around us both and we tripped out of the bathroom, aiming for the bed. I thought maybe we should dry off properly so we wouldn’t make the bed all wet, but Lucas had other ideas. Flinging himself onto the mattress, he tugged me on top of him so that I was upright straddling his waist, my knees pressing into the mattress on either side of his hips. This wasn’t something we’d ever tried before and I felt suddenly self-conscious with my breasts on full display while he was mostly covered up. I let my hair fall forward, covering my nipples, but he pushed it out of the way. I frowned at him and made an unhappy sound, folding my arms to hide myself instead.

“You’re beautiful, Katie,” he said, gently pulling my arms away and then brushing his thumbs over my breasts, sending flutters of feeling through my body. “Don’t cover yourself, not in front of me.”

“Beautiful…” I said, my hands moving to the wounds on my cheeks. It was so easy to forget about them. After all, I wasn’t the one who had to see them, unless I was looking in a mirror. But Lucas would have to see my ruined face whenever he looked at me. Did he see me differently now? Was it just my body he wanted, or was it all of me? Was I a disappointment and he just didn’t want to say so?

I found I couldn’t remove my hands from my cheeks, but Lucas didn’t make me. Hoisting himself up into a sitting position with me still straddling his lap, he placed delicate kisses over my fingers and my lips until my hands fell away of their own accord. He kept on kissing, one kiss for every single cut and bruise. “I don’t even see it,” he whispered. “Nothing that happens to your body could ever make you less beautiful to me. Nothing.”

I wrapped my arms around this surprising and thoughtful and romantic and amazing, amazing boy and wondered how on earth I’d managed to find one as perfect as him, almost by accident.

“Maybe so, but there are still too many light on,” I said shyly, and he got up to turn off most of the lamps, giving me another chance to ogle his lovely body.

Still, my limbs protested as soon as he let me go, my arms aching for him. Only when our heads were side by side on the pillow and his arms were around me once again did I feel right. That’s what it was. This felt right. It felt good. It had been so long since I’d felt right in my own body and mind that I almost didn’t recognize the feeling.

His hand was running up and down my hip lazily, his eyes roaming over my face. Every few seconds he leaned forward and kissed my lips. I felt so relaxed I was worried I might fall asleep, and that was definitely not what I wanted. Not tonight.

“I want you, Lucas,” I said, keeping my eyes on his.

“Mmmhmm,” he said. “Me, too.”

Yeah, he clearly wasn’t getting what I meant.

“No,” I said, easing myself against him so that we were hip to hip. “I mean I want you, right now.” His sleepy eyes flew open and his hand stilled on my hip, his fingers digging into the fleshy skin. I leaned in and took his mouth with mine, claiming every inch of it, my tongue slipping against his as he pressed me back against the pillows, making a tortured sound deep in his throat.

“You’re making it impossible to resist you,” Lucas panted. “I mean, I’m in physical pain here. It’s unkind, what you’re doing.”

“I beg to differ,” I said. He was leaning on his side and I looped my leg over his hip, drawing even closer. Feeling exploded in my groin as I felt him brush against me there. “I think I’m being very kind.”

“Katie,” he said, his breath ragged as I let my mouth explore his chest, while my hands took on a mind of their own. “Kat…oh my God,” he moaned, gritting his teeth as I let my lips creep lower and lower and lower. In the end, he had to pull me up and bind me in a mammoth hug, his arms pinning me still to get my attention. “Are you sure about this?” he said. “Do you really want your memories of our first time to be all mixed up with… I don’t want you to regret this. Having sex just because you want to forget, it’s not—”

Dislodging my arm, I reached up and pressed my hand to his lips.

“I want to do this now because you held my hand while I broke the news to my parents,” I said. “Because you defended me to my sister. Because you moved in to my apartment to keep me safe. Because you poured me a bubble bath. Because you’re more concerned about my first time than I am.” His dimples popped and I ran my fingers over them. “I’m not trying to escape, or to lose myself, or to prove anything. I just want you, Lucas. I just love you so much that all the rest of it doesn’t even register. Not when I’m with you.”

I had to catch my breath after I was done. That was a lot of feelings and a lot of words for me. It had to be some kind of record. But it was worth it, because I’d never seen Lucas look so enamored of me before. When he kissed me then, softly at first, teasing open my lips with his tongue, and then gradually deeper and with such intensity, I thought to myself,
This is what it feels like to be loved completely.
I wanted to wrap myself up in that feeling. I wanted to wrap myself up in him, so I did.

When the moment came at last and he hovered above me, his chest against mine, I felt a shiver of fear, remembering how hard I had fought to avoid this kind of intimacy. I would never be more vulnerable than this, more naked, more open. And I could never take it back.

He brushed his lips against mine. “Are you ready?” he whispered, and I knew. I would never really be ready. Not totally. Not one hundred percent. There would always be a part of me that would want to push the world away, to hide myself, to guard against anything good, assuming it would turn bad. But I could still choose who I wanted to be, and I wanted to be with Lucas, even if he was bad news, out of my league, and one hundred percent trouble. I was ready to take this leap, as long as he was taking it with me.

“Yes,” I said, and our eyes locked as he rocked into me, filling me, tipping me over into a new place I’d never been to before. A place where I could be seen without shaking. A place where I could be held without breaking. A place where we could put me back together.

25

Lucas pulled the car into the school parking lot and we both looked out at the playing field on the other side of the fence. There was a group of boys playing a game of touch football while other kids sat in clumps on the bleachers. Three girls sitting on a bench on the sidelines seemed particularly interested in the game, though they were pretending not to be. The one in the middle reminded me so much of Emily at that age that it made my heart ache.

“There he is,” I said, pointing at a boy with light hair wearing a blue t-shirt.

“Are you sure about this?” Lucas said. He placed a hand on my arm and it was as though an electric current was running through my body. It had been like this since the moment I’d woken up in his arms, our bare skin glued together, our bodies ready and eager before we were even fully awake. We’d made love before breakfast and then again in the shower before we checked out of the hotel, and now every time he touched me it was like he was flicking a switch. I swear, if we hadn’t been parked in the middle of a schoolyard, I would have taken him then and there.

I might have been embarrassed except that the silly grin on Lucas’s face told me he was feeling the exact same way. He pulled me into a kiss that became hotter than I think it was intended to be, his fingers smoothing my skin at that place where my shirt met the waist of my jeans, my hands running through his hair.

“Because you don’t have to,” Lucas said as we broke apart, both of us a little short of breath.

“Don’t have to what?” I said. My head was a little hazy, swimming in Lucas’s scent, but then I shook it briskly and came back to my senses. “Oh, right. This. No, I’m sure. I want to.” I put my hand on the door handle, readying to get out.

Lucas frowned, making me pause. I hated to see even the tiniest bit of distress on that gorgeous face. “It just seems like you’re punishing yourself, Katie. And you know you don’t have to do that.”

Cupping his cheek with my palm, I gave him a reassuring look. “It’s okay,” I said. “I just want to talk to him. It’s something I should have done a long time ago. Not because I owe him but just because…because I need to, I guess.”