Only Ever Yours

I smile, loving that even though it was a long time ago, my mom met Camilla. I know she would love her now.

“They struggled to have kids. Took them a while to have me and after that, she never got pregnant again. Because I was their only child, they spoiled me.”

Camilla smiles softly. “Same with me. My mom couldn’t carry a baby, so they hired someone to carry me. Mom said it was hard to watch someone else carrying her baby, so they only did it once. I was given everything I could ever want or need—materialistic as well as love and attention.”

“I’m sorry about your mom,” I tell her, already knowing the story. “I met her a few times at various social engagements and she was very nice.”

Her eyes fill with emotion. “She was the best.”

We’re both quiet for a few moments, lost in our own heads and loss, before Camilla says, “My turn.”

“All right, hit me with ’em.”

She taps her chin a few times, thinking about what to say. “Okay, let’s see… I want to open a high-end fashion boutique one day, my favorite color is pink, and I have a tattoo in a spot that can only be seen when I’m naked.”

My hands, which are resting low on her hips, tighten at the mention of her last possible truth. “Your lie is that your favorite color is pink.” I don’t even have to think about it.

“How are you so confident?”

“Easy, the second you brought up fashion, I remembered your dad mentioning once at a business dinner, his daughter was attending fashion school.”

“And what about the tattoo?” She raises a single brow. “How do you know that’s not the lie?”

“It could be.” I drag my eyes down her body. “But I’m really fucking hoping it’s the truth.”

When she huffs, I know I’m right.

“I’m going to need to see this tattoo… now.”

“No way.” She shakes her head, then squeals when I quickly lift her and flip her onto the couch on her back.

“Where is it?” I ask, pretending to search for it.

“Nope, I’m not showing you,” she says stubbornly, crossing her legs to deny me access. “You’ll have to earn it.”

“How?”

“You want something from me, you have to give me something.”

“Name it.”

“Give me the boxers.”

“Fine.” I reach back and grab them, holding them up.

“Now put them on me,” she says with a twinkle of mischief in her eye.

I find the holes and push them up her smooth legs, making it a point to run my fingers along her flesh. I expect her to take over once they’re above her knees, but instead, she lifts her shirt, exposing her neatly-trimmed pussy and… a fucking tattoo just below her hipbone.

Forgetting about the boxers, I slide to the side of her, so my face is parallel with her hip. “When did you get this?” I ask, running my fingers along the ink.

“A few months ago.” When I raise a brow, silently asking her to explain, she continues, “It was a month after my dad was sentenced to prison. I had lost everything, and what I didn’t lose, I sold because we needed the money. I couldn’t afford the apartment he was renting, so I moved into the one I’m in now. I was job searching, but nobody would hire me. I felt defeated, like I was at my lowest.”

She sighs and her eyes gloss over. “I was downtown and stopped inside the art gallery to take a break. There was a painting on one of the walls of the most beautiful tree blowing in the wind. The way it was painted, you could almost feel the pressure on the tree. It was titled, ‘Bent, not broken,’ and it just… called to me. I felt like I was the tree, so close to breaking. One more gust of wind and I would snap.

“After I left, I was walking by the front of a tattoo shop and the tattoo artist was outside smoking a cigarette. He asked if I wanted to get something. I was about to tell him no, that there was nothing of meaning I’d want tattooed on me permanently, when the image of the painting came to mind.”

And so she got the words, bent, not broken, along with a small colorful tree swaying in the wind, tattooed just below her hipbone. This woman, still so young, has been through some serious life-changing shit, yet she remains so strong.

I trace the ink one more time, then press a kiss to the words. Goose bumps prickle her skin, and her thighs tighten. When I glance up at her, she’s staring down at me with lust in her eyes. With my gaze never leaving hers, I press my lips to the tree, darting my tongue out to lick across her flesh.

She sucks her bottom lip into her mouth and groans softly, so I do it again, this time licking my way down her bikini line. I told myself I was going to go slow with her, so I stop there, planting one last kiss to her skin. But then, like the little minx she is, she slightly parts her legs, silently conveying what she wants.