I reached for his jacket, tugging it off. Then his shirt. The dozen little buttons came out of their holes before he shrugged the material off of his muscular shoulders, letting it follow the jacket. His belt was next. A hiss sound escaped as he tugged it free of the loops. My fingers snapped the button and then the zipper, and then they made a pile with the rest of his clothes.
Until he stood in boxers and I stood in nothing but a white lace thong with the word Mrs. in jewels against my hip bone.
He grinned. “Oh, I like this.”
He walked me backward toward the bed as he fingered the lacy material. The back of my knees hit the bed, and then he was sliding the thong over my hips and removing his boxers. He followed me like a predator as I crawled backward on the bed.
This time, I didn’t mind being his prey.
“I like having firsts with you,” he said, bringing our lips together again.
“You can have all the rest of my firsts.”
“First and last,” he said as he pushed forward into me.
My eyes slid closed, and I arched my back at the sweet feel of him. He was right. He had been my first. And god, I wanted him to be my last. Just like this. My husband. And me, his wife.
His arms came down on either side of me, caging me in, as he began to move. Our chests were pressed together. My legs holding him for dear life. My eyes fluttered open to stare up into his blue orbs that I’d made a vow to only hours earlier. He pressed one more kiss to my lips and picked up his pace.
There was no quick, heated intensity to our coupling. It was pure passionate desire. The knowledge of each other’s body coming easily to us. The sex more than sex. It was making love in the most intimate of ways. Two hearts joining with the two heated bodies. Making a promise with actions as much as words. Completing the agreement we had just made to love one another forever.
And as we came apart, our bodies responded in kind. Reaching new heights. New depths. A new reality. This was more than we’d ever experienced. More than I had ever even known existed.
We lay back, panting and sated. The force of our consummation rippling between us and out into the universe and beyond.
Our fingers laced together. A silent declaration.
“I didn’t know it could be like that,” I whispered.
He tugged me closer. “I never knew any of it before you.”
“This feels like a dream.”
“Then I hope we never wake up.”
I grinned. “I don’t think even I could dream up something as amazing as you.”
He laughed. “Probably not.”
I scoffed at his cockiness. “It’s lucky that I love you.”
“It is,” he agreed. “Come. Let’s clean you up.”
“Why? Aren’t you going to just get me dirty again?”
He shot me a devilish smirk. “Absolutely.”
I pressed my hand to his chest to keep him still for a moment before he dragged me off for what was clearly a barely veiled eagerness for shower sex. “What are we going to do when we leave here?”
“Do we have to decide today?”
“No,” I said softly. “But…”
“Shh,” he said, running his fingers through my hair. “Our future is simple. We trust in each other, and the rest will sort itself out.”
“I wish we could stay here forever. Can we stay here forever?”
“Alas, no. I have work in the city,” he reminded me. “But you know as well as I do that we can’t escape who we are just by leaving the city.”
I sighed. “You’re right. Hiding out here won’t solve everything.”
“No. Trying to escape the Upper East Side is pointless. We have to trust each other and find a middle ground.”
“Is there a middle ground?”
He nodded. “We don’t have to be celebrities, Natalie. We can just be us. No expectations. If anyone has a problem with that, then they don’t matter. Okay?”
“It’s never worked in the past,” I reminded him.
He smirked and grasped my chin, pulling me in for a hot kiss. “This time, we’re not running, and we’re not playing the game. I don’t want to rule Manhattan. And you don’t need to be a star socialite. You can be Natalie, and I will be Penn. The rest we can figure out as we go.”
“What about the crew?”
“I think you knocked them all down a peg or two, Nat. I have a feeling things will be different when we get back.” His hand slid back into my hair. “Lewis and Katherine are tired of fighting. Rowe and Lark just want their friends back. We don’t have to be the way we were before. We can be something new. No more secrets. No more lies. No more till-death loyalty.”