The Dance Off

She moved first, and insanely he felt himself twitch inside her. Enough, he urged himself. Any more and the rubber would be irrelevant.

He pulled himself free of her, and his body felt instantly bereft. How soon it was used to her shape, her scent, the feel of her wrapped tight around him. How soon it wanted all that and more. Not sure that his legs would carry him just yet, he perched on the edge of the table.

Distractedly, he noted that the floor was a mess: broken plates, a fork end up into a crack in the wood, sauce oozing under the cupboard. But he didn’t have the energy to care.

It hadn’t been sex as he’d known it—it had been survival of the fittest. And he wondered what it meant that they’d both lived to tell the tale.

Nadia pulled herself to sitting and leant against his back, laying a string of warm kisses along his shoulder blade. “Wow.”

“You’re welcome.”

Her laughter tripped over his skin, then she slid from her table, stepped over the mess, till she was standing, naked, in front of him. Lean hips, beautiful thighs, small breasts with the most perfect pink nipples, a belly he wanted to rub his cheek against.

“Shower?” she asked. “Not much hot water I’m afraid, so we’d have to share.”

A hair band between her teeth, she lifted her lean arms to retie her hair back into a chaotic bun and simply awaited his answer. Not an ounce of self-consciousness in the move. Just a woman who knew herself, liked herself, enjoyed the pleasure her body brought her.

For a man who’d spent a lifetime striving, soaring, hitting every pinnacle he’d ever aimed towards yet never reaching that illusive plateau of fulfilment, her effortless self-satisfaction was soporific, sinking into his bones like a drug.

“Coming?” she asked, a kick to her lush mouth.

Ryder didn’t answer; his voice would have been little more than a hoarse croak as it was. Instead he lifted her up, threw her over his shoulder, her raucous laughter bouncing off the walls.

Then with a kiss to her gorgeous backside Ryder said, “Point the way, woman.”

She did, with a neatly pointed toe.

SIX

The Sunday sun shone upon the breezy St Kilda bistro. The chips were salty and hot, the drinks icy cold, and as Sam chatted away about how her wedding plans were coming along Nadia tried not to flinch every time Sam mentioned her brother’s name.

It was less than twelve hours since the tryst in her apartment, and she could still feel Ryder in the ache of her muscles, smell him on her skin, see him every time she blinked her damn eyes.

“I tried to keep it small, you know,” Sam continued. “But everything seems to be spinning further and further out of our control.”

“It’s your wedding day, Sam,” said Nadia, shaking herself into the present. Though she wasn’t sure how she could help; as a kid the only time she’d imagined herself in a white dress was if it was a tutu. “Let that bossy streak of yours run wild!”

“Yeah,” said Sam, rolling her fey grey eyes before they faded flat, and Nadia had a feeling she knew why.

Nadia nudged Sam’s foot with a toe. “Ryder filled me in some on what happened the other night. With your father.”

“He did?” Sam managed to look both relieved and like a puppy remembering it had been kicked.

“Are you okay?”

“Most of the time. Nothing the right pills and some darned expensive therapy don’t keep in check.” When Nadia merely stared back, Sam put both hands over hers. “Honestly, I’m fine. The other night was horrible. Just really mean and ugly. But it only made me sure that I’ve done the right thing in cutting him off. Which, of course, my more astute brother did millennia ago. And speaking of Ryder. He talked about Dad? Using actual words? That’s... I’m... Wow.”

Nadia shifted on her seat. “Ryder didn’t tell you we’d talked?”

Another eye roll. “Of course not. The man treats me like I’m made of glass. Though I get why. I do. What with his mum dying when he was so young, and our dad being...well, our dad, Ryder holds on crazy tight to the things that matter to him.”

Sam curled her hands back into her lap and sighed.

“Don’t tell Ryder this, but the only reason I’m going with a big white wedding is to give him the chance to give me away. I’d be happy to marry my guy right here, right now. But Ryder’s so unwavering in his effort to do right by me I thought nothing less than an official ceremony would give him permission to really let me go.”

Nadia nodded, even while she was only listening with half an ear. A warning bell had begun to buzz pretty insistently about a minute back when Sam had said Ryder holds on crazy tight to the things that matter to him.