Faking It to Making It

She lifted to her knees, holding her hair from her neck as she sank over him. Arching her back, she lifted, nudged again and again. The touch sent her head rocking back on her neck, her mouth open, her skin pink all over.

He gripped her hips, took control, stroking her even while he throbbed with pressure that beat to the point of pain.

“There,” she said on a gasp. “Right there.”

“Bossy.”

Her eyes focused on his and her cheeks came over all rosy as her eyes dropped to his mouth. “You like it,” she realised, letting him an inch inside before pulling away.

“Yeah,” he said through gritted teeth, “I really do.”

And with that she slid over him, all silken and gorgeous demand, and pleasure tore through him like liquid heat, twisting him inside out. She rocked, making his whole world spin, till it imploded where their two hot bodies met.

As exhaustion and completion dragged him to sleep Nate knew. Helping her pull up her kitchen floor clearly wasn’t enough. He had to do more. Make her understand how grateful he was. Know that she meant something to him even as he told her goodbye.

NINE

Nate wasn’t sure how long he sat on the edge of Saskia’s soft bed early the next morning, watching her sleep, remembering how he’d held her in the night, her head beneath his chin, his hand on her hip. But at some point she’d curled into a little ball on the edge of the bed. He wondered if she always slept that way or if she’d been making room for him.

Figuring it was too early for philosophising, he padded down the hall and into the main bathroom to splash water on his face.

And there, amongst the stash of pens and paint samples on her bathroom bench, he saw a yellow legal pad. Even at a glance he recognised the Dating By Numbers study, the questions he’d managed to avoid answering. Though apparently at some point somebody had—many had notes against them in a different-coloured pen, some with something that looked a heck of a lot like the words Pub Crawl scrawled in the margin.

Intrigue and a healthy dose of jealousy—because some other man had given her what he wouldn’t—made him read on to find questions about intimacy, love, attraction, fear and faith. The kinds of things he’d rather eat dog than talk about at length.

And yet seeing her happy, curly scrawl racing all over the page it seemed to him a small thing she’d wanted—a few simple truths in exchange for all he’d asked of her.

He gazed down the hall to where she slept.

She’d put herself out there with his family, his friends, risking exposure, putting up with his irascibility. The woman had had her faith in people trodden on time and again, and yet her generosity was so hardwired she’d do the same thing all over again if he asked.

While he’d thrown a few bloodless titbits into the damn dossier as if they were some kind of gift. Because without thought, without care, he’d hardwired himself to resist anything remotely intimate.

He gripped the legal pad tighter in his hand as he was hit with a wave of disappointment. In himself. He was a selfish bastard. A wholly self-made one at that. Independence was one thing—grudging self-interest quite the other. That wasn’t the kind of man he’d hoped to be one day—not even within spitting distance.

He found a pen, then, taking a deep breath, went through the list, jotting down notes, sometimes paragraphs, giving her the answers she was missing, moving on to the next before he had a chance to think about the one before in an effort to outrun the horror.

When he’d finished he let go a shuddering breath.

Then he padded into her room and kissed her on the shoulder, leaving the pages on the pillow beside her.

She still didn’t budge. Sleeping the sleep of the content. Of someone whose life was just as it should be.

He ran a hand over her shoulder, feeling the innate warmth that flowed just below the surface, like the crushed petal of a rose. In touching her, a soft milky scent rose up to him. The tattoo on her shoulder brushed rough against the pad of his thumb. He traced it distractedly. And then not so distractedly.

She deserved better. More. He wanted her to know it. Needed to know she was as amazing as he knew she was. And there was only one way he could think of to tell her. To show her. To make her see.

Spurred, he pressed himself to standing, pieced together his clothes, threw them on only as decency demanded, and headed out through her door, closing it softly behind him.

* * *

The following Tuesday evening Saskia brought a hot chocolate into the lounge and sat, curling her toes beneath the skirt of her maxi dress.