I push that voice away and focus instead on these past couple of days, waking up next to Arturo every morning, always sore with what we did the night before. He’s taken me hard and slow, and I’ve ridden him, too, taking the lead like I did in the library.
But we’ve done more than have sex.
He’s urged me to sing more than once, always sitting back with that intense look on his face, waiting impatiently like a beast about to devour a meal. But when I start singing, something in him seems to relax. That shadowy near-smile claims his lips and his eyes brighten for minutes at a time, even as he continues to gaze intensely.
“It seems like you enjoy it,” I murmured the day before yesterday, sitting in his lap in my bathrobe, feeling his desire flame through the thin fabric.
“Like it,” he said, voice as shadowy as his half-smile, his breath whispering across my neck. “That doesn’t do it justice. It’s … Jesus, Aida. When you sing, I don’t have to think, I don’t have to worry. I can just sink into the beauty of your voice. You’re going to make such an amazing mother. Everything about you is perfect for it. Your body is perfect for making babies, an impossible-to-resist curvy temple that’s all mine. And your personality … so kind, so loyal, so you. And that voice is going to be as perfect for lullabies as it is for chart-topping singles.”
I giggled, slapping him playfully on the shoulder.
“Don’t get carried away,” I said. “I’m not going to top the charts. I’d be happy if I could record a song without thinking it’s complete crap.”
“That won’t be difficult,” he growled. “I’ll just order you to do it, and like my obedient princess, you’ll do whatever I say. Because I own you.”
He claimed me then, right there where we sat, lifting me up and then lowering me onto his always hard manhood.
I bounced and grabbed his face, kissing him between the lust-filled motions, our teeth clicking together in the urgent carnality of it. Afterward, we lay together in bed, his hands making patterns in my hair, tickling, teasing.
“How can we feel so close?” he mused once the sun had set, the moon making patterns on the ceiling the same as he did across my scalp, as though the two were linked, his touch and the steel colored moonlight. “We met less than a week ago, and yet I feel like I know you. I’ve never believed in fate before. I never dreamed such a melodramatic concept could truly exist. A man takes what he can when he can, with whatever tools are available. Fate doesn’t come into it.”
“And now?” I whimpered, kissing his chest, tasting his sweat, tasting him.
“Now I don’t know what to believe,” he snarled. “You’ve opened me up to so much.”
“You’ve done the same to me,” I said.
He laughed grimly. “Yeah, I know that.”
“No,” I said, though my body flared at the implication of his words. “I’m not talking about that. Before we met, I never dreamed all my crazy fantasies could come true. I thought they were meant for other women. More … more traditionally attractive women, you know?”
Skinnier women, I was thinking, but I knew he’d fall into a savage rage if I put myself down in that way.
“You’re the most attractive woman alive,” he said flatly.
“And the singing,” I laughed, shaking my head in disbelief. “It doesn’t make me want to melt in embarrassment when I do it in front of you. I don’t know how that’s possible.”
“Because you know we’re always going to be together, so you might as well get used to it,” he snarled passionately.
Now, in the car, Arturo reaches across and gives my leg a squeeze, sending warm shivers up my thigh. They swirl around my sex. It’s sore from all the times we’ve fucked, made love, and everything in between these past couple of days.
My lips ache and my clit tingles with all the rubbing and licking and sucking, and yet I feel my hole quiver and my womb sing when he touches me, ready for more.
“Don’t worry,” he says firmly. “Everything’s going to be okay. We have each other – always – and that’s all that matters.”
I reach down and press my hand against his, holding on tightly, praying for the courage to believe his words.
“My only regret is you’re not dressed like my personal fuck toy,” Arturo rumbles.
I giggle. “Yeah, because that’d be a good look, wouldn’t it, rocking up to meet with my Dad in no underwear with my breasts hanging out?”
He chuckles. “You better stop talking like that. I’ll pull over and savage you right here.”
I stare at him, my man, in his iron gray suit, his hair the same color, shades of experience etching every part of him. I still have to pinch myself to make sure I’m not dreaming when I drink in the sight of him, forty-one years old, a man who’s waited his whole life for the woman he truly wants, he can’t resist.