Slow.
Measured.
I'd never bought into that shit about sex being about the journey as much as the destination. Sex was always to come. That was the whole point. But, somehow, as the confusion turned to desire, to an almost raw vulnerability on her face, all that mattered was the moment, our bodies moving together, her legs wrapping around my waist, her soft sighs, her arms encircling my neck, pulling me down to press our lips together.
I didn't give a damn about an orgasm right then.
I just wanted to be close to her, to be inside of her, to be a part of her.
"Ace..." she whimpered, her hips wriggling restlessly.
But in that moment, I was too selfish to speed it up for her, to give her what she needed most.
I'd never been quite so in the moment before, so in-tune with someone. I noticed every hitch to her breath, every flex of her fingers on my shoulders, the way her thigh muscles started to shake, the way her voice went from higher-pitched whimpers to lower, deeper moans.
Her walls tightened hard around me, letting me know she wasn't going to wait any longer.
My lips pulled from hers as my hand reached back to grab hers, pinning it to the mattress above her head, holding as her back arched, as her mouth opened in a silent moan, as her walls started a deep throbbing around me.
She came hard and deep and long, milking my orgasm out of me too, leaving me a boneless mass on top of her for a long moment as I struggled to pull myself back together.
"What's the matter?" she asked as I finally found the strength to push back up, and look down at her.
"Nothing's the matter," I said, brows furrowing.
Her hand rose, fingertip tracing over my temple. "You didn't change at all," she told me, voice concerned. Like she was worried, uncertain. Like she possibly thought it may have been a sign that I was losing interest in her.
She wanted answers, but I didn't have any. I didn't know how to tell her that while the primal side of me might not have responded this once, that it hadn't impacted me any less.
"I don't know," I admitted. "Best guess is the Change is more of a primal response," I told her. "And that wasn't primal. That was something different," I said, rolling to my side, pulling her onto hers.
"Oh," she said, jaw softening, tension leaving her body. "That makes sense."
"I'll be right back," I told her, getting out of bed, making my way to the bathroom.
"Hey, Ace?" she called.
"Yeah?"
"Can we go out today?" she asked.
I tried to pretend the 'we' didn't make this strange sensation tingle through my chest, but there was also no denying it.
"Any place in mind?" I called, hoping my voice came out less impacted than I felt.
"Just out," she said, sounding light, easy. "I've been cooped up forever," she added.
And, to her, it probably had felt like that. To me, it seemed like no time at all.
"We can do that," I agreed, coming back out to find her in my spot, drinking her coffee.
"I can see the sights. Now that I know where I am," she added, rolling her eyes at me. "Oh, can we get food?"
"You say that like we haven't been feeding you," I said, climbing over her, taking my coffee when she handed it to me.
"No, it's gotten a lot better," she admitted. "How do I explain this to someone who doesn't really care about food?" she asked, pursing her lips.
It wasn't that we didn't care about food. We all used to. Eating had never been much of a thing where we were from, so when we came to the human plane, like many other things, eating had been something we'd all indulged in heavily. And each fifty years or so, the diet would change enough for us all to go through a phase again, testing out the new things humans had come up with. Food-like products that came in packages, were created in labs, not the actual food that came from the ground.
"Sometimes you just need something fatty and greasy that you didn't make yourself," she declared.
"Like pizza?" I asked.
"Yes!" she said, letting out a moan that was damn near sexual. "Exactly like pizza. Let's get pizza."
"We can do that. Anything else?"
"Can we see the ocean? I've seen the west coast, but not the east."
"It will be cold as fuck, but we can do that too."
"And fries."
"I thought you wanted pizza."
"I want pizza and fries. We puny mortals need to eat several times a day," she said, giving me a saucy smile. "Before you guys stole me, I used to have bigger boobs and butt, I swear," she added, tsking her tongue.
"In that case, why don't we do some pasta and ice cream?" I suggested, getting a girlish giggle out of her.