After

Chapter 12: Aftermath of wedding ceremony 2

The aftershocks were gentle, internal pulses that made her muscles flutter in slow, unpredictable waves. She went completely still above him, her breath catching each time one rippled through her.

Hardin’s low sound wasn’t quite a laugh. It was something darker, more satisfied, vibrating through his chest and into hers. His hands held her hips, his thumbs tracing absent circles on her skin.

She hadn’t realized she was moving. It was a tiny, unconscious rock of her pelvis, a seeking motion for the fading echoes of sensation. Her body was still talking, a whispered conversation between nerve endings.

“You’re still going,” he murmured, his voice rough and sleep-soft. His eyes were heavy-lidded, watching her face in the broken light from the street.

She flushed, the heat spreading across her chest and neck. She started to pull away, to stop the instinctive motion, but his hands tightened on her hips, holding her in place.

“Don’t,” he said quietly.

He guided her, his hands applying gentle pressure, encouraging that slow, shallow rock. It was barely movement at all, just a shared stillness that breathed. He was still semi-hard inside her, and the tiny shifts created a soft, full friction that made her sigh.

It was different now. Not desperate, not hungry. It was drowsy and intimate, a quiet extension of what had just shattered them. She relaxed into it, her palms flat on his chest, feeling the steady, slowing drum of his heart under the ink-stained skin. Her fingers brushed the dead tree stretching across his ribs.

They stayed like that for long minutes, breathing together. The world outside the windows was a silent, blue-tinged world. A car passed somewhere in the distance, the sound fading into nothing.

Finally, she stilled, the last of the aftershocks having passed through her like a distant tremor. She felt hollowed out and heavy, a pleasant weight settled deep in her limbs. She went to move off him, wincing slightly at the sensitivity.

“Wait,” he said. His voice was clearer now, edged with something that made her pause.

He slid his hands from her hips to her lower back, then up her spine, a slow, possessive stroke. He pushed himself up slightly on his elbows, his gaze intense. “I need to..”

His touch made her shiver, causing a subtle roll of her hips. She bit her lip, looking at him.

“What?” she asked, her voice barely a whisper.

He shifted beneath her, his body tensing, looking up at her his hand brushed a strand of hair behind her ear. The gesture was surprisingly tender, an awkward poetry in his calloused fingers.

"Did I hurt you?" he asked. The question was too loud in the quiet room.

She shook her head, a soft denial. "No."

He was searching her face, his blue eyes navigating the shadows for signs of a lie. His voice was rough, stripped of its usual defensive edge.

She put her hands on his chest, gliding them up to rest on his shoulders. The skin was warm, She leaned down, kissing him.

Her hips moved ever so slightly, a gentle, reflexive adjustment. She broke the kiss, looking at him. His breath was warm on her lips.

She slowly lifted up, Hardin nearly out of her, a breath of cool air between them. Then she slowly sank back down, taking him in again with a deliberate, full motion that made his eyes flutter closed for a second. It was a reclaiming, a silent answer.

"See?" she whispered, her forehead touching his. "You didn’t hurt me.”

A hard breath left him, a release of some deep-held fear. His hands came up to frame her face, his thumbs stroking her cheekbones. "Tess," he mumbled, the nickname a raw, broken thing.

"I'm here," she said simply.

His eyes searched hers, She felt his body begin to relax under hers, the tense cords in his shoulders easing. The quiet hum of the fridge from the kitchen downstairs seeped into the room.

She looked at him. She felt him throb inside of her, a distinct, hardening pulse that made her breath catch. She wrapped her arms around his neck and moved back and forth once, a slow, testing slide. She had no idea she was teasing him.

“Christ, Tessa,” he groaned, his hands flying back to her hips to still her. A stunned, almost pained laugh escaped him.

“What?” She blinked, genuinely confused. Her cheeks flushed warmer. “I just… shifted.”

“You shifted,” he repeated, his voice dripping with amused incredulity. He guided her into another of those slow, maddening rocks, his eyes locked on hers.

“I did!” she insisted, but a shy smile touched her lips. She felt the undeniable, solid proof of his reaction nestled deep within her.

A surprised little breath left her lips. It wasn’t a thought, just a reflex. Her arms still around his neck, she moved again, a slow, curious roll of her hips. She was looking directly at his reaction, feeling his reaction. His eyes darkened, the blue swallowing the pupil, and his jaw went tight. A muscle feathered in his cheek.

He was perfectly still, letting her explore this newfound power. His silence was a thick, charged thing. She did it once more, a bit more certain this time, and he exhaled a ragged “fuck” that was more prayer than curse.

“You like that,” she whispered, not really asking.

“Yeah,” he gritted out, the word strained. His hands flexed on her hips, fingertips pressing into her skin. “A little too much.”

He seemed caught between letting her continue and shutting it down. His body was all enthusiastic consent, hardening further with each small shift, but his face was a war of conflicting shadows. This vulnerability, her being in control, even in this sleepy, post-coital way, clearly unnerved him.

“Why is that bad?” she asked, her voice soft. She stilled, waiting.

He looked away, his gaze fixing on the cracked ceiling. “It’s not bad,” he said, but the tone was wrong. It was the voice he used when lying about being fine. “Just unexpected.”

“Hardin.” She waited until he looked back at her. The streetlight cut across his face, highlighting the tense line of his mouth. “Talk to me. Not in poems. Just talk.”

He was quiet for so long she thought he’d refuse. The fridge hummed its one-note song downstairs. Finally, he spoke. “When you do that… it feels like you want me.”

“I do want you,” she said, the simplicity of it hanging in the air.

He stared at her. The words seemed to bounce off him, not sinking in. "You want this?" he finally said, his voice hollow. His hand gestured vaguely between them, encompassing his bare skin, the messy bed, the entire toxic wreck of the evening they’d crawled out of.

"Not this," she said, her patience thinning. She pressed her palm over the frantic beat of his heart. "You. I want you, Hardin. The you that’s here right now. Not the one from the terrace, or the car. This one."

His throat worked as he swallowed. He looked utterly lost. Washed away by her quiet certainty. It left him naked in a way that had nothing to do with their bodies.

She took his silence as an invitation. She moved her hips again, a deliberate, gentle roll that made his breath catch. His hands tightened on her, a reflex. She did it again, building a slow, shallow rhythm that was less about pleasure now and more about communication.

She watched his face, seeing the conflict—the desire to believe her warring with a lifetime of expecting the worst. She leaned down, her lips brushing his. "I'm not going anywhere," she whispered against his mouth.

he kissed her, his mouth soft and seeking.

She kissed him harder, She rocked against him with more purpose, a demand for him to be present. He responded, his hips lifting to meet her, a low groan trapped in his throat.

She broke the kiss, pulling back just enough to see his eyes. His gaze was locked on her mouth, her expression. She rocked against him, looking at him, her mouth agape.

"I want you," she says again. The words weren't gentle. They were a declaration, solid as stone.

Something fractured behind his eyes. A harsh, ragged sound escaped him, part sob, part surrender. His hands came up to cup her face, his touch reverent and desperate.

"Then have me," he breathed, the words raw and permission granted.

He pulled her down into a kiss that tasted like salt and promises. It was messy and deep, all tongue and shared breath.

He tasted like the ghost of whiskey and something infinitely more bitter, a flavour she wanted to swallow whole until it was just them.

Then they moved.

It wasn’t a frantic pace. This was a slow, deliberate reclaiming of the space between heartbeats. He guided her hips with a firm, sure pressure, and she followed, sinking onto him with a depth that made her vision blur at the edges.

Her head fell back, a cascade of blonde hair wrapping around her face. Her nails found the back of his neck, scraping lightly through the damp strands there, not to hurt but to hold on. He groaned into her skin, a vibration she felt in her bones.

He buried his face in the curve of her shoulder, his breath hot and damp. Both his hands wrapped around her back, palms spread wide as if he could cover every inch of her spine, every vertebra, and shield it.

Her breathing quickened, losing its ragged edge and finding a new, urgent rhythm. She felt the build, a low, insistent coil starting deep in her stomach, tighter and more focused than the aftershocks. It was a deliberate drawing-together of every nerve he’d just scattered.

A loud, unfettered moan broke from her lips, echoing in the quiet room. It was a sound of pure sensation, without thought or restraint.

In response, Hardin’s mouth traveled a desperate path from her ear down the column of her neck, across the sharp line of her collarbone, then to the sensitive curve of her shoulder. Each kiss was a brand, a silent punctuation mark in a sentence he couldn’t voice.

He looked up at her, his ocean-blue eyes wide and dark. Her face was a map of conflict, lips parted in pleasure, brow faintly knitted as if the intensity bordered on too much. He watched the flutter of her pulse in her throat, the sheen of sweat on her upper lip.

"Tessa," he moaned. Her name caught in his throat, strangled by the sight of her and the feel of her tightening around him. It was a prayer, a curse, and a surrender all at once.

It was a prayer, a curse, and a surrender all at once. The sound of it, so stripped bare, made Tessa’s rhythm stutter. She pressed her forehead to his, their breath mingling in short, hot gusts.

He moved with her, a helpless upward push of his hips that dissolved into a prolonged, shuddering groan. His eyes screwed shut, then flew open, locking onto hers with a wild, panicked intensity. He was completely breathless, God, he didn’t want this to stop.

He looked at her face, a portrait of pleasure edged with the faint, painful tension of overwhelming feeling. His hands, which had been anchored on her back, flew up to cradle her jaw. His thumbs brushed the apples of her cheeks.

“Tessa,” he groaned, the word scraped raw. “Baby.” He forced himself to spit the rest out, each syllable a battle. “I don’t want to stop, but I don’t want you to be sore tomorrow.”

She stopped.

The gentle rocking ceased instantly, her body stilling atop his, feeling him thick and present inside her. Her mouth fell slightly open. The word echoed in the humid dark between them, a foreign, tender artifact she hadn’t known he possessed.

“Say it again,” she whispered, her voice barely audible.

She looked at him, her blue eyes wide, searching the storm in his for the truth of that single, fragile syllable.

A slow, deep flush spread from Hardin’s neck up to his hairline. His gaze dropped to her mouth, then back to her eyes.

He opened his to speak, but nothing came out. The word had been a lapse, a soft crack in his armor, and now the vulnerability was a physical weight on his tongue. He felt her around him, warm and still, a perfect, maddening fit. He couldn’t form words, feeling her around him, not moving.

He closed his eyes, his head tilting back into the pillow as if struck.

Tessa grabbed his face in both hands, her thumbs pressing along his jaw.

She forced him to look at her. “Say it again.”

His breath hitched, a shallow, trapped sound. The word seemed to terrify him more than any admission on the terrace. His eyes were wide, the blue almost swallowed by black. She could feel the rigid tension in his jaw beneath her palms.

“Tessa,” he managed, a strained evasion.

“Not my name,” she whispered. Her thumbs stroked the tight skin over his cheekbones, a contrast to her firm grip.

He was drowning in her gaze. His mouth opened, then closed. He couldn’t form the word. A raw, frustrated sound escaped him instead.

She kissed him. It wasn’t soft. It was a claiming, a deliberate transfer of the courage he lacked. She poured every stubborn, forgiving ounce of herself into it until her own lungs burned.

He kissed her back with a sudden, desperate hunger, his hands flying to her hair. Then he broke away, pulling back sharply as if coming up for air. He gasped, his head tilting back against the pillow, exposing the long line of his throat.

She wrapped her arms around his neck, her body pressing flush against his. She looked down at him, her face inches from his. “Say it.”

“Fuck,” he groaned out, the curse a shuddering release of pressure.

He turned his face, nestling it into the curve of her neck as if seeking shelter. His lips moved against her damp skin, his voice a broken, muffelled rasp. “Tessa. Baby.”

Hearing it, the full, vulnerable combination, sent a lightning bolt through her. Her hips jerked involuntarily, a sharp, backward-and-forward slide that made him gasp. The movement was pure reflex, a physical short-circuit.

His hands slid from her hair down to the small of her back, palms spreading wide. He pulled her impossibly closer, eliminating any last whisper of space between them. His body was a line of tense heat beneath hers, every muscle locked.

A ragged groan tore from his chest, vibrating through her own. He looked up at her, his eyes clouded with a pain that had nothing to do with physical hurt. “I don’t want you to be sore,” he gritted out, the words strained, his hands spreading wide and possessive on the bare skin of her lower back.

She looked down at him, finding herself unable to form words. Her arms were still locked around his neck, a silent anchor. She could only move, a slow, deliberate roll of her hips that drew a shattered gasp from his lips.

“Please,” she cried out, soft and broken.

It wrecked him, that word falling from her lips. He surrendered with a sound that was pure defeat, his mouth finding the frantic pulse in her neck as her head tilted back. “Tessa, baby,” he mumbled against her sweat-damp skin, the endearment a raw scrape.

She cried out, moaning his name into the dark. “Hardin.”

She moved against him then, back and forth, feeling every inch of him with a clarity that stole her breath. Her eyes fluttered shut, then open, struggling to focus on the sharp angle of his jaw, the stark tension in his throat. The rhythm wasn’t frantic or desperate; it was a deep, claiming cadence that spoke of a rightness that terrified them both.

She forced her eyes open, her gaze hazy and unfocused. His stare was relentless, blue fire in the dim room, drinking in every hitch of her breath, every flicker of sensation across her face. He needed to see it, to be absolved by it.

Something in his expression cracked. A line spread from his eyes to the tight set of his mouth. Dissolving under the reality of her weight on him, her heat around him.

His hands fell from her back to the mattress, palms flat as if bracing for an impact that had already hit.

Tessa saw it. It undid her completely.

She stopped moving, her body going still. She leaned down, her own breath hitching.

“Hey,” she whispered, her voice cracking. “Look at me.”

He opened his eyes. He looked emptied out. She held his gaze, her thumbs stroking his jaw. She didn’t speak. She just looked at him, letting him see whatever he needed to in her face.

A ragged breath shuddered through him. He shifted beneath her, his body tensing. With a gentle, firm pressure on her hips, he guided her backwards as he pushed himself up. He scooted back, his shoulders finding the hard wooden headboard with a soft thud.

He was sitting up now, and she was straddling his lap. The new angle made her gasp, a sharp intake of breath that felt too loud.

“Is this okay?” he asked, his voice scraped raw.

She nodded, her words stuck somewhere deep in her throat. He put his hands on her hips, his palms hot and definite. He stilled her for a second, his touch a question. She nodded again, a slight, eager dip of her chin.

His fingers tightened. He began to move her, a slow, deliberate slide forward and back. The friction was different, deeper, more concentrated. Her breath caught, her eyes widening.

She looked at him, at his hands on her hips controlling the rhythm. A slow, building understanding dawned in her haze. She matched him, her own muscles flexing in time with his guiding pressure. It became a collaboration, a silent conversation conducted through touch and shifting weight.

Her hands lifted, her fingers threading into the messy, damp hair at the base of his skull. She fisted it gently, not pulling, just holding on. She needed the anchor.

His gaze was locked on where their bodies joined, then flicked up to her face. His expression was one of fierce, concentrated awe. He was watching her feel it.

His hands stayed on her hips, a firm, sure guide. She moved with the timing he set, a rising, falling cadence that coiled heat low in her belly. He controlled the pace, but she gave herself over to it completely.

Then he thrust up.

It was a slow, deliberate lift of his hips from the bed, meeting her downward slide. It buried him deeper than before, a perfect, shocking fit that made her see white at the edges of her vision.

The sensation was a live wire, stripped and sparking. It hit a place inside her she didn’t have a name for. Her mouth fell open.

A sound should have come out—a moan, a groan, a scream.Nothing did. The pleasure was a physical vacuum, stealing the air from her lungs and the voice from her throat. Her body bowed backwards, a silent arc of stunning sensation, her hands tightening in his hair.

She was suspended there, mouth open in a silent cry, everything in her pulled taut towards a single, blinding point. The world dissolved into pure, wordless feeling.

The world dissolved into pure, wordless feeling.

She hung there, suspended, every nerve a live wire singing the same impossible note. He held her through it, his hands firm on her hips, his own breath a ragged sawing in the quiet. He didn’t break the rhythm, not even as her internal tremors pulsed around him in fading waves.

When she could finally breathe again, she slumped forward, her forehead finding the warm hollow of his shoulder. Her whole body felt liquid, boneless. He gently kissed the damp skin of her temple, his lips lingering.

“Still with me?” he murmured, his voice a gravelly whisper next to her ear.

Her hands, which had been fisted in his hair, now lay limp on his shoulders. He began to move her again, a slow, seamless resumption of that deep, rocking cadence. It was gentler now, a persistent, building thrum.

He kept the slow, steady pace. The rocks of her hips moved in perfect time with the guiding pressure of his hands. His thrust up met it every time, a synchronized push and pull that built a new, deeper heat. The earlier frenzy was gone, replaced by something more deliberate, more terrifying in its certainty.

“Hardin,” she breathed, the name a sigh of pure sensation.

“I know,” he gritted out, his own control visibly fraying. His jaw was a tight line, his forehead beaded with a fresh sheen of sweat in the dim light. The veins in his forearms stood out as he held her, moving her. “I know, Tessa.”

They were both a wreck, one second from tipping over that sweet edge. The air grew thick, charged with the sound of skin meeting skin, their combined breaths growing shorter, sharper. Every drag, every lift, was a friction that promised obliteration.

She looked at him, her eyes wide and unguarded. He looked back, his blue gaze holding hers, refusing to let her hide from it. The distance between their faces was nothing, just shared, humid air.

The tension coiled, tighter and tighter, a spring wound to its breaking point. It was in the clench of his stomach beneath her, the frantic flutter of her pulse under his thumb where it rested on her waist. The entire universe narrowed to this bed, this man, this unbearable, perfect friction.

“Tessa—”

“Hardin—”

They both said each other’s names at the same time, breathless. The simultaneity shattered them. They looked at each other, a final, stunned recognition in their gazes, and fell off that sweet edge together.

It wasn’t a slow unraveling. It was a hard, sudden severing of the thread holding them to the world. Her cry was a sharp, broken sound against his mouth. His own release was a silent, seismic shudder that locked his body, his fingers digging into her skin as he held her flush against him, pumping deep. They clung to each other, wrecked and trembling, as the waves crashed through them, over them, leaving nothing in their wake but the two of them, utterly spent.