Chapter 2: Bodies Like Lightning
The world had shrunk to the dimensions of the old quilt, to the heat of Morven’s skin against hers, to the frantic rhythm of their hearts. Isla’s senses were overwhelmed—the taste of salt and whisky, the scent of rain now sharpening the air, the astonishing softness of Morven’s mouth, the rough catch of her own calloused fingertips on Morven’s back.
Morven’s hands were not gentle. They were demanding, sure, tracing the lines of Isla’s body as if memorizing a new geography. Every touch sparked a nerve Isla hadn’t known existed. Her own shyness had been burned away, leaving only a raw, consuming hunger. She tangled her hands in Morven’s short hair, pulling her closer, chasing the sensation of teeth on her lower lip.
A low growl of thunder rolled across the sky, vibrating in the floorboards beneath them. The storm was closing in.
“God, Isla,” Morven gasped against her throat, her voice stripped of its usual playful edge. It was just breath and need. Her leg slid between Isla’s, a firm, insistent pressure that made Isla arch off the mattress with a sharp cry she barely recognized as her own.
The first hard crack of thunder coincided with Morven’s hand finding its way under the hem of Isla’s nightdress, skating up her thigh. The dual shock—of sound and touch—made Isla flinch, then melt. The storm wasn’t outside anymore; it was in her blood, in the electric space between their bodies.
“Look at me,” Morven whispered.
Isla forced her eyes open. In the gloom, Morven’s face was all intense concentration, her blue eyes nearly black. The fearless front was still there, but Isla, who had known her for a lifetime, saw the faint tremor in her lower lip, the almost imperceptible question in her gaze. It undid her. This was Morven, scared too. The realization was more intimate than any touch.
“I’m here,” Isla breathed, and it was a confession, a surrender, and a promise all at once.
The rain arrived in a sudden, deafening torrent, hammering the slate roof just above them. It was a white noise that swallowed the world, leaving only their ragged breathing, the rustle of fabric, the soft, wet sounds of their kisses. Morven pushed the nightdress up, her palms skimming Isla’s ribs, and Isla helped her, pulling it over her head and letting it fall somewhere into the darkness. The cool attic air touched her skin, followed immediately by the devastating heat of Morven’s body covering hers.
There was no more thought. Only sensation. The weight of Morven’s hips settling against her own. The press of a knee. The trail of a mouth down her sternum. Isla’s head tipped back, her red hair fanning across the pillow. She stared at the dark ceiling, seeing nothing, feeling everything. Her hands clutched at Morven’s shoulders, then her back, nails digging in lightly.
Morven’s mouth closed over her nipple, and Isla cried out, the sound lost in the drumming rain. Pleasure, sharp and bright, lanced through her, pooling low in her belly. It was too much. It wasn’t enough. She was fragments, coming apart under Morven’s relentless focus.
“Morven… please…”
She didn’t know what she was begging for. An end. A beginning. More.
Morven understood. Her hand slid down, past the waistband of Isla’s simple cotton pants, and her touch was both an answer and a question so profound it stole the air from Isla’s lungs. Isla’s hips jerked, seeking, and Morven’s mouth found hers again, swallowing her moans.
The storm reached its zenith. A simultaneous flash of lightning bleached the room in a stark, silent, blinding white.
In that frozen, illuminated instant, Isla saw everything.
She saw the freckles across Morven’s shoulders, the faint scar on her collarbone from a childhood fall. She saw the desperate wonder on Morven’s face, the vulnerability she’d hidden so well. She saw their limbs tangled, skin gleaming with sweat, the quilt a chaotic sea around them. She saw the faded photo on the dresser—two girls, ages seven and nine, grinning gap-toothed on that very bed, arms slung around each other’s shoulders.
Then the light vanished, swallowed by an immediate, skull-shaking crash of thunder that seemed to split the sky above the house.
The darkness that followed was absolute, and louder than the silence had ever been.
Morven went utterly still. Her forehead dropped to Isla’s shoulder, her breath coming in hot, ragged bursts against Isla’s skin. Isla could feel the frantic pulse in Morven’s wrist where it rested against her hip.
For a long moment, there was only the rain, and the echo of the thunder in their bones, and the weight of what they had just done settling over them like ash.
“Bloody hell,” Morven whispered, the words muffled.
Isla couldn’t speak. Her body was still humming, aching, alive in a way it had never been. But her mind, her careful, librarian’s mind, was beginning to reboot, throwing up frantic, blinking lights of alarm. Cousin. Family. Tomorrow. Forever.
Morven shifted, pulling her hand back, rolling onto her side but not letting go. She kept an arm draped over Isla’s waist, possessive and afraid. In the dark, her fingers traced idle, soothing circles on Isla’s stomach.
“You’re thinking,” Morven said. “I can hear you thinking from here.”
“What are we?” The question left Isla’s lips before she could stop it, small and broken.
Morven’s hand stilled. The rain eased slightly, from a torrent to a steady, grieving pour. “I don’t know,” she said finally, and the honesty in her voice was more terrifying than any glib, confident answer. “But don’t you dare tell me it was a mistake.”
Isla turned her head on the pillow. As her eyes adjusted, she could just make out the pale outline of Morven’s face, the glint of her eyes. “It wasn’t a mistake.” Saying it made it more real. “But it changes everything.”
“Maybe everything needed changing.” Morven’s bravado was returning, but it was thin, fragile.
A floorboard creaked in the hall below.
They both froze, listening, their breath held. The old house was full of such noises, but now every sigh of timber was a footstep, every rattle of a window a turning doorknob. The reality of the world—the family downstairs, the life waiting in Glasgow and Edinburgh—crashed back in, colder than the storm.
Morven let out a long, slow breath. “It’s just the house,” she said, but she didn’t sound convinced. She pulled Isla closer, tucking Isla’s back against her front, fitting them together like spoons in a drawer. Her nose nuzzled into the hair at the nape of Isla’s neck. “Go to sleep, Isla.”
Sleep was impossible. Isla lay awake in the dark, listening to the rain slow to a drizzle, feeling the steady beat of Morven’s heart against her spine. The scent of their sweat, of Morven’s apple shampoo, of sex and old wool, filled the attic. It was a new scent, marking a new world.
Her body was sated, humming with a deep, weary satisfaction. But her mind raced down dark, tangled paths. What happened in the morning? What happened when they walked downstairs and saw their aunts and uncles across the breakfast table? The guilt was a cold stone in her stomach, but when Morven’s arm tightened around her in her sleep, the warmth that followed was enough, for now, to keep the cold at bay.
Just before dawn, as the first grey light began to seep around the edges of the curtains, Isla finally drifted off. Her last conscious thought was not of fear, but of the exact pressure of Morven’s palm on her stomach, a anchor in the strange and terrifying sea they had launched themselves into.