Chapter 2: Morning After Realities
The first thing Olivia registered was the weight. A solid, warm pressure across her ribs, an arm anchoring her to the bed. Then the scent—not her lavender laundry detergent, but something earthier, with a hint of spice and last night’s whiskey. She blinked against the horizontal stripes of sunlight cutting through the blinds, painting Matt’s chest in gold and shadow.
His breathing was deep and even against her hair. Memories from a few hours earlier flooded back—the fumble for his keys in the bar parking lot, the hungry press against his duplex door, the way he’d whispered “you’re actually insane” after her karaoke rendition of Total Eclipse of the Heart, right before he kissed her. It had been a blur of laughter and stumbling and his hands, finally, on all the curves she’d spent years apologizing for.
A deep, pleasant ache throbbed between her legs. A real one, not the phantom loneliness she was used to.
Then her phone buzzed on the nightstand, a seismic vibration in the quiet. She jerked, the mom-alarm in her brain screaming to life. Shit. Kids. School pickup. Sara’s soccer bag, Liam’s forgotten permission slip—
She carefully extracted herself, Matt grumbling in his sleep, rolling into the space she vacated. The cool air hit her skin. She found her panties and jeans in a trail from the door, her bra dangling from the lampshade. A snort-laugh escaped her. God, she felt twenty again. Young and stupid and deliciously used.
She was hopping into her jeans when she turned and saw him. The sheet had dipped low on his hips, outlining the lean muscle of his back, the curve of his ass. And, pressing insistently against the faded cotton, the unmistakable tent of his morning erection.
A reckless, electric current zipped through her. The clock in her head was ticking, a frantic metronome. But another, deeper rhythm was pulsing in her blood. She hadn’t been late yet. She could afford… ten minutes.
She padded back to the bed, the worn floorboards smooth under her bare feet. She didn’t shake him. Instead, she climbed back onto the mattress, kneeling beside him, and put her mouth close to his ear. Her voice came out a low, rough scrape, nothing like her mom-voice.
“Matt. Wake up.”
He made a muffled sound, more vibration than word.
She let her hand drift down his spine, over the sheet, to the swell of his ass. She squeezed. “I said wake up. I have to go get my kids.”
“Mmhmm,” he mumbled, face buried in the pillow. “Drive safe.”
“No.” She leaned closer, her lips brushing his ear now. “You don’t get it. I have to leave in fifteen minutes. So you need to wake the fuck up right now and fuck me. Then you can go back to sleep.”
That got him. He shifted, turned his head. One dark eye opened, bleary and confused, then cleared with a swift, hot understanding. A slow, sleepy smile spread across his face. “Bossy.”
“You have no idea.” She didn’t smile back. The need was a physical fist in her stomach, tight and urgent.
He moved then, fast for someone half-asleep, rolling onto his back. The sheet fell away completely. He was fully, magnificently hard. He reached for her, but she caught his wrist, pinned it gently to the pillow above his head. His eyebrows shot up.
“Uh-uh,” she said, the command leaving her lips before she could think. “Just lie there. This is fast. This is for me.”
A challenge flashed in his eyes, but he settled back, a willing captive. “You said fuck you. Not fuck me.”
“Semantics.” She shimmied out of her jeans again, kicked them off the bed. She kept her panties on, the cheap lace already damp. She swung a leg over him, straddling his hips, but didn’t lower herself. She just looked down at him, at the beautiful, stark contrast of his skin against the white sheets, the proud line of his cock straining between them.
She put her hands on his chest, feeling his heart hammering against her palms. She could feel his heat. Smell the sleep on his skin. She leaned down, kissing him, not soft or sweet, but deep and claiming, tasting herself and him and the night before. He groaned into her mouth, his free hand coming up to tangle in her hair.
When she broke the kiss, they were both breathing hard. “Condom?” she panted. “Side table.”
He gestured with his chin. She snatched the foil packet, tore it with her teeth. She rolled it onto him, her movements clinical, efficient, her fingers trembling only slightly. He watched her, his chest rising and falling, the muscle in his jaw tight.
Then she hooked her thumbs into the sides of her panties, dragged them down and off one leg. She didn’t move to position herself. Instead, she guided him with one hand, notched the head of him right where she was swollen and slick and aching. She held him there, just for a second, a torturous promise of pressure.
She looked him dead in the eye. “Don’t be gentle.”
And she sank down, taking him all in one fierce, downward stroke.
A sharp cry was punched out of her. He swore, a guttural, beautiful sound, his hips arching off the bed to meet her, to bury himself deeper. The stretch was perfect, overwhelming, a blazing fill that erased every thought of packed lunches and minivan gas. She braced her hands on his shoulders, her head falling forward, a curtain of hair around their faces.
“Jesus, Olivia,” he gasped.
She began to move. No rhythm, no technique, just a frantic, driving need to feel him, to use this, to carve the memory of him into her bones before the real world came crashing back. She rode him hard, each drop a jolt of pure sensation, the slap of skin on skin loud in the sunlit room. She was aware of everything—the bite of his fingers on her hips, the corded strength of his stomach under her, the sweat already beading between her breasts.
“Look at me,” he demanded, his voice thick.
She forced her head up, met his gaze. His eyes were black, intense, locked on hers. He wasn’t a passive participant anymore. He met every downward plunge with a powerful upward thrust, driving into her from below, finding a angle that made her see stars. The bedframe started a rhythmic thump against the wall.
It was rough. It was raw. It was exactly what she’d asked for. Pleasure coiled, tight and hot, deep in her core. She could feel it building, a wave gathering force, shutting down every part of her brain except the part that felt this.
“I’m gonna…” she choked out, the words fraying.
“Yeah,” he gritted out, his pace faltering, becoming jagged. “Come on. Come for me. Then I will.”
That was all it took. His permission, his filthy, whispered command. The coil snapped. Her back arched violently as the orgasm tore through her, a white-hot current that clenched around him, milking, pulling. She cried out, a sound she didn’t recognize as her own.
Feeling her convulse around him was his undoing. With a shattered groan, he thrust up one last, final time, holding himself deep as he came. She felt the pulse of him inside her, the hot rush, and collapsed forward onto his chest, boneless and spent.
For a long moment, there was only the sound of their ragged breathing and the distant hum of a lawnmower. The smell of sex, sharp and sweet, filled the air. She could feel his heart pounding against her cheek.
Slowly, he brought his hands up, stroking her damp back. “Holy shit,” he breathed, laughter and awe in his voice.
A giggle bubbled out of her, hysterical and light. She pushed herself up. The condom. The time. Her eyes found the digital clock on his dresser.
“Double shit,” she said, scrambling off him, wincing at the tender, liquid ache between her legs. She moved quickly, finding her clothes, pulling them on. Her hands were unsteady.
Matt lay there, watching her, a satisfied, drowsy expression on his face. The sheet was around his ankles now, and he made no move to cover himself. “You’re a force of nature, you know that?”
“I’m a late mom,” she said, dragging a brush through her tangled hair from her purse. She leaned over, gave him one last, quick, hard kiss. “Don’t get up.”
“Wasn’t planning on it,” he murmured, his eyes already closing.
She grabbed her phone, her keys, and was at the bedroom door when his voice, soft with sleep, stopped her.
“Olivia?”
She turned. He had one arm thrown over his eyes, a smile playing on his lips. “Next time, I pick the song.”
She laughed, a real one this time, bright and surprised in the quiet room. Then she was gone, down the hall, out the front door, the morning sun hitting her like a spotlight.
As she fumbled with her car keys, her phone rang. The school’s number flashed on the screen. The real world, impatient and demanding, had arrived. But for the whole drive, her body thrummed with a secret, sated heat, and the taste of him was still on her tongue.