Chapter 2: Morning Reassurance
I woke to the smell of her hair on my pillow and a solid ache in my groin. Gray morning light seeped around the edges of her curtains. She was pressed against my back, her body a soft, warm curve spooning mine, her arm slung over my waist. Her breathing was deep and even.
And I was rock hard.
It was a primal, insistent throb against my boxers, a leftover from last night and a fresh demand for this morning. Every detail of her was imprinted on me—the feel of her skin, the sounds she made, the way her body had opened for me, trusted me. The memory made me harder.
I shifted slightly, and her arm tightened around me. A soft sigh ghosted across my shoulder blade.
Slowly, careful not to wake her, I turned over. She murmured something unintelligible and settled onto her back, her face peaceful in sleep. The sheet was tangled around her waist, leaving her breasts bare. I watched her breathe, watched the slow rise and fall, and the ache became a urgent, possessive need.
My hand moved of its own accord, skimming over the dip of her waist, resting on the soft swell of her stomach. Her skin was warm silk. She stirred, her eyelids fluttering.
“Aidan?” Her voice was husky with sleep.
“Right here.” My own voice was gravel.
Her eyes opened fully, sleep-clouded and soft. They focused on my face, then drifted down to where my obvious erection strained against the thin cotton of my boxers, pressing against her thigh. A blush crept up her neck.
I leaned in, kissing the spot where her pulse beat in her throat. “Morning.”
“Morning.” She shifted, a nervous little movement. The doubt was already creeping back into her eyes, the morning light exposing the vulnerabilities the darkness had softened.
I couldn’t stand it. I kissed her, deep and slow, trying to pour every unspoken feeling into it. My hand slid down from her stomach, over the sweet curve of her hip, and gripped the generous flesh of her ass. I squeezed, claiming it. She made a small, hungry sound into my mouth.
I pulled back just enough to speak, my lips brushing hers. “You’re thinking again.”
“I’m not,” she whispered, but it was a lie.
“You are. I can hear it.” I rolled onto her, settling my weight between her legs. The contact made us both gasp. “Let me remind you.”
I didn’t wait for permission. Last night had rewritten the rules. I kissed her again, more urgently this time, my hands mapping the territory I now knew by heart. Her breasts, her ribs, the incredible softness of her hips. She arched into my touch, her hands coming up to tangle in my hair.
I broke the kiss, trailing my mouth down her neck, over her collarbone, taking one nipple into my mouth. She cried out, her back bowing off the bed. I lavished attention on her, with my tongue and teeth, until she was writhing, until her fingers were clutching at my shoulders.
“Still not convinced?” I growled against her skin.
She just whimpered, a high, desperate sound.
That was all the answer I needed. I hooked my hands under her knees, pushing them up and out, spreading her wide for me. I looked down at where I was poised at her entrance, already wet from her and from last night. My cock felt huge, throbbing with need. I guided myself to her, nudging against her heat.
“Look at me,” I commanded.
Her glazed eyes met mine.
I pushed inside.
It was slower than last night, a deliberate, stretching invasion. She was so tight, still swollen from our earlier rounds. Her mouth fell open in a silent ‘O’ of shock and pleasure. I watched her face as I sank deeper, inch by inch, until I was fully sheathed, buried in her incredible warmth.
“See?” I said, my voice strained. “You fit me perfectly.”
I began to move. A steady, deep rhythm. Her head tipped back into the pillows, her eyes squeezing shut. The sounds she made were incoherent, beautiful. I drove into her, over and over, the slap of skin filling the quiet room. Each thrust pushed a gasp from her lips.
But in the daylight, it was different. I could see everything. The way her body jiggled with the force of my movements, the ripple of flesh on her stomach, the bounce of her breasts. She must have felt it too, seen it in the way my eyes traveled over her. Her eyes snapped open, a flicker of self-consciousness breaking through the pleasure.
“Stop,” she breathed.
I didn’t stop. I couldn’t. I hooked my arms under her legs, pushing them back toward her shoulders, changing the angle. Deeper. “No.”
“Aidan, wait—”
“I’m not waiting.” I punctuated each word with a thrust. “I’m not hiding. I want this. I want all of it.” My hands slid down to her hips, gripping the soft flesh there, holding her steady as I pistoned into her. “Every fucking inch.”
Tears leaked from the corners of her eyes. Not from pain. From a feeling too big to name. Shame and need and a desperate, clawing hope.
I leaned down, catching her mouth with mine, swallowing her whimpers. My rhythm became erratic, rougher. The bed frame knocked a soft, persistent beat against the wall. I was lost in her, in the feel, the smell, the overwhelming rightness of it.
“Touch yourself,” I rasped into her ear.
She shook her head, her cheeks flaming.
“Do it. I want to watch you come.”
Hesitantly, her hand slipped between our bodies. Her eyes stayed locked on mine, wide with a mixture of defiance and vulnerability. When her fingers found her clit, her whole body jerked. A low moan tore from her throat.
That was it. The sight of her, giving herself permission to feel pleasure, to be seen taking it—it undid me. My orgasm roared up from my guts, blinding and brutal. I slammed into her one last, deep time, my release pumping into her in hot, endless pulses. I collapsed on top of her, spent, my face buried in her neck.
Her own climax followed, triggered by mine. She clenched around me, milking me dry, her cries muffled against my shoulder.
For a long time, there was only the sound of our ragged breathing. The sun had grown brighter, painting gold stripes across the rumpled sheets.
I softened inside her and slowly, reluctantly, rolled off. We lay side by side, not touching. The space between us felt charged, like the air after a lightning strike.
I turned my head to look at her. She was staring at the ceiling, tears still tracking silently into her hairline.
“Cat.”
She didn’t answer.
I propped myself up on an elbow. “Look at me.”
She turned her head. Her expression was a wall of bruised emotion.
“Why does this make you cry?” I asked, softer now.
She swallowed hard. “Because it can’t be real.” Her voice was a torn-up whisper. “This. You. Looking at me like… like you see me, and then wanting me anyway. It doesn’t compute in my brain.”
“So your brain is wrong.”
She gave a wet, humorless laugh. “My brain has twenty-two years of evidence. You have… what? A really persistent boner?”
It stung. I flinched. “That’s not fair.”
“Isn’t it?” She sat up, pulling the sheet around her like armor. “What is this, Aidan? Really? You’ve had your fun. You proved your point. You can… you can cross ‘fuck the insecure fat roommate’ off your bucket list.”
The words were so cruel, so deliberately designed to push me away, that for a second I couldn’t speak. Anger, hot and sour, rose in my throat. But beneath it was a colder, sharper understanding. This was her weapon. Sabotage. Burn it down before it could hurt her.
I sat up too. The space between us on the bed felt like a canyon. “Is that what you think this is? A bucket list?”
She wouldn’t look at me.
“I didn’t use a condom,” I said, the words quiet and deliberate. “Again.”
Her eyes flicked to mine, then away. “So?”
“So you think I’d do that for a checkbox? You think I’d do that lightly?” My voice started to rise. “I’m in you, Cat. Bare. There’s no bigger fucking proof than that.”
“Proof of what?” she shot back, her own voice trembling. “Lust? Curiosity? A kink for… for this?” She gestured bitterly at her body under the sheet.
I lost it. I grabbed her wrists, not hard, but firm. “Proof that I’m not afraid of you! Proof that I want you, all of you, exactly as you are! No barriers, no lies, no fucking plastic between us when I’m inside you! What more do you want? A signed affidavit? A blood oath?”
Tears were streaming down her face now. “I want it to last! I want you to look at me in a week, in a month, when the novelty wears off and all you see is the me I see, and not flinch! I want you to not wake up one morning and realize this was a mistake!”
Her shouting echoed in the small room. The silence that followed was deafening.
I released her wrists. My anger evaporated, leaving only a hollow ache. She was wrong. So wrong. But I saw the landscape of her fear, and it was vast and desolate. My physical proof meant nothing against that.
I reached out, slowly, and wiped a tear from her cheek with my thumb. She stiffened but didn’t pull away.
“Then give me a month,” I said quietly.
“What?”
“Give me a month. A week. A fucking day. Just… give me the next five minutes without assuming I’m lying.” I moved closer, ignoring the sheet she held tight. I put my hand on her cheek, forcing her to meet my gaze. “I’m not going to wake up and see a mistake. I’m going to wake up and see the girl who makes my chest feel too tight when she laughs. The one who borrows my hoodies and never gives them back. The one who reads fantasy novels with the covers folded back and gets into screaming fights with the TV during football games. The one with the smart mouth and the stupidly beautiful eyes and the body that drives me out of my goddamn mind.”
She was staring at me, her lips parted, her breath catching in hiccups.
“You’re not a novelty,” I whispered. “You’re a fucking epidemic. And I’m already sick.”
I leaned in and kissed her. It wasn’t a kiss of passion, but of promise. Soft, lingering, sealing the words to her lips.
When I pulled back, her eyes were still wide, but the wall was cracked. Something raw and hopeful peeked through.
“Five minutes?” she echoed, her voice tiny.
“Start now.”
I lay back down, pulling her with me. She came stiffly at first, then melted into the curve of my body, her head on my chest. I wrapped my arms around her, holding her tight against the chill of her own doubts.
We lay there as the sun climbed higher, her vanilla scent mixing with the smell of sex and sweat and something new. Something fragile.
My body was already stirring again, responding to her nearness. But for now, I ignored it. This was bigger. This was her listening to my heartbeat, and me praying she could feel its truth through her fear.
The five minutes passed. Then ten. She didn’t speak. She just held on.
It was a start.
It was a start.
Her breath hitched, warm against my chest. The silence between us wasn't empty now; it was thick, charged with everything we’d just shouted and everything we hadn’t said. I could feel the dampness of her tears on my skin.
My hand moved slowly from her back to the nape of her neck, my fingers threading into her damp hair. I tilted her head up gently. Her eyes were waiting, wide and uncertain, glistening.
I didn’t kiss her right away. I studied her face—the faint freckles across her nose, the subtle trembling of her lower lip. She watched me, her chest rising and falling with shallow breaths. The world had narrowed to this bed, to this space between our mouths.
Then I closed the distance.
My lips found hers softly at first, a bare touch, a question. She answered by parting them, letting out a quiet sigh that I caught. I took the invitation. I traced the full curve of her lower lip with my tongue before sliding inside.
Her taste was complex. There was the lingering salt of her tears, the vanilla from her lip balm, and underneath it all, something uniquely her—warm and darkly sweet. I explored the shape of her, the smooth inside of her cheeks, the ridge of her teeth.
My tongue touched hers, and she flinched, then softened. A shiver went through her. I deepened the kiss, not with force, but with a slow, thorough curiosity. I mapped the roof of her mouth, the sensitive spot behind her front teeth. Every subtle twitch of her jaw, every catching of her breath, was a word in a language I was desperate to learn.
Her hands, which had been balled into fists against my sides, unfurled. Her fingers crept up to my shoulders, then my neck, holding on as if she were adrift. I felt the moment her own tongue grew brave, tentatively meeting mine, dancing a shy, retreating step before advancing again.
I cupped her face, my thumbs stroking her jawline, holding her right there in the kiss. It wasn't about passion now; it was about presence. I was trying to kiss the doubt right out of her, to fill every hidden space with undeniable, physical truth.
She made a small, broken sound in the back of her throat, and her body went pliant against mine. Her mouth opened wider, accepting the exploration, surrendering to it. The last of her resistance melted away, leaving only a raw, aching need that mirrored my own. We breathed each other's air, shared the same wet heat, and for those long minutes, there was no her and no me, just this single, converging point of contact.
When I finally broke away, we were both gasping. Her lips were swollen, glistening. Her eyes searched mine, no longer defensive, but deeply, profoundly vulnerable. She looked seen. She looked conquered, not by me, but by her own yearning.
She touched her own lips with her fingertips, a look of wonder on her face. “No one’s ever…”
She didn’t finish. She didn’t have to. I knew. I’d kissed her like I was claiming territory, like I was memorizing a map I never wanted to forget. And she had finally, truly, believed the map was worth keeping.
The silence stretched, but it was different now. It hummed with a new, fragile understanding. She shifted against me, her damp cheek sliding across my chest, and her hand trailed down my stomach.
Her fingers brushed against me, tentative at first, then wrapping around my hardness with a certainty that stole my breath. I looked down to see her watching her own hand move, a focused, almost studious expression on her face. She pushed the sheet away, the morning light painting her skin in honeyed shades, and lowered her head.
Her breath was warm. Then her lips were warmer. She kissed the tip, a soft, closed-mouth press that made my entire body tighten. Her tongue followed, a shy, experimental flick that tasted salt and skin. A low groan escaped me before I could stop it.
She took me into her mouth, slowly, her eyes fixed on mine. The heat was incredible, wet and soft. She began to move, her head bobbing with careful concentration. Her hand worked the base in time with her mouth, a rhythm she was clearly thinking hard about.
I tangled my hands in her hair, not to guide, but to feel the connection. She moaned around me, the vibration thrilling up my spine. Her pace increased, grew more confident. She was exploring me, learning the shape and heft of me, her tongue tracing veins.
Then she tried to take me deeper. I felt her throat open, felt the head of my cock press against the back of her mouth. She gagged, pulling back instantly, a string of saliva breaking between her lips and me.
She tried again, pushing herself, her eyes watering. She got a little farther this time, her nose pressed into my skin, but her body rebelled. She pulled off with a wet, gasping sound.
Frustration twisted her beautiful face. “Damn it,” she whispered, her voice rough. She looked up at me, her eyes glistening with unshed tears of effort. “I wanted to deepthroat you. To give you as much pleasure as possible. But your cock is just too long and thick.”
She said it with such genuine annoyance, like she’d failed a test. My heart squeezed. I gently lifted her chin with my finger.
“Hey,” I said, my voice thick. “Look at me. What you’re doing feels incredible. Perfect.” I smoothed her hair back from her forehead. “I don’t expect you to perform like a pornstar for me. I just want you.”
She searched my eyes for dishonesty, finding none. A shaky breath left her. Then, with a resolve that melted into pure, unselfconscious hunger, she leaned down again. This time, there was no agenda. Just her mouth, her tongue, her pleasure in giving pleasure. It was messy, imperfect, and real.
And it was the most intimate thing I’d ever felt.