Chapter 2: Glass and Steam
The water sheeted off their skin as Calder lifted her, her thighs locking around his waist as he carried her dripping from the hot tub. He didn’t take her to the bed. He pinned her against the cold glass balcony door, the city’s neon grid a dizzying tapestry at her back. “See that?” he growled, nudging into her with a blunt, insistent pressure. “Everyone down there is asleep. And you’re up here getting fucked.” The obscenity, spoken against the shell of her ear, made her gasp. He thrust up, seating himself deep, and the twin sensations of the freezing glass and his burning heat tore a ragged cry from her throat. Her head fell back with a thud. “That’s it,” he panted, his pace relentless, each drive punching the air from her lungs. “Let the whole fucking city hear you.” She was unraveling, her earlier shyness incinerated by a raw, claiming need. She clawed at his shoulders, her moans turning into shouts that fogged the glass. He watched her fall apart, his own release building, a brutal tide. “Come for me again,” he commanded, his voice guttural. And she did, screaming, her body clamping around him in violent waves. He followed, spilling into her with a low, broken curse, his forehead pressed to the cold pane beside her head. They slid down the glass together, a heap of slick limbs on the balcony floor, the only sound their shared, ragged breath steaming in the cold air. After a moment, he brushed her tangled hair from her face. “Okay?” he murmured, his voice returning from a faraway place of dark hunger. She could only nod, a spent, boneless smile touching her lips.
He carried her to the bed, their bodies damp and cooling, and they collapsed into the tangle of sheets without speaking. Her last conscious thought was the solid weight of his arm across her ribs, a mooring line in the dark. She fell into a deep, dreamless sleep where the only sensation was warmth.
Calder woke hours later to the silent, insistent throb of his own body. The room was pitch black, the mountains invisible outside. Whitney was a soft, warm weight against his side, her breath slow against his neck. He was already achingly hard, a dull pulse that demanded attention.
Shifting carefully, he moved over her, easing her onto her back in the gloom. She stirred as he nudged her thighs apart, a soft, sleepy sound escaping her lips. He entered her in one smooth, deep push, her body accepting him easily, still pliant from sleep and their earlier couplings.
Her eyes fluttered open, finding his shadowed face above her. “Calder?” Her voice was thick with sleep.
“Right here,” he murmured, beginning a slow, rolling rhythm. “Just need you.”
She wrapped her legs around his hips, locking him deeper. Her hands came up to cradle his jaw. “Don’t be gentle,” she whispered, her voice clearing, hardening. “Not now. Fuck me like you mean it.”
A growl ripped from his chest. He drove into her, the pace turning urgent, the bedframe knocking a steady beat against the wall. Every thrust was a claim, a punctuation in the dark. “Like that?” he grunted, the sweat already blooming between them.
“Yes!” The word was a gasp, then a shout as he hammered into a spot that made her vision blur. She screamed his name, the sound swallowed by the room’s vast privacy, a freedom that unleashed her completely. “I’m so close,” she sobbed, her nails scoring his back.
He didn’t slow, chasing his own peak, her tight heat milking him. Her climax tore through her, a silent, wide-mouthed convulsion before the cry followed. He kept moving, relentless, as she chanted, “Don’t stop, don’t stop, please,” into his shoulder.
Overstimulated, trembling, the words spilled from her without filter. “Calder, please,” she begged, her voice breaking. “Put a baby in me. Do it. I want it.”
The raw plea detonated something primitive in him. He slammed into her, deeper, harder, his rhythm fracturing into something frantic and absolute. “You’re sure?” he gritted out, the concept twisting his control into a violent, final strain.
“Yes!” Her back arched, offering everything. “Fill me up.” The filth of it, the profound surrender, was the end of him. His release was a blinding, shuddering rush, a final, pounding cadence as he spilled himself deep inside her with a guttural cry that sounded like her name.
He collapsed onto her, spent, the words “fill me up” echoing in the silence between their ragged breaths. For a long minute, there was only the sound of the wind and the frantic beat of their hearts slowing. Then, without a word, Whitney pushed at his shoulder.
He rolled off, his body slick with sweat. She sat up, her curls stuck to her damp neck, and looked down at him in the dark. The city’s distant glow etched the determined set of her jaw.
“My turn,” she said, her voice low and rough.
Before he could respond, she swung a leg over his chest, her thick thighs framing his head. She settled her weight onto his face without ceremony, her wet heat smothering his mouth. He gripped her hips, a muffled sound of surprise and immediate hunger escaping him as his tongue found her.
He devoured her with a relentless, starving intensity, his fingers digging into the generous flesh of her ass. One slick finger pressed against her tight rim, working in small, insistent circles as his tongue lashed her clit. She rode his face with abandon, her motions becoming jerky, uncontrolled.
“Oh god, yes, right there,” she chanted, her voice strangled, then rising. Her moans, shameless and loud, spilled from the open balcony doors, carried away by the mountain wind. Her thighs tightened around his ears, her whole body bowing as the climax ripped through her.
He didn’t let up, drinking her in, until her shuddering collapsed into gentle tremors.