by K. T. Samois
Hardin takes his time peeling her out of her jeans, even going so far as lifting one foot and then the other. He strokes the pad of his thumb along the back of her calf to the tender hollow at the back of her knee, just to hear the noise she makes as he does. Although Hardin hasn’t received many presents in his life, he’s always believed himself to be the sort of person who would enjoy the unwrapping almost as much as the reveal.
Hardin’s in no rush.
He wants to savour the way her skin is softer than the finest silk; the way she glows in the half-light like black-market ivory. Hardin wants to tangle his hand in the waves of her hair, red-black in the dim light; hungers to kiss the moans out of her mouth.
Hardin’s seen Riona stop traffic before. She’s striking even on her worst day. Almost nude, Riona looks like something Pygmalion might have carved out of marble. From his place on his knees, Hardin feels like the luckiest man on earth.
She’s taken the trouble of wearing lace sheer enough to see through, and Hardin has just confirmed that Riona is a natural redhead. His nostrils flare at the sea-bright scent of her arousal, darkening the fabric of her panties. Desperate for a taste, Hardin does the next best thing. His mouth finds the flutter of her femoral vein at her inner thigh, and presses an open-mouthed kiss there.
“Green!” Riona’s voice carries. The knowledge thrills Hardin into repeating the gesture on the other side; this time, she clamps her mouth shut to stifle the high whine. He presses a toothy kiss to the fabric at the waistband of her panties. Riona squirms, but this time she takes longer than before to murmur an assent.
Deciding instead on the tease, he lets his tongue trace the muscle that runs along the inside of her thigh.
“Holy shit,” Riona says. At her side, her hands flex restlessly.
“Do you wish those were in my hair right now?” Hardin asks; his breath is hot against the core of her, and Riona makes a desperate noise high in her throat.
“Yes, sir!” She’s at wit’s end, desperate to feel him. For him to touch her.
Hardin stands up.
“How unfortunate for you, Riona.”
Those remarkable green eyes of hers flash open. “Wait, what?!”
“Kneel,” Hardin orders. She scrambles to do as she’s told. “Hands behind your back. Hold your elbows if you can.”
Of course she can. It does indecent things to her figure: her waist pinches inwards as her chest pushes outwards. Her hair tumbles loose over one shoulder. Godiva-like waves cover one breast; it only tantalizes him more.
His gloves are no longer a benefit, not when he can get his hands on Riona. He peels one off with his teeth.
“Oh my God,” Riona says, watching raptly as he strips the other glove off with deliberate slowness. White, sharp teeth fix into supple black leather, and Riona bites her bottom lip, leaving plum-red tooth marks as some of her dirtier fantasies come to life.
Bare hands tangle into her hair and bring her close for a searing kiss. When his hands slide down to the straps of her bra, both of hers flutter up to hold his hands in place.
“I’d like to keep this much on. For now. Is that okay?” Riona asks, trying not to sound nervous. Hardin nods, dipping his head and pressing a heated kiss to her collarbone.
“Of course,” he says, putting fire in the bottom of Riona’s belly. He might lead, but they’re still partners in this dance.
She soon realizes why he’d been so quick to concede. Hardin dips his head, and with exquisite deliberation, closes his mouth over her nipple. The lace on her bra has been a tease all night, and never more so than now.
When he curls his tongue around the nipple, her moan is a desperate demand. He rests his teeth against the lace, a gentle threat. Riona wriggles and then gasps when she feels his teeth. Her body arches, bringing her torso closer to his mouth. His hand cradles the small of her back. Her leg hitches over his hip, and her entire body breaks out into goosebumps.
“Liked that?”
“Yesss,” she whines, and Hardin switches to the other breast, nipping here too as a gentle punishment. She wails.
“Say it properly, Riona,” he says, removing all contact. She leans towards him anyway, like she’s searching for the warmth of him.
“Please, sir. Please. Green. Lime green. Emerald green. Kelly green. Chartreuse.”
“That’s a shade of yellow.”
“Oh my God, you pedantic fu-,” Ree snaps, but Hardin’s had enough games for now. He rises above her like a wave, crashing down against her body. When he rolls his hips against her core, he can hear her gasp.
“Pedantic- what was that, again?” Hardin asks, sliding his hand between them and against the lace of her panties. He sounds so smug Ree almost expects him to have a forked tongue.
“Fuck!” She gasps when he strokes her, and Hardin doesn’t bother hiding his chuckle.
“If you insist,” he says. Hardin obliges, bringing his leg up between hers. He can feel the heat of her through the fabric of his trousers; he’s sure she can feel the way the muscle of his thigh flexes as he crouches over her. His finger traces the seam of her and she shudders like she’s hypothermic. He can feel the way her thighs tremble around him, so he repeats the gesture.
“Hardin — Hardin, please.” She pants his name against his neck, a ragged prayer with the lightest stroke of his fingertips. There’s power here. Like a conductor, he’s making music with a mere gesture.
“Riona.” He says her name like a lover’s caress, and she sucks in a shuddering breath.
“Y-yes, sir?”
“Would you like to come?” He says it casually enough that she almost misses it. He can see when the volley lands; lust-dark eyes open wide — and then look anywhere but at him. Hardin’s treated to a sunset of blushes painting over her skin: coral on her breasts and carmine on her cheeks.
She nods.
“Then ask nicely,” Hardin orders, and Riona’s hips jerk hard against his thigh.
“Sir — Hardin, please.”
“Ask me, Riona. Go on.” He strokes her again, a deliberate tease. Her legs tremble and he can see her toes arch out of the corner of his eye. He repeats the gesture, and that is when Riona breaks.
Words escape in a froth. “Hardin. Sir — sir, please, may I come? Please, let me come, Hardin!”
He does as she asks, stroking her as she shudders, clinging to him. He can feel her nails through the fabric of his shirt.
Every muscle in her body tenses, and Hardin feels the crush of her thighs against his, tight enough to bruise.
When he pulls away, she’s still whispering extremely complimentary things about — and to — him. Hardin tucks her face up to the curve of his throat. When she curls around him, affectionate in her afterglow, he indulges himself by running a hand through her hair.
It’s been a few moments of companionable quiet when Riona lifts her head, looks down at his trousers, and asks,
“So, when can I play with you?”
***
Ree’s asleep when she feels the warmth disappear from her bed. The mattress dips, waking her up, and she lifts her head.
“Mmmph? Hardin? Where’re you going?”
He’s sitting on the side of the bed, dressed, face hard and gaunt in the cold light of the street-lamp, but when she calls his name, he turns his head to look at her. There’s a moment where she can see him consider lying.
“Just to the bathroom, kitten,” he says, instead, and rises to his feet to make it a truth.
When he returns, hands damp and face wet, she lifts the sheets to welcome him back to bed. He strips down to his boxers and slips into the queen-sized bed with her. Ree wastes no time in making herself at home; after tonight, there’s no point in being shy. She fits herself to him like a vine, tossing her leg over his hip to pin him in place.
Hardin’s fingers card through her hair, soothing away tangles and knots. “Go to sleep, Riona.”
“Only if you’re going to be here when I wake up,” she mumbles grogg
ily, and he nods.
“If you like,” he says into the tangle of her hair, and-
“Yes,” she tells him, eyes closed and mind drifting off already. “I’d like that a lot.”
Chapter Six
The sunlight streams in through the sheer curtains, diffusing into the gentleness of mid-morning. A balmy spring breeze rustles the trees on the boulevard below. The pothos in the window casts dappled shadows across the soft and rumpled fabric, and the bare thigh it reveals. Ree lies on her side, sleep-indolent and sweet. Her fingers trace patterns on the skin of Hardin’s chest and clavicle; he catches them and presses them to his lips with aching tenderness.
“So I’ve been thinking-” she starts, but a wry voice from above cuts in.
“That’s a dangerous preposition,” Hardin says, deadpan.
His hand strokes along her hair as though he were petting a cat. Ree luxuriates in his affection.
“Oh, ha. See if I make you any coffee.”
“What if I ask very—,” he says, as his fingers trail down the skin of her arm, “—very nicely?”
Oh, he thinks he’s so cute.
“I don’t even think you have that setting, Hardin. But-” Ree gathers courage to her like a cloak. “But it’s been four months. I’d like you to meet my family.”
The silence in the room is deeper than the tomb.
“It’s just-”
He cuts her off, voice flat as a frozen lake. “You want me to meet your family.”
Ree fights the urge to grin. That is not a No.
“This place doesn’t have the square footage for an echo, Hardin. Yes, I’d like to introduce you to my family. They’re important to me.”
They are a blur of red in a frame on her bedside table — seven sisters in a ten-year span. Her parents had wanted ‘a few kids’. The gods and IVF had conspired to give her parents what they’d asked for.
“I can’t even name them all, Riona. I’m not sure this is wise.”
“Well, you only need to remember two. Mr. and Mrs. Araby, right?”
He stares down at her, face blank. It’s what he does when he’s thinking something he’d rather she not know yet, but Ree is getting wise to his ways. She shifts, so she’s facing him, joined at the hip with her legs cradled between his. She rests her chin on her hands and folds her hands on his chest. Her hair’s a mess around them — I need him to untangle this for me, or I’m going to pull my head off trying — so she tugs it over one shoulder and lets it tumble over his abdomen. He doesn’t move it, so he mustn’t mind.
“This is important to you,” Hardin says, as his hand strokes her hair. It isn’t a question.
“They’re my family. Of course it’s important. They’re nosy as hell, but they mean the world to me.” She takes a breath before committing to the rest, because it feels momentous. “And — And you are, too. You’re not a secret. You know that, right? I don’t want to hide you. I want to be with you. I want them to like you as much as I do.”
She thinks of Sorcha, who probably would like him as much as Ree does.
“Or almost as much,” Ree says. “I’ll still like you the most.”
“I-”
“Nope.” Her finger rests, light as a snowflake, on his lips to silence him. “My turn.”
His eyebrows fly up at her audacity, but Ree barrels on before she loses her nerve.
“I’m going to say this because it’s important you hear it. You matter to me, Hardin. You matter to me very much, and I want to introduce you to the other people I care about.”
She holds his gaze; he’ll know if she’s lying, and she wants him to know that she’s not.
“Riona, I-” His voice is a strangled squawk.
“If you can’t,” Riona concedes, because he truly might not be capable of this. “I... I won’t understand, but I’ll let you explain it until I do.”
She takes a deep breath, steadies herself with a hand on his chest, and scoots up to press a kiss to the corner of his jaw, the highest she can reach without dislodging herself from her cozy cuddle. When she tucks herself back up against him, she’s sure he can feel her smile against his chest.
“But I’d really like to show you off. Moira’s going to swallow that obscene tongue stud of hers.”
“Oh?” Hardin asks, fishing for more intel. “That’s the one that wanted to see what would happen if she put a bunch of rubber bands around a watermelon.”
“Yes. But at least that prank only hurt her. The time she left a can of surstromming in Roisin’s locker was awful. They had to fumigate the entire school.”
“You’re not serious.”
“She said it was just Swedish Fish, and that school rules said we could have those for snacks between class. That got her an in-school suspension.” He snorts, and she grins against his chest.
Ree shifts closer, tossing her thigh over his hip and bringing the two of them as close as she can get them. He feels stiff as a board with nerves, and she regrets having to subject him to this. Hardin’s a semi-feral cat on a good day, and her sisters are a pack of beagles.
“So we have the littlest. Who’s next up?”
“Yours truly.” Ree replies, and Hardin seems a bit surprised.
“What? I had assumed you were one of the older ones.” He admits, a bit deflated to have guessed wrong.
“I get that a lot. I’m the family Switzerland.”
Hardin nods.
“And who else is there?”
“Roisin’s next. Sixty seconds older and we’ll be off to Heaven before she lets me forget it.” She tries to keep the bitterness out of her voice but some seeps in anyway. “She’s the rowdy one in the family.”
There’s a masterclass in diplomacy in that single sentence alone.
Hardin seems to understand.
“Whereas you are not. I suppose the difference in temperament was difficult.” Hardin’s careful to keep his voice neutral, but Ree knows he’s fonder of her serenity than of Becca’s gregarious attempts at engaging him in conversation.
“She’s the life of the party,” Ree says, and gives an eloquent wave of her hand. “It’s a bit like hearing a beep I can’t find the source of. She’s just… at eleven all of the time.”
Hardin, sensing a tender spot, rubs his hand down the length of her back. “And the two of you are twins. Above that?”
“The triplets.”
“You lie.” He sounds horrified. His body language confirms it; he’s rigid under her, and not in the way she’d like. She shakes her head quickly.
“Nope! Siobhan, Sile, and Sorcha — eldest to youngest.”
Hardin stares at her, but she’s telling the truth. His expression doesn’t change, but Ree can feel his palm go clammy against the skin of her back.
“Siobhan took the Bar — she’s working her way up to District Attorney and from there… wherever. Sile does something for Evie. Knowing her, it’s probably splicing glow in the dark jellyfish genes into fish.”
“Interesting. Is she a geneticist?”
“She’s multidisciplinary,” Ree says, and can feel Hardin’s abdomen flex with a wry laugh at how dry her voice is. “Ro says she’s trying to letter in Nerd. And then there’s Sorcha.”
“The one with the sponsors.”
She beams up at him.
“You remember! Yes! The one with the sponsors! She was so mad at my ‘shitty photos’ when we went to Emerald Garden, Hardin. It was great. And that’s the lion’s share of us.”
“Your poor mother,” Hardin says, and Ree laughs.
“My mother went for a c-section every time and was back in the lab as soon as she could pump. Dad’s schedule was way more forgiving, so we all grew up in one lecture hall or another. They don’t let kids in the lab, anyway.”
“A lecture hall?”
“Sure. Dad’s the Dean over at Columbia.”
“Right,” Hardin says, sounding a little strangled. “Of course. And your mother?”
Ree shrugs. “She says it’s
classified.”
Hardin goes pale; Ree can empathize. Mom is pretty intimidating.
“And your eldest sister — Evelyn? What about her?”
Ree’s stomach plummets. Knowing what Hardin is, no good will come of introducing him to Evie.
“Leave her alone, Hardin.”
“Don’t bite my head off, Riona. At least describe her so I’ll know if I bump into her on the subway.” He sounds a little hurt, and Ree knows she’s been sharp.
“I don’t mean to stonewall you, Hardin, I’m sorry. I just don’t ask questions. Then I won’t perjure myself before a court or Congress or whatever. I know you like to poke at things with sticks-”
“I do not poke things with sticks-”
“How is that the bit you emphasize?! Just — if you see Evie, please don’t bother her?” Ree hates the pleading tone in her voice, but can’t help it.
“You don’t have to ask twice, Riona,” Hardin murmurs, and she tilts her cheek into the flat of his palm. Even when she’s a knotted cable full of frayed nerves, he can still soothe her with a word. “I’ll leave well enough alone. Tell me about your parents. What will that gauntlet look like?”
“Not so bad as all that. Mum’s a bit intense, as I mentioned. She’s very forthright. And Dad-”
Ree’s voice warms. Her father read her Joyce, and Tacitus, and held the biggest bouquet at every recital no matter how small her part.
“You’ll like him,” she says. “How are you with military history?”
“I have a more practical knowledge-base,” Hardin says. Ree snorts. Despite his desert-dry tone, his hands have already started untangling the knots in her hair.
“Thank you, Hardin.” she murmurs, surging up to seal their deal with a kiss. “I know this isn’t easy for you.”
“No,” he agrees, looking as though he’s chewing glass to admit it. “But you are a font of information.”
“Of course,” Ree says. “I want them to love you as much as I do.”