“I don’t have to be above you,” he says.
“No?”
“No,” he whispers back, smiling.
He runs his hands up my torso, fondles my br**sts, slips his hands over my shoulders and down my back before sliding his hands beneath my bu**ocks and lifting me up. I lean forward and brace myself with my hands on his chest. My privates are hovering above his body now. He moves, shifts slightly beneath me, and then I feel the soft, thick tip of his manhood probing at my entrance, just touching, just brushing.
I gasp in a sharp, surprised breath. “Like this?
He rubs his hands in comforting circles on my back. “Just like this, my love. ”
My love. The words hit me deep in my heart, spearing into the most secret places in my soul. I am his love. How can that be? How could I be worth his love?
He waits. Watches me. Hunter never does anything unless he is sure I want it. He is straining, tensed, needing me. I can feel it in him, taste it the air. I kiss him, taste his need on his lips, in his saliva, on his breath, on his tongue.
Does he feel my need? I need him. I want him. But he is not moving, just waiting, and I think he will not do this for me. I must do it.
My throat is clenching tight, so dry, and I am sweating, trembling on him. My thighs are around his hips, and his taut, muscular stomach is beneath my core, and his arms are around me, his hands on me.
“Kiss me, so I can do this,” I say.
He closes with me slowly, eyes on me until the last moment. I watch his eyes slide shut as our noses nuzzle against each other and our lips touch, and then I am lost, so sweetly lost. I reach between our bodies and grasp his manhood, guide him to my entrance and in, then pause.
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He knows the words I need to hear: “I love you, Rania. ”
He is inside me. I could burst, split open at the seams, for he fills me completely. He is motionless, his hands on my waist, blue eyes wide, soft, loving, fixed on me in that soul-searching way he has. He is not fully immersed in me, only part of the way. I swallow hard and lean over him, slip my hands beneath his head and clutch his hair, press my lips to his throat.
I am shaking like a scrap of paper in a long wind.
I move my hips, withdrawing, and a whimper slides out from my throat. Hunter groans deep in chest and his hands tighten on my waist, but he does nothing to urge me faster or deeper.
When he is nearly slipping out of me, I gather a deep breath into my air-starved lungs—making me realize I had been holding my breath—and then I slide down his body, driving him deep, fully into me, exhaling as he impales me.
“God,” Hunter says, but the word is drawn out into many syllables, a groan as long as his exhaled breath, matching mine.
“Please, touch me,” I whisper. “Tell me what you are feeling. Your voice…I want to hear your voice as we make love. ”
His hands drift up my sides to caress to my br**sts, taking their weight and treasuring their softness. “You feel so good, Rania. Being inside you like this is…it’s f**king heaven, baby. ”
I move again, draw my hips high, so only the soft, broad head of his manhood remains in my privates, and then I pause, waiting for him to speak, for I heard him draw breath, heard the scrape of air past his vocal chords. My eyes are shut tight, and every other sense is tightened like a string across a sitar. I can smell him, sweat, faint cologne, deodorant, soap…and me, my scent mixed in with his. His body is beneath me, filling my sense of touch. There is nothing to feel but Hunter, his hands on me, his legs like flesh-covered stone, his manhood within me, his breath on my cheek as he speaks.
“I love this so much. I love your skin. ” He moves, just a little, his hips ever so gently drifting up and then back down; the slight motion sends rockets of delight bursting in me, and I let myself slide down so his hips bump mine, driving him deep, deep into me. “I love your eyes. I love your breath on my lips. ”
And then I move again. I let myself slide up his length and back down, not just with my hips now, but with all of me, my whole soft body on the hardness of his. He moves with me, just one sweetly slow thrust, and it feels so good I have to claw my fingers into his shoulders and whimper.
“Move with me, Hunter. ”
He groans. “Thank f**k. Holding still like this is the hardest thing I’ve ever done. ”
He scratches his nails down my back and I shudder, writhing on top of him and driving him deep. A small, fluttering explosion billows through me when he is all the way inside me, and now…
Something breaks open inside me when he begins to move, slow gliding strokes into me. There is no fear anymore, no worry, no memory, nothing but Hunter and the incredible sensations he gives me.
“Oh, god, you feel so good, so f**king good. ” Hunter’s voice is a low growl in my ear, driving me to move faster.
I love that I make him feel good. I want more.
I kiss his lips, hungry and needy. Now his thrusting is a little faster, and I match him. I cannot help but move in sync with him. His manhood slides into me, fills me, stretches me, and now I come to a realization.
He does not just fill my body, my womanhood. He fills me. My heart, my soul. He fills the horrible emptiness that has gaped inside me all my life. The moment that he slid into me, I knew. It has just taken me this long to understand the strange feeling flowing in my veins in place of blood:
Happiness.
I let the tears flow, let myself sob. I never stop moving, and now I take control of the pace, collapsed on top of Hunter, my love, my husband, my fullness, and I move like a madwoman, like a woman possessed. I am sliding and slipping on top of him, driving him into me and pulling up and away until he has almost pulled out of me, and then he is deep again.
Our bodies crash together in a perfect symphony, my cries of pleasure growing louder and more desperate, more passionate. Hunter’s voice joins mine, and I love the sound of his voice raised loud in pleasure, ecstasy given to him by me, by my love.
“I love you, Hunter. Please do not stop. Not ever. ”
“I won’t, I promise. Never. I’ll love you forever. I’ll make love to you until there’s no me and no you, only us together like this forever. ”
“Yes, please! I want that, always. Only us. I love this. I love this. ” My words are spoken to the rhythm of our body’s union, crashing together, gliding and sliding away, rhythm like a song, and my thoughts are disjointed poetry, my words are pidgin of English and Arabic, and all I can do is sob above him and move above him and kiss him where my lips drag along his skin and grasp him and claw him.
Heat blooms and curls inside me, crushed hotter by Hunter’s body within me, and now the heat is exploding and spreading and my entire body is convulsing and I am curling into a ball on top of him, weeping helplessly. The way he made me come in the past had seemed earth-shaking, more intense than anything I could have imagined. This…this is beyond those orgasms by several degrees of intensity. I come, and I come, and still Hunter is moving into me, becoming desperate himself now, and I can only cling to him as he crashes into me, ungentle and furious, and I would not want him to change it or stop or be gentle.
“Yes, Hunter!” I prop my hands on his chest and move my hips to meet his, and he is driving so deeply into me I think he cannot go deeper, and then he pushes me upright, gently leans me backward, and I lift up with my legs and he drives up with his hips and he is even more completely inside me and I come yet again, and I have an errant, lucid thought. That phrase of his, to come in reference to orgasm, it is perfect, so right for the experience of reaching orgasm with the man you love. You are not merely finding a physical release, you are coming into a new realm, coming into heaven, coming into him, becoming him.
And then he comes, and I think I have truly lost myself in him. He explodes, and I feel his seed fill me, hot and wet inside me and I love that, too. I love the way he groans wordlessly, almost yelling, plunging hard
and hard and hard, and I fall onto him, wrapping my arms around his neck and weeping, weeping onto his shoulder, body-wracking sobs.
We are still now.
“Why are you crying, Rania? Are you okay?”
I gasp, shuddering with aftershocks and receding sobs. “Yes. More than yes. ” I lift up and roll over so I am cradled by him, palm his cheek and let him see into my soul through my eyes. “I am crying because that was so wonderful, so good that I do not know the words for it in my language or yours. ”
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He sighs deeply and lets it out, clutching me close. “For me, too. That was the most amazing thing I’ve ever experienced. ”
“Do you remember asking me if I have ever been happy?”
“Yes. ”
“I am happy now. You have given me happiness. ”
I see his eyes shine and shimmer, and his arms tighten around me and I see a tear streak down his face. “You’ve made me happy, too, Rania, and I didn’t think I could ever be happy again after my parents died. ”
“We can be happy together. ”
“Yes, please,” he whispers. “I’d like that. ”
HUNTER
We sleep after making love, and I wake up with the most raging hard-on of my life. Rania is nestled against me, spooning me, her back to my front, and her ass cradles my achingly hard cock. She is so soft in my arms, so warm, so fragile and small, yet I know she is strong, so unbelievably strong.
I don’t care who she has been, what she has been. I know some guys wouldn’t be able to get past the fact that she was a prostitute, but that doesn’t matter to me. What matters is she loves me so completely, and she doesn’t hide it or hold back.
I thought I would die of sheer ecstasy when she slid down my body and pushed my c**k into her hot, wet pu**y. I did die, I think. I died and went to heaven, and to remain still while she found herself, while she learned to let herself feel, that was the hardest thing.
Like, ever.
I wanted to plunge into her, hard and wild and desperate, but I couldn’t. And I am so, so glad I didn’t. It took an age, it seemed, for her to understand the joy of making love, for her to open up her heart and her mind and her body and let me love her truly, but she did, and she rocked my world.
And now I want to do it again.
My palm slides of its own volition up her thigh, then in across her belly, up to her br**sts. Dim gray light streams in through the window and gives us a gentle glow of lightening dawn. I cup her breast, gently toy with the nipple. She moans in her sleep, shifts. I slide my hand down between her thighs to the tight triangle and she moves, just a little, loosens her clamped legs.
I’m not sure I should push this, but I can’t help touching her, wanting her. My middle finger reaches the top of her cleft and slides in. Now she is waking up, her eyelids fluttering to grant me glimpses of her chocolate eyes.
“Hunter?” Her voice is thick and sleep-muzzy.
“I’m sorry,” I say. “You’re just so sexy when you sleep, I couldn’t help touching you. ”
She smiles, brushes a stretching hand across her face, groaning as she flexes and tenses her muscles languorously, like a cat. Her br**sts arch up and out, and I slide my hands across them, and then, when she is at the peak of her stretch, I lean in to suckle her nipple, flicking it with my tongue.
She moans, an impossibly erotic sound. I snake my fingers down to her slick pu**y and slide my fingers into her, sudden and without warning. She giggles and writhes, pulling me over onto her. The sound of her laugh, true, innocent laughter…it’s the most amazing thing I’ve ever heard.
I’m above her, poised between her thighs, weight on my elbows, lips inches from hers, and her laughter fades. I hadn’t meant to land on top of her; it just accidentally happened. My c**k nudges her entrance, and I have to tense every muscle in my body to keep from plunging into her.
Her eyes are wide, her laughter gone, but her hands are on my shoulders, still and not trembling. I move to get off her, but she shakes her head.
“No, please. Just wait. ” Her voice is so gentle, so hesitant, so innocent.
I wait. While I wait, I kiss her. She seems to find some kind of courage, some kind of solace in my lips on her skin. I begin at her shoulder, the round arch where arm meets shoulder, and then move to her clavicle, her throat, the hollow between throat and chest. She whimpers but does not move, does not speak. I venture a risk, kiss the swell of her breast, one and then the other, then take her nipple in my mouth and tongue it erect, one and then the other.
Her arms slide around my neck while I kiss her br**sts. Then I move up to kiss her lips, and her hands glide ghost-soft down my back to cup my ass.
“Look at me,” she says.
I look at her eyes. She is afraid again, but I see determination in her expression.
“Rania. You don’t have to prove anything to me. ”
She shakes her head. “Not to you. To me. ” She caresses my ass, small, hesitant circles. “This was Sabah’s place, on her back. I want to make it mine, Rania’s. Ours. I do not want to let Sabah steal my pleasure. ”
We share the silence for a long moment, and then she pulls at me, gently urging me closer. Her small, warm hands on my ass urge me into her. I pause before entrance.
“Are you sure?” I ask.
She nods. “Yes. Just…slowly. And kiss me. ” She touches my lips with hers, and then says, “I need your kisses to make the memories disappear. ”
This time, it’s me. I have to make this perfect, make it right.
I breathe in her scent and kiss her sweet lips. I kiss her with all the tenderness, all the bone-deep love, all the soul-shaking passion welling up in me for this woman. There is so much. I had no f**king clue I could feel this way, this much. It’s like some deep well opened up inside me, and now all the love in all the world is being poured through me into her.
She pulls at my ass, insistently now, and I adjust my weight, spread my knees slightly, and move into her. I enter her with a slowness at once excruciating and delightful, so slow it is almost not motion at all. She whimpers again, high in the back of her throat, and as I slip deeper her whimper is drawn into a moan.
Our bodies meet and her back arches as I bury myself to the hilt inside her, and now it’s my turn to groan. “God, Rania…you feel so amazing. I love being inside you. ”
“Please, more,” she whispers. “More, more. ”
I give her more, but slowly, gently. I try to make love to her as softly as I kiss her, not as if she’s fragile, but with tenderness. I go so slowly that each slide in, each slip out seems to take an eternity, an infinity of heaven.
She clutches my ass, pulls me against her, and I move a little faster, a little deeper. I alter the rhythm of my thrusts, a slow thrust in, a slightly faster withdrawal. She moans, gasps, and clutches me, breathing harder and harder. I feel a sheen of sweat slick across her body, mingling with my own sweat.
“Hunter,” Rania gasps, “I love this, with you. Don’t stop. It feels so good, so right. Please, give me more, a little more. ”
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Something about her words strikes me as unusual, and it takes me a few beats to figure out what: she used a contraction.
I don’t bother saying that I couldn’t stop if I wanted to. I can only move with her, feeling her sweet, lush body slipping like yards of the softest silk beneath me, tasting her lips, her breath. God, I love her. Love her so f**king much it should be impossible, and I love her more with every breath I take, with every delve of my c**k into the heaven of her pu**y.
I love her more, and more, and I wonder how much I might love her in ten or twenty years. I try to imagine it, and my head spins.
Her nails claw down my back, and she whimpers, cries out, and now her legs curl around my ass and she pulls me in, and in, and in, harder and harder. It’s heaven, it’s sweet glo
rious perfection, angel of love made flesh, made woman, whose name is Rania.
Her br**sts are crushed against my chest, firm but giving, and her breath is on my ear, erotic moans, the soundtrack of sex, of love. Her inner muscles are clenching around me, clamping down as I drive in, releasing as I slip out, and goddamn I didn’t know a girl could do that. It feels like her pu**y is grabbing me and letting go, and it’s the hottest thing I’ve ever f**king felt.
I slip my arms beneath her neck and kiss into her oblivion, into breathless abandon; I kiss her until she’s gasping for breath and bucking into me, flung by passion into wildness. She’s an animal suddenly, arching her back, clinging to me with her arms and legs, with her whole body, screaming my name as she comes, and I can’t hold back, can only come with her, and oh, my f**king god, it’s the most intensely purifying experience of my life, my whole body is plunged into fire, into ecstasy.
“Rania…” I gasp her name.
It’s the only word I know, in that moment. All I know is her. Her name. Her body, her love. Nothing else has ever existed.
The war, the goddamned awful memories, the death, Lani’s betrayal…it all is vanished, gone, subsumed in the river of Rania’s love.
She’s still holding tight to me, clinging to me like I’m a spar and she’s shipwrecked, her breath coming in long, deep, ragged gasps, br**sts heaving against my side. Her palm rests low on my belly, inches away from my cock. Her leg is thrown over mine, and she traces circles on my skin with her finger, then reaches down to touch my cock, rubbing her palm along its length, toying with the tip.
We don’t speak, and she plays with me, and then I’m hard and she’s climbing astride me and riding me. She spears herself onto me and sits with me deep inside her gorgeous body, and she rises up and falls down and her long bottle-blonde hair is in her face and across her shoulders and brushing her ni**les. I take her hips in my hands and lift her up, crush her down. I kiss her belly. I kiss her br**sts.
I hold back, tensing, until she comes for the first time, and then I sit up and guide her legs around my back and move with her, sitting up, face to face, kissing, making out as we glide into each other, and I feel the river widen, deepen, her love filling me and making me love her yet more.
THE END
Epilogue
DYEING
DES MOINES, IOWA, 2005
A woman stands in front of a mirror fogged with steam. She has a robin’s-egg-blue towel wrapped around her chest. She wipes a streak across the mirror with a slim palm, cleaning a swath in which to see her reflection. She smiles, a sweet curving of red lips. She unwraps the towel and cleans the mirror the rest of the way.
She smiles at her reflection again, her expression surprised, almost as if seeing someone familiar, someone not seen in many years. She drags her fingers through her hair, cut to brush the tops of her shoulders.
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