Wished

Chapter 22

22

Max’s Paris home is in the 16th arrondissement, near Trocadéro. It’s old, beautiful, and has a distinct old-money feel. The sandstone building is as stately as a Parisian museum, six stories high and wrapped in gorgeous iron balconies. Chestnut trees line the sidewalks, and after the noise and color of Montmartre, the quiet elegance of the sedate street sets off a rebellious buzz inside me.

Max’s hand shakes as he unlocks the front door. I shiver at the look he casts me, my insides vibrating, my skin tingling.

When the door swings open I step through, and the lights automatically come on, set to dim. The space is open, hushed, and looks so much like the decorating at the Barone estate that I can’t help but smile. Tall ceilings, chandeliers, ornate plaster molding, intricate paneling, nineteenth-century art, spindly-legged furniture, and luxurious rugs. The marble-floored entrance gallery sweeps into a wide sitting room with velvet-cushioned furniture and a chaise longue situated in front of a wall of windows that lead onto the iron balcony.

The tall gold satin curtains are drawn back, and right in the center of it all, there’s a view of the Eiffel Tower. It’s glowing, lit up like a Christmas tree. A beacon in the night.

Max shuts the door, and at the click of the lock we’re enfolded in a quiet, expectant hush. He steps next to me, not touching me. But I can feel the heat of him; hear the quiet whisper of his indrawn breath.

“When you said you wanted my scream to be heard at the Eiffel Tower,” I say, nodding to the shining lights reflecting off the windows, “you weren’t kidding, were you?”

He’s quiet, and when I finally look up at him I find he’s watching me.

My breath catches and my heartbeat picks up, racing through my chest. I’ve seen that look before. It’s the look my mom gave my dad, right before we took him to the hospital for the last time. It’s the look Dorene has whenever she watches the opening credits of her husband’s movies in the courtyard, the volume turned up high.

It’s the look I imagine I had the first time I saw Max.

“Anna,” he says, his voice a deep, insistent plea.

“Yes,” I say, agreeing to everything in his eyes.

And then there isn’t anything separating us anymore. I drop the bouquet of freesias and it hits the floor with a whispered sigh. Our mouths clash with a violent need. The teasing, fire-lit passion of the Montmartre steps is gone. Now it’s as if our mouths are at war, fighting to win and to be won.

I grapple with his leather jacket. He shoves at my dress. I yank free his belt. He tugs my dress over my head.

Cold air hits my skin and my nipples pucker. He swears and grabs my breasts. He cups their heaviness in his palms and pinches my nipples. I bite his lip. Lick the inside of his mouth. Shove his pants down his hips.

My bra. His shirt. My lacy thong. His boxers. All gone. Casualties in our haste, and in our fight to touch and to feel and to be.

We’re a battle of hands and mouths, tugging and tasting, and I’m breathing so hard I can’t catch my breath.

I trip backward, falling against the wall. My bare back hits the cold plaster and Max falls over me, pressing me to the hard surface. He grabs my wrists, holding my arms over my head, and drops his mouth to my neck, to my fluttering pulse, and then to the hard points of my breasts.

I arch into his hot mouth and cry out when he sucks—hard—then bites down. Then he frees his mouth with a slow pop and blows hot air across my stinging nipple. There’s a sharp, hungry pulse between my legs and I strain against his hold.

He looks up at me, his eyes glazed and hungry. Then he smiles so wickedly my heart nearly leaps from my chest. I clench my legs together at the insistent, needing pulse.

“You taste like sunshine,” he says, “and wishes come true.”

“You don’t like my wishes,” I say, straining at his hold on my wrists, wrapping my ankle around his calf and rubbing my leg down the rough hair on his. I shiver at the feel of him.

“Tell me what you wish for tonight.” He drops his mouth to my other nipple, takes a hard suck, and scrapes his teeth over the sensitive point. “Tell me what you wish and I’ll make it come true.”

I close my eyes, unable to look directly into his gaze. In life, sometimes you run across something so beautiful that you can’t look directly at it. It’s as if the beauty tears at something inside you. The beauty is so astounding, so shattering, that you have to look away. In this moment, with his mouth worshipping my breasts and his gaze telling me he’ll grant my every wish, Max’s smile is the most beautiful thing I’ve seen in my entire life.

The Eiffel Tower, Notre-Dame, Sacré-Coeur—nothing can compare.

He’s so beautiful that I can’t breathe, my heart has lost the ability to beat, and the corners of my eyes sting as tears leak from their edges. He’s too beautiful to look at.

“Anna? What?” He straightens, releases my wrists, and pulls me to him, kissing the salt pooling at the edge of my lips.

I shake my head, my mouth trembling against his. “I’m afraid to ask.”

“Tell me and I’ll do it. Anything.”

I open my eyes finally. He’s waiting, his hair falling across his head, the stubble on his jaw dark after a day of growth. He smells like the city, fresh air, spring sun, and the hand-milled soap I lay out for him every week. On my lips I taste him—sweet, insistent desire.

“I want ... I want a night I’ll never forget.”

He smiles, wide and wicked. “Anna, darling. I’m going to give you a night you remember even into your next life. You want passion?”

I nod. “Yes. Do you?”

He draws his fingers across my jaw and tucks a strand of hair behind my ear. “For the first time in my life. I want it all. Damn the consequences.”

“What consequences?”

He grins. “None. There are none.”

Then he grips my hips and lifts me. I straddle him and he strides through the living room, down a long, antique-strewn hall, to a large bedroom. There’s a giant four-poster bed in the center of the room with a white silk canopy. On the nightstand is a photo in a gilt frame of me and Max at our wedding. He glances at it and lets out a small scoff.

He carries me to the bed, flips the photo face down on the nightstand, and says, “This night is about us. Not that.”

I nod, my throat tight.

Then, as if we’ve both given ourselves permission to let go of everything except the wish of this moment, we collide.

I grip Max’s bare shoulders, press myself against his length, and send my mouth over his lips. He sinks to his knees, hitting the thick rug, and drops me to the bed, my calves hanging over his shoulders.

And then, with a ragged breath, he sets his mouth to the heat between my legs. There isn’t any build up; there isn’t a slow tingle or a throbbing spark. No. The second his mouth hits my clit and he takes a long, hard suck, I arch my back and scream.

The orgasm rips through me, tearing me in half as I come and come and come. I claw at Max’s shoulders and he grabs my wrists, pushing them and me back to the bed as he continues to suck and bite and pull so the orgasm that began doesn’t stop—it just keeps building and growing—until I’m mindless with the sensations tearing through me.

Max’s rough stubble rubs against the insides of my thighs, his fingers release my wrists and reach up to grip my hands in a tight hold, and he thrusts his tongue inside me. He’s rough, insistent, a mirroring of the kisses we’ve shared. When his tongue invades me I cry out again, clamping down, wishing he were inside me so I could feel myself around him.

He’s tasting me, sucking and biting and licking, and I can feel his hot breath as tremors flow through me. I grip his hands and try to pull him up.

But he shakes his head and says, “Not done,” in a greedy, hungry voice. “Been reminiscing about this taste, and it’s better ... how is it better? You’re so sweet.”

He sucks me again, humming against me, and when I lift my hips involuntarily he lets go of my hands and thrusts a finger inside me, then another.

I toss my head, driving down on his invasion. “More,” I say. “More, more, more.”

My toes are curling, my spine is tingling, and the blood pumping in my veins has taken on a throbbing pulse that echoes my heartbeat. It’s as if my veins are contracting and pumping pleasure through me in great, violent pulses.

Max swears as I come over his hand. I scream raggedly again, my voice raw and husky.

The mattress is soft underneath me, the satin sheet slippery and wet from my sweat and my coming. Max lifts me then, pushing me back onto the bed. He presses his mouth to mine and his lips are wet, sweet, and hot.

I’m buzzing, so sensitive that everywhere he touches me I light on fire like dry kindling set to flame. He presses his body over mine, pushing me into the mattress. His legs are muscled and rough with hair, and they scratch my bare legs, sending a shiver over me. His chest, solid and muscled, has a dusting of hair that scrapes my sensitive breasts and just-kissed nipples.

He’s hard, full, and thick. I reach down and wrap my fingers around him. He’s satin heat, and when I clench my hand in a tight grip he pulses and leaps in my hand.

Max’s jaw clenches and he yanks in a shuddering breath as he stares down at me.

Then I gently push him, and he rolls with my touch, flipping our positions so I’m on top and he’s helpless beneath me. He’s covered in perspiration, the wetness of my orgasm, and the flush of sex. I make my way down his abdomen, kissing his taut skin, the line of his muscles, the trail of hair leading down.

And then I lick the moisture at the tip of him. His hips jerk up toward me and he makes a strangled noise. I grip the base of him and wrap my mouth around him.

He tastes salty and sweet, and as I lick around his length his hands dig into my hair, and he lets out another indistinct sound.

“Anna, Anna, Anna,” he says, until my name has blurred into one long annannanna .

I take him deep, the tip of him pressing against the back of my throat, and he fights his urge to thrust and bury himself, holding still beneath me as I suck and lick and taste.

I can feel him growing thicker in my mouth, and as I tilt my eyes up to look at him I see ecstasy on his face. His mouth is upturned, his eyes glazed, and he’s watching me as if I’m his dove, his Heloise, his heart.

I pull my mouth free, my lips tingling from the suction and the feel of him, and when I do, he grabs me and flips me beneath him.

“The first time,” he says, “I want you to come here, in this bed, so that if I don’t remember you, I’ll come back here and dream about this moment. But the second time? What do you want? I want your hands spread on my desk, your ass in the air, as I come in you from behind. The third time?”

“Do you have a garden?” I ask. “I want ... outside.”

I gasp as he sends his length gliding against the sensitive nub of my clit.

“I have a balcony,” he says. “We could open the doors, let the stars in. And in Geneva ...”

He trails off, pausing over me. I’m sure he was going to say that in Geneva he has acres and acres of land with countless spots to have sex for all of nature to see.

There’s almost a flash of regret there, so I quickly press my mouth to his, tugging him by the hair to pull him in for another deep, luxurious kiss.

Finally, with his length dragging over me, he says, “In Geneva there’s a folly in the woods. A ruin with stone columns and a mosaic floor, open to the sky. The columns are perfect for tying someone up and licking them until they scream.”

“Sounds lovely,” I say, dragging my hands over his lower back, pulling him along me.

“It does,” he says, lost in the rhythm of moving along the outside of me.

The slow, teasing build that was lost before is there now. It shimmers and glows, and I reach out to meet it.

Max reaches toward the nightstand, pulls a condom on, and then settles his tip against me.

“Anna? Yes?” he asks, whispering my name.

“Yes,” I say, arching up to him.

He lets out a shuddering breath and then looks into my eyes as he slowly pushes forward, stretching me. I tilt my hips at the feel of him. He keeps my gaze, watching my expressions, reading my every emotion.

He pulls his tip out and slowly thrusts back in, a millimeter at a time. The slow build is nearly too much—I want to grip his hips and pull him inside me in one quick, hard thrust. But no matter how much I tug, how much I roll my hips, Max keeps up his slow invasion so I feel drugged on the pressure of him, on the clasp of my insides around him.

As he thrusts deeper I cry out, clenching, riding on a wave of mounting pressure. When Max feels my muscles clenching around him he makes a harsh, hungry noise, and then his slow, careful control breaks.

He thrusts into me and the hurricane I predicted is unleashed. Max thrusts into me as I come, screaming into the sheets.

“I feel you,” he says. “I feel you. You are the sweetest thing I’ve ever felt. I can’t?—”

Then his voice is cut off and he’s pressing a bruising kiss to my mouth. He grips my hips, tilting me, so that when he thrusts in again he hits a spot that has me crying out incoherent words.

I grip him, coming against him, as sweat runs down his forehead, down his chest, and the sounds of begging and pleading and loving and worshipping blend together in a single wish. More. More. More.

And then— I love you.

I say it first, somewhere in between yes and please and more and I can’t and you can .

“I love you.”

I say it first.

And then, if I thought Max was unleashed before, my words cause an explosion. He flips me over. I grab the wooden headboard and he grips my hips, holding me from behind, spreading me out beneath him as he thrusts and thrusts and pushes me higher and higher. And then he’s off the bed, standing, and he’s pulled my ankles over his shoulders, tilted my hips, and he’s pistoning into me, hitting that spot, and I’m screaming as I come.

And then he’s over me again, his eyes glowing in the lights of Paris as he looks down at me, burying himself inside me. He grips my hands, holding me close, and we’re touching everywhere—touching so deeply I think he’s touched my soul.

“Anna,” he whispers against my mouth, “I was wrong. One night with you.” He thrusts again, losing his rhythm, his words coming out ragged and raw. “One night with you. I’d give up anything.”

Then he reaches down and strokes my clit, and with my name on his lips I light up like a line of stars, like a rivière necklace, like a wish in the glowing fire of a burning candle.

He gives one final thrust—a desperate, needing, shaking plea. I clench around him as he comes, driving into me, calling my name.

As we slide down, our hands entwined, our legs tangled, our hearts thumping wildly, one against the other, Max presses a kiss to my mouth and pulls me against him, wrapping me in his warm embrace.