32
ELY
I don’t get time to talk to Wyatt before the funeral the next day. He insists on sleeping on the sofa, of course, even if it means he looks a little bit raggedy from poor sleep come morning. It doesn’t help that we wake up so late we barely have time to eat breakfast, shower, and change into appropriate clothes before heading to the church.
Saint Francis’s is an old whitewashed building, home to the town’s small but tight-knit Irish-American community. Having never been to a Catholic Mass before, I find myself completely out of sync with all the other mourners: I’m constantly standing when I’m supposed to kneel, and I don’t know a single one of the hymns. I have to force myself to be still during prayer, rather than rock back and forth to my own private rhythm as I murmur the words under my breath.
But I’m not here to pass as Catholic. I’m here to support Wyatt. Although I’m not sure how much he really needs my support anymore—it seems like his family is more than happy to welcome him back with open arms now that his father’s tyranny is taxidermied in that coffin.
Don’t be bitter, I chide myself. Being anything less than thrilled for Wyatt would be asshole territory. And I am happy for him.
I’m just sad for me.
It’s not until the evening, after most of the mourners have left the house, leaving behind their casseroles and lily bouquets, that Wyatt pulls me aside and murmurs, “Let’s get out of here.”
A narrow sandy road leads away from the house, past the marsh toward a swell of sandy dunes. We clamber over the low hills, scratchy beach grass whipping against our calves. The beach on the other side is dark and empty, the black ocean crashing against the shore and washing tiny sea-worn shells onto the sand.
“You hanging in there so far?” I ask him as we kick off our shoes. The sand is cool between my toes, almost damp feeling even this far back from the water.
“It’s not so bad,” he says, offering me a little smile. “I still can’t believe I’m back here. Or that they even want me here. I guess a part of me is still waiting for my dad to come crashing through the front door calling me all kinds of names and telling me I’m no kid of his.”
We make our way across the beach to where the waves tumble against land. The ocean water is frigid, the air tasting like salt and grass.
“So it was just your dad, then,” I say.
I wonder what it must be like to see your entire life totally recalibrated like that. All the assumptions Wyatt had built up in his head about what his mom and brother might think overturned, just like that.
He shrugs and leans over to pick up a shell, turning it in his palm before giving it up to the water again. “I guess so. He was kind of like that. He was…Everyone was afraid of him. You never knew which version of him you were gonna get. Sometimes he was all hugs and throwing balls around in the backyard and making pancakes shaped like Mickey Mouse. Then other nights he came home, and we’d spend the next morning patching up the holes he’d punched in the walls. I swear I don’t know how Liam turned out so well adjusted. Whatever genes he got clearly didn’t pass down to me, ’cause all I did was slowly try to kill myself for four years straight.”
“I’m sorry,” I say. I don’t know what else there is to say. I hesitate to take his hand, even though all I want to do is lace our fingers together and hold on tight. Instead I touch my fingertips very lightly to his elbow, just long enough—I hope—to remind him that he’s not alone.
Wyatt shakes his head. “That was a long time ago. And now he’s dead. No point spitting on his name anymore.”
Maybe that’s why Wyatt is a better person than me, because I’m not sure I could hold myself back. I still harbor enough resentment toward my own family to power a small city.
“Thank you for coming,” Wyatt says after a moment. He’s stopped walking, standing there with the tide lapping against his ankles and his hands stuffed in his pockets like a nervous schoolkid. “Seriously. I didn’t have any idea what to expect on this trip. And having you here…it’s made it easier. I know we haven’t had a lot of time to talk or anything, but it makes me feel better just knowing you’re around. Maybe that’s inappropriate for me to say—”
“Don’t you start,” I warn him. But I’m smiling all the same. “I’m glad. And don’t feel like you need to entertain me or anything. I just want to…to be here for you. The way you’ve been there for me.”
This time I don’t have to overthink it, because he’s the one who reaches over and catches my hand in his. His palm is warm and dry against mine, a little gritty from the sand on the shell he picked up earlier, his thumb rubbing at the back of my hand.
I try to find something to say, something to fill the silence that stretches out between us, but my head is full of nothing but white noise. Wyatt’s eyes are dark in the half moonlight, the crash of waves against the sand a dull roar.
When he kisses me, I suck in a sharp breath through my nose, and he cups a palm against my cheek, fingertips skimming my ear. I can taste salt on his lips and, when I press my body against his, feel his heart racing just as fast as mine.
“I’m sorry,” he says half a second later, although he still hasn’t really pulled back—his lips graze mine, his breath hot against my skin.
I slide both my hands into his hair and keep him close. “Don’t be.”
This time neither of us holds back. He kisses me like he means it, his tongue in my mouth and his hands sliding over my body, keeping me close. The ocean breaks against our legs, and the breeze picks up, tangling my hair around both our faces.
This feels like something inevitable, a conclusion we’ve been racing toward for weeks now. I wish I could pour myself inside his body, merge us into one being. I want to see the world as he sees it. I want to feel the air on his skin, the cold water and sand against his feet.
“Let’s go back to the house,” Wyatt murmurs against my lips, and there is no part of me that has the strength to resist.
The house is quiet when we make it back, Wyatt’s mother and brother apparently off to bed already, exhausted from the long day. We creep up the steps like teenagers sneaking back in after a night out partying, muffling giggles, Wyatt’s hand still laced with mine.
His childhood bedroom is, thank fuck, about as far away from his mother’s as it could get.
“Did you really live here?” I ask in half a whisper, taking in the plain gray sheets and white walls, the books stacked neatly on the desk. The whole place is so devoid of personality that I find it impossible to square with the man standing next to me. The room reminds me of a photo from a Pottery Barn catalog, like it was designed around the idea of a child but never inhabited by a flesh-and-blood one.
“Yep,” Wyatt says, hardly sparing a glance behind him. His gaze is too fixed on me. “Mom changed a lot, though. Degendered it. It’s…a good feeling. Like maybe she really was just waiting for me to come back.”
He slides his hands up my thighs, hiking up the hem of my dress. And I forget all about the weird museum room in favor of kissing him again.
The kiss breaks only long enough for Wyatt to strip my dress off over my head—and then his lips are on my neck instead, drawing a low sound from my throat. He cups my breast in one hand, thumb rubbing over the peaked nipple through the thin fabric of one of the flimsy bralettes I wear since my tits have never been big enough to justify actual bras.
“I hope your walls are thick,” I mumble, face pressed against the side of his head, where I can breathe in the piney scent of his shampoo.
“Oh yeah. Liam got up to plenty when we were younger, and I never heard a thing.” Wyatt unclips the back of my bralette. “That, or he was making it all up. Which might be the more likely explanation.”
I’ve finally managed to get his tie undone without looking. “Please stop talking.”
He laughs but obeys, and by the time he pushes me back onto the bed we’re both naked. His skin is warm everywhere I touch. And I’ve been wanting this for far too long; I want to engrave every second of this night into my memory permanently. Underneath his weight I feel heavy, protected. I want to keep him held close forever.
It’s nothing like our first time. He isn’t that suave stranger I met in a club. He touches me now like I’m something gentle, something worth protecting.
Like he…feels something for me. Perhaps the same thing that I feel for him in return.
He trails kisses down my sternum, going far too slowly. I want more—I want him to dig his fingers into my hips so hard they bruise. I want him to shred me apart with his teeth.
But he’s perilously, torturously gentle. He handles me like I’m something valuable and easily broken. He touches me like he never wants to stop.
“Did you bring…?”
He shakes his head. “This wasn’t exactly on my to-do list for the weekend.”
Heat floods my cheeks. “Oh. Right.”
“Don’t worry, though.” He nips at the corner of my jaw. “There are plenty of other ways to have fun.”
His fingers slip between my legs and I gasp. The smirk on his face is more than enough reward for waiting so long—and the longer his hand is down there, the more incapable I become of actual coherent thought. And when he shifts down the length of my body to let his tongue take over, I give up on staying silent. I keep one hand tangled up in his hair while the other clasps tight over my mouth, holding back the moans.
His tongue is fucking magical, for one thing. He teases it around my clit too well, always not quite close enough. I arch my hips toward him, searching, yearning for more, but he won’t give it. He just slides his tongue between my lips, licking at my entrance, then goes back to his torturous task at my clit. The heat that wells between my legs is unbearable; my thighs tremble on either side of his head, the hand in his hair pulling so hard I’m surprised he doesn’t cry out.
“God,” I groan. “Please—Wyatt—oh god, keep going. I—”
The first climax that crashes over me feels like getting caught under an ocean wave before I’ve had time to take a breath. I’m trapped in the undertow, lungs straining for air, hips straining toward his mouth as I reach desperately for his hand, holding on tight.
He doesn’t stop. He keeps going, slower this time, spending more focus on my inner thighs and dragging his tongue carefully, carefully up my taint and back toward my cunt. I hum and sink back into the sheets, languid and satisfied even as my body keeps rocking up against him. Even as he draws me closer and closer to the edge again.
The second climax is softer, like being rocked in a gentle tide. I’m still shivering slightly as Wyatt makes his way back up the length of my body and kisses me, letting me taste myself on his tongue. My hands feel useless as I rest them on his narrow hips, wishing there was something I could do to return the favor but remembering too well how firm he was in his boundaries last time—no touching him in return.
“I’ve missed you,” I say softly.
He tips his brow against mine. This close, his brown eyes are dark and easy to lose myself in. “I’ve missed you too,” he says, and catches my wrist in one hand, guiding it down below his navel.
My breath hitches. “Are you sure?”
A faint smile crosses his lips and he nods. “I trust you.”
I lift up to kiss him hard as he rocks his hips down against my hand, chasing friction. I want to be the best he’s ever had, the way he was the best I’d ever had. I want tonight to pop up in his memories every time he looks at me. I want him to fall asleep thinking about it. To remember it in the shower. I want to invade him the way he has invaded me.
It’s only fair, right?
I finish him not once but twice; the third time we come together, and then the exhaustion chases us down and tethers us in a deep and sweat-slicked, satisfied sleep.