CHAPTER 3 — THE ROOM
1062 Words
They talked at the bar for an hour before either of them suggested anything.
That was the part she had not expected. She had expected it to feel cheap, a rebound, a bad decision made in a vulnerable moment that she would cringe about in the morning. But it did not feel like that. It felt like the most honest conversation she had had in months, which was strange because neither of them said anything particularly meaningful.
He asked her if the whiskey was helping.
She said, "Marginally."
He said that was the most accurate review of whiskey he had ever heard.
She looked at him properly for the first time then. He was older than her. Dark eyes. A stillness about him that she recognised because she worked at it herself and knew what it looked like on someone else. He was not trying to impress her. He was not performing.
She found that almost unbearably attractive.
"I'm not going to tell you my name," she said.
"Okay," he said.
"I'm not asking for yours either."
"Sounds fair to me," he said.
They stayed at the bar until the piano player packed up and the bartender started wiping down the counter with the aggressive energy of someone waiting for the last customers to take a hint.
He looked at her. She looked at him.
She said, "I'm not usually like this."
He said, "Like what?”
She said, "This." She motioned to herself.
He settled the bill without making a thing of it and stood up. Then she stood up too and they walked to the lift.
His room was on the sixth floor. It had the city view. The curtains were open and the lights outside came in soft and orange, it made everything feel warmer than it was. She stood at the window for a moment and looked out while he stood behind her and she could feel the heat of him before he even touched her.
His hands came to her shoulders first. His touch was light. Then his mouth found the side of her neck and she let her head fall to the side and closed her eyes and felt her whole body respond to that one point of contact like a current running through a wire.
"Hi," she said softly, which was a ridiculous thing to say.
She felt him smile against her neck. "Hi."
He turned her around slowly and looked at her face in the orange light. She looked back at him and whatever he saw made him exhale quietly through his nose. He cupped her jaw in one hand and kissed her and it was not a tentative kiss, not a first kiss kind of kiss, it was the kiss of someone who had already decided and was done waiting.
She grabbed the front of his shirt.
He reached behind her and found the zip of her dress in one swift movement and drew it down slowly, his fingers trailing the length of her spine as he went, and she felt goosebumps chase his touch all the way down. The dress fell off her shoulders and pooled at her feet and he stepped back just enough to look at her and the way he did it, unhurried, thorough, like he had all night and intended to use it, made her feel more exposed than the dress coming off had.
"You're staring," she said.
"I am," he said, not apologising for it.
She reached up and started on his shirt buttons. Her fingers were steady, which surprised her. He watched her face while she worked and she could feel his eyes on her like a second touch. She pushed the shirt off and put her palms flat against his chest and felt his heartbeat, already faster than he was letting on.
"Not as calm as you look," she said.
"No," he agreed. His voice had dropped to something lower and she felt it in her stomach.
He walked her back toward the bed and she sat down on the edge of it and he stood in front of her and she pulled him down by the belt and kissed him again, harder this time, and he made a low sound against her mouth that she felt everywhere.
He laid her back and took his time. His mouth moved down her throat, her collarbone, the curve of her shoulder. She arched into it. He paid attention to every sound she made and adjusted accordingly, methodical in a way that should not have been as devastating as it was.
"You're doing that on purpose," she said to the ceiling.
"Doing what," he said against her ribs.
"Going slow."
"Yes," he said simply.
She gripped the sheets.
He worked his way back up and settled over her and looked down at her face and she looked up at his and the city lights moved across them both and she thought that she would remember this, the particular quality of this moment, for a very long time.
When he finally moved she gasped and he stilled immediately.
"Okay?" he said.
"Don't stop," she said.
He did not stop.
The room got warmer. The city outside went quiet. She stopped thinking about everything that had happened that night, the party, the betrayal, all of it gone, replaced by just this, just him, just the weight of him and the heat of him and the way he kept watching her face like her reactions were the most interesting thing in the room.
It built slowly and then faster and then she stopped being able to track it. Her nails found his back. He moaned, low and broken, and it undid something in her chest.
When it finally broke it broke for both of them at the same time, crashing and breathless and complete, and he buried himself deep and held there and she felt him shudder against her and she wrapped her arms around him and held on.
He collapsed against her and pulled her close, one arm locked around her back, and pressed his mouth to her temple and stayed there.
She did not move away. She let him hold her. Put her face against his neck and closed her eyes and listened to his heartbeat slow down.
For the first time all night she felt completely still inside.
- Writer
