Her lips were inches from his. Jisung moved his hands from her waist to her hips, his thumbs pressing into the soft skin just above the hem of her shorts. They were short, tight spandex dance shorts, the black fabric stretched taut over the powerful curve of her thighs. He could span his hands across their length, his fingers nearly meeting at the front. She was always athletic, strong from years of cheer and California hikes, but feeling it now, under his palms—her body was a revelation. Curves people in Seoul paid surgeons a fortune to approximate. As his grip tightened, she moaned, a low, rough sound that went straight to his cock, and leaned into him, pressing her breasts flush against his chest.
And fuck, she had great breasts. Real, full, straining against the thin cotton of her t-shirt. He was losing it. The careful control he wore on stage, in interviews, was gone, stripped away by her confession and the heat of her in his lap. He needed to see her. All of her. But more than that, he needed this to go slow. He’d waited two years, a lifetime. He wouldn’t rush it now.
“Kelsey,” he breathed, his voice ragged.
“Hmm?”
Her eyes were half-lidded, her green gaze fixed on his mouth. She shifted her weight, grinding down against the hard ridge of his erection, and he hissed, his fingers digging into her hips to still her.
“Slow,” he managed. “I need… I need to take my time.”
She went still, her expression softening from dazed hunger to something more tender. “Okay.”
He leaned forward, capturing her mouth again, but this kiss was different. Not the frantic, years-pent explosion from minutes before, but deep, searching. He tasted the coffee on her tongue, the unique, familiar sweetness that was just her. One hand slid up her spine, under her shirt, tracing the knobs of her vertebrae. The other came up to cradle her jaw, his thumb stroking the apple of her cheek. He poured every unsaid thing into that kiss—the loneliness of hotel rooms, the hollow ache of seeing her name pop up on his phone when he was an ocean away, the sheer, terrifying rightness of her here, now, saying she was his.
When he finally broke away, they were both breathing hard. The blue TV light played over her face, catching the gold in her strawberry-blonde hair, the dusting of freckles across her nose. He’d memorized that face a hundred times from photos. It was nothing compared to the real thing, alive and flushed under his hands.
“I want to see you,” he said, the words gravel.
She nodded, a quick, nervous dip of her chin that was so unlike her usual confidence it made his chest tighten. He stood, lifting her with him as if she weighed nothing, her legs wrapping instinctively around his waist. He carried her the short distance down the hall, shouldering open the door to her bedroom. It was dark, lit only by the streetlight filtering through the blinds, smelling like her perfume and laundry detergent.
He laid her down on the bed, following her down, bracing himself above her. For a long moment, he just looked. Her hair fanned out on her pillow, her chest rising and falling rapidly, her green eyes wide and watching him. He reached for the hem of her shirt.
“This okay?”
“Yes.”
He pulled it up and over her head, tossing it aside. She wasn’t wearing a bra. His breath caught. Her breasts were perfect, full and high, her nipples peaked and tight in the cool air. He lowered his head, not to take one in his mouth, but to press his lips to the space between them, over her sternum. He felt her heart hammering against his mouth.
“Jisung,” she whispered, her hands coming up to thread through his hair.
He kissed a path to the underside of one breast, then finally took her nipple into his mouth, sucking gently. She arched off the bed with a sharp cry, her fingers tightening in his hair. He lavished attention on one, then the other, until she was writhing, little pleading sounds falling from her lips. He could feel his own arousal, a painful, demanding throb behind his zipper, but he ignored it, focusing on her. On the taste of her skin, the way she trembled when he bit down just shy of too hard.
His mouth moved lower, over the tight plane of her stomach, tracing the lines of her abs. He hooked his fingers in the waistband of her shorts. “These too.”
She lifted her hips, and he dragged them down, along with her panties. He tossed them off the bed and sat back on his heels, looking at her. Really looking. She was completely bare, powerfully built, every muscle defined. And she was wet, glistening in the dim light. The sight made him dizzy. He placed a hand on her inner thigh, feeling the muscle jump under his palm, and pushed her legs apart gently.
“You’re so beautiful,” he said, the words torn from somewhere deep and raw. “It’s unfair.”
He bent, not to enter her, but to kiss the inside of her thigh. She jerked. He did it again, higher. Then he replaced his mouth with his hand, spreading her open with his thumbs, and lowered his head.
The first touch of his tongue made her scream. Her hands flew back to his hair, not guiding, just holding on. He licked into her, slow and thorough, learning her taste, her rhythm. He’d imagined this, in a hundred lonely, guilty fantasies, but the reality was so much more. The way she clenched around nothing, the broken litany of his name and “please” and “there,” the salt and musk of her. He brought her to the edge with his tongue and fingers, feeling her thighs start to shake, then pulled back, blowing softly on her heated skin.
“No,” she sobbed, trying to pull him back. “Don’t stop.”
“Not yet,” he murmured, crawling back up her body. He needed to be skin to skin. He shrugged out of his own shirt, tossing it away.
Her hands were on him immediately, sliding over his shoulders, his chest. They stilled when they encountered the raised ink on his skin. Her fingertips traced the script over his left pec first: ‘Blessed’. Then they drifted to the compass on the front of his shoulder. Finally, they slid down his side, following the long, vertical line of text that ran from his ribs to his hip: ‘Respondent Life’.
“When did you get these?” she asked, her voice awed.
“The last two years,” he said, watching her face. Her touch was feather-light, reverent, and it was undoing him. Every nerve under the ink was on fire.
“This one,” she said, her finger retracing the ‘Blessed’ over his heart. “This is for your career? For the success?”
He shook his head, capturing her hand and pressing her palm flat over the tattoo, over his pounding heart. “No. This one was for you. For having you in my life, even when you were just my friend.”
Her eyes filled. She leaned up and kissed the tattoo, her lips soft and warm against his skin. Then she moved to the compass. “And this?”
“So I’d always find my way back to you.”
A tear escaped, tracking down her temple into her hair. She kissed that one too. Then her hand slid back to the long, vertical text on his side. ‘Respondent Life’. Her touch there was different. Not reverent, but possessive. Her nails scraped lightly over the letters, and he shuddered, a full-body spasm that made his cock ache.
“And this?” Her voice was low, knowing.
He was losing control. Her touch on that particular tattoo, the one that spoke of answering to a higher call, of a life lived in response to a purpose—a purpose he’d only ever vaguely understood until this moment, until her—it was short-circuiting his brain. He caught her wrist, stilling her hand.
“That one,” he said, his voice strained, “is for this. For answering this.”
He kissed her, hard, rolling so she was on top of him again. The feel of her bare skin against his chest, her wet heat against his stomach, was exquisite torture. He fumbled for his jeans, shoving them and his boxers down just enough to free his cock. He was painfully hard, the head slick with pre-cum. He reached for his wallet on the nightstand, pulling out a condom with trembling fingers.
She took it from him. “Let me.”
She tore the packet and rolled it onto him, her touch firm and sure, and he had to bite his lip to keep from coming right then. When she was done, she looked at him, her hair a messy halo around her face. “Now?”
“Now,” he gritted out.
She rose up on her knees, positioning herself over him. He gripped her hips, guiding her. The first touch of his head against her entrance made them both gasp. She sank down, slowly, taking him in an inch at a time. He watched her face, the flutter of her eyelids, the parting of her lips on a silent oh. She was tight, impossibly hot, and so wet. When she was fully seated, she went still, her inner muscles fluttering around him as she adjusted.
“Kelsey,” he groaned, his knuckles white on her hips. “You feel…”
She began to move, a slow, rolling grind of her hips. He met her thrust for thrust, his hands roaming from her hips to her breasts, to the sweat-slicked skin of her back. The pace built, from slow and deep to something more urgent, more desperate. The bedframe knocked softly against the wall in a steady rhythm. He could hear every slick sound of their joining, every ragged breath, every choked-off moan.
He sat up, wrapping his arms around her to crush her against him, changing the angle. She cried out, her nails digging into his shoulders, scoring lines over his tattoos. “There, right there, don’t stop.”
He was close, so close, the pressure coiling tight at the base of his spine. But he needed her to come first. He reached between them, finding her clit with his thumb, circling it in time with his thrusts. It only took three strokes. She shattered with a broken scream, her body clamping down around him in rhythmic pulses that milked him, dragged his own orgasm out of him. He came with a guttural shout, burying his face in the curve of her neck, pumping into her until he was spent and empty.
They collapsed back onto the bed, a tangled heap of limbs. He held her, his face still pressed into her skin, breathing her in. Her heart was still racing against his. Slowly, the world came back—the sound of a distant siren, the feel of the cool sheet under his back, the weight of her, perfect, on top of him.
He didn’t want to move. Ever. But he had to take care of her. Reluctantly, he shifted, disposing of the condom before gathering her back into his arms. She curled into his side, her head on his chest, her hand splayed over the ‘Blessed’ tattoo. They didn’t speak. The silence was full, heavy with everything that had just happened, everything that had been said and done.
He pressed a kiss to the top of her head. Her hair smelled like her shampoo and sweat and sex. It was the best smell in the world. Outside, Los Angeles hummed, indifferent. In here, in the dark of her room, with her breath evening out against his skin, Jisung felt something slot into place inside his chest, something that had been loose and rattling for years. It was quiet. It was certainty.