April Prompt: Next Step (Patreon)

Masterlist

Notes:

I have been wanting to write this prompt forever, so thank you all for voting for it and thanks to the person/people who requested it. The prompt is a marriage proposal (celebration sex included). I posted a short piece of them moving in together to preface this, if you want to you can read that here. This proposal takes place a few years after Interference, is from Taylor's POV, and there's nothing I can say that you won't read in this one shot, so enjoy :).

Interference: Next Step

Standing at center rink, I took in a deep breath, letting it out again slowly to try and calm my nerves. It didn’t work. My hands were clammy and trembling around the little black box in them, my heart was pounding so fast I could feel the pulsing of it in my ears, and my stomach was fluttering so anxiously that I might actually be sick if I had to wait much longer. Jordan should be here any minute, and we’d been together for three years now and I knew she wanted to marry me. We’d talked about it, but what if she actually got here and saw me with the ring, and decided she really wasn’t ready? What if she said ‘no’ in front of her family, and Mitch, who were sitting on the player's bench only a short distance away?

But I’d planned it all out as intricately as I could. For starters, today was our three-year anniversary. I’d told her I had fun dinner plans for us, but that she had to come get me at the rink first because Mitch was being stubborn about letting me leave early. In reality, he’d closed the place down a couple of hours ago so I could prepare. I’d tried to dress a little nicer than usual too. I had on my hooded black leather jacket and a fancy V-neck shirt. I’d even ironed my blue jeans and wore my best pair of sneakers. Victoria had approved when she arrived, and best of all, she’d given me thumbs up on a wearing a hat because ‘at least you did your hair’ and ‘it’d be weirder if you weren’t wearing one.’

As far as the rink went, all the lights were off except for the scoreboard, which flashed today’s month and day in the score boxes, and the year we’d first got together in the time box. From the door of the rink to where I was standing in the middle of the face off circle, I’d stretched out a red carpet and lined it with tea candles, which went around to enclose the face off circle too. A string of white lights went around the entire glass of the rink, a string on top and another where the glass met the boards. The nets had been pulled nearer to the center, and so many red roses had been laced through the holes that it looked like a curtain of flowers behind me. I even knew exactly what I wanted to say... though, at this point I was so nervous that I wasn’t sure I’d remember. Maybe I should’ve written it down…

As I stood there feeling weak in the knees, I saw Victoria come sprinting through the rink door. “She’s here,” she said, leaping over the candles and practically skidding to a halt in front of me. “You ready?” I gave an uneasy nod while she took in the look on my face and reached up to straighten my hat, eventually flipping it around backward while mumbling something about kissing. “You got this,” she encouraged, moving to the hood of my jacket to fix it over my shoulders. “She was ready for it a year ago. Deep breath.” I took another deep breath, and Victoria patted me on the shoulder and then hurried past me to sit with everyone else on the bench.

It felt like forever. I hadn’t let out that breath I’d inhaled, and it took so long for anything to happen that I started getting lightheaded. Every second waiting for Jordan to reach us on the back rink was torture. I knew she was ready for this. We both were, but this was so big that I couldn’t help thinking about everything that might go wrong. I could completely forget what I was going to say, or be so nervous by the time she finally got here that I wouldn’t be able to say anything. I could drop the ring and lose it because I was shaking so badly. It was nearly impossible, but I was getting so anxious that the idea of accidentally knocking the nets over into the candles and setting everything on fire crossed my mind too. Surely it could have only been a couple of minutes, but it felt like it took so long that I started worrying Jordan had seen all the lights off and thought nobody was here.

I nearly pulled out my cellphone to make sure she wasn’t trying to get a hold of me when I heard her voice call, “Taylor?” There was a collective gasp of anticipation from everyone behind me.

Then I saw her through the glass. She rounded the side of the rink, and her pace visibly slowed as she took in all the lights surrounding the boards. I’d told her our dinner plans would be casual, but I couldn’t help staring at her as she reached the door, because she’d still put effort into getting ready. She was wearing a long sleeved flannel shirt – the one she knew was my favorite because the blue and green in it brought out her eyes – and the sleeves were rolled up to her elbows. She had on her nice pair of black jeans with black heels. And her hair. Her long blond hair was curled so the ringlets fell over her shoulders in waves. And I knew she’d put effort into getting ready, but she made it look so effortless, and she was so gorgeous and I was in complete awe that I was about to ask her to marry me.

Her eyes widened as she reached the door, and she stopped at the entrance when she caught me staring at her, and she realized what was happening and her hand reached up to clutch at the side of the glass for support. It was so silent that I could hear her murmur a shocked ‘oh my god’ as a growing smile reached her lips, and in spite of the joy already brightening her expression, I needed to do this before I did something like forget how to breathe again. I motioned her forward, squeezing the box in my hand and swallowing down the nervous lump in my throat.

Jordan started forward along the red carpet, her hand moving to cover her mouth as she whispered ‘oh my god’ to herself over and over again. She finally reached where I was standing, still looking so shocked that she just stared at me, but her eyes filled with tears when I dropped to one knee. That smile on her face widened to a grin, and while her hand lowered to her chest, I noticed that she was trembling too.

“Jordan,” I started, gazing up into her tear-filled blue eyes, trying to commit that wonder-filled look to memory. “When we met three years ago, well… our teams were rivals.” Her lips twitched like she wanted to smile even bigger but couldn’t. “I distinctly remember you hit me,” I teased, “you really knew how to make an impression…” She let out a soggy laugh, and she looked so happy and surprised and beautiful that I could feel my own eyes blurring. “Back then we were both closed off and afraid, but that never stopped you, and you opened me up to a love that I never thought I’d have.” I paused to blink away the moisture in my eyes. “I found that love in you, and you’re it, and you’re forever, and I want to spend every day for the rest of my life showing you exactly how grateful I am for you.” I held the black box out in front of me, and opened it up to present the ring. My mother’s ring. The ring I’d been saving years and years for this exact moment. “Jordan, will you marry me?”

Jordan was so happy that she laughed, but she was crying too and a sob broke through, and she wiped the back of her hand over her cheek as she nodded. “Yes,” she cried, giving me her left hand while I pulled the ring out of the box, and she kept nodding. “Yes. Yes. Yes.”

I was shaking so much that it really was hard not to drop the ring, but I managed to stand and get it on her finger while everyone behind us clapped and cheered. Then I wrapped my arms around her waist, pulling her into a tight hug.

“I love you,” she said, sniffling as she squeezed me around the neck.

I pulled back just enough to kiss her, but I could feel in it just how big the smile on her face was, and I was grinning bigger than I ever had, so it was clumsy and I stopped kissing her to laugh, “Love you too.”

“And I love you too!” Victoria shouted, throwing her arms around both of us with her entire weight, so that it nearly knocked us over. She let me go to grab Jordan, hugging her and rocking her back and forth in her excitement, clearly proud to see her best friend get engaged. “Were you surprised?” she asked Jordan as she let go.

Jordan nodded, taking in a breath and wiping the last of the joyful tears from her eyes. “I had no idea.” While the rest of her family strode over, she finally stopped to look around the rink. She took in the candles and the roses, with the corners of her mouth twitching like it was starting to get tiring smiling like she was. But then she noticed the scoreboard with our anniversary on it, and she laughed and pointed and drew me into another tight hug. “It’s beautiful. So perfect.”

She let me go, and because her family was standing there, she moved over to give them all hugs too. She finished hugging Justin, and he immediately ran over to me, throwing his arms around my hips. At seven years old, he was tall enough now that I only had to lean over a little bit in order to hug him back, but I was too excited. I knelt down and stood back up with him dangling from my arms, hugging him tight.

“Hey, Uncle Justin,” I said while I squeezed him, and he set to laughing at that like he did every time we called him it. Jamie was pregnant, and he found it hilarious that he was going to be an uncle soon when all of his aunts and uncles were middle aged.

Once I’d set Justin down again, Mitch’s hand set on my back, and I turned around to look at him. “Congrats, kid,” he said, pulling me into an embrace. His arms circled my shoulders tight enough that I could barely breathe, and he didn’t let go for a long minute. When he finally did, it was with a sniffle, and he was blinking fast like he didn’t want me to see it.

“Are you going to cry?” I asked, trying not to laugh at him.

“He already cried,” Vic teased.

“You know what,” Mitch told her, smiling, “I’ll let that one slide.” He grabbed me to hug me again. “I might've cried a little bit.” And I couldn’t help but laugh as I embraced him in return. “I’m just so happy for you.”

“Thanks,” I said, squeezing him and trying not to get teary-eyed again too. Mitch was like a father to me, and I was already way too happy without knowing how emotional this entire thing was making him.

The next hour passed by in a blur. I was too overjoyed and still on a rush of adrenaline from being so nervous, and I couldn’t focus on who I was talking to or what we said. I couldn’t even remember what I’d said to Jordan when I proposed, or if I’d said everything I’d intended to. Everyone was smiling and talking and congratulating us all at once, and all I could really think about was how beautiful Jordan looked. How happy. Her smile was the biggest one of the group, and I couldn’t imagine that her cheeks weren’t completely numb because there wasn’t a moment I looked at her that she wasn’t grinning. I’d done that. I’d made her this happy, and that made me happy.

Before I knew it, we were in the car, pulling out of the rink parking lot to go home and spend the rest of our anniversary alone – even Jamie and Cameron had volunteered to watch Taz for the night so we’d have no distractions. Jordan leaned over the middle console the moment after we got onto the street, pecking rapid kisses over every inch of my face that she could reach. Her mouth met my cheek and the side of my chin and my neck. She even managed to kiss around my ear after nudging my hat up with her nose, and every time her lips touched down, my stomach fluttered with giddy excitement.

“You have no idea how nervous I was,” I told her, almost feeling embarrassed about it now, because she was so happy that she was hardly even in her seat anymore.

“Why?” she laughed, kissing the corner of my mouth. “You had to know I was going to say yes.”

“I mean, yeah,” I answered, trying to catch her lips with my own, but she purposefully kissed back along my jawline, and I couldn’t follow if I was going to keep my eyes on the road. “I just wanted everything to be perfect, and then I guess I was kind of scared you’d change your mind about being ready.”

She released an amused huff against my cheek. “You know how you said that you want to spend every day for the rest of your life showing me how grateful you are?”

“Is that what I said?” I asked, and she deadpanned at me like she thought I was teasing. “No seriously, I was so nervous that I don’t remember.”

“Yeah,” she chuckled, “that’s what you said.” She pecked me on the side of the nose. “Anyway, I feel the same way.” She shrugged, leaning her head against mine. “It’s been years, Taylor, and I can’t remember the last time I ever doubted this. You’re it. You’re forever.” I couldn’t help it that my mouth curled into a massive grin, and when Jordan saw it, she set to kissing me everywhere all over again. “Best,” she said, punctuating it with a peck to my cheek, “anniversary,” another kiss to my jaw, “ever.” She pressed a slower, more open kiss to my neck, reaching around the other side of it with her hand to press her fingers into the tense muscles there. “And you can start relaxing now – I said yes.”

Somehow, my grin widened even more. “You did say yes.”

She hummed her agreement, trailing her lips back up my neck and along my jaw while she asked, “So what other plans do we have for tonight?” But her lips got so close to my mouth, and her kisses weren’t quick and excited anymore. They were soft and stirring. I tried to turn my head and kiss her properly, but she set the backs of her fingers against my chin and turned me forward again. “Eyes on the road,” she said, a smile in her voice even though I couldn’t see it. “Plans?”

Her open lips moved back down to my neck, and though they were gentle and easy, they were just wet enough to stimulate my imagination. She was doing it on purpose. She was teasing. “I only have one plan for you if you keep kissing me like that,” I told her.

In response to that, her teeth grazed my skin, and I could feel the skim of her tongue just behind her lips, but she still feigned innocence. “Kissing you like what?”

“You know exactly what you’re doing,” I laughed, and though her lips thinned against my flesh with a smile, she didn’t stop. It was distracting enough already without her hands doing anything, but then she slid one over my knee. Three years. We’d been together three years and she could still get rises out of me by hardly trying, and I was already on the verge of melting. “And in a moving vehicle,” I teased, trying to hold onto the shreds of composure I could feel slipping away. “So irresponsible.” There was no laugh this time, and her lips sealed around my earlobe as her hand started up my thigh. “J-Jordan?”

She hummed curiously against my ear, but her mouth was so hot and I could feel the texture of her tongue every time she tugged gently at my earlobe, and it sent such a sweet flood of warmth through my core that I didn’t want to protest. Her hand slid further up my thigh, and instead of sticking with what reluctance I had left, I let my knee shift outward. I gave her space to slide her hand as far up as she wanted to. Only, she didn’t. As her lips left my ear to kiss down my neck, she skipped the topmost part of my thigh and went straight up to my collarbone. Her hand met the skin exposed by the low cut of my V-neck shirt, but while her mouth clamped down over my pulse point, she traced the edge of my shirt with the tip of her finger.

It was such a contrast, such a delicious pull that I didn’t know which feeling to react to. I didn’t know whether to tilt my head to the side to offer more of my neck, to encourage the suction of her mouth and the occasional nip of her teeth, or whether to lean further into the seat, arch my shoulders back so her hand would take the invitation and stop being so painfully light. Because I loved her mouth. Loved the heat of it and how I could just imagine what her full lips looked like against my throat, because I’d watched her kiss me this same way so many times in other places. My wrist. My hip. My inner thigh. With the tip of her tongue touching down just enough to fill me with need. But her finger was grazing the skin of my chest in the most teasing way. Tracing under the edge of the fabric on its way down, and stopping at the bottom of the V just before reaching the dip between my breasts to let me know that she was thinking about it. To let me know that she was well aware she could easily slip her hand down my shirt, and that I wanted her to.

After another few moments, it didn’t matter how conflicted I was. She coaxed a reaction out of me anyway. Her finger reached the bottom of the V and skipped further to my stomach, and she let her entire palm touch down as she slid back up on one side, purposefully massaging me through my clothing. Even through my shirt and bra, it was still stimulating enough that an approving hum left my throat.

Jordan lifted her lips from my neck, grazing the tip of her finger inward along my collarbone. “Are you still watching the road?” she asked, kissing up to the spot where my jaw met my ear. I nodded that I was. In response to it, Jordan’s hand slipped down again, this time working into my shirt and beneath my bra. I drew in a pleased breath the very moment she cupped my breast, but then she adjusted so the stiff point of my nipple was between two of her fingers. I felt the stimulating pressure with the first knead she gave, and struggled to keep my eyes from fluttering closed. “How about now?”

I already had both hands on the wheel, but tightened my grip out of determination as I laughed breathily, “You’re such a tease.” At least we were almost home, because I wasn’t sure how much more I could take before pulling over. Only a few minutes now, and then I could take her in the house and focus entirely on her.

Jordan seemed to realize we were almost home too, because she devoted all her attention to doing as much as she could before we got there. Her mouth resumed kissing and nipping and sucking at every inch of my neck she could reach. Her hand groped and massaged and pinched so perfectly that the pleasure traveled straight through my chest, past my stomach to settle between my legs. My breathing was getting heavy with how good it felt and the strain of not losing myself to it, and I was shifting restlessly in my seat. I wanted so badly to touch her, to kiss her and press myself against her and feel her body against mine. I needed friction. And not just the kind of friction I was getting with her hand down my shirt.

We were just turning into the parking lot of our apartment complex when Jordan’s hand left, and it fell to my hips to grab the button of my jeans and that’s the kind of friction I needed. I really didn’t care anymore that we were in the car. The moment I pulled into our parking spot, I turned the keys to shut the car off, leaving them in the ignition because I was too impatient to even unbuckle my seatbelt. Jordan managed to get hers off before I leaned across the center console, finally taking her lips in a proper kiss. She met me just as eagerly, pushing hard every time I leaned in to kiss her deeper, working me back into my seat.

My shoulders met the backrest, and I wanted her to climb over. I wanted her near me or on me or in me, I didn’t care which, but she grabbed the keys and pulled them out of the ignition the very same moment she stopped kissing me. “See you inside,” she snickered, throwing open the door and slamming it closed behind her as she ran toward our apartment.

I sat there, completely dazed for all of a second before realizing what just happened. Then I threw open the door, forgetting I hadn’t taken my seatbelt off and getting jerked back into the car when I tried to jump out. I clumsily slid out of the belt and hit the lock, throwing the door closed behind me and sprinting toward our apartment. Jordan had just gotten the house keys into the lock when I reached her, and she was laughing and breathing heavily as I wrapped my arms around her from behind.

“You’re such a freaking tease,” I accused on a laugh of my own.

She turned the handle so fast that we both stumbled through the door, and it’d barely shut behind us when she turned in my arms and pushed me back into it. Her arms wrapped around my neck, and her open mouth met mine in a deep, earnest kiss as her tongue slipped past my lips. Sex had never been the most important thing to me about our relationship. It had always come after our friendship, and Jordan’s comfort. But this, feeling exactly how much she trusted me after all this time in how little restraint she showed, that was important. That trust was the foundation of everything we were, and that’s what made moments like this so rewarding.

Jordan’s lips left mine just long enough for her to pant, “No more teasing,” and then they were back and her hands were everywhere. She grabbed the opening of my jacket just to push it back down my shoulders, but was too impatient to take it all the way off. I did it myself as her hands ran flat up my chest, cupped my face just long enough to pull me deeper into the kiss, and then dropped back down to grab at my waist and hips while we both simultaneously kicked out of our shoes. I couldn’t lean my head back against the door with my hat on, so I took it off and set it backward on Jordan’s head, and she took the opportunity to reach for the bottom of my shirt.

With one fluid motion, she pulled it up and off, discarding it to the floor as her hands met my bare stomach. We were both breathing so hard with excitement that we could barely keep kissing, but the sweet taste of her tongue every time it slid over mine was too good to give up. I pulled Jordan’s hips more firmly against me, and then reached for the first button of her flannel to finally let my own hands get involved. She set her palms against the door on either side of my head to lean forward, to keep kissing me and grinding herself against me while I struggled with the overabundance of buttons, and the roll of her hips felt so amazing that I almost didn’t care about getting her shirt off. All I wanted to do was lay her down and slip my hand between her thighs and let her keep moving like that.

By the time I undid the last button of her flannel, I was too eager to take it off. I reached down for the one on her jeans, undoing it as she pulled me away from the door. Her lips never left mine as I guided her backward toward the couch. Those extra steps to the bedroom were just too far, and there wasn’t a word or sound of protest when she realized which direction we were going. She dropped onto the cushions the moment her calves hit it, dragging me down so I had to bend over to keep kissing her because I wasn’t ready to sit or lie down yet. Not before I grabbed the hem of her jeans, and she readily lifted her hips so I could pull them and her underwear at once down her thighs, over her knees, past her ankles, until they were another small pile on the floor.

It had been my full intention to drop to my knees and indulge my tongue with other parts of her, but before I could, she pulled me forward and over her lap so I was straddling her. Her lips left mine to meet the upper part of my chest as her hands wrapped around my back, and I knew what was coming. And I was completely willing to delay giving for this. For the moment Jordan undid the clasp of my bra and added it to the pile of her jeans on the floor. For the feel of her kissing a trail down my chest, and between my breasts, and outward until she’d reached the center of one. For the way her scorching mouth sealed around the same nipple she’d been teasing in the car.

She sucked it past her lips, holding it there to work it with her tongue while she took my other breast in her hand. The next stunted breath I let out carried a low moan, and my fingers were itching with impulses. I wanted to touch and grip and urge as I moved against her, but she didn’t like her head being grabbed when she was doing things with her mouth. So one of my hands went up to thread through my own hair while my other set over the one she was touching me with. I squeezed her hand every time she pressed with it to encourage the kneading, slid my palm up her forearm every time she let go just enough to tease my nipple with her thumb. My fingers slipped back through my own hair, pushing it out of the way as I looked down so I could watch. So I could see how each heavy breath I took pulsed me against the heat of her mouth.

After a minute, I couldn’t take just watching anymore. Her hips were moving beneath me in rhythm with every flick of her tongue, and they were bare and if I didn’t find something to do with my own mouth I’d lose it. I leaned back enough to pull myself away from her lips, and she took the hint and lifted her chin so I could kiss her again. I finally took the opportunity to touch her stomach, to run my hands over her chest and underneath her open flannel to touch her shoulders. Her hands were all over my back, clutching and pressing to bring me even closer, slipping down and under my clothing to grab at the bare skin of my backside. She was everywhere and I loved it.

But then her hands came forward, a finger tracing just beneath the hem of my underwear, and I knew she was getting ready to take this further. “You first,” I panted against her lips, and when she nodded, I pushed backward. I slipped off the edge of the couch to kneel between her legs, reaching out for her hips to bring her forward and closer to the edge. She scooted toward me willingly, letting her knees fall open so I had no obstacles to my destination, and I was so eager and heated and ready that I didn’t care to pay her back for all that teasing in the car.

I dropped forward, pressing an open kiss to her clit and tugging it gently between my lips, but then the taste of her reached my tongue, and it wasn’t enough. Jordan always tasted so good and I should’ve known I’d want more. That I’d end up teasing her anyway because I couldn’t resist letting my tongue glide through her. Letting it slip down to her entrance to gather an indulgent taste at the source, run back up to circle that tender point of nerves, and then stroke slowly back down, punctuating every few journeys with another wet, open kiss.

It wasn’t long before she was writhing beneath me. Her hands were following mine every time they made a smooth caress up her thighs, gripping when I reached her waist as if she wanted me to grab, to pull myself deeper into her. Whenever my tongue circled back up, her hips left the couch, pushing against my touch to beg for more. Her breathing was broken and shallow and desperate, and every once in a while an exhale brought a pleading whimper with it.

The next time I fell back to her entrance, she begged in a whisper, “Taylor,” nudging her hips upward.

And I’d satisfied myself enough to give her what she wanted. I focused all my attention exactly where she needed it, in exactly the way she loved. My tongue circled with just enough pressure that her hips wouldn’t meet the couch again until she was done. I stroked at the mid tempo that I knew would finish her fastest, and within moments, it did exactly that. Her shoulders pressed harder into the couch as her back arched, hips rising even further off the cushion as she bit her bottom lip to stifle a yell. I finally grabbed her by the waist, using my hands to hold her against me, so her euphoric rocking wouldn’t drag her away from my mouth as I kept pulsing my tongue against her, coaxing wave after wave of climax through her core.

Her hips hovered even after she finished because I kept dragging my tongue against her, making her shudder with aftershocks for almost a minute until they faded. Until her fingers ran back through my hair and she dropped back into the couch with a sigh. I took that as my cue to stop, and set to scattering kisses between her hips and up her stomach while she recovered breath. Eventually her shoulders left the backrest, and she leaned forward to catch my lips with her own, kissing me deeply while she guided me up to sit again. The moment I was back on the couch, she switched our previous positions. She threw a leg over to straddle me, planting one lingering peck to my lips before pulling away to meet my gaze.

I’d never get over how beautiful she was. There was something about the way she still had her flannel shirt and bra on, the way she was still wearing my hat backward while she was completely bare from the waist down that was incredibly sexy and adorable at the same time. Only Jordan could do this. Only Jordan could leave me simultaneously breathless with adoration and entirely turned on. And I knew what that look meant. Knew what it meant that she’d climbed into my lap without taking my jeans off first, because there was no way she could touch me like this.

“Again?” I asked, leaning in to kiss her neck while my hands rounded her hips.

She let out a soft hum as her head fell sideways, letting me kiss her and caress my palms up her waist for a few moments before murmuring, “If you don’t mind.”

I trailed back up her neck to her lips, and whispered, “Course not,” before kissing her like we’d never stopped.

And when she’d agreed again, she’d meant now. She was already grinding down on my lap as her lips opened against mine, searching for friction anywhere she could get it. I didn’t wait to slip my hand between us, and it didn’t matter that I’d just tasted and taken everything she had to give. She was so wet, and my hand wanted the same thing my tongue had. The source. I didn’t just want to feel her moving against me like this. I wanted to feel her moving around me like this, and I dropped one finger to her entrance, pausing to hold it there so she could tell me if this was one of the occasional times she wanted it.

She didn’t just nod or hum against my lips. She breathed a scorching “yes” into my mouth, and rolled her hips forward so purposefully that she took the tip of my finger. I pushed the rest of the way in, meeting clinging heat and drawing an unchecked moan from her throat. One of her hands set on the back of my neck to kiss me deeper still, her tongue teasing mine into slipping past her lips while her other hand fell between us. I could feel her breathing pick up when she touched herself, but I wanted her falling apart, and I knew just how to get it. The next time she ground against me, I followed the rhythm with my hand, lining up a second finger. I eased it into her, hooking forward the second I was inside to hit that sensitive spot against her front wall.

Jordan’s hand pressed harder at the back of my neck as her movement hitched, and that was it. All at once her hips were bearing down, and she was moaning against my lips and clutching at me with the one hand she could. I could feel her muscles fluttering around my fingers, and there was an almost envious clench between my legs as the sound and feeling of her release made me more eager for my own. Her hand kept moving above mine while I pulsed into her, letting her ride this out as long as she possibly could, until her head fell on my shoulder and she stopped tightening with residual waves.

When I couldn’t work another spasm out of her, I removed my fingers and pulled my hand out from between us, sliding my other hand beneath her flannel to rub her back. It didn’t take long for her to recover, at least enough for her to shift sideways in my lap and push me over, and I adjusted onto my back while she situated herself between my legs. She reached to my waist for my remaining clothing, grabbing my jeans and underwear when I lifted my hips so she could start taking them off. Once she’d discarded the articles to the floor, she set her hands on my shins, sliding them upward as she pushed my legs apart to expose her destination. But her eyes took in the sight at my core, recognized exactly how ready for this I was, and she met my gaze and smirked.

“Don’t look at me like that,” I laughed. “You know how sexy you are.”

Jordan grinned, dropping over me onto her hands so she could dip down and kiss me, and I could feel the smile still on her lips even before she pulled away to look at me again. “It’s like you constantly forget how hot you are.” She pushed herself back onto her knees between my legs, tracing her palm up the center of my stomach. “I could literally work one out on your abs.”

I clenched so hard at the very idea of it that my eyes lidded. “You’re more than welcome to,” I told her, but inched my hips up, “after…”

“Subtle,” she teased, but she didn’t make me wait any longer.

She lowered herself fully, not wasting a single moment before her lips were buried against me. And I was so not wrong about just how little she was going to make me wait, because she went straight for my sweet spot. She used her fingers to push the hood of my clit back, and her tongue made a testing flick to make sure she was right where I loved. I don’t know exactly what feedback she was looking for, but my back arched as I choked out such a pleased sound that it was halfway between a whimper and moan, and she knew my body intimately, and she didn’t wander away from that spot.

She flicked the tip of her tongue against it until the intensity left me a gasping, trembling mess, and then painted flatter circles to soothe out the sensitivity. To let me come down enough that I could feel exactly how close she’d brought me to the edge before inching me away from it. And she wasn’t making me wait, but she was teasing. She knew perfectly well that one was too much and the other wasn’t enough, and it was sweet and agonizing and she was way too fucking good at this. I had to grab something. My arms shot over my head and my fingers folded over the outside of the armrest, clutching so hard that my forearms were burning after a mere minute, but I hardly noticed over the shooting pleasure of her tongue.

She built me up so many times, and I wanted so badly to come but I didn’t want her to stop. Every time she slowed in order to bring me down, I was throbbing as if I’d already finished, like I was clenching with aftershocks when in reality it was need. A need so bad that my body was begging for it. Pulsing against her tongue to tell her what I hardly had the breath to say. But I could only take it for another minute before it was too much. Before not even the soothing rhythm could work the tension from my core, and my abs were coiled tight and burning with the need for release.

“Please,” I rasped, feeling a desperate tremor roll through my spine. “Fuck, Jordan, please.”

She stopped teasing, but she didn’t go straight into the tempo that she knew would finish me. Her tongue slowed again to that soothing rhythm, and it picked up in speed and precision. She brought me back to the edge so gradually that I could feel every tense moment of the build up. I was rising. I was edging. I was there. And then I was falling into consuming, uninterrupted bliss. My head dropped back and my hips left the couch and I moaned so loudly to the ceiling that I knew it would leave my throat raw but I didn’t care. Nothing could distract me from the powerful clenching under Jordan’s tongue as she stopped moving and simply pressed it there. As I came in wave after wave of release for what felt like minutes on end. She’d built me up so many times that my body was relieved. Didn’t want to stop because I’d finally reached climax and it was so. Damn. Good.

When it ended, when I didn’t have a single pulse left in me, I went entirely slack. My eyes stayed closed and my grip on the armrest loosened and my knees fell completely open. I was so spent that I couldn’t react to the gentle pecks Jordan pressed to my inner thighs, or the nips against stomach, or the teasing kiss to the center of a breast, or the trail of her lips up my neck. I didn’t even kiss her back when she reached my mouth, and I heard her laugh as she moved to my ear.

“Are you alive?” she whispered.

Despite the exhaustion, my lips curled. “I honestly have no idea,” I said. “You might have actually killed me and I’m in post-orgasm heaven.” She snorted with laughter, and I opened my eyes to find that she’d lifted to look down at me. “Ask me again in five minutes.”

“Okay,” she laughed.

I reached up, cupping her face in one hand and pushing my shoulders off the couch enough that I could press my mouth to hers. I kissed her slowly while my thumb ran over her cheek, my lips lingering every time they closed against hers for a long few moments before opening again, just basking in the feel of her. After a minute, her lips thinned, and I pulled away to take in the smile on her face.

“What?” I asked.

That smile widened to a grin, and she said as if realizing it for the first time, “You want to marry me.”

“Well,” I chuckled, setting my hands on her waist, “in case it’s not abundantly clear, I am madly in love with you.”

“I know, but, like,” she shoved off the couch, sitting up so rapidly between my legs that she bounced, and I don’t how her grin managed to get broader, but it did. “We’re actually going to do it.”

“Yep,” I laughed.

“It feels surreal,” she said, finding my hands on her thighs and lacing our fingers together. “At the rink I was excited, of course, and on the way home, but I was super stunned too. It’s finally hitting me how huge this is.” She wiggled with joy, glancing down to watch me playing with the ring on her left hand. “Taylor, this is forever.”

Three years ago, that simple word might’ve been enough to terrify both of us. Now, there wasn’t a single hint of hesitation on Jordan’s face, or a prick of doubt or unease anywhere in my stomach or chest, and in the matter of a moment, I was beaming as brightly as she was.

“How do you want to celebrate?” I asked. “The rest of the night, anything you want, you choose.”

She hummed, glancing thoughtfully around the main area of our one bedroom apartment before her eyes lit up. “You know that really good twenty-four hour diner by the Corona rink?”

My eyebrows rose with surprise. That diner was more than an hour away, but they did have some damn good pancakes. “It’s almost eight pm and you want breakfast,” I laughed, and Jordan pulled her bottom lip between her teeth and gave an eager nod. “Sounds good to me.”

She practically threw herself off the couch to collect our clothing, so excited that she didn’t even notice I was still lying there just to watch her, beaming like an idiot about how happy a simple thing like breakfast could make her. About how happy it made me whenever she had a smile on her face. Even saying I was madly in love seemed like a colossal understatement. I wanted nothing less than an eternity with her.