September Prompt #2: Full (Patreon)

Masterlist

Notes: Surprise! You all were cracking me up so much with the poll last month that I couldn't resist writing a second prompt for you. For future reference, if there's a tie in the polls, I'll probably cast my own vote to break it. So don't keep trying to get three out of me ;P. This is the left out love scene in Chapter 19 of Breaking Legacies, from Ava's POV.

I've also been wanting to write this from Ava's POV since I wrote the book. Part of that is because I literally adore Ava with my entire heart, and this seemed like the perfect opportunity to get in her head and explore her emotions without it being overly dark. The other part of that is because Kiena is potentially the least outwardly self-aware character I've ever written, in that she doesn't pay much attention to/worry about herself or her body. This gave me a chance to present an outside perspective and appreciation for her, and who better to do that through than Ava?

Breaking Legacies: Full

Kiena’s hands traced up the curves of my naked waist, her eyes following their path before she managed to meet mine. “Have I ever told you how beautiful you are?”“You’ve never needed to,” I said, as just the glimmer of adoration in her gaze was enough to make my heart skip. “I’ve always seen it in your eyes.”I kissed her, and the moment my lips met hers, I could feel the breath leave her lungs. The breeze of it hit my upper lip, and her mouth was so hot against my own, so smooth, and everything I needed in that moment was depth. More depth. Unending depth. Her lips parting further while my fingers tangled in her hair, while her tongue slid over mine to grant my first real taste of her.It had been so long since she’d kissed me like this, and it was so different from how she’d kissed me less than an hour ago. Then, there had only been love, and appreciation. Gratefulness at simply being with me again, and they were all things I’d felt too. Now, there was hunger. Need. There was desire so real that I could taste it on my tongue. That I could feel it in the press of her against my bare chest, or in the clutch of her hands at my hips, already trying to draw me nearer.Of everything I’d missed about her, her hands were one of the things I’d missed the most. Her strong, sturdy hands, which were weathered and calloused with life and duty. That were capable of so much power and devastation. That I’d watched take life with a flick of the wrist, or were so capable that they’d given back my life, and yet they were hands that had never been anything but gentle with me. I’d missed the way she touched me so immeasurably. The warmth of her palm cupping my face. The stroke of her thumb across my cheek. The tender dexterity of her fingers when she cared for my wounds or traced the shapes of my body.And they were finally here, touching me again. They were running up and down my back, caressing my arms, admiring the curves of my waist and thighs. They were stirring in me feelings and emotions that I hadn’t felt in months. Things that sometimes I feared I’d never feel again. But I was feeling them, and I didn’t ever want to stop.My fingers left her hair to reach for the bottom of her tunic, and she raised her arms and pulled away from the kiss so I could lift it off and over her head. As I discarded it to the floor, she leaned forward, passing my mouth for my chin. She kissed along my jawline while her hands returned to my waist, trailing pecks around my neck until she finally opened her lips against my pulse. The very moment the moist heat of her mouth met my skin, my eyes drifted shut and my head fell to the side.It was like being with her for the first time. Every sensation was so compelling it was as if I’d never kissed another person before. Never had someone’s lips sucking faint bruises into my skin, so that I could feel my blood rising and throbbing at tantalizing points all over my body. Never had someone’s teeth punctuate a particularly searing kiss, or their tongue trace the spots between bruises as if afraid to miss a single taste. But it was Kiena’s lips. Kiena’s teeth and tongue, and my stomach and heart were in a flurry.This, above all else, was why the last six months had been worth it. It was why I’d do it all again if I had to – for her. I had been angry with her for leaving, and for every day she didn’t come, and for every day my waning hope made me doubt how much she loved me. But she did. I felt it. Oh, and I’d always felt it, and now that my mind was clear, I knew that if she hadn’t left me that day, then we wouldn’t be here. If she’d tried to fight, Hazlitt would have killed her and snuffed out the bright light of our future together. Only, she hadn’t, and he hadn’t, and now I knew it. My sorrows were far from over, but for a while I could forget them because my heart was so full of joy and relief and love that I could hardly breathe.My chest was heaving with fulfillment and blossoming arousal, and Kiena’s lips left my neck to kiss along my collarbone. They trailed slowly and openly to my shoulder, pressed a kiss to it and shifted back inward. Down my chest, across and back up to my other shoulder, leaving humid heat against my skin. She recognized the stunted depth of my breathing, and after kissing her way back to my chest, she set her forehead over my racing heart.“Ava,” she murmured, one hand leaving my hip so she could run it up my stomach and between my breasts, replacing her forehead with it as her eyes met mine. “Are you alright?”I nodded, swallowing hard while I tried to find the air to answer, but I was feeling so many things that it was difficult to even find the words to express myself. Instead I dropped forward, and set my forehead against hers to recover breath. Her earthy brown eyes studied me for a long few moments, interpreting my face and deciding what to do before her hand slid back down my stomach, the tips of her fingers finding the waist of my trousers.It was exactly what I needed. She knew it was exactly what I needed. The very thing that could release some of what was overwhelming me, but I panted, “It’s too soon. I want to enjoy you.”She hesitated, hand pausing its direction while she assured me, “You will.” She pressed one brief peck to my mouth, and then grazed her lips to my ear to whisper, “And I promise it won’t be the only time you finish tonight.”The very idea of finishing was enough that my eyes lidded, and there was a demanding clench at my core. “Yes,” I breathed, pulling back enough to find her lips with mine.Her hand slipped completely under my clothing, and if I thought for a moment that I could’ve waited, I was wrong. I hadn’t even realized how wet I already was until she touched me, until her finger met the moisture between my legs and she hummed her approval into my mouth. I needed this. Needed her clutching at my hip and guiding me into a rhythm as she drew circles against me, needed her lips melting with mine as one of my hands set against her jaw and the other threaded again in her hair. Needed her tongue meeting the tip of mine to greet each jagged breath I let out.It wasn’t just the physical sensations I needed, either. It wasn’t all she gave as I savored every emotion that passed through her touch. The desire in the grasp of her hand at my hip. The adoration in the tenderness and depth of her kiss. The devotion in the stroke of her finger as it followed every roll of my body above her.I couldn’t have waited because I’d already waited six months. Six months to feel how much she wanted and cared and loved. Six months to be touched again by the woman I’d given my entire soul to, and my soul was rejoicing. And suddenly, just release wouldn’t be enough. It wouldn’t satisfy the extent of my desire and yearning unless my body was as consumed as my heart. Unless Kiena was as wholly within my senses as she was within my thoughts and emotions.“Fill me,” I pleaded, and the heat of her breath stuttered against my lips. “All of me.”Her strokes ceased as her hand lowered, and with the next roll of my hips, she slid two fingers so deep within me that the heat flooded through my veins and coiled around my lungs. My chest tightened, forcing such a pronounced moan from my throat that, as my hand left Kiena’s jaw for her arm, she went nearly as slack as I did. She dropped her head against my shoulder, and only the weight of her kept me from collapsing completely forward as she drew her hand back to push into me again.“I love you,” she huffed against my skin, kissing an open peck there. Every time she said those words, my heart skipped, but she said them while she was inside me so that I clenched powerfully around her fingers, and that made her groan into my shoulder. “Gods have mercy, Ava.” She left a string of searing kisses inward along my chest. “I love you.”I wanted so badly to say it back, but every time her fingers hit the deepest place inside me, it stole whatever air I had for speech. Even more, her lips were hinting at their destination as they traveled down the center of my chest and then outward again, and the words I wanted to say were lost to thoughts of urging. It took everything I had not to use my remaining grip on her head to direct her there more quickly, but then she nudged me just enough with her forehead as her free hand set between my shoulder blades that I knew to lean back. I settled myself readily against her palm and let her support my weight, and her mouth finally reached the peak of a breast.Her lips sealed around my nipple, and I was so glad that the pressure of her hand at my back was enough to hold me against her, because the moment the heat of her mouth touched down, I lost even the strength to clutch at her head in encouragement. I lost all strength to do anything but keep moving my hips. To keep grinding down on her fingers so I could take her as deeply as possible.Because she’d never kissed me there before. I’d never felt the pleasure of her lips kissing wet, open pecks, or tugging at that hardened point of flesh. Never experienced the impossibly rough yet smooth texture of her tongue flicking and circling to the measure of her fingers inside me. Never met with a feeling like her scorching breaths across my chest as she moved to the other side, skimming that second peak with her teeth before treating it to her remarkable tongue.If it wasn’t for her hand at my shoulder blades, I’d not have been able to keep myself upright, and after a minute it seemed like her arm couldn’t do it either. Instead of drawing me forward and abandoning my chest, her hand ran down my back. It caressed straight along my spine from my neck to the lowest spot between my hips, and with the tickle of the graze came a stiff pressure and a tingling against my skin. That tingling penetrated so I could feel it thrumming just beneath the surface, filling my body with the faint sensation of a current.It wasn’t unpleasant in any form of the word, but it was so different from anything I’d ever felt that at first I didn’t know what she’d done. But then her other hand came around to the front of me, and I realized that it was her magic holding me up. She’d set a current at my back to keep me there, to keep me near so that she could use both hands and still kiss my chest. Of all the things I’d ever imagined her doing with magic, that wasn’t one of them, but she’d found a way and it was useful and I loved it.It allowed her free hand to join the other between my legs, her thumb pressed against my clit to match each circle she drew with the sway of my hips, and I’d never been so full in my life. Each pass of her thumb sent waves of pleasure crashing through me. They met the thrum of her current as it flushed through my veins, gained in strength with every flick of her tongue at my chest, and rounded back to the roll of my hips, colliding with the pressure that built low in my belly every time she hit the perfect spot inside me. I was so wonderfully full of her. Full of her fingers, and her magic, and her love. Completely full, body and soul, and I could only hold so much.With the next turn of sensations she incited within me, that building pressure finally burst. I hit the peak, and my back arched against the hold of her magic and my hands clutched at her shoulders because I needed to grab something. Needed something to hold onto as my mind went entirely blank of everything but the absolute euphoria shooting through me. My hips jerked against her touch while I moaned so loudly my throat burned, desperate to keep her buried inside me but unable to keep my trembling body still. My chest heaved into the blazing concentration of her mouth while I struggled for the air that each uneven moan tore from my lungs.It was the most acute, enthralling pleasure I’d ever endured, and even when it started fading, I was still consumed. Still released quivering whimpers as I pulsed greedily against and around her fingers, so reluctant to let it end. When it finally did, I slumped completely backward into the hold of her magic, my head tipped back, and I couldn’t open my eyes and I could hardly breathe. I panted for breath as the tension of climax abandoned my shuddering muscles and I throbbed with weakening aftershocks.Kiena’s lips were the first to release me, and she kissed around my chest and neck for a minute before pulling out of me. Her hands slipped out of my trousers, my eyes cracked open just enough to watch her shake her wrists, and I couldn’t help releasing a quiet laugh at the fact that pleasing me hadn’t been as easy as she made it feel. She tilted her head enough to meet my gaze, lips curling into a grin while she lifted one hand to the height of my chest. Her fingers circled once through the air, and then she gestured her open palm toward me in a slow press that began to lay me back.Her magic lowered me until my shoulders met the bed. She shifted, but before climbing over me, she reached for the waist of my trousers, and I lifted my hips to let her remove them completely. Once they’d been discarded to the floor, she dropped on top of me, pressing a few gentle pecks to my jaw and lips before lifting enough to look at me.“Is it possible,” she mused, “to miss doing something you’ve never done?”I lifted one hand, tracing her hairline while I asked, “What is it you’ve missed doing?”She adjusted so she could take both of my breasts in her hands, and pushed them together at the center of my chest to bury her face in them. I could barely make out her muffled voice saying, “This.”I laughed, wrapping my arms around her head to hug her, and briefly pressing her deeper into my chest before letting her go. “I do believe it’s possible. And I dare say you can hide away in them whenever you’d like.”She rose, kissing the smile in my cheeks while she teased, “You may come to regret that statement, Little Will-o’.”“Never,” I giggled.She chuckled and pressed a final kiss to my lips, and then set her forehead against mine. I cupped her face in my hands, cherishing the feel of her above me for a minute before she spoke again. “Is it alright that I used magic?” she asked. “You were so comfortable with testing my control that I didn’t think you’d mind…”I nudged her affectionately with my nose as I nodded. “It was perfect.” And something like relief went through her eyes, so I asked, “What else have you learned to do with it?” She considered the question for a long moment like she didn’t know if she’d learned anything else, but then she lowered her lips to mine, searching my eyes for consent until we met in an open kiss. I didn’t know what to expect, but soon after there was the nip of a spark along my tongue. It was shocking in more ways than one, and I couldn’t help drawing back with a gasped, “Oh!” as my hand covered my mouth.Kiena gave a huff of laughter, looking a mixture of amused and alarmed as she asked, “You didn’t like it?”I removed my hand and licked my lips. The spark and its bite were gone. “I’m not sure,” I laughed, and squinted at her in suspicion. “Who taught you that?”She snickered, but kissed the tip of my nose and said seriously, “The mind masters put me in the memory of an ancestor, and his wife had the same magic.”“Do it again?” I requested. She dipped her head to kiss me, sending another jolt along my tongue. It startled me just as much, but this time I couldn’t help falling into a fit of giggles after. “It tickles the second time,” I cackled.“Well, then,” Kiena said with a smile, “if it’s love-making we want, that simply won’t do.”My eyebrows lifted. “Who says we can’t laugh and make love at the same time?”“Have you ever finished while laughing?”“No…” I admitted, “but we’re laughing now, aren’t we?”“Fair point,” she chuckled.I gave her a joyful kiss on the lips, and she returned her forehead to mine as she settled against me and I curled my arms around her neck. For a long minute, we simply stared at each other, content to laze in the silence between us. She had the most beautiful brown eyes I’d ever seen. They reminded me of the sunset beyond the Guelder walls, not because of the brightness or the brilliance of the sky’s colors, but because of the way the trees of the forest shone in its light. Strong, sturdy pines, whose bark came to life amidst the amber of the setting sun, and sang of depths and details that only the gods I didn’t believe in could imagine. Except for that short time of the day, when they lay bare the beauty of the trees and for those thirty minutes, I almost believed. And I’d never been so near believing as whenever I stared into Kiena’s eyes, while she stared back with their robust color so full of life and sentiment, because she was the closest thing I’d ever had to an answered prayer.“I do love you,” I told her.That gorgeous brown flashed with recognition, and she lowered the smile in her lips to my ear to whisper, “Say it again.”“I love you,” I murmured, humming my approval when she pressed a slow kiss to my ear.There was another to my jaw. “Once more,” she said, and kissed my cheek before finally lifting enough to look at me.I held her gaze, making sure that she knew I meant it with all of my heart when I said, “I love you, Kiena.”And she kissed me, and everything in me reacted with the intense desire to be full of her all over again. This time, however, I would enjoy her. I’d fill myself with appreciation for her until I could make her feel the exact amount of pleasure she’d just given me. I rolled us over, directing her arms upward above her head and sliding my hands along them until I could fold my fingers with hers. I kissed away from her mouth, down the side of her neck to her shoulder, following the path my hands had left on her arms so that I could learn every inch of her all over again.Because her body had changed since the last time I’d touched it, and kissed it. The six months she’d spent with the rebels had left evidence of being good for her. The steady supply of food and regular meals had helped her to put on such a healthy amount of weight, and almost all of it was muscle. I could feel the enhanced strength in her arms, see it in the more defined curves of her biceps and forearms. As I kissed a trail between her breasts and to her stomach, following my lips with my hands, I noticed that her chest had thickened – her breasts were fuller, and beneath them was a more developed brawn. Nor were her ribs the defining lines of her torso any longer, where instead her naval was framed with a lean layer of stirring muscle. I’d always found her beautiful, but knowing and seeing that she’d not gone wanting was a beauty of its own.But her time in the caves had also been detrimental. She was scarred in ways she never had been. There was a healing wound in her arm near the shoulder, and the deeper one across her knuckles. There were a few long white marks all over her upper body, where she’d been slashed or cut with a sword or skimmed with an arrow. She’d been fighting. For me, or for her, or for the kingdom’s people. Whatever it was she’d been fighting for, she bore its marks.One of these scars in particular drew my eye. The newest one. The one I’d put in her ribs even though I’d fought with everything in me to stop it. I’d tried so hard – had never fought anything more desperately in my life – but I’d almost killed her. No. Hazlitt had almost killed her, and it wouldn’t have haunted me so if I hadn’t been able to feel the cut of dagger through flesh. It’s what haunted me most about every life he’d forced me to take, or almost take, and the heat of Kiena’s blood was still fresh in my mind.“Ava,” she murmured, reaching down to cup my face, “don’t dwell if it hurts.” I struggled to blink away the tears that had gathered in my eyes. “I’m alright, Little Will-o’.” She used the gentleness of her touch to guide me upward, until my eyes were level with hers. “You’re alright.” One hand slipped around to my back, running purposefully over my scar as she said, “And never again.”“Never,” I repeated, holding her gaze and soaking in the confident and reassuring vow in her eyes.It would never happen again; she’d made sure of it. She’d given back my peace of mind and proved for the countless time exactly how safe I was with her. Exactly what she’d give and do to ensure my comfort and happiness. I didn’t know how I could ever express the limitless intensity of my gratitude and love for her, but oh, how I’d try.I kissed her, and her lips parted with mine so that I could skim her tongue with the tip of my own. So I could drown in her depths for a minute before giving all the pleasure I could. One of my hands fell to her waist, tugging the tie at the front of her trousers to undo it, but I was so reluctant to leave her lips that I continued to kiss her even after I finished. I explored her with that hand instead. Traced my fingertips over the new lines of muscle on her stomach, grazed the delicate flesh between her hips, teased a touch by slipping beneath her trousers to run my fingers through the hair above her core.I explored the middle of her body until I could feel the impatience in the clutch of her hands at my back. Then I left her mouth to kiss down her neck. I pressed open pecks to the dark and scattered freckles that decorated her fair chest, and to the few across her ribs, and the one beside her naval. I went back up to chart them with my tongue, and by the time I’d licked over the one on her stomach, she was fidgeting beneath me.She’d waited the same long six months that I had, and I couldn’t bear the idea of making her wait any longer. My mouth left her stomach as I lifted enough to grab the waist of her trousers, and I took them off and added them to the disordered piles on the floor. There was no need for instruction. Kiena’s legs parted readily, the glimmering invitation at her center more than I could possibly resist. It was my turn to taste. My turn to overwhelm.Lowering myself between her legs, there was nothing I wanted more. I ran the flat of my tongue straight up her core, and a relieved moan left her lips as my eyes drifted shut from the taste of her. It was beyond my knowledge yet exactly how she liked being touched, and as badly as I desired to indulge myself in the vast moisture beneath my mouth, what I wanted most was more of the sounds she made. The raspy noises that vibrated from her throat. The way she said my name when she was breathless and on the edge of climax.So I devoted myself to discovering the speed and pressure and direction that she liked most. It took hardly a minute of painting broad strokes with the width of my tongue, of drawing more precise ones with the tip of it and then circling until I found just what I was searching for. She seemed to love all of it. She was squirming as her hands fisted in the blankets, but then I hit a place that coaxed her hips off the bed. They rose to meet my tongue more firmly as she sucked in a heavy gasp, and I set to working that spot to make her fall apart.She gifted me with the first raspy noise moments after, but it broke off into ragged breaths as her back arched further and her head fell back. I savored as much of her taste as I could while I focused my efforts, and touched her everywhere I could reach with my hands. I caressed her thighs, followed them up to her hips where I grasped, holding her still for a long enough moment that I could draw more precisely and earn another moan. I ran my palms over the smooth planes of her stomach, feeling the way the muscles beneath them tensed with every quake of her hips and each jagged exhale.However, her hands were clamped firmly on the blankets. Her hands that were always gentle and careful and even still were so reluctant to get carried away. But I wanted her to get carried away. Wanted her to know that she could cling to me in the same ways I did to her, wanted to feel in the twitch of her fingers just how close she was to coming undone. So I reached up to take one of her hands in mine, and brought it down to set it against my head. She lifted enough to look at me, and her other hand followed as she met my gaze and she finally panted my name.Her fingers threaded into my hair as her head fell back again, and her hips throbbed. The right hand stayed where it was, its wavering grasp never straying from the back of my skull, while her left kept brushing back through my hair or moving unruly strands out of the way or cupping what it could of my face. It was so like her to do that: to find a way to express tenderness even in the midst of using the grip of the other to guide me against her, and to keep my tongue right where she needed it. So like her to make me feel loved even when I could taste her want, and I loved her for it.It was only moments later that her hips froze and one of her knees jumped, and my name stumbled a second time off her lips in such a low moan that there was a responding pulse between my own legs. It was a warning. It was breathless and on the edge of climax, and I used what stamina I had left to double the speed of my tongue, and her reaction was instant. Her wandering left hand joined the other at the back of my head as she drew in a deep breath, as her entire body tensed at the peak, and then she was falling over into the finish.Her back curved away from the bed as her knees lifted and her legs folded against either side of my head. Her hands clutched, and I stayed buried there as deeply as I could while she shouted her pleasure. I followed the unruly lurch of her hips as she moaned and writhed and while the combined thump of her heartbeat and orgasm fluttered against my tongue. I cherished the heat of her thighs against my ears and the delight of her nails against my scalp. I treasured the noises she made and committed each and every one to memory.Even after the noises ended and she calmed enough to let her knees fall outward, her hands stayed tangled in my hair. I continued the gentle strokes until I couldn’t earn another beat, and then finally allowed myself to wander for more of her taste. There was a discernable throbbing at my core as I explored her with my lips and tongue. A renewed arousal that grew with every minute I stayed between her legs, or that my tasting made her whimper. And as my own desire was gaining on my focus, and I could feel a similar need in the remaining clasp of Kiena’s hands, it reminded me of a promise she’d made at the start.Despite that promise, I would’ve been content to stay where I was and explore until I’d brought her to climax a second time, but then her hands left my hair to cup my face. She directed me upward with a sense of urgency, her thumb wiping briefly over my lips before her mouth met mine in such a desperate kiss that it knocked the air out of me. By the time I could breathe again, I’d already melted into her. Already lost myself completely to the tangible need in the parting of her lips against mine, or in the way her tongue slipped past my lips in search of my own.She shifted to put us on our sides, pulling me flush against her as her hand found the back of my knee. Her mouth didn’t leave mine once while she pulled my leg up to hug her waist, and I became so aware of the abundant moisture at my center as the position exposed me to the cool air. Her hand rounded the curve of my hip, grasping for a moment at my backside so she could grind her hips against mine, and then that hand returned forward to slip between us.The cool air was replaced so suddenly with the heat of her hand that I stopped kissing her to release stuttering puffs of breath against her lips. It was so difficult to even think while her fingers slid through my folds that it took me a long few seconds to recognize the similar plea in her eyes. When I did see it, I stretched my own hand between us so that I could touch her at the same time, and her jaw went slack as a whimpered moan left her throat.It distracted her so much that her touch faltered against me, but when I rolled my hips imploringly against her hand, the focus returned to her gaze. She met my push with a drive of her own, and there was so little space between us that the rhythm she established was exactly the thing we needed to keep her hand moving against me, and mine against her. And she tried to kiss me. Her mouth brushed mine and her tongue skimmed my bottom lip, but we were both already too breathless.There was something so incredibly arousing about the way we were moving together that it didn’t matter if there was too little space for her touch to be precise. There was something about the scorching heat of her body pressed so near to mine that I felt just as close to her as I had while she was inside me. And there was something about the way her eyes met mine, how her gorgeous gaze locked on mine while her uneven breaths fell on my lips that made it so I wouldn’t have kissed her yet even if I could.Because I could see the very thought in her eyes that she didn’t have the air to say aloud. I love you. It echoed in my own mind over and over, every time our hips met, or I could taste the humidity of her panting on my tongue, or there was a jolt of budding pressure low in my stomach. I felt her love in every fiber of my body and every corner of my heart, and all those same feelings of being completely filled were rushing upon me faster than I could bear. I was peaking already, and I watched her eyes scan my face with realization before they lidded and the movement of her hips hitched.I only managed to peck her lips once before the full force of climax hit us at the same time. I dropped my head forward to bury my face in her neck, to feel as enveloped in her as I could as all the tension in my body melted into bliss. My hips rocked hard and slow and perfectly in time with hers while I whimpered into her flesh. While I felt the vibrations of the deep moans leaving her throat against my nose, and couldn’t help nuzzling into her to feel them even more. This second release was warmer and softer but somehow even more fulfilling than the first.I was so unbelievably comfortable and satisfied, and the thrumming contentment in my veins was so overwhelmingly gratifying that my eyes blurred with tears. I couldn’t keep them back, and they soaked Kiena’s neck as the climax faded, as our hips steadied and the pulsing stopped and she fell quiet. She pulled her hand out from between us to set it against my back and hold me, and I did the same with mine so I could wrap it around her waist, just above where my leg was hugging her too. Then I couldn’t keep her from hearing my sniffle.She pulled back enough to get me to look at her, and while she was clearly surprised, she didn’t appear as alarmed by my tears as she had the first time we were together. Instead, there was an adoring smirk at the corner of her lips as she kissed my forehead and asked, “Do you always cry after sex?”“No,” I answered, but then I released a soggy laugh while I reached up to wipe at my eyes. “Oh, I don’t know… it keeps happening with you.”She chuckled, pressing tender kisses to my cheek, and across the bridge of my nose to the other side. “So long as they’re happy tears.”“They are,” I assured her, sniffling again as she thumbed away a final stray droplet. “I get so full of love for you, Kiena.” And as the smile on her face grew, I felt a heat flushing through my own. “I love you so much that I can’t keep it all in, and it overflows.”She beamed, but my eyes were still blurry, so I buried my face back in her neck so she wouldn’t see. “Why are you hiding?” she laughed.“Because it’s embarrassing,” I admitted, “but I can’t help it.”"I don't mind," she said. Her hand set on my back, fingers absentmindedly mapping the curves of my crow. “If I’m honest, Ava, I find it a comfort that you still love me so much after everything.”I leaned back to look at her, taking in the remaining traces of guilt in her eyes. “If anything, it’s only made me love you more.” I followed a long, thin scar on the side of her hip with the tip of my finger. “I see what you’ve given. How you’ve tried.”She smiled gratefully, and I curled myself into her and felt her arms hug me tight. While she continued to caress my back, I explored her with my own hand. I pressed my fingers into the muscles on either side of her spine, grazed her hip and then skimmed her backside so lightly it tickled her and her hips jumped.She didn’t stop me, though. Not until I’d squeezed repeatedly at her thighs and grabbed at her stomach did she laugh, “What are you doing?”“Feeling,” I answered, rounding her shoulder and cupping her arm. “You’ve flourished with a steady diet.”She smirked and glanced between us as she patted her belly. “Is my diet too abundant?”“You know quite well,” I scolded through a laugh, rolling us over so I could sit astride her hips, “that that’s not what I meant.”“It’s not?” she teased."No.” I grabbed her hands, folding our fingers together as I pinned them to the bed above her head. “It’s attractive.”“Is it?” Her hips gave an involuntary push beneath me, and she was being so wonderfully coy that I was seconds away from abandoning my already dwindling composure.“Very,” I said, and the next subtle thrust of her hips was met with a downward push of my own.She lifted her head enough to pass a deliberate glance along what she could see of my body, and then met my gaze with a less than playful spark in her eyes. “You know what’s unbelievably attractive?”Instead of taking a guess at what she so clearly meant, I unfolded our fingers so that her hands were free, and leaned forward enough to whisper in her ear, “Why don’t you show me?”There was hardly a moment after I pulled back to look her in the eyes again before her hands had shifted out from under mine and set against my shoulder blades. She drew me down into a deep kiss and then immediately let them begin wandering my curves, and now that my heart and soul were content, I wanted nothing more than to satisfy every physical urge that passed between us. I could feel in the aimless fondling of her hands that Kiena felt the same, and there was still the hint of a coy smile in her lips as she kissed me that let me know this wouldn’t just be sating. Like everything so often was with her, the rest of this night would be lighthearted. It would be fun. And I was so ready to indulge in this kind of fun.