While I was going to teach her how to disappear into the moment.
Then I was going to keep her there forever.
Rich locks of brown hair flowed around her precious face. Her eyes were alight, flames dancing in the depths. She tiptoed across the floor. She came up within a foot of me when she paused, and her chest shuddered, and the tiniest, neediest breath escaped her full, pink lips.
Then she slowly climbed down onto her knees on the rug. As something locked inside her broke. “Logan. I’m not sure I know how to stand any longer. I’ve been doing it alone for so long.”
“Fuck me.” It slipped from my tongue as sure as I was slipping into a dream.
Her throat worked as she looked up at me, as she sucked every last drop of self-restraint from the air.
Hers.
Mine.
I wasn’t sure.
The only thing I knew was I heaved a breath as heavy as stones when she whispered again, “Logan.”
She leaned up and pressed her cheek to the inside of my thigh, rubbed herself there, eliciting an inferno that scorched through my insides.
A whirlwind of heat.
I reached out and traced her lips with the pad of my thumb, urging her to look up at me.
Flames leapt.
Danced and played.
Ready to consume.
“Aster.”
It was praise.
Affection.
A threat.
“Was I always destined to end up right here?” Her voice was a wisp. Short rasps of uncertainty. “No matter where you went, would I find you there? Or is it all a horrible coincidence? A stroke of bad luck? Or maybe…maybe it’s a punishment?”
“Little Star. One tiny star hidden in a vast cosmos. The only one I can see.”
She choked out a pained sound. “Even if I can’t see you, I’ll know you’re there, and I’ll find my way to you.”
She repeated the promise I’d made her that night.
A promise that whipped in tattered shreds around us.
Taking her by the chin, I lifted her face farther. She looked up at me with this expression that slayed me through. “Did you believe it, Aster? Did you believe what I told you then?”
Her throat bobbed heavily when she swallowed, and her eyes filled with the mist of old-broken dreams. “I believed you.”
“But you didn’t wait for me.” The words cracked.
Blinking, she forced out the confession. “My heart did.”
The air thinned, and my blood thundered. This manic crash that wanted to tear its way through.