Free Sultry Sunset by Mary Calmes

shoulder.
    “God, look at you.”
    It was him, though, not me. His body was a work of art, powerfully muscled under the deep, dark tanned skin. I wanted to touch all of him. “Holy crap, Mike, you’re—”
    “Michael,” he corrected, and when his gaze slowly and with difficulty lifted from his perusal of my form and locked with mine, I understood how I had wanted to be looked at in bed from the very first time. That… how he was doing it… like he wanted to both devour and cherish me at the exact same time—was it. That was how your lover was supposed to stare, where you could feel the heat and desire and dangerous, razor-edged longing rippling just there below the surface. “No more Mike.”
    He was Michael to me now, as he’d been to his wife, as he was to his family, and I was included, the circle extended to me because I was part of them, the sacred trust he shared with only a few.
    I rolled over on my back, sprawled out and ready for him to do with as he pleased, and when he climbed onto the bed, I reached for him.
    “I’ve dreamed about this,” he told me as he crawled over me, lying down between my legs, his hard, leaking shaft sliding along mine as he pinned me under him.
    “Oh yeah?” I asked, my voice barely above a whisper.
    “I dream about all kinds of things with you,” he rushed out, wrapping his arms under me and burying his face in the side of my neck.
    His jolting shiver made me smile.
    “You needed me.”
    “Like fuckin’ water—yeah.”
    Michael’s answer made me brave. “You were wasting your time on anyone who wasn’t me,” I said as I pushed his thick black hair out of his face, savoring the feel of the cool texture against my suddenly hot skin, trailing my fingers up and down his spine, wanting to hold him tight, never let go, willing myself to not show him how frantic my desire was.
    “I know.”
    He knew!
    “I won’t do it anymore.”
    “Your family—what will they think?”
    “They’ll think ‘If he loves him, then so will we.’”
    Michael loved me.
    It wasn’t right place–right time, it was simply me.
    Me.
    He loved me because I’d been the one to drag him back into the light.
    I was the one who’d insinuated myself into his life, under the tripwire where everyone else got trapped, and danced around inside of his dreams.
    I was the one who made him care about food again and take pride in its preparation, which touched on his childhood and his family and was the reason he was back on the phone with his mother asking for recipes.
    All roads led to me.
    I was it, the man he loved.
    “Did you hear me?”
    The tears were ridiculous; I never cried over anything, ever, but there they were, because I didn’t have to tiptoe around what I wanted, what I could say.
    “I want your mother to lose her mind over me because mine is gonna adore you,” I sighed, more happy than I could ever remember being.
    His smile was so warm as he lifted for my kiss. “We’ll go see them, my family, as soon as you sort out your latest community center debacle.”
    “Oh, you heard about that,” I growled, because of course he had. The stupid town was only so big, and he had picked me up in jail, after all.
    He laughed and scrambled free, flipping me over on my stomach and hauling me to my hands and knees.
    “Well, now, Michael, what is it you want?”
    He kissed down my spine and I shuddered beneath him, letting my head drop as he kissed over my right cheek and his hands spread me open.
    “You should let me shower or—”
    “No, I like the way you smell… and taste.”
    The strokes over my puckered hole went from tentative to teasing to deliberate so very fast. “You’ve been thinking about me for a while,” I said, nearly vibrating with happiness. The idea that I had occupied his thoughts made it hard for me to even form words.
    “Yes” was all he said before his thumb slipped inside, eased by the saliva dripping between my cheeks.
    “Michael!” I yelled, pushing back