Not close enough to push. Close enough that the warmth of me reaches her and the saffron in my scent settles around her strawberry in the warm air of the room.
"Pretty good," she says, to the window, to the view, to the island.
"Yes," I say.
She turns around.
I can see every detail of her face in the afternoon light, the green of her eyes, the warm olive of her skin, the dark honeyhair loose on her shoulders, and she is looking at me with the expression she uses when she has decided something and is done pretending she hasn't.
I put my hands on her face.
Both palms. Her skin warm under my fingers. The heat making itself known in the air between us, and my saffron responds to every part of it before I have said a word.
"I have you," I say. "You understand me? Whatever happens. We have you."
She looks at me.
"All three of us," I say. "You and her. You are not doing any of this alone again. Not one day of it."
Her jaw moves. Just slightly. The specific movement of someone receiving something they have been wanting and being careful about how much of that wanting they let show.
"Santos," she says.
"I know," I say. "I know."
I kiss her.
Slow and deliberate and real, my mouth against hers, my thumbs moving once across her cheekbones, and I feel her exhale into the kiss, the long slow exhale of someone who has been holding something up by force and has finally, completely, decided to put it down.
Tomas puts his hand on her shoulder from behind.
Matteo’s sandalwood scent comes warm from her other side.
And the three of us settle around her, the five of us, in the warm September room with the island gold outside the window, and the tiramisu on the coffee table in the living room that will absolutely keep, and the bond humming in the air between all of us, and her strawberry and rose flooding the room completely open and entirely without apology.
She has been holding everything back since the moment she arrived on this island.
This afternoon, she holds nothing back.
Neither do we.
Ti amo, principessa. Ti amo ogni curva di te.
26
JENNIFER
Santos's tongue traces my lower lip, soft and certain, asking rather than taking, and I open for him and his hands tighten fractionally at my jaw and the saffron in his scent floods the room and I taste him, amber and warmth and something underneath that is just Santos, just him, the particular flavor of a man who has been thinking about this for considerably longer than he would have admitted before tonight.
I put my hands against his chest.
Not pushing. Just there, feeling the warmth of him through the fabric, the steady rhythm of his heart which is going considerably faster than his exterior suggests, and he makes a low sound into the kiss that moves through my chest like a current.
"The doctor said it is fine for you to be in full heat. You have nothing to worry about. You and your baby. We'll take care of you. Just tell us if it's too much."
I nod my head, finding myself speechless as Tomas puts his hand on my shoulder from behind.
Warm and solid, the weight of him settles into the room around Santos's saffron, the three of them layering in the air. Myomega moans at the idea of being where she's been craving to be since that one weekend in Vegas.