He didn’t flinch.
His fingers curled inside me, stroking the spot that blurred the edges of my vision; this wasn’t just physical. I’d spent years numb and convinced of my own deficiency, and now every nerve ending had come screaming alive under thisman’s hands, and I didn’t know whether to cry or beg him to never stop.
The boat rocked harder. I arched into his hand without meaning to. A low, broken moan slipped out. Callan leaned in, his lips brushed my ear.
“Let go, Sloane,” he whispered. “I’ve got you, love.”
That voice.
Those words.
I’ve got you, love.
The pleasure rolled through me in waves that left me shaking against him. My thighs clamped around his hand. My forehead dropped to his shoulder. I bit down on the fabric of his shirt to muffle the sounds pouring out of me, and he kept touching me through every pulse, drawing it out, steady and sure, until I had nothing left, until I went limp against his chest, trembling, oversensitive, and completely undone.
When the aftershocks eased, he didn’t pull away.
His fingers stayed inside me. His thumb brushed feather-light over my swollen clit.
He finally eased his hand free, smoothed the fabric back into place with the same careful tenderness he’d used to move it aside, tucked the blanket higher around us, and lifted my chin with two fingers until I had nowhere to look but straight into his eyes.
His voice came roughly, quiet, almost reverent.
“Did youfeelthat?”
My eyes burned.
“God, yes,” I breathed, my voice shaking. “I felt it everywhere.”
His eyes darkened, steady and unflinching—as if he couldsee straight through every wall I’d spent years building.
I pressed my forehead against his chest, breathed him in—salt and warm skin—and the tears came before I could stop them, hot against my cheeks.
Relief.
Because all those years—the emptiness, the silence inside my own body—I hadn’t been broken.
I had been waiting for hands that wanted to know me, a voice that said, “Let go, and meant I’ll catch you,” for someone who touched me like I mattered more than what my body could give them.
Callan’s arms enveloped me, his chin resting on top of my head. He didn’t ask why I cried, didn’t try to fix it or fill the silence with reassurance.
He simply held me.
My mouth found his, my hands dove into his salt-rough hair, fingers twisting in the dark strands still stiff from the sea wind. I pulled him closer.
He kissed me back as if he’d been waiting for me his whole life.
His tongue slid against mine. I moaned into his mouth, low and helpless, and he answered with a rough sound in his throat that vibrated straight through me. The kiss turned molten.
The blanket slipped lower, forgotten.
His hand found the small of my back, sliding up under my shirt, hot and wide against bare skin. He dragged his fingers down my back in one long, deliberate stroke, and I arched into it without thinking, hips rocking forward until I caught the hard length of him straining against my thigh.
I broke the kiss enough to gasp against his mouth.
“Callan—”
He didn’t let me finish. His lips brushed mine again—once, soft, barely there—trailed along my jaw, down the side of my throat. When his teeth closed gently over my pulse point, I whimpered, hips jerking. He sucked lightly, tongue flicking over the spot, and the sensation shot straight through my center, reigniting that sharp, needy ache he’d satisfied minutes ago.