Four days without sex is apparently my breaking point.
I'm lying here in Tara's bedroom staring at the ceiling in the dark and doing the math in my head like it's going to change the answer. Four days. When did two days become my normal maximum? When did I turn into the kind of person whose body starts staging a revolt after ninety-six hours of celibacy?
The bed shifts as Tara rolls over. Her back is to me, the curve of her spine visible even through her sleep shirt, and I can hear her breathing evening out into something that might be sleep but probably isn't.
She's been perfect. That's the problem.
Four days of cooking together, of watching movies on her absurdly comfortable couch, of conversation that somehow manages to be easy despite the circumstances. Four days of her being respectful and kind and giving me exactly the space she promised. A few pecks on the lips. Nothing more. Like we're teenagers whose parents might walk in at any moment.
I thought she'd initiate constantly. I was braced for it, honestly, the way you brace for cold water. But she hasn't. Not once. Probably trying to be kind. Probably trying to let me settle in the way she said she wanted to.
And now my body is lost.
This is ridiculous. I'm ridiculous. I shouldn't want this. I shouldn't want her. She's not Sabrina.
But then again, that's exactly why I'm here, isn't it?
Sabrina's voice surfaces in my head, soft and certain against my ear that last morning. 'Let yourself fall for her even if it's just a little bit. It would turn me on so much if you made love to her.'
The justification slides into place. If I don't fuck Tara during this month, Sabrina will be devastated. That's the whole point. That's what she wants. What she needs. And I'm just lying here like some kind of monk while my wife is probably at home right now imagining exactly what I should be doing and getting increasingly disappointed that I'm not doing it.
I bet Sabrina would be thrilled if she knew how fucking horny I am right now. Lying here in the dark next to another woman, my body practically vibrating with need. That's what she wants, isn't it? For me to want this. For me to want Tara.
The guilt sits in my stomach like a stone.
I shift closer. The movement is small at first, testing. Tara doesn't react. Her breathing stays even, that careful rhythm that could be sleep or could be someone pretending very hard.
My cock is already hard. Has been for the last twenty minutes of lying here doing mental gymnastics. I press forward, letting it dig into the curve of her ass through the thin fabric of my boxers and her sleep shorts.
She goes completely still. The stillness of someone who has just become acutely aware of something and is deciding how to respond.
I wait.
"Leo," she says. Her voice is quiet.
"Yeah," I breathe against her shoulder blade.
Another beat of silence. Then she shifts, rolling onto her back so she can look at me. The ambient light from the window catches her red eyes, and I can see them searching my face.
"Are you sure?" she asks.
The question is so gentle it makes my chest ache. She could take advantage right now. She could just go with it, claim this as the victory she's been waiting for since I walked through her door four days ago. Instead she's checking. Making sure.
"Yeah," I say again. "I'm sure."
Tara's hand comes up to my face, her palm cupping my jaw with that same careful tenderness. Her thumb brushes across my cheekbone.
"Okay," she whispers.
Then she kisses me.
Her lips move against mine with patience that feels almost reverent, like she's trying to memorize the shape of my mouth.
Her hand slides from my jaw down to my chest, fingers splaying across my sternum. I can feel my heartbeat against her palm, frantic and obvious.
"You're shaking," she murmurs against my lips.
"I know."
"We can stop."
"I don't want to stop."
The words come out more desperate than I intend. Her eyes search mine again in the darkness, and whatever she sees there must satisfy her because she nods once.
Then she says something I don't expect.
"Prove it."
It doesn't come out like a challenge. It comes out soft, almost uncertain, like she needs to know how badly I want this. How badly I want her. Her hands move to the waistband of her sleep shorts and she pushes them down, lifting her hips to slide them off completely.
My boxers are already tented obscenely. I hook my thumbs under the elastic and push them down, my cock springing free. I move over her, settling between her thighs, my arms bracketing her shoulders.
God, she's gorgeous. She always has been. The way the dim light catches the angles of her face, the intensity in those red eyes even now, the perfect lines of her body beneath me. I don't deserve this. I don't deserve her. I ran away from her. I married someone else. And she's still looking at me like I'm something precious.
I line myself up, feeling her heat against my tip, and I push in.
The sensation is overwhelming. Too much. I'm barely halfway inside when my body betrays me completely. Pleasure explodes through me with zero warning and I'm cumming, my hips jerking forward involuntarily as I moan into her shoulder. Wave after wave crashes through me while I'm still sliding into her, filling her before I've even fully bottomed out.
Panic floods my system immediately. My face burns with humiliation. This is what apparently four days has done to me. I can't even get all the way inside her before I finish like some virgin teenager.
"Oh my god," Tara breathes, and when I force myself to look at her face, she's smiling. Not mocking. Something softer than that. Something that looks almost awed. "Leo. You really want me, huh?"
"I'm sorry," I gasp, still trembling with aftershocks. "I didn't mean to…"
"No, no," she cuts me off, her hands coming up to frame my face. Her thumbs brush my cheekbones. "I can't believe you came the second you went in. That's hot."
The words register somewhere in the back of my mind. In this world, when a man finishes quickly, it's supposed to be flattering. Proof of how attractive she is, how much effect she has on him. I know this. I've known for a while.
The embarrassment still stings anyway.
"Do you want to stop?" she asks gently.
I don't answer her with words. Instead I kiss her, pressing my mouth against hers with a desperation that surprises even me.
She kisses me back immediately, her lips parting to let my tongue slide against hers. The kiss deepens, becomes something hungry and consuming. Her hands thread through my hair, pulling me closer, and I'm vaguely aware that I'm still inside her, that my release is coating her inner walls, warm and slick.
We kiss for what feels like hours but is probably only minutes. Long, slow kisses that make my head spin. Her tongue explores my mouth like she's trying to memorize every detail. My breathing gets heavier. My body starts responding again despite having just finished.
My cock twitches inside her. Then again. And then I'm hardening, blood rushing back with surprising speed, filling me out until I'm fully erect again while still buried in her warmth.
"Fuck," Tara breathes against my lips, her eyes widening as she feels me swell inside her.
I start pushing into her slowly, carefully, testing my own control. The sensitivity is almost painful but in the best possible way. Every ridge and texture registers with crystal clarity.
She smiles, wide and genuine and a little bit dangerous. "Scared you might cum too fast again?"
"Yes," I admit, my voice barely above a whisper.
Something shifts in her expression. Her eyes go dark with hunger and before I can process what's happening, she's moving. Her hands grip my shoulders and she rolls us over with a strength that takes my breath away, pinning me beneath her.
My wrists are captured in her hands and pressed into the pillow above my head. Her grip is firm but somehow impossibly gentle.
"I believe you," she says softly, her face hovering inches above mine. The tenderness in her voice contrasts sharply with the dominance of her position. "Now promise me you won't cum until I let you."
My heart hammers against my ribs. The vulnerability of being pinned like this, of having my control taken away so completely, sends electricity down my spine.
"I promise," I manage.
"Good boy," Tara murmurs, and the praise sends warmth flooding through my chest despite everything.
She starts moving. Slow at first, rolling her hips in a way that makes me gasp against the pillow. Her grip on my wrists never loosens, keeping me pinned exactly where she wants me. The sensation of being held down while she takes what she needs from my body is intoxicating in a way I wasn't prepared for.
"Do you know how long I've waited for this?" she asks, her voice dropping to something low and intimate.
I open my mouth to respond but she picks up her pace and the words die in my throat, transforming into a moan instead.
"I'm never letting you go again," she continues, her eyes locked on mine with a concentration that makes it hard to breathe. "Not to Sabrina. Not to anyone. You're going to be mine, Leo. Mine and mine alone."
The words should terrify me. They should make me want to pull away, to remind her that I have a wife waiting at home. But instead they send heat coursing through my veins, making my cock throb inside her.
"Tara," I manage, my voice coming out strangled.
"Shh." She leans down, her lips brushing against my ear. "Just feel this. Feel how perfectly you fit inside me. Feel how good it is when you're where you belong."
Her hips roll again, taking me deeper, and I whimper helplessly beneath her. The sensitivity from my first orgasm makes every movement almost unbearably intense. I'm already fighting the urge to finish again, my body trembling with the effort of holding back.
"That's it," she praises, her breath hot against my neck. "You're doing so well for me. Being so good."
Her eyes drift down to my mouth, and something in her expression suddenly looks hungrier, more predatory.
"Your mouth is so pretty, Leo," she breathes.
Before I can respond, her thumb presses against my bottom lip, hooking inside and pulling down to open my mouth wider. I let her do it, my jaw going slack under her touch as she stares into my mouth like she's found something fascinating there.
"So fucking pretty," she repeats, almost to herself.
Then she leans forward, her lips parting above mine, and I watch as she gathers saliva in her mouth. The strand forms slowly, stretching longer and longer until gravity takes over and it slides from her tongue down into my waiting mouth.
The sensation hits me in layers. First the warmth of it landing on my tongue. Then the taste, distinctly Tara, slightly sweet, intimate in a way that makes my stomach flip. And underneath all of that, the awareness that this should be disgusting.
Except it's not.
It's hot. Unbearably hot. The wrongness of it transforms into something electric that shoots straight down my spine and makes my cock throb inside her.
I remember she did this once before. In front of Sabrina, back at that motel. The image flashes through my mind, vivid and sharp, Tara hovering over me exactly like this while my wife watched from her chair, Sabrina's fingers working between her thighs as Tara claimed me.
Something snaps in me.
I lift my head off the pillow, chasing the strand still connecting our mouths, collecting it on my tongue before pressing my lips against hers. The kiss is desperate, messy, all-consuming. My tongue pushes into her mouth with a hunger that surprises even me, tasting myself mixed with her, and she moans into it like I've given her exactly what she wanted.
Her grip on my wrists tightens almost painfully as she kisses me back with equal fervor, her hips still rolling against mine in that maddening rhythm. I'm drowning in the taste of her the heat of her body surrounding me, the weight of her pressing me into the mattress.
When she finally pulls back, we're both breathing hard. A thin strand of saliva still connects our lips before breaking.
"Fuck," she gasps, her red eyes wild and unfocused. "Leo, I…"
Her words cut off as her body suddenly tenses above me. Her inner walls clench around my cock with devastating pressure, fluttering in waves that make stars burst behind my eyelids. She's cumming, her mouth falling open in a silent cry as her orgasm crashes through her.
The waves of her orgasm keep rolling through her, each contraction squeezing me with a pressure that makes my vision blur at the edges. Her head drops forward, hair falling like a curtain around us, and her lips find my ear.
"I love you," she whispers, barely audible over the sound of our breathing. "God, Leo, I love you so much."
The words hit me like physical things, warm and devastating. My body responds before my mind can catch up, pleasure building at the base of my spine with terrifying speed.
"I'm in love with you," she breathes, her voice cracking slightly. "I never stopped. I love you."
My hips buck up involuntarily, driving deeper, and she gasps against my neck. Her words keep coming.
"I love you. I love you. You're everything I want. I love you."
The orgasm tears through me with brutal intensity. My back arches off the mattress, my wrists straining against her grip as I empty myself inside her for the second time tonight. Each pulse feeling like it might be the last before another one hits. I can hear myself making sounds, desperate and broken, but I can't stop them.
She keeps whispering it. Over and over. Pressing the words into my skin like she's trying to tattoo them there permanently.
When it finally subsides, I'm left trembling beneath her, my breath coming in ragged gasps. Her grip on my wrists loosens, becomes a caress instead of a restraint. Her fingers trace patterns across my palms before sliding down to lace with mine.
She lifts her head to look at me, those eyes searching my face with an intensity that makes my chest tighten.
The silence stretches between us, heavy with expectation.
I can't say it back. Tara's expression shifts almost imperceptibly. Something dims in her eyes, just for a moment, before she blinks it away and forces a small smile.
"It's okay," she says softly, and I can hear the effort it takes to keep her voice steady. "You don't have to say anything, yet."
She shifts slightly above me, her fingers still laced with mine against the pillow.
"Try all you want to pretend you don't," she says softly. Not angry. Not accusatory. Just... certain. Like she's stating a fact about me. "You'll change your mind soon enough."
She releases my hands and pulls me up against her chest. Her arms wrap around me completely, one hand cradling the back of my head while the other presses against my spine, and suddenly I'm surrounded by her warmth.
My face is pressed into the curve of her neck. I can feel her heartbeat against my cheek, still racing from what we just did. Her fingers thread through my hair with that same gentle reverence she's shown all night, and I realize I'm trembling again.
"Shh," she murmurs, her lips brushing my temple. "I've got you."
The embrace is total. Consuming. Like she's trying to hold every part of me at once, to prove through physical pressure alone that I belong here, in her arms, in her bed, in her life.
"You're safe here," she whispers. "You know that, right?"
I nod against her shoulder.
"Good," she says, and I can hear the smile in her voice. "That's all I need right now."