Finding Eden(47)

He grinned and then leaned in and kissed me deeply for long minutes, our bodies heating even more as he circled his hips, rubbing his erection against my pubic bone. He took himself in his hand and used the head of his penis to circle against me and we both moaned into each other's mouths. His chest was rubbing against my nipples and my body felt deliciously achy, and tingly, and beautifully needy. Because need could be a beautiful thing if you knew another person wanted very much to meet those needs. I smiled against Calder's mouth and wrapped my legs around his hips.

I needed him to be inside of me. I needed to be connected to him in every way possible. I reached down to guide him to my opening, but he beat me to it, lining himself up and surging inside. The feeling was so immediately full and intense that I cried out, arching backward. "Yes," I sighed out. It was like coming home.

Calder began to move very slowly, moaning out my name as I rubbed my hands up and down his body, relishing the feel of his warm skin, his size, his perfect maleness moving over and inside me. My body melted beneath his and my heartbeat pulsed between my legs where he was pressing in and out of me in the perfect rhythm. My breath came out in short gasps as bright white pleasure pulsed through my core and I came in a blinding flash of bliss. Oh God, oh God, oh God.

"Eden, Eden," Calder was moaning as his thrusts grew faster, more powerful. "I love you. Oh God, I love you so much." He pounded inside me for a few more strokes and then he froze, and his expression contorted in a look of pleasure so intense it was almost pained. I watched him, spellbound. His lips parted and his expression relaxed as he circled his hips slowly, opening his eyes. He was utterly gorgeous. "You were made for me," I said quietly, not even meaning for the thought to come out of my mouth.

Calder smiled gently, rolling to the side. "Yes," he said. "I was. And you were made for me." He gathered me to him and stroked my arm.

We spent the rest of that night clinging to each other, running our hands over each other's bodies, reacquainting and memorizing each part of the other, discovering the many ways in which we still fit together so perfectly.

We whispered the words of love and devotion that we still felt, reassured each other this was real, and true, and that we'd never be separated again. Our souls clung to each other as much as our bodies did. And yes, there was healing.

At some point in the night, I heard Calder cry out in his sleep and realized we'd drifted apart in the bed. I scooted over to him and ran my hand over his hair, whispering his name softly. We'd blown the candle out and so the room was dark, but I could still see the tense expression on his face. His eyes popped open and he looked around, confused for just a second. Then his eyes landed on me and relief filled them as he reached for me and squeezed me to him. "They live behind my eyes, Eden," he whispered softly. "Each one of them. I see them, I hear them, I feel their fear and their horror. I feel it. Every night."

"What makes it better?" I asked in the darkness.

He sighed and gripped his hair in his hand. "Sleeping on the floor helps sometimes. Maybe because that's how I slept as a child. It comforts me, I guess."

"Then let's move to the floor."

He looked down at me. "I don't want you to sleep on the floor."

"I don't want you to hurt."

Calder squeezed me to him tighter. "You're here. I'll be okay because you're here. And tonight I won't make myself picture each of them, one by one. I won't torture myself."

"Why do you do that?" I asked, my heart squeezing tightly.

"All these years, I've felt like I deserved it. I've felt like, if I got to live then it was my duty to keep hurting for them."

"And for me?" I asked softly.

He shook his head in the darkness. "No. It was different with you. With you, my greatest fear was that I would start forgetting you . . . the details of you. It tortured me. It tortured me," he rasped out.

He turned toward me and I faced him and his eyes moved over my face in the near darkness of the room.

"And so you painted me?" I whispered.

"Yes," he whispered back. "I painted you."

I leaned forward and kissed him hard on his beautiful mouth, my love for him bursting out of me and seeming to fill the room. "I love you, I love you," I chanted between kisses. "I'll never stop loving you, you beautiful, tortured man. I know the goodness in you, Calder. I do, more than anyone. I know the tenderness of your heart, and I know all that was taken from you. I know the dreadful sorrow inside of you. I live it, too. I know. I know. But I also believe we are going to be okay—we are going to love so hard and with so much intensity, that it's going to melt away all the pain. And if now and again, the pain comes back to haunt us, then we'll come back here, to The Bed of Healing. And we'll spend as much time as we need just escaping from the world. That's our plan because I swear to you, my beautiful, sweet love, everyone deserves a love story that doesn't hurt."