Ben had lifted his chest off her, bracing himself on both hands and staring down at the place where their bodies joined, and she had to admit, it turned her on. So primitive, watching his glistening flesh disappear at the same time that she lifted to meet him.
She touched him first, lightly circling his base with her thumb and fingers.
“May,” he groaned. “For Christ’s sake, we’re trying to get you off. That’s just—”
She tightened her grip, and he inhaled sharply through his nose.
“That’s just what?”
But it was too late to tease him—he was gone. His hips picked up, hammering relentlessly for a few beats until his whole body stiffened and he groaned. May’s skin prickled at the sound. Her fingers found her clit as he dropped his head against her shoulder. She stroked herself, smelling the sweat on Ben’s neck and lifting her hips as he bumped lightly against her, tweaking at her nipple, and all the pleasure in her body focused down, sharpened.
She heard the dull thud of footfalls on the basement stairs. Voices in the living room. Her hand worked faster between them. Her hips bucked, her back arching hard enough to bring Ben’s head up.
“That’s it,” he whispered. “That’s my girl.”
His words filled her with a frantic desperation that she was way too far gone to analyze. Pinned down by Ben’s gaze, she was alone in this—his eyes, his words, his lazy twisting of her nipple and the fullness of his cock inside her such passive forms of participation in comparison to the crazed energy with which she chased her own orgasm.
No lover had ever watched her the way Ben did. There was no hiding from him, and she didn’t even want to. She wanted him to see her—to witness the ugliness of her need.
She wanted him to know everything.
She wanted him to know she loved him.
Oh, bad idea, May.
But it got her off. When the orgasm came, it pulled her tight as a clenched fist, tight as her own fury at herself, and then granted her reprieve, flinging her out of her own head. She gasped, openmouthed. She gave herself over to it—a seemingly endless contraction of pleasure and painful joy.
Ben balanced above her, blocking the overhead light. Watching the whole thing.
She closed her eyes when it ebbed away. Pressed her lips into his skin. Touched her nose to his shoulder.
She opened her eyes and drank in the sight of his hard, beautiful face. With trembling fingers, she outlined the shape of his jaw.
Loved him.
Fuck.
“Your mom thinks I’m going to help talk you into getting back together with Dan,” he said quietly.
“I know. I heard.”
“There’s no fucking way I’m doing that.”
“I broke up with him,” she said.
“I know, but you didn’t break up with him enough.”
“I get it. I’m sorry. I promise, I’ll—”
Mingled voices rose from the living room. Allie and Matt. The front door opening. One of their friends leaving or arriving.
“I’ll fix it,” she said.
But she didn’t know how to fix it.
“I miss you, May.” His voice had a roughness to it, emotion she hadn’t heard. Not like this. “I haven’t even left yet, and I already miss you.”
“Stay a while.” She held on to his arms and kissed his forehead. “Just stay.”
The bottom riser of the upstairs staircase creaked as someone put weight on it. She heard Matt laugh. A dog barking.
“They’re coming.”
She couldn’t move. Her heart felt too full, her throat closed with emotion, choked up with feelings she couldn’t put words to.
“May?” he asked. “You with me? We have to move. Quick.”
She managed a nod, and then when he smiled, she looked away. Better to focus on the moment—his withdrawal, the condom disposal, the arranging of their clothes and their faces, the unlocking and opening of the door. Better not to think about what was happening to her.
What he meant to her.
What she felt when he looked at her that way.
By the time the wiener dog burst into the room, Ben looked like nothing had happened, but May still felt as though she’d been ripped into tiny pieces and scattered all over the place.
CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX
Allie knelt at the apex of the horseshoe-shaped table and committed murder with a staple gun.
Her victim was a wad of gauzy pink and orange and white ribbons, which she was supposed to be forming into some sort of rosette to adorn the head of the reception table.
T-minus five hours until the wedding, and the whole family was at the National Railroad Museum, decorating the reception hall. The room was high-ceilinged, with a warehouse feel and six neat rows of enormous train cars—engines, sleeping cars, cabooses—lined up like, well, boxcars. Toward the front of the room, the museum staff had arranged tables and chairs in a large space crowned by a horizontal reception table. There were twinkling lights on the engines and a decorative archway for leaving presents underneath. A temporary dance floor and a space for the DJ to set up.