He is so firm, so assured, that I allow myself to believe it. I collapse into him, absorbing his warmth and his security and his strength. The sinewy muscles of his chest throb with heat and my fingers trace the striations, finding the beat of his heart.
I press mine to his, and take pleasure in the way they unite.
It makes me feel like we’re one, like we’ll always be one.
I open my arms and he comes to me, holding his head against my breast, lapping at them, caressing me. There’s a flash of silver, skin pressed to skin, bone against bone. My thighs fold around his hand, squeezing him into me, holding him close. He palms me, strokes me, ignites me.
I gasp, he swallows it. I moan into his mouth, he smiles against mine.
“You are lovely,” he tells me as he slowly slowly slowly takes me again, and in his eyes, I know that I am. In the reflection of his gaze, I see my long dark hair, lush and shiny. I see my curves and my angles, my smile and my woe. I see it all the way he sees me and I am lovely.
It is empowering and I tremble with it.
He smiles.
“See what you do to me, Livvie?”
He wraps my white fingers around his manhood and it pulses and hardens, again and again and again. When we’re finally spent, I fall against him and sleep in his arms, sleeping the sleep of the sated…until I begin to dream.
My dreams build, black, black, blacker, like storm clouds rolling in from the horizon. Phillip rides the storm and his face is thunderous.
“Don’t betray me,” he booms, and his mouth is contorted and angry.
“What do you mean?” I ask, and I’m confused because I’d never. I’d never in my life betray him. He has to know that. “I’d give my life for you.”
He pauses amidst the storm and looks down at me, his gaze pensive and black.
“Would you?”
I reach for him, but he dissipates into the mist of the clouds and then he’s gone. I feel his absence immediately and I wake up screaming, clutching Phillip, pulling him close.
“What is wrong, Livvie?” he asks quickly, caressing my hair. I shake my head, still terrified to the bone.
“I lost you,” I tell him. “In my dream you were gone, and I was so alone, and you were angry with me.”
“I could never be angry with you,” he tells me and his voice is a song that I am desperate to believe.
I am unsettled and restless, but his fingers stroke my back and lull me into relaxation. I lie with him all night, in his small bed in his small cottage.
We bask in the moonlight from the open window, and I inhale the cool English breeze. I smell the roses and the greenery and the scent of Phillip’s skin and it’s a combination that I know I’ll never forget.
Time and time again he reaches for me and his fingers are soft and his breath is hot.
Over and over, he makes me his and over and over I take it. I take him in, I accept him as mine. If only that would be true forever.
There is a spark in the air tonight, though. Something different, something that crackles in the way I breathe, that electrifies every touch. Perhaps it is because I know our time is limited. Perhaps it is because my heart is breaking.
I don’t know.
All I know is that when I leave my beloved Phillip in the morning as the sun rises over the moors, I feel different. I feel heavy, I feel sad. I feel ravaged and ever alone. But thoughts of my helpless mother assail me, and drive my feet toward Whitley, because without me, she’ll flounder and perish. I must do this. I must provide for her, as she has provided for me since the day I was born.
I look back over my shoulder only once, and the haunting look in Phillip’s dark eyes will stay with me forever. It is full of things I don’t understand, and full of things that I do. Want, sadness, even guilt. I close my eyes, squeezing them tight.
I have to resist running back to his waiting arms. I must.
For my mother.
Three weeks later I learn that I’m pregnant.
Chapter Three