She didn’t know what to say. In Juan’s world the bedroom wasn’t the place to tell him you had the terrifying feeling that you loved him. ‘The air-conditioning,’ Cate said, and she lay there as he went to turn it down, lay in his bed and replayed his words, told herself she could just enjoy what they had now.
As he climbed into bed and started to kiss her, at first her response was tentative. It was too late to be chaste, Cate told herself, and, yes, there was the heaven of his touch.
She felt the skin of his back beneath her fingers, felt the strength of his arms pulling her closer, and she was a mire of contrary feelings, because she wanted this and yet she was scared to give in. His tongue was as necessary as water to her mouth, his scent embedded in her head for ever and his touch almost more than her heart could handle. Her hands moved over his shoulder, to his neck and then her fingers paused, felt the ridge at the back of his neck. Then Juan’s hands were there, moving hers away.
Again.
Her eyes opened to him and they stared for a moment, still kissing, but a part of him was out of bounds and he felt her withdraw, knew that tonight was about to end, and he didn’t want it to, so Juan moved to save it.
Cate felt the shift in him. It was more than physical—he dragged her back to him, not with passion but with self; he just brought her back to him with his mouth.
He kissed down her neck and to her breasts and Juan lost himself for a moment, just lingered. He wanted her hot beneath him, he wanted them both sated, or he usually did, but tonight he let himself pause. He tasted her skin and licked and caressed with his mouth and then moved down.
She could feel the scratch of his unshaven jaw, such a contrast to the warm wetness of his mouth.
‘I’ll be sitting on ice tomorrow.’
It was her last feeble attempt at a joke, because she felt like crying from the bliss. His mouth, his touch, was slow but not measured. There was no blueprint—he followed her gasps and breaths, guided by them. It was more than sex. Her hands went to his head to halt him, scared to hand herself over, and then she felt his tongue’s soft probe and heard the moans from him—and she gave in to being adored.
Juan hadn’t done this in a long time; he hadn’t been so enchanted ever. He buried his tongue in warm folds and she gave in to his intimate caress. Cate wanted him to stop, because she could feel herself building, in a way she never had. She wanted the trip of orgasm, a textbook pleasing, not the new feeling of delayed urgency he stoked.
‘Stay still.’ He wasn’t subtle, he held her legs wider open and she looked down at him. Every stroke of his tongue was dictated by her response and when she sobbed he went in more firmly; when she arched, his mouth held her down. He tasted her, he ravished her.
He adored her.
Why, she was almost begging as his mouth took her more fervently. Why did he have to take all of her? Why did he have to show her how good things could be? She was coming and fighting it; she was loving it and scared of it, scared of loving him.
Juan held her in his mouth and he just about came himself as he felt her throb and finally still.
‘Cate.’ He said her name as he slid up her body. He did not allow her time to calm; he had taken her rapidly once and she sobbed now as he took her slowly. It was torture to be locked with him, to be consumed by him, to gather speed together with each building thrust.
Cate arched into him, her orgasm a race down her spine and along her thighs. The powerful thrusts of him had her dizzy, the feel of his final swell that beckoned his end was like a tattoo being etched in her mind. And then he collapsed on top of her; incoherent thoughts were voiced. It was a moment she would never forget.
‘We could have had three months!’ Breathless, Juan berated the time lost to them.
Breathless, Cate thanked God she had waited, because she couldn’t have given him months of this with the end looming.
She was beyond confused; his bed was no place to examine her true feelings, because she was only here for one night, except both knew they had just gone too far.
They both lay, pretending to be asleep, until finally they were—but it was an uneasy sleep, a difficult sleep. Cate didn’t want to get too close to the man who lay beside her and Juan, with a mind that raced through the dark hours, chose not to hold onto her throughout the night.
Juan woke at two.
He always did.
He moved his legs, just a little, he moved his hands and then remembered Cate’s hands on his neck and the look they had shared. He wondered if she might guess.
Asleep, she rolled into him and after a moment he put his arm around her; the luxury of that she could not know. He allowed himself the bliss of contact as he faced tomorrow—the anniversary of the wedding that hadn’t happened was the day he had dreaded the most.
He dreaded another day now, one week on Tuesday when he left Australia. It was already drawing eerily close.
‘HOLA, MAMÁ!’
Cate lay in bed, awaiting the promised coffee, but since Juan had got up his phone had rung three times and she had listened to him chatting away in the kitchen in Spanish, sounding incredibly upbeat.
Cate felt anything but.
Last night had been amazing, possibly the best night she had ever had, except she had got too close, had given away too much. Not just with words; last night had been way more intimate than she had intended.
Perhaps more intimate than Juan had intended too, for he didn’t quite meet her eyes when he walked into the bedroom and waited while she sat up in bed and then handed her a mug. ‘Sorry that the coffee took so long.’
‘Is it your birthday?’
‘No,’ Juan answered. ‘Why?’
‘All the calls?’
‘Just family.’
He wasn’t so upbeat now; if anything, things between them were back to being a touch awkward.
‘What time are you working?’ Juan asked.
‘Twelve,’ Cate said, glancing at the clock. ‘What about you?’
‘I have the rest of the week off till Friday. I have to move out of here on Tuesday.’
‘Where will you go?’
‘I am staying with a couple of nurses I met, travelling, who work at the Children’s Hospital.’
Nurse Purple Face, Cate thought. This was big-girl’s-pants time: it was time to hide the truth and lie; it was time to smile and pretend it had been good while it lasted.
Good didn’t even come close.
Cate gulped down her coffee and then climbed out of bed. ‘Well, I’m going to head home.’ She started to pull on her clothes.
‘Have a shower,’ Juan offered. ‘I’ll find a towel…’
‘I’ll get one at home.’ She didn’t want a beach towel or a Juan towel wrestled from a backpack. She wanted a cupboard with towels in it and a home that wasn’t about to be abandoned without a backward glance a couple of days from now.
Even if the views were to die for.
Even if it had been fun.
‘I’ll see you.’ He gave her a kiss and she returned it briefly, because it was very hard to not ask when, not to know if this was the last time.
‘Cate…’ He walked her to her car. ‘I’ll call you.’
‘Sure.’
His