Chapter 22 Chapter 11 (ii)
Fae
I chuckled softly. “Are we getting hot in here?” I whispered. It sounded a bit clunky and stupid. I was such a freak when it came to flirting. I really didn’t know how. But he was so familiar, willing, and this was all so refreshing. I wanted to flirt with him, even if I often felt like I didn’t know what I was doing and saying.
“Hot and hard,” he admitted in an aroused whisper.
I felt the curl all the way down to my toes. “Shall we go up to the suite?” I asked because it was truly what I wanted to say. It was truly what I wanted to happen. I was pulling him closer. I suddenly wanted all of him, naked, pressed against my naked body.
He lowered his head and kissed me on the lips despite the people on the beach. “You’ll never have to ask twice,” he whispered again, his lips a thread away from mine.
I gulped, and he helped me get up from the sand. I took the mat and he took my glass of wine, placed it on the nearby portable bar that was scattered on the beach. He possessively pulled me closer as we turned back towards the direction of the hotel.
When we returned to the suite, we quickly undressed and went to the bathroom to wash off saltwater and sand from our bodies. I no longer felt shy about undressing in front of him—I was drunk last night so that didn’t count—especially when I saw the desire on his face and in the feverish way he watched me. I still wonder how this man could make me feel so beautiful. His eyes were passionate and burning with desire. I even caught him swallowing and sighing as I passed him to go to the bathroom. He was reflected in the shiny stainless panel on the door.
There, he used soap to further heat our bodies up, caressing every nook and crevice of my body, working me between my thighs. At that point, my knees had no strength left to resist, and he almost carried my weight as his palm continued to rub against me until all the soap washed down.
We quickly dried ourselves with towels before he lifted me and carried me to the bed, where he buried his face between my thighs, gifting me with my first orgasm. I had already discovered the pleasure he could bring me, but I had more in mind the happiness I could see in him rather than my own pleasure. I wanted to tell him that my body was his. That everything he wanted was for him. But I felt overcome by shyness. Still, I forgot about it in a short while. He was so good with how he used his tongue. He was such a wonder.
I screamed and moaned in pleasure. He was so determined, so thorough. And after he brought me to my last shuddering climax, he crawled up to me and filled me with his desperate desire.
I screamed again.
It wasn’t just because of the incredible pleasure, but because in his arms, I could. Those arms carried me when I was mindlessly drunk. I sobbed in those arms when my broken heart was hurting too much. I experienced the tearing of my virginity, when I whimpered and moaned my very first orgasm, in those arms.
In Jigo’s arms, I could be anything without filters. And he wouldn’t judge me. I could be myself with him.
And in his arms, I was incredibly contented and happy.
We made love almost through the night, cuddled in between, and slept when we got exhausted.
He was still asleep when I left early in the morning, sore between my thighs.
I didn’t promise to stay until the end of the weekend. I knew the boat had a trip this morning, and it was leaving in an hour.
I moved carefully and dressed, putting my few clothes in my bag, and briefly looked at him lying on his bed, deeply asleep.
I knew what we had shared wouldn’t last.
It shouldn’t.
I was so lucky that he became my rebound, and I would always be grateful for that.
But I needed to be alone. I needed to face my life.
I couldn’t fall for Jigo completely, only to repeat what happened to me with Carl.
We weren’t the kind of couple who would marry each other.
Well, okay, no one expected Carl to marry a woman outside his circle either. But Jigo...? He was more entrenched in the exclusive world of the elites than Carl. His ancestors from both sides were old money. Those families were already wealthy during the time of the Spaniards, and they acquired more wealth by forging alliances through marriages. I couldn’t fall for a man like him. The ending might be different, but my experience with Carl was too traumatic.
We had something between us, and I knew it could bring so much happiness. So when it ended, it would hurt even more. That’s why I decided to cut it off. Who would have thought that among the connections to Carl I would leave behind, Jigo would be the first?
While I walked towards the boat that would take me and the other guests to Batangas City Port, I felt a slight pang of sadness at the soreness between my thighs. We couldn’t stop making love. He had provided lube. But we had gone a bit overboard.
I didn’t leave a note. It wasn’t like he was new to this. He knew the game better than I did.
But my heart still twisted and I gasped as my chest tightened when I saw him running on the sand from the hotel, wearing only boxers, towards the sea. The boat was already far from the island. I briefly worried if I should have left a note for him. If I had been too harsh.
But it was done now. I had done it.
Instead, I turned away from the sight of him standing there, shoulders slumped, hands on his hips, how whole body language telling me how violently he protested my leaving as he looked out at the distant boat.
I turned and looked the other direction, to where the boat was resolutely cleaving its way in the waves farther away from him.
It hurt already, I admitted, wiping away the tears that streamed down my cheeks.
I was wrong.
Jigo wasn’t the perfect rebound. Because it hurt.
Why, out of all the men, did my rebound had to be Carl’s best friend?