Read Curio Vignettes 05 Exposure for Free Online Page A

like to believe, but it’s different here, undeniably. Quiet, calm, dark, easy. The peace I’ve worked so hard to create in my little cell in the honeycomb called Paris. An entire countryside’s worth.
    “Lie on your side,” Caroly whispers.
    I do, tucking my lower arm beneath her head and its pillow, pulling her close with the other. She strokes my chest and kisses my neck, and I feel myself turning helpless, desperate, rabid—a thousand conflicting things at once. No one’s ever made me feel so wanted, so longed for, so treasured as she does. She waited for me, she’s said. Avoided men for ages, then sought me out as a rejection-proof point of entry into the world of sex. Now she loves me, somehow. Wants me just as deeply as she did before those carnal initiations. Wants me as so much more.
    It’s as comforting as it is terrifying, because in such a short time I’ve come to care for her in a way I hadn’t known possible. With it comes a fear I’ve blocked since the passing of my mother. I love Caroly so much, if I lost her, a part of me would turn brittle and crumble to dust, leaving a hollowness I’d carry with me for the rest of my life.
    I’ve tensed, and she notices. She stops caressing to embrace me, surely thinking some tentacle of my agoraphobia has snaked between us, to turn me so rigid and unsure.
    “I’m fine,” I promise, and smooth her curls. “Just feeling so much. All good things.” Good things chased with a fear of loss, but such is life. And I have a life again, a proper one. The fear is a thing to rejoice in. Proof that I can still love this deeply.
    “Maybe we should get you out of your head.” She strokes my hair, gazing into my eyes. I want to swim in those blue irises, dive deep and emerge under a pitch-black sky, riddled with stars.
    I steal a kiss. “Maybe we should.”
    Another kiss, and she welcomes my tongue, making my cock throb with impatience. Her hand runs down my neck and chest, over my stomach and between my legs to clasp my erection. I gasp, the sound swallowed in the kiss. I fumble to return the touch, but she grasps my wrist, halting me.
    “You’ve already made me come, remember? Let me spoil you for a little while.”
    Kind words, but I hear mischief in her tone.
    Let me torture you for a little while , I translate. The anxious virgin I met in March must have been a figment. The woman here on this bed with me now is too fearless, too eager to possibly be the same Caroly. My progress has been slower and more halting, but I limp steadily onward toward a functional life, her hand always there, guiding me.
    The tender thoughts dissolve as she urges me to lie back, edging her way down my body.
    I put a hand to her arm. “No. I’m too close already.”
    “Just for a minute.” She’s on her knees between my legs, palms slipping over my chest, stomach, caressing my hips, my calves, up the insides of my thighs. I moan, helpless, and gather her hair in my hands.
    The barest glance of her fingers jolts my cock. A stroke and I’m shaking.
    “Just imagine how good it’ll feel,” she murmurs, then my crown slips between her warm, soft lips.
    “ Oh .”
    Needing a distraction—a chance at lasting longer than a minute—I conjure the first time she did this to me. She’d wanted to try sooner than I’d thought wise, considering her inexperience. It ended in tears. Now the fingers wrapped around the base of my shaft are strong and confident. She swallows half my length in a breath, pure slick heat. No hesitation.
    “Yes.”
    I made you this woman , I think, and my pleasure folds in on itself, too strong and potent to ignore. I hold her curls loosely, following the bobbing motion of her head.
    “Softly,” I beg.
    It feels so good, so absurdly good, I have to laugh. “Where on earth did you learn this, beautiful girl?”
    She frees her mouth just long enough to smile at me and say, “From a very patient man.”
    Another minute I let her spoil me, then I know it’s