The Heart's War by Lucy Lambert

his chest. My desperation leant my strength. But it wouldn’t be enough to keep him here, I knew. And that knowledge just made me all the more desperate.
    “I’ll make it through,” Jeff said, running his fingers through my hair, gently squeezing the tense muscles at the back of my neck. They’d practically tied themselves into a knot.
    “How do you know? Why are you so certain?”
    Cupping my chin gently, he lifted my face so that he could look me in the eye. “Because I have you to come back to, Ellie. And nothing’s going to get in the way of me coming back to you. Do you understand?”
    Pressure built behind my eyes, and I couldn’t look at him anymore. But he kept me from looking away.
    “Do you understand?” he repeated.
    “Yes,” I said finally.
    “I love you so much,” he said, tilting my head back a little further so he could kiss me.
    It was a chaste, loving kiss at first. I don’t know which of us made it into something more. Maybe both of us. But I do know that neither of us stopped it.
    Again, I recalled being with him. My body recalled. That heat expanded within me. That now-familiar slick sensation returned between my thighs.
    “Be with me tonight,” Jeff said, breathless.
    “Yes,” I said, unable to offer any other response.
    Emboldened by my new-found knowledge, I let my hand slip down his shirt to squeeze the front of his slacks. Jeff groaned at my touch, letting his head roll back. I kissed his neck this time. My lips parted, and I let the tip of my tongue play up and down his throat. He writhed against the couch, thrusting his hips against my grip.
    It took a shockingly small amount of time to pull the skirt up past my hips. I wanted to feel him, I wanted his touch. So I grabbed his hand and guided it between my legs. He found the source of my heat and slickness there, his fingers exploring my most intimate area through the screen of cloth that blocked him from feeling my bare flesh.
    And despite all that, we both tried to remain as quiet as possible. I don’t believe either of us could have borne the frustration of being found out.
    It was so hard to remain quiet while he touched me, pulling aside my underwear and running one finger between my lips there, and finally up into me.
    My own hands busied themselves unblocking his belt, then quickly yanking open his trouser to expose his stiff desire.
    He let me stand long enough to kick my underwear off before pulling me back down onto him, my skirt draping our hips so that we had to go by sense of touch alone.
    But at that moment, touch was the most primal and powerful of senses. I found him quickly, both of us sucking air in through our teeth as I sank down on him, as I surrounded him with the hot, slick folds inside me.
    His hands explored my body while I rode him up and down, the sounds of our loving thankfully muffled by my skirt.
    Every one of my senses drew inward to that present moment, concentrated on the joining of our two bodies into one. It could never end, but somewhere back in my mind I knew it would.
    That thought sent a jolt of energy through me, and I forced our bodies together again and again, each movement more desperate than the last, as though I could somehow trap us both in a never ending cycle of pleasure if I gave myself to it as fully as I could.
    The couch began squeaking against the floor, but I didn’t care. Hot droplets of sweat snaked their way down my forehead, down my back. Perspiration dotted Jeff’s face. The heat of the fire glowed against my back, but it couldn’t match the heat between us.
    Then that moment of release came again. Jeff went rigid beneath me as he emptied himself into me for a second time. I rode him harder as my own body fell away into that murky storm of my climax.
    Even the cool relief flooding into me couldn’t keep a sudden shard of fear from stabbing into me. It was over. I couldn’t make it last forever. And soon, Jeff would be gone. And I would be here, in Kitchener, without