Chapter 6: Rule Six

He kissed me against the cabin door with the rain still pouring behind it.

His glasses were fogged, and he didn't take them off.

He walked me backward across the room, and my calves hit the edge of the bed.

"Rule six," he said into my mouth.

"I know what it says."

"I can't stop thinking about it."

"Then stop thinking," I said, and pulled his wet cardigan off his shoulders.

It fell on the floor with a heavy slap.

He undid the buttons of my sweater one after another.

His fingers weren't steady, and he did every button properly.

I stood there in my bra and let him look.

He looked for a long time.

"You have ferns," he said.

A line of ink ran up my left ribs, a fern frond with the curled tip at the bottom of my breast.

He traced it with one fingertip.

"I drew it myself," I said. "In the mirror, badly."

"It isn't bad."

He put his mouth on the curl of it.

I made a noise, and my hands went into his wet hair.

I got his shirt open, button by button, the way he'd done mine, and put my palms on his stomach.

He was long and lean, with pale skin and a faint line of blond hair that ran down from his navel.

I pushed him back until he sat on the bed.

He was breathing hard and looking up at me, and he looked like a man nobody had looked at in a long time.

"Take your things off," he said, and his voice cracked.

"Gladly," I said.

I unzipped my jeans and stepped out of them.

I took off my underwear, and he made a small sound that I felt in my stomach.

Then he slid off the bed onto his knees on the rug.

"Isak."

"I've been thinking about this since the boathouse," he said. "I want to do it right. Tell me what works."

He put his hands on my hips and kissed the inside of my thigh.

I sat down on the edge of the bed with my legs open and my heart pounding.

"Slow," I said. "Start slow."

He did.

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