The instant the door hissed closed she realised that she didn't want him to go. It hit her like a physical pain, his sudden absence slamming into her chest and making her reel. She stood amongst the jumbled plates and the melting ice cream, candles guttering in the last breath of twilight, the ocean behind her singing a sad song of loss. Gritting her teeth, she attempted to push it away, her old friend abandonment, but the habit had been inside her for too long and she couldn't avoid the sting.
He had left her alone, as everyone did in the end and she should be used to it by now. Except that this time it was self-inflicted. This time she'd told him she didn't want him and he'd left, after putting up no more than a token objection. Somewhere deep down she'd expected him to fight, wanted him to even. He was planning a future with her, he'd made it clear on a number of occasions that he had feelings for her and every time she pushed him away he kept coming back. But this time he'd let her go. She'd said she wasn't interested and he'd left all of that future behind and walked away. She would have believed that this was all some kind of dark side ploy, or written it off as lack of interest on his part if the mark on her neck hadn't demonstrated otherwise.
He loved her and he'd let her go. And why?
Because he knew he couldn't force her to love him back.
Because he valued her happiness more than his own.
Because he wasn't the man she thought he was.
The fact that he wasn't currently attempting to fight her into submission, or even seduce her into bed suggested she'd misjudged him yet again. The Kylo Ren she knew was dead, but she was having more trouble burying him than Ben was.
It wasn't love that hastened her steps towards the door, she had little enough experience but she was fairly sure love wasn't supposed to feel like this. Love was warm arms and gentle words and not this jabbing pain in her gut and the prickle of tears behind her eyelashes. It was the loss of the connection that sent her after him. He was awkward and difficult but there were times when he unbent himself enough to tell her a secret, or steal food from her plate, or cuddle her unashamedly when she thought that with enough smoothing of the rough edges, she might find a hole in her life into which he would fit. They had a connection, the excitement which troubled her every time she met him showed her that, and that connection was something she hadn't found with anyone else. Having experienced it, she no longer wanted to be alone.
She stabbed at the door controls and it took an age to cycle open but luckily the hotel was so large that he hadn't yet made it to the end of the corridor.
'Wait,' she called, conscious of the pleading tone in her voice. 'Don't go.'
He turned, but he didn't start the journey back. 'Good night, Rey.'
She thrust out a hand, yanked him back by Force but he fought off the compulsion halfway down the corridor and trudged in her direction on his own, with a wary look on his face.
'Stay with me.' She tried to make it sound casual. 'We haven't finished talking.'
He sighed, leant against the wall and regarded her with resignation. 'You only want me to stay so you'll have time to destroy the fleet. Be my guest. I'm not going to stop you. We've been through this before.'
'No, stay with me because I want you to.' That was what he wanted to hear, she was sure. It was embarrassing to say the words though, she'd never had to make that kind of admission before.
'You don't. You're not ready. You don't even know what you're asking.'
'I do. You say I'm not alone. Prove it.' She sounded much braver than she felt.
'Are you coming into exile with me?'
She shook her head. 'I can't just leave.'
His face tightened and he pushed off the wall. 'Then I won't stay.' Reacting to something he read in her expression, he reached out a hand and ran his knuckles over her cheek. 'I don't want one night, Rey. I want a future.'
She chewed her lip. 'I could visit,' she offered, without having thought it through. 'After you leave I can find you through the Force and I can visit you and you can visit me. We can get to know each other better and… see what happens.'
It was a concession only, not the commitment he wanted, but he was vulnerable to a certain kind of persuasion, and he didn't seem able to prevent himself from jumping at every chance she offered. She felt that same sense of cohesion from him again, the same reassembling of pieces that meant his emotions were slotting into place to form a different pattern. This time it was peaceful though, a quiet contentment rather than the possessive outburst of the previous night.
The smile he gave her was almost shy. 'I'd like to see what happens now.'
'What's going to happen now?' she half whispered.
He shrugged. 'You're going to learn to trust me.'
Her heart gave a sudden lurch in her chest and all the sick excitement she'd ever felt rose in her belly, bringing an acid burn to the back of her throat, a tremble to her hands. She recognised it. This was fear. She'd been afraid before, more than once, afraid of a fight, afraid of being left, afraid of dying alone but this was a more insidious terror. It wasn't him she was afraid of, not the warmth in his eyes, the way his shoulders had relaxed, the certainty he was planning to take her to bed.
This was what she'd been scared of all along, since the minute he'd knelt at her feet and told her he wanted to come home. This was why she'd found it so hard to trust him – fear of the power he'd have over her if she did. It was frightening, how vulnerable she would make herself, how open she'd be to hurt if she let herself give in, if she let herself love him back. She had been alone for such a long time the walls she'd constructed around her heart were impenetrable, no one could hurt her because no one could get in. But she wanted the connection, she wanted to chase that spark of something between them and see where it would lead.
She swallowed the fear, and stepped backwards through the open door. He followed, moving forward as she retreated, never breaking her gaze. Across the tapestry strewn floor, she trod carefully until the bed hit the back of her knees and she had nowhere left to go; she had never felt more like prey in her life and she quailed before his advance.
But he put his arms around her and the fear fell into nothing.
His chest smelt of the sea tonight, the fabric having taken on a salt tang from the time they'd spent outdoors, mixed with candle smoke and the faint suggestion of something sweet. He was so large she was lost in his embrace, enclosed and shuttered away from the world outside by the wall of his body holding her close. The Force spoke to her silently of the power that existed in their coming together but it was in the background of her awareness now, no longer the unstoppable onslaught it had been when she'd first touched him. Now the contact she felt was almost entirely physical, concentrated in the brush of his cheek against her hair, his leg against her thigh, his palm against her back.
At length she lifted her head to look at him, finding herself falling into the darkness of his eyes, and she raised her hand to trace the twist at the corner of his mouth with a fingertip. He was wearing the expression she'd seen once in a vision, the happiness that had sat so oddly on him before now manifesting itself in front of her. He smiled again, and she realised he was waiting for her to kiss him.
She began where she'd left off, stretching up on tiptoes to continue the line of kisses from last night, little glancing touches that teased his mouth open. His hands came up, sealed themselves on either side of her face and tilted her head back, then he took possession of the kiss. She was lost in it immediately, the rush of sensation when his tongue pushed past her lips, the joy of feeling her body interlocking with his as her arms twined around his neck and her ankle wrapped his leg.
She kissed him back and the power she had over him sang in her blood as he shuddered and trembled at each flick of her tongue in his mouth, at the increasing pressure of her hips as she pushed herself against him, struggling for closer contact. He thrust her away in the end and she stood silently, cheeks hot, lips already bruised as he released the catch on his belt, flung off his tunic and stripped away the shirt beneath. She explored his chest with nothing but her eyes and the lightest brush of her fingertips, learning the old injuries, the scars, the bunch of muscles underneath as he reacted to her touch.
His eyes were burning, black as the night outside when she put her mouth to his skin and learnt the taste of him, the salt tang and the heat of him on her lips, the texture of his flesh on her tongue. He was breathing hard by the time she'd kissed her way to his right nipple and the groan he let out when she licked it was the most erotic thing she'd ever heard.
It was surprisingly easy to seduce him, she decided, watching his eyes flicker shut and his fists clench simply because she'd grazed him with her teeth. If she'd known last night that all she had to do was touch him and he'd do whatever she wished she'd never have taken her top off. She kissed a line down his stomach and listened to him whimper her name. It was clear that he was trying to take this at her pace because he knew she was inexperienced and was trying not to rush her into anything she wasn't ready for. As she knelt to fumble with the fastening of his trousers she was aware that his pulse was racing, he was flushed and there was something very large against her cheek that hadn't been there before.
He stepped back suddenly, kicked off his boots and yanked down his trousers, shoving them into an untidy mess of fabric before pulling her clumsily back to her feet. He pressed her against his body and this time his kiss was urgent, rough and getting more desperate as her fingers explored the fabric of his underwear, outlining the straining contents. She let herself be kissed, but all her attention was on the hard length she grasped tight in her palm, the movement and the give around the damp end, the heavy hang of the skin beneath.
He broke the kiss, pressed his forehead to hers, gasping for air. 'Do you trust me?' he whispered brokenly.
More certain now, she nodded and found that within a second or two he'd snapped her around, put his chest to her back, released the fastenings on her dress and was palming her naked breasts, his erection rubbing against her bottom.
She said nothing but 'oh' at the sight of his hands spanning her chest, kneading her flesh but his fingers brushed her nipples and a rush of excitement shot from her belly to her groin, forcing her to draw a shaky breath. He rolled her skin between his fingers, the pressure and the friction drawing a cry from her throat and her body reacted in an instinctual fashion, her nipples rising into firm peaks that he pinched and caressed until she was pressing herself into his hand with the pleasure of it.
She watched herself responding, a red flush spreading across her chest, her heart thumping in her ears while one of his hands slipped lower and his mouth fastened on the side of her neck. She barely felt it, focused on the steady creep of his fingers over her belt, under the waistband of her leggings, inside her underwear, between her legs.
The jolt as his finger found the right place was like a surge of lightning across her nerves. She'd touched herself before, she wasn't that much of an innocent, but to have someone else do it was a totally different sensation. His index finger was so much larger, the point of contact so much wider, the pressure he exerted so much greater that a moan ripped out of her throat before she could stop it.
The sucking on her throat stopped, and she could have sworn she felt him smile against her neck. One hand pinched her nipple while his finger stroked between her legs and the twin pleasure and pain seemed to collide inside her. She melted against his body, spreading her thighs and surrendering to whatever he wanted to do next.
'Ben,' she heard herself say, feeling the rub of his finger and the tremble of approaching orgasm threading through her stomach.
'No one…' he growled, yanking his finger out of her knickers and dropping to his knees in front of her.
'On the light side of the Force…' he made short work of removing her boots and chucked them over his shoulder.
'Would wear this dress…' her leggings and underwear were peeled off her hips and joined the boots.
'And look at me the way you looked at me today.'
She was naked under her skirts, her breasts exposed and the fabric only secured by the belt still firmly attached around her waist.
'So now…' he put a palm on her stomach and pushed her backwards so that she fell flat onto the bed.
'I am going to do exactly as you asked…' he nudged her knees apart and scrambled between her thighs.
'And show you the dark side.'
He flicked her skirts to one side, put his head between her legs and she propped herself on one elbow to watch.
'It consumes you,' she whispered as he spread her open and his tongue settled on her clitoris.
She arched into the moment, the wetness and the licking, the sloppy noises and the slippery friction and above all his eyes watching her as she writhed against his mouth.
'It controls you,' she said when he worked his finger slowly and carefully into the tight place inside her for the first time.
She clenched her fists and he eased her past the discomfort of it with another barrage of tongue until she relaxed and a second finger attempted to join the first. It took a while of concentrated patient attention with his mouth before she could disengage her instinct to reject the intrusion and release the tight internal clench that was stopping his progress. Two fingers slid between her legs and she spread herself wide, the orgasm now washing around her body, her muscles tensing for the moment it would spill over. She reached out, put her hand on the back of his head and he closed in, flicking at her clitoris with the very end of his tongue and she felt a third finger stretching her out.
'It turns you into its slave,' she managed and then it was too much and she came on his face, on his hand, the climax wrung from her lips with a cry and he worked her through it, fingers and tongue in a steady rhythm between her legs.
She flopped back on the covers as soon as it was over, her eyes on the ceiling and although the orgasm he'd just given her had made her physically prepared, she wasn't sure she was mentally ready for what was going to happen next. She shut her eyes to try to force away the fear but it had a hold of her and wouldn't let go. The bed shifted as his weight settled on it and he adjusted her position slightly, lifting her hips with one hand, pushing her knee to one side with the other.
From the feel of the brush against her entrance, his cock was going to be commensurate with the rest of him and for the first time she regretted all those occasions on which she'd thought favourably about how tall he was, how wide. She took the first inch or so with a grimace but then her muscles contracted involuntarily and his thrust stalled, went into reverse.
'No names beginning with 'L',' he said, and it was so unexpected that she popped open her eyes in surprise.
He hovered above her, the skin around his mouth red and his forehead creased with concern.
'Names beginning with?' she began.
'For the twins,' he clarified quickly. 'Our twins. A boy and a girl. No names beginning with 'L'. I thought we could call them Kyle and Kyla. What do you think?'
She stared at him for a brief second, at the twinkle in his eyes and the sudden suggestion of a smile on his lips and she couldn't help it. She laughed. It was so ridiculous, so utterly out of character and so at odds with the tension inside her that once she started laughing, she couldn't stop.
He sheathed himself with a single smooth thrust but she continued to laugh even as she felt the burn between her legs and the stretch when he pulled out and used his weight to power into her again.
'I can't believe it,' she spluttered, the breath whooshing out of her chest in time with his slow, deliberate strokes. 'I'm fucking Kylo Ren and he's telling me jokes.' She squinted up at him. 'If that was a joke?'
He eased in and out of her with an increase in speed. 'That was the only one,' he confirmed. 'I haven't got a routine or anything.'
She chuckled again, fully relaxing at last and his shoulders flexed as he brought his hips forward with a touch more force. The pressure inside her was intense, the emotions equally so; she'd let no one else know her like this and whatever happened next, he'd always be her first. He seemed to pick up on the thought because the amusement fell away and he glanced down the bed. She raised her head to track what he saw. She was still half dressed, but her chest was exposed and her breasts bounced with every thrust of his hips, her legs were spread and his naked backside heaved between her thighs, pushing his cock in deep. She shuddered at the sight of what she'd become, wanton and debauched, the illicit thrill of it racing through her loins.
He met her gaze and his face was darker now, his voice deeper. 'Say it again,' he ordered.
She knew what he meant. 'I'm fucking Kylo Ren,' she whispered and the impact of these words was immediate.
His pace increased, her whole body shifting with the force of his strokes as he rammed himself into her again and again. There was tension in his shoulders, sweat beading on his temples and she put her hands on his chest tentatively.
'Again,' he gritted, closing his eyes.
'I'm fucking Kylo Ren,' she admitted, his arms buckled and he dropped his weight on top of her with a groan.
His cock pumped hard between her legs, building to a couple of short, sharp pounding jerks that made his entire body shake and he buried his face into the sheet beside her ear, panting hard.
'I bet you wish you hadn't,' he murmured, extracting himself none too gently and stomping off to the bathroom.