Straightforward, blunt, matter-of-fact. All the things he likes about her. And if there’s some lurking instinct inside him to doubt her words, well. If there’s one thing he’s known about her, incontrovertibly, from the first time they ever spoke, it’s that Gwenaëlle doesn’t mince words or tiptoe around an inconvenient fact. He strongly suspects she wouldn’t lie about this.

So he breathes out, “I think that can be arranged,” and makes his way back up her body again — only pausing along the way to deliver open-mouthed kisses to her navel, her ribs, her now-naked breast, briefly sucking at a darkened nipple, he can’t resist exploring each piece of bared flesh — until he’s joined her at the head of the bed. His hand still aches, an irritating background noise he’s hoping he’ll stop noticing soon, but as he ponders their positions, how much he does or doesn’t trust his hands to carry his weight through the rest of this, examining the logistics…

I want to know what you like, she’d said.

Still figuring that out. The words in this next exchange might sound oddly clinical but his tone very much isn’t: heated, hungry, speaking this want into being. Words are a kind of magic themselves.

“I’d like you on top,” Stephen says. (You know, if it sounds good to her, casually.) “In my lap.” Beat, the corners of his eyes crinkling into a smile, “If that’s alright.”