The second button slid through its hole. Then the third. Hæra’s pale skin came into view. She didn’t seem to be wearing a bra, but Madeleine couldn’t see enough to know for sure. She leaned forward eagerly. What would Hæra’s breasts look like?

Hæra stopped unbuttoning. “This is all you get.”

Madeleine looked up into her eyes in dismay. “No! You get to see all of me. It’s not fair.”

“Good things come to those who wait.” Hæra took hold of Madeleine’s bare shoulders. Her shirt was unbuttoned just far enough to show the line of her cleavage. There wasn’t much. Her breasts must be smaller, perhaps like an athlete’s, part of a strong and lean body.

“I’ve waited long enough,” Madeleine groaned. “Show yourself to me. Please!”

“I’ll be the judge of what’s enough. But…” Hæra traced a fingertip down Madeleine’s throat.

Madeleine promptly got goose bumps and gasped. Hæra’s touch left a streak of heat behind.

“But I’ll learn something from you,” Hæra continued, her voice a husky murmur. “Something I should have learned a long time ago.”

Nothing existed beyond the skin Hæra was touching on Madeleine’s throat. Until now, it had only been a patch of skin like any other skin, neither special nor blessed. Now it held Madeleine’s whole consciousness. “W-what is that?”

Before her eyes, Hæra slowly sank down to her knees in the grass. Her eyes never broke contact with Madeleine’s.

“How to pray,” Hæra whispered.

Her strong, warm hands cupped Madeleine’s hips. She leaned forward until her nose pressed into the dark curls between Madeleine’s legs and inhaled deeply.

And then—her tongue⁠—

Hot. Wet. Waking up everything it touched, welcoming Madeleine’s flesh into a brilliant new world, a country discovered at last. Madeleine cried out in shock. She’d heard of this act, but she hadn’t known it could turn your brain into static. Was she about to faint?

No. She wouldn’t be allowed to. Hæra would make her take it. Madeleine had no choice.

“God, yes,” she sobbed. She grabbed Hæra’s hair, all that black hair, and pulled her in closer. “Don’t stop.”

“I can’t stop,” Hæra mumbled. She licked over Madeleine’s flesh, which was getting more slippery by the moment as Madeleine writhed on her mouth. “I want you too much.”

Yes. Yes. They both wanted it—Madeleine wasn’t alone, finally not alone⁠—

She pushed her hips forward pleadingly. “Please want me!”

“This is how I pray.” Hæra’s tongue went faster, pressed more firmly against the sensitive nub Madeleine had avoided touching for decades—a hot, wet, rhythmic stroke that licked her into the stratosphere, finally sending her from Earth to heaven.