It had been a test, I saw now. Not that I’d wanted to hurt him or stick it to him, but I had to know how he felt about me. If he could let me come here to sleep with another guy, coupled with the fact that he’d moved out, I’d have to assume he really didn’t want me. And then I’d have to move out, because I couldn’t remain a squatter in his house.
Rose had done her part and told Colin that I was back on the prowl, heading to the club to pick up some random guy for rough sex. I’d played my part, but I wouldn’t have followed through. If Colin hadn’t shown up, I definitely wouldn’t have had sex with any of these guys.
But he’d come, looking angry and fierce and everything perfect.
“What do you think you’re doing?” he raged. “You’re leaving. Now!”
“Thank God,” I said. “Let’s go.”
I hopped off the stool and grabbed his hand, then beelined for the exit, practically shoving people out of my way in my haste. Once outside I put my hand against the brick wall and sucked in air, but it stank. We needed to get away from here.
“Where to?” I asked.
“Home,” he practically thundered. “You’re going home.”
I considered that. “No,” I said. “I think I told you once that I don’t bring guys home.”
“I’m not coming with you,” he ground out. “I’m putting you in the car and sending you there.”
“I’ll drive to another club,” I said.
“Then I’ll follow you there and drag you out.”
“How very stalkerish,” I said. “Do you follow girls around in clubs often?”
He stopped then and closed his mouth, probably because he had followed me at the club, according to Rose.
“Do you have a motel room we could use, perhaps?” I asked.
He glared at me. I knew he wanted to tell me to go home, but he knew it wouldn’t work. And perhaps it had dawned on him now what I was about in this game. Or maybe he’d known all along and come anyway, his baser instincts winning out over whatever strange logic had kept him away.
“I need it,” I said. Getting fucked was the least of it. I needed him.
That seemed to decide him. Even as some of the fury faded from his eyes, lust filled them. We were going to have sex tonight.
“Follow me in your car,” he said.
“I think I know the way.”
His eyes promised retribution for my mocking tone. I could only hope.
I followed him anyway, not wanting to risk it, but I’d been right. We pulled into the same motel, drove to the same building near the back, and parked in front of the same motel door.
It had to come to this. We’d both fought the good fight, but it had been over since we first saw each other. All this sex and pain and love had been inevitable, almost fated. Now I was getting sappy. Maybe I did, in fact, need a good, hard fuck.
I beat him to the door, but I didn’t have the key so I turned and watched him slowly leave the truck. Was he just now accepting the inevitability? Or would we fight one last battle inside that room?
I stepped aside to let him open the door. He let me in first, and I dropped my purse on the same fabric chair and strolled inside.
The room was different than before. Last time it had been all clean and musky in the blank slate of an unused hotel room. Now it was lived in, strewn with clothes on the floor and bottles on the dresser.
Paperwork was spread across the rumpled sheets as if he’d been working there. I picked a few up and found information about leases and sales and transferals of rights.
I looked up sharply. “You aren’t selling the place?”
“A new location.”
“Really? Like a franchise?”
“I’ll still own it. Both of them.” He gave me a wry look. “I found myself with too much time on my hands.”
I smiled. “Give up a bad habit, did you?”
“And a good one,” he said, somehow closer to me.
The answer popped into my head. Oh? Well, we can fix that right now. Cheesy, but then his mouth was on mine, and I’d missed it. I’d missed its warmth, its taste, its very Colin-ness. Because it was him and he knew me and he loved me. Even if he never said it, not with words, because that wasn’t his style. He said it with his actions, taking care of me and getting angry when I did stupid shit. And he said it with his body.
With his tongue as it swiped along the seam of my lips and touched against my tongue. You’re mine, it said. If you’ve forgotten, I’ll prove it to you. The love words were only in my mind, but he’d put them there. I’d been too afraid to try, to even imagine this, but he’d insisted with his feeding me and bathing me and caring for me, and all I wanted to do right now was give some of it back.
I pulled his shirt up, to feel his abs and then around to his back. He ripped the shirt over his head and tossed it aside, then unbuckled his jeans and kicked them off. I’d thought we’d take it slow, let it build, but his urgency was hot, contagious.
I started to pull off my clothes, to catch up, but he stopped me.
“I want to,” he said.
My lips curved. “You like to do that. Undress me, wash me, feed me.”
“Mmm-hmm.” He was infinitely distracted as he circled me and slid his hands up my skirt.
“I can do those things on my own, you know,” I said on a gasp as his fingers found a spot. “All on my own.”