Chapter Seven
Unconscious
May in a moderately priced motel in a small Colorado Mountain town…
I got into the bedroom, my hands on my jeans and was about to shove a foot through when they were yanked clean away.
I reared up and made a grab for them as Ren clipped, “Ally, what the f*ck?”
“Give me my jeans!” I snapped loudly but he held them away.
Thus began a stand up tussle that included some slapping and grabbing (me), defensive maneuvers (Ren); my part desperate, his part possibly confused. Finally, he tossed the jeans behind him and since he was a tall, powerfully-built Italian hothead standing between me and my jeans, an obstruction I was not likely to breach, I grunted in frustration and shoved his chest (also in frustration).
He took two steps back and lifted both his hands, palms out my way.
“Right. Enough. Calm down and tell me what the f*ck you’re talkin’ about,” he demanded.
I locked my eyes with his.
“You fought over her that night.”
His head jerked and he asked, “What?”
“That night!” I shouted. “That night we hooked up. You fought with Luke over Ava.”
Suddenly, his body went completely still, as did the air in the room, and his eyes didn’t leave me but they’d gone funny as he whispered, “Seriously?”
“Seriously,” I hissed.
He shook his head, not in the negative, like he was trying to clear it.
Then he asked disbelievingly, “You’re tellin’ me we’ve been in each other’s space for over a year and you’re throwin’ this shit in my face now?”
“Well, if that’s not enough…” I shot back instantly, slamming my hands on my hips, something Ren’s eyes watched before they came back to mine and I saw they were heating.
This was a warning signal I’d made a habit of not heeding. And at that point, I did the same and kept right on talking.
“There was the night at the art gallery where you said you had eyes on me but I never caught your eyes on me. But I did see you gazing at Ava!”
I sounded like a jealous bitch. I knew it. And I didn’t care.
Because the big bossy jerk asked me to Ava’s wedding!
Those eyes I was talking about narrowed and he returned, “I might have looked at Ava, Ally, but f*ck, only because she was there.”
“You didn’t look, Zano, you gazed.”
He blinked then asked, “Jesus, have you lost your mind?”
“No.” I answered. “I’m a woman and I know.”
“You know,” he replied.
“Yep,” I bit out. “I know.”
“You know, for a year I’ve been bangin’ you, busting my ass to find a way in with you, you gave me every sign I was succeeding… and before you open your mouth to deny it, I’ll remind you about Christmas morning,” he warned me.
Since I’d opened my mouth to deny it, at his reminder, I snapped it shut.
He kept going.
“And that entire f*ckin’ year you’ve been thinkin’ I’m in love with another woman and you didn’t say anything?”
God.
Was he serious?
“What do I say, Zano?” I retorted. “What questions do I ask when I don’t want the f*cking answers?”
“If you’d asked, you might have found you wanted the answers,” he fired back.
Then, all Italian hothead badass, he lost it.
Lifting a hand, he tapped the tips of his fingers to his temple and jerked his hand out at the same time leaning into me and shouting, “You’ve totally lost your goddamned mind!”
“You know I haven’t,” I snapped.
“No,” he clipped as he turned. His movements rough with suppressed anger, he stalked to my jeans, still talking. “What I know is, I wasted a goddamn year on a lunatic. Jesus. F*ck me,” he bit out, bending and tagging my jeans. He turned and tossed them to me, continuing, “You hide it well, Ally. All that f*cking crazy under all that hot. You had me snowed, thinkin’, you allowed me to dig deep, I’d get the warm and sweet with the hot, not a hot f*ckin’ mess.”
I’d caught my jeans and I had nothing to say to that remark but no chance to say it before he prowled by me, his anger now at such an extreme that his movements were fluid as his adrenaline flowed.
And he kept talking.
“You wanna go. Go. Be my guest, honey.” He bent and grabbed his own jeans, tugging them on and not looking at me. “You want this over, you get it, ‘cause now, with this, I see I’ve wasted a year on your bullshit, and honest to Christ, I never wanna lay eyes on your jacked ass again.”
Ouch.
That hurt.
No, that wasn’t right. It killed.
But I took his invitation.
And not only because it was the only option open to me.
Also because it was the smartest.
As fast as I could, I dressed and made sure I had my phone and all my belongings (not that I came with many, Ren dragged my ass there in another Italian hotheaded tizzy).
But I knew Darius and Brody were staying in the same hotel, I just didn’t know their room numbers and I needed to get from here, to one of their rooms, then home, and fast (my pick, Darius).
But at the door, because he didn’t get me, I decided before we were over, he was going to f*cking get me.
Hand on the knob, I turned to him, dredging up what had been haunting me for over a year. Something that had killed the hope I had for my own kickass Rock Chick fairytale. Something that taught me the death of hope was the worst thing you could experience.
I saw he was pulling his shirt over his head and started, “That night, beer and bourbon and you liking the Bears?”
He yanked his shirt down and twisted only his neck so his burning eyes locked on me but he didn’t turn to face me.
I sucked in breath as his gaze boiled away my flesh.
Then I did what I always did. I pulled it together, straightened my spine and held his eyes.
“The next morning, I woke up happy. So happy I was f*cking smiling. It was the best date I ever had and it wasn’t even a date.”
That muscle in his jaw jumped but he didn’t say anything.
I didn’t need him to.
My voice quieter but no less emotional, I laid it out.
“Naked with you in your bed, smiling to myself and happy, you pressed into me, curled your hand around my breast and said Ava’s name in my hair.”
I watched his face blank even as his chin jerked back.
“So think what you want but I know I’m not jacked,” I whispered. “That, Ren, when a woman lies naked, thus exposed, in a man’s arms, when all she’s thinking about his him, and he calls her another woman’s name, that’s how she knows.”
And with that, I was done.
I turned, whipped off the chain, twisted the handle and pulled open the door.
I got it open halfway before Ren’s hand landed palm flat on the door. I was pulling but he was stronger. Thus the doorknob slipped out of my hand and the door slammed shut.
Before I could take a breath, I was pressed front to the door with Ren’s heat pressed in behind me. Further defeating any chance of retreat, his hand snaked across my belly and his arm turned to iron.
Great.
“Let me go,” I snapped.
His lips came to my ear. “Baby—”
“Let me go!” I shouted, trying to yank away but his other arm wrapped high across my chest and he held me tighter, closer, his lips not leaving my ear.
“I was unconscious,” he whispered.
I jerked harder but he didn’t let go.
So I gave up but didn’t give in. I strained against his hold, rested my forehead against the door and waited for this to be over.
“Listen to me,” he urged.
I closed my eyes and stated, “You tell me, the situation was reversed, you wouldn’t think the same damned thing.”
“I was asleep.”
I opened my eyes. “Bullshit. You were into her. You’d fought over her that night. You took her back through that whole thing, even after we had our thing.”
“I see this, honey. I get you, why you’d think what you’re thinking. But you gotta listen to me.”
God!
Why couldn’t he ever let it be over?
“Say it so I can get gone and this can be done,” I hissed.
His arms gave me a gentle squeeze. “Come sit on the bed with me.”
I jerked against his hold again, clipping, “F*ck no.”
“All right, Ally, baby, calm down.”
I went still, not because he told me to, just because I needed my strength. I was holding on by a string.
When he didn’t go on, I ordered, “Just say it so I can go.”
I heard and felt him draw in a deep breath.
Then he said, “I get you’re not in the place right now that what I’m gonna ask is gonna be easy, but I need to give you what you need and some of it isn’t going to be what you wanna hear. What it is gonna be is honest.”
I closed my eyes again and clenched my teeth.
“Are you gonna stick with me and hear me out?” he asked.
I opened my eyes and snapped, “Just get it done, Zano.”
“All right, honey.”
God.
Sweet.
Someone kill me.
“I was into her,” he admitted quietly and my throat closed. “But that night, beer, bourbon and me tellin’ you I like the Bears was not about her. It was about you and me. Then you snuck away and I get that, Ally,” he said the last swiftly, his arms going tighter as he felt my body go solid. “I get why you’d do that. But I didn’t get it then. I thought it was something else, honey, and you know what I thought it was.”
“Yeah, you came over to my place in the middle of the night and made that perfectly clear,” I reminded him.
“I also apologized,” he reminded me.
Crap.
He did.
I shut my mouth.
“So yeah,” he continued gently as well as cautiously. “I had feelings for Ava and I had to work through those. But, Ally,” his arms gave me another squeeze, “she was with another guy. Deep in it with him. I had no shot. I knew that. We’d never been out on a date. I hadn’t even kissed her. I was definitely never in love with her.”
“You took her to Carmine’s,” I reminded him.
“That wasn’t a date, honey,” he told me. “And you know it. I took her to dinner and took her home to Stark. A man taking a woman to dinner and dropping her off with another man is not a date.”
Okay, I had to give him that.
“I thought we’d connected,” I found myself whispering then I found I couldn’t stop doing it. “We were naked. You were holding me. And you were thinking about her.”
“She had a lot of shit happening around her, and I was involved. So it’s not surprising that shit was swirling in the back of my head. But I wasn’t thinking about her. I wasn’t in control of my thoughts. I was unconscious.”
“You just said you were into her,” I reminded him.
“And I found another woman I was into, we had a great night, the f*ckin’ best, and she blew me off. A man did that to you, you had no idea why, how would you react? What would you think?”
Oh crap.
That made sense.
And he thought that night was the best?
“Can we stop talking pressed to the goddamned door and move to the bed?” he asked.
“Let me go,” I demanded softly.
“Ally—”
“Please let me go, Ren.”
His arms got tight before they went loose and I stepped away.
I turned and saw him standing there, eyes on me, but they weren’t pissed. Not even close.
They were warm and concerned.
I closed my eyes against that beauty and dropped my head.
I had one way to explain this and make him let me go. Only one.
Was I going to use it?
I opened my eyes and lifted my head.
I was going to use it.
“For Lee, it was Indy.”
He did a slow blink before he asked, “Baby… what?”
“For Lee, it was Indy. Only Indy. It had always been Indy.”
Understanding moved through his features and he made to come at me but I lifted my hand to him and he stopped.
I dropped my hand. “Eddie screwed everything that moved, but I swear, the minute he got a load of Jet, he was gone.”
“Ally, let me—”
I cut him off. “I think you know I could go on.”
“I know,” he said quietly.
“I want that for me,” I shared.
“Honey,” he started carefully, “you weren’t my first.”
“I wasn’t your first several things,” I replied.
“I wasn’t in love with her, Ally. Baby, I hadn’t even kissed her,” he told me.
“Yeah, Ren. But that doesn’t mean anything. I know because I fell for you before you kissed me. It was just that I knew I’d done it the morning after.”
His head jerked, his brows shot up, but his eyes stayed locked on me.
Then something moved over his face I didn’t quite get, but it was more than a little alarming, and he growled, “Come here.”
I had to get this done and get the hell out of there, so I shook my head. “No, I—”
“Ally. Get. Your ass. Over here,” he ground out and I blinked.
Then my spine straightened again.
“Zano, don’t you—”
“F*ck it,” he bit off then he was on me and half a second later he was on me as in, I was on my back in the bed and his body was covering mine.
Macho Alpha Maneuver!
How had I not seen it coming?
“Zano!” I shouted, shoving at his shoulders
The shoving at the shoulders and shouting gig didn’t work in the slightest (then again, it never did).
But this time, it was because Ren was focused.
Like, really focused.
“You’re in love with me?” he asked.
“Well, I was,” I snapped.
“So you were in love with me and then you spent a year sleeping practically every night at my side, every morning eating breakfast with me, even though you thought I had feelings for another woman, and you’re not in love with me anymore,” Ren replied immediately.
That sounded absurd.
Still, I was realizing that maybe I’d landed myself in hot water and perhaps silence was the key to the hungry Italian hothead that was lying on top of me not making a meal of me.
Ren didn’t need me to participate in this discussion and give him more fodder to chew me up and spit me out.
I’d already given him plenty.
I would know this when his eyes narrowed and he noted, “A year I’ve been busting my ass to get in there and the whole f*cking time I wasn’t just in there, I was in there.”
I kept my mouth shut and just gave him big eyes. Indy cuted her way out of things. She was good at it. It even sometimes worked on Lee.
I’d never tried it but I figured now was as good a time as any.
He took in my big eyes and didn’t find them cute.
I knew this when he declared, “Christ, you’re a pain in my ass.”
He stopped talking.
I didn’t fill the void.
He didn’t either.
Finally I couldn’t take it anymore and asked, “Can I go find Darius now?”
“No you f*ckin’ can’t go find Darius now,” he answered and I shut my mouth again. “Jesus, Ally, you just told me you’re in love with me.”
“Uh… I think I said was.”
“So you’re not in love with me?”
I didn’t answer that.
“Ally,” he growled.
God!
I knew one thing, he never let anything go so I had no hope in hell of him letting this go.
And since I was letting it all hang out it was time to go for the gusto.
But carefully.
“I didn’t say that,” I whispered.
Instantly upon my words, his eyes got heated. It was his angry heat warring with a totally different kind of his heat and he verbalized these conflicting emotions by sharing, “I don’t know whether to f*ck you or turn you over my knee.”
I decided not to give him my input because the first option I was always up for and the second one might make me lose my mind and we didn’t need any more emotion making things crazy.
Instead, I decided to change the subject and I did this by asking cautiously, “Um… what’s happening here?”
“Um… you’re officially ending this game we been playing by tellin’ me you love me?” he asked back sarcastically.
I had already pretty much done that but I didn’t point that out at that juncture because I decided at his words and tone that I felt we needed more emotion making things crazy.
And I was going to bring it.
“Seriously?” I snapped.
“Jesus, why can’t you just say it?” he returned.
“Maybe because you’re essentially ordering me to,” I fired back then kept going in order to advise, “Don’t think you can watch the Rock Chicks and think you’re getting the same thing with me. This macho bossy shit does not fly with me.”
“Clue in, Ally,” he immediately volleyed, “Watchin’ the Rock Chicks, I know exactly what does and does not fly with you, and just like every one of those men when their women serves up attitude, I don’t give a shit. And, just sayin’, that attitude, just like with them, is why I’m with you.”
“What?” I bit out.
“Babe, every one of those guys had p-ssy lined up at the door. Bitches were gagging for it. They’d do anything to get their hooks into those men and those men knew it. They didn’t want a woman who’d do anything. They wanted a woman who knew her own mind and wouldn’t do anything. Not a single one of your posse lets their man walk all over them. And not a single one lets them get away with shit. At least not without dishin’ up a fair amount of attitude before they let them get away with it which is the definition of not letting them get away with it.”
This, I had to admit, was true. At the very least, if one of the Hot Bunch got bossy, they’d get an eye roll, but usually they bought a whole lot more. Those boys might get their way but that didn’t mean they didn’t have to work for it.
I just never looked at it that way.
Ren wasn’t done.
“With your crew, you get what you see, not some twisted version who’s tyin’ herself into knots to give you what they think you wanna see. And even if every one of you and your crew are totally f*ckin’ whacked in your own unique ways, it’s just you and all you. Not some bullshit fantasy that will go up in smoke the minute you get your hooks in me.”
There was a lot there, and all of it made total, if surprising, sense.
But I got stuck on one thing.
And being me, I called him on it.
“I’m not whacked!” I stated (loudly).
“Ally, you been f*ckin’ me for a goddamned year, in love with me since the night we met, and pushing me away that whole time. That’s whacked.”
“There were circumstances that led to all that, Zano.”
“And you took your sweet time sharing those with me, and I’ll add, did it in a goddamn motel hours away from home, after rescuing some random damsel in distress who got f*cking buried alive that you met on your f*ckin’ computer, for God’s sake, and you did it during a f*ckin’ drama. Baby, that, all of that, is whacked.”
“Faye’s not random. She’s my friend!” I shouted.
“You met her in person last night!” he shouted back.
“So?” I asked, still shouting.
“Jesus, are we honestly fighting about the fact you’re in love with me?” he asked.
“Words you’ll never hear if you keep up this bossy in your face bullshit, Zano,” I returned (again, loudly).
He scowled at me.
Then he rolled off, shifting to his back in the bed. He lifted his hands to his face and rubbed, muttering under them, “F*ck me.”
I rolled to my side, got up on an elbow and requested to know, “If I try to leave and go find Darius, are you going to pin me to the bed again?”
He removed his hands from his face and locked eyes with me. “F*ck yes.”
“God!” I exclaimed, falling to my back on the bed with a plop.
Within an instant, Ren was looming over me.
His hand came to my jaw and his face dipped close.
I glared.
“I’m in love with you, Ally.”
I stopped glaring and my heart flipped.
“What?” I whispered.
He didn’t repeat himself.
He said something a lot longer and almost (but not quite) as good.
“I knew it could happen when you were cool when I told you about my dad and you wrapped your hand around my thigh. I definitely knew it could happen when you went wild for me on my stairs. Shit went down and it took a while but I knew it did happen when you cried in my arms after Sadie had her thing. Anyone who would feel that badly about being mean and care so deeply about another human being’s f*cked up life I knew was the woman for me. You gave me a run for my money, and once I stopped finding it a pain in my ass and started enjoying it, I did nothing but. I enjoyed every f*ckin’ second, Ally. And every f*ckin’ second I’ve never doubted how I was feeling. And just to be clear, how I was feeling, every day through this game we’ve been playing, was that I was falling deeper in love with you.”
Holy crap.
“Seriously?” I breathed.
“Seriously,” he declared firmly.
I stared up at him, my heart beating hard, my stomach melting, my hands itching to touch him, words getting clogged in my throat.
With effort, I was able to let some out and the ones that came were, “I’ll go to Ava and Luke’s wedding with you.”
When I was done speaking, I watched him close his eyes then watched as he dropped his head so his forehead was against mine.
Whoa.
Wow.
God.
Ren Zano loved me.
I got choked up again and put a hand to his chest, sliding it up to curl around the side of his neck. At the same time I lifted my other hand and wrapped it around his wrist at my jaw.
He lifted his head an inch and opened his beautiful eyes.
And there it was in all its glory.
God.
He loved me.
I so totally didn’t see that coming.
But I was over the freaking moon that it did.
“Maybe I’m a little whacked,” I whispered.
He said nothing which meant he agreed, just maybe not about the “a little” part.
Suddenly, for the first time in a very long time, I was uncertain.
But I’d very nearly f*cked this up by being emotional and maybe a bit stupid (okay, maybe not “maybe” about that last part).
I had to stop doing that.
Therefore, I asked quietly, “Don’t you think it’s a little weird, a woman saying she fell in love with a man the first night they met?”
“No,” he answered immediately as his eyes got warmer and more beautiful.
My nose started tingling.
I swallowed.
“Do you love me, Ally?” he asked in his sweet voice.
I stared into his eyes. I drew in a breath.
Then I answered, “Yes, Ren. I love you.”
I didn’t get to stare into his eyes as they responded to that.
Because his mouth and body were responding to it.
That was to say, I was in his arms and he was kissing me.
Hard.
My mouth and body, specifically my heart and my happy place, responded to his kiss (and the f*cking righteous fact that he loved me) and I rolled him to his back with me on top. I shoved my hands under his shirt and yanked up.
He lifted up to sitting, forcing me to straddle him, and ended the kiss only to finish what I started, tug off his shirt and toss it aside.
Then he tugged off my tee and tossed it aside.
His arms closed around me, his mouth took mine again, and he fell back, taking me with him and twisting so I was on my back, Ren on me.
His hands moved on me and I liked it.
My hands moved on him and it was debatable but I might have liked that more.
His mouth took, mine gave.
This was our way. One place I absolutely didn’t mind Ren being bossy and domineering was in bed. And he was both, he’d never been anything but both, and I got off on it.
Finally, his fingers curled into the cup of my bra and pulled it down. I bit my lip in anticipation for the delights awaiting me and he didn’t delay. He moved his mouth there, sucked hard, getting what he was going for immediately; my moan that corresponded to the heat surging through me at the same time me driving my hands in his hair.
He swirled his tongue around my nipple then blew against it.
Oh God. I loved it when he did that.
I felt it pucker further and harden harder and whimpered as that shot straight to my happy place.
“Kick off your boots, baby,” he murmured as his arm that was around me shifted up, his fingers honing in on my bra clasp.
With a flick, it was undone.
With a tug it was gone.
“Hurry, honey,” Ren ordered softly then he went after my other nipple.
It was difficult, I wanted to concentrate on what he was doing, but I managed to toe at my boots until they were gone.
Ren heard the second one hit the floor. I heard my zip go down and suddenly my jeans, panties and socks were gone.
Lying down my side but up on an elbow, his hungry, heated eyes came to mine and my happy place convulsed.
“Spread for me,” he whispered.
I held his eyes and did as asked. He held my eyes and slid his fingers through the wetness between my legs.
My hips jerked.
A growl tore from his throat.
Hearing it, my hips jerked again.
Ren delayed no further, slid down my body, rolled into me and his mouth was there.
I wrapped my legs over his shoulders and dug my heels in his back, my fingers in his hair, arching and moaning as my happy place spasmed.
“Ren,” I breathed.
God, I loved this.
No, that wasn’t right. I liked this before. But I loved the way Ren did it. Like he couldn’t get enough of me. Like he’d waited lifetimes for a taste of me and now that he had me, he never wanted to stop.
It was amazing.
He kept going until my happy place was nearly as happy as it could be.
Then he was up and covering me, his eyes catching mine right before he slid inside.
As he filled me, my lips parted, my eyelids lowered and I wrapped all my limbs around him.
There it was. Everything I needed.
Holding my gaze, he started moving.
“Ren?” I called on a whisper.
“Yeah, baby,” he answered, gliding, not thrusting.
He was making love to me.
He loved me and he was making love to me.
Thank God I didn’t f*ck this up.
I tightened my arms and legs, lifted my head, touched my mouth to his and dropped it back to the bed as my declaration of gratitude for what he was giving me.
Then I requested, “Can I change my answer?”
“What answer, honey?” he asked, still gliding, going faster, not harder, but touching me deep.
I arched into him, sliding a hand up his back and into his hair.
“To that question you asked last summer,” I answered, my words hitching because he was again going faster, this time harder, and it was doing a number on me.
But I needed to get this out or I’d lose focus and not say it.
And I really needed to say it.
Again, that wasn’t right.
I really needed Ren to hear it.
“Ally, baby, what are you talking about?”
“This,” I said.
“What?” he asked.
I held him tight at the same time I lifted my head and put my mouth to his. No brush this time, just being close, all this while holding his eyes.
He sensed what I needed and—God, Ren, so awesome, always so freaking awesome—he stopped on an inward glide, filling me thus giving me what I needed.
All I needed.
“I’m amending my answer,” I whispered. “This.”
I gave him another squeeze, this time with everything I had, including my happy place, and I felt it as he bit his lower lip, showing he liked what I did to him, nipping my lip in the process, something so hot it made me shudder underneath him.
“This, baby,” I kept whispering, “does not feel casual.”
His eyes burned into mine.
I moved a hand to his jaw and finished, “And it never did.”
I just got out the last word before Ren slanted his head and took my mouth, hot, hard and wet.
He also again started moving.
But not gliding.
Not even close.
And he kept doing it until we both found it.
Simultaneously.
It.
Was.
Righteous.