I didn't need to be told twice. I was covering her back, arms reaching around to palm her breasts, my tip butting up against her entrance between one thumping heartbeat and the next.
I shut my eyes with that first drugging thrust. She was wet, pliant, so I didn't hold back, jamming in to the hilt without preamble. The noise that escaped me right as her wet heat covered the base of my shaft was more animal than human. I was not a thinking being in that moment.
I was mindless. Her slave.
I watched us in the mirrors, watched myself going in and out of her, watched my cock squeezing in and dragging out slowly, then faster, frenzied. As soon as she began to get loud, close to her release, I slowed the rhythm again.
She was braced on all fours, her back arched, but her head was turned with mine, watching our bodies, never meeting my eyes no matter how long I stared at hers, trying to catch her gaze.
Again, it stung, but it was a battle for another day.
I watched her face while my body pumped into hers, watched her watching where we joined, and that did it. I'd wanted to last longer, wanted to savor more, but it was hopeless. I should have been amazed with myself for lasting as long as I had. The first touch of her nose nuzzling my shaft back in the living room had nearly had me coming in my pants.
I kissed her nape while I emptied inside of her, savoring with complete pleasure that moment of total abandon where I lost myself in her, my mind blown to bits.
I was still coming, spurting after-effects deep in her womb, when I lifted my head to watch her slack-jawed release, caught the way her eyes glazed over as the skin-tingling rush of her orgasm overtook her.
It was breathtaking. A heaven worth going through hell for. I'd never thought otherwise.
And the best part of all. I got to have her again. And again.
And I did. I was greedy with it. Insatiable. Voracious.
She brought me to life. I had her as many times as I could before she cried uncle.
There was never an end to this need she created inside of me. This endless chasm of want in my blood for her. Never had been. Never would be.
CHAPTER
TWENTY-ONE
"I wanted the whole world or nothing."
~Charles Bukowski
PAST
SCARLETT
Gram was not happy about my decision to get a job.
Dante less so. He was irate, predictably belligerent about it. He threw such a fit initially that Gram ordered him to go for a run.
When we were alone, she tried several different tactics to get me to change my mind. She was a formidable woman, not used to hearing no. And when she did hear the word, she didn't even consider accepting it. It was nothing but a challenge to her.
It was the closest we'd come to really butting heads. That alone almost made me cave.
"Darling," she said with her most charming smile. "We only just got you here. I was looking forward to your company."
It was the principle of the thing. I would not, could not, end up like my parents, like my grandmother.
"I've made up my mind," I told her stubbornly. "It's not a big deal. Just a few hours on school nights, a few more on weekends. Now that I've quit drama, I have plenty of free time."
She tried a different tactic. I knew she would. "I wouldn't get your hopes up. It's the wrong season for part-time jobs. I guarantee no one is hiring."
I swallowed hard. "I already have one. The manager of the 5 and Diner hired me on the spot. I start on Monday."
Her eyes narrowed on me. "It's quite unnecessary. Why on earth would you need a job? Any need you have, I'm happy to provide for. Just tell me what it is you're earning money for. I'll buy it for you, darling!"
I gave her brutal honesty. Not because I wanted to and not because I wasn't grateful. It was a matter of self-worth. If I was ever going to get some, I knew I had to earn it. "I can't be a Durant charity case, not more than I can help. At least if I get a job I'm trying to take care of myself."
She gave me the coldest look I'd ever seen her aim my way. It made me shiver and instantly want to take back whatever I'd said that put that look on her face.
She was a force of nature like that. What she felt, you felt. If she was happy, the world knew joy. When she was angry . . . yeah, you felt that too.
And when she was disappointed in you, you felt like absolute shit.
"I'm sorry that you thought this was charity," she said with haughty chill. "You thought I felt some sense of duty toward you? And here I thought I was doing it out of love. Silly me." Her tone was scathing. A vacuum of disdain, it sucked all warmth from the room. Took my stubborn pride and left me feeling ashamed and alone.
I was out of my league. A trashcan girl could not hope to go head to head against a queen.