His eyes were so beautiful, so kind. So concerned. His eyes held the promise of all eternity as well as my total damnation in their depths. I wanted him to make me forget. To give me new memories to hold onto as I navigated the rest of my life.
Somehow, none of the evil voices from the past mattered now, because all that mattered was how he was looking at me. Not with lust. Not exactly anyway. Lust was there, but something more important as well. Longing. Need. And he felt so familiar to me, like I had known him for more than a day.
“Truth or dare.”
He grinned, the little gap showing for an instant as his eyes wandered over my face. “Dare.”
I reached up and touched my clover. Own luck. Own love. Own life. Own legacy.
With a heart pounding so hard I felt the rush of blood throbbing in my temples, I said, “I dare you to kiss me.”
At my soft words, his pupils bloomed, his jaw tightened. He let go of my chin, but instead of stepping away from me like I thought he would, he released the knot on top of my head, then combed the strands with his fingers.
I wanted to crawl up his chest and close my lips over his. I couldn’t remember needing human touch this intently. This freely. On my own terms. But, good heavens, I needed it now.
As if in slow motion, he took my mouth, slicing his lips across mine in a kiss of urgent need and desire. Our tongues danced, entwined, as his hands fisted in my hair. He pulled, and… oh, a liquid deliciousness spread through my body. He pulled again, and I was lost, my hands curling into his shirt.
“So sweet,” he murmured against my lips before tugging at the bottom one with his teeth. His words were like a balm for my tortured spirit, a beacon of light to chase away the shadows of my memories.
For a while.
His hands fell from my hair and ran down my back before cupping my ass, lifting me harder against him. I felt his erection against my belly and pressed into it harder. I was scared, my heart beating like a wild drum, but I wanted this so badly that nothing else mattered.
“Make love to me.”
There. I said it. Said what I wanted, what I needed, and the words seemed to unleash some built-up dam inside him.
He lifted me until I could wrap my legs around his waist, lips never parting with his. Then we were moving, through the door of his bedroom, and I was on his bed, his weight pressing me into the mattress.
He raised his head, but I pulled it back, crushing his lips onto mine. Our kiss softened and then deepened again, tongues licking into each other’s mouths, tracing the other’s lips. I lifted and ground my pelvis into his, needing pressure between my legs.
Because he seemed to always sense what I needed, he pressed his thigh between my legs, then higher, giving me the pressure I craved. His hands worked on the robe, pushing it away from my shoulders. The t-shirt was next, sliding up my body and over my head before being tossed onto the floor.
“So incredibly beautiful. So soft.” The calluses on his palms moved from my face to my throat, and lower, their roughness enhancing everything I was feeling. “Mine. My goddess.”
It was true. I felt like a goddess in his arms. I touched him too, pulling his shirt up and over his head so I could feel his skin as I ground my sex into his thigh, using him to fulfill my needs, and he let me.
“Please.”
I wasn’t even sure what I was begging for as he kissed down my throat. Then lower. His tongue licked at my skin, lips kissing my breasts, fingers pulling hard on the puckered flesh of my nipple. His mouth opened, capturing the sensitive tip between his teeth. His teeth grazed, his mouth suckled on me, softly, slowly, so intimately. The rasping of his teeth, the warmth and wetness of his mouth, the flickering of his tongue all combined into a whirlpool of sensations that threatened to drown me, pulling me into the place I’d only written of.
My longing for him increased, his tenderness and strength fanning the flame building inside of me, a light I didn’t know was there.
“I need you. Please. Inside of me.”
It sounded wanton of me to beg, but I didn’t care. Not with him. With Gray, everything I did felt right.
He growled. “I’ll be inside you.” He crawled back up to my mouth, his hand in my hair again. Pain radiated from the wound on my head, but I didn’t stop him. Staring down into my eyes, he continued, his voice a seductive grumble, “My fingers will be inside you. My tongue will be inside you.” He thrust his erection into my hip. “My cock will live inside you.”
His words were as seductive as the hand moving down my belly. Our mouths connected again as his hand began a slow exploration down my body. Stomach, hip, thighs, his fingers skimming over the flannel of the sleeping shorts before slipping underneath the waistband.
I whimpered as his hand cupped my sex, his thumb circling my clitoris, causing me to arch into him. “So hot.” He groaned against my ear when a finger slipped inside me. “So wet.”
I stiffened.
His finger curled inside me, but it was like all the passion, all the life inside me drained from my system with those two words.
He didn’t seem to notice as his mouth found my breast again, a second finger being added to the first.
This is now, I told myself, trying to stay present. This is Gray. Not them. This is now. I’m safe. I’ve never been safer than right here.
A tear slid down my temple as I tried so desperately to escape the past, tried so hard to believe what I was telling myself.
I found my four-leaf clover with my fingers.
Own luck. Own love. Own life. Own legacy.
But I was trapped in the self-imposed prison of my mind. In that dark place, it wasn’t Gray’s fingers and mouth. It was… theirs.
That’s when he noticed.
Lifting his head, he looked down at me, confusion and concern on his face. “What’s wrong? Did I hurt you?”
More tears came, and I hated them. I hated feeling weak. I hated being out of control. But I was… and god help me, I couldn’t stop from shaking.
He slipped his hand from my shorts, sat up, pushed off the bed. “I’m so sorry.”
I tried to tell him it wasn’t him, that it was me. That I was trapped in that place. Trapped in my mind. But I couldn’t tell him. My tongue was as numb as my heart.
Climbing back on the bed, he stuffed my arms into my robe, closed it, tied the belt. He pulled my head to his chest while also pulling a blanket over me.
“Zoe. God. I’m so sorry. I thought… I didn’t…”
I was shaking my head no. I was digging my fingers into his skin, trying to keep him from moving away from me again.
Shame was a prison. Guilt the guard. My deep self-loathing the hook which held the key to freedom. As much as I tried to reach through the bars and take the keys in my hand, it seemed that only my fingertips could graze them, teasing me with hope. Eluding me constantly.
“I’m s-s-sorry.” My teeth were still chattering, and I sounded pathetic even to my own ears, but he needed to know this wasn’t his fault.
So wet.
“Shhhh… you have nothing to be sorry for, Zoe. It’s my fault. I’m the one who’s sorry.”