Beyond Shame (17 page)

He felt an answering tug, a tingle at the base of his spine. "Do it again."

She caught her plump lower lip between her teeth and obeyed. It was a light, shy touch, one that barely counted, but this time she didn't stop. She edged her fingers lower, parting her swollen folds as she explored tentatively. "I liked your fingers inside me."

"Gonna try yours now?"

She did, leaning back to brace her weight on one hand as she pushed two fingers inside. A slow, wicked smile curved her lips. "Not as good. Too small. Too short."

Jasper caught his breath. "You have more fingers."

"Show me." She worked a third finger into her pussy in spite of the words, moaning when she thrust them deep. "Why won't you touch me? Don't you want me when we're alone?"

He dropped into a chair to keep from crossing to the table. "You're drunk, sweetheart, and I have my rules."

"I don't understand them. I'm doing everything you tell me to. My hands might as well be yours, except they're not as good."

Maybe she was right. He nodded to the bedroom. "Bed's through there. I'll take the couch."

Shock painted her features, followed swiftly by mortification. She stumbled off the table and snatched up her panties, and by the time she dragged them up her legs she was shaking.

Her next stop would be the door. Jasper shot across the space between them and grasped her upper arms. "If you don't see the difference between me touching you and what was happening, that means there
is
no difference. I shouldn't have been doing it."

"Why is it always so easy for you to
stop
?" The question tore free, ragged and edged with honest pain. "I must want you so much more than you want me. I'm like one of Ace's groupies, needy and pathetic."

He wanted to shake her. "Because I don't get to lose control. If I lose control, people die. Things go wrong." Her hair brushed the back of his hand, and he couldn't resist running his fingers through it. "You'd get hurt."

He saw the moment the words penetrated, the moment she not only understood but believed. Her eyes widened, and she pressed both hands to his bare chest, fingers splayed wide. "Don't you get tired of it? Having to be in control, having to protect me?"

"Yes
and
no." He tugged at her hair, then indulged himself by stroking his fingers over her cheek. "In the long run, it's worth it."

She absorbed that in silence as she turned her face into his palm. Her lips tickled the heel of his thumb in a ghost of a kiss. "Don't make me sleep alone. I won't try to do anything, just...hold me? Please?"

"Noelle..."

Something wet brushed his palm. Tears. "I don't understand the rules here. I'm trying. I swear I'm trying."

She was crying.
Fuck.
Jasper folded her in his arms. "Stay. I want you to. I can keep my hands to myself."

"I'm sorry. I'm sorry, I didn't mean to—" She swiped at her cheeks angrily, dashing away tears. "I should go. I don't want to stay like this."

"This is why you
should
stay," he argued. "Not sex, not like this. But being here is okay."

She shivered and leaned closer, rested her forehead against his shoulder. "When I was ten, one of my tutors gave me a kitten. I only had her for a few hours before my father came home, but I fell in love with her. She would nuzzle my cheek and climb all over me... I had something to cuddle."

Jasper hooked his arm under her legs and picked her up. "Your dad made you get rid of her?"

"My father got rid of her, and then he got rid of the tutor, too. They told me at dinner, and when I cried, my mother slapped me so hard she split my lip. She said decent ladies don't cry, because tears are how wicked women make righteous men doubt their convictions."

A heartbreaking moment, and the saddest part was that it had to have been one of many, a string of confusion and shame. "I'm sorry, sweetheart."

She rubbed her cheek against his chest with a sigh. "I don't want to manipulate you. I just don't want to be alone, and I don't want to be with anyone else."

"Shh. Right now, it's time to sleep it off." He eased his bedroom door open with his foot.

Noelle huffed. "I wish you were drunk. Then you'd tell me things about you."

Oh, if only she realized. "I
am
a little drunk." He eased her onto his bed and tumbled after her. "What do you want to know?"

She seemed to consider the question with adorable gravity as she wiggled into a comfortable position with her cheek resting on his arm and her hand over his heart. "Where are you from?" she asked finally. "Eden, or the sectors?"

"Neither. I grew up on a farm east of here."

"In the communes?"

Nothing so sterile or acceptable. "A private operation. We grew corn for the distilleries, along with some other things."

"Oh, one of the illegal farms," she murmured sleepily. "We're not supposed to know about those. In Eden they tell us that nothing can live outside the communes, that the land can't support people. But I heard my father arguing with a partner once about whether or not to send the military police to shut one down. I think some of the councilmen pay to support private farms so they won't have to worry about rationing during the lean harvest years."

If they did, they relied on outfits more reputable than the one Jasper had worked. "My parents dropped me off when I was ten," he told her. "An apprenticeship, they all called it, but the only thing I learned was how to survive. I guess that's a trade all by itself these days, though."

Noelle lifted up onto her elbow and peered down at him. "They left you when you were ten?"

He couldn't meet her gaze. "Had to get to work."

She laid her palm over his cheek, her skin soft and warm above his beard. "That must have been so hard. And terrifying."

The farm had housed kids even younger, children who couldn't handle the backbreaking work. "I'd still be there if Robbins—the man who ran the place—hadn't traded me to Dallas to settle a debt."

"How old were you then?"

"Twenty-two." And Dallas had been in the beginning stages of building an empire.

The curling ends of Noelle's hair tickled his throat as she kissed his temple. "I'm glad he took you. You're worth more than any debt."

"That's what he thought, I guess. He still made me work it off, though—one year." After that, he'd been free to go, but where? Sector Four was as good a place as any, even before he'd proven himself loyal to the O'Kanes.

She settled close to his side but kept her fingers pressed to his cheek, absently stroking his beard. "You're all so strong. You've been through terrible things and you still
live
. I don't think I ever realized how numb I was until they threw me away. Like I was a shadow of a person."

She felt good cuddled against him, so good it dulled the razor's edge of the lust. "Sometimes...you have to hit bottom before you can figure out where to go."

"I've been slipping for a while. Ever since—" She broke off, tensing. When she continued, her words were lower. More intense. "My father had started negotiations for me to marry. After that, nothing mattered. I didn't care if I was ruined. I thought my father would cover it up to save face but all of the important men would know, and no one would have me after that."

"There are worse things than being alone on your own terms." Though maybe not in the city.

"I thought so, too. I knew my father would restrict me to the house for a few years to keep me from harming the family's reputation, but I didn't mind that. I'd have had access to a desk and the city's library. But then something else happened."

Jasper's stomach clenched. "What?"

As if she felt his tension, she made a soothing noise and stroked his chest. "Somewhere between deciding to let that boy touch me and getting arrested for fornication, I woke up. Even if my father had kept me in the city, I wouldn't have been happy locked up alone with my books anymore. I know I'm all tangled up inside, and I know it bothers you...but I'm sure about one thing. I'm not made to be untouched and alone."

Nobody was, least of all a woman as filled with life and curiosity and
desire
as Noelle. "I know what you mean." He kissed the top of her head. "Sleep. You're gonna feel like shit in the morning."

"Don't care." With a sigh of satisfaction, she squirmed closer. "At least I'll feel."

He waited until her breathing began to slow to whisper, "Me too."

Chapter Twelve

Noelle woke up dying.

Her skull pounded. Her mouth tasted like she'd swallowed cotton, and the roiling in her stomach reminded her she'd swallowed something far, far worse. Even shifting to her side made the room tilt and the churning increase until she whimpered.

"Don't move. It makes it worse."

"Lex?" The pillow smelled like Jasper, and the bed didn't feel like the pull-out couch. It couldn't be Lex's bed, either—the sheets weren't nice enough. "Where am I?"

"Jasper's place. He had to go." Lex rattled a small bottle. "Head hurt?"

"Not so loud, please." Noelle pressed her palm to her temple and tried to keep her head from throbbing so hard it split open. "I don't think I can eat or drink anything right now."

Lex touched her cheek. "You've got to. Water and aspirin, honey, that's all that's going to fix this."

Groaning, Noelle eased carefully onto her back and squinted up at Lex. "Where did Jasper go?"

"Business. Well, trouble," she amended. "Something's going down tonight. Got to prepare."

Noelle choked down the aspirin with as small a sip of water as she could manage and studied Lex's face. There was no hint of subterfuge, no sign that Jasper had dumped Noelle on Lex to get away from her.

That would be more comfort if Noelle's memories of the previous evening were clearer—or less embarrassing. "I think I was very drunk."

Lex grinned. "Does that mean you don't remember making out with me? I'm crushed."

It surfaced in a rush, a vivid memory of Lex's tongue swiping through her mouth before Noelle ended up sprawled on the table. She groaned again and covered her eyes with one hand. "I remember. I guess it's a good thing Jasper drank half my shots."

"Relax. As far as those parties go, it was damn tame." Lex stretched out beside her. "Bren said he got you back to my room, but I figured you must have dragged your drunk ass down here to have it out with Jasper."

She remembered that, too, far more clearly than she wanted to. "I changed my mind. Maybe I wasn't drunk enough."

Lex laughed. "Being passed out cold has its upsides."

"It probably keeps you in bed where you belong." Noelle eased onto her side and smiled at Lex. "I think it ended up all right, though. We talked."

"Good. He seemed square this morning, anyway."

That gave her hope. Between the humiliation of begging for something Jasper wasn't ready to give and the mortification of breaking down into tears, the evening should have been a disaster. But the moments she recalled most vividly were those spent cuddled against his side.

She couldn't remember how long they'd talked before she'd drifted to sleep, but the low rumble of his voice had chased her into dreams, a whisper that made her feel safe and cherished.

Moving slowly to avoid upsetting her body's precarious truce, she curled her hand around Lex's. "I'm glad I'm an O'Kane."

"Me too, honey." Lex propped her head on her other hand and looked down at Noelle. "I know what you want from him, and I need to explain something to you about the way things work here."

A different sort of queasiness stirred Noelle's gut. "Did he tell you what happened?"

"Jasper? He doesn't talk, not about that. But he doesn't have to." Lex tapped her temple. "I see the hunger, Noelle."

"How can you even tell what's what? I'm starving for everything."

"No, you only
want
some things. The others... Yeah, you're starving for those."

"What am I starving for?" No, that wasn't the real question. In her heart she knew, and so did Jasper. The question he wanted answered was the one she couldn't begin to unravel. "And
why
?"

Lex shrugged one shoulder. "I don't worry about why.
Why
doesn't matter. It won't change what you need."

"It matters to Jasper."

"Not even slightly." Lex leaned closer, held Noelle pinned with her dark gaze. "Jasper doesn't want to go too far because he's worried about what happens after. If you think it's all fucked up and wrong, eventually you'll hate yourself
and
him. You'll hate your life."

"Oh." Put that way, Noelle understood his fear. And as much as she wanted to brush it away, she couldn't. Not honestly. "I can't help it. I want to believe it's not wrong. I think I'm starting to, but I don't know."

"So take your time and enjoy the ride."

It couldn't be that easy. "What did you want to explain to me?"

Lex's brow furrowed. "The things you've been offering him—and what you've been asking for in return—it's fast. Even for an O'Kane. So don't be surprised if he hesitates, okay?"

Noelle closed her eyes as her stomach churned with more than the aftereffects of the liquor. "So the things I'm starving for aren't the things I'm supposed to want."

"Don't put words in my mouth, baby girl," Lex said, gentle but firm. "Fast, not wrong."

Except wanting them fast must be wrong, or at least naïve. "Help me understand. What makes it different from all the other things people do?"

"You really don't get it, do you?" Lex sat up then, her spine stiff and her dark eyes clouded. "You don't
need
him, Noelle. You don't need anyone, not anymore. You have the gang, and you have yourself. You can do whatever the hell you want."

Lex sounded as confused as Noelle, and she felt laughter bubbling up. Of course Lex couldn't understand her question. She lived in a world where all the lines were drawn, where her body and her mind were her own to give. Where giving had some meaning, because she knew how to hold back.

"I was trying to do what I wanted," Noelle confessed, safe behind the shield of her hands. "But no one can tell, can they? Jasper doesn't know if I can say no. None of us do, not even me."