Only Love (The Atonement Series) (28 page)

I wanted to say something but him being inside me was such a joy in itself, the whole act left me helpless and speechless.

“Are you sure you don’t want to continue this on a bed, like normal adults? Or would you rather we stay here in the hallway and fuck each other like a couple of drunken high school kids?”

“Bed,” I panted out loud before he walked us through the apartment. “Make a left, and it’s all the way down the hall.”

Drake followed my directions and we ended up in the guest bedroom which was slightly smaller than my sister’s but it was clean, immaculate, and had a comfortable bed with silk sheets and a private bathroom.

We separated then when he set me down on the bed and I instantly felt the emptiness he’d left behind. He took off his clothes efficiently and quickly before he stared at me like a predator watching his prey and crawled to where I lay on the bed. He unzipped my dress and slipped it off me, pulled off the ruined thong and undid my shoes before he pushed me further on the bed and spread my legs again.

I took one look at my lover and wrapped my arms around his neck before he slammed his manhood into me again. We moved together in a rhythm that was so highly satisfying, I was quite surprised I didn’t come on the spot but then again, he took his time, working his way inside me, thrusting in and out like I was well tuned engine.

It was nice and slow; tortuous and sheer pleasure; agony and ecstasy all rolled into one because he wasn’t ready to come and he wouldn’t allow me to come yet either. I became frustrated because just one orgasm and I could go all night but this was complete and utter teasing because he could and it was maddening yet so very addictive at the same time.

I rolled us until I was on top and he was on the bottom. He sat up and I gripped my arms tighter around his neck as I rode him like I was in the local rodeo contest. Drake refused to cooperate and I couldn’t control our sex. It turned out he had a few sadistic tendencies after all because he just laughed and I finally slid off him in frustration.

“What is up with you?” I questioned angrily as I lay on my stomach and refused to face him. “You’re just one huge tease tonight, aren’t you?”

“Something like that,” he said before he lay on top of me though he balanced his weight with his strong arms. “What’s your hurry? You act like we have to finish this off by a certain deadline. There is nothing wrong with wanting to make it last.”

“Can we make it last some other time? My clit is on fire and I just want to get off, Drake, so we can both get some rest and hopefully find out what the hell is going on tomorrow. No muss, no fuss.”

He kissed my back at the base of my buttocks. “There is nothing wrong with getting off but who wants predictable, babe? When we get married and have been doin’ this shit for twenty years, predictable is fine but for the time being, let’s have some fun. You’re still so young and you have had a tough summer. I know you care about me and you probably love me in your own way but I’m in love with you, Deirdre.

“There is some part of your heart that is locked up tight and you won’t let anyone in…except Colin. The son of a bitch doesn’t even know how lucky he is because he got to possess
all
of you. I get your body but I don’t have your heart and yeah, I know, I’m a guy so romance is supposed to mean shit to me but that isn’t how it works. I really want all of you too and if I can’t have the whole package then perhaps we shouldn’t continue this because you’ll just end up breaking my heart.”

Drake removed his weight from my body and lay out on his back.

I couldn’t stop the tears as they ran down my cheeks and I sobbed quietly. He was right of course; I couldn’t let anyone in because if I did, they might hurt me the same way Colin had and that would devastate me. I hadn’t gotten over Colin’s deception and like a jack rabbit, I’d gone from one relationship to another.

Drake and Colin were as different from one another as night and day and it was my stupidity I hadn’t seen it before. He wouldn’t hurt me the way my former fiancé had because it just wasn’t part of his makeup as a human being. He had experienced that type of heartache and loathed the thought of treating another human being like that, let alone me.

My life seemed to be nothing but a string of disappointments and heartaches lately. I’d lost my father and Colin yet both losses were connected and thus could not be separated and that is what my ex-fiancé failed to comprehend. He and his brother had taken my father away and I, in turn, had taken away the only thing I could control: my fidelity and affection. Those two parts of the equation had been easy yet love still remained no matter how much I wanted to despise him.

I had a real dilemma here to face because if Drake and I were going to be together, I would have to shed every part of my past, Colin included. It didn’t mean we couldn’t be friends but I couldn’t expect my current significant other to accept me being in love with another man even though I couldn’t make a life with him. It wasn’t fair to Drake and it wasn’t fair to me or Colin either. He knew I still loved him; and he knew if he worked me over hard enough and stayed around, I would eventually cave but I couldn’t.

Something inside me broke at that point as I sat up and collapsed on top of Drake. “I’m so sorry for all the heartache I put you through. I didn’t want to fall in love with you and I still don’t but…I can’t keep you dangling on a string either. Colin broke my heart and I can’t allow that to happen again. This past year has been too hard for me and to experience it with another would be sheer torture. I do want to be with you and I know it’s not fair to ask but can we take this day by day and see how it goes?

“I’m not perfect and I won’t always make you happy but I want to give what we have a chance. If you’re willing to try then so am I and perhaps with time, I will allow that part of my heart to thaw and I can be in love with you instead of him. Please say you are willing to try at least.”

“Fuck, Deirdre!” Drake slid his hands over his face and rubbed hard. In the dim light that came through the open curtains, I could see he’d been crying. “What else do you expect me to say? Of course I will do what ever it takes to keep you but that doesn’t mean I have to like it.”

“I suppose this gives you permission to take advantage of my body any way you see fit until my heart fully belongs to you,” I added seductively.

It didn’t take much for him to flip me over, spread my legs and enter me once again. Despite our emotional out pouring, he hadn’t gone soft and I was still wet with desire.

Our feelings tumbled over into our lovemaking and he seemed to fuck me that much harder and deeper because I wasn’t in love with him. It was exactly what I needed in the end because as he thrust into me again and again, he drove me to highs I never thought I would ever see and when we came together, it was beautiful and it set us both on fire with lust, need, and love for one another.

Chapter Twenty

Colin

“Did you tell them what was going on?”

Colin faced a scarlet-faced Mikayla as they stood in the sitting room of his condo. “No, of course I didn’t. Why would I do that when I want Deirdre back? If you killed the prick, you would be doing both of us a favor.”

She glared at him with hard blue eyes. “Don’t lie to me. Why were they suddenly gone from the party?”

“I think you would know more about that then I would, sweetheart. How great is Drake in bed because if he’s that good then she probably took him home so they could get it on,” he responded before he walked into the kitchen and grabbed a Beck’s from the fridge.

Mikayla’s high heels clicked against the hardwood floors. “You’re not a very good liar, you know that? If I wasn’t so impressed by your own bedroom skills, I would kill you myself.” She walked closer until she was pressed against his backside, her fingers working over his still-clothed manhood. “They never went back to the hotel so where would they be? There are only a few places they could have gone…”

“Listen,” Colin began as he turned around and faced the horny nympho in front of him, “I don’t know where they could be! They wouldn’t have gone to Liam’s since we live in the same building. I don’t know much about Deirdre’s comings and goings. They wouldn’t be at Drew and Aubrey’s because they were still at the engagement party when we left and they came together. I don’t know what kind of rental they had so I simply can’t help you, sweetheart.”

She crossed her arms against her ample breasts as she stepped back from him. “I have a feeling they went to the mother’s house. She’s a widow on her own and they probably thought they would be safe there but they are wrong. If Drake doesn’t want to be with me then I will still make him pay.”

Colin’s heart began to beat faster in his chest and sweat began to gather in the most intimate places of his body. “I don’t understand. Even if they are at her mother’s house, surely you wouldn’t murder innocent people just to get to him. He’s not worth it.”

“Don’t you think that is something I should be deciding and not you?” Mikayla turned away from him and all he saw was the back of her white blonde hair, including the part where she added extensions to her own very short hair, ruined by the extensive bleaching it had been subjected to repeatedly over the years.

“Listen, this is Seattle, not East L.A or fuckin’ Compton. You don’t just shoot people up—gangsta style—because it’s cool or because you need to get rid of someone. I highly doubt this hit can’t wait until we are all back in La Jolla. Don’t bring this kind of violence here because frankly, we don’t need it.”

She already had her iPhone pressed to her ear before she issued instructions in Ukrainian to the caller.

Colin tried to reach for the phone but she was faster and began to run down his hallway shouting instructions before she hung up.

He caught her at the end of the hallway and she began to laugh. “It’s all done now. The hitmen will go to the mother’s house and murder everyone in there. You really should have told me where she was, Colin…especially since I know she isn’t at her mother’s.”

The bottle of Beck’s slipped from his fingers and fell on the hardwood floor where it shattered. “Why would you send people to her mother’s house if you know she isn’t there and for Christ’s sake, I don’t know where she is—I swear to God I don’t know where either of them are! Do you think they would have honestly told me?”

Mikayla slipped a Marlboro Red in her mouth and lit it before she dragged on the cigarette and began to walk into the living room again. “Probably not…but it’s a nice message to send. The Shevchenko family won’t be fucked around with for any reason and this little bitch you all protect has to learn this lesson for herself.”

Colin felt the rage build and before he knew it, he grabbed a glass sculpture he purchased from Baccarat. It was an art-deco piece, shaped like a phallic symbol with sharp edges. He walked toward Mikayla and swung it at her head. The sound of the object connecting with her skull sounded like it had shattered the bone in the back of her head. He’d done irreversible damage and no doctor would ever be able to put her back together again.

Mikayla stumbled several feet before she fell to the floor and a pool of blood began to form around her head, inadvertently putting the cigarette out she still gripped between her right index and middle fingers.

His heart thudded in his chest and his whole body was covered with sweat but it didn’t stop him from setting the object down before he pulled out his Samsung Galaxy Note and called Liam’s.