Promise (25 page)

The way he tastes is unlike anything I’ve ever imagined. Uniquely and utterly masculine. His skin on my tongue has some inner instinct rising up and making me ravenous to please him.

“God, babe.” His words drip over me like a gentle, sensual rain.

I feel the first gentle pressure of his hands on my head. He’s not forcing, he’s guiding. And, instead of feeling panic, I feel connected.

My mouth opens wider taking in the thickness of him, working up and down; he touches the back of my throat, and my body reacts and closes off my air.

His hands have turned to gripping fingers, gathering my hair in a tangle, and he’s showing me the cadence, his rhythm, and I desperately want him here showing me just this.

“Just like that. God—right there.
Jesus
. . .”

He’s making a sound I want to hear over and over. The water is spraying around his back, making a white halo around the magnificence of his body. The head of his massive cock is growing, and my tongue plays with the defined ridge. I revel in the way my mouth is making this happen.

Faster, he’s nudging the back of my throat, and I can’t help the little gagging sounds that are coming from me. The roots of my hair are straining under his hands, but I don't care. I am single-minded, and every thought I have is compelled to bring him this.

“Take it, babe. Good girl, such a good girl . . .” He grunts, the words coming like bursts of some kind of primal torture.

Faster, faster, deeper . . . until I can get no air, and I don’t care. I never thought I’d desire what’s about to happen. I was sure—
sure
—this would never be a part of my life.

Before today I thought it would have taken force to make me do this . . . but here I am. Willingly, gladly giving him this part of myself.

I’m someone else right now, desperate for his flavor on my tongue, and my mind and body come together to reach that goal. I suck like my life depends on it and feel his body harden, his moans turning into a bellow even under the roar of the water.

It’s me doing this
for
him, and a strange sense of pride comes over me as my throat works to take him as deep as I can. Hands, tongue, lips toiling willingly until he grows to another size inside my mouth, and I feel the first spray of release slick my tongue.

“
Oh fuck
—” What follows is a sound I love. The sound of a kind of pleasure I didn’t know about until today. It is like the call of a wild beast, pulling me back in time, claiming me in some carnal way.

I gag and try to hold him, but he’s too big, the explosion inside my mouth far from the revolting, degrading act I had imagined. It is a sharing—a taking of part of him, a giving of part of me. And, I
want
his essence inside my body.

I gasp a breath around him, giving myself a moment with the last gush dripping from my lips onto the stark paleness of my skin. I can barely tell the difference between me and his cum.

The moment hits me just as his fingers loosen in my hair, and he falls to his knees, face to face with me, his eyes a stormy sea, the dark look of a man deep in a state of some satisfaction I don’t understand.

I swallow deep, making sure he knows it’s what I want to do.

“Beautiful.” His lips are on mine.

He’s kissing me even as his flavor still runs in my mouth, and he is utterly shameless, making me want him more.

I’m spinning as our kiss ignites, realizing everything that has happened—from the moment I turned that corner in front of the building and ran into that stink of a man . . . to being in Beckett's bed, feeling him enter me . . . and then, now, having him pull us together, enveloping me in some raw possessive power that I both want to run from and never leave.

“Now, you really are mine. You know that, don’t you?” That crooked, sexy smile is back as he pulls me up into him, standing for us both, and deep in my soul, I answer in the affirmative because there really is no other possibility at this moment.

I belong to him, and it’s beyond the depth of any emotion I’ve ever felt with another human being.

Before I can speak, he’s turned the water off and spins me in a towel. He’s got me dried and tucked in beside him, naked and warm under the covers of his bed, his lips on my forehead and arms locked around me like armor. His body is the pinnacle of masculine presence as I trace my fingers down his collarbone, over the planes and angles of a chest so smooth and hard, it creates a new sensation of texture I’ve never imagined.

“Are you okay? And I don’t want a quick answer. I want to
know
, Promise.
Are. You. Okay
? Because this is the beginning. Do you get that? This isn’t a singular event. It’s a door, and we are in a new place now. You and me, together.”

I can feel how much he really wants to know how I am. My default has always been silence or at best a nod or a single word. With him, I feel the sentences form. Paragraphs and thoughts want to tumble out and be received, because I sense he not only wants this from me, he needs it.

“I’m . . .” I take a second because I honestly want to give him an answer that feeds his need to know. “I’m exhausted and exhilarated. I’m horrified and at peace. Does that make any sense? I’m so many things that shouldn’t exist together in the same moment. I want to get dressed and leave and pretend this didn’t happen, and I’m helpless to move away from you.”

He doesn’t just listen to me; he absorbs my words, internalizing them, taking them in like they’re an honor and not just some sonic waves created to drift passed him.

“It makes perfect sense. . . . Do you feel safe?”

“Right now, yes. Safer than I’ve ever felt.”

His body shifts, angling toward me and tucking me into that perfect spot next to him, my head on his chest. The thumping of his heart tells me my answer has changed something inside of him.

“Thank you. That is the greatest gift anyone has ever given me.”

He reads my mind again as his lips take my mouth, and a torrent of flapping wings explode in my belly.

Beckett

“I wish you would stay.” We’re driving out of the basement parking structure, and I feel empty already knowing she won’t be laying with me the rest of the night. The Suburban hums as I pull out onto the empty street and take a turn toward the freeway back toward her apartment.

She will soon understand her value. It is beyond this world. Beyond anything anyone can quantify that doesn’t see her like I do.

I can see a little smile curl her lip upward as I glance over at the girl who cried sitting alone in that courtroom all those years ago.

Inside the most magnificent moments of my life, I feel the dread. The possibility that I can be here, right now, with her, and still know that I contributed to the ruin of her life—that I made a choice and let her be consumed by the vile evil that I know exists, the evil that will come back to extract its due from me someday.

“I have to be up at 5:30 to get ready for work.”

I don’t care. I want to tell her I don’t care and show her the empty drawers with her name on them I’ve already set aside. Show her there is space in the cabinet in the bathroom and half the closet is hers.

My brain is working out the pieces of how to make sure she never leaves again while simultaneously trying to stomp out the inevitable seeping in of dark secrets that could send her as far away from me as she’s ever been.

“I’ve been known to be up at 5:30, you know. I’ve been up at every hour on the clock a few hundred times over. I’ll be up all night tonight.”

“Why? Why do you have to stay up all night?” There is a subtle worry in her voice, and I hate to admit I like it.

“Because you won’t be there, and I’ve already realized I won’t sleep unless you’re with me. So, it’s blackmail. I won’t sleep until you come back.”

“You’re blackmailing me? What’s next, a hunger strike if I refuse to let you—”

My chest pulls tight. “Don’t ever refuse me.” The words tumble out faster and harder than they should, and I see her wince.

Did I just say that? And mean it?

“Hey, sorry.” I throw my hand to the back of my neck and squeeze. “That came out wrong. I have to be honest, something about you—about us—is so different. I’m still sort of stunned by you. I’ll try to rein in the beast you have clearly unchained.” I smile, and she gives me one back that feeds my soul.

“Yeah, we kind of got caught up. I never expected this.”

I need her hand in mine. All the time. My hand leaves the back of my neck and gravitates toward her, and I feel the softness of her skin. Could it really be that no woman has ever felt like this before? Is she of such an order that no one has ever come close? Or, am I just so jacked that every sensation seems new with her?

My fingers interweave with hers, pulling the back of her hand to my lips.

“Me, either.” I kiss her hand again then continue. “But, we’re here now, and in my crazy head, we’re never leaving.”

“Yes.” Promise leans her head on my shoulder, and her single word of agreement has me ready to carve into her again.

“Say ‘
yes
’ again.”

“What? You’re a little weird. You know that, right?” The passing streetlights flash inside the windows every few seconds, lighting up her hair like a glowing halo.

“Just say it.”

I need to hear the word again. I think of all the other answers in the future for which I want her to use this word.

“
Yes.
” Her voice is clipped, but there is still that little bit of a smile coming through.

“That is now officially my favorite word.”

She shakes her head but I see her smile grow, and my heart is slapping against my chest far harder than the moment calls for.

“Here. Turn in here.” She points as I see the apartment complex on my left.

It’s dark out, but not late. We’d already talked about what happened on the street with the attack and decided not to call the police or tell anyone else. I left it up to her, and she made that call.

As I turn into the complex’s driveway, I remember the sound of her screams, and I feel an invisible fist slam into my gut.

“You okay?” She looks at me, and I realize I must have made some distressed noise.

“Yep. All’s good. Where do I park?”

Bruce is leaning against the kitchen's quartz countertop when we make our entrance into his and Promise's shared apartment. His foot is wiggling fast, and I can see him glancing from me to Jeremy with something between amusement and horror.

“Beckett, this is Jeremy. Jeremy—Beckett.” Promise introduces us with a tension in her voice that I hate.

I’ve found my new least favorite word.

Jeremy
.

Whoever this fuck is, he was here when we walked in. Standing there like he belonged. Motherfucker’s got some lessons coming; I can feel it already.

“What’s up? What are you doing here?” Promise is uncomfortable, and it makes me want to tear this dude’s throat out.

Not Bruce.

Jeremy.

My hackles are up, and the dude isn’t smart enough to take his fucking eyes off me.

I know this fucker.

Holy shit. I absolutely fucking know him. What the fuck is he doing here?

“I need to talk to you. It’s important.” He’s talking to Promise, but his eyes are on me.

I can smell shit coming from him. Not the excrement kind, the other kind. The bad kind.

We are only three steps inside the door, but I’m on high alert. I can read the signs. Bruce is smiling, but he isn’t relaxed. Yet, creepo-in-khaki sure as shit thinks he’s at home.

I’ll fix that.

He’s not a big dude, but he’s got that arrogant ego halo around him. Sitting there, at the dining room table, like he’s in his own damn house. I glance over to see his jacket tossed on the sofa in a heap. He’s drumming his fingertips on the table, and they’re making a clicking sound.

Dude needs to schedule a manicure, and I can see where he couldn’t bother to wipe off the drops of mustard and ketchup from his short-sleeved, worn, plaid dress shirt.

Yeah, I see you, motherfucker. Don’t push me. I’ve got another damn gear that you do not want to experience. Take. Your. Fucking. Eyes. Elsewhere.