Slay (Storm MC #4) (22 page)

A man I hadn’t thought of in nearly as long. 

A person I didn’t want to think of.

My heart rate picked up as the memories flooded my mind.  I gulped my scotch and turned my gaze back to Donovan.  “Julian was a motherfucker I should have known better than to get involved with.”  I gulped more scotch.  Fuck, I hated dredging up memories.

He sat on the edge of the bed, his concerned eyes focused on mine.  I loved the way he looked at me when he was worried about me. Sometimes, his eyes could be so soft for such a hard man.  “Tell me about him,” he murmured.

I tipped the rest of the scotch down my throat, took a deep breath, and shared the darkest moment of my life with him. 

“After Annie and I left home, we had nowhere to go, so we had to stay with friends for awhile.  I had no work experience at all. I mean, I never had to work while I was at school because my parents gave me whatever I wanted.  So, I struggled to find a job, which meant we couldn’t afford rent.  Like I said, some friends did let us stay but we wore out our welcome eventually and ended up living on the streets.  I met Julian at a café one day when I was applying for a job, and he took us under his wing and helped us get back on our feet.  He found me a job with a bartender friend of his and he gave us a place to stay.”  I stopped to take a breath and put my glass out for a refill.

Donovan filled my glass again before saying, “I’m not gonna like this story, am I?”

I shook my head.  “No.”

He poured himself another drink and drank half of it straight away.  “Fuck.”  His features had hardened, and I wished we’d never started this conversation. 

“We eventually started something.  To me, it was just sex, not a relationship.  Julian was the third guy I’d ever slept with and he showed me a whole other world of sex.  He liked it rough, and I discovered I did, too, so we were a good match.  Julian made it clear he wanted to keep sleeping with other women, and I had no issues with that.  I was young and wanted to see what was out there.  I thought him sleeping around meant I could, too.  Turns out I was wrong.”  I stopped again to drink some more scotch.  My chest had tightened and a chill ran through me thinking about this.  I raised my eyes to Donovan’s and let the care I found there help me get the rest of the words out.  “He’d been getting rougher with the sex, inflicting a lot of pain, and I had started to pull away a little.  I can handle rough, but only when there’s some emotion involved.  With Julian, there was nothing.  It was just fucking and pain while he got off.  One night, I was at work and a guy I’d never met flirted with me.  Julian saw it, and when we got home, he let me know just how unhappy he was that another guy had shown interest in me.”  My voice caught in my throat.  “He beat me so badly I ended up in hospital for days . . . He tried to kill me, but Annie saved me . . . she hit him over the head with the baseball bat he kept in his bedroom and got me out of there.”  My heart beat fast in my chest and my mind swam with the bad memories.  I wanted to squeeze my eyes shut and pretend none of this was true.  I’d never told anyone this story; Annie was the only person who knew about this. 

Donovan moved fast.  He shifted to take me in his arms, and I let him hold me. 

I needed that.

I needed him.

He didn’t say anything, and I needed that, too; the silence where our actions spoke louder than anything either of us could say. 

We simply clung to each other.

Eventually, he moved us so I lay in his arms.  And then he whispered, “There’s a lot of bad shit in this world, sweetheart, but you’ve got me now.  I won’t let anyone or any-fucking-thing get to you again.”

I spread my arm across his chest and let my hand curl all the way around and under his side.  Holding him tight, I whispered back, “Thank fuck you like crappy little bars in the backstreets . . . thank fuck you found me.”

***

We fell asleep, and I woke up a while later to his hand on my pussy, his mouth on mine.  Before I was even fully awake, my instincts took over, and I opened my mouth and my legs to let him take whatever he wanted.

He can have anything he wants.

His leg shifted over mine and pushed it further apart from my other one at the same time that his hand slid from my pussy to cup my ass.  He lifted my ass slightly off the bed and demanded to know, “Your pussy ready for my mouth?”

Oh, god, I was
more
than ready.

“Yes,” I managed to get out. 

He let me go, moving down my body until his head was situated between my legs.  It was still dark, and I couldn’t see his face clearly, but I could
see
his hunger.

My man needs me.

I shut my eyes and held onto the sheets as he flicked his tongue against my clit.

Fuck.

He used his tongue to get me wet, and then he pushed it inside me while he brought his finger to my clit.  Rubbing me with his finger and exploring me with his tongue, he brought me close to orgasm, and then he backed off, pulling his face away from me.

Fuck.

I reached down to grab his hair, showing him how desperate I was for his mouth.

He placed his hand on my stomach, splaying his fingers out before roughly dragging his hand down to hold my pussy.  “Jesus,” he murmured.  “I can’t fucking get enough of you, baby.”

I moved my hand to cover his hand on my pussy, and our eyes met as I said, “I can’t get enough of you, either.”

My eyes had adjusted to the darkness now, and I watched as he stared at me with heat.  “Fuck,” he said, before shifting our hands off me, and lowering his mouth back to me.

He gave me his tongue and his teeth, and, this time, brought me to orgasm.  As the sensations shot through me, my heart constricted, and I knew this was the moment.  The moment my feelings for Donovan took the leap off the cliff: a leap of complete faith that this man would hold my heart in his hands and cherish it forever.

Chapter Twenty-Two

Layla

“Layla, we need to go,” Donovan said in his impatient voice.

My head snapped up from what I was doing, and I glared at him.  “Don’t use that voice on me.”

His brows quirked.  “Which voice?”

“Your hurry-the-fuck-up voice,” I muttered, and looked back down at the table where I was in the middle of fighting with plastic wrap to cover the salads I’d made.  Plastic wrap and I were not friends, and I was just about to throw it out of the fucking window.

Donovan moved towards me and stilled my hand by placing his over it.  His warm breath whispered across my cheek when he murmured, “Let me do it.”

I turned my head slightly to look into his eyes.  “How do you manage to piss me off and then make it all better in the space of two minutes?”

His lips brushed mine.  “Just talented, I guess.”

I shook my head at his cockiness.  “Okay, Mr Talented, hurry up, because we’re already running late and I don’t want to annoy your sister.”

He finished wrapping the salads.  “Something tells me Madison is gonna love you regardless,” he said as he picked up both the salads.

“How do you figure that?”

As he began ushering me down the stairs to go to the car, he said, “My sister has been giving me grief for a while to start dating again.  So you should probably expect an interrogation.”

I followed him to his car and waited while he opened the door for me.  “Oh, God.”

His hand rested on my arm, stopping me.  “Are you worried about this?”

There was no point lying to him, even though I would have preferred not to be this open so soon in our relationship.  “Not worried so much as feeling a little anxious.”  I held back the rest, hoping he’d let me off.

“Why?”

My eyes struggled to meet his, but he cupped my cheek and tilted my face up so I had no option but to look him in the eye.  “I want your family to like me, and I’ve never had that feeling before.  I’ve never given a shit if people liked me, so I’m a little rattled by it.”

His eyes glazed with the desire for me that was never far away.  When he spoke, his voice had that growly tone to it I liked, but at the same time, there was softness there.  “It means something to you that my family likes you?”

Butterflies fluttered in my tummy.  “Yes,” I whispered.

“Fuck, you’re something else,” he murmured.  “They’re gonna like you, and if they don’t, I couldn’t give a fuck.”

“Thank you.”

He kissed me and then asked, “We good now?”

I smiled.  “Yes.”

He settled me in my seat, put the salads on my lap, and then drove us to Madison’s house.  It was a good twenty-minute drive, and when we pulled up outside her home, I’d completely calmed down.  Donovan’s words had eased my nerves, and I was glad I’d been honest with him. 

I fell in love with Madison’s home the minute I saw it from the outside.  A brick lowset, she’d landscaped the front yard with lots of colourful flowers and a water feature.  I sucked at identifying flowers, so I had no clue what kind they were, but there was such a mix of colours it reminded me of a beautiful painting.  It turned out she loved colour.  She’d filled her home with it: on the walls, in the decorations and with more flowers scattered throughout.  I got the impression Madison loved decorating.

We walked through her home, down the hallway and ended up in her kitchen.  Donovan placed the salads on the counter and smiled at Madison who was getting steaks ready for the barbeque.  It wasn’t often he smiled, so I knew straight away they were pretty close.

“Blade!” She greeted him by flinging her arms around him in a welcoming hug.

I watched in interest as he let her hug him.  His arms didn’t go around her but he did place his hands to her arms and hold her there.  Donovan didn’t seem to be a touchy-feely man.  Except where I was concerned, and then it seemed he had no problem with touching me in any way he chose.

Madison let him go and turned her attention to me.  Her face lit up with delight before she pulled me into a hug, too.  “I’m so glad you could come today, Layla.  Blade’s been very quiet about you, so I know nothing about how the two of you met.”  She let me go and gave her brother a dirty look.

Donovan scowled and turned to look at J who was walking towards us.  Jerking his chin at him, he said, “J.”

J gave him a chin lift in return and said, “Blade.”  He moved into Madison’s space and slipped his arm around her waist.  She sunk into him, nestling her head against his chest, placing her hand on his stomach.  I noticed the ring on her finger: J was her husband.

“J, this is Layla, Blade’s girlfriend,” Madison introduced me.

Girlfriend.

“We’ve met,” J said, flashing me a breathtaking smile.  His smile was enough to melt the panties off any woman in close proximity.

I returned his smile.  “Hi, J.”

Before anyone could say anything else, another guy came down the hallway towards us. Jesus, another fucking panty-melting dude.  This guy didn’t look so friendly, though. 

“Scott,” Madison greeted him quietly.  She gave him a questioning look and when he shook his head, she asked, “She’s not coming, is she?”

He flinched, and his whole body tensed at her words.  As I looked closer at him, I noticed his exhaustion.  He scrubbed a hand over his face.  “No.”

Madison looked crushed.  “Shit, I spoke to her last night and she said she’d think about it.”

Scott blew out a long breath.  “Yeah, I thought she would.”

“What are you going to do?”

“Keep fighting for her.  I won’t give up on her or on us.  Whatever she needs to get through this, I’ll make happen,” he said with determination. 

She gave me an apologetic look.  “Sorry, Layla, meet my brother, Scott.”

We exchanged greetings, and then he left us to go out to the back yard.

Donovan watched him go, and then turned to Madison.  “Is he okay?” he asked.

Sighing, she went back to preparing the steaks and said, “I honestly don’t know.  He won’t talk to me about it.  You know what he’s like, bottling everything up.”

“Maybe you should just leave him be, baby,” J suggested, earning a frown from Madison.

“No, we need to get him to talk about it.”

Donovan bent to whisper in my ear, “You okay in here if I go out and talk to Scott?”

I looked up at him and nodded.  “Yeah, you go and talk to your brother.  Seems like he might need that.”

He brushed his lips over mine and left us.  I watched him go and then looked back to Madison who stood staring at me with a look of wonder on her face. 

At my questioning look, she said, “I’ve never seen Blade like that before.”

“Like what?”

She pointed at me.  “Like he just was with you.  Affectionate.  He’s usually so tightly wound and doesn’t do displays of affection.  I love that he’s like that with you.”

I thought back to the Donovan who came to my bar for a year before talking to me.  “Yeah, he’s a very intense man, that’s for sure.”

“I’m so glad he found you,” she said, softly, before finishing up her steaks.

J had started rearranging food in the fridge so he could put the salads I’d brought in there.  He pulled sausages out, and took them and the steak outside to the barbeque.  Madison smacked his ass as he left and grinned at me when he muttered something about not revving him up when he couldn’t do anything about it.

“So tell me, how did you meet Blade?” she asked once we were alone.

“He’d been coming to my bar for a long time but never really spoke to any of us.  He just sat in the corner and kept to himself, but one night recently, he stepped in and helped me sort out a problem with a debt collector who came to the bar looking for my business partner.  It just progressed from there.”

“He’ll look after you.  You know that, right?  I’ve known him for a year now, and I’ve never seen him date before.  Blade’s the kind of man who is either all in or all out, and something tells me he’s all in here.”

I smiled at her.  “I’m pretty sure we’re both serious about this.  He’s given me that impression, and even though we’ve only been seeing each other a short time, and have still got a lot to get to know about each other, I feel like I’ve known him forever.”  I dropped my voice.  It felt odd to admit this stuff to a stranger.  “Do you ever feel like that with people?”