by Hart, Lane
Knowing I have no choice but to find out what he wants since he’s the one who is paying for all of my mother’s visits and procedures, I sigh and slip through the door that shuts behind me. When I see the man who is sitting on the exam room table, I gasp audibly. It’s not Lowell. And it actually takes me several seconds of staring at his face before recognition dawns on me.
“Cedric?” I say in disbelief, because…it’s impossible.
“Hey,” he says with a crooked grin when he hops down from the table and strolls over to me. He looks so…different, which is why it took me so long to realize it was my childhood best friend. He’s no longer tall and lean. His chest is broader, and his arms are much thicker. I’ve never seen him with facial hair before, because he couldn’t even grow a mustache in high school, but now he has several days’ worth of black stubble along his stern jawline that loop around to a goatee.
He looks…good.
Better than good. Great. Amazing. Hot. As. Hell.
His boots come to a stop about a foot away from me, his hands shoved in the front pockets of his jeans like he’s not sure if he should hug me or not. So I decide for him.
I launch myself at him, winding my arms around his neck and squeezing him tight. His arms thankfully come around to hug me back just as fiercely until I’m lifted off of my feet.
“God, I’ve missed you,” he murmurs into my hair, his voice deeper, gruffer than when he was my easygoing best friend.
I want him to hold me forever, but I know that’s impossible. I’m suddenly paranoid that Lowell will find out he’s here. He would hurt Cedric again, much worse than what he did the last night at his house. Reluctantly, I let him go and take a step back to look at his different but still so familiar face. His silvery-blue eyes are the one thing that hasn’t changed, not even the way they look at me.
“Wh-what are you doing here?” I ask him.
“I couldn’t stay away from you any longer, Ev.”
“You shouldn’t be here,” I say softly. “If Lowell finds out…”
“He won’t,” Cedric replies calmly. “Only the nurse I bribed knows I’m here. She snuck me in through the back door.”
“Why are you here?” I ask again. “I’ve missed you too, but Lowell is even more dangerous than he was before.”
“Yeah, well, so am I,” he says confidently. That’s when I finally notice his black leather cut, one with patches on it, similar to the ones on Lowell’s denim one.
“You joined an MC?” I ask in surprise. “How? When?”
“It took me over two years to patch in, but I did it, and now I’m a member of the original charter of the Savage Kings.”
Frowning, I tell him, “I’ve heard that name before.”
“I’m not surprised,” Cedric mutters. “The Kings are the ones who took down the Ace of Spades MC years ago. Lowell was one of the three stragglers that started the new club.”
Grasping either side of the leather, I tell him, “This isn’t you, Cedric. What are you doing?”
“This is me,” he says, covering my wrists with his much bigger hands, one of which rubs over the seashells on the bracelet he made me so long ago. “I’m not the same sweet, innocent boy I was before.”
My heart breaks a little after hearing that, because I never wanted him to change, especially if this change has anything to do with me. “It’s so great to see you and to know that you’re doing well; but if you don’t stay away from me, you’re going to get yourself hurt,” I warn him.
“You think I’m doing well? I’m not. I haven’t been doing well for two years! Do you have any idea how much it hurt me to stay away from you?” he asks, eyes narrowed in anger. “How much it hurt to know that you were with him, that you married that asshole after the night we were together?”
“I didn’t mean to hurt you.”
“You got the worst end of this deal,” he says. “I may have been alone, but that has to have been better than being his captive.” Letting go of my wrists, he reaches up to my cheek, his thumb stroking gently over my skin and sending chills down my spine. “You’re beautiful, Ev, always have been. But you look awful. What the hell has he done to you?”
“He’s helped me. He’s helping my mother; he’s paying for what she needs to get by while waiting for a new kidney. We should be getting the call any day now,” I explain. I can’t bring myself to tell him the rest. How do I tell him the truth about what my life has become? About how many pills it takes for me to be able to get through each day? Even right now, while I’m away from Lowell, there’s still a part of me that yearns to go back, to seek the sweet relief only he can give me. He recently started keeping his stash locked up since he knows how much I need them, and he likes making me earn them. I ‘earn’ them through favors, doing whatever he wants me to do, because I can’t resist the escape the pills provide. It’s a vicious cycle, and not one that, combined with my mother’s financial dependence, I will ever be able to break.
That’s why no matter how badly I miss Cedric, I can’t be with him.
“I should go,” I tell him. “We’ve been gone longer than we should’ve been for a simple blood draw.”
“How can you live like this? With him controlling every part of your life? I’ve seen how he treats you. I’ve watched you with him for two years, and soon you won’t need his help anymore.”
“What do you mean you’ve seen how he treats me?” I ask.
“I never forgot about you. I’ve been visiting your mom every month since you left me.”
“But…she never…”
“I made Rita swear not to tell you. I knew he would be pissed if he found out, so I didn’t want you to know either. But I can’t stay away much longer. Soon, I’m going to earn the money your mother needs and take care of you and Rita both, the way you deserve.”
“Cedric–” I start.
“Are you happy with Lowell, Ev? Honestly?” he interrupts.
Lowering my eyes from his, I shake my head no.
“That’s what I thought. Here,” he says when he grabs my hand. While still holding it, his other hand reaches inside his leather cut, pulling something out that he places in the center of my palm. It’s a tiny, white, fan-shaped bay scallop shell. “Here’s another seashell for your bracelet. You still wear the silly thing, so I know you still care about me.”
He’s right. I’ve never been able to take it off. It’s a symbol of our innocence. Even though mine is long gone, it’s still the sweetest, most thoughtful gift anyone’s ever given me. The bracelet doesn’t have any monetary value, but to me it’s priceless. Which is why, when Lowell and I first started dating, I lied and told him my father gave it to me right before he and my mother got divorced. If Lowell had known that Cedric made it for me, he wouldn’t have just told me to stop wearing it. He would’ve destroyed it.
But if I admit to Cedric how much the bracelet means to me, he could do something foolish…like try to sneak and see me again.
“I forget I have it on most of the time,” I lie to him.
“Bullshit,” he says.
“It’s true,” I say as I shove the new shell into the tiny little pocket on my jeans that I never had any use for before, and then run my fingers over the shells that have been my comfort blanket for years. It’s an absent gesture I probably make at least a hundred times a day.
“Then give it back to me.”
“What?” I ask.
“If the bracelet doesn’t mean shit to you, then give it back to me and I’ll throw it in the trash. You’re a twenty-year-old woman wearing a cheap piece of crap made for a ten-year old girl.” He holds out his hand, palm up, and waits.
Parting with the small token feels nearly impossible. Just the thought makes my stomach clench. The ‘silly bracelet’, as he called it, is one of the last good things I still have in my life, other than my mother, who gets sicker by the day while she waits for a new kidney to replace her two failing ones.
But if I refuse, I’m almost certain Ce
dric will do something stupid.
Still, I can’t part with the sweet token.
“No,” I tell him. “I, um, I have to go. Please don’t try to see me again.”
When I start to leave, Cedric lunges for me, clasping my face between his strong, warm palms and slamming his mouth down over mine. He steals my breath and my sanity, because I move my lips over his as the force of his attack flattens me against the wall. I cling to Cedric’s shoulders, digging my fingernails into the leather fabric as his tongue invades my mouth in such a rough, dirty way that a moan escapes and is drowned out by his brutal kiss.
Cedric doesn’t make a sound as we kiss, but I feel him grow long and hard in the front of his jeans. His steely shaft is so substantial it could probably keep me pinned to the wall all on its own. Cedric’s hands squeeze my hips, and then his thumb moves underneath my shirt, stroking the sensitive skin of my stomach. His teeth nip at my bottom lip before his mouth moves down to my neck.
“I am going to see you again,” he says, his warm breath coating my neck between damp kisses. “Soon.”
“Okay,” I agree, because my entire body has gone limp and compliant after that head-spinning kiss and the feeling of his hard body pressing into mine.
“And I’m going to kiss you again,” he informs me. “The next time you see me will be the last time you ever have to see Lowell again.”
“But…my mom–” I start.
“She’s going to see the best doctors in the state, and I promise I will do whatever it takes to get her a kidney, even if I have to cut out Lowell’s to give it to her.”
There must be something seriously wrong with me. Hearing Cedric threaten violence against the asshole I’m married to is the biggest turn on I’ve ever experienced. I reach around to give the back of Cedric’s hair a tug to bring his lips to mine again, and then my hands are roaming urgently over him. Starting at his shoulders and down to his chest and his flat stomach and around his back…Holy shit! Feeling the gun tucked into the back of his jeans is so much hotter than it should be. The weapon is dangerous, but necessary in the new world I live in. The old Cedric never would’ve touched a gun. But I’m guessing that the new Cedric doesn’t just carry it but knows how to use it. That sort of show of confidence and strength is hot. The urge to tear my clothes off and beg for Cedric to take me right here, right now is strong. So strong.
Still, I find myself saying the words, “You can’t kill him,” against Cedric’s lips. Not because I would mourn Lowell’s death, but because I don’t want Cedric to take on something so awful for me. Getting caught up in a murder charge would ruin his life. “Promise me.”
“Fine. I won’t kill him,” Cedric tells me while grinding his hard cock against my stomach and staring down at me like he knows exactly what I’m thinking. “I’d rather make him suffer anyway.”
Chapter Nine
Cedric
I shouldn’t have kissed Evelyn, but I just couldn’t let her leave before I tasted her lips. I’ve waited too fucking long, and now trying to stop kissing her feels like a completely foreign concept.
From the way she’s moaning with every touch of my tongue to hers and whenever I press my hard bulge against her stomach, I know she would let me fuck her right here against this wall if I wanted to. And I want to, goddamn I do.
But I won’t.
The next time I’m inside her, it will be for good. She won’t leave me to run back to the son of a bitch who conned her into marrying him. She’ll be mine and only mine.
She made me promise not to kill him, which might be a problem. That’s the only way to make sure he’s out of her life for good. But that’s fine. I don’t have to kill him to make him suffer. First, I want him to feel the same ache I did having to see her with another man. Then? Well, then I’ll just have to find another way to bring him down. It’s not like he’s a squeaky-clean boy scout. I’m sure there are a number of things he does on a daily basis that could land him a long prison sentence.
When Evelyn’s delicate palms slip under my shirt and her fingernails slide down my pecs and lower, unzipping my jeans, I almost change my mind about not fucking her.
“Not yet,” I tell her when I grab her hand to stop her. “You’re right. You need to go.”
“But I’m hurting. And so are you,” she says, giving my shaft a rough squeeze through the denim.
“My cock has been aching for you for years,” I tell her. “A few more months is nothing.”
“Months?” Evelyn exclaims, and I love and hate that she sounds disappointed. Fuck, if I could be with her right now, I would; but I have to stick to the plan. One that takes time so that I can do this right.
I lower my hand between her legs and cup her pussy through her jeans, making her cry out and her eyelids grow heavy. “Only a few more months. That’s it,” I promise her while I press my fingers up into her. Evelyn takes her hand off my cock to cover mine that’s massaging her. “Whenever he touches you, pretend it’s me,” I say just as there’s a knock on the door. “Just a second!” I yell to the nurse that’s standing watch. Since we need to hurry this along and I don’t intend to let Evelyn walk out of here hot and horny to go home to that asshole, and also because I’m a greedy bastard who needs to taste her pussy, I hastily undo the front of her jeans and jerk them down her thighs while dropping to my knees. My tongue swipes over the crotch of her black cotton panties while inhaling her sweet scent before hooking a finger in the fabric to tug it to the side. I don’t tease her. The tip of my tongue goes right to work, frantically flicking against her clit.
“Oh…oh shit!” Evelyn screams when I thrust my tongue deep inside of her cunt without warning. When I remove it to get back to torturing her clit, I replace it with one of my fingers, sinking it in slowly before pumping it in and out. She’s soaking wet, her juices running down her thighs that I plan to lap up just as soon as she comes for me.
“Cedric!” Evelyn cries out as she starts moaning deep in the back of her throat. She pulls my head roughly toward her body when her walls clench around my finger. Knowing she’s close, I attack her clit until her moans abruptly cut off. There’s a five second pause followed by a loud gasp when shudders ripple through her body in waves, starting at her bucking hips and moving up to her arched back. “Yes! Oh god, yes!”
The nurse may have some explaining to do about the noises Evelyn’s making since I doubt any of their patients ever get so loud with affirmations when seeing the nephrologist. Although, some men may scream something similar when the nephrologist checks their prostate…
As soon as Evelyn’s body stills, I pull my finger free and then swipe my tongue over her pussy lips and over each side of her thighs, licking up every drop of her arousal and savoring it.
“Cedric…oh my god, Cedric,” Evelyn whispers as her fingers comb soothingly through my hair.
“Now you can leave,” I look up at her face to tell her.
“Okay,” she agrees with a nod as her head lolls against the door. Since she doesn’t make any move to walk out, I stand up and then pull up her panties and pants, zipping and buttoning them for her.
“I’ll give you a few minutes to find Rita and get out of the parking lot before I leave,” I promise her.
“Okay.”
I’m starting to think that okay is all she’s capable of saying.
“You all right, Ev?” I ask.
“Uh-huh. I just need a second…”
She runs her fingers through the front of her black hair and then tucks each side behind her ear. The rosy flush on her cheeks makes her look a little bit healthier, although I’m worried about the dark circles underneath her eyes. They look like more than a few restless nights’ sleep worrying about her mother.
Another knock sounds on the door, which seems to startle Ev into motion.
“So, um, I’ll see you soon?” she asks.
“Yes, soon,” I promise her. Pressing my lips to her temple, I rest my hand on her lower back and urge her out the door even
though I wish she could stay with me.
“Bye, Cedric,” she says over her shoulder when she steps into the hallway.
“Bye, Ev,” I reply, telling myself that this last bit of waiting will be easy and nothing compared to the years that have already passed.
Chapter Ten
Evelyn
“So, Mom, is there something you’ve been keeping from me? Maybe someone who has been visiting you on the sly?” I ask once we leave the doctor’s office and climb into my car. My hands are still shaking when I grip the steering wheel, my heart galloping like it may burst out of my chest. And my panties? Well, they’re so wet they’ve probably soaked through my jeans.
Hopefully I’ll have time to change them when I get home, before Lowell notices.
“I’m not sure who you’re referring to,” she replies, still dodging the question.
“I just saw Cedric,” I tell her. “He was here, at the doctor’s office.”
“Really? Huh, I wonder why he would come here of all places?” she questions aloud, even though I already know the answer. It’s the one place that Lowell doesn’t follow me. “Well, anyway, he asked me not to tell you,” she says. “And I try to keep my promises.”
“How long?” I ask when I leave the parking lot, driving slowly to get answers. “How long has he been coming by?”
“Ever since we moved out here,” she replies, just as Cedric claimed.
“And how often?”
“Oh, I don’t know. Maybe once a month?”
“Wow,” I say with a shake of my head.
“I don’t know why he didn’t want you to know. I told him you would’ve loved to see him. He was your only friend for years…”
“I know, but I’m married now,” I remind her. “You cannot mention his name in front of Lowell. Ever.”
“Well, why not?”
