by Riley Ashby
My body hit the water hard, like falling on asphalt. I was frozen, my lungs paralyzed, and then the cold water flowed into my mouth and down my throat. I heard her speaking as I went under, but I couldn’t catch the words in my panic and confusion. Even when I looked into Meyer and Conrad’s face as I cowered, bleeding, on the floor of a loading dock, I had never been this afraid. I struggled to find the right way up, so disoriented from the head blows. My fingers finally brushed air, and I brought my head out of the water, deep gasps filling my lungs with air so cold it froze my lungs in place. I tried to kick to stay afloat, but my body still didn’t know how to stay upright. The dress swirled around my legs, impeding my movement, making it too difficult to tread water. I reached out for the dock but couldn’t find anything to grab on to, knowing it would be useless if I did. My hands were already stiff, and I was trembling violently.
And then, I couldn’t move any more.
I sank below the surface.
Maybe it would be better this way. Was this what Meyer was thinking when he took those pills? He wouldn’t have to worry about protecting me anymore. He could break free from his father and create a new life for himself far away from here. Without the vendetta against my mother to fulfill, Conrad would go back to focusing on his business and leave her alone.
But my mother…
She’d fought so hard for me. Raised me even though I was a reminder of her horrible abuse. Risked her own well-being to care for Meyer when he was sick, then reappeared somehow to bring him those notes so that I could know the truth. What would happen to her if the family who’d tried so hard to destroy her life took mine?
My thoughts were so jumbled, but I used every remaining brain cell to hold that one thought. The vision of my mother’s face when she finally found out I was gone. My father’s shaking hands as he held her, trying to contain her panic. Her grief. But it would never be enough, would it? Not when the baby she’d fought to make her own was gone.
I summoned the last strength still burning in my belly and kicked toward the surface. Opening my eyes underneath the freezing water, I found the faint light and extended my hand toward it. And then a body joined me in the water, grabbing my outstretched hand and yanking me up. I sucked in delicious, life-giving air, leaning into the hands around my waist holding me afloat.
“Come on, Maddie, I’m not done with you.”
“Meyer?” I asked, though it sounded more like a gasp. I was shivering, trying too hard to stay warm.
“I told you not to trust her,” he snarled.
He kicked us to the edge of the water—not a true shore, just a concrete wall breaking the waves—and my feet finally scraped against the bottom. One of my shoes was missing. Meyer put both hands on my waist and lifted me up into another pair of arms. Dry fabric covered my entire body, and I was scooped up against a warm chest.
“Not Meyer,” I said, tapping the buttons of a dry shirt. I could still smell him, the cologne lingering in this jacket draped across my body.
“Too warm, I know.” Joshua’s voice sounded tight, and I wondered if he was worried about something. We were moving, but I didn’t register much. I could feel the blue in my toes, and I still wanted to vomit. I was exhausted beyond belief.
With a rush of warm air, we were back inside, and I could finally feel some warmth penetrating my skin. Meyer was yelling, though I couldn’t imagine what about. I bounced a little—walking up stairs?—and there was the slam of a door. Joshua set me on the soft carpet as Meyer lit a gas fireplace, much like his own. Had we gotten back home somehow?
Home.
“She needs a doctor,” Joshua was saying, but Meyer was on his knees next to me.
“She needs me. Leave us alone.”
“I’m fine, Joshua.” My tongue was a little more flexible, and the words didn’t sound so breathy. “I’ll sleep it off.”
“We’ll call if there’s a problem. Right now, I just need to get her warm. Let us be.”
Joshua grumbled, but I heard a door open and shut, and then Meyer left my side briefly, and I heard the sound of a lock. I sighed and closed my eyes, ready to sleep, but familiar hands pushed aside my hair and tugged at the zipper of my dress.
“I won’t fight you anymore,” I said, rolling to my side so that Meyer could pull the clothes off my shivering frame.
“As glad as I am to hear that, I’ve got other things on my mind right now.” More wet clothes hit the floor, and I was airborne again, gasping when my cold toes hit warm water. I slipped in water up to my neck, then leaned back against Meyer as he pulled my hair away from my neck and kissed me there.
“Not more water,” I moaned, struggling, but he held me still. His naked flesh pressed against my own.
“Can’t you trust me, Maddie?”
He had asked me that before, and I laughed at him. This time, I was relieved he was here. I was giving in. Anita had tried to kill me, but he fished me out of the water, brought me here, and was warming me back to life. His hands massaged my arms, fingers, and legs, bringing warm blood back to my body. With the warmth came my sensibilities and the realization of what just happened.
“Meyer,” I gasped, “Your sister tried to kill me. I almost died.”
“You’re not allowed.” He pressed his lips against my cheek. “I told you, I’m not done with you.”
“Where’s Anita?”
“Taken care of.” He sounded grim. “I don’t want to talk about her. I trust you believe me now when I say she’s a problem.”
“I should have trusted you from the start.” I turned to the side so I could rest my cheek on his chest. He sank a little lower, taking me with him, so the water lapped at my chin. “I’m sorry.”
“Don’t apologize to me.” The resignation in his voice matched what I felt. “I never should have let it get this far.”
*
When the water began to cool, Meyer stood us up and dried us completely before pulling me into a bedroom.
“Where are we?” I asked. I was simultaneously groggy but also incredibly awake as though I had been stabbed with an EpiPen. Meyer gestured to a pile of blankets and pillows in front of a fireplace, where I laid down obediently. He pulled my towel away, leaving me naked again before slipping next to me and pulling more blankets over us. I didn’t bother to try to cover myself. We were far beyond modesty at this point.
“Still at Shawn’s house. I told him we had to get you warm immediately.” He turned me on my side and spooned me. He wrapped his legs around mine, then tucked one arm over my chest, reaching up through my breasts to wrap his hand around my throat. He rested his fingers on my pulse.
“Anita?”
“Joshua took her down. She’s not the criminal mastermind she’d like to be.”
“What’s happening to her?”
“I don’t know. I don’t care. We’ll find out tomorrow. Stop asking questions and rest.”
I was torn between letting my eyes fall closed and wanting to stay awake and be close to him. I felt electrified.
“You saved me.”
He scoffed, and I found myself hurt before he spoke. “Of course I saved you, Maddie. I didn’t have any other choice.”
I rolled to face him, crossing my arms between our chests to offer myself some space while still touching him. “Your life could go back to normal if I left.”
“There’s nothing normal about me existing without you. I mean that.”
He squeezed me, and I realized I was shaking. “Nothing’s normal anymore.”
“It hasn’t been normal since the moment you spit in my father’s face. I’ve never seen anyone do something so brave.”
“Taunting your abuser isn’t brave.” My hair was damp against my back. He squeezed me closer.
“You didn’t taunt. You fought back. I’ve never done that, not once.”
I squeezed my eyes shut briefly, regretting my jab at him from earlier in the night. “I was lucky I had you to protect me.”
He didn’t meet my ey
es. “I didn’t protect you at all.”
“You did. You got me out of there. You put yourself between us whenever he’s around.”
“It’s not such a big deal. You’re my responsibility.”
“Don’t you see?” I grabbed his face, yanking his head toward me. His eyes trailed up my face, resting on my lips and nose before meeting my gaze. “It’s more than responsibility, Meyer. You feel something for me. Something you thought was burned out of you when my mom left.”
“No, no.” He shook his head and placed his forehead on my shoulder. “You don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Will you stop arguing with me for two seconds?” My fingers dug into his cheeks as I pulled him up again and pressed our foreheads together.
“Then what would we have to talk about?”
I sighed in frustration, punching against his chest ineffectually. He grinned, brushing my nose with his own.
“Smile, Maddie. We’re alive, and we’re together. Conrad doesn’t know where we are, for now. What more could we ask for?”
For neither of us to have nearly died in the past week. To know we could sleep safely for more than one night.
My head hurt so much. In spite of that, the fear and anger, and the coldness of earlier, Meyer was right. I actually felt safe. He had gone up against his sister for me when he could have let me sink. He didn’t dump me at a hospital or just tuck me into a bed. He brought me back, inch by inch, and was holding me. He had never done that before. He had tried to contain me, box me up, send me away when he was feeling too raw, but he never just sat and held me like this. I noticed the way he angled his hips away from me and kept his hands from roaming over me too intimately. This wasn’t about seduction or charm—it was just us. Two humans who were hurting. Together.
“Always so busy. You never rest,” he said, brushing his lips across my goose-bumped skin. “Sleep.” Heat rushed to my belly with this thrill of having him so close and not wanting to push him away. I inhaled, my chest rising to meet his lips, and he kissed my shoulder.
I twisted in his arms, breasts against his chest once more, and there was no ignoring his dick growing between us, pressing into my leg. I took his hand and put it on my breast, feeling him harden beneath me as I did so. His fingers tightened even as he spoke.
“Maddie …”
“I told you I won’t fight you anymore. You win.”
His free hand brushed back my hair so that his lips could graze my ear. “What is wrong with you?” He bit my earlobe.
“You saved my life.”
“You don’t owe me anything.”
I slid a hand between our bodies, wrapping my fingers around his cock as it jumped in my hand. He was so immense, and I found myself salivating at the thought of him. I wanted to taste him, to run my tongue over every inch of skin.
“I’ll never pay it back.”
“You already have, Madeline.” As I pressed my hand against him harder, he licked my neck, kissing the soft spot of skin below my ear. “You’ve saved me in more ways that I could ever save you, even if I tried for the rest of our lives.”
I pulled his head away from my neck to look at him. “Do you want to try? For the rest of our lives?”
He was shaking, breathing in jerky gasps. His cock jumped beneath my hand as he squeezed my nipple. “We need to rest.”
“We need each other.”
I kissed him now, gently, like our first kiss would have been if we had been given the chance to meet on our own. If I had found him out at dinner one night, catching his eye across the bar. Or at one of those fundraisers, unmarred by our perceptions of each other’s family. The way it should have been.
“Look at me.”
He did, still trembling. His raw gaze showed me the fear he worked so hard to hide every day of his life. He’d been able to hide it from me for far too long. Me, who thought I had him figured out right from the beginning. How had I been so blind to the truth, to the warm-hearted man who had survived beneath the layers of frost he’d used as his armor for three decades? More importantly, how long would it take me to melt away the iceberg he used as a fortress?
“Where did you go?” he whispered, snapping me out of my head. His hand curved around my naked back. I felt the pads of all his fingers in the spaces between my spine.
“Sorry.” I inhaled deeply, already dizzy, but there was no going back. His fingers pressed harder into my back for the briefest moment, and then I didn’t know which way was up.
Meyer pulled down my hands and latched his mouth over a nipple, and his warm tongue chased away the chill. I let my head fall back as I moaned.
“Shit, Maddie.” He moved to my other nipple, not neglecting me for a moment, rolling me to my back as he moved over me. “Are you cold?”
He was concerned, holding me so tightly, wrapping me up every way he could while still attacking my breasts with his mouth and grinding his hips against mine. I felt the surrender in his movements even though he hadn’t said anything out loud. He just needed me to let go of those chains and tell him this—this truth we couldn’t deny between ourselves anymore—and let himself love me.
“Freezing.” It was a lie. I was burning up. The warmth from the gas fireplace overwhelmed us; I threw away the blanket that hid us from each other. He sat up to look at me, my body that he had seen so many times yet never in this way, painted with desire and begging him to fill me with his hot, hard length I had been craving in my dreams since the first time I saw it.
I dragged his face back up to mine as he settled between my legs, sliding himself between my pussy lips. I gasped, feeling his hard length against my core, and shuddered.
He froze. “Do you want me to stop?” The concern in his face broke my heart. And there, he was using that word.
“Don’t go soft on me now, Meyer.”
He dragged his teeth across my collarbone. It was a marking, the possession he always wanted to have, but I didn’t mind it. I found myself hoping he’d bite harder, bruise deeper. I wanted to match the marks on his body until he didn’t feel self-conscious about them ever again. I would cut myself to copy every scar if it stole some of the shame from his eyes.
“I don’t want to fuck this up again.”
“You wanted to own me.” I traced my thumb across his swollen lips.
“I’m sorry,” he said, darting his tongue out to lick me.
“Don’t be,” I moaned. “No more apologies. Please. Just do what you promised. Make me yours.”
I wiggled beneath him, reaching down to grasp his cock, velvet coated granite. “There.” I almost laughed with relief. “You’re warm there.”
He grabbed my wrists to hold me still, but I squeezed and rolled against him. His eyes fluttered closed, and I thought about how much darker his eyelashes were than his hair.
“I’m cold, Meyer. Warm me.”
He groaned and kissed me. “Stop me,” he said, pressing me against the carpet with his entire weight.
“I won’t.” I spread my legs shamelessly as he rubbed himself against my pussy, just outside my entrance. I burned to have him inside. I could feel how wet I was for him already, a tingling in my clit that intensified as he rocked back and forth.
When he put his mouth over my nipple, I moaned and arched my back. He rubbed against me harder.
“I meant it. I’m not fighting you on this anymore. And you can’t fight me either. We’ll deal with that self-loathing later. It hurts me too much to keep pushing this away.” I sat up and kissed him. He pushed me back down to the ground, covering me completely, enveloping me in his essence.
“Not like this.”
“Yes, like this. This is all there is right now. There are too many variables for us. I want it. I want you. I want you to fuck me now.”
And like that, he did. No foreplay, no stroking, no oral, just his hard manhood impaling me on this stranger’s bedroom floor. I screamed from the suddenness of it, the glory of finally feeling him inside me after weeks of
back and forth and self-flagellation for whatever this was that lingered between us.
He wasn’t slow, or gentle, and there was no consideration for whether I was a virgin or large enough to take him. We didn’t talk about protection. He didn’t ease into me or let me acclimate, just sudden pounding thrusts that made my head ring even louder. Instead of recoiling, I wrapped my legs around his back and pulled him deeper until his balls slapped against my ass.
“Fuck, Madeline. What are you doing?”
“Giving up,” I breathed, right before he cut me off with his mouth on mine. “Giving in.” He put his hands on either side of my head for leverage. My back grated against the blanket, then carpet, as we scooted across the floor. He ground against my clit, and I cried out again. He was hitting my G-spot with every thrust, and the pressure overwhelmed me. I drowned again, this time in fire and pleasure. I dragged my nails down his back, feeling the skin break in their wake.
It was perfect. Everything I wanted, everything I hoped for, everything the way I expected him to be.
“Madeline,” he half growled, half yelled, then sat up and pulled me with him onto his lap. He never pulled out of me, bouncing me up and down on his rod as we sat upright. I felt my breasts jiggling and ass aching, but he bit my nipple. I screamed, then leaned over to bite his ear in retaliation. He dug his fingers into my ass to hold me on him.
“Come on me,” he growled, forcing me up and down in longer and longer strokes. He pulled out of me almost completely, then thrust himself inside me with urgency. “I’ve pumped myself dry so many times imagining you. Come around me now so I can unload in you for real.”
