I reached down and grabbed my dick, jacking off once, twice. I wasn’t surprised when she arched up, and her hand came out to hold my cock.
She was surprisingly timid and shy around people, but I wasn’t just anyone, was I?
Even with years and distance between us, I was hers.
Why shouldn’t her less cautious, her more adventurous side come out to play?
Feeling blessed, I let my head arch back as she explored me. Her touch was shy, but grew braver as I groaned when she clasped me. I figured she didn’t know what to do, so I covered her fist with mine and guided her, showing her how to touch me.
Her tongue peeped out as she licked her lips, making me want to feel that on my dick, but not this time.
Not now.
“I’ve read enough to know that all virgins say ‘this won’t fit,’ but I really don’t think this will,” she muttered, but there was laughter in her eyes as she stared up at me. “Aren’t you lucky that I like a challenge?”
“I’m very lucky,” I rasped, my tone more serious than hers.
And I was. That she was letting me touch her at all, that she was touching me like this, was a fucking miracle.
Shuddering when she pressed a kiss to the tip, I wanted to both scream with joy and rage.
I didn’t deserve that tender kiss, the soft exploration of her lips as she tasted me like I was something to savor.
But also, the prospect of her doing this with any other guy filled me with outrage.
She was mine.
Just as I was hers.
Reaching down, I pushed my fingers through her hair and urged her to look up at me. That twinkle in her eye was something I hadn’t seen in far too long. It made my emotions surge from one side of the spectrum to the other. I wanted her to be like this always, but in a short while, I’d be back with that bitch, my life poisoned once more by a brother who loathed me and a wife who didn’t understand why she couldn’t manipulate me.
I shoved those thoughts aside because they had no place here, not really. They were my reality, but Thea was my everything.
She mattered more than they did, and years of self-preservation had me ignoring and evading her, stepping out of her way because I knew, if I didn’t, I’d crack.
I’d always thought I was selfish, had always believed I was a little too much like Cain for my own good, but I’d stayed away from Thea, wanting her to achieve all her goals, wanting her to succeed, wanting her skill to shine through like she deserved.
I’d known that if I approached her, this would happen. I’d bring her down.
And I’d known myself, because the second she was within reach, the second she was within touching distance, look where we were.
I was marring her, tainting her.
I knew that meant a lot to someone like her. No, she didn’t live the Roma way, but she did still live by some of the tenets.
I was making us mahrime.
Unclean.
I was sullying her.
A shudder whispered through me as I recognized how wrong this was, and when she looked at me, I knew she saw what I was thinking, feeling. But she shook her head and surged onto her feet. Within seconds, she was naked, fully, totally, eye-poppingly naked, and I’d never been more delighted or terrified.
“You don’t have to do this,” I rasped, even as my gaze ate up every piece of her, every part touched by my hungry eyes.
“Yes,” she stated formally, “I do.”
Then, I wasn’t allowed to think, I was only allowed to feel. She curved her arms around my shoulders, slipping them upward so she could cup my neck, then run her fingers through my hair. Her touch was like a siren’s song, and I sank into it, shuddering again as she forced me to look down, to stare into her eyes before she joined our mouths.
I knew I’d never be the same ever again.
As I carefully pushed her backward and onto the bed, I loved how she spread her legs, letting me settle in the core of her immediately.
She felt like fire, and I burned in her heat, burned in the flames that made her mine. That made me hers.
As I slipped my tongue into her mouth, thrusting mine against hers, coaxing her to respond because I knew she was new to this kind of kiss, I ground my dick into her, letting her feel me, letting my hardness rub against her softness.
She was wet, and I wanted to shout hosannas to the sky for that. I wanted to explore her and taste her and tease her and charm her, but I wasn’t sure if I could.
I had everything I’d wanted for years in my arms, and I knew I was lucky if I managed to get her off before I made a real dick of myself.
With a sigh, I pulled back, enjoying her moan of disappointment when I stopped kissing her. But I knew I had work to do.
She was a virgin, and I wanted her to think on this moment with joy. Never fear or discomfort. If I carried on grinding into her, then I wasn’t sure how she’d end up feeling—disappointed most likely. So, I started to move down, kissing her throat, sucking on the side of her neck, licking her earlobe, and making her shudder.
I started rubbing the tips of her nipples with my lips, anointing each side, loving how sensitive she was. Her tits were small, but those nubs? Sweet fuck, they were tender.
She shivered each time I sucked down hard, and I almost thought, if given enough time, she might be able to get off with just me sucking on them that way.
I bit my lip at the thought before I focused on other things. Like trailing my tongue over the muscles in her belly—she was close to a six pack—and then I pressed a kiss to the top of her pubis.
It didn’t surprise me she was bare, but it turned me the hell on to see her like that. She was a swimmer, we shaved everything, men included, but the sight blew me away.
I could no more stop myself from diving into her and feasting like a madman than I could stop myself from diving into a carb buffet the night after a meet.
That was why I’d been outside the hotel—I’d been intending on indulging the one fucking vice I had.
Instead, I was here.
Talk about epic timing.
She smelled like soap. That was my initial impression. Like some kind of soap that wasn’t heavily fragranced. Clean, I guessed. A little hint of, maybe, roses? I didn’t know, but that simple essence was enough to make my heart pound.
The heart of her was like the rest of her—simple, understated, elegant.
I bit my lip as I pushed my face against the hard muscles of her belly. She let her hands drag over my scalp, let her nails rake me once more.
“Adam?” she whispered.
I heard her nerves. “I love you, Thea,” I whispered back, unable to stop myself from telling her the truth. “I love you so much. You have my heart.”
A shaky sigh escaped her. “I know I do. I kind of always knew I did, but some days, I’d just doubt, you know? Some days, I’d forget because—”
“How couldn’t you?” I whispered, feeling miserable, even as I was so fucking happy I could explode. I pressed my lips to the base of her belly, just before her groin, and murmured, “I want to taste you.”
“I won’t stop you.”
I let out a laugh, surprised by that reply. Looking up at her, I grinned and saw she was grinning back.
“Since when did you turn shameless?” I teased with a happy sigh.
“Since I learned to grab what I could get, take every moment and make it mine.”
I’d made her that way, taught her to be like that.
But I wasn’t going to be sad. Not anymore.
Instead, I gave her what she deserved.
I reached down and pressed a kiss to her apex, then let my tongue slide through the folds of her sex before I reached her clit and sucked on it a little.
The instant I did, she moaned, and I looked up, loving how she tipped her head back, loving how she keened and arched her body, almost dancing with the pleasure I gave her.
The sinews of her muscles surged and swayed in a rhythm that enchanted me,
and the taste of her was more than I’d ever imagined.
She belonged on my tongue.
I gave her what she needed, gave her what she deserved. Tasted and savored, licked and sucked and fucked, then did it again and again until she was crying out, her orgasm whirling through her like a firework display on the Fourth of July. She tensed around me, even as she soared, and I knew I had to move.
As she was still in the throes, her spine arched, her throat tipped back, I surged upward, grabbed my cock, and slipped the tip inside.
She instantly stilled, but when I thrust into her, trying to be careful—hoping I wasn’t doing it wrong—I rubbed her clit with my other hand as I carefully tried to make my way deeper inside her without hurting her.
A low groan escaped her as I began touching her clit. She arched and twisted, like she was trying to evade my touch, but there was no avoiding it.
I wasn’t going to let her.
I felt her maidenhead, was careful when I pushed past it, and I knew when she tightened up, it was down to pleasure, not pain, because her eyes popped open and I saw a blankness that made my heart pound—she was lost to the ecstasy, and I’d never seen a more beautiful sight in all my life.
The second I was home, I let my weight cover her, topping her like a blanket. I propped my arms on either side of her head, let her feel the intensity of my breath on her lips, of hers on mine, I let her feel the heat and fanned the flames higher as I dipped down and kissed her as I began to thrust.
She was shaking, her eyelashes fluttering in a way that made me feel like she wanted to watch me but wasn’t sure how to when her body was experiencing so much.
I wanted her that way—overwhelmed and overjoyed.
Nipping her bottom lip, I began to speed up, needing more, needing everything, needing to share the joy with her, that ecstasy uniting us just as our bodies were.
When I climaxed, I felt delirious. Like I was dying, but like I was living too. It burned through my nerve endings like they were taffy, turned me into a liquid vat of goo as I spent myself inside her as she tautened around me, dragging every drop of pleasure from my body.
When I sagged on her, she let her arms and legs go lax around me, and I missed the tightness of her hold, even as I burrowed my face into her throat.
I felt like a pussy at that moment. Not worthy of her. Familial duty had turned me into some whipped SOB, and I hated myself because this was where I should be.
This was my rightful place.
“Stop it,” she murmured softly, her eyes still closed—I knew because her lashes didn’t flutter against my temple.
“Can’t.”
“Yes, you can. Think of the present. Of this moment. That’s what matters.”
It didn’t.
I wanted her, only her.
She sighed, running her hands through my hair and urging me to look at her once more. “We hate Cain, but do we hate him enough for him to have a statutory rape charge on his rap sheet?”
I looked at her, stared into those beautiful eyes, and, wishing I could tell her everything, nodded. “Yeah. At this moment, I do.”
She smiled, amused by my candor, even as she was shaking her head. “You’re too good a man, Adam. You would never have done any of this in the first place if you weren’t.”
“How can you say I’m a good man when I betrayed you?” I rasped, hating myself, even if I’d only started my dive down this rabbit hole because of her in the first place. Cain, I wasn’t bothered about…but anything that threatened her future?
I’d annihilate.
“I know the truth now. You only betrayed me by keeping me in the dark.” She winced. “I-I don’t want you to go back to her,” she admitted roughly. “But I get it.”
“I don’t want to lose you,” I whispered.
“You won’t.”
I wanted to ask her if this was going to be the first and last time we did this, but I didn’t really want to know the answer. If I knew it, it would drive me insane if I thought I’d never get to hold her like this again.
“I wish I’d known you were Catholic back at the start,” she grumbled, making me jerk back in surprise.
“Why?”
She shrugged. “It would have explained a lot.”
“My family is Catholic,” I muttered. “I’m not.”
“You go to church,” she pointed out.
“Because I have to. I won’t when I have choices.”
“Choices,” she whispered, “are expensive.”
“Tell me about it,” I breathed. “But one day, I won’t be the whipping boy. I won’t just have to accept whatever they tell me to accept.”
“When is that ‘one day?’”
As I stared at her, I knew what I’d never known before. I might not be able to implement all the changes I wanted, needed, but I could make a start.
“Today.”
THEA
When Adam slipped his fingers through mine, something settled inside me.
Something wholesome and good and...God, there were no words. Not really.
It just felt right.
So right.
There was no justifying the pain he’d caused me, and maybe it made me a horrible person, but to know that he’d suffered too? To know that there was a reason, a justification—it made things better.
God, that did make me sound horrible, especially since I’d known he wasn’t happy.
His drawn face, the constantly tight mouth. The way he looked at Maria. I’d known, hadn’t I? I’d known he wasn’t happy.
“You’re thinking hard,” he muttered as we took a seat in the restaurant.
I looked around, surprised by his choice. Sure, the Ramsdens gave me an allowance, but I didn’t use it. I wasn’t a total charity case. What I spent, I needed. For kit and things for school. Nothing more, nothing less.
But this place was one of those upscale burger joints. Not just a regular Mickey D’s for him, nope. A gourmet place.
“I’m thinking spiteful things,” I admitted, wanting to tell him the truth.
“About me?”
I saw his fear, regretted it. “A little.” I sighed. “I was so unhappy and confused, Adam.” I reached up and rubbed my eyes. “I guess...knowing that you were unhappy, too, makes me feel better?”
His eyes widened, and he stunned me by laughing. “Well, I guess we just had confirmation that you’re no saint.”
My own eyes twinkled, because his laughter wasn’t cold or hard, but genuinely amused. “I think we confirmed that back in the hotel room, didn’t we?”
“We did.” His voice turned low, into a deep rumble, and he grabbed the hand I’d placed on the table and slipped his fingers through mine.
The place was set up with several gleaming black banquettes with matching tables. On the back and side walls were plants and, I guess, hedges for want of a better word, sprouting out, but it made it feel like we were sitting outside when we weren’t. The kitchen was open, so we could see the cooks working on our order that we’d placed upon entering the restaurant.
What it definitely wasn’t? Interesting. Cool, upscale for a burger place, but the way Adam suddenly started staring around, I knew he was doing it to avoid my eyes.
I tipped my chin to the side and tugged on his hand. “What is it?”
“I don’t want this to end.”
Everything had to end.
The words were on the tip of my tongue, but I didn’t say them. I was going back to an empty bed, but he was going back to a life. One where he was raising his brother’s son, where he had a wife who wasn’t me.
It was so wrong, so antiquated, that I didn’t know what to say.
My people were old-fashioned. We led traditional, to some, crazy lives because of it. But what Anna and Robert had done to Adam was disgraceful.
It changed my opinion of them, and of Anna in particular. I’d never really settled that well with her, because I knew, to her, I was an opportunity to make things right in the public eye
.
She had goals, was ambitious. She wanted back into the political sphere, and the only way to smooth over her son’s shitty past was through me. But Robert? I didn’t get it.
I shook my head. “I’m surprised by your father.”
“Why?”
“Surprised he let you go through with this.”
“None of us had a choice,” he rasped, and while it might have been uncharitable to think he was weak, spineless for following through with his parents’ and Maria’s machinations, I saw then there was a strength to him. A resolve and an inner fortitude that made him the good and decent man I knew him to be.
Cain had wronged him in so many ways, yet here he was, trying to protect him. Still protecting him, even though there’d never be any thanks.
With my free hand, I tugged at my bottom lip. “We can’t see each other. Coach wouldn’t allow it.”
“I know.” He cleared his throat. “Trust me, I know, and I won’t do anything to jeopardize your career, Thea. I wouldn’t do that to you.”
Selfless.
It hit me just how selfless he was, and how selfish I’d been.
“I should have tried—”
“Tried to talk to me? I’d have walked away. There was no way I was putting this shit on your shoulders, and there was no way I wouldn’t have been able to the second we talked.” He blew out a breath. “Look at this. Look at what just happened between us,” he rumbled. “I can’t stay away from you, Thea. You’re in my blood.”
I knew exactly how he felt, and that was why, hours later, I fell asleep in his arms after he made love to me again. Yeah, I was sore, but I didn’t know when we’d have this opportunity again. Or if we ever would.
I woke up in his arms, got showered and changed with him watching me and me watching him. The bittersweet tang of knowing Maria had this right to him in the eyes of the law, a right I’d never have, was painful, but I dealt with it. I handled it because I had to.
He didn’t want her.
Didn’t want this.
Neither did I.
Above The Surface Page 20
