Amelia’s time in a spa that was really a place for people with eating disorders and other problems. For some reason, she couldn’t shake the need to control her food, obsessing over every calorie.
Leo watched her eat lettuce and celery for a week before he had a complete breakdown and begged her to eat something, anything. They’d cried together but she’d felt sort of disconnected from the problem.
Dangerously thin, it was her father who checked her into the clinic since her mother refused to accept there was anything wrong with wanting to be thin.
“Being at prime photo weight is perfectly understandable!” she’d screamed at Amelia’s father. “You’re overreacting…”
Gil had uncharacteristically screamed back, “You are underreacting, Augusta! She isn’t eating, damn it! Now you expect her to simply not care about doing what every fucking human since the dawn of time has done? She’s going!”
Weeks of therapy, meeting a few strong people, and daily encouraging letters from Leo had helped to set her right again. Amelia learned that controlling her food was something she did to compensate for being unable to control other areas of her life.
Back in her house, she’d pushed back at her mother more than ever before...but she was tired. It seemed every meal, every outfit, every minute of Amelia’s life was a source of discussion and debate.
Over several months, she fought Augusta less just to get some peace. The recent trip had seen a full slide into all her old habits.
Hugging Leo to her, she murmured, “I want to talk, I want to tell you everything in my head, and I want to get your opinion on some things...but right now, I want you to love me.”
Leaning back, he smiled and kissed her. “Right away, Miss Whitehall. Lay back, relax, and let me take care of everything.”
She might never be a princess but Leo never failed to treat her like one.
Chapter Seven
Leo took his time kissing Amelia, lightly stroking her skin, and pulled back to whisper, “How I’ve longed to see you, to touch you.” Nuzzling his cheek against hers, he added, “I will never take the honor of having you in my arms for granted, Amelia. I see you. I respect you. I love you.”
“Leo…”
He left several kisses on her lips before moving to her jaw, her neck, and along her shoulder. He made his way over her torso, leaving light licks on her skin and gently suckling her pale pink nipples.
His touches were gentle, thorough. It felt like he was memorizing her through his hands. Settling between her legs, he laid his cheek on Amelia’s inner thigh as he explored her folds up close.
“I am enthralled by you.”
She watched him, raked her fingers through his hair, and wondered at the stories she’d heard friends tell of their first times.
Tales of awkwardness, insecurity, and pain.
It felt as if she’d lain like this with Leo a thousand times. Amelia wasn’t embarrassed or nervous. There were no second thoughts, and there was nothing in her mind other than him.
Giving and receiving pleasure.
When he inserted a finger inside her, her hips arched instinctually to get closer. He kissed the skin just above her clit and she released a gasp.
“I’ve been preparing you for months. There should be no pain. If there is, we stop and take it slower.”
“No,” she told him. “I don’t want to go slow.”
Stroking inside her several times, he added a second finger. He lowered his lips to her clit and sucked it. She couldn’t hold back a whimper of need.
“Every part of you, inside and out, is ambrosia.” Meeting her eyes up the length of her body, he smiled hungrily. “Food of the gods, Amelia. Since I was fourteen, you’ve nourished me in many ways. Thank you for yet another serving.”
Then he proceeded to lick, suck, and nibble her until she was writhing, begging, panting beneath him. He made her come with his mouth and fingers and moved back to watch her face.
“Another, I think.”
His name was a chant as he went back to worshipping her as if he’d played the scenario out in his mind. As if following a script she’d never read, she gave him her moans, her whispers, her screams.
As a second orgasm wracked her body tight, she managed to tell him through gritted teeth, “I need you inside me, Leo. Now.” Barely able to open her eyes fully, she stared at him. “Come here and fuck me.”
Winking, he kissed her clit and crawled up her body. “Such language from the mouth of a lady.” Wrapping Amelia’s hair around his fist to hold her still, Leo growled, “I love it.”
His kiss was aggressive and she could feel how his cock throbbed against her mound as they shared the flavor of her.
Leaving the bed, he pulled a condom from his jeans. She watched him roll it on as he came back to the bed and her eyebrows rose with a smile.
One side of his mouth lifted and he confessed, “I’ve been practicing. I didn’t want to look like an idiot. It’s my first time, too, remember?” The golden skin of his face made his teeth seem even whiter by comparison.
He crawled on the bed and settled between her thighs, their naked skin touching from breast to thigh.
She dragged her fingers through his hair and held his skull above her. “I’ve loved you so long that I can’t remember what it was like before I did. I never want to know what it’s like not to love you.” She kissed him deeply and stroked the back of his legs with her feet. The short hair tickled and stimulated her at the same time.
Maintaining eye contact, Leo set his cock at the entrance of her pussy and wrapped his arms around her.
“I love you, Amelia. I do remember what it was like before I loved you and it makes me appreciate how much life and color you brought into my world. Thank you for this gift. I’ll cherish it always.”
Then his hips surged forward as he dropped his mouth over hers. With a gasp, Amelia’s thoughts split between the unfamiliar pressure and the familiar mouth kissing her.
She was so full. For a moment, it felt as though they shared the same body. She stilled for three beats of her heart to process all of it.
Slowly exhaling, she asked, “You studied, didn’t you?”
“Amelia, don’t I always?”
Wrapping her arms and legs more firmly around him, she hugged him as hard as she could. “You’re amazing. Move now.” Lifting enough to find his lips, she released some of her own aggression. “I need to feel you move.”
Then she rocked her hips and he groaned. He set a slow and steady rhythm, pulling out halfway before burying himself inside her again.
Leo never looked away from her face.
The first time she came, he almost joined her, but reached between them to hold the base of his cock with a small gasp.
Amelia started to question him, still breathing hard from her orgasm, and he shook his head.
“You deserve more. I can wait.” The tension etched into the beautiful lines of his face belied the control in his words.
Amelia pulled her lower lip between her teeth. She sighed his name as he returned to slow, steady thrusts.
A few minutes later, he pulled Amelia’s knee to his hip and changed angles.
“It’s insane that I’m making love to you,” he murmured. “I keep thinking it can’t be real because it can’t possibly feel this good.”
“I wish we’d done this months ago. Yes, oh yes, Leo.”
He claimed her mouth as she dug her short nails into his scalp and the back of his shoulder. He built her back up with the same assurance – some would call it arrogance - that he displayed in every area of his life.
“I’m coming. Come with me, Leo. Come with me.” Amelia’s upper body left the bed as she groaned his name.
Leo drove forward harder, faster three times and let go of his control with her name on his lips. She watched him above her in awe, shaking from her own pleasure.
His groin was pressed tightly to her, as deep as he could get, and she could feel the heat of his come fill
the condom. The tendons in his neck were starkly defined, his head thrown back, his eyes closed.
Gasping for air, he opened his eyes and tightened his arms around her. She wanted him closer.
“Lay on me, Leo. Stay like this…”
“Love, I’ll crush you.”
“You won’t.” She pulled him until he settled all of his body weight on top of her, their heads side by side.
At her ear, he said softly, “I never knew such ecstasy existed. I didn’t know there was more beyond having an orgasm.”
“I didn’t either. I-I felt like I wasn’t inside my body.”
He chuckled. “Yay for the rookie moves.” It made her laugh and hug him tighter. A minute later, he reminded her, “I need to pull out, baby. We’ll lose the condom.”
Shaking her head, she didn’t let him go. “Nothing will ever compare to this, Leo. To the feel of your body against mine, the feel of you inside me. Knowing you love me as much as I love you. This moment is perfect and I want to hold onto it just a little longer. Don’t leave me, please don’t leave me. I’m not ready.”
He nodded and held her, giving her what she needed, because that was the man he was.
How she loved him.
* * *
For the next several hours, they were in a world of their own making. She was sore and they were tired but she didn’t want their time together to end.
When the third condom broke, Amelia didn’t experience a moment of stress because she’d been on the pill for years.
It was something Augusta demanded of her daughter’s doctor to plan pageants and auditions around Amelia’s cycle. “I don’t want you splotchy or puffy so we won’t do them when you have your monthly visitor.”
As a result, Amelia was probably the only teenage girl who was glad to get her period every few weeks.
They alternated between making love, soaking in the tub, and sitting curled together in blankets on the sofa, staring at the lake beyond the glass.
“I’m at peace for the first time in a long time,” she told him in the late afternoon.
“You’re going to be so sore, honey. I shouldn’t be taking you so much.” He played with her hair and she leaned into it.
“I wish we could stay like this, just like this, Leo. Naked and fucking for the rest of our lives. Reality will intrude all too soon.” Swallowing hard, she said, “We’re going to be grounded from one another for a while. I want to overdose on you...the soreness is worth it.”
“Alright.” He stroked his fingertip from her temple to her chin. “Soon, we’ll have Jamaica.”
“A little time apart and then I’ll follow you anywhere.”
Leo asked carefully, “What about college?” She shook her head. “You’re so smart, Amelia. Why?”
“I wouldn’t even be graduating high school without the constant help you’ve given me since freshman year. I’m done using you like that. I don’t have the attention span for reading anymore, or writing anything longer than a paragraph.”
He hugged her closer. “Amelia...why didn’t you tell me?”
She shrugged. “I have a few ideas...things I’d like to do. We can talk about all of that during the summer, when we’re away from my mother, my life here.”
“If you want to go to college, I’ll help you.”
“No, Leo. You’ve worried about my work as well as your own for too long. I know you put off college for me.”
“Amelia…”
“Don’t lie. I saw the letter on your kitchen table. I know what you’ve sacrificed.” She turned in his arms and he pulled her up on his lap. When he would have tried to explain, she placed her fingers over his lips. “It-it makes me sad to know you could have been in college two years ago but put it off to take care of me. It’s not right, Leo.”
“It isn’t a sacrifice to care for you, Amelia. Leaving you would have made it almost impossible to focus on school.”
“You’ve done enough and it’s your turn to take for a while. I’ll take care of everything while you go to college.”
Choosing his words carefully, he asked, “What about modeling and all of that?”
“I’m done with it once I’m out of the house.”
He stared at her in silence for a long moment. Then he asked, “What happened, Amelia? When you were in New York?” She blinked against tears. “Something did happen because I’ve never seen you so anxious to run from your house. Tell me so I can help.”
“There was an executive who got sort of fixated on me. During the fashion show, I was coming out of the dressing room, heading for the stage, when he cornered me.” She stared at the lake, remembering. “He had...dead eyes. He groped me, said things to me that made my skin crawl. Said I would be a pretty addition to his collection.”
“Amelia. You were assaulted. Oh my god.” He cupped the back of her head. “Did you report him?”
She shook her head slowly. “My mother said he was one of the wealthiest men in the country. A widower. She told me I must have misunderstood, that it wasn’t as bad as I was making it out to be.” Finding Leo’s hand, she gripped it tightly. “She said that in the modeling and acting world, things like that happen but you brush them off and keep going.” Meeting Leo’s eyes, she whispered, “She said she was sure you had done worse and I wasn’t crying about that.”
“That fucking sociopath…”
“I-I started smoking on the third day and doing energy shots to get through sixteen-hour days because all I wanted to do was sleep. I went through the motions, performed like a circus monkey, and hated every second.” She closed her eyes. “Right now, it’s energy drinks and cigarettes. How long before it’s prescription uppers or cocaine? I can’t do this, Leo. I won’t do it anymore.”
Holding her face, he said, “First, you being a model or actress doesn’t give any fucking animal the right to paw you without your consent. Your profession, how you were fucking dressed or not dressed, or how rich that fuck is doesn’t make what he did to you right or acceptable. Not ever, Amelia.”
She collapsed against him sobbing and he held her through it.
“Second, you can do whatever you want in your life. Whatever fulfills you as a person, that brings you joy. It doesn’t have to earn a cent. I don’t care about anything but your happiness. I’ll support any and all decisions you make.”
Sitting up, she said brokenly, “Thank you, Leo.” She kissed him with urgency and murmured against his lips, “Love me through it and I’ll come out whole on the other side.”
Carrying her back to the bed, he loved her until they couldn’t think. As the afternoon began to fade, they fell hard into an exhausted sleep with Leo’s body curled protectively around Amelia’s.
* * *
That was how their parents found them hours later.
Leo’s mother and father followed Augusta and Gil to keep things calm. While they’d assured Amelia’s mother repeatedly that the young people were safe, she’d refused to act rationally.
The woman demanded the police department track the LoJack in Leo’s SUV. Upon arrival at the cabins, she screamed threats until she was given a key from the kindly couple who owned the place.
Augusta didn’t hesitate to use it without knocking - throwing the door wide and gasping at the vision of her daughter’s naked body spooned by her boyfriend.
Leo’s eyes opened and he literally growled, “Get out of this room. You have no right to see her this way.” Augusta opened her mouth to scream and Gil shoved her toward the door. “You will not humiliate her. Wait outside.”
Amelia’s eyes fluttered open to see Leo’s feral expression above her and realized their peace had come to an end. He pulled the blankets up and tucked her body closer to his own.
“How dare you touch her? You aren’t fit to lay your brown...” Her voice was muffled as if Gil put his hand over it. The horrible woman continued screaming on the porch.
Leo’s parents backed from the room and the door closed.
He whispered
, “I love you and it’s going to be alright.”
She nodded and lifted her body, her palm on his cheek. “I know that, Leo.”
They showered and dressed.
Before opening the door to their parents, he said, “There are only a few more weeks until graduation. A few weeks is nothing.”
“That was before I felt you inside me, Leo. I can never go back to before again. You’re like a drug.” She lifted up and kissed him deeply, thrilled when he gripped her body hard through her clothes.
They opened the door and Augusta immediately started pointing her finger in his face and yelling.
He listened for thirty seconds and held up his hand. Her voice stuttered to a stop.
“I’d love to hear the story of your first time, Augusta. I’m sure it was the night of your honeymoon, right? We’re eighteen and we’ve been dating almost four years. We waited for one another and used protection.”
He tightened his hold around Amelia’s shoulders.
“We love one another and that should be all that matters. It wasn’t the backseat of a car or one of us sneaking out a second story window. No danger, no fear. I drove Amelia here alone and I intend to drive her back alone.”
Augusta screamed, “You’re a rutting animal!”
Leo whirled on her, years of pent-up fury spilling from his mouth. “How dare you pretend to care for her? She’s a puppet to you, nothing more. You let her starve. You hop her up on caffeine and anything else you can think of that’s semi-legal. She started smoking. She’s working all the damn time. She’s underweight again and you don’t give a damn about the anorexia coming back. When she’s away, she’s depressed. When she’s home, she strung out trying to readjust to her life. What do you want from her?”
Augusta sputtered in rage, her skin a mottled red. “If you got her pregnant, so help me God…I won’t have it!”
Leo spoke softly, his tone dangerous, “If all the protection we used didn’t work and Amelia is pregnant, it will simply speed up our wedding. Don’t make threats. I warn you.”
“Y-you warn me? I’ll have you arrested! You dirty…”
Feel My Love: The Damaged Series - Book Two Page 5
