by W. Ferraro
His eyes drifted over her, and the obvious fact was she was beautiful, awake and asleep. She slept peacefully, obviously finding comfort in her dreams, something he was envious of. Like so many other aspects of his life, being a Marine taught him to live and function on minimal sleep, which helped keep his demons at bay. Demons that seemed more alive and gripping, now that he’d opened the Pandora’s box of being with CeCe. But, dammit, he would willingly accept the licks of Hell’s fiery fury for one moment of her sweet taste.
Leaving her last night was the second hardest thing he had ever done. How he wanted to take her right then, and physically show her everything she refused to see with her eyes and heart. But he wanted—no, needed—her to see he wasn’t the man she thought he was, and if that meant he had to deny himself, then so be it.
Nevertheless, his fear surfaced and slid off his tongue so easily when she came to him today. He’d faced the enemy head on, was willing to die for someone else’s war and he survived, wounded and scared, but alive. But that was nothing compared to the power this beautiful creature held over him. Soon it would be time for her to understand just what that power was, and how he meant every fear-filled word.
Unable to resist being this close and not touching her, he leaned over and kissed her soft, swollen lips. As he tongued the soft line, her eyes fluttered open, focusing instantly.
“Hey.”
“Hey, yourself, I must have really worn you out,” Jared stated, brushing away the soft lock of hair that had fallen across her face.
“Seven orgasms will do that to a person,” she leaned up and over him to look at the bedside clock. Jarod took the exposed breast that dangled in front of his face as an invitation, as he glided his lips over the soft point. “None of that.” She said as she pulled away from him before adding, “I have to go.” She slid out the opposite side of the bed, quickly retrieving her discarded lingerie.
“Got a date?”
“As a matter of fact, I do,” she answered not even looking in his direction.
“Excuse me?” he barked, suddenly furious.
She cinched the tie on her coat before turning to him and laughing at his expense, “I’ve told you before, jealousy does not look good on you, Gates”
Shit! We’re back to Gates again. Dammit! What does she mean she has a date?
“Mind explaining why you are rushing off?” he tried to sound unaffected, but he knew it sounded just as he meant it.
“Well, I came, I conquered, I came again,” enhanced with a wink, “now I’m leaving.”
“You think so, do you?” He shot out of bed reaching her easily, but what he hoped would be a romantic wrestle back onto the bed, became him losing his balance as slicing pain shot through his thigh, causing him to collapse back onto the bed as the cry of agony ripped from his mouth.
“Oh my God, Gates, are you okay?” she asked, as she kneeled in front of him trying to look at and touch his thigh.
“It’s fine!” he bellowed, embarrassed for her to see him at a weak moment.
At the tone of his voice, her eyes met his, and the fury in them couldn’t mask the fear of her pitying him.
“Obviously, it isn’t fine. Were you going to tell me about this?” she asked pointing to his thigh, her unwavering gaze demanding an answer.
He continued to rub at the excruciating pain out of habit, even though it never helped. Dammit, he didn’t want to tell her about the ugliness of his body, nor did he ever intend for her to see him broken by it. He wasn’t an idiot, he knew when he dropped the towel she saw it, but that was all the attention he’d planned on her having of it. Didn’t that just get fucking blown to smithereens?
“I’m waiting!” she snapped, standing with her arms crossed over her chest and her hip jutted out.
Squeezing his eyes shut against the pain, he knew he had two options; tell her, or don’t tell her. When Jarod raised his head and met her annoyed gaze head on, he made the decision…to go right down the middle.
“Not now.” And with that cowardly, backdoor answer, the pain increased and began to burn.
CeCe threw her hands up and rolled her eyes, irritated, as she marched to the door. Every heeled step emphasized her annoyance.
“Fine! Whatever…like I said, I have somewhere to be. See you around, Gates.” She said over her shoulder, never looking toward him as the door closed behind her.
Well isn’t that fucking perfect! Three steps forward, twenty steps back. Gates, you are an asshole!
CeCe had quickly showered, changed and was just on her way out of her room, heading up to Dylan’s suite, when she noticed Jarod casually leaning against the wall across from her door. Their eyes connected—his full of inquisition, hers of annoyance.
“You going to tell me where you are going?” he asked, not moving.
She crossed her arms over her chest, raised her eyebrow and countered, “you going to tell me about your leg and hip?”
“One has nothing to do with the other. One is my job.”
“Job Schmob!”
A smile spread across his face at that, melting a bit of the ice inside her chest.
CeCe honestly didn’t know why him keeping something from her bothered her so much, but it did. It felt like a betrayal of some sort. She realized how foolish such a concept was, but there was no other word to describe the feeling.
He pushed himself off the wall with his foot, stepped slowly towards her and let out a loud breath, “You aren’t going to drop it, are you?” CeCe batted her eyelashes in response. “God, Kitten, you certainly are infuriating. Let’s just leave it at a story for another time. I’m just not ready to share that with you.”
“But you will?” she pushed.
“I will.”
“Alright then.” One small victory for her, but it felt important.
“Now your turn…where are you going?”
“We are going upstairs.”
“We?”
“Yup! You and me, Slick. How good are you with diapers?”
CeCe laughed aloud at the priceless look on his face in response.
Two hours later, Jarod was on a hotel bed with rumpled sheets and a happy female…three actually. The evening was the furthest concept possible of how Jarod thought his night with CeCe would go. But he was enjoying himself. Currently, he was the foundation of the Cross twins’ nighttime entertainment.
“Come on Gates, let’s see how many pushups you can do with forty pounds of wiggly, giggly little girls on your back.”
“Pfft…easy,” Jarod pushed off his forearms as Cat and Ria sat on his back, laughing from their bellies as they went up and down, falling off then climbing back up as quickly as they could. By the time he counted out one hundred reps, only Ria remained in place and was happily pretending he was a horse, kicking his ribs to get him to “Gibby um orsy, gibby um orsy!”
“You heard her!” CeCe said through her own deep laughter, as Cat sat between her legs on the bed watching the huge flat screen television.
Making sure Ria was secure, Jarod climbed off the bed, adjusted to the pain in his leg, and galloped around the room, making what he thought was a convincing horse sound, but CeCe told him it was pitiful. With the ranch activities occurring in the room, soon Cat’s attention was diverted from the television and she wanted her turn on “orsy man”.
After many more rides, switching off between giggling little girls, when it came time for bed, he was happy CeCe told him to head out to the living room of the suite so she could put the girls down. His leg and hip were screaming, and he went without argument, but not before Cat and Ria insisted on hugs and kisses. By the time Jarod left the bedroom, his smile was a reflection of the two smaller ones about to go to sleep.
He was sitting on the uncomfortable couch when CeCe emerged twenty minutes later. She looked fantastic, mouth-watering. Regardless that he had her not even four hours ago, he wanted her again and again. Her taste was the most addictive kind of drugs, and he was ready for another hit. Her long
hair was pulled up in a high messy bun; her shapely legs showcased in short cut offs she wore. Her bra could easily be seen through her white scoop neck tee and her feet were bare displaying her French manicured toe polish. She sat next to him tucking one leg under her and pulling her other knee to her chest. CeCe wiggled her toes, unknowingly tempting him.
“They asleep?”
“Goodness, no,” CeCe removed her hair from its high knot, letting if fall as she combed her fingers through the tangled locks, “but hopefully they will be shortly.”
God, could she get any sexier? The more she ran her hands through her hair, the more her sweet smelling scent wafted to his nose, increasing his already revved libido. With his eyes openly roaming her leg, Jarod slowly moved his hand over, watching and waiting for her denial, which never came. Jarod gripped her foot, pulled it towards his lap, where her foot rested high on his thigh. He began to rub her foot, pressing deep into her arch. Her head fell backwards to the cushion she leaned against.
“That feels incredible,” she moaned.
He continued to rub and enjoy the pleasure she was receiving at his strong hands. He stopped only long enough to pull her other foot from under her ass so he could alternate from one foot to the other. After several minutes of finger work, he brought her left foot to his mouth, running the tip of his tongue along the top of her foot, from her big toe nail up to her ankle, continuing up to her knee and back down. All the while never breaking eye contact with her, fueled by the aroused fog clouding her beautiful hazel eyes. When he returned to the starting point of her toe, he began to rub its arch again with one hand while the other gently massaged behind her knee. Somewhere along this journey, her nipples hardened against the tight strain of her top, calling to him for attention. The diversion of his attention from her face to her chest apparently was abrupt and lengthy, causing CeCe to laugh. That sound was one of the best sounds to him, only topped by her moans and screams of pleasure.
He didn’t complain when CeCe shifted her position and straddled his lap. Her smile matched his own. Her hair hung around both of them, making a curtain in which only the two of them existed. He was consumed by her mouthwatering scent, her kissable plump lips. Not to mention those pebbled hard nipples now pressing into his chest, and her barely covered warm heat pressed into his cock, straining against his zipper.
“I want to bury myself in you for just a short while,” he whispered as his hands roamed around to her ass, pulling her even closer.
She snickered before rubbing herself against him some more, “Only a short while? Jeez, Gates, didn’t we talk about this stamina thing.”
He smiled between light bites of her lip alternating with each word, “Oh, but by a short while, I meant we will start with infinity, and work our way up.” The instant he finished his statement he noticed the change in her.
She straightened her back, sitting upright and breaking their intimate position. She ran her hand through her hair, the way she does when she is annoyed, before placing her arms across her chest under her breasts.
“What?” Jarod huffed, pissed she pulled away from him. When she didn’t answer, but instead just sat there, stone still, he asked again, louder this time, “What the hell happened, Cees? What I do this time?”
“Lower your voice!” she snapped before climbing off his lap and walking to the closed bedroom door to check on the twins; they hadn’t stirred.
Jarod watched as she paced the room, simultaneously giving him a wide birth. This only fueled his pissed off mood. He was off the couch in a nanosecond, refusing to give into the scream of pain that sliced though him. He reached her in another moment, catching her off guard at his speed, as he grabbed her upper arm.
“Don’t shut me out. Tell me what just happened, Dammit!”
“Let go of me, Gates!”
He did not comply, his anger continuing to fuel him, “There we go with calling me Gates, again! My name is Jarod! You know that is my name; hell, you called me it all the time back then, why is it you refuse to call me it now?”
What he saw in her beautiful face at that moment was worse than the pity he was so afraid of, this was unadulterated hatred. He recognized the bone deep anger; it was the same mask and mentality of so many fellow Marines, as well as his own haunting demons.
“You have two seconds to get your hand off of me before you no longer have your fingers, Gates!” she seethed.
He released her, crossed his arms over his wide chest, and waited for an answer to his questions.
After several seconds—that felt like minutes—of the stare off, she decided to tell him the truth and get it off her chest, “I call you Gates as my defense mechanism.”
“Defense mechanism?” he was confused at the unexpected response. “Why the hell do you need a defense mechanism for me, and what did I say to make you pull away?”
“I told you this was sex! That’s it!”
“I don’t believe you,” he countered.
She ignored his response, searching his face for something he couldn’t even fathom. Not finding it, she looked down at her feet before continuing, “Yeah, a defense mechanism to make myself remember how you gutted me,” she said, with less steel in her voice, raising her gaze to him, allowing him to see the scars he left on her soul.
Shit! She no longer was the pissed off combatant she had been, but rather gave glimpses of what he had done to her all those years ago. Maybe his dream and hope would never come true. Maybe his biggest fear—that he could never make up for his cruelty—was about to come to fruition. The justification for his actions back then no longer held the same importance today. Instead of the hot, amazing sex bringing them closer, maybe it was her best weapon; her weapon of mass destruction. At a loss, he ran his hands over his head before shoving them in his pockets. He was just about to speak when she walked to the door and opened it. She waited, never looking toward him.
He knew, in this moment, how he responded would either sink him, or allow him to sail another day. Perhaps if he gave her time, she wouldn’t shut him out just yet. Silently, he walked to the door, stopping in front of her, still refusing to look at him. And he admitted it hurt. Slowly, he leaned down and kissed her forehead and whispered against her soft skin, “I’m sorry. You have no idea how sorry I am.”
He saw her squeeze her eyes shut, and he decided to walk out and come up with another way to break down her wall.
As he stepped into hall, she spoke, the steel returning to her voice, “That time in my life was both one of the worst, and one of the best; the latter because of Dylan and because of you. I never thought I would be able to trust a guy again after Troy, but Dylan showed me I could. With you, it was different; I felt things for you I never felt for Troy, even after all the time we had dated. I always knew I was just another notch in your belt, but you sold a good game, and I actually believed I was different. How stupid of me. Granted, you didn’t hit me like he did, but you left me. Disposed of me, like I was nothing. Like my virginity was nothing to you. From that moment, I swore I would never allow myself to be the victim again. That is why I need a defense mechanism against you.” She finally looked at him, her beautiful hazel eyes met his, and the ache it caused in his soul was worse than the shrapnel ripping through his skin and muscles like butter. “I need to remember that Gates,” then she closed the door leaving him stunned.
He remained there, looking at the closed door, for several minutes, before finally turning and walking down the hall. Her defense mechanism might just be his self-destruct button.
Why is it, after saying what she had wanted to say for years, she felt so terrible? Perhaps it was the quiet of the room, or guilt for being mean, or for missing out on the sure-thing orgasm she was heading for with that little foot rub; regardless, she felt like shit now.
Ducking out on Dylan and Natalie, after their multiple invites to stay, CeCe only had one thing on her mind; numbing herself with liquor. Even the silence in the elevator grated on her nerves, the God awful instru
mental music apparently taking a break. True to the saying, the silence was deafening.
When she reached the bar, it was fairly busy. She found an open stool at the bar and sat, quickly ordering a shot of Patron and a Dirty Martini. While she waited, she looked around and felt a tad underdressed. Maybe she should have changed out of her t-shirt and shorts before coming down, but she’d just wanted liquor. Oh well.
“Here you go, Miss,” the bartender said with a kind smile as he placed the two glasses in front of CeCe.
“Thanks. May I start a tab, please?” she asked, before tossing back the shot.
“Rough night?” The fiery liquid still licking her throat, she just rolled her eyes at the voice to her left.
“Kind of,” CeCe answered, looking in the other direction, hoping he could take a hint.
“What could possibly be wrong with a fine looking thing such as yourself?”
Yeah, no such luck on the taking a hint. Fabulous!
CeCe turned back to speak with the gentleman addressing her. Usually, she could probably find something appealing about his runway model looks and extremely fit body, but right now, all she saw was a penis on his shoulders. The last thing she needed in her life was another one of those.
“Look, Prettyboy, rule number one in how to pick up a chick: Only go for the ones looking to be picked up. That is not me, so move along.”
She didn’t even find humor in his appalled expression, or the derogatory name he called her under his breath. She quickly drained her martini glass, asking for a refill of both. When the bartender placed both glasses in front of her again, she downed the shot, finally feeling the numbing sensation she was going for.
She had just plucked the second liquor-infused olive off its pick, when the bartender placed a huge Caesar salad in front of her.
“I didn’t order this.”
“I know. The man over there did, saying if you were going to consume so much liquor, you needed to have something in your stomach. Please, don’t shoot the messenger.”
