by Lexi Ryan
I spent so many years avoiding asking that question out loud. Asking a question means you’re willing to hear the answer, and I didn’t think I could handle someone telling me what I already believed in my mind. She didn’t want us.
“I’m sure she wanted you,” Arrow says, as if reading my thoughts. “She had to have made the decision for a reason.”
“I don’t know. Maybe she thought it was my father’s turn to do all the work and child rearing. She never said. She didn’t even say goodbye if you don’t count the note. She couldn’t have known that her leaving would drive Dad to drink. She couldn’t have known that he’d lose his job, and Nic and I would be left fending for ourselves.”
“I’m sorry, Mia.”
“I wish you’d quit apologizing for my life. It’s embarrassing.”
“You deserve better than what you’ve been given. Better than a mom who leaves without explanation, better than an alcoholic father, and better than a boyfriend who sleeps around on you.”
“What makes me so deserving?” I pull back to look at him. He’s watching me with cautious eyes. “Doesn’t everyone deserve all that?”
“No, Mia. Some people don’t deserve shit. But you . . .” He touches my face, tracing my jaw and skimming his thumb across my lips.
“Do I deserve you?”
He draws in a breath. “What happens tomorrow? After I take you home and Brogan calls? What happens after your buzz wears off and you remember you don’t want to be with me?”
“Why would you say I don’t want to be with you?”
“Wasn’t that the decision you made when you decided to date Brogan? You didn’t want to be with me because of who my father is, and so you chose him,” he says. “I don’t blame you, but I’m asking what happens tomorrow when you remember all of that.”
“I don’t know.” I remove my hand from around his waist and find the dark trail of hair I know from memory starts just above his navel and travels down under his shorts. “I’m sick of making decisions based on tomorrow. I’ve been doing that since I was fourteen. I want tonight. For once.”
He releases a long, slow hiss of breath. “You’re sure?” he asks, his voice low and husky.
I nod, move to straddle his lap, and let the blanket fall off my shoulders.
His lips part and he stares up at me in a way that makes me feel like a goddess granting his greatest wish. I release the clasp on my bra, and he watches as I toss it to the floorboards.
Cupping my jaw gently, he leans forward to trail soft kisses down my neck. His mouth opens, and his hands go to my sides. His thumbs brush the undersides of my breasts.
He strikes me as absolutely vulnerable in this moment. He touches me with such tenderness that I’m melting from the very center of my core all the way out to my fingertips.
“You’re beautiful, Mia.” He dips his head to my breast and draws a nipple into his mouth.
I moan involuntarily and arch into him—his touch, the stroke of his tongue, the wet heat of his open mouth latched onto me. His hands slide down my body and find the button on my jean shorts. I push them down, along with my panties, and kick them to the side. He takes my hips, squeezing them tightly.
I let myself dissolve into the moment. Into the feel of his tongue on my breasts. Into the heat of his mouth on my skin. I roll my hips, slide my fingers into his hair. For once in my life, I stop worrying about what I’m supposed to be doing and how I’m supposed to be acting. I just feel. Arrow makes me feel.
He responds to every sound that comes out of my mouth. Every move I make. Every time I moan or shift my hips to press our bodies closer. His breath catches and his hands grip me tighter, showing me how much my response turns him on.
Nothing is simple between us. Even if I never return to Brogan, he’ll always be between me and Arrow. Even if my dad can forgive me for falling for a Woodison, Arrow’s family will always be something between us. I’m not fooling myself into thinking that another girl sucking Brogan’s dick suddenly made my affection for Arrow less complicated. All I’m doing is allowing myself this night. This moment.
“I have condoms in my glove compartment,” he murmurs in my ear. “If you’re sure.”
I’m not sure. I’m scared. Not scared that it’ll hurt—though it might—or that he won’t be gentle with me—I know he’ll define gentle. I’m scared what this means to me. I’m scared that I’ve had months and months with Brogan and so many opportunities to do this with the man I’m supposed to love and I’ve found every excuse to avoid it. And here I am in Arrow’s arms at the first opportunity.
I’m scared of how much it means to me that he was there tonight—alone in his dorm room after a win, as if he were waiting for me instead of going to the party. I’m scared of how I’ll feel after. When I’ve given another piece of myself to the guy who had me from the first. But mostly I’m scared that this night might slip away before I can stretch my wings and fly.
“I’m sure,” I say, and before I can chicken out, I climb over the seat, pop the glove compartment, and pull out the box. It’s new. Closed. Sealed on all sides. That shouldn’t matter. It doesn’t necessarily mean anything more than that his last box is gone. But I don’t want to be just another condom in a half-empty box, so I like that I have to open it.
Arrow helps me peel his shorts and briefs from his hips, and I hand him the condom in its wrapper. He puts it on, splitting his attention between me and the latex covering his shaft.
I straddle him. He cups my jaw and his eyes lock with mine as I position my body over him and slowly work my way down. He gasps, and I bury my face into the side of his neck so he can’t see me grimace. It hurts more than I expected.
“Dear God, Mia. You’re so . . .” One hand squeezes my hip and the other falls from my hair to find my hand. He laces our fingers and holds them to his chest.
I stay still for a minute, letting my body adjust to his size, to this intrusion of someone inside me, until the pain gives way, edged out by pleasure. I pull back enough to look at our intertwined fingers, my skin against his, my knuckles against his pounding heart.
“Are you okay?”
Swallowing, I nod. “I’m good.” The emotion clogging my chest makes the word come out too thick, and I’m afraid he knows just what this means to me. Afraid he’ll take it back if he understands the magnitude of this moment.
He strokes my cheek and skims his thumb over my bottom lip. “Beautiful.” He holds me behind my neck and leads me forward to his kiss. His kiss is gentle and his lips are warm, and I feel so safe and good.
Any pain from the beginning is gone as I slowly rock into him. Experimentally, I lift my hips and slide down along his length. He sets his jaw and squeezes his eyes shut, so I do it again, and his breath rushes out of him.
I’m ashamed to admit to myself that I’ve imagined this before. Tonight isn’t the first time I’ve thought about making love to Arrow. I’m sure it could have been more romantic. I’m sure he would have rather been with me for the first time in a bed. But there’s nothing about this I’d change.
Every move we make feels sweet and so poignant, as if he’s found my heart unlocked and is carefully retrieving it.
I don’t know how long I move over him before the look on his face changes. He goes from sweet and tender to something a little more desperate. From careful and controlled to something wild. Watching him lose that careful control is somehow sweeter than every tender touch before.
“Did you?” he whispers, his voice hitching.
Tonight means too much for me to taint it with a lie, so I shake my head. “It’s okay.”
“Mia,” he murmurs. Then, like he can’t handle it anymore, he buries his face in my neck, grips my hips tight, and shifts his hips under me. He rocks into me with more force than he’s used to touch me all night long, and it hurts a little but I love it. I offered myself to him, and this—his pleasure, the rough sound at the back of his throat, his jerky movements—this feels like he’s taking me. M
aking me his.
He holds me tight as he groans, and I feel him swell inside me, feel the long rush of his exhale against my neck as he comes. Then he’s still. Fingers in my hair. Lips trailing up and down my neck.
“I’ve waited too long,” he says, and I’m not sure what that means, so I just nod.
We find some tissues to clean up after, and before things can get awkward, he gathers me against him and covers us both with the blanket and holds me in a cocoon of warmth. I close my eyes for just a moment, and the next thing I know, he’s whispering my name in my hair.
“The sun’s rising.”
I sit up, and sure enough, orange stretches out behind the trees on the other side of the lake. The sun is rising, and I’m here in Arrow’s arms.
I wake up to someone kissing the back of my thigh. Soft, open-mouthed kisses on that tender skin just below the curve of my ass. Arrow’s mouth. Arrow’s kisses. Deft and skilled and guaranteed to make men fall short for the rest of my life.
Moaning, I start to roll over, but he places a hand on my back to hold me still. “I’m really just getting started if you don’t mind.” His voice is low, gravelly with sleep—the little we got—and it stirs something low in my belly.
After watching the sun rise, we came back to my apartment this morning, locked the door to my room, climbed into bed together, and napped. Or at least I did.
I look over my shoulder to where he’s kissing his way up my back. “Why can’t I roll over?”
He grins and cups me between my legs with one big hand. Heat pools there fast and tight. “Because.” Then he doesn’t need to say anything more. He strokes me, and at the same time his mouth is on me again, trailing down my back and over the curve of my ass. He kisses the backs of my thighs, then follows the path up with his teeth and tongue, all the while working his fingers over me. The angle of his touch is different than anything I’ve ever felt before, and the skin he teases with his mouth so much more sensitive than I could have imagined. I suddenly feel like Brogan left half my body unexplored.
The thought of Brogan makes me tense, and Arrow must notice because he lifts his head and stills his movements. “This okay?”
“Yeah. I . . .” I swallow. “It’s good.”
He nuzzles my inner thigh and groans. “Damn right it is.” He guides my thighs farther apart, slides his hand out of the way, and replaces it with his mouth. Pleasure stabs through me—the sudden heat, the angle, the scratch of his stubble—and his lips move over my most private spot, and everything inside me coils tight and hot and needy.
When he pulls back, it’s only long enough to roll me to my back and position his face between my legs again, but he just looks instead of kissing me.
“Arrow,” I whisper. I want his mouth again. His hand. Both. More.
He flicks his gaze up to mine and grins. “I woke up with you and for a second I forgot last night. I thought I was dreaming.” He leans forward, and I gasp as his tongue runs the length of my clit. “When I remembered . . .” He watches me as he licks his lips. “Well, I hope you don’t mind if I kiss you here for a while.”
His words steal my breath and make something greedy and achy coil tight between my legs. I don’t have a chance to respond before his mouth is on me again, longer this time. Slower. He spreads me with his hands and explores me with his lips and tongue. And it would feel good no matter what, because he seems to know just how to touch me—how to alternate soft and hard and where to suck—but when I force my eyes open and witness the fantasy of Arrow in my bed, Arrow kissing me like this, it only adds to the pleasure.
I’m halfway there when he slides a finger inside me, and even tender from last night, I can’t help but lift my hips off the bed and get his mouth closer to my aching clit. He groans and rewards me by sucking. Ever. So. Gently.
And then I’m gone. Slipping. Falling. Melting.
“What’s your thing, Arrow?” The clock reads ten a.m. We’re still in bed, and I’m in no hurry to go anywhere. My phone flashes at me from the nightstand, but I don’t want to see a bunch of missed calls from Brogan or face reality after these amazing hours with Arrow. I will. Just not yet.
“My thing?”
I feel stupid for a minute. That day we met was so much to me. Maybe he doesn’t even remember it. My curiosity wins out over my pride. “The thing you want so desperately that the idea of having it makes you as sick to your stomach as the idea of never having it?”
His eyes lock with mine, and I know he remembers. His Adam’s apple bobs as he swallows. Tearing his gaze from mine, he rolls to his back and stares at the ceiling. “It used to be football.”
I always presumed it was football, but then he never said one way or another. “It isn’t anymore?”
“Football’s been playing second string in my wishes for a lot of months now. My life was easier when football was my everything.”
“What is it now?”
That’s when he looks at me again, his eyes dark and tormented, his body tensed beside mine. The silence grows thick with everything we never say. “You.”
My heart squeezes and my breath catches. There’s so much in that word. A promise of what he’ll be to me if I let him. A question of what tomorrow will hold. And I’m not sure what I think about either, so I just take the answer as the gift it is and remind myself to breathe.
I don’t want to speak his name and break this spell, but someone pounds on the door, breaking it anyway. I pull from Arrow’s touch and sit on the edge of the bed.
“Ignore it,” he says, wrapping an arm around my waist.
“Mia Maria Consuela Mendez!”
“That’s my brother. Shit.” Nic’s only been out of prison a couple of weeks, and neither of us are used to it yet. I forget that he can stop by anytime he wants, and he forgets that I’m not five anymore.
“I know you’re home,” Nic calls. “Your neighbor told me she saw you come in this morning.”
Arrow sits up and drags a hand over his face.
“I’m sorry,” I whisper.
“It’s cool.” He scans the room, probably knowing how bad this looks, considering I was his best friend’s girlfriend this time yesterday. “Tell me what you want me to do.”
I swallow. “Hide?”
“Mia—”
“I’m serious,” I hiss. “Nic is not going to like seeing you here, and I’d rather you leave with your face intact. Get your clothes and hide in the closet.”
“I’m not scared of him.”
“Do it for me,” I say as Nic pounds on the door again. “Please.”
“Right. Okay. Fine.”
While he gathers his clothes, I hurry and dress myself. I grab a button-up shirt and a pair of jeans.
“Mia, I fucking swear!” Nic calls.
“I’m coming,” I say. “I was sleeping.”
“It’s important,” Nic says. “Dad’s gone on a bender and he’s gotten out the gun.”
My fingers pause halfway up the buttons. This is reality, Mia. This is your real life. Not Arrow saying sweet things to you under the stars or waking you up with kisses. This. Your dad and alcoholic benders that make him wax poetic about suicide.
I hurry with the last few buttons as I rush to open the door. “What does he want?”
“He’s flipping out about talking to you,” Nic says.
Since all he’s cared about for the last eighteen months was Nic getting out of prison, this surprises me. “Why?”
He shrugs. “Just come home so we can talk him down.”
I nod and cast an apologetic glance to the closet where Arrow’s hiding. I hate leaving him like this, but I don’t have a choice. Maybe he needs the reality check, too.
When we get to Nic’s car, I hesitate with my hand on the door handle.
“Get in!” my brother calls.
I fold my arms across my chest. “Let me see your eyes.”
“I’m clean. For Christ’s sake. You know I’m clean. Hell, you’re probably the only one who
does know.”
I can see in his eyes he’s telling the truth, and I trust him to be honest. He knows how I feel about riding with him when he’s stoned—or anyone, for that matter. Not happening.
When we get to Dad’s trailer, he’s sitting on the edge of the bed, crying—blubbering, really—a handgun hanging from his fingertips.
Nic and I exchange a look, and he nods. I’m hoping in our silent communication he’s thinking that he’ll get the gun while I distract Dad.
“Daddy?” I step closer slowly. The last thing I want to do is startle him.
Dad’s head snaps up and his jaw hangs open for a minute as he takes me in. “My daughter,” he says. “My daughter. Tell me it’s not true.”
“What’s not true?” Another step closer. A shallow breath. A silent prayer.
“Frank told me he saw you with the Woodison kid at the Dairy Maid last night. Tell me it’s not true. Tell me they’re not going to take you away from me, too.”
“No one’s taking me away, Daddy. I’m right here.” Another step, and then I jump as the gun hits the ground with a thump.
“They can’t have you, too. Not my daughter. It’s bad enough that they took Isabella.”
Nic grabs the gun off the floor. I try to catch his eye and fail.
“Who took Mom?” I ask. “What are you talking about, Dad?”
“Tell me it’s not true,” Dad says. “Tell me you aren’t letting a Woodison ruin you.”
Ruin me. Dear God, do I hate that expression. “No one is ruining me.” I wrap my arms around his shoulders and hold him while he cries.
Nic and I work together to calm him down and get him into bed, and when the trailer is quiet, I follow my brother outside.
“What was that about?” I ask.
“He fucking hates Woodison. The dude fired him. You know that.” But Nic still won’t look me in the eye.
“What aren’t you telling me?”
When he meets my eyes, it’s with a resigned sigh. “There are things little girls shouldn’t have to know about their moms, Mee.”
“Then it’s a good thing I’m not a little girl anymore. Tell me.”
