Understanding Beauty (The Beauty Trilogy Book 2)

by Raven Scott

“So,” Rain says, coming over to put her arm around my shoulders. “How good is the dick?”

  Rowan burst out laughing, Rogen lets out another string of cuss words, and I snicker, leaning over to kiss her cheek. “Wouldn’t you like to know.”

  She nods her head. “Yes, yes, I fucking would.”

  I smirk at her and wink. “Let’s just say I like not being able to walk right.”

  Rain’s mouth drops open and Rowan lets out another loud laugh. I turn and smile up at Rogen before he leans down, putting his lips so close to my ear his breath tickles.

  “Just wait until later, baby. I can’t wait to bury my dick in that tight pussy while I kiss all over that perfect body of yours.”

  Now it’s my jaw that drops as my face heats with lust.

  13

  Spending the day watching Rogen tattoo was simply amazing. It’s one thing to admire someone’s ink after it’s done, but watching him create it was magnificent.

  I wanted to go home after, but we agreed to meet Collins and Cannon for supper. The last thing I want to do is blow either of them off, especially when I’m just getting them back in my life the way they belong. Rogen holds my hand the entire drive over to meet them and I fight to keep the smile off my face.

  Collins, Cannon, Rain, and Rowan are already seated at a table toward the back of the restaurant. Rain and Rowan went shopping after Rogen finished the tattoo, but I stayed with him for his other client as well. The second client got a very intricate Trinity Knot that was wicked cool to see Rogen complete.

  As we step toward the table, Rogen puts his hand on my lower back to guide me. Cannon is the first one out of his seat. His eyes shift between me and Rogen, following the path of Rogen’s arm to my body. I think he’s going to say something, but he replaces the look of confusion with a smile and wraps me in a hug.

  “Ah, it’s good to see you, sis,” he says as he squeezes me tightly.

  I run my hands up and down his back and chuckle. “Good to see you too, brother.”

  Cannon lets me go and pulls out the chair next to his. I sit and Rogen takes the empty chair next to me, putting him between me and Rowan. Rain is next to her and then Collins, who’s giving me a very coy smirk as I smile at her.

  “We heard you guys have been at the shop all day,” Cannon says, sitting back in his chair. “You finally going to lose your ink-virginity, little sister?”

  Rogen snickers next to me and I roll my eyes. “Actually, I am.”

  Everyone’s eyes go wide. I’m literally the last friend without so much as one tiny tattoo. Collins sits forward a little, resting her hand on her growing baby bump. “Seriously?”

  “I sketched out something special for her,” Rogen says as I turn to look at him and smile. His eyes meet mine and he slides his arm around my shoulders, pulling me toward him until his lips softly touch my forehead. My eyes close for a moment and then it clicks that we’re in a room full of people, and Collins and Cannon don’t know much of what’s going on between Rogen and I.

  Opening my eyes, I don’t move away from him, but I look back to Collins, whose eyes are darting between Rogen and I, her mouth slightly agape. The questions swimming in her irises are obvious as she stares holes into me. I reach over and cover Rogen’s hand with mine and he laces our fingers together. Collins’s mouth opens and closes a few times and I shrug my shoulders and wink at her just as the waitress comes up to the table.

  Tonight is going to be potentially entertaining.

  We order appetizers and everyone chats, multiple conversations going on all at once. Rogen is chatting with Rain about what she wants as her next tattoo, so I turn to my brother.

  “You ready for fatherhood, Cannon? I think it’s really going to suit you,” I say with a smile and glance at Collins, who’s deep in conversation with Rowan about baby names.

  “As ready as I think I can be,” he says, sitting forward and leaning toward me a little more. “I’m rearranging the schedules at the bar so I can be home more once the baby’s born. I’ve always worked a lot, but I don’t want to miss a moment of this.”

  I reach out and put my hand on his. “You’re going to be an amazing father. You know that, right?”

  My brother looks at me with a twinkle in his eye. “Thanks, Parker. I hope you’re right.”

  The waitress comes back and we all order dinner, and then we eat between telling stories and getting everyone caught up on what each other has been up to over the last few weeks.

  “How’s that case you’re working on, P?” Collins asks before twirling a forkful of spaghetti and taking a bite.

  I wipe my mouth with a napkin and take a sip of my wine. “It’s going, but not as quickly as I’d like. We’re running into more red tape, so to speak, than I’m used to.”

  “What’s the issue?” Cannon says as he takes a sip of his own beer.

  “I can’t get any information on the defendant. Usually, the charges are public record once they’re filed. But we filed them without direct information, the police giving that to the courts. It’s hard to prepare for the possibility of a trial when I don’t know who I’m trying to put in jail,” I say with a little more irritation in my voice than I like.

  “What the hell would cause them to keep that information from one of the attorneys?” Rowan says with her brows pulled together.

  I shrug my shoulders. “An injunction from his attorney, which I feel like I’d know about, or the defendant is a minor and they don’t have parental consent to release the information yet.”

  “Oh shit,” Rogen says, sliding his hand over my thigh. “I never considered that as a possibility, Theodora being killed by someone her own age.”

  I nod sadly and reach over to run my fingers through his beard. “I’m really hoping it’s the former. Prosecuting one kid for the death of another is a losing situation all around.”

  After a beat of silence, Rowan launches into her argument for Collins and Cannon naming the baby after her. It breaks the tension that came with talking about Thea’s case.

  As everyone is laughing and joking, Rogen leans in and nips at my earlobe, sending a wave of shivers through my entire body. “No matter what happens, you’ve worked your ass off on Thea’s case, and you’ve done her justice.”

  My heart melts at the sincerity and compassion and full support in his voice. “And I really want to take you home now and do very dirty things to you.”

  I squeeze my thighs together as my pussy damn near floods from his words. Rogen has the most instant effect on me, and part of me absolutely loves it.

  We hold out for another forty-five minutes before Rogen makes an excuse about being exhausted and wanting to get home. The moment we walk in the front door, Rogen crushes his lips to mine and starts tearing at my clothes like they’re on fire. Before I know it, I’m bent over the side of the couch as he slides a condom on before slamming into me, making me scream out his name.

  “Fuck, you’re addictive,” he growls as he leans over and pulls my body up some. I grab the back of the couch, arching my back as he slams into me harder with one hand on my hip holding me steady and the other coming up to grip my throat.

  My pussy tightens and everything is more sensitive than it’s ever been as my orgasm builds to its max. “Rogen, please,” I moan, pushing back and matching his intensity.

  “Damn it, Parker,” he growls, fucking me harder and harder. “Come on, baby.”

  I scream his name and cuss as I cum. Rogen lets go of my hip and reaches around to rub my clit, making my orgasm even more intense. He finds his own release, and just as he pulls out and pulls me into his arms, someone knocks on our front door.

  I stare at him in surprise and he snickers, grabbing his shirt off the floor and tossing it to me. “Get that. I’ll clean up.”

  As he walks back to his room and I slide my panties back on, I’m hit with a little sadness that he isn’t walking back to my room. We still have separate rooms despite the fact we sleep together more often than not.


  I comb my fingers through my hair, take a deep breath, and open the door. I choke on my next breath as I stare at Collins standing on my doorstep with a smirk on her face.

  “Collins, what’s up?”

  She presses her lips together and tries not to laugh. “We were on our way home and instead of texting, I wanted to ask you in person if you and Rogen wanted to come to the sonogram appointment the day after tomorrow. I didn’t realize you and my brother would be . . . busy when you left dinner.”

  “Collins, I—”

  “Knock it off, sis,” Rogen snaps, coming up behind me. He doesn’t skip a beat as he slides his arm around my midsection, trailing it up the front of me and softly gripping my throat as he turns my head so he can kiss my lips. “Yes, we’ll be at the appointment. No, it’s not your business what’s going on between me and Parker right now. When we’re ready to talk about it with you, we will. Okay?”

  Collins nods her head and says goodbye with a smile on her face.

  Closing the door, I turn to Rogen. “Thank you.”

  “I should have asked if you wanted them to know before I touched you in front of everyone. I didn’t even think about it because it’s just become so normal to touch you and kiss you whenever I want lately,” he says, his eyes searching my face as he cups the side of it.

  “I don’t mind,” I whisper, staring at his lips, just wanting them on me again.

  “Good,” he whispers back before leaning down to kiss me. “I want to sleep next to you tonight, Parker. Is that okay?”

  I nod and wrap my arms around his neck, bringing his lips to mine again. It’s hard to admit, but I sleep better when he’s with me anyway, and today has been too good of a day to end it without being in his arms.

  14

  Collins texts me the next day with a very vague reference to her showing up at the flat and finding me post-fucking and wearing her brother’s t-shirt. Then she called this morning, at eight in the morning on a Saturday, to remind Rogen and I that today was the sonogram appointment. Which is how I’ve ended up sitting in bed with nothing but the sheet covering me, a tray of breakfast across my lap and Rogen next to me with a tray of his own.

  He got up and made breakfast while I dosed back off, but then woke me up with a tray of coffee, orange juice, waffles, eggs, and bacon. And it is amazing. Rogen is staring at me as I munch on my last piece of bacon.

  “You know, I remember this one time when Collins and I were little, we had behaved well enough that our parents let us go to a local farm,” he says shifting his eyes down to our hands laced together between us on the bed. I can’t take my eyes off his face, swallowing the last bit of my food. Rogen hardly ever talks about his family, but now he is . . . and completely of his own choice. “Collins was so adamant about being able to milk a cow. She’d read it in a book or something and the whole summer it’s all she wanted to do.”

  Rogen glances up at me and then back to our hands, moving his thumb in gentle circles against my skin. “I didn’t care what we did as long as Collins was happy. That’s all that mattered to me, even back then. She dressed in a pair of overalls and her only pair of boots with a white t-shirt, looking like the best little farm girl she could, and walked right up to the farmer and told him she was there to milk those cows.” Rogen chuckles and lifts our hands to kiss my knuckles. “Our parents are shitty people, Parker. Growing up, all I thought was if I could do better, be better, maybe one day they’d love us. We were never good enough, though.”

  I tear my hand out of his and practically throw both the trays down onto the floor so that I can straddle his lap, grabbing both sides of his face and forcing him to look at me. “You were always enough. Collins was always enough.”

  Rogen tries to pull his head away and look anywhere but at me, but I tighten my grip and lean down, slamming my lips into his. A heartbeat passes and his body relaxes, his arms going around my waist as our tongues dance together. When he pulls away, he presses his forehead against mine. “Thank you.”

  “You’re welcome,” I whisper, lifting my head to kiss the tip of his nose. “So, are we still on for tattooing next Saturday?”

  Rogen adjusts his ass, which pushes his hard-on against my clit and makes me bite my lip to keep from moaning. “Yep. Just me, you, and my tattoo gun. You sure you still want to go through with it?” He rests his hands on my hips.

  “I need to. I need something to help push my healing and this is it. With the trial coming up in a few weeks and all the stress from that, plus fighting with myself every day to remember Dalton and still live my life, this will be good. I can’t explain it, but—”

  “I get it,” Rogen says, bringing one hand up to hold the side of my face. This time I lean into his touch like my life depends on him. Like he’s the very structure holding me together.

  The longer I’m with Rogen like this, in his arms, I can feel the shattered parts of me slowly gluing back together. There’s always going to be cracks and nicks in me. You don’t lose someone you love the way I loved Dalton without there being lasting issues. But I want to keep healing, even if sometimes it doesn’t feel like I can.

  Rogen kisses me hard and bites my bottom lip as he pulls away, making me groan with want.

  “I need more, Rogen,” I beg, kissing him again, letting my hands completely drop the sheet from covering my upper body.

  He pulls the sheet away so there is nothing between his body and mine, and I can’t help but run my fingers over the tattoos that cover his body. He tilts his head back as my fingers trace the ones on his neck, and I slowly move to his shoulders and then his chest.

  When I touch his stomach, he leans forward, wrapping his arms around me and pressing his hands into my back. He takes one of my nipples into his mouth, sucking hard and swirling his tongue around the hardened peak before moving over and doing the same to the other one.

  Kissing between my breasts, he flicks his tongue out to caress my skin. “You’re so fucking perfect, baby,” he whispers, nipping at my skin, the little pangs of pain making me soaking wet. As he moves one of his hands up my back to grip my neck, biting and suck my collarbone and shoulder, he trails his other hand between my legs, rubbing and pinching my clit until I’m squirming in his lap, moaning and shaking.

  “Rogen, please,” I beg, tangling my hands in fists in his hair. “I need you inside me, please.”

  He moves his hand from my clit and leans over to grab a condom out of his dresser. Yanking it out of his hand, I rise to my knees and lick my lips as I rip it open and slide it down his length. Positioning my entrance over his hard cock, I slide down slowly, taking his full length, digging my nails into his shoulders as I do.

  “Fuck, you feel so good, Parker,” he grabs the front of my neck and pulls my lips down to his, practically fucking my mouth with his tongue as he grabs my hips, squeezing them.

  Holding onto his shoulder, I move, sliding up on his cock and slamming down over and over until my body is aching for release and my thighs feel like they’re on fire. A scream breaks from my lips when Rogen grabs me, pulls me off his cock, and throws me back on the bed, bending and sucking my clit into his mouth.

  My whole body arches as he slips two fingers into me, moving them in and out, faster and faster, licking and sucking my clit until I’m cumming so hard it’s almost painful. Before my body even fully recovers from my high, Rogen slams his cock into me again, moving hard and quick, pinning my body to the bed.

  My nails dig into his back as another orgasm builds quicker than should be allowed. I spread my legs even further, slightly lifting my ass until Rogen’s thrusts go so deep, I’m seeing stars.

  “One more time, Parker, come on, baby,” he growls in my ear.

  A few more thrusts and we’re both cumming, my body zapped of all energy the moment Rogen pulls out.

  I want to get up and clean up in the shower, but as I go to sit up, Rogen comes in with a warm cloth again and cleans me up. I hadn’t even realized he’d gotten up. Every time
he does this, though, this sweet act, the guilt hits me.

  Dalton is the only other person I can remember doing this, and the act itself reminds me of him. For a moment, it makes me feel the pain again. The guilt like I’m betraying him, like he’d be angry at me for being with Rogen. Lately these emotions don’t push through often, but right now they are, and I don’t want Rogen to see them. I squeeze my eyes closed, willing the pain back.

  Lips softly touch mine and my eyes flutter open to meet Rogen’s, the corners crinkled with his smile. “Why don’t you shower and get around. I’ll make us a snack and you can eat while I get ready. We’ve got to meet Collins and Cannon in less than an hour, baby.”

  “Mmm,” is all I manage as he gets up, kissing down my body as he goes. When he leaves the bed, I watch his very perfect ass slide on shorts and head out into the kitchen.

  The pain is ebbing at the edges of everything, but, taking a deep breath, I’m determined to keep it at bay for the next few hours at the very least. I will not ruin Collins’s sonogram by letting this darkness consume me again.

  Plus . . . Rogen feels so good . . . I don’t want to let it back in.

  15

  “It’s your fault we’re damn near late,” Rogen says as we try to rush through the doctor’s office. He walks behind me with his hands on my hips, nuzzling my neck and peppering my skin with kisses, making me giggle and playfully squirm away from him.

  “Rogen, stop,” I say laughingly as we both kind of fall into the waiting room.

  We freeze as ten or so pairs of eyes snap up to glare at us. Two of those sets belong to Collins and Cannon, who both wear wide-eyed expressions with their mouths open slightly, gaze shifting from me to Rogen and back.

  My cheeks heat and I have to try and swallow the laugh that threatens to break from my throat. Rogen straightens immediately and clears his throat, stepping around me and grabbing my hand, pulling me toward my brother and sister-in-law.