Keep From Falling (Markson Grove Series Book 1)

by Amy Vanessa Miller

  He reciprocates the kiss with an excitement and eagerness that matches my own and we tumble onto the bed with a loud smash, pushing the bed forward and crashing the headboard against the wall.

  I pull myself backward, further up the bed toward the pillows, as he crawls with my movements, staying directly above me. I sit up, allowing my breasts to playfully brush passed his face as I pull my shirt up over my head, revealing to him my black lace bra.

  I begin to kiss each tattoo on his bare torso, licking my way from one to the other. I can feel his heart pounding in his chest. He lets out a moan and taking each of my breasts into his hands gently, he runs his fingers over top of the bra, causing my entire body to tremble. I want so badly to feel his fingers on my bare skin that my body is literally aching in anticipation.

  As though he is reading my mind, he casually slides his fingers underneath the edge of the bra, waiting for my reaction. I let out an excited gasp. Taking that as a sign to proceed, he allows his fingers to explore further.

  I can hear Spencer pounding on the door in the hallway, but I can’t bring myself to care. My drunken haze makes his demands for me to open the door sound so far away that they don’t even seem real.

  Parker lays his naked chest on top of mine, his body pushing so closely to me that I can’t even be sure where I end and he begins. He kisses my lips, then my neck, and then the top of each breast. He looks up at me with lust filled eyes as he licks his tongue up from my cleavage to the base of my throat. I moan loudly.

  I sit myself up slightly with my elbows and begin to reach for the bra’s latch behind my back, but Parker gently stops me, taking my hand into his and bringing it to his lips.

  “Keep it on,” he says, kissing my hand. He runs his lips up the length of my scar-covered arm, being sure to kiss every last one of them, including my newly inflicted gash, with softness, tenderness, and love before resting his lips on my neck. I gasp, instinctively lying back into the bed.

  In spite of how much he’s always hated seeing me cut myself, he’s made it very clear to me that my cuts and scars have never made him think I was any less worthy of him. He’s always made me feel nothing but beautiful when I am with him.

  I tremble with so much need that I can’t contain it, and If I thought I couldn’t possibly want him any more than I did a minute ago, I was wrong.

  He begins to kiss his way up my neck toward my chin. I throw my head back into the pillow and lift my hips so that I can feel his body against mine. Wanting me. Needing me. Even through our layers of clothing, my skirt, and his jeans, the contact is electric, and I know we both feel it immensely.

  He slams his lips onto mine once again, slipping his tongue into my mouth ever so slightly and brushing it against mine. I tremble. I can’t handle this for much longer; I want him, every part of him!

  He breaks the kiss for just a moment in order to tenderly lick my bottom lip, and then the top one. He smiles, continuing on with his kisses, over and over on my lips. I giggle between each one, remembering his little licks of endearment from when we used to be together and how much I’d always loved them.

  Suddenly, Spencer’s loud pounding on the door begins to radiate through my head and I stop being able to tune it out.

  I close my eyes in hopes that the pounding and yelling might disappear and fade into background noise, but all that closing them actually accomplishes is it causes the room to spin all around me.

  I reopen my eyes abruptly.

  Parker reaches down to my thigh and begins running his hand up and under my skirt as he continues to kiss me. When his fingers touch the trim of my panties, I moan and readjust myself, trying to guide his fingers to where I want them to go. But he takes his hand away just as I feel as though I’ve found the right position, and places it back on the outside of my skirt. I let out a little whimper of disappointment. He chuckles, knowing very well what it is he’s doing to me.

  “Parker!” Spencer’s voice breaks into the moment and brings me crashing back to reality. “You better fucking open the door or so help me God, you’ll be dead by the end of the night!”

  Spencer’s worried. I need to assure him that I’m ok.

  “I’m fine Spencer,” I manage to call out in a drunken slur. I don’t realize just how drunk I actually am until that very moment. My words are barely comprehensible and the way they sound makes me giggle slightly. There is no way that reassured him. But in my drunken stupor, I really don’t care. It’s the only effort I’m willing to make at this point. I’ve taken myself away from Parker long enough as it is.

  “Hear that, Spencer? She’s fine, now fuck off,” Parker calls out. I know that the statement is harmless on his part, but I can also tell he’s trying to push Spencer’s buttons on purpose. Knowing very well that I’m happy and safe in his arms, but playing on Spencer’s fear that he might be hurting or taking advantage of me. I don’t know why he always feels the need to play the bad guy with everyone around him but me.

  We wait for a few moments to give Spencer time to reply and when he doesn’t, I begin to nibble on Parker’s earlobe playfully. He lets out a loud moan, instantly getting back into the moment and nuzzling his face into my neck, causing me to shriek out in a fit of laughter.

  I can’t handle it anymore. I need him inside me right now!

  I slip my fingers into the waist of his jeans and fumble with the button for a second before I finally get it undone. When I start trying to tug the jeans off of him, however, he abruptly stops me.

  “I can’t,” he says quietly, and the words make my entire body freeze in place. A chill runs down my spine as anger begins to take form inside of me.

  I shove him off of me. “Fuck you!”

  He sits up on his knees and buttons up his jeans. There’s a look of regret radiating in his eyes. “Sky,” he sighs, reaching out to me, a pained expression visibly clear in the worried creases of his forehead.

  “Why?” I demand, slapping his outstretched arms away from me. I glare at him.

  All that’s happened tonight between Bree and me instantly comes crashing back into my mind like a tidal wave of emotions. I drank so much tequila to numb myself completely and now it’s like the numbness has just vanished entirely. My eyes begin to well up with tears and I know that this time I won’t be able to hold them back.

  “Sky,” Parker says again, pleading for me to let him touch me. He can tell I’m about to break, but won’t move toward me without my ok first. I always make the first move with us. He never does anything unless he’s sure I want it.

  “It’s not because I don’t want you. God, believe me, you have no idea how much I really want you right now. All of you,” he assures me, reaching his arm to me yet again and raising his eyebrow as if to ask if it’s ok. I nod, leaning into him and he lovingly wraps his strong arms around me, bringing me tight to his chest. I listen to his deep and steady breaths, allowing my own breathing to slow down and mimic his. As soon as I do, calmness finally takes over me.

  He wipes away the tears that have managed to escape my eyes with his middle and index fingers and then takes my face into both of his hands making me look right at him. He wants me to really see him and know that what he’s about to tell me is the complete, and honest truth. He knows I need that assurance because he just knows me that well.

  “I made you a promise,” he says, kissing me on my forehead and letting his lips linger there.

  Realization dawns on me as his words settle into my mind. I close my eyes and take in his gentle touch as I remember the promise he made to me over a year ago. He kisses me on my left eyelid, and then on my right. He kisses away all of my tears, and every piece of anger that goes along with those tears, before finally ending up on my lips. And with one emotionally charged kiss, he leaves me feeling so much more loved and wanted than anyone else in my life has ever made me feel.

  “Do you remember?” he asks, his lips still lingering on mine. The electrical charge still present in the air between us.

&n
bsp; I nod. I remember it perfectly.

  “Can I ask you a question?” Parker asked me one night at The Misfit Mansion while we lay on a couch together smoking a joint.

  I took a deep toke, holding it all in my lungs as I turned my head and brought my lips less than an inch away from his. He brought his mouth to mine instantly, allowing our lips to touch just slightly, as I exhaled the smoke from my lungs and he inhaled it into his.

  “Sure,” I replied once I had finished exhaling. I leaned back into his body and snuggled up against his bare chest.

  He exhaled, wrapped his arms around my upper body, respectfully managing to avoid touching my breasts. He kissed the top of my head. “If I asked you into a private room with me tonight, would you?”

  I turned abruptly and looked over his expression to see if he was serious. I knew after the argument he had with me about wanting me to stop fucking guys who didn’t deserve me, that his feelings had become something much more than simply that of a friend. But having sex with Parker would be too intimate. Smoking a joint with Parker was insanely intimate; I couldn’t even imagine the intensity he’d bring to a sexual encounter. And, to be honest, the idea of it kind of petrified me. And believe me, the irony of that wasn’t lost on me at all.

  “You know I don’t do that with people who matter,” I said finally.

  He chuckled, obviously expecting that answer or something close to it. “How about a real date then? Do I matter too much for that?” He handed me what was left of the joint and sat up straight on the couch, pulling me upright with him.

  “You’d want to do that?” I asked uncertainly. At this point it had been about eight months since I’d first introduced myself to him in the basement of The Misfit Mansion, and nearly six weeks since he’d made me ‘his’ and I made him ‘mine’. We didn’t fuck, but we belonged to one another and everyone knew it. I never had a relationship that progressed like this with anyone before and it felt amazing. I was scared to take it to the next level.

  He nodded, “I would.” He casually traced his fingers over the scars on my arm without taking his eyes off of my face.

  I smiled in spite of how scary the idea of a real date sounded. “Yes,” I agreed finally, ignoring the fear inside of me.

  “Yeah?” he asked, obviously surprised by my reply. His mouth formed into a tiny grin.

  I nodded and he immediately kissed me on the lips. I fell in love with the taste of his kisses since our very first one only a week before, and ever since then, I couldn’t get enough of them. I kissed him back excitedly.

  That’s when someone took a seat on the couch next to us. We pulled away from our kiss abruptly.

  Parker looked to me first then over to the person who sat down next to us. “Problem?” he asked the guy who was watching us closely with a smirk on his face.

  “Nope,” The guy replied as he pulled out a baggy of what looked like pure MDMA crystals from his pocket, and dumped a bit on the table in front of us.

  As he began crushing the crystals and cutting the powder into lines, he placed another small baggy of white crystals on the table and nudged it toward me without taking his eyes off of the powder he was about to snort. “Molly for The Goddess,” he said. Molly is a slang name often used for MDMA at The Misfit Mansion, which confirmed what I suspected it was to begin with.

  I looked at Parker uneasily, wanting to see what his reaction was to this apparent proposition. A proposition I was used to receiving at the mansion, but one that Parker had made very clear wouldn’t happen anymore now that I was his.

  Parker looked as though he might beat the guy to a pulp right there. He clenched both of his fists tightly and opened his mouth to say something, but I quickly interjected.

  “Not tonight,” I told the guy, sliding the baggy back his way.

  He snorted up the first line and then looked up at me, visibly annoyed. “I was told a bag of MDMA would get me a good fuck tonight. And The Goddess never turns down Molly.”

  He was right, as much as I hated to admit it. I had never turned down a bag of MDMA before that night.

  “She told you not tonight, so fuck off,” Parker hissed.

  The guy ignored Parker and continued to look at me. “I can wait till you’re finished with this douche,” he said, motioning toward Parker.

  I bit down on my lip, nervously trying to think of what to say to him to make him leave, but before I had a chance to say anything, Parker had already taken care of it by punching him square in the nose!

  “Oh my God!” I exclaimed, bringing my hands to my mouth in disbelief and jumping up from the couch. “I think you broke his nose!”

  The guys nose gushed blood all over the table and floor. He got up, hurriedly pushing the sleeve of his hoodie to his nose while glaring at Parker. “What the fuck is your problem?” he screamed, his voice reaching a pitch that I’m sure he was embarrassed about.

  “I told you to get lost. She belongs to me. Now fuck off before I break the rest of your face.”

  Once the guy stormed off, I turned to Parker with a sigh, “I wasn’t going to get a room with him. You didn’t have to punch him,” I said, deflated by the entire ordeal.

  “I saw you eying the drugs, though,” he pointed out. “Don’t tell me you weren’t considering it.” He sat back down on the couch, leaned all the way back, and lit himself a cigarette, something I hadn’t seen him do at The Misfit Mansion since the very first night we spoke.

  I shook my head. “I wasn’t. I wanted the drugs, but I didn’t want to fuck him.”

  He nodded, took a long drag of his cigarette, and then reached out ahead of him and grabbed the baggy off of the table.

  I gasped. In all of the chaos of getting his nose broken, the guy forgot to take his drugs back!

  “Now I have the drugs,” he said with a testing look. “What are you going to consider doing with me?”

  His face was serious and I could see no sign of joking in his eyes. I shifted my weight uncomfortably from one foot to the other, trying to decide what to say next.

  “You’re not being fair.”

  He tossed the baggy to me and I caught it with both hands. “Then do MDMA with me tonight,” he said.

  I shook my head in disbelief. He never wanted to do Ecstasy with me before. He had always been very much against it. “I thought you don’t do E.”

  “I don’t do pills,” he returned quickly, knowing that was going to be the first thing I would say in response to his request. “This is pure crystallized MDMA. I will do this with you… If you’ll let me.”

  I wanted to say yes, but I was petrified of what might happen if the two of us were both high and out of control on the drug. I didn’t want my first time with Parker to be like that. I wanted us to be sober and with no ounce of numbness taking away any amount of pleasure we would experience from it. Could I tell him that without him thinking that I was a hypocrite?

  I sat down next to him on the couch and took his hand into mine. “If we do this, would you be mad at me if I asked you to not have sex with me while we are high? I want our first time to be completely drug-free and not here at the mansion…” my voice trailed off.

  His face softened, and he brought his hand to my cheek, looking deep into my eyes. “You know I would never make you do anything you didn’t want to do. Ever. I like the idea of our first time being drug-free. It makes sense for us.”

  I smiled, “Yeah?”

  He nodded. “I promise that when we have our first time together, when you are completely ready, it won’t be here and we won’t have even one taste of any type of drug in our bodies to make it less than perfect for the both of us.”

  I smiled brightly throwing my arms around him. “You are so perfect,” I said.

  He smiled back, kissing me on the top of my head. “You’re pretty perfect yourself.”

  I jumped to my feet and started toward the stairs, tugging at his arm to follow me. “Let’s get a room then.”

  He grabbed his T-shirt hanging off
the side of the couch, pulled it over his head, and eagerly followed me to a private room.

  “I forgot how much you really cared about me,” I say, still going over the memory in my mind. “You made that promise to me because you knew how much I needed it. How do you know me so well? You know me better than I even know myself.”

  “Because I love you. I’ve loved you since the minute I first laid eyes on you and I’ll love you till the day I die,” he replies unabashedly, and as usual, it’s exactly what I need to hear.

  Evan

  “Sorry I hurt you,” I say to Bree as we lie together underneath my blankets.

  She kisses my cheek softly and smiles, “It’s fine,” she says.

  “Do you still hurt now?” I ask, concerned.

  “I’m sore,” she tells me honestly.

  I cringe. “Maybe we should wait a bit before trying it again,” I suggest.

  “Maybe a few days,” she agrees, giving me a quick kiss on the lips. “But right now I’m getting dressed because the last thing I want after what we just did is your mom or sister walking in here and seeing us naked in your bed. Not quite ready for that just yet.”

  I laugh. “Good point,” I say, reaching for the clothes piled on the floor next to my bed.

  Once we are dressed, I make the bed haphazardly and then plop myself back on top of it, resting my back up against the headboard. I motion for her to sit between my legs. “So what kind of movie do you feel like watching?” I ask.

  She pulls her beautifully messy hair into a high ponytail and then crawls onto the bed, positioning herself between my legs. I wrap my arms around her shoulders and neck, kissing the top of her head lightly.

  “My curfew is eleven,” she says. “I don’t think we have time to watch a movie.”

  I look at the clock hanging on the wall above my TV. 9:38. “I suppose you’re right. How do you feel about making out a bit more then?” I tilt her chin up with my index finger and kiss her lips as softly as I possibly can. I feel her moan into my kiss, and my lips curl into a tiny smile. I think she feels for me the way I feel for her now.