When her nose brushed against his belly, and she sucked in the last inch of him, Evan realised that he was biting his own fist hard enough to leave marks behind. He had to, just to maintain the last scraps of his control. To stop himself from bucking against her, from fucking her mouth.
After a few seconds of perfect, oh-fuck-yes pleasure, she pulled back. His length slid from her lips, glistening wet, and she gasped as she caught her breath. Then, before he could ask if she was okay, she took him hungrily back into her mouth.
“Jesus,” he growled as she sped up the pace. “Jesus Christ, you’re so fucking—ohhh shit.” He watched her slide back and forth along his near-painful erection, her eyes fluttering shut, her low moans sending vibrations along his cock and up his spine. He couldn’t stop his hands from cradling her face, sinking into the softness of her hair, even as he chastised himself.
He didn’t do things like this. He didn’t give into his urge to rut against a woman’s face, to use her mouth, even if his balls were tightening and his vision was blurring and his lust was an uncontrollable beast.
But Ruth pressed a hand over his, as if encouraging him. He looked down and realised that she’d slid her other hand beneath her waistband, that she was touching herself. His knees almost buckled. Evan sagged back against the door and pressed a hand to the wall for support.
Christ, he wanted her naked. He wanted to watch as she played with her own pussy for him, as she came with his cock in her mouth. He wanted to see her cunt wet and soft and wanting him.
“You like this,” he grunted, his hips jerking as she sucked him deep.
She moaned again, her eyes meeting his, her tongue working him expertly.
“I want you to come,” he said. He didn’t recognise his own voice. It was harsh, commanding, nothing like him, but it tumbled from his lips anyway and it seemed right. “I want you to come,” he repeated, firmer now, “and then I want to fuck you.”
She shook her head slightly and pulled back, releasing him. “In my mouth,” she breathed.
If he hadn’t been desperate before, he was now. The sight of her gleaming, swollen lips, the sound of her breathless murmur—it was all too much. She swallowed him again and he gave in. He tightened his grip on her hair and thrust, holding her still as he pumped into her, gritting his teeth as the hand beneath her waistband moved faster.
When she came, squeezing her eyes shut, her throat seemed to tighten around him. He felt the vibration of her long, drawn out moan, and he let go. Sensation danced along his spine as he groaned out his release, holding her tightly against him, burying himself. She clutched his thighs and swallowed everything he gave her.
Completely drained, Evan ran a hand over his face. His skin was hot, sweat gathering at his brow as if he’d run a damned marathon. He found himself grinning from ear to ear, which wasn’t really surprising. He might’ve just had the best orgasm of his life.
Ruth started to rise. In the interests of efficiency, Evan simplified the process and picked her up.
She gave a very un-Ruth-like shriek, followed by a reassuringly Ruth-like scowl. “What are you doing?”
Evan clasped his hands beneath her arse and tried not to look too smug when her legs tightened around his hips. “Nothing.”
“Oh, really?” She glared at him, her nose an inch from his. “It’s just, looking you in the eye is usually harder than this.”
“You never look me in the eye anyway.”
“Incorrect. I look you in the eye at least once a day. It’s disgracefully intimate.” Her lips were pursed, her eyes dancing. She was smiling his favourite kind of smile, the one that didn’t seem like a smile at all.
Evan kissed the corner of her mouth softly. He’d thought he loved that mouth before; now he was ready to pay it tithes. “You’re in a good mood. I don’t suppose—”
“It has nothing to do with you,” she cut in primly. “So don’t be smug.”
“Nothing?” He grinned. She huffed. He leant against the door and readjusted his hold on her, because she didn’t seem to mind the fact that he was essentially grabbing her arse.
So he might as well really enjoy it.
“Maybe it has something to do with you,” she admitted. “Slightly. Perhaps.”
“Perhaps.” His smile grew wider.
“Perhaps. By the way,” she added, her brow furrowing. “Why did you text me? I mean, did you want something?”
“Aside from this?”
She snorted. “If you’re trying to say that you rushed home from work for a blowjob—”
“To see you,” he corrected. “I rushed home from work to see you. I wanted to talk.”
“About?”
Evan tried to remember the way he’d been going to say things, and failed. He’d been aiming for something approaching a romantic declaration, but not romantic enough to make Ruth choke on her own spit. Or hit him and run away. Then again, she seemed unusually receptive to gentleness right now. Apparently, orgasms loosened her up.
“Well,” he said slowly, “It’s funny, what with Brune being here and all, but I actually wanted to tell you that… Well, that I know about Daniel, and I don’t care.”
She blinked. “I beg your pardon?”
“He, um…” Evan searched for a simple way to explain. “He and I had a disagreement at work today.”
Ruth had become very still, very stiff and upright in his arms. “A disagreement about what?”
“You, I suppose.”
The last scraps of contentment faded from her expression. “Are you taking the piss?”
“No. I—”
“Put me down.”
This was not going well, but then, he hadn’t expected it to. “Why?”
“Put me down,” she repeated, “and put your bloody dick away.”
He sighed. “Whatever you want.” Letting go of Ruth felt like throwing away a vital organ, but that was silly. She was still right there in front of him, glaring in a comfortingly familiar manner. Evan yanked his clothes into place but didn’t bother to zip up his jeans. “You’re upset. Do you want me to keep talking, or do you want to rant?”
“Keep talking,” she said, “and I’ll rant when you’re done.”
“Okay. I guess that girl we bumped into—his sister-in-law? Told him that she saw us together. Or maybe it was the plumber. Or maybe it was both. Anyway, he was pissed. And I realised that…” Evan sighed. “He’s jealous. Right? He sent the flowers. He’s your ex.”
Ruth wasn’t looking at him anymore. She was looking at the wall, her face as blank as the clean, magnolia paint. “You realised. You just… realised.”
“Yeah. I don’t know why I didn’t figure it out before.”
She looked at him sharply. “Why would you figure it out before?”
Evan had the feeling that he was heading into dangerous territory, but he couldn’t tell if the ground would fall out from under him, or the walls would close in around him, or something else entirely. He didn’t know where to look for the threat. “Well… he always told me to stay away from you. He was so fucking smug when I found out about his car. He—”
“His car?” Ruth looked furious now, but he wasn’t sure who she was furious with. “He’s still banging on about that fucking car?”
“Not exactly. But—”
“He had no right to do that.” She jerked back, began to pace. Evan stared. He had never seen Ruth pace. He had seen her wander around a room as she spoke, and he had seen her sit in odd places or in strange positions, and he had seen her wring her hands and tap rhythms out against table-tops. He had never seen her stride from one end of a space to the other with a look on her face that screamed murder, and he didn’t like it.
“It’s okay,” he said. “I don’t care.”
“You don’t care about what?” She demanded.
He couldn’t decipher the look on her face. He should be cautious, he knew—but she was upset. Ruth was upset, and he couldn’t stand it, and he thought he could fix i
t. So he said, “I don’t care if you have a criminal record because you smashed up that dick’s car.”
Ruth stared at him for a moment, her face impassive. Then she said, “I think you should go.” Her tone was mild, unreadable. Which meant that she was hiding a hurricane of emotions he’d never have access to.
“Talk to me,” he said. “Tell me why you’re upset.”
She shrugged. “Why don’t you go and find whoever’s been feeding you this shit and ask them, since they know everything?”
“Ruth. No-one’s—”
“You’ve been sitting around talking about my family,” she said quietly, “and you want me to act like you’ve done something good.”
“No.” He shook his head. If the movement was a little frantic, well—it matched his mind’s desperate cries of Fix it! “That’s not what happened, and that’s not what I want.”
“So what do you want?” She demanded. “Because I’m really starting to wonder. Do you want to do this? Do you want to be with me? Or do you just want to solve a mystery and save a girl?”
“What the fuck?” He had no idea how things had gone so exquisitely wrong. “Ruth. You know it’s not like that.”
“It’s not?” Her jaw was hard, as if she were clenching her teeth. Her dark eyes shimmered like ink. “If it’s not like that, why would you fight over me with Daniel?” She thrust a hand into her hair, began pacing again. “Jesus, that’s probably why Mr. Burne came over.”
“We didn’t fight,” Evan insisted.
She paused to give him a disbelieving look. “I know Daniel. I know you.”
“And I want to know you!” Evan burst out. Because it had become almost painful, the way everyone knew something except him. The way Daniel or random women in shops or even Zach could drop shit on him about someone he—
Well. About the woman his life revolved around.
But he didn’t know how to explain that to Ruth without sounding sickeningly selfish. He realised suddenly that his intentions tonight—his idea that he’d reveal all the knowledge he’d collected and excuse her of all sins like some kind of fucking God—had been selfish.
She looked up at him, a heart breaking little frown on her face, and said, “You do know me.”
Evan swallowed. “That’s not what I meant.”
But it was too late. He could see that in her weary, hopeless eyes, in the way she rubbed at her temple.
Then she said, “Just go. Okay? Please?”
Jesus. He didn’t want to go. He didn’t want to leave things like this, and he didn’t want to leave her at all.
But he couldn’t refuse. So he went.
Chapter Twenty-Four
Patience Kabbah was neither observant nor assertive. Those who knew the Kabbahs often wondered how, exactly, she had produced one daughter who was particularly sharp, and another who was especially demanding.
If anyone had thought to ask Patience, she would have told them that it happened quite by accident. But people rarely asked Patience about things.
Her name suited her well, but ‘Contentment’ would have suited better. She was, by nature, an eternally satisfied woman; and, despite the difficulties life had thrown at her, this commitment to satisfaction always carried her through. Of course, she didn’t think of it as a commitment to satisfaction. She saw it as God’s plan, and followed faithfully.
When the love of her life, an older, powerful lawyer, turned out to be married, Patience had not worried. She had simply loved him anyway, and been rewarded with two children, a large house, and a life-long income.
That the house was in England as opposed to Sierra Leone, and that the love of her life eventually moved on to greener pastures, did not trouble Patience overmuch. She supposed that England would do, since she spoke the language well and it was not too foreign. She supposed also that she would eventually find the next love of her life, and at least she could take her time looking.
And so, decades after arriving in Ravenswood, Patience was, always had been, and doubtless always would be, blissfully content. Her greatest sorrow was that, somehow, her daughters had ended up quite the opposite. Neither of them were happy to simply float through life, and as far as she could tell, it caused them nothing but trouble.
Take this Sunday, for example. The family had cooked together, as they did every week, but their usual laughter was absent. It was not at all hard to discern why. Within minutes of her daughters’ arrival, Patience deduced that Hannah was worried about Ruth, and furiously resentful of the fact. She also deduced that Ruth was oblivious to Hannah’s resentment, but was certainly upset over… Something. With Ruth, one never really knew.
Patience spent the rest of the painfully silent afternoon wondering if she should assist her awfully prideful children in resolving their issues—all of which stemmed from caring and doing far too much in a world made for the careless and passive. She decided, after many internal sighs, that she’d better. Her daughters had a knack for running into trouble if left unattended.
“Girls,” she said, as they moved to clear the table.
Hannah answered quickly and politely. “Yes, Mummy?”
Ruth, who had always been a strange and disrespectful child, said, “Yeah?”
“Do not come out of the kitchen,” Patience said, “until you have solved your problems.”
Ruth frowned. The child would certainly wrinkle before her time. “What problems?”
With a weary sigh, Patience said, “Ask your sister.” Then she turned and began her search for the TV commander. She was quite exhausted by that tense interaction, and she wanted to watch Deal or No Deal.
“What was that about?” Ruth crouched by the cupboard under the sink, hunting out a fresh bottle of washing up liquid.
Then she heard the kitchen door shut with a decisive click.
Ruth pulled her head from the cupboard and stared. Her sister was standing in front of the door with her arms folded, a familiar, stern set to her mouth.
“You know,” Ruth began cautiously, “Just because Mum said—”
“She’s right. She’s always right. I want to talk to you.”
The word talk had become Ruth’s personal nightmare over the last few days. She’d examined it from every angle, explored its every connotation, remembered every time Evan had asked her to do it, and decided that talking was for the devil.
But she always tried not to upset her sister. So Ruth stood, and dusted off her hands on the back of her leggings, and said, “Okay.”
Hannah sighed. Ruth knew from experience that this indicated an extensive lecture on the horizon. Accordingly, she leant back against the counter.
And then she remembered Evan lifting her up to sit on the edge of a sink, asking her—asking her—for a kiss.
“I heard that Daniel and Evan had a disagreement,” Hannah said.
Ruth sighed. “Seriously? That’s what you want to talk about?”
“I thought that was why you’re so upset. Apparently, Evan’s in a bad way.”
Ruth stared. “Evan’s fine.”
“Really? No black eye?”
“Um… no.”
“No dislocated shoulder?”
“Definitely not.”
“Hm,” Hannah sniffed. “I suppose that rumour came from Daniel, then. But you admit they fought?”
“I really could not care less,” Ruth lied.
And Hannah said, “I’m tired of you pushing me away.”
For a minute, Ruth’s mind stuttered; was this Hannah, or was it Evan? Or was it Maria, two years ago, or Hayley, before her?
Ruth swallowed. “I don’t mean to.”
“I know,” Hannah said. “That makes it worse.”
Ruth wanted to turn away. She wanted to avoid her sister’s gaze and pour her focus into something else, some mundane task. She wanted to split up her attention so that processing these words wouldn’t seem quite so intense. She wanted this conversation to feel like less of a slap in the face. But she was done with bein
g a coward, so she stayed exactly where she was.
“I’m sorry,” Hannah said. “I’m really fucking sorry.”
Well… that was a surprise. Ruth frowned, trying to figure out if she’d missed something.
Finally, she just had to ask. “Sorry for what?”
Hannah gave her a look. “You know what. And I know that this is—God, years too late—but if it weren’t for me acting like a damn fool you wouldn’t be in the position you are now.”
The pieces slid together. Ruth stared at her sister with growing horror as she realised what Hannah was trying to say.
“No,” Ruth insisted. “No. That’s not true. It’s not your fault. It’s my fault, and his fault, and—”
“Your fault?” Hannah echoed, her face incredulous. “Jesus. Sometimes it occurred to me that you might genuinely think that, but I didn’t believe it.” She rubbed at her own temple for a moment, her expression melting into weariness. “I should have, though, shouldn’t I? That’s why you’re like this. That’s why you’re punishing yourself.”
Ruth looked down at the kitchen tiles; familiar, cream squares. Following the lines of pale grout between them helped her clear the thoughts crowding her head, helped her pinpoint the most important part. “I’m not punishing myself. I’m not pushing you away.”
“Bullshit,” Hannah said, her tone incongruously gentle. “I know you adore that man.”
Ruth’s breath caught in her throat. “Evan?”
“Yes, Evan. And now you can’t deny it, because if it wasn’t true, his name wouldn’t have even occurred to you.” Hannah gave a little tilt of the head that brought to mind their childhood, the pointless, circular arguments they’d have that she would always win.
Ruth bit down on the inside of her cheek. “I don’t see what Evan has to do with us.”
“I suppose he’s just a symptom of the issue.” Hannah spoke quietly, her voice clipped. “You’re so committed to keeping people at arm’s length, you can’t tell your own sister that you’re falling in love. We don’t do secrets anymore, Ruth. Remember?”
“Don’t,” Ruth snapped, her temper flaring. “This is nothing like the last time.”
A Girl Like Her Page 15
