“So what kind of software are you using? Maybe it’s something I can help you with.” I suggested as I crutched over to one of the black leather wingback chairs in front of his desk. “You do know I have a degree in accounting, right? In fact, I would love to help. It’ll give me something to do instead of just holding down your couch.”
“No, you need to relax,” he started.
“Stop. If I relax any more, I’ll be a puddle of mush on the floor. I need something to do, Brody. If not, I may go insane. Please. Let me help you,” I pleaded with him, even grasping my hands together and pouting dramatically.
Once he smiled, I knew I had him.
“Okay, if you insist. I’ll bring you the laptop out there and give you what I have.” He leaned back in the chair and shook his head. “I swear, you’re too good to be true. Funny, confident, beautiful and smart. And best of all, you’re begging me.”
His last comment caught me off guard and I burst out laughing. “Don’t worry. Soon the tables will be turned, my friend. That much I can promise you.”
He stood and came around the desk and stopped in front of me. “Is that so?”
Leaning down, he slowly inched toward me then kissed me. What started as a chaste little kiss soon turned into an impassioned, fiery kiss. He picked me up and sat my ass on the front of his desk. He refocused his attention to my chin then my jaw as he kissed, licked and nipped his way down to my neck.
I was pretty sure if Jane had not interrupted us I would have spontaneously combusted right there in his arms.
From that day until now, we would have little moments where all of the horrors of the last month fell away and it was just us. Then passion overtook every sense we had. We craved each other’s touch, taste and scent.
Since the day my father died and Brody slept in bed with me, he was always a perfect gentlemen and never pushed me. He knew I was trying to find my way through the grief.
Poor guy probably had blue balls the size of Texas, but he never complained. Not once.
He was truly my Prince Charming.
That’s what made this upcoming conversation so terrifying.
He was in the bathroom, brushing his teeth when I hollered in. “Hey, babe, we need to talk.”
God, those are the most dreaded words in any relationship.
It was quiet. He turned the water off and called. “That sounds ominous. Am I going to like this talk?”
He strolled out the bathroom looking finer than a GQ model. His shirtless chest and stomach were indescribably amazing. Every time, I noticed new bumps and muscles I’ve never even seen before. The view never got old, especially the way the pajama pants hung from his hips accentuating that V which promised oh so much.
“What?” I asked stupidly, because when he entered the room all of my thoughts vanished. All I could think about was licking every inch of his bare chest down over his abs. And I’m off track yet again.
“You said we needed to talk.” He looked over his shoulder at the bathroom then back to me, confused. “You did just say that, right?”
“Yes,” I said rather loudly, reining myself back in. “I wanted to talk to you about us and where everything stands. And well, I was thinking that maybe next week when Ronni and Lois come to visit, that I’d go back to New York with them. That way they could help me at home.”
“So you’re just going to leave? And we”—he motioned back and forth between us—“are basically over? Is that what you want? Is that what you’re trying to say?”
The hurt and frustration were obvious and painful to see.
“No, that is most definitely not what I’m saying, Brody. I don’t want us to be over. We are just starting to figure out what this is. But I have to be realistic. I have a home in New York. And a job that is waiting for me. What would you have me do? Just abandon my job and my horses, pack up all my shit and move in here with you?”
“Yes, that is precisely what I want you to do. I thought that you wanted this relationship, but clearly, I was mistaken.”
“We could make it work, if we tried. You could come visit on the weekends and I could come for a week here and there. It won’t be easy but we could do it.” I tried to explain but he wasn’t hearing me anymore.
“I’m pretty sure you were the one who said back at Christmas that long-distance relationships never work.” He threw my words back at me as he walked into the closet and came back out a few minutes later, dressed.
“Where are you going?” I asked from my side of his bed.
“I need to clear my mind. I can’t deal with this right now. After all of the shit we went through to get here, you just want to go back to New York and date each other from a distance? I can’t do that. I can’t sit here and pretend that I’m okay with that or pretend that I don’t have more feelings for you than you do for me. I’m sorry.” He shook his head. “I won’t do it.”
With that, he turned and left. He walked away and didn’t look back.
Fuck.
Chapter Twenty-nine
~Brody~
As I walked out of my bedroom and escaped down the stairs, I kept playing her words over in my head. I had been making all of these plans for us, and all the while she wants to move out.
What the fuck?
How had I misread the situation so horribly?
As I stopped at the console, I grabbed the keys for the last car I thought I’d be driving at ten thirty on a Tuesday night. My father’s 1966 Shelby Cobra. It was his most prized possession. While I got rid of most every trace of him, I couldn’t get rid of this car. Not only was it worth a small fortune, I loved it.
Walking out the garage door, I pressed the button to open the farthest bay of the garage and hopped in the old beauty. She started on the first crank and purred to life. My body was swathed in chills. I had always driven her respectfully and with extreme caution.
Tonight, I would throw caution to the wind that blew through my hair as I flew down the road in the priceless American sports car.
Once I hit the asphalt of the main road, I let her loose and got a little sideways. I forgot for just a split second that she had almost five hundred horsepower under her aluminum body. She reminded me quickly and the thrill and adrenaline erased my worries.
After a few miles of reckless driving, I approached an accident. There was only one cop there and he hollered at me when I slowed and pulled over onto the grass shoulder. A midsize SUV had crashed into a tree on a curve just before the main intersection on the island.
“I need your help. I called for assistance, but there is a small child in the back and the mom here is in bad shape,” he shouted from his position at the side of the driver’s door. His arms were in the window attending to the mom. “Can you please check on the kid? She was crying when I got here but she stopped. If I let go of the mom’s neck I think she’s going to bleed out.”
“Yeah,” I said as panic started to set in. I pushed opened the door and ran to the side of the smoking vehicle. “It’s not going to catch on fire, right?”
“I don’t think so—it looks like steam off the radiator,” the officer said.
Reaching the back passenger-side door, I wrenched it open and found a blue-eyed baby boy, who looked to be about four or five months old, strapped into a rear-facing car seat. As soon as he saw me, his little hand reached for me. I started to take him out of the harness when I remembered what the instructor said from the car seat safety class I took just before Lillian was born: never take them out. It’s safer for them in the seat until they can be looked over properly.
“Hey, buddy. I’m going to take you over here. Everything is going to be okay,” I said reassuringly. I tried to believe it myself. Releasing the locking mechanism, I lifted the seat out and took him over to the police cruiser. “Hey,” I called to the officer, “he seems to be okay. I don’t see any blood or anything.”
The baby started to fuss a little and I tried to hold his hand and talk softly but he wasn’t having it. My cell pho
ne buzzed in my pocket. I reached in a dug it out.
It was Emmery. If I didn’t answer it she would be worried. “Hey Em, I can’t talk right now. I’ll be home later. There was an accident—”
“Oh my God, Brody. Are you okay?” she asked frantically. “Where are you?”
“I’m fine. It wasn’t me. I just pulled up to it. I think it just happened and there was only one cop here. Driver is in bad shape.” As I explained, the ambulance pulled up, lights flashing and sirens blaring. “I’ve got the little boy but…the ambulance is here. I have to go. I’ll call you back.”
“Be careful,” she said softly.
“I will,” I told her as I hung up and waved the paramedics over.
“Driver is in bad shape. I’ve got my fingers on a big cut in her neck. When I let it go, it’s gushin’ really bad,” the officer hollered over as the first paramedic jogged to him with a bright orange backboard and a bag full of supplies. “The gentleman at the car has the infant that was in the backseat.”
“Steve, I’ll take the baby. You keep going with the driver. I’ll be there as soon as I look over the baby,” the second medic said, trotting over with a similar bag as his partner. “Hi there, sir. Can you tell me what happened?”
“I just slowed as I was coming by and the officer over there hollered for me to stop,” I explained. “He said the baby was crying when he arrived but when I pulled him out, he was quiet. He got a little fussy while we were waiting but he since calmed down. I didn’t see any blood or cuts but I left him in the car seat just in case.”
“Okay,” he said as he used a flashlight to hastily look over the baby. “Can you stay here? I’m going to help my partner with the driver.”
“Certainly,” I agreed. Tonight was a little chillier than it had been recently, and I shivered as the breeze kicked up a little. The little boy started to cry again. He had to be cold. “Is there a blanket in the back that you can see? It’s a little cold out here for him.”
“Don’t see one,” the officer hollered back from his position still hanging halfway through the window.
“Take him into the back of the rig. It’s warm in there,” one of the medics hollered out.
I lifted the car seat off the hood of the police car and carried the baby into the back of the ambulance. Closing the door, I set him down on the stretcher as I heard a fire truck roll up, quickly cutting its sirens. I tried to gently rock the carrier, like I sometimes would do for Lilly when she was tired but was fighting sleep, in the hopes that would calm him enough that he might fall off.
After a few minutes, he began to slowly blink his eyes, opening them less and less each time until he was asleep. I sat and watched him until there was a tapping on the window. It was the medic. Quickly, I pressed a finger to my lips signaling him to be quiet as he came in.
“He’s asleep,” I whispered. “How is his mom?”
The young male paramedic with crew-cut sighed then shook his head. “She didn’t make it. We still have to transport for a doctor to pronounce time of death. I’ll try to make it as quickly and as quietly as possible.”
“What’s going to happen to him?” I asked, and my heart broke for this poor baby who would grow up and never know his mother.
“We will take him with us to the hospital, where they can check him over and call Social Services. Hopefully, they can find a next of kin or relative close by.”
“And what if they can’t? He’ll just be put into foster care or something?”
“Probably, unless someone steps forward to take him in. It’s super sad, man. We see it all of the time,” the young man said with a grimace. “But you’re free to go. I’m sure you have places to be.”
“Can I please give you my card to give the family of the boy? If they find one, I mean. I’d like to stay in touch and make sure he’s okay,” I said, pulling my wallet from my back pocket and retrieving a business card.
“Sure. You also will need to stick around and talk to the cops. Just a formality, ya know?”
“Right. Thanks,” I said, looking at the little brown-haired boy once more before quietly slipping out and finding the cop sitting on the trunk of his car. “Excuse me. The medic said you needed to speak with me before I go.”
“Yes, if ya have a minute,” the officer said with a heavy sigh then slid down and walked around, opening the door and pulling out a notepad. “Could ya just write down everything that happened after ya arrived and your name, address and phone number? In case we have more questions.”
“Of course. I gave the medic my card to give to the child’s family member that takes him in. I’d like to help in any way I can,” I reiterated.
“That’s mighty nice of ya. I’ll make sure somebody lets ya know what happens to him,” the big-bellied man said with a dreadful look.
After ten minutes of writing everything down, I climbed back into the Cobra, which all of the firefighters had been ogling and whispering about. I started her up and turned right around and went straight home. When I finally pulled in, I noticed the foyer light was now on.
Shit, I forgot to call Emmery back.
Shutting the engine down, I closed the garage door and went inside. Emmery was sitting on the stairs in her plaid boxer shorts and fitted grey tank top with her crutches beside her and her phone in her hand.
“Oh sweet Jesus, you’re back. I thought you were going to call. I was worried. Is the little boy okay?” she asked as she stood up on the third stair, using the banister for support.
I strode over to her and wrapped my arms around her beautiful, curvaceous waist and hips and buried my face into her chest.
“Brody, honey, are you okay?”
“The mom died. That little boy no longer has a mother,” I told her then pulled back and looked up at her. “What if he has no other family? They said he’d go into foster care. Bad things happen to kids in foster care.”
“I’m so sorry you had to see that. I’m sorry you left here upset, but I’m so grateful that wasn’t you. I don’t want to fight with you, Brody. I don’t know what tomorrow holds, but whatever it is, I want it to be with you next to me,” she said, running her hands through my hair, pushing it all back. “C’mon, baby. Let’s go to bed.”
Without a word, I pulled her to me and lifted her off her feet and into my arms, and I kissed her like I would never have another chance. She dropped her crutches, and I carried her the rest of the way up the staircase into the bedroom and laid her down gently on the bed.
The look in her eyes screamed for me to take her but I had to be sure.
“Are you certain this is what you want? If you’re hurting or are in any pain, we can wait,” I said. I wasn’t sure I’d be able to stop myself once I started down this road with her.
“Brody Davis, if you don’t get naked and get in the bed and make love to me, I’ll hop back down those stairs, get a crutch and come back in here and beat you.” She squinted those beautiful eyes then said, “I’m beyond sure.”
I didn’t remember taking off my shoes or socks, but before I could say another word, I was completely stripped and hard as a rock. Around her, I was always fighting it off. Thinking of things to distract myself from her supple body that just begged for me to fuck it.
She was pulling her shirt off when I reached up and started to yank her shorts down. “I feel like I’m in high school all over again. Ripping my clothes off, not able to wait another second.”
“Jesus, I sure as hell hope it’s better than when you had it in high school,” I said as I caught first sight of her magnificent naked body, bare in front of me. My hand immediately found my stiff cock and stroked it a few times. “It sure as hell is going to be better than anything I’ve ever dreamed about.”
She slid back and propped herself up on the pillows in the middle of my bed. “I’m not sure you can live up to my fantasy of you and I in bed,” she teased mercilessly.
“I guess there is only one way to find out.” I reached into the bedside table and pu
lled out a condom. Once I was all wrapped up, I climbed on the bed and hovered over her. “You’re sexier than I could have ever imagined. I can’t wait to taste you and feel you grip me as I make you come.”
Shifting further down the bed, I spread her legs, careful of her surgical boot and dipped my tongue into her slick heat. Jesus, she tasted better than anything I could have imagined. Flicking and swirling my tongue around her engorged nub, I slipped one then two fingers into her tight, wet depths. Before long she was bucking and screaming, chanting to a higher power.
“Oh, God, Brody. Oh, God,” she moaned as she shook.
Before she finished convulsing, I climbed up and sunk in her, balls deep. “Fuck.”
“Don’t move, just wait a second. Oh, God. Yes,” she hollered as her walls clenched and relaxed over and over around my cock. As the spasms slowed, I started to thrust my hips, starting shallow and slow then driving in hard and fast until I felt myself getting close.
Slowing down, I leaned down on my elbows so we were nose to nose and she whispered, “Kiss me.”
She lifted slightly and flicked her tongue across my bottom lip, enticing me. I slipped one hand behind her head and held her still. I stopped moving and kissed her. Our tongues danced, flitting and rolling around each other. Her teeth tugged on my bottom lip when we parted long enough to take a breath before going back in. I sucked her top lip between mine, pulling and tugging it until she moaned.
Sitting up a little, I started to rock into her again, finding my pace. She reached up with both hands and teased her nipples, pulling and pinching them, causing me to thrust wildly as her pussy tightened around me once more. She moaned loudly, begging me for more.
“Harder. Oh, God, Brody. Harder,” she yelled. I obliged and fucked her relentlessly as she came yet again.
I wanted so badly to flip her over and have her ride me but her ankle and leg wouldn’t survive that. Hell, I don’t think I’ll survive this. Changing pace a few more times, I tried to hold out as long as I could but she felt like heaven and it had been a long time.
His Redemption Page 26
