by D. L. Raver
I ducked into a shadowy corner and checked my appearance, discretely doing a sniff test of my underarms and breath to make sure I didn’t stink, which thankfully I didn’t.
Pulling my hair from my ponytail, I finger combed it out, hoping I looked as sexy as I felt in my black bikini and sarong. I applied a coat of Burt’s Bees Tinted Lip Balm and gathered my confidence as I walked to Sloan’s door.
I knocked on his door, all the while my heart galloped about my chest as I waited for him to answer. I didn’t have a clue how he would receive me, and I prayed he wouldn’t turn me away. I was tired of his issues trumping the need we had to be together.
Besides now, the night of Chris’ funeral had been our only other chance. That night, I left my desires behind to be there for him, though it had been a test of my resolve.
Sloan had needed me in a way he hadn’t before. He had been emotionally raw and hurting, mourning for a family member he’d lost.
Here in Cabo, nothing stood in our way. Irelyn and Rachel wouldn’t look for me as long as they thought I was in my room.
I jumped when the door opened.
“Kenna,” Sloan’s sexy Irish accent drawled. A wide smile split his face, and he pulled me into his room.
I didn’t have time to ask why he was here before he closed and locked the door
Sloan crushed his lips on mine in a heated and demanding kiss. I wrapped my arms around his neck and my legs around his waist, allowing him to hold me against the door as he kissed the shit out of me.
Apparently, he saw the opportunity as I did. His kiss told me he wanted this equally as much—needed it as much.
“Sloan,” I moaned into his mouth as he carried me to his bed and laid me down. I watched greedily as he pulled off his shirt, revealing the bare, ripped chest I had kissed every inch of in life and in my dreams.
But a question burned in my mind and I needed to know.
“Sloan, why are you here in Cabo?”
His large hand smoothed my hair as his eyes met mine.
“Because I live with this dull ache—a constant ache. It’s the kind of ache that reminds me I have something to loose. Every time I look at you or touch you, a voice in my head says mine! Time to claim what belongs to me.”
I opened my mouth to say something but what I could say to that? So, I kissed him as if I’d die without him.
I started to reach behind to take off my bikini top when his large, warm hand grabbed mine.
“Don’t. I want to. Too many times, we’ve come close, and I’ve dreamed about this Kenna.”
I bit my lip as I watched him take off the rest of his clothes. God, he was beautiful, like Adonis beautiful—sculpted to perfection with that inverted triangle on tight abs leading my eyes to his proud erection.
My hands twitched, aching to run my fingers over his tensed body. I trembled with anticipation, a little fear, and downright sexual need. I almost couldn’t believe we were going to do this—I’d wanted him forever. But apprehension rode side by side with my excitement. I knew from listening to Irelyn and Rachel that the first time wasn’t always great.
“We’re going to take this slow. I’m going to make your first time good for you, M’fhíorghrá,” Sloan said, as if reading my mind or sensing my apprehension.
He climbed on the bed and sweetly kissed me as his hand found and cupped my breast. “Do you know how fucking gorgeous you are, Kenna?”
I shook my head, my mouth too dry to speak.
He must have seen the slight fear that surely sparked in my eyes because he reached behind him and grabbed a bottle of tequila.
I giggled a little, loving we both loved the same liquor.
He took a swig, and then handed the bottle to me. “Drink. It will relax you.”
I did as he bade and took a large swig without choking.
Sloan’s gaze widened with what I assumed was surprise by my ability to down the tawny liquor. What he didn’t know was I could drink tequila with the best of them and without the customary lime chaser.
He laughed before he tangled his hand in my hair and pulled me closer, kissing me again. His tongue dipped into my mouth and swirled around. We both tasted like tequila and sexual frustration, and it turned me on. I squirmed as he positioned his naked body over my still-clothed one.
Sloan straddled me, and I could feel his hard cock pressing against me.
I shivered at the contact.
“Sit up, Kenna,” he commanded in a voice that brooked no argument, and I had to admit his take-control style was hot.
I sat up, and he untied my bikini top, dropping it to the floor.
“Fuck, I love your tits.” He pulled us together, chest to chest, as he kissed and nipped along my jawline.
My nerves caught on fire with his movements down my body. When he captured my peaked nipple in his mouth and started to suck, my head fell back, and I moaned.
“Oh God, Sloan.” His attentions to my breasts created a direct response in my sex. Fuck, but I was hot and wet for him.
My body broke out in shivers and gooseflesh, and when I opened my eyes I found him watching me—gunmetal greys wide and needful.
“You’re wearing it.” He brought my left wrist that wore his bracelet to his lips and kissed my wildly beating pulse.
“I never take it off,” I rasped out.
“Good.” His wide, satisfied grin made me grin too.
I kissed the x-shaped scar on his arm as I tried to ready myself mentally for what was to come.
“Is this going to hurt?” I tried not to sound nervous but I couldn’t help myself.
“If you stay relaxed it won’t be too bad, and I intend on totally relaxing you first. Though it’s killing me, Kenna. I’m dying to fuck you. I need to finally make you mine.”
I brought my lips to his, kissing him hard while I ground myself against his cock.
Sloan moaned as he pushed me back on to the bed. He kissed and sucked on the breast he had yet to taste before working his way down my stomach. Untying the knot of my sarong, he pulled it from beneath me and dropped it to the floor to join my bikini top.
“Lift your hips,” he said as he tugged my bikini bottom down. It, too, joined the pile with my other clothes.
I hooked my leg over his hip and Sloan pulled me against him, bringing us flesh to flesh. He kissed me again, his tongue driving and darting into my mouth.
“Mmm,” he groaned, the vibration of his words going right between my legs, making me clench with need. “What I’m going to do to you. Open to me.”
I bent my knees and opened for him. My smooth, regular heartbeats turned into a short staccato rhythm as his tongue found its way to me. With long, purposeful laps, he tasted me, humming his contentment with each pass.
A pleasure-fueled ripple surged over my body as Sloan loved me with his tongue. My body squirmed and shuttered at the contact. Other than my birthday, he hadn’t pushed sexual contact between us.
Sure, I’d brought myself to orgasm on many occasions, but I knew the one building inside me, the one Sloan ministered, would be the biggest I’d had yet to experience.
Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.
Lifting my head slightly, I glanced down at Sloan and found him, again, gazing at me. The sight of this gorgeous man between my thighs, going down on me, was my undoing.
He must have felt the inevitability of my release because his free hand entwined with mine just as I screamed his name in orgasmic bliss.
Before my pleasure-filled brain could register his movements, Sloan’s mouth was on mine, giving me a taste of myself on his lips. Then, he slid into me in one long stroke. A low primal growl escaped from him as he entered me for the first time.
Our union was amazing; intense beyond anything I could have ever imagined. I won’t lie, it hurt. Sloan wasn’t exactly small; at least I didn’t think he was, but what did I have to compare it to?
I took in a deep breath as a rush of emotions flooded me. I squeezed my eyes closed, forcing back the emotional tsunami threatening
to drown me. Crying would ruin everything but I've waited for this for so long—dreamed of this for so long.
Sloan seemed to sense my precarious state and stopped moving, holding my face between is hands.
“Are you okay?” he asked, panting, his lusty, heavy-lidded gaze dark with concern. I could feel him jerk inside me, signaling his attempt to stay in control.
“Yeah.” Having Sloan finally inside of me filled and completed me, turning the pain into a dull ache.
“I never dreamed you’d wait for me, but fuck I’m so glad you did. I don’t deserve this gift from you,” Sloan said with such love in his eyes, my breath caught.
“I—It’s only you, Sloan. It will only ever be you. I love you.”
Though I had said it to him before, the love I had for him now was so much stronger. For the rest of my life, I’d never love anyone the way I loved him.
“I know, M’fhíorghrá.” He kissed me sweetly, reverently, and I reveled in it, letting his actions speak for the words he couldn’t or wouldn’t say.
He began to slowly move inside me, and I felt my lips make an O as ecstasy and pain rode together throughout my body.
“Please Sloan. Please.” I moaned, then kissed him, tightening my muscles around his cock, causing him to groan as well. I lifted my hips, encouraging him to move faster.
Sloan began to pick up his pace. Though the sensation was totally new to me, I let my instincts reign, following his lead, meeting him stroke for stroke.
My nails scraped down his back as a new wave of tingling began to build deep inside. When his thumb found my clit and started to rub, I feared I might fly apart.
“Kenna. God, you feel so fucking good, just like I knew you would. Open your eyes and come with me, M’fhíorghrá.”
I did.
And we did.
Sloan’s body tensed and shuddered as we gave ourselves over to one another in a way I thought only reserved for romance novels and movies. He nuzzled my neck as we came down, holding me tightly.
“Mine!”
I wanted to answer his possessive exclamation but I couldn’t find my voice, so I kissed him intensely, possessively.
With our bodies slick with sweat from our lovemaking, we gazed into each other’s eyes as the reality of what we done settled around us.
We had crossed the line we had held firm for years. Hell, not just crossed it, but kicked it to shit, obliterating it into a million pieces. Nothing between us would ever be the same.
I had let the man I love claim me for his.
We continued to make love throughout the night. Sloan took care of me, making sure to edge out any discomfort with bouts of mind-bending pleasure. In between our love making sessions, I snapped pictures of us together with happy, blissed out expressions on our faces.
With him, I was safe and loved, and I wanted this time together to last forever.
But when I woke in the morning to an empty room—sans Sloan and all his belongings—my heart constricted and cracked. He had left sometime while I slept without saying goodbye.
As much as I wanted to hate him, I couldn’t. I knew why he had left; knew being with me competed with a mandate he had a hard time fulfilling.
I was a distraction he didn’t need.
Knowing this didn’t stop a tear from escaping, especially when I recalled the name he called me.
M’fhíorghrá.
That one word, a word I’d heard my Irish grandmother call my grandfather, fractured my heart just a little more.
True love.
Sloan had called me his true love and not for the first time. I needed to hold on to it, keep it close for times, like now, when he pushed me away.
I lifted up my wrist and rubbed the gold lover’s knot bracelet between my thumb and forefinger. Sloan told me he loved me in so many obscure ways, and I had to believe one day he’d say the actual words.
Until that day, I refused to give up no matter how much my heart broke.
Chapter Nine
Sloan
Present Day
I STOOD ON the balcony of my loft, trying desperately to stay sane—to not give in to the need to kill someone. Tonight had ended in an epic fail, and now Kenna was in even bigger trouble than she’d been in before.
I studied the Emerald in my hand which I swear had turned an even darker green. It reminded me of Kenna’s eyes and I wanted to scream—to holler and squeal like a wounded animal.
My mind returned to the car I had seen speeding off in the distance when we arrived at the abandoned house. I slammed the fist that held the Emerald on the edge of the balcony, and pain shot through my hand and arm, but I didn’t care. I needed the pain to keep me centered even if it meant I had broken my hand.
That car had Kenna in it. I knew it now without a doubt.
“Fuck!” I turned my head upward. “Why didn’t I make Grant follow it?”
Gingerly, I opened my swelling fist and released the Emerald from my grip. More than any time before, I hated the fucking rock that forced me away from the woman I loved. Suddenly, the urge to toss it off the balcony had me taking two steps backward before I did just that.
I inhaled deeply and exhaled, striving for control. If I had any hope of saving Kenna, I needed a clear head, not one filled with emotional turmoil.
Irelyn’s face popped in my head, and I sighed out my guilt. The saving grace from tonight was she was safe and with Zolt. With everything that had happened I’d forgotten about my cousin.
“Priorities,” I whispered and glared at the Emerald. “Screw that.”
I had my priorities in check. Kenna needed me more than Irelyn did. She had people to look after her. Kenna didn’t; at least not in the way I could, though I was doing a piss poor job of it.
But I would do better.
I had to do better.
For ten days, I tried to do better. I followed every lead, went into bars I wish I hadn’t; all to no avail. The trail to Kenna grew colder and colder with each passing day. Even the Emerald didn’t heat anymore, and I worried I’d never get another chance with her.
The plan now centered on a wanker named Max that T-bone knew. Max was a known player in the BDSM arena and had agreed to participate in online auction. But I didn’t trust the bloke, and I wasn’t about to put Kenna’s life in his hands.
In my weakest moments, I considered asking Kieran for help, and several times, my finger lingered over Kieran’s phone number. Once, I actually dialed him, then ended the call before it could go through. Something deep inside told me to leave Kieran and the Ceilte out of this, but desperation coursed through me, making me consider options that might prove more hazardous than good. The less Kieran knew about my personal life the better, though if I was being realistic, he likely knew everything already. Going off Ceilte radar probably triggered a red flag, and only an idiot would believe Kieran’s interest hadn’t been piqued.
Kenna wasn’t my only concern. Yesterday, I’d received a text from T-bone telling me Irelyn and Zolt were headed to Vegas to elope.
I worried their marriage may have been a knee jerk reaction to seeing the video Chris had for her on his laptop. On it, he told her about everything, including their father's duplicitous and traitorous ways. Jacob had given Irelyn to Marcus to cover his own ass. Even after knowing Xavier had murdered his son, Wilkes still did nothing to save his only daughter.
I wanted to call and talk to Irelyn about everything, but it wasn’t my place. When I mentioned my concerns to T-bone, he didn’t disagree with my assessment, but he also wasn’t about to interfere. He assured me Irelyn had changed Zolt. He’d seen a part of his friend emerge that he had never expected. Finding Irelyn, falling in love with her, and losing her all in the span of mere weeks profoundly changed him for the better.
For now, I would trust in T’s assessment. But I had to wonder what her parent’s reaction would be. According to T, they had decided to elope after seeing the video. I, too, had seen it. I could only imagine the impact it would ha
ve to hear your brother talk to you from the grave.
Chris had tried to save Irelyn by convincing his father to hire Zolt with hopes he and Irelyn would fall for each other. By all accounts, they had. I could only imagine the affect it would have to know your brother had sent you such an amazing gift.
One day, in the near future, Jacob Wilkes and I would have words where my fists would do the talking.
Today, however, brought with it a whole new set of issues. After further investigation, a list containing all the members of Marcus’ sex club had been found and now Zolt, Irelyn, T-bone, and Grant were on their way to Quebec to confront Jacob and Emmeline Wilkes about what they’d found. My cousin Emmeline’s world was about to implode, and I sighed as my worry shifted from Irelyn to Emmeline.
I should be with them, I thought too late to do anything about it. She and her mother would need family around when the shit went down, but the problem remained, they didn’t know me as family. I was nothing but the hired help.
As much as I wanted to help my cousin, I wasn’t going to leave Scottsdale while Kenna remained missing. Eventually, I’d get a break. I had to because I had made so many mistakes with her—hurt her in more ways that I could possibly atone.
I closed my eyes and let myself drift back to several weeks ago when Kenna had called me to pick her up from a disastrous date.
I drove my Challenger to the front of the movie theater where I found Kenna waiting, her sandaled foot impatiently kicking the concrete. I couldn’t help but stop and watch her for just a moment. Her long, strawberry waves curtained her face as she stared at the ground.
I flashed back to us being together in Cabo not too long ago. We had been insatiable for each other and parts of me regretted that. I should have been more careful with her body as well as her heart.
But being the wanker I was, I had been careless with both. I had fled when the deed was done because I couldn’t face the aftermath of crossing the line I had tried so fucking hard to hold. Seeing the pictures she sent to my phone the following day only made me feel like an even bigger bastard. The way we looked at each other in those pictures….
