Point of Return

by Stacey Lynn

  I didn’t know what the hell to do once Jaden stormed out of my house. I stood there just as in shock as him. Sophie looked like a damn spitting image of Scratch. If Jaden looked at her hard enough, there was no way he could miss it.

  What I was also shocked with was how good Ryker seemed to be with little kids, because when in the hell did that happen? I couldn’t imagine a guy on an oil rig had much experience taking care of little kids like the girl in my living room.

  And most of all, I wanted to stare at Liv. I wanted to hold her in my arms when she smiled at the little girl in such a way it almost broke my heart. I felt her jealousy that Jules had a kid and she didn’t. I saw the pain in her eyes when Sophie smiled and laughed. I wanted to hold her and take her to my room and promise her I’d give her as many damn kids as she wanted if only she could smile and look at me in the easy way she was able to do with a little girl.

  Ryker was the first to move, standing abruptly, somehow seeming like he couldn’t be in the enclosed space and headed for the deck. When I heard the refrigerator door slam so hard followed by the door to my deck making an even louder banging sound, I exhaled.

  My club didn’t need all of this shit from our pasts blowing up on all of us. Quietly, I heard Liv begin comforting Jules while the two of them packed up their blocks. Once they were gone, I decided Ryker had had enough time to cool down and I met him on the deck.

  His hands gripped the rail and he stared into the distant forest at the edge of our property line. A broken beer bottle littered the light brown grass in the middle of my back yard.

  I let the door slam behind me and walked to him, handing him an extra beer I had grabbed on my way out.

  “That was fucking interesting.” I lit a cigarette, rested against the railing, and waited for Ryker to explain why he had just flipped out.

  I leaned against the rail and watched Ryker pop the top and flick it into the grass. What in the hell was it with him littering my lawn?

  “I don’t know what to do for her,” he said after he took a long pull from his beer.

  I took a drag off my cigarette.

  “Free her,” I said and watched Ryker grit his teeth. How was this so complicated? The club had a plan and if Ryker was any sort of man he had always wanted to be, he’d be here to help. He had already stayed well over his originally promised week only trip. “We get this shit done the way Black Death wants and they let her go.”

  He glared at me. “And what happens to Faith if it gets fucked up?”

  It was possible. That many men, that many clubs and families together with as many firearms as we planned on having and shit was always bound to get screwed up. But looking at the negative never helped anyone.

  “We don’t fuck up.” He continued glaring. I shrugged.

  This was possibly my only chance to get him to come back, and if I had to use Faith as a way to do it, I would. I wanted my brother home. “It’s not that fuckin’ hard, Ryker. Get your ass back here, join the club, and do what needs to be done.” I took another drink, wrapping my fingers around the cool neck of the bottle and waited some more. Ryker kept glaring and then he shook his head.

  “It’s not that simple, man.” He stared back out at the land. Out of nowhere, his foot made contact with the deck. The wood cracked from the force of his booted kick.

  The man needed to calm down before he had an aneurism before he hit thirty.

  I laughed. “You break my deck and you’re fucking fixin’ it.”

  For the first time since Ryker got home, he laughed with me. It was weak, but it was there. Then his eyes turned serious again. “She has to hate me.”

  “Probably does,” I said. “Does it really change the fact she shouldn’t be doing that shit in the first place?”

  He curled his hands into a fist. As if he was going to hit me. I laughed again.

  “Fuck,” he exhaled. He muttered a string of words that didn’t combine to make a full sentence before he settled on, “Everything is so fucked up.”

  It was. I couldn’t argue. But running from the fucked up shit never made it better for anyone. Ryker was proof of that. I still never fully understood why he left town the night our dad was shot. It was an accident. I had only kicked him out of the house so he didn’t get busted with an unregistered weapon. I never thought he would have gotten so fucked up from it that he’d peel the hell out of town until he couldn’t drive anymore. I knew I was missing something, but I knew he wouldn’t tell me until he was ready.

  Wasn’t five years long enough to carry all that shit on your shoulders? I wanted to tell him to let it go, but I didn’t.

  Instead, I rested my ass against the deck. “Welcome to our life. It’s always been this way, but you’re the only one who can fix it.”

  He pushed off the deck and I matched his stance. If he wanted a fight, I was ready this time. I didn’t need another black eye.

  “How could you let her do this?”

  Oh, hell. I laughed. I couldn’t help myself. Sometimes, talking to Ryker was like trying to talk to Olivia—or a brick wall. “Cut the shit, man. We all had to do shit to survive after that night. You think Faith wanted this? You have no idea the hell she went through and if you wanted her taken care of, you should have been man enough to step up. Instead, you ran off, so ashamed of shit when it was a fucking accident in the first place, and left the rest of us to clean up the damn mess.”

  Ryker panted with anger. His chest heaved and fell and his fists curled until the knuckles were white. I watched his jaw tighten right before he exhaled it all. He turned, picked up his beer bottle, and chucked it out into the yard along with the other one.

  I watched it bounce and shatter. “You’re cleaning that shit up, you know.”

  We were silent for a beat before Ryker laughed. This time, he threw his head back, his eyes closed and he sounded happy.

  About time.

  Then he sobered and exhaled heavily. “I don’t even know if she’d want my help.”

  What a moron. I smiled. “This is Faith.”

  “Faith hates me.”

  “Probably, but there’s only one way to find out.”

  His eyes snapped to mine and his eyebrow rose.

  I kept talking. “Make an appointment and talk to her.”

  Uncertainty flashed in his eyes and he shook his head. He whispered something I didn’t catch before he met my eyes again. This time, he looked absolutely certain. Whatever questions he had, had been answered in just a few quick breaths. “You need help for that Sporelli bullshit in a few weeks?”

  A weight left me. Finally, my brother was coming home.

  The shower water had been running for so long it had to have been cold by now. I wanted to go to her. I wanted to wrap my arms around Liv and protect her from every bullshit thing that was running through her head right now.

  Instead, with my head resting on my headboard, I adjusted my hard dick in my pants and stared at the door to the bathroom. I was such an ass. The thought of her naked in the shower, the water running down her tight body had me harder than I’d been since I was sixteen and got to touch her boobs for the first time.

  When I heard the water shut off and the shower door open, I removed my hand from my pants. Reluctantly. I was still hard. I wanted Liv to help me. Even though I knew she couldn’t. But God, how good would it feel to have her small, thin fingers wrapped tightly around my dick. Her lips wrapped around my shaft.

  Damn it. I moaned silently and blew out a breath. Then I groaned aloud when she opened the door, wrapped in only a towel. It barely covered her.

  Liv frowned at me before she left the room. I stayed on the bed staring at her. She hadn’t said anything yet about me crawling into bed with her during the night over the last week since she got out of the hospital when she had nightmares, but this was the first time I had planned to fall asleep in my bed. From down the hall, my old bedroom door closed and a lump hit my throat.

  Was she going to sleep there? Without me? Shit, I
had probably fucked this up all over again.

  I’d sleep on the couch, or in that old nasty twin bed, if it meant she was more comfortable in mine. I threw back the covers on my bed and swung my feet to the floor, but as soon as they hit the cold wooden floor, I heard Liv’s feet softly padding down the hall and back to my room.

  My heart almost jumped through my throat. Clad in one of my old high school t-shirts, one that I knew had been hidden in the bottom of a drawer until she pulled it out weeks ago when she first stayed the night, she slowly walked back into the bedroom with her head looking only at the floor.

  My shirt. The one I had always let her sleep in. Something inside of me swelled. Lust? Definitely. Pride? Abso-fuckin-lutely. Love? God, I wanted her to love me as much I did her.

  She climbed into the bed next to me, pulled the covers up over her and said nothing.

  With my back to her, my hands curled into the edge of the mattress.

  “I can leave if you’d be more comfortable,” I said through gritted teeth. I didn’t want to leave. I wanted her to admit that she needed me. At the very least, she needed something—someone—to help her.

  “It’s fine.”

  My lips twitched. Fine. Fine, fine, fucking fine. I hated that word. It was all I had heard for weeks now. Everything was fine. She was fine.

  My fingers fisted the mattress harder, and I heaved a deep breath before I turned around to face her. She wasn’t wearing make-up and her long brown hair was still wet from the shower. Wearing my stupid old ratty t-shirt, she looked sexier than anything I’d ever seen.

  “Don’t let this break you, Liv.”

  She looked away and I saw her chin tremble slightly. Jesus. I hated seeing her so upset.

  “Talk to me.”

  “I can’t,” she whispered and her pink tongue poked out and wet her lips. “I hate…” she stopped and took a shaky breath.

  I moved so that I was sitting, leaning against the headboard and pulled her so she was in front of me with her back to my chest. Her body moved into my arms without a fight.

  It should have made me feel good—the fact that she’d so easily move where I wanted her.

  It didn’t.

  She let me move her because she had no fight left in her.

  My arms wrapped around her stomach and I pressed my lips into the top of her head. She smelled like my shampoo.

  “Talk to me, Liv,” I demanded again. My voice was rough. My dick was hard and I hoped to God she wouldn’t feel it pressing into her ass cheeks through my boxers.

  She shook her head but rested back against me, relaxing. Then her shoulder shook and I heard her sniff away tears. I hated seeing her cry, but God I was glad she was thinking something other than the ‘fine’ bullshit.

  “I wanted that baby,” she whispered through a shaky breath. My arms held her tighter and I kissed her hair again.

  “I know you did.”

  “I hate that I called Travis, and he died because I didn’t listen to you.”

  “Don’t do this, Liv. Don’t blame yourself, we talked about this.”

  She nodded against my chin, agreeing with me but not believing me. It would take time, I knew, for her to get past the guilt.

  Then she surprised the hell out of me.

  “I hate that, even with all of that going on…” her voice trailed off and her fingers went to her eyes. “I hate that, despite everything else, I’m so glad I’m with you.” She choked over the last word with a sob and my arms froze.

  “Liv,” I said. She shook her head, and I could feel the pain inside of her as if it was soaking from her skin directly into mine. She wasn’t suffering from regret and guilt from Travis dying. She was suffering from guilt of wanting me, despite him and their baby dying.

  It probably made me the largest asshole in the world that her words were the best thing I’d heard, in possibly ever.

  My hands let go of her and went to her hips. Then, I shifted her so she was straddling me, facing me. I removed my hands from her hips and cupped her cheeks, pulling her face up so she was looking directly at me.

  “This isn’t wrong. It’s exactly where you’ve always belonged.”

  She shook her head. With my thumbs, I wiped away her tears. “It is wrong. The timing of it all… I shouldn’t want to be with you as badly as I do.”

  My head fell back on the headboard. I pulled her head to me and wrapped my hand around the back of her head and her neck, holding her to my chest.

  What in the fuck was I supposed to say to that? I wanted her just as badly as she wanted me.

  I had no words. Nothing came out of my mouth except a shaky exhale as I held her close to my bare chest, feeling her breasts brush against my skin through the flimsy shirt she wore.

  “It’s not right,” she mumbled against my skin. Her hot breath felt so damn good against my chest.

  I shushed her. “Timing is rarely good. We’ve been through so much shit in our lives. Hell, in the last few weeks alone, we’ve been through enough shit. I want to help you get past all of this, I do. But I’m not going to feel bad for wanting you.” My lips pressed against her hair again, and her hands tightened against my hips. “It’s always been you, Liv.”

  She shook her head and I felt another tear roll down her cheek, landing on my skin.

  “I can’t stop thinking about them.”

  She said nothing else. I knew she was trying to line everything that had happened to her in the last six weeks into a straight and narrow line that could make sense, but it wasn’t possible. It simply didn’t happen for people in our lives.

  Then her weight shifted. I suppressed my groan as her hips moved against my waist. Blood rushed to my dick and I felt it get harder. Not that it had ever gone soft with her sitting so close to me. It was an accident, I told myself. There was no way she wanted me right now. She was too confused, too lost in her thoughts to want this.

  But hell, I wanted it. I didn’t respond. I didn’t care that my dick was hard and rubbing her in the perfect place. Fucking baseball, I hated baseball, but I thought about it. I thought about how sleepy that shit made me. It didn’t help. Christ. I had Liv on my lap—nothing was going to help me.

  Then, she shifted again and her hands on my hips squeezed me to her. It was a slight move, but hell. That was no accident. My arms tightened around her.

  “Liv,” I warned. Or groaned. This couldn’t end well. I knew it. She was going to hate herself for this.

  She pulled back from me and I let her go, thinking she would climb off me, slide into her side of the bed, and pretend she hadn’t just rocked her clit against my dick.

  Instead, she pulled her bottom lip in between teeth and bit down before releasing it slowly. Her eyes showed her doubt and fear. They also clearly showed her need.

  “Make me forget, Daemon.” I shook my head against her soft, needful plea. She stopped me before I could say anything. “I can’t get them out of my mind. That day. I can’t forget it. It haunts me. I need something to replace it.”

  She rocked her hips against mine and I moaned. My hands went to her hips and I held her there.

  “Damn it,” I growled.

  She shook her head again and closed her eyes. “I can’t… It hasn’t been enough time to do much—”

  “I know,” I said, cutting her off. I knew exactly what she was trying to say.

  I knew she had to wait longer for sex. But fucking shit. Liv was in my bed, rocking against me, asking for it. I wanted to pump my arm in the air and shout, “it’s about fuckin’ time.” I wanted to throw her on her side of the bed and tell her to come to me when she was thinking clearly, because I knew she wasn’t. She couldn’t be.

  “Help me forget, Daemon. Please.”

  I stared at her. Warred against doing what I knew was right versus what I wanted.

  But that damn please did me in.

  My hands sunk into her hair and I pulled her lips to mine.

  I tasted cigarettes and mint on Daemon’s breath as
soon as his lips touched mine. I didn’t know if I was going to be able to talk him into touching me or not.

  But I needed it. As his tongue swept over my lips, parting them and opening my mouth, I melted into him.

  I felt ashamed for wanting him so badly, but I couldn’t stop it. For weeks, I had pushed thoughts of Daemon to the side. Hell, for years, I had pushed thoughts of Daemon and what he did to me, how he made me feel, to the dark corners of my mind. If anything, the last few weeks had taught me that I was tired of running from what I wanted.

  So I wrapped my arms around his shoulders and moved against him. I didn’t care that I couldn’t have sex yet. I didn’t care that Travis was dead and my baby was dead. I would go back to dealing with the grief when I woke up in the morning. Because I would. I knew that as soon as I went to sleep, the nightmares I’d been having of seeing Travis fall to the ground, and the insane dreams I’d had about my baby crying out Mommy while I slept, would plague me again.

  But right then? All I wanted was something good to happen. Just once, I wanted to take what I wanted.

  I rocked against Daemon again and my body shook on top of him. One of his hands left my hair and settled on my hip. Slowly, he pulled me down against him and I felt him hard against me. He hit me perfectly every time I moved. We groaned together when he pushed me against him again. We swallowed each other’s moans and kept moving, rocking and pulling on each other.

  He pulled me to his mouth as if he was afraid I would run. His tongue devoured me before he moved my head back, and his lips licked, sucked, and kissed along my neck before one of his hands brushed against my chest.

  “Daemon,” I whispered. My voice was harsh and needy. I wanted him. I hated that I couldn’t have him.

  “Ride me,” he growled softly. “Get yourself off, Liv. I know you need it.”

  God, did I need it. I listened and rocked against him more. My hands left his shoulders and held onto the headboard behind him. I moved against his hard dick like I did when we were teenagers, wanting to feel him against me. I wanted his skin on mine. As if he knew what I was thinking, Daemon’s hands went to the edges of his shirt that I was wearing. He ripped it off quickly, and then smiled at the shirt balled in his hands before his eyes stared at my chest.