by Penny Dee
“What?”
“Tell me how I can make this right.” I cried. I went to him but he reared back from my touch. But I couldn’t let him walk away, so I reached for him again, and this time he let me. “There has to be a way to make this right.”
He looked pained. His face passive but his eyes stormy and anguished. His backpack dropped to the floor again. And with a hiss he pulled me into his rock-hard chest, and I fell like a ragdoll against him.
“How could you fucking do this to me?” he cried suddenly, his face ravaged by turmoil. He dropped his forehead to mine, inhaling deeply as if he was breathing in my very essence. He reached for my jaw. “How could you break down every goddamn wall I had, only to make me want to build new ones?”
“I’m sorry,” I sobbed. “But if you give me a chance, I will spend the rest of my life making it up to you.”
His grip tightened around my jawbone. His breathing suddenly ragged as his blazing eyes rushed over my face. I could feel his agony, and it was breaking my heart.
“Why, little bird?” He moaned desperately. “I fucking loved you. I would have done anything for you.”
Loved. Not love.
“I’m sorry—”
He slammed his lips to mine, groaning as his tongue swept into my mouth. I could feel the vibration of it ripple through to my bones. His kiss was desperate. Angry. Heartbroken. His big hands pressed into my cheeks. There was a storm inside of him, raging wild as his mouth dominated mine.
With a moan, he ripped himself away from me.
“You’re the best and the worst thing to happen to me,” he growled, and then picking up his backpack, stormed out of the room.
I sagged against the wall and slipped to the floor.
He was gone.
And I could only pray it wasn’t for good.
TAYLOR
After a week, there was still no sign of him. I switched to autopilot. I climbed out of bed, I got Noah to school and then I went to work.
But the clubhouse wasn’t the same with him gone. Nothing was. He was the first thing I thought of in the morning and the last thing when I turned the light out at night.
Everything in between felt empty and gray.
I missed him.
Terribly.
I put one foot in front of the other, but my heart ached and I struggled to smile. I became attached to my phone, always checking it for a message from Bull, and when I was at work, I kept looking over to the door, willing him to walk in.
But he never did. Because he was gone. And I didn’t think he was coming back.
After my shifts, I would pick Noah up from school, and sometimes we would hang out at the breakfast counter while he did his homework and talk about his day. Other days, he’d spend the afternoon with his friends, and I would stare out the window and wonder if I was ever going to see Bull again.
At first the Kings were wary of me. But beneath the cool stares and cold shoulders, there was a deep current of understanding. This was the MC world. It was dark. It was dangerous. And it was unpredictable. Things could turn on a dime.
They knew about my past. My parents. What Alex had done. And apparently, Bull had warned them that any attempt for revenge would be met with brutal consequences. They needed to understand that everything was done in an attempt to keep my brother safe, and that at no stage was Bull’s life in danger because of me.
It would take time, but they would learn to trust me again.
A second weekend passed without a word from him, and I couldn’t stand it any longer.
I approached Ruger. “Please, you have to let me know he’s okay.”
I didn’t know how Ruger felt toward me. Had he forgiven me for the lies?
Did he hate me for hurting his best friend?
He probably thought I had no right asking, but I didn’t care. I needed to know he was alright.
Seeing me so distressed, Ruger’s face softened and he nodded for me to sit down on the bar stool next to him.
“He’s okay.” His green eyes sparkled across at me. “He just needs time.”
“Do you think he’ll ever forgive me?”
He shook his head regretfully. “I don’t know.”
I took a chance in asking, “Will you?”
Ruger thought for a moment before replying.
“I’m going to tell you something, and I want you to listen carefully because this is a weird fucking situation and I can see how much you’re struggling with it. You were caught between a rock and a hard place. I get it. We all do. And if any of us were in the same situation…who knows if we would’ve done it differently.” His brow creased. “I think you’re the best thing to ever happen to him.”
His unexpected words hit me with so much warmth I wanted to cry.
“You do?”
“You brought him back to life, Taylor. You gave him what none of us could…hope. Before you came along, he was stuck in darkness. But you changed that. You brought him out of it. You made him happy. Made him love again.”
“But he hates me. And I don’t blame him.”
“He doesn’t hate you. He loves you.” His gaze met mine. “He’s just not sure what to do with that in light of the events that transpired.”
His words lingered in me. Hours later, as I spent another evening overcome with longing, they replayed over and over in my mind.
Tonight, Noah was at a sleepover. Despite being a school night, I let him go because he’d suffered two major losses recently.
Pickles.
And now Bull.
I didn’t know how to make it up to him. I could barely cope with it myself. Pickles’s death had been completely out of my hands, but I was responsible for Bull being gone, and it all wrapped itself around my neck like a giant boa constrictor.
Now I was alone, with a bottle of wine already opened and a storm brewing outside. By late evening, the rain was coming down hard. I could see the glittering needles falling through the illumination from the street light and I was becoming more depressed with every raindrop.
I turned away from the window, fighting tears. I missed him. I missed him desperately.
Taking my glass of wine over to the couch, I curled up in front of the television. But I only stared at the screen. I couldn’t absorb anything. All I could do was miss him.
The knock at my front door was so faint, I barely heard it. But it was followed by another one, this time louder. I glanced at the clock. It was a little after nine and I wasn’t expecting anyone.
Setting down my glass, I crossed the room and peered through the peephole and immediately, my heart leaped to my throat.
With hurried fingers, I unlocked the door and ripped it open, my pulse hammering in my ears when I saw him standing on my front stoop in the rain.
An overwhelming longing washed over me as he stood across from me.
He was rain-soaked, his sopping t-shirt clinging to his broad chest, and his hair falling in wet tendrils over his forehead.
Speechless, I absorbed the sight of him, wondering for a moment if he was real or if I was somehow imagining this because I was so crazy-lost without him. But he was really here. Standing in front of me. Raindrops rolling down his beautiful face and falling from his parted lips as he panted.
Beside him, his hands were curled into fists.
I whispered his name, but it was swallowed by the storm.
Seeing him cracked open the wound in my chest and poured pain into my already broken heart. I wanted to go to him. To touch him. To hold him. Kiss him. But I was terrified he would push me away and tell me he didn’t love me anymore.
Neither of us said anything. Instead, we just stared at each other; him, struggling with the emotion coursing through him, and me aching to touch him.
“I told myself I could forget you,” he finally called out over the rain. And my stomach dropped to the pit of my stomach. Because he didn’t love me anymore and he was here to tell me so.
He shook his head and looked tortured; his
brows drawn in by heartache. His fists opened and closed at his sides.
“But I can’t fucking get over you. And I don’t want to. Because I love you. Do you understand me, little bird? I fucking love you!”
I started to cry.
“But if you don’t love me…tell me now…because I can’t go another minute like this. Because it’s killing me, Taylor. It’s killing me being without you. And I can’t move on until I know how you feel.”
With a cry, I ran into his arms and pressed my mouth to his wet lips, kissing him urgently, needing him so desperately, and wanting to ease both of our pain. Rain poured down around us, drenching us as his lips parted and his warm, luscious tongue slipped into my mouth. He shivered against me, his soft moan falling between us as we kissed frantically in the storm.
I pulled away from him only long enough to tell him that I loved him too—that I loved him so much I could barely breathe without him—before finding his mouth again and kissing him like I was dying of thirst and he was my oasis.
“I love you so much,” I cried, my tears joining the rain on my cheeks. I buried my face in his drenched chest and he trembled.
When I looked up, I saw his chin shudder with emotion. Rain spilled from his beautiful lips. “I don’t want this life if it means it’s a life without you. Tell me what you need from me, and it’s yours.”
It killed me to see him in so much pain.
“You,” I cried. “I just need you.”
I kissed him and his lips faltered. I felt him hesitate. Felt his need wrestle with his fear.
But then the damn broke, and with a desperate groan, he kissed me back, hard and urgently, his breathing ragged, and with every lick of our tongues, our walls completely fell away.
We tumbled into the living room and it was a blur of limbs ripping off wet clothing before we fell to the floor and Bull covered me with his powerful body. I felt his abs, warm and thick with muscle, sliding against me as he pressed his hips into mine, and the familiarity made me want to cry because I had missed this so damn much.
“God, I missed you,” he moaned, as if reading my mind. He slid down my body and lowered his mouth over one nipple, torturously sucking and licking it, before dragging his tongue across my breastbone to repeat the same motion on the other one. “And these breasts…” He let my nipple go and moved lower, dragging his tongue down my ribcage and over the gentle swell of my belly. “It’s been torture not being able to have this beautiful body under me.” His lips moved over my skin as he spoke. “To touch it. To taste it.” He moaned, inhaling my scent as he licked his way past my hip bone. “Tell me this body is mine,” he groaned, and I could hear the torment in his smoky voice. “Tell me this body belongs to me.” I gripped the plush rug beneath me, and my legs fell open as he moved over the pubic bone.
Two fingers entered me at the same moment his tongue licked through soaking skin. “Tell me this pussy is mine.”
I moaned out a yes, but it came out strangled and inaudible.
“Tell me!” he demanded, his fingers sliding in and out of me as he tormented my clit with his tongue. I was soaking wet and I could hear my body pulling at his fingertips.
“Bull…” I moaned out his name, desperate to come.
He lowered his head.
“Tell me your pussy belongs to me. And only me.” His tongue flattened across my clit, and I lit up like a skyrocket.
“Yes! Oh God, yes!”
My orgasm crashed through me with indescribable force. With a cry, I arched my back off the floor and threw my hands to his scalp, my fingers tangling wildly in his wet hair.
“That’s it, baby,” he moaned against my quaking flesh as I came on his mouth. “I’ve been aching to make you come.”
My legs shook, and a serene heat moved slowly through me before I sagged farther into the floor in a boneless heap.
Flushed, I looked up at him, taking in the broad shoulders and chiseled chest as he rose up and knelt back on his knees, his giant cock jutting upward to touch his lower abs.
“Please…” I begged, coming down from my high. “I need you inside me.”
It had been weeks since he’d touched me, loved me, and I needed him inside me when I came again.
His eyes glimmered with erotic darkness, and I watched with uninhibited wantonness as he took his thick cock in his hands and pressed it to my swollen entrance. I whimpered, trembling as he dragged the engorged head through the sensitive flesh, not knowing how much more I could take.
He fixed his eyes to mine and I could see he was barely keeping control. When he entered me, we both groaned, but then he held himself there, not moving, and it was torture. I needed him to move. Desperately.
“Tell me you’re mine,” he begged. “Tell me I’m your man.”
The lack of movement, the torture, it had me seconds away from another orgasm.
“Yes,” I cried. “I’m all yours, Bull. And you’re all mine.”
He drove his heavy length into me and detonated my hanging climax. I clenched his cock and we came together, clinging to each other as we fell into a blissful oblivion, our bodies tangled and our hearts pounding wildly.
When I came down, I softened against him, relaxing for the first time in weeks.
He was back.
And he was mine.
Later, we showered together, taking our time to lather up one another’s bodies, and I soaked up every blissful, soapy touch, savoring every second with him. Because I hadn’t forgotten the cold ache or the relentless fog that came with his absence. I knew a world without him in it, and it had left me lifeless and heartbroken.
Now he was home, and I was going to cherish every second.
As we kissed leisurely under the steady stream of warm water, Bull cupped my face in his big hands, his strong fingertips brushing against my jawbone and whispering lightly across my damp skin. And I melted against him, lost in the tenderness of his touch, drunk on the warmth of his kiss and the sweetness of his lips.
And even though it was highly erotic, and despite his erection pressing against my stomach as we kissed and licked, and touched, we did nothing more than lose ourselves in the intimacy of our kissing.
It wasn’t until the warm water ran cold that we wrapped ourselves in warm towels and dried off before slipping between the sheets. Immediately, Bull pulled me to his chest and secured me there with his big arms, his body hard and comforting as he wrapped himself around me.
We made love slowly this time. Every touch purposeful. Every moan full of meaning. And in that moment, there was just the two of us, two bodies moving together in the soft glow of a bedside lamp, while a storm continued to rage outside.
Before he came, Bull paused to look down at me, and I was touched by the affection in his eyes.
“I’m all yours, little bird. Now and forever. Or for however long you want me.”
The look on his face was heartbreaking.
“Forever,” I whispered. “I want you for forever.”
With the smallest movement of his hips, he started to come, dropping his head with a moan, and I fell in step with him, giving into the rush of ecstasy as it poured into me.
He collapsed against me, the heat of his rapid breath caressing the nook of my neck, the warmth of his big body covering mine.
When our bodies softened and our breathing calmed, I settled into his arms. Looking up into his handsome face, I touched the scruff along his jaw.
“Where have you been?” I asked quietly.
He was quiet for a moment, and I could hear the gentle thump of his heartbeat.
“Riding. Thinking.” His fingers absentmindedly traced imaginary lines across the skin of my shoulder. “Riding some more.”
“You’ve been gone so long.”
“I needed time.”
“What have you been doing?”
His gaze caught mine. “Trying to figure out the best way to ask you to marry me.”
TAYLOR
Twelve Months Later
> Jesus Christ, the pain was like nothing I’d known.
“You’re doing so well, baby.”
I grabbed Bull by the t-shirt. “You did this to me…”
Sweat ran down my forehead as another wave of excruciating pain swept through me.
“Well, I hope it was me,” he said with that mischievous glint in his eye.
I twisted my hand deeper into his shirt. “Does this look like a time for jokes—” Agony cut me off, and I cried out as two kinds of pain twisted at my insides. “—goddamn, it feels like a bowling ball is trying to push its way out of my body!”
When Bull chuckled, I threw him a warning look. The contractions were on top of one another now.
The midwife delivering my baby looked up from between my legs. “Ok, Taylor, I’m going to need you to push.”
Taking in a deep breath, I gritted my teeth and pushed for dear life…thankfully, I was rewarded with a strange release.
“We have a head,” she said.
I looked at Bull, and relief washed over me like warm water. “We have a head?” And I started to cry when he nodded.
“Yeah, baby. We have a head.”
I drew in deep breaths.
“Okay, Taylor. I’m going to need you to push again. I know you’re tired. But I need one big push from you, okay. Your baby wants to meet her mama.”
With all of my muscles tightened and straining, I pushed, but it was no use. My baby wasn’t budging.
“Okay, take a moment to get your breath. Now, I need you to give me another one of those. On a count of three, one…two…three…now push!”
Again, I tried, I pushed as hard as I could, my body clenching, my muscles straining, my eyes squeezed shut, until I couldn’t do anymore.
Air burst from me as I let go.
“I can’t do this,” I cried to Bull, suddenly afraid. I was exhausted. I had nothing left. Fifteen hours of labor had taken its toll, and I was spent.
He clasped a big hand around mine “You can do this, baby. One more push.” He tenderly wiped hair from my face and leaned in to press a kiss to my forehead. “My sweet, strong, little bird. You’re the strongest, fiercest woman I know. You can do this, baby.”
