by V. L. Brock
“What time is it?” I asked sleepily.
“Just after eight.”
I licked my lips with a groan and stretched out my cramping legs. I’d never get used to that damn sofa.
“Another nightmare?” he asked somewhat distracted, his focus remaining on his weaving fingers.
All I could do was nod. I was too tired to do or say anything else.
“I wish you would just wake me up instead of coming out here all the time. You don’t have to go through this on your own.”
“I’ve told you before; I don’t want to burden you.”
“Burden me?” he smiled, disbelieving. “Darlin’, you could never burden me. I panic when I wake up without you there,” he frowned before setting about changing the topic. “I brought you coffee.”
Walker shifted once I reared up from the couch, handing me a mug of coffee from the table behind him. I smiled my gratitude and took a welcomed sip.
“Do you want to talk about it?” he asked when I lowered the mug from my lips and rested the bottom of the ceramic on my knees.
“No.”
“Kady, it would help if you did.” He shuffled to my left and set an encouraging hand on my knee. I winced at the tenderness of the forming bruise, but thankfully, my reaction went unnoticed. “We can work together and try…”
His words went interrupted. “I said no.”
He sighed. “Darlin’ please, let me help you.” In that moment, I felt cornered and provoked. Why couldn’t he just back the fuck off? It was an image in my head that I would gladly give my life to forget.
An adrenaline surge had me standing my ground. “I said, NO!” I shouted and before I could register what was happening, the mug of steaming coffee was being hurled down the room, shattering against the cracked plaster of the wall. My body was shaking, my breathing labored.
When I looked back at him, he was simply staring at me. Silently counting to three as I sucked in a breath, and exhaling to the count of five, I closed my eyes, feeling tears rising. “I didn’t mean…I’m sorry,” I murmured with a shake of my head.
His entire expression altered before me. Concern was no longer apparent in his gaze. They were defiant, they were surprised, almost pleased, although I had no idea why. When his jaw tightened a tiny twitch of his mouth broke free, he hoisted me up by my arms so I was standing in front of him. Towering above me, the matted, blond locks from my face were brushed away. “Don’t you dare apologize,” he rasped. The way his lips formed the words with power and emphasis made me tingle. Words, as he tipped my head back, ended, and my mouth was devoured.
His muscular arms, although so substantial in their diameter that my hands could barely cover them, were still being clawed at by my desperate fingers. Even as adrenaline fueled whimpers and groans escaped me, the lasting and uninterrupted sweeping of his tongue through my mouth, fueled and bred yet more carnal sounds.
Frantic hands searched my body, down my neck, breasts, waist, around my back and to the curve of my ass. With a gasp of air between kisses, I was pulled up the length of his body, my legs instinctively binding around his hips while I fisted through his hair, our lips unbroken. I didn’t know what it was: the fear behind the nightmare I had earlier that night, the freedom I dreamed about as I fell back into slumber, the anger I felt as he pushed and provoked me, the buildup of adrenaline…so many factors to play on, but this was needy, it was erotic…it was a release.
Falling unceremoniously onto the couch, I straddled his hips. My body was unconsciously grinding against the prominent evidence of his early morning arousal, through his boxers, while my lips embarked on the journey down his neck. When the snaps of the shirt I was sporting, were pulled apart, he made short work of stripping the material from my body, my nipples growing taut against the warmth of his flesh.
“Don’t,” he grated, his hands catching my face once my lips began their descent down his chest. He was only just feeling comfortable with my hands touching his scars; my lips however, were a completely different story.
The upwelling of adrenaline had my body physically shaking. I was certain I could run a marathon, either that or beat the living shit out of someone, or take the living shit being beaten out of me. Those feelings roused a degree of alarm for me. So I took my anger, pent-up frustration and determination out on the man lying on the couch, restrained between my legs.
He pushed me back and I shrieked, landing with a thud against the rusted, aged springs. But that lasted for all of a moment. Once coherent thoughts were torn from my mind, never to be formed, and my panties were torn from my body, I pushed myself up, pinning him beneath my body again. His warmth, girth and the feel of his veins as my hands slipped over him, once he was freed of his boxers, was something I needed to get used to. This was mine. He was mine. And that was something I had to continually remind myself of.
Down my golden flesh, his rough, dry hands skated and were soon parked on my thighs, his thumbs making work of massaging the summit between my legs. I knew his intention and I hated it. The desired spot that needed massaging was right there, just a hairsbreadth away, yet his deliberate avoidance and the wicked glint in his eyes simply goaded me.
“For fuck sake, Walker, just touch me,” I growled.
Peeking up at me with his lips surrendering to a cocky, roguish smirk, his mouth made slow work at forming one single word, “Where?”
“Everywhere.”
As I worked at fisting his length, his thumbs parted the dampened flesh further. “I’m here,” he whispered. “Take me. Use me, darlin’. I’m yours.”
Fuck! My breathing was already ragged and uneven. You know those moments where you just don’t give a fuck about anything––those moments where your adrenaline surge is so high that you need to burn that energy out of you, somehow. Well this was that moment.
Walker was laid back on the end of the sofa. My left leg was resting on the inner side, while my right leg braced my weight with my foot firmly on the floor. The only thought in my head was to calm myself down, a release. Positioning him beneath me, I hovered over his rather intimidating length then let my thighs give into my weight as I dropped, taking him inside of me.
On a low, pleasure enthused groan I tipped my head back. I heard Walker hiss, giving into his highly erotic, carnal sounds, that matched my own.
“Fuck!” I cried, his hands resting on my hips steadying me while he ruthlessly bucked his pelvis. With the most intimate parts of our bodies crashing together, I took ahold of his hands, laced our fingers, and with his arms locked, he aided me as I raised and lowered myself off him at a frantic pace. The erotic sounds of pleasure and desperation, alongside striking flesh, ricocheted around the bare walls while drowning out my panting.
When I opened my eyes and looked down on him, his jaw was working and a crease formed on his brow, causing the skin to whiten. “Jesus Christ, darlin’. Are you going to continue beating me?”
Slowing down a fraction and swiveling my hips when I met his base, I panted, “You want me to stop?”
“The fuck I do,” he groaned, once again unshackling any restraint he had and plunged further inside of me. In that moment, the bruising sensation that radiated throughout my lower abdomen at his insanely deep penetration, was exactly what I needed.
The muscles in my thighs and buttocks burned and ached, but that didn’t stop me. Whimpering as I leaned back, my hands released his and braced my weight upon his knees. Each time I rose off him, my pelvis tilted, allowing the thick crest of his length to caress and tease before embracing the pleasurable pain, which came with each strike as he battered the highpoint inside of me.
“Yes…that’s it…oh fuck…” I cried.
When I looked down, his stomach muscles were tensing. I could feel the muscles of his thighs hardening under my palm as I sunk my nails into his flesh.
“Jesus, Kady…FUUUUUCCKKK,” he drawled, his release ripping through him, sending each muscle quivering and tightening in my body. My anger, frustratio
n and hormones were left to fall to a gradual safe level, along with my heartbeat, before I crashed onto his chest.
“Feel better?” he asked, the heat of his breath and the uneven rise and fall of his chest matching my own.
“I have no idea what that was…but damn…”
“That darlin’––” putting a finger under my chin, he coaxed me to look at him. His eyes were glistening as sweat beaded and trickled down his temple. “––Was a more pleasurable form of release.” When I just gaped at him totally confused, his dimple appeared along with his adorable smile, and my sweaty locks, which were plastered across my face, were pushed back behind my shoulders. “That was a healthy, less dangerous, and more satisfying unshackling for both of our problems.”
What the Hell did that mean? I scowled. “I don’t understand.”
“You burned off the adrenaline, instead of numbing it. How do you feel?”
I felt a little embarrassed, considering the likelihood that Walker’s neighbors may have heard us, or even more mortifying, that we could have possibly damaged downstairs’ ceiling…Still, I didn’t have the energy to go on about that. Instead, I simply sighed, “Shattered,” with a contented grin.
Once we had both showered, I yanked on a pair of fashionably worn jeans and a white camisole. With a little blush dusted over my cheeks, a few coats of mascara on my lashes and a sweeping of gloss over my lips, I began feeling more like myself.
Actually, I felt better than myself. I felt empowered.
“Have I ever told you how impossibly beautiful you are?” Walker practically growled in my ear, his arms clutched me around my waist as I finished tousling my blond locks and set the hairdryer on the dresser.
Smiling as I studied our reflection, I muttered, “I believe you have.”
“Well,” his arms unbound around me and his hands, upon my hips, aided in twisting me to face him. He loomed over me with that sexy, dark just-fucked hair, the tips still wet from our shower. “I’m going to tell you again. You are drop dead gorgeous, Kady Jenson. I can’t believe someone like you would…”
My eyes widened. I knew where this conversation was headed. “Stop! There are lots of things I don’t want to hear, Walker, and that is one of them.”
“Alrighty then,” he mouthed, flashing a small, accepting smile, while a sliver of roguishness twinkled in his eyes. The corners of his mouth tipped, and that adorable dimple in his left cheek made an appearance. After placing a soft kiss to my mouth, he licked his lips, humming, “Raspberry flavor, my favorite,” before turning and stalking towards the closet. I was glad he couldn’t see me blush. “I have to pop out for a few hours,” he informed me when he reemerged, a black gym bag being set on the bed.
“Oh?”
“I won’t be too long,” he went back into the hole, drew out some gray sweats, a tank-top along with a pair of sneakers, and, folding it up neatly, he dropped them into the bag. “I need to go to the gym to see my Uncle Les. Thought I’d get a workout while I’m down there. I did tell you last night, but you were out of it, darlin’.”
The springs made their infamous squealing, dying noise as I perched myself on the edge and watched him get ready. “It’s fine. I’ll think of something to keep me busy.”
Equally amused and taunting eyes darted to my direction. From around from the foot of the bed, Walker made his way to me with purpose and just enough sexual intent to make my breath catch in my throat. “’Aye, just as long”––the mattress drunk in his balled fists when he lowered them into the springs, restraining me in the area between his locked, tattooed arms as he leaned into me––“as you stay out of trouble.” We were so close that I could taste the air he was breathing and my God, it was beyond erotic.
I found myself staring completely unreserved at his mouth. “I never get into trouble,” I smiled. In a moment of realization, I heard what I had actually said and the smile I was once donning was swiftly stripped from my face. Letting my head drop in shame, I breathed, “I mean––”
“Never again, Kady,” In my peripheral vision, I saw his head shake, “You don’t need to worry about that, ever again. Understand, darlin’?”
“Some things are easier said than done.”
“You can do it. You just need the right push to believe it.” With his fists still balled into the bed, he cocked his head to check his cuff-like watch. “Damn. I gotta go, darlin’.” My lips pressed by a lingering kiss, he shoved himself from his position, and then whipped the bag over the iron footboard of the bed as he left. “I won’t be too long. Later, darlin’.” He kissed me again and playfully swatted my ass as he opened the apartment door.
“Later.”
The minutes were ticking by at an agonizingly slow pace when I remembered telling Laurie that I would call her. Blindly fishing out my cell from my purse, I brought up her number and pressed the call button. While standing in front of the window, I watched an odd car zoom past as the driver blasted their music. Voicemail finally ended the tone of the connecting calling. I could have brushed it off the first time, but when voicemail repeatedly picked up my calls, I knew something wasn’t right. It was very unlike Laurie to not answer her phone. That I knew definitively.
My mind went into overdrive. Her words from the night before haunted me: I don’t want anyone getting hurt because of me, while images of both her and Liam at the hospital made my stomach clench.
No forewarning could have prepared me for the overwhelming wave of panic and anxiety that came over me at the mere contemplation of ‘what ifs’. In that moment, I felt it was my duty to protect the ones around me. I had to put an end to it all.
Issuing the anger raging in my blood, onto my handset, I thumped in a number which I had committed to memory for so long, and paced the length of the living room while equally waiting and dreading a certain voice to answer. My heart thrummed in my chest and my hands were clammy. I was sure the sweat from my ear was pasting itself onto the screen of my cell, but I didn’t care. I tapped into all that anger, all that hatred that I felt this morning and brought it to the surface once again.
“Hello.” The urge to instinctively hit the end call button had to be fought against when his voice met my ear. “Hello, who’s there?” he asked once again, his voice croaky.
“What do you think you’re playing at?”
“Oh, Kady baby. What a pleasant surprise.”
“I’m not your baby, and I’m not calling you for idle fucking chit-chat, Liam. What have you said to Laurie?”
“Laurie?” he sounded shocked by her name. “What would I want with Laurie?” he sneered.
Breathe, Kady, breathe.
“Don’t lie to me, Liam. For once in your Goddamn life, just stop lying to me. I saw you both talking at the hospital, which by the way, you had no right to even be there.”
“No right? Excuse me, Kady, but you’ll find I had every right to be there as you’re estranged from your family, and I am the closest thing you have to one.”
“This is all because of you, Liam. Everything that is happening, everything that has happened, is because of you. You have to leave me alone. I’m done, we are done. Leave us all alone otherwise I’ll call the police and will file a complaint.”
“And they will believe someone with your mental history? Come on Kady, wake up.”
I closed my eyes and focused on my anger. I wasn’t fighting it or attempting to quell it any longer. If I was going to unleash myself fully from his grasp, I needed to embrace it. “Liam, I mean it, so help me God, I fucking mean it. Leave Laurie, Walker and me alone. You wanted Liv all that time ago, well you can have her. See how long she will put up with your shit because I. Am. Done.” Just like that, I cut him off with a single press of my thumb.
Flopping back onto the sofa, I closed my eyes and the blinding light of awareness brought a smile to my face: I did it. I stood up for myself. For once, I was in control.
The buzzing of my cellphone coming from beside me saw the end of my reverie. “Hello,�
�� I answered.
“Hey, girlie. Sorry I missed your call, I was in the shower. Everything okay?”
“I was just about to ask you the same thing. I was just about to set out on the War path. You okay?”
“Of course. Why wouldn’t I be?” Even down the handset I could hear her scowling around her words.
“I was just really worried after last night and I couldn’t get ahold of you. I added two and two––”
“––And came out with fifteen. I’m fine. Honestly. But thank you for caring.”
We spoke for a little while, making general chit-chat while I pottered around the apartment and finally settled in the tiny kitchen. With the handset held between my shoulder and my ear, I shuffled onto one of the countertops and stared at the purple and white hyacinths in the pint glass, opposite.
“You there, girlie?”
“Yeah, I’m here. Listen, I want to do something nice for Walker for when he comes back from the gym. Any ideas?”
A puff of air traveled down the speaker. “Walker’s a hard one to surprise. How do you feel about getting back in the kitchen?”
“Ummm…” I didn’t feel very enthusiastic about that idea at all. I’d only pushed myself and busied myself in the kitchen for two reasons: making Liam happy, and using it as a way to disguise my self-inflicted intentions.
“His childhood favorite was Shepherd’s pie and mashed up peas. Rosaleen used to make it all the time for him.”
“Rosaleen?”
A beat passed, then a small, weighted sigh crackled the speaker. But the sigh wasn’t as weighted as her words. “Walker’s Ma.”
Walker had told me that she had passed, and I knew without a shadow of doubt that it had killed him. So much so that the gruesome scar coated above his heart, was a constant reminder of his pain and of his loss. That one night many months ago awoke in my memory. When he told me about her passing, he had hit his heart, saying she was always there. The evidence of his grief was sitting there, too.
“What, umm…what happened to her?”
