“Easy, Bri, I’m not going to kill you for caring,” I say, looking at him and giving him a warm wink. “Just don’t spread this around please?”
I continue to watch the monitors.
“No problem, May,” he says, scooting now a little closer.
Bringing your personal life into work, especially in this type of work, never ends well. I need to lock this up big time.
Fortunately, it turns out to be a quiet night; however, we still have tomorrow night. Hopefully, I can talk this out with Kevin sometime tomorrow, and I can come to work with a much more level head.
“Hey, babe. Just calling to say hi and see if we can talk about me coming out there. Call me when you get a chance. Love you.”
Third call, third voicemail. He always answers my calls, and if he doesn’t, he calls at 8:30. And not a single text. Something is going on, and it makes me very uneasy. Maybe he is still in shock over everything with her and the baby. I just have to give him his time, and we will be able to move forward, right?
Three weeks. Three fucking weeks of no emails, calls, or texts. To say I’m on edge is a serious understatement. I didn’t do anything wrong, yet I’m the one that is hurting and wondering and scared. I wish there was someone I could call that can break down whatever happened because I’m dumbfounded, and it’s really starting to affect everything. Work has been, without a doubt, miserable. I forgot my earpiece and radio one night. I dropped a case of beer the following night. Then I stumbled up the stairs and almost fell down those same stairs five minutes later. Misery. Pure misery. After getting into a shoving match, not to mention slap fight, with a customer, Paul grabs my arm and all but throws me into the office.
“Get out, Terry,” he says a little too calmly, but he’s staring daggers at me.
“Sure, no problem, Paul,” Terry says, putting a hand on my shoulder. Other than Paul, Terry has been the only other person to catch all my slipups these past two weeks. Living in Hell is one thing, but people seeing my living hell is by far ten-times worse.
As soon as Terry closes the door behind him, Paul steps back, without taking his eyes off me and locks the door. What is he going to do, kill me?
I turn to check out the monitors, but before my eyes can focus on one of the screens, Paul’s hand is on my shoulder pulling me back and then slamming me into the lockers. What the hell? I stop thinking because I know I had this coming. I could’ve gotten someone hurt because my head has been everywhere except here at work. I can’t look up at Paul and see his disappointment, so I just stare at his chest. It’s rising and falling so fast. Did he have a fight already tonight? Jesus, I just don’t know. He’s so close I can almost hear his heart pounding. What’s the matter with him?
Putting his index finger under my chin, he tilts my face up, and before I can say anything, his lips crash to mine. I don’t push him away; I don’t do anything but let him kiss me. The look on his face is contorted with anger, sadness, and I think love.
“Kiss me back goddammit,” he growls out before his lips are on mine again.
Closing my eyes, I let go of all the baggage I’ve been holding onto for the past three weeks and wrap my arms around his neck. Taking that as the green light, Paul runs his hands down my sides and then down the back of my thighs. He gets a good grip and pulls my thighs up, and I wrap my legs around his waist. As I’m locking up so I don’t fall, he slams me against the lockers again even though there is no more room, and he pushes himself against me. One hand is on my ass cradling it, and the other is in my hair keeping our lips sealed together.
When did he take my hair down? I pour everything I have into whatever this is that’s happening. Not wanting to think about anything or anyone else, I welcome this distraction, no matter how misplaced it might be. God, I have to keep this quiet, so I take out our earpieces and radios and throw them on the chair. Problem solved. I’ve let go of his waist, and I yank his shirt out of his pants. The buttons on his shirt are the snap kind, so with one swift jerk, I’m staring at hard, very defined, and perfectly golden tanned skin. He has a Steelers tattoo on his left peck. Then there is the scar he got from a knife in a fight a couple of years ago. But how, and I mean how have I not noticed his body before?
As I am admiring this perfect creation of man, I feel him working the tie on my wrap around shirt. It falls open, exposing my black satin bra and the groan that comes from the back of his throat is one of the sexiest and primal things I have ever heard. He pushes his head into the crook of my neck and starts his assault on my sensitive skin with his hot tongue. I start to fumble with his belt and pants button. He stops his tongue from its advances and pulls his head up slightly. When I have his zipper down, he looks at me and then our lips are smashed together once again. Pure heat and lust fill the air surrounding us. No kid gloves, no soft and gentle here with us. I don’t expect it from him anyway. He never is gentle anywhere else.
I let his pants fall to the floor, and I grab the waistband of his black boxer briefs and pull them down his powerful thighs. Wow, his manhood is big, like practical joke big. Where does he think that is going to go? I stand back up, and he goes to work on my belt and pants. When he lets go of them, they fall to the floor, and I am wearing nothing but my bra and matching lace panties. I always wear all black when I work.
Putting one hand on the locker behind the side of my head, he leans a little forward while his other hand runs smoothly down my flat stomach. When it gets to my panties, he takes one finger and slides it into the waistband and slowly moves his finger across my lower stomach, side to side. Once he’s done playing tease, he hooks one finger in and pulls them all the way down. While he is still squatting, he takes off my boots, and my pants and panties follow quickly.
He puts both hands on each ankle and then starts to move up my legs, over my calves, on to my knees, then to my thighs and stops. Looking up at me, he slides his hand in between my legs and closes his eyes.
“Jesus, you want this as much as I do, don’t you? . . . I can feel how much you want this . . . Fucking Hell,” he groans.
I let my head fall back to the locker with a clunk and let a small moan escape from my lips. He doesn’t stay there long as he takes his sweet time up my body, wanting to feel every inch of me. I don’t think we have that kind of time, well not now anyway. Cupping my breasts, he rubs himself against me, and I moan again. Grabbing the back of my thighs, he lifts me up once more. As I am suddenly aware of what is about to happen, I find my voice.
“Paul,” I manage to get out, my mouth and throat are dry from the panting.
“May, please don’t make me stop,” he says, burying his face in my neck and continuing the exploration of the sensitive skin on my neck. He even bites a little. Nice.
“This is going to change us . . . everything,” I whisper with my eyes closed, and I’m now grinding my pelvis against his.
Stupid body.
“Fuck I hope so, May,” he growls out.
And with that, in one smooth motion he thrusts into me all the way without stopping. We can’t be joined together any more, and it feels like I have just been split down the middle. I call out his name. I don’t know why. It’s all my brain can come up with at the moment.
“May, why did I have to wait this fucking long to have you?” he says, pulling almost all the way out before slamming back into me, pushing me higher against the locker.
Two thrusts and I feel like I could come right now. Jesus this is good.
“Shut up, Paul . . . and start moving,” I say to the ceiling.
Thrust after thrust after thrust rips me apart little by little. Feeling how much he has wanted me all these years, I feel a tear creep out of my eye and fall down my cheek. Thrust after thrust after thrust he rocks the center of me. I’ve gripped the top edge of the locker to get some kind of leverage, and I feel my orgasm just out of reach.
“Fuck, Paul, I’m going to come,” I say through clenched teeth.
“You come with me, May. I need that. I need to feel you let
go with me.”
Oh–my–God.
One more thrust.
“Come for me, May; let me see you come while I’m inside you, please.” It’s not a question.
The angriest orgasm I have ever felt starts small, but then it radiates and pulses through my body to every possible place it can go within me. Thank God the club’s music is loud because I’m yelling my release, unable to hold it in any longer. This orgasm is almost too intense. My nails are now firmly dug into the back of his neck, and I pull his head forward, so his forehead is laying on my shoulder.
I feel his shudders as he comes down from his own orgasm. Placing a kiss on my skin, he ever so slowly eases out of me and lets my thighs slide down. He puts both hands on the lockers on both sides of my head and lets his head hang down while we catch our breaths. When he has it under control, he pulls me to him and wraps his arms around me. Pressing skin to skin and lips to lips, we stay locked like that for a few moments before we hear a knock on the door. Paul breaks this kiss, but not his hold on me.
“We’ll be right out,” he says very calmly.
OH, please! Like we didn’t do what we just did.
He lets go of me, and we stare at each other as we pull on our clothes. Only after we are done dressing do I break our eye contact and get our radios and earpieces off of the chair.
Standing mere inches away, I reach over and clip his radio to his belt. I then run his earpiece wire under his shirt, pull it through the collar, and lay it on his shirt, all the while still being inches from our bodies touching again. He does the same to me, and I could go again.
“Friendship changed . . . safe to say,” he says with a small smile playing on his lips.
Pulling his earpiece off his shirt and placing it in his ear, he turns, unlocks the door, and walks out.
CHAPTER NINE
The rest of the night dragged on after my interaction with Paul. I didn’t avoid him, but I just made sure that the entire club was between us at all times.
Okay, okay, okay. I was avoiding him.
I even moved from my spot against the wall a couple of times just to make sure we didn’t get too close, which seems ridiculous because all he has to do is radio to me, and he is in my head.
I let my mind wander to what happened between us. It’s only now that I remember feeling all those years of restraint from his body. I wonder what made him suddenly want to let go. I have no idea. So what the hell happens now?
“May, quit biting your nails,” Paul radios to me.
“I’m out,” I say walking towards the office a little quicker than usual and ripping my earpiece out at the same time. He’s not going to stay in my ear all night.
I know he’s going to be heading this way to find out what’s going on, but I would hope he already knows and maybe just backs off a little. He was upstairs walking the U-shaped patio, so I think I have maybe five minutes before he can get through the crowd and to the office. God, how did I let this happen and let everything get so fucked up?
I clean out my locker and shove my radio deep into my bag. The door opens and closes, and I know whom it is before I even look.
“Terry,” Paul says.
“Yup . . . I’m out of here,” Terry says as he walks out of the door. That poor guy keeps getting kicked out of his own workstation.
“Why did you do that?” I say into the air with my head leaned all the way back and my eyes closed.
Paul leans up against the closed, and now locked, door.
“I have been in love with you since we were kids. Seeing you in the last few weeks, completely unraveled over some guy who doesn’t deserve you, has been one of the hardest things I have ever had to watch–ever. You should be with me, May. Everything we’ve been through, everything we have, c’mon are you kidding me? I don’t have that with other girls. You of all people know this. If you tell me that you don’t love me like I love you then . . .”
And he stops.
I look at him with narrowed eyes as I stand up straight, trying to keep my composure. This conversation could destroy fifteen years of friendship.
“What? What, Paul? What’s the end of that fucking sentence? If I don’t love you like you love me, then what? We won’t be friends . . . business partners? What will happen to us, huh, Paul? You didn’t think about that when you had me wrapped around you and pushed against the lockers did you? Granted, I am just as guilty for what happened, but if you took advantage of a weak moment on my part to try to guilt me into being with you, then we were never friends in the first place.”
I feel like I’m going to be sick. He’s not even looking at me.
“I’m right, aren’t I?” I say, voice trembling.
“May, if you won’t be with me, love me like I love you, then I’ll deal with it my way, but I am not going to fucking lose you as a business partner or friend.” He’s holding onto my shoulders like he might fall down.
Biting the inside of my cheek, I look up into those beautiful brown eyes.
“You just did,” I say as I step around him, unlock the door, and walk out of the office.
Driving home was a blur. The man I am in love with has completely turned away from me, and the one person who knows me better than that man has just made a great situation and friendship worse.
When I get into the door at my house, my exhaustion hits me hard. With everything weighing on my shoulders, I only just make it to my room and change into my pajamas before I fall onto my bed and into a well-deserved deep sleep.
Who the hell is knocking on my door? Sunday is my day to do whatever I want, and this Sunday, it is sleeping in. I look at the clock, and it’s 4:30 in the afternoon. I don’t bother putting my robe on, I just saunter my sliding feet to the front door. Pulling it open and seeing Paul leaning against the doorframe is confusing. That little smile he does is nowhere to be seen.
Serious Paul? Hmmm, interesting.
“Paul, what the hell are you doing here?” I ask, rubbing my eyes.
“I need more,” is all he says back.
“You have got to be kidding me? Did you not hear what I said in the office, or was all the functioning blood in your body going to your dick? If you want to talk,” I elongate the word, “about this later, give me a call. Until then, I am taking my ass back to bed,” I say while closing the door.
The door stops.
“I’m putting you to bed, May,” is all that I hear before the door is pushed back open, and he walks in. I close it and start preparing for the conversation that we should have had years ago, apparently.
“I can put myself in be–“
And I’m against the door.
“Fuck, Paul . . . you have got to stop doing that!” I say as I rub the back of my head.
“I’m sorry, but like I said, I have to have more.” His hand is cupping my face. He slouches his hips and presses his full erection against me.
Damn you, Paul Morris–you and your penis.
Picking me up is nothing to him, and he guides my legs to settle around his hips. Heading to my bedroom, he kicks off his shoes along the way. When we get into the bedroom, he sets me down on my feet, slides his hands over my shoulders and then down my arms, softly and gently. Slow and sensual Paul? I wasn’t aware he even had this side. Even more interesting. He walks around me, letting our skin skim over each other’s here and there. When he’s completely behind me, he lifts my shirt up and over my head. Before his hands can liberate me from the rest of my clothes, my phone starts ringing.
Walking over to the nightstand, I pick it up to silence it, when I glance at the screen and see Kevin’s name. The blood rushes out of my face as I say, “Holy shit . . . it’s Kevin.”
I look back at Paul, and yeah, he’s not happy at all. He sits down on the bed with a huff.
“Hello?” I ask, not knowing what to expect.
“Is this May?” It’s a woman.
I put it on speakerphone.
“Yes it is, and who is this?” I’m now looking at
Paul, and he’s intrigued himself.
“Doesn’t matter, I just wanted to let you know that Kevin’s been fuckin around on you for weeks now with some slutty eighteen year olds . . . He likes them barely legal. That and to not expect him to call you again because it’s fucking over.”
What the hell do I say to that? I don’t want to know any details or anything, so, “Thanks for calling,” pops out of my mouth, and I hang up.
“Fuck,” is all Paul can get out as he looks from the phone to me, trying to read my mind.
He gets up from the bed and walks over to me. I’m still holding my phone, trying to recover from the gut punch I have just received by some woman on the man that I love’s phone. Ain’t that a kick in the head?
“I’m so . . . so sorry, Ma–”
Throwing him off guard, I hurl my phone as hard as I can into the wall. I stand there looking at the pieces laying on the floor and can’t help but to realize that it is like my heart, severely broken and without a replacement. Paul pulls me towards him, and I go willingly, shaking because I’m so infuriated. Everything I told Kevin, how much I let him in to see behind the curtain and through the walls, makes me sick. I bury my head in Paul’s chest and cry, again.
This sucks.
At least I know the truth, and I can stop racking my brain for an explanation.
I guess the geography was a deal breaker.
Taking a deep inhale, my senses are covered in Paul’s scent of fresh laundry. I put my hands underneath his shirt and lay them flat on his stomach. His hands have stopped rubbing my back and are now frozen there.
“May, don’t do this because you are pissed off at him,” Paul says cautiously.
I pull away from him slightly and raise his shirt up over his head. My hands are free to roam as they please, seeing as how they didn’t get to last time. He’s perfect in my eyes; I’ve got to admit that. All those hours we trained together did his body truly, truly good. I stretch up on my tiptoes and press a long, slow, soft, wet kiss on his Steelers tattoo. One thing we have always had in common is the Steelers. I become aware that I’m naked from the waist up and use this to my advantage to get what I want. Pushing up on my toes, I push forward so our upper bodies are completely touching, skin to skin.
Need You, Need Me (The Need Series Book 1) Page 6
