WYLDER

by Kristina Weaver

  He wants love. I can see it every time he looks at me, and I hurt knowing that I can’t give it to him. At least not yet.

  It doesn’t take long to dry off and dress in the sweats and T-shirt I took when I snuck out of the room, and I take the time I need to dry my waist-length hair and put on a light dusting of concealer and some lip balm.

  And then it’s time to eat because two days without food is way too long for a girl like me who has a healthy appetite.

  Lyon hobbles in a little while later, and while I’m feeling awkward and unsure about everything in the bright light of…mid-afternoon, I smile and indicate the plate I set for him.

  He doesn’t know what to do. I see him hesitate before hobbling over to the table, his gait unsteady without the crutches.

  “I…morning.”

  Oh God, I cannot do this awkward tap dancing stuff with him today. I want to be normal again and not be a wreck, and the only way to do that is if the people around me don’t walk on egg shells or watch their every word.

  “God, don’t do this, okay? I can’t deal with you not looking at me and trying to hunch over to make yourself look smaller. You’re huge, Lyon, and besides all that, I told you I’m not afraid of you. What part of I want you didn’t you get?” I huff, sitting down to stab at the pasta I threw together.

  “Lay, I just don’t want you to rush into anything until you’re ready, okay?” he says, meeting my eyes at last.

  “Rush? Lyon, if I didn’t have a boyfriend and a freaking open wound, I would have sexually molested you in the damn hospital,” I mutter, smiling when his mouth drops open before he grins wickedly.

  “You did?”

  “I so did. You forget what a wanton woman you made me eight years ago, and trust me, I remember all the sex. I may be an asshole when it comes to feelings, but sex is not something I will ever forget with you. I do want you. But I won’t use you,” I say, determined to be better.

  It isn’t easy knowing that I’m still so hot for Lyon I don’t care that Rory just broke up with me, and I should feel guilty about using him. All I want is to have him touch me, and yeah, part of that is about proving that I can have sex without freaking out and going into a trauma-induced trance.

  “Don’t say that! I’m here for you, and if you need me, you have me,” he growls, pushing his empty plate away to stare at me over the rim of his cup.

  “Lyon—”

  “You think I don’t want you too? I haven’t had sex in months, Leila. I can’t even look at another woman since you came back into my life. Trust me, woman, you using me will not be a problem for me,” he mumbles, flushing when I laugh and bite into my lip.

  No, but that is Lyon for you. Since that first moment, well, okay, since the moment I opened that dorm room door and saw how far he’d go to have me, I knew Lyon won’t deny me anything.

  He never has, except that one time when we tore each other apart.

  I know he loves me. I’d see it even if he never said the words again. And I do love him. I do. I just don’t want to love him as much as I do. That’s the scary part and the real reason I haven’t attacked him like a sex-starved harpy.

  “Don’t let me hurt you,” I plead.

  His soft grin makes my heart leap, and I smile back at him when he rises and reaches out a hand for mine.

  “Nothing hurts more than losing you.”

  Chapter Twelve

  Leila

  I’m shaking when he closes the bedroom door and twists the lock, my body coming alive so suddenly I have to take a step back just to keep myself from touching him.

  Today is a start of sorts, a new start that I don’t know where it will lead, but I’m ready, and I want him to know this. Stepping back, just far enough for my legs to bump the bed, I undress without artifice and let him see me, wanting him to see me and know that this time I’m offering myself to him.

  Lyon swallows roughly and groans when I slide onto the bed and settle down, giving him time to look at me, my nerves weaker than the need I have to feel him all over me. I’m anxious too, and yeah, part of that is the result of fear.

  I’m not afraid of him though, rather the niggling fear that something will set me off or some memory from my attack will come between us. I refuse to let it though and pray that I’m strong enough to be with him fully.

  Lyon pauses, and I can see his trepidation before he slowly clomps over to the bed, his cast making him move at a crawl, and pulls his clothes off. He’s hotter than I remember, the body I once knew as well as my own covered in a few scars and a big black tattoo that has me leaning up to inspect.

  I want to cry when I see it up close, my name staring at me bold as brass in curling script placed over his heart.

  “I got it about six years ago,” he says gruffly when I run reverent fingers over his skin, strangely hurt that he left me but has spent six years with me on his skin, inside him.

  I don’t know what to say, so I don’t say anything at all, instead coming to my knees to swipe my lips and tongue over his skin. His groan is loud, aching, and I cherish it as I swallow down angst and force myself to continue.

  I touch him everywhere I can reach, using just my fingers to reacquaint myself with him. He’s harder than I remember but still so familiar I blink tears away when he suddenly picks me up against his chest and kisses me softly.

  I feel his passion, the control he’s exerting over himself, and push harder, kissing him deeper when he doesn’t try for more. He’s nervous. I can feel it, and that only makes me want him more.

  I need him. I don’t want the last man to have been inside me to be some fat pig with homicidal tendencies, and yeah, I get how strange it is to think that right now, but it’s true.

  And it’s my brain!

  “Lay, slow down,” Lyon grunts, growling out a moan when I shove my tongue in his mouth and use his grip on me to wiggle closer.

  “No. I want you, and I don’t want to do this like it’s a test. Touch me. Love me,” I whisper, moaning when my words set him off and the hands that were gentle before close around my ass, squeezing me tight and into his growing erection.

  I feel glory wing through me when the contact makes me squirm and revel in the arousal that spikes, heating me, making my sex clench and shudder as I feel the slide of the wetness I haven’t experienced in months.

  “Leila.”

  That’s all he says, but that one word holds a wealth of meaning, and I moan back when he starts sliding me up and down his shaft, the throbbing length glancing on and off my clit in jerking thrusts so good I spasm inside and feel myself go a little insane with need.

  I’d take penetration now over anything else, but Lyon, well, he’s Lyon, and before I can scream a denial, he pushes me away and gets onto his back, hands planted behind his head.

  “Use me.”

  And I do. I can’t help myself when he’s spread out beneath me, his body on offer, open and waiting for anything I want. And I want.

  Stepping over him, I come to my knees just over his hips and lean in to kiss him slowly, feeling as seductive as I do needy. Lyon wants me badly. His shaft is pulsing where we just touch, his shaft streaming beads of liquid from the slit.

  And his eyes. I see lust and love and hope in those blue eyes when I pull back and look into them. I want to do everything with him, gorge myself on his body and relearn the angles and planes of his hard form.

  I want to touch and taste and take. I want it all.

  “Do it,” he growls when I hesitate, his voice a snarl of longing when I look down at his shaft and try to stop myself from sliding down on him without foreplay.

  I should kiss and touch, but I’m suddenly aching for him to fill me, and he sees it. Shaking now, I take his shaft in hand and bring it to my opening, whimpering when the soft skin slides over my flesh and lodges there, throbbing in time to my own heartbeat.

  He’s coated in me, slippery with my juices, and the knowledge turns me on even more. I want to slam down and grind myself to rel
ease. Ride him so slowly we both yell out when we come.

  I want it all, but right now, I’m blazing where we touch and so empty it pains me. Taking a deep breath, clearing my mind of everything that wants to bombard me, I slowly, oh so slowly, lower down, moaning when he pierces me and the soft burn fills my sex.

  Lyon is a big guy, totally in proportion with his body, and taking him isn’t easy after eight years of being alone and then with Rory, who is…

  But I need him, and my body is vibrating with lust as I remove my hands, plant them on his shoulders, and let gravity guide me down.

  Lyon’s teeth are clenched, the muscles in his arms bulging as I moan, sliding down, down until every piece of him is stuffed inside me. The fullness is like nothing I’ve felt before and familiar all at once.

  We’ve had sex in a million different ways but oddly never with me on top, because we usually dove at each other and patience was not something we possessed then.

  “Don’t rush it. Make it hurt,” he pleads when I pull up, intending to slam down.

  I want to slam and ram and hammer myself over him, but I heed him and do it gently, crying out when he fills me again. Over and over. Slowly. Gently. I ride him in lazy twists and leisurely thrusts that build and build the pleasure inside until all I feel is him, in me, owning me, taking away all the hurt and anger I’ve held inside.

  This is not sex. It’s not making love or anything that can be labelled romantically. It’s me taking back my body, and God, it’s so good I cry and scream when the orgasm slams into me, throwing me down, my hips ramming as I ride it out and fall forward, gasping for breath.

  Lyon is still hard, still throbbing, but he doesn’t move, just reaches a hand to me and softly strokes my back. It’s then that I do cry, because I’m grateful and humbled by his love.

  “I’m sorry.”

  “Don’t be. That was the hottest thing I’ve ever felt in my life,” he growls, kissing my hair.

  He isn’t moving, not by an inch, but I can feel how much he’s straining when, incredibly, he grows harder.

  “Lyon.”

  “Don’t. I don’t want you to say or do anything right now, Leila. Just lay here with me and breathe,” he whispers, smiling at my glare when I push up to stare down at him.

  “Screw that.”

  I ride him like I haven’t just come, the wet sounds of our sexes slamming together sparking off renewed arousal and the need to come so hard I have to bite my lips to stop the screams that want to come.

  He just keeps still, watching me with glittering eyes and gritted teeth, his cock taking everything I have as I race for another orgasm and clench so tight he yells out a curse.

  “I want you to come, Lyon. I want you to come hard and deep and keep filling me until every part of me has you,” I say seductively, making him snarl and throw his head back when I slam down again and rub my clit, putting on a show just for him.

  “Aaaah, fuck, you’re going to kill me.”

  No, I’m killing us both, I think, speeding up when the need to come burns low in my belly.

  “I thought about this for three years after we broke up. I tried to date, but I’d see your face, and I just couldn’t do it. I used to touch myself at night when I was lonely and sad, and I’d imagine it was you touching me, pushing your fingers inside me and making me come.”

  I let go just as he does and orgasm so hard my mouth opens in a soundless scream while Lyon shouts out, grabs my hips, and bows beneath me, shooting into me in hot, thick streams of release.

  I can’t move after I collapse on him. I’m still boneless and wheezing from the victory of doing this with him. And Lyon, he lets me be, his hands stroking me as he silently comforts me.

  I stay that way for a long time, taking the time to think because now that I’m not crying and feeling sorry for myself, all I have is time to evaluate what just happened.

  Do I feel good? No, I feel great! I just had sex, rebirth, re everything, and I did it with the man I once loved so much I thought I’d die when he left me.

  But I feel bad too because even after the best sex I have had in a long time, I can’t look at him and say what I know he wants to hear. Taking this step may seem easy, but for me, it’s the last chance we have, and I won’t ruin it by jumping in the way I did before.

  “Don’t overthink it,” Lyon says softly, reading me the way he always did when we were younger.

  “Lyon—”

  “A step at a time, Leila. We move as fast as you can handle and just enjoy being together. I don’t want you stressing out about my feelings and worrying yourself into an ulcer. We’re here, wherever here is right now, and that’s enough,” he says, playing with my hair.

  “I just don’t want to make things—”

  “Nothing is worse than being without you. Trust me on that. So, take your time and think and do whatever it is you need to do, Leila, but just promise me that even if you can’t be with me the way I want, you’ll stick around. I can’t do another eight years without friendship at the very least.”

  I want to cry because his words are so much more than what I expect and so opposite of what Rory yelled at me. I smile instead because Lyon doesn’t know it but he just gave me something I have never had.

  “Promise. Now, Lyon, I’ve been really patient, but what the hell happened to your leg?” I ask, feeling guilty when it hits me that he’s got a bandage on his thigh too.

  “A teeny tiny bullet and a fight with gravity,” he chuckles, pulling me back when I go to sit up.

  “What?”

  “Don’t go crazy, babe. It’s all good. It’s the only reason it took so long for me to come to you. I had to have a little surgery down in a country where good doctors are not easy to find, and when I got back, Mom had me under lock and key. Bear and Wolf smuggled me here.”

  He sounds so blasé about it, but I’m shocked to the core at the thought of him being hurt! This is why I wasn’t all that guilty when he didn’t pursue his military dreams years ago.

  It sounds awful, but I was so relieved that he stayed with me, because thinking of Lyon going into dangerous situations gives me the hives. Oh Lord, I think, swallowing on a wave of nausea. He’s got a job that could kill him.

  If we’re together, I’ll have to stay home and wait, biting my nails and praying every time he leaves for some foreign clime to get his ass shot up.

  And I can’t do anything about that, just try to accept it because it’s his dream and he loves it.

  Even now he’s still chuckling about nailing some asshole in the face just before he took a dive off a roof. Is the man crazy?

  Huffing because I am offended by his lack of self-preservation, I lay quietly and draw circles on his chest, relaxed and not thinking about any damn thing but being here with him in the moment.

  Maybe he’s right. Maybe all I need to think about is now and let the future take care of itself.

  “So, this Rory prick…”

  “Don’t even think about it, and don’t you dare tell your brothers either. Hawk already enjoys scaring people, and he’s got a nasty temper for such a serious guy,” I mutter, shaking when he starts laughing.

  “But, Lay, he was an asshole.”

  “No. He was understandably annoyed because I’ve been holding him at arm’s length for the last few months. I haven’t even let him touch me, Lyon,” I mumble, hating how pleased I am by that statement, as if it’s an accomplishment or something.

  Lyon purrs beneath me, and I pinch his nipple to show my disgust.

  “Don’t even. It wasn’t right. I took one look at you and suddenly my relationship took a backseat. That isn’t right.”

  “No,” he says seriously, pulling me up to kiss me softly. “But your body was telling you it didn’t want him. And that’s not wrong, Leila. You may need time or just friends or whatever you let us be, but you can’t deny the truth. You belong to me as much as I belong to you.”

  “Arrogant ass,” I mutter against his lips, smiling int
o his kiss.

  “No. Just sure of what I feel. Now, sleep. We’ll wake up later and eat and do all the weird shit friends do together, and then tomorrow we’ll do it again.”

  I get his message and relax once more because no pressure is a really good place to be right now, and I think I’ll just enjoy it.

  For a while. I’ll have to think soon, but for now, I’m in Lyon’s arms, I’m safe, and I don’t need anything else.

  ********************************************************************

  “Go, baby!”

  Danny yells at the top of her lungs while chewing on a cookie, and I laugh when crumbs fly everywhere, restraining the urge to break out and cheer myself when Hawk passes to Lyon and my guy streaks through Lynx and Wolf for the touchdown.

  “God, is there anything better than watching six hot Wylder men play football?” Lori asks, making Rain cackle because she includes Alric in that assessment.

  “Nope,” I answer, sipping on a glass of wine and leaning back in my chair, watching Lori swing beside Rain.

  Two weeks have gone by in a blink, and everything is great. Work is great—after I lied my ass off and told my boss I was puking like I was dying. And life is good too. Lyon comes over at night, and we eat and watch television with Meek and then go to bed.

  I got my period a day after we had sex, so it put us in a place where cuddling was all that was on the menu, and true to his word, the man doesn’t seem to care what we do, as long as we’re together.

  But we did go at it like animals the moment I told him I was clean. Then it was all battle stations, and wow, do I still feel it. Life is going good, great, spectacular, but for the fact that poor Mika is going downhill fast with the economy making jobs scarce, and no amount of reassurance on my part seems to help.

  Add to that Rory calling me constantly—I have not told Lyon, for obvious reasons—and the good, great, spectacular is a lie.

  Most people would look at my life and think but golly, it’s just perfect. I have the perfect man, the perfect job, and a family who calls me more than once a month like my own parents do.