A Stone in the Sea

by A. L. Jackson

  “You can’t sit there, silly…that’s my mommy’s chair.” A bell-like laugh rang from her and she pointed to the chair at the opposite side of the table. “You sit in that one. That’s our special spot for people who don’t live here.”

  “Um…okay…thank you.”

  I rubbed a palm over my face. What in the name of God was I doing?

  I looked at Shea again, who was stealing a sly glance our way, a grin forming at the corners of her mouth while a whole ton of worry creased the corners of her eyes.

  Walking around the table, I pulled out the chair and slipped down onto it, knee bouncing a million miles a minute

  “Hi,” I said, raking a flustered hand through my hair. “I’m Baz. Your mom’s…friend.”

  So apparently now I thought formal introductions were in order.

  Confusion pinched up her nose and she said my name as if I were crazy, her voice lifting my name like a song. “Baz?”

  “Well, Sebastian is my real name. But my friends call me Baz.”

  Her eyes narrowed in speculation. “Am I allowed to call you Baz?”

  I drummed my fingers on the table, my nerves out of control. “Sure.”

  “Okay, Baz.” She stuck out her little hand.

  I looked at it as if it might burn me, before I hesitantly reached out and took it.

  Her head nodded along as she shook my hand and spoke all prim and proper. “It’s very nice to meet you, Baz. I’m Kallie Marie Bentley.” Her tone turned excited. Words began to fly from her mouth at warp speed. “Did you know I’m four years old? Only for seven months and then I’m gonna be five and then I get to go to big girl school and I get to ride on the bus.”

  Out of the blue, she flapped her arms. “I’m a butterfly.”

  Um. Okay.

  But my mind went fluttering right back to the kaleidoscope of butterflies gracing Shea’s slender hip.

  A smile pulled at one side of my mouth.

  “You’re a butterfly, huh?”

  “Yep. Butterflies are so, so pretty and my favorite kind is the Monarch kind. Did you know they fly so, so far?” Her words quieted, like she was sharing a secret with me. “Two thousand whole miles so they can get warm in the winter.”

  Soft laughter rolled around on my tongue. God, the kid was cute. “Two thousand whole miles? You sure about that?” I whispered back.

  She nodded emphatically. “Uh-huh. I know for sure FOR SURE! It says so in my favorite book. You want me to read it to you? I got it right upstairs in my room.”

  Shea cut in. “How about we read it another time, sweetheart? Breakfast is going to be ready in a couple minutes, and we need the table set if we’re going to eat.”

  From where she stood at the stove, Shea pitched me an apologetic yet graceful smile, because I’d gotten sucked right into the whirlwind that was Kallie Bentley.

  “Okay, Momma.” Kallie climbed down from the chair she was perched on. I tried to keep my attention trained on Shea wearing that robe and the insane body hidden under it, which wasn’t all that safe a subject to concentrate on. It was weird witnessing her here, taken out of the element of the bar, out of the atmosphere of her room last night.

  There? Her skin simmered sex, that storm gathering from beneath the surface, like in the shadows it searched for way to be exposed.

  But here?

  Here she was whimsical and gentle and…and…a mom.

  That fact fucked with my head.

  My gaze slid right back to the little girl who pushed a step stool up against the counter and climbed to the top step. She carefully pulled down four plates from the cabinet above.

  That wasn’t such a safe place for my attention, either, because I kept getting that agitated feeling wind up in my chest as I watched her make her way around the kitchen and back to the table. Her little tongue poked out to the side in concentration, her movements controlled as she focused on setting the obviously vintage purple plates safely at each spot.

  She slid one in front of me and peeked up at me. “There you go, Baz.”

  “Thank you,” I mumbled.

  Shea and April set platters piled high with food on the center of the table. Tender fingers sent chills racing down my spine when Shea fluttered them along the base of my neck, leaning over my shoulder to place a cup filled with steaming coffee down in front of me.

  We all sat down and shared a meal together. And it was relaxed and easy and terrifying.

  I’d been a fool for wanting to lose control with Shea.

  Because I didn’t know how I was going to get it back.

  Arms crossed over my chest, I had my hip propped up against the counter.

  Watching her.

  Shea focused on pushing some buttons on the dishwasher, her attention trained away, intensity billowing around us, that invisible tether stretched taut.

  Almost reluctantly, she stood to face me. Quiet filled her kitchen, the two of us just looking at each other, the water running through the pipes, and our confused breaths the only sound.

  April and Kallie had just left to go to the park, and when they’d gone, it’d stolen all the relative ease. It felt a bit of an olive branch when April had looked at me as if she were making a tough decision, then made a quick glance to Shea, before she’d turned to Kallie and bent her voice in that way women always seemed to do when they talked to little kids.

  “How about a trip to the park?” she’d asked, and Kallie had been all over it, flying up the stairs to her room to get changed and bounding back downstairs in less than two minutes. She’d jumped up and down, the ball of pure energy she was, clapping her hands and squealing, “All ready, Auntie April!”

  Shea had knelt down and hugged her, murmured, “Have a great time, Butterfly,” while she brushed back some of that uncontrolled hair. The kid had gone and flung her arms around my leg, hugging me tight, saying something about me reading to her another time while I’d been completely struck dumb.

  April had paused at the door and looked back at us, eyes narrowed. “Three hours,” she’d warned, obviously giving the two of us some time alone, because she wasn’t immune to the questions swirling between Shea and me, either.

  Now Shea cleared her throat, redness on her cheeks. “I’m going to run upstairs for a minute. Why don’t you wait for me in the living room? The remote’s on the coffee table…it should be easy enough to figure out.”

  “Sure,” I answered, though watching television was the last thing I wanted to do. What I really wanted was to follow her right back up those stairs and go for another round, to see her with the sun shining down around her, lighting up the lush lines of her body while I pounded into the delicious warmth of it.

  Don’t go there, Stone.

  Instead, I trailed her into the living room and watched her jog upstairs and disappear into her room with a quick, unsure glance behind her. I pushed out a strained breath from my lungs, wondering again what in the hell I’d gotten myself into.

  My phone buzzed in my pocket. Turning away, I wandered back into the middle of the living room, pulled out my phone to see who’d texted. I swept my finger across the face and couldn’t help my grin.

  The Keeper.

  Should have known he’d be concerned.

  Hey, asshole. It’s noon and we haven’t heard a word from you. Everything good?

  Nope. I was completely and utterly fucked.

  I tapped out a vague reply to Zee. Yep. Everything is good.

  Immediately it buzzed again. You didn’t come home last night.

  I resisted rolling my eyes. The kid was a sharp one.

  Another text came in right behind the last.

  You with Shea?

  Yeah, I answered.

  Your girl okay?

  My girl. What the fuck? Should have known Zee wouldn’t leave it alone.

  Memories from last night went careening through my head. The way Shea had looked at me when I’d undressed in front of her, seeing beneath all the hard and cold and scarred.

>   My chest tightened, a painful squeeze of my lungs.

  My girl.

  Maybe in another lifetime, if I’d chosen another path, if I’d made a million different choices.

  She was shaken up, but okay, I returned.

  Okay, man, keep us posted.

  Will do.

  Stuffing my phone back in my pocket, I roamed Shea’s living room, looking at the pictures on the walls, the books crammed into the bookshelves, the basket of toys in the corner on the floor.

  Home.

  And I was invading it, putting a blemish on the safety of this place, but I didn’t know how to stop.

  I drifted over to the baby grand. With my index finger, I struck one key. The sound rang through the room, and my ear tilted when that hidden place inside me thrashed, pushing from the inside out.

  Music had always been my peace.

  Drawn, I sat down on the hard bench and my fingers began to move lightly across the keys. Instinctual. I kept my voice barely more than a whisper as I fumbled through the words I’d written for Shea just days before, feeling something bleeding out from within. I got lost in it, in her song and her depth and some kind of fucked-up shame, because I knew I’d done this, was responsible for everything Shea and I were stumbling through. Because I couldn’t find the willpower to stay away.

  She was my weakness.

  I froze when I felt the presence behind me. The song slowly blinked out, the last note lingering in the dense air, before I slowly looked over my shoulder to find Shea. Thoughtful eyes met mine in all their warmth—covering me, pulling me in, dragging me under.

  “You play,” she said, a statement rather than a question.

  “A little,” I said with a shrug.

  She scoffed. “I would hardly classify that as a little.” She shuffled toward me, barefoot, and still wearing that robe. “You have a beautiful voice,” she whispered, and again it took on that reverent tone, like she was recognizing something inside me I didn’t see.

  She ran her fingers up the back of my neck and into my hair, and I lifted my head to it and tried not to moan like a girl when she pressed her hot mouth to my Adam’s apple, kissing me there like the temptress she was.

  “Such a beautiful, beautiful voice for a beautiful, beautiful man.” The words vibrated against my throat.

  “Shea.” My response was hoarse, uttered toward the ceiling as she kissed up and down my throat. With her daughter’s innocent face running like a reel through my mind, I searched inside myself for some kind of resolve. For courage. For a speck of integrity. “I should go. I shouldn’t be here. I shouldn’t have stayed. Shouldn’t have come back.”

  Never should have come in the first place.

  “You’re exactly where I want you to be,” she coaxed against my skin.

  “Shea.” It was a plea for one of us to find reason.

  “Please,” she whispered, hands sinking into my shoulders.

  Weak.

  Weak.

  Weak.

  That’s what she made me.

  Groaning, I gave, because she already had me, and I swiveled a fraction, grabbed her by the hips, and pulled her onto my lap. She was quick to straddle me, a smile taking over her face as I palmed her ass, all those waves of shiny soft hair falling down around us.

  “It’s hardly fair, you know,” she said.

  “What’s not fair?”

  “You…looking the way you do. Then you turn around and have a voice like that? Singing and playing that way?” She pulled back with a grin. “Tell me you don’t play guitar. You know what they say, a man with a guitar automatically becomes ten times sexier than any other guy in the room.”

  I curbed a snort.

  Didn’t I know it.

  And that was exactly the shit I’d come to hate.

  “Pair that with this face and this body…” she continued, purely playful.

  Any other girl started talking like that and I’d have tossed her from my lap.

  Instead, I kneaded my fingers deeper into the flesh of her ass, rocking her into my cock that was at the ready and begging for more.

  Shivers rolled through her. “…and I would say you’re irresistible, Sebastian Stone.”

  “Is that all you want me for…my body?” I teased, running my hands up her back, eliciting a pleasured whimper from her.

  Fingertips played across my chest, and her expression turned vulnerable, that storm collecting speed. “Yeah. I do want this body.” Those fingers fluttered up to my jaw. “And I want this face.”

  Eyes not leaving mine, she slowly leaned down and kissed me over my heart. “Most of all, I want this,” she murmured, hiding nothing, laying herself bare.

  Why is she tormenting us both?

  My lungs pressed full.

  This girl didn’t play games. She knew she could send me running, and she just put it out there.

  “Don’t think I can give you that.” The abraded words scraped from my mouth. “I’ve got so much shit, Shea.” I felt the lines pinch my brow, hoping for her to finally see what I tried to show her last night.

  But that was the thing.

  She’d seen it all, even though she couldn’t make out the details.

  And still, she wanted me.

  “I’m no good for you.”

  Darkness flashed through her eyes, like lightning striking through dense, gray clouds.

  “And I’m no good for you,” she contended, wetting her lips, eyes cast downward before she looked back at me. “People might say I come with baggage. But I will never consider Kallie anything but the gift she is. The most priceless, precious gift.” The confession broke in her throat. “And I have to protect that, Baz. What happened this morning? Her finding us? You make me lose my head.”

  “I know. I’m sorry. I never should have put you in that position. I should have left.”

  A pained sound escaped her. “That’s the last thing I would have wanted. Being with you? Falling asleep in your arms?” She sucked in a breath. “I needed it, Sebastian…I needed you.” She exhaled. “You make me feel like I can breathe.”

  “Then how does this work?”

  “You want it to work?”

  “It won’t,” I bit out, quiet but sharp with implication. “It won’t work,” I reiterated. “But this morning showed me just how fucking impossible it is to let you go. Not while I’m here, in this city with you. I don’t think I can stay away.”

  Hadn’t been able to stay away since the second I saw her. After last night? Wasn’t going to be able to start now.

  She fisted desperate hands in my shirt, eyes racing across my face.

  “I’m going to break you, Shea.”

  I knew it.

  Felt it in my gut.

  “You already have.”

  A growl rumbled in my chest, and I hoisted her up. Piano keys clanked as I propped her up against the shining black.

  Fuck, she looked gorgeous there, hair tumbling over her shoulders, the collar of her robe popping open to reveal the curve of just one breast, the outside of her thighs in my needy hands. I ran them under the hem of the satiny material.

  “You put on underwear.” I faked a pout, and she giggled. That sound was so damned sweet I was sure I’d never grow tired of hearing it, but I knew I’d never get the chance.

  “Figured I’d better cover myself up a little. Someone might get the wrong impression that I’m easy or something.” It was all a self-conscious tease.

  “Nothing easy about you, baby,” I countered soft, sliding my fingers under the edges of the lace clinging to her slender hips and pressing my mouth to the skin between her breasts, catching on to the wild beat of her heart. “Every bit of you is complicated. God, you’ve got me twisted up inside. Every fucking second, thinkin’ about you.”

  If Shea could strip herself bare, then I guessed I owed her a little bit of that, too.

  I nudged the robe open wider, exposing those gorgeous round tits and puckered-up pink nipples. “Look at that. So perfect, S
hea.”

  “You see me,” she whispered, fingers fluttering up to her neck as she tilted her head back, echoing me from last night. And I knew she wanted me to see. To feel.

  Fuck, I did. I fucking did, and it was reckless and dangerous, every move fraught with peril.

  I began to work her panties down her legs. I edged back far enough to drag the lace off one foot, then the other.

  I spread her knees wide, perfect pussy on display.

  My gaze trailed over her where she was propped up on the piano like an angel, one side of her robe draping off a delicate shoulder, tapering down to where the belt was knotted at her waist.

  Or maybe she was the devil with an angel’s face, because this girl was going to destroy me.

  She reached out and cupped my cheek, her expression soft, surrounded by all her light.

  Angel.

  Definitely angel.

  “Gonna fuck you with my mouth, baby.”

  She whimpered, and tremors of anticipation rolled through her.

  I gripped her by the outside of her thighs, holding her open, dragging my tongue from the root of her ass all the way to her clit.

  On a strangled gasp, fingers dove into my hair, yanking hard. “Sebastian.”

  Fuck, that felt good, ’cause I loved it rough, but I was giving this girl all the gentle I could find.

  And I ate her up, tongue lapping between her lips, diving deep.

  She just yanked harder. “Shit.” That throaty rasp spurred me on.

  I teased her opening with a finger, up and down the slick, wet flesh, nipping at that sweet spot that had her writhing with my teeth. I sank two fingers inside and sucked her clit into my mouth.

  Like an earthquake I held in the palms of my hands, she shattered, bursting into a billion unrecognizable pieces. Her entire body shook. She cried out, pressing me closer, pushing me away. And she was chanting my name. Again and again. Like it meant something.

  And I could feel her storm swarming us, taking us whole. Vapors and whispers of her unknown.

  She didn’t take the time to come back down. She slid from the piano and right onto her knees, reaching out for my hand to urge me to stand. I fumbled out from under the piano, lust knotted in my stomach and vibrating in my thighs. I hovered over her, looking down at her while she yanked just as fiercely at my fly as she’d yanked at my hair. She didn’t take her eyes from me as she freed me from the constraints of my underwear.