by Lyric James
Shit.
Shit.
I see beneath all of it, Stella.
A disconcerting shadow clouded her senses, taunted her very being. She squeezed her eyes shut. He didn’t know her. Hell, she didn’t know herself anymore. The behavior she exhibited this weekend wasn’t who she was. She didn’t engage in one-night stands. Stella’s mother did that. A quiver coiled through her stomach like a snake. “We need to… I need to get back to work.”
Bile rose in her throat, and she pressed a closed fist against her mouth. Would she even be able to stand seeing Ian again after the weekend was over? He’d made no promises to her. Even on the beach he’d told her nothing was wrong with just wanting someone for one night, one encounter. The only reason he was in the attic with her was because he’d promised her he’d help her out if she spent some time with him. After tonight, he had no reason to see her again.
Ian came up behind her and lightly gripped her shoulders.
She shook him off with a violent shudder. “Don’t touch me.”
He dropped his hands and stepped back, rocking the rickety table again before he picked it up and set it aside. “Stella. What’s wrong?”
Rounding on him, she balled her fists and felt each and every nail as it bit into the center of her palms. “Look, you got what you wanted, okay? I had sex with you, and you paid me back with a couple of hours of manual labor. You don’t have to pretend anymore. Your duties are done. Go back downstairs, enjoy the rest of the weekend, and leave me alone.”
When his body flinched back slightly, she knew she’d delivered a blow he wasn’t expecting, but it didn’t stop her tirade. “What did you expect? That I was going to fall all over you like the rest of the women who’ve had the pleasure of having Ian Hollis in their bed?” She pointed to her chest. “Well, I’m not one of them. So get over yourself.” She whipped around and blindly rummaged through another trunk.
“Whoa. Where is this coming from?”
Stella ignored him as she sorted, tears dripping out of her eyes, splattering silently on the blankets she knew she couldn’t use in her store.
“Stella.”
The fire in his voice singed her back, but she kept sorting until he yanked her up and made her face him.
“What is wrong with you?” he asked, gripping her shoulders.
“Nothing,” she muttered, wiggling away from his touch. She moved to a chest of drawers behind him she hadn’t yet gone through yet.
“Yes. There is. What did I do to deserve this…diatribe?”
He didn’t turn her around again, thank goodness, or he’d be able to see how much his touch, his tender words, affected her. Stella’s heart thudded in her chest while heat flashed like a lit fuse inside her. Air whooshed out of her lungs, and her shoulders drooped. “Just go, Ian. Please.”
“Not yet,” he whispered in her ear, air tickling the outer ridge.
The urge to push back against him, rub her butt across his crotch, inundated her. It had been less than twenty four hours and she’d already become a wanton, someone she didn’t even recognize. One minute she was this dedicated staid professional, free of men in her life. Seconds ago she was a snarling pit bull ready to tear away a piece of flesh. The next moment, she wanted Ian to bury himself inside her.
What in the world was wrong with her?
Even though her back was to him, she recalled in vivid detail everything about him. Just how intensely green his eyes were. The faded scar on his right hip she’d slid her tongue across all the while wondering what he’d done to receive it. And when he smiled at her, that slow sexy smile, a dimple crinkled in his chin.
Everything about him made her panties wither inside her shorts.
And it was as if Ian sensed her weakness, her need for him.
“What are you so afraid of?”
Everything she wanted to say. No, there was no denying her attraction to Ian. She knew that now. Didn’t understand it, but understood she had no choice but to accept it. He pulled her back so his cock ground against her ass, his fingers digging into her hips.
“Tell me you don’t want this.”
She didn’t.
She did.
Stella wanted his touch badly, even though deep down she knew it was a mistake.
His tongue slid across her neck, over her shoulder where he bit down, and she gasped. The erotic, fleeting touch made her insides prickle, her breasts tighten, and her toes curl inside her freaking sensible shoes. Tipping her chin back, she rested her head on his shoulder as his warm breath coasted over her face.
“Tell me you don’t want me inside you right now. Tell me, Stella, and I’ll stop.”
His mouth pressed against her neck, and his teeth took a brazen bite. The combination of pleasure and pain caused a dangerous flare of longing inside her. Ian’s hands slid down her arms, gripped her wrists, and brought them behind her back.
“There are so many naughty things I want to do with you,” he growled, tightening his grip.
Stella moaned a protest and tugged against the confinement. Yet, when his hand slid around to cup her, unzip her shorts, a hot rush sluiced through her.
No. “We need to… I need to get finished,” she panted.
It was a miniscule sound, a tiny wisp, the slow slide of her zipper going down, but her urge to struggle diminished when his fingers reached inside her panties, slid lower, and felt the wetness she wished wasn’t there.
“Tell me to stop.”
She was incapable of uttering a word. All she could do was widen her stance and allow him entrance. Without pausing, his hand slipped along the rim of her soaked panties, back and forth before he dipped under and slid his fingers between her slippery folds. She bucked her hips and clamped her wet pussy around him, crying out. “Oh yes.”
The moment turned wild and wicked in seconds as her hips jerked backward, seeking more of the dark pleasure he offered. This was what she wanted, God help her. She couldn’t stop him now. This night would be her only chance to let go, be somebody different. A shudder rippled across her skin and heat curled through her center, up into her belly. She was absolutely drenched, coating his hand.
She couldn’t deny it anymore. She’d been attracted to Ian since the first moment she saw him. She’d fantasized about him, wondered what it would be like to be at the mercy of his wickedness.
“You are mine, Stella. All mine.” His voice was harsh with desire and his other arm tightened around her waist. “Tell me what you want,” he commanded as he stroked her wet skin, sliding the pad of his thumb across her clit with increased frequency.
She groaned as he circled her clit, over and over, and she writhed, enjoying the sensation, but abruptly, he let her go and stood back. When she turned to face him, his arms were rigid at his sides, his chest heaving beneath his shirt.
“I won’t touch you again unless you tell me what you want, until you admit you want me.”
“Ian,” she murmured, shaking her head, her heart kicking up staccato beats in her chest. Lust turned to shame when she realized what he wanted her to say. Stella didn’t talk dirty or say crude words. She barely cursed. “Don’t make me…”
“Say it, Stella. Tell me what you want. And I don’t mean in this attic. What do you want tomorrow? Next week? Next month?”
Fuzzy, incoherent thoughts skittered around in her mind. She didn’t understand what he was saying. “I…we…agreed to a one-night stand. What is this?” She pivoted around and adjusted her clothes.
Ian came up behind her. She could feel his breath on her neck. The heat of it sent shivers down her spine. “I didn’t agree to anything, Stella. I wanted you to spend some time with me.”
She shifted. He was too close. She busied herself, checking and rechecking the labels he’d put on some of the boxes she wanted picked up and delivered to her shop. When she saw a mistake he made, she found another one and began to fix it. Edging the plastic backing off the label, she carefully affixed it on top of the old one, caring a littl
e too much to detail, that it was exactly covering the one he’d placed on the box from corner to corner with no overlay. The thought of looking into his face, gazing into his eyes, put a sour taste in her mouth. “And I did. What else do you want from me?”
Ian took her wrist and turned her to face him. “I want more than that. I want to see you tomorrow, and the next day, next week. I want to come to your store and explore it, sit with you. I want to see pictures of you with your grandmother. I want to fly you to Paris and take you to dinner. I want everything, Stella, but you have to tell me you want the same thing.”
Everything Ian felt was expressed clearly on his face. She didn’t see a hidden agenda there or deception. But fear rippled along her nerve endings like ants digging through the surface. This wasn’t what she expected. He wasn’t supposed to want this. He wasn’t supposed to want…forever.
Moving back slightly, she shook her head. Her mind fought to catch up with what he was saying, scrambled to understand. A nervous laugh escaped. “And what, I’m supposed to believe you want a relationship…commitment…to one woman?”
“Is that so hard to believe?” he asked with an emotion-choked voice.
Heaven help her, she wanted to believe him, in him. What he said filled her heart with a combination of elation, trepidation, and mystification. How could this gorgeous man want forever with her? “We barely know each other.”
“And whose fault is that? Every time I came near you, you rejected me. You never gave me a chance.”
Of course, he was right. All she’d ever seen was a playboy. That’s all she ever allowed herself to see. Until tonight.
“I never only wanted one night, Stella. That’s what you assumed.”
Girl, you better grab that man while you can.
Honey, I’d be all over a man like that in a hot second.
Lighten up, Stella. You’re acting just like your grandmother.
Don’t come out of your room tonight, little girl. Momma’s got a hot date.
Gritting her teeth, she shook the horrible images of her mother words out of her head. She was not her mother. She was not her mother. And she wouldn’t fall for his lies.
“I can’t. I won’t,” she moaned on a sob. Sidestepping Ian, she staggered to the steps on leaden feet.
“Stella, wait. Please,” he yelled and grabbed for her, but she shook him off, stumbled and as she did. She lost her balance and fell into darkness.
* * * * *
Stella felt as if someone had sewn her eyelids together with needle and thread, then placed ten pound weights on top of her head. With considerable effort, she opened them to slits and saw aching, blinding white. White ceiling, white walls, and white sheets. Where the hell was she?
A monotonous creaking sound, back and forth, back and forth came from her right. Low hushed voices and the repeated beep, beep, beep of a bell registered in a far off place.
Someone was humming. As she tilted her head to the right, fire raced up her neck and she squeezed her eyes shut, blowing out short, sharp breaths. She attempted the movement again, this time more slowly, and when she did, cinnamon wafted into her nostrils and it made her smile, although it probably looked like a grimace on her face.
“Grandma,” she said.
The creaking stopped, and the wonderful flavor got closer. “My baby,” she said. Stella felt a feather light graze over her forehead. “You scared me to death. Why in the world were you running from that man?”
The cobwebs in her brain tightened around a memory she couldn’t bring to the surface.
“He loves you. I don’t think he’d harm the hair on the backside of a fly.”
She reached up to take her grandmothers withered hand but couldn’t move. “I can’t…what’s...where am I?”
“Visiting, I hope. You can’t stay here, child. Oh…it’s a wonderful place, but you’re not ready for this yet. You haven’t given me any grandbabies yet.”
Here? Where was here? Stella tried to open her eyes a little more, but the pounding behind her lids made it so difficult she slid back into darkness.
* * * * *
“Stella. Come on, sweetie. Wake up.”
Her lids fluttered, so much so she felt the feather light wisps of her eyelashes on her face.
“That’s it. Come on. Open your eyes all the way. You can do it.”
This time, the voice came from her right side, and she shifted her head toward it. When they came open, she was staring at Dayna who was crouched beside the bed.”
“There you go. What are you trying to do? Scare us half to death?” she asked and rubbed her arm.
Stella shook her head as heat began to form behind her eyes.
“It’s okay, sweetie,” Harper said and brushed the back of her hand down her cheek. “We’re here. It’s okay.”
“What happened?” Stella asked. The memories were clouded inside her brain.
“You fell out of the attic. It was crazy. One minute I was walking out of the kitchen with Blake, and the next you were tumbling down from nowhere. I thought Ian was going to have a heart attack he flew down those steps so fast.”
Stella shifted her gaze around the room.
He wasn’t there.
“Where?” She cleared her throat just as Violet stepped into the room with two Styrofoam cups. “Where’s Ian?”
Violet paused. Dayna and Harper exchanged glances.
Dayna responded after she took the cup Violet gave her. “He was here, but he left when the doctors said you were going to be okay.”
She swallowed hard and wanted to press her fist to her lips as her stomach clenched. Instead, she stared down at the end of the bed at her toes sticking out from under the covers. He hadn’t cared enough to stay and talk to her. “I guess I’ll see him at the house when I get back.”
“Well, honey…” Harper hesitated.
Stella looked at each one of them in turn.
“He actually… He’s on his way back to Miami,” said Dayna.
A tear slid down her cheek. Several memories from the night swept down on her like a tidal wave.
It had all been a lie.
She should have known. How could she be so stupid? Listening to her first instinct was always what Stella did when it came to her life and her career, and she ignored all of it when it came to Ian Hollis. She scooted up in the bed and swiped at her face. “Fine. Whatever.”
She attempted to swing her legs to the side of the bed, but Violet stopped her. “Whoa, honey. Not so fast.”
“When can I get out of here?” Her left eye began to twitch, and she crossed her arms.
Dayna took her hands and gently squeezed. “Talk to me. Tell me what happened.”
She made herself take in a slow, steady breath and gave Dayna a brittle smile. “Nothing. I’m just ready to leave.”
Her friend didn’t back down. “What happened between you and Ian?”
“Nothing.” She would give away nothing. Absolutely nothing. No one would hear how she humiliated herself this weekend over Ian Hollis by having a one-night stand with him. It turned out she was just like the rest of them. All the women who flung themselves at him. But she was dumb enough to fall for his lies. She shook her head. “I’m fine.”
“No, you’re not. And he’s not either. He raged at the paramedics, the emergency room nurses, the doctors, pacing up and down the hall for hours until they told him you were all right. Then, he just up and left. The only person he talked to was Blake,” Dayna said glaring up at Harper. “But he’s not giving up anything.”
Harper held up her hands. “Look, I tried. He wouldn’t tell me a thing.”
Dayna implored her, her gaze zeroed in, not wavering. “Spill,” she insisted.
Stella shook her head. “It was nothing.”
“You’re lying. I watched the two of you on the beach and when you came back into the house and when you disappeared into your room for a couple of hours. Plus he was up in the attic with you all evening. There’s something there.
I know it.”
So, she wouldn’t be able to keep her humiliation to herself. The thought of it made bile rise in her throat. She allowed her gaze to scan each one of their faces. They were her friends. Her best friends. If she couldn’t confide in them, who could she confide in?
Ian.
No! Not true. Not true. He’d be here if that were true.
Violet sat beside her on the bed. “Honey, you’ve been fighting your attraction to Ian since the first time you laid eyes on him. And he’s been trying to sway you in his direction from the moment he saw you. What’s up? What happened tonight?”
Stella sank back against the pillows and covered her face. “I had sex with Ian.”
Harper grabbed her hands and pulled them down. “What?” Disbelief clouded her voice. They knew her, everything about her, and doing something this reckless wasn’t something she ever did.
“You had sex with Ian?” Violet asked.
She kept her chin pressed against her chest and squeezed her eyes shut. “Yes.”
“Hold up. You go from stay away from me to jump my bones in one night? You, Stella?”
Sliding her feet to the floor, she crossed the room and stood at the window. Street lights lit up the half-empty parking lot. She saw an ambulance race toward the emergency room entrance. It was hot outside, but the trees planted in pillars at the end of each parking row blew in the breeze. She placed the palm of her hand against the cool glass of the window.
“I just wanted to experience it one time, you know? Be reckless, wild. I told myself I could have a one-night stand with Ian and then it would be over. No hard feelings.” She turned to face her friends. “But he tried to turn it into something else.”
They were all sitting on the edge of the hospital bed now, facing her. The looks of shock and bewilderment on their faces were almost comical. She loved them so.
“What do you mean? Turn it into what?” Dayna asked.
“You know,” she said, hunching her shoulders. “He has feelings for me? He tried to push me into a relationship, to admit I had feelings for him. He wants today, tomorrow, next month.” She gave an involuntary shudder. “But this is Ian, right? How can I believe that? The man goes through women like water in a spigot.” She began to pace, traipsing a trail from one side of the room back to other. “I wanted to believe him. I did. But…but…”
