by K. I. Lynn
It was to make sure she was okay. That was the lie I told myself to assuage the irresponsible motive of keeping her beside me. Slipping my hand in hers, I led her through my condo and into the master bedroom. With my hands on her hips, I directed her to sit on the edge of the bed. I began unzipping her boots, trying to get them off when I felt the warm, tingling sensation of her fingers sweep through my hair.
“So silky,” she murmured.
My eyes closed, and I leaned into her touch, but then pulled away. She was doing it, drawing me in. I couldn’t fall, couldn’t get involved with her any more than I already was. Her small petting only reminded me of how starved I was for affection, how much I wanted it.
Once her boots were off, I lifted her to standing, then worked at getting her skirt off.
“You do know I’m not so drunk that I can’t walk or undress myself, right?” she said with a small giggle.
“Shut up and get in the bed, Delilah,” I commanded. Once she was settled, snuggled into the blanket, I pulled my shirt off and slid under the covers and against her back.
It’d been years since I last slept with someone, but there was no way I was going to let her out of my sight. The warmth of her skin soaked into mine and relaxed me.
How had I forgotten the simple bliss of human contact?
Halfway through the night I awoke, hard, my hips grinding against Lila’s soft ass. It was softer, intimate, but still laced with the intensity that drove our attraction.
When I woke a few hours after that, it was to the sound of crying. I glanced around, trying to find the source as the bed was empty, and found Lila on the floor ten feet away, her arms wrapped around her.
“Lila?” I asked as I jumped out of bed. I looked around, trying to find a reason when a sob broke from her, tearing at me. “Lila?”
I dropped down in front of her, and she flung her arms around my neck. I wrapped my arms around her and pulling her close, my head in the crook of her neck.
“What happened? What happened to you?” she asked.
It clicked, the reason for her outburst. She saw what I kept hidden from everyone—my scars. The evidence that I was a dead man walking, that my heart shouldn’t have been beating.
I tensed, the action pulled her closer, almost using her as an anchor to keep me from crumbling.
“Please, don’t ask me that. Please… I can’t…”
I can’t tell you about what I lost, about why I am the way I am, about why you need to stay away.
The beast growled, but in pain instead of anger, crying out.
I kept her securely wrapped in my arms, keeping her from looking at them again, until her tears subsided. It was a reaction I wasn’t used to from women. Most who caught a glimpse were a mixture of curious, disgusted, and full of a pity I couldn’t stand.
Lila continued to confuse and surprise me. More so when she studied them further, her fingers reaching out to trace the large raised scar that wound around my hip.
I stared at her, completely confounded by her reaction. Leaning down, I caught her bottom lip between my teeth, drawing her attention away from my monstrous appearance.
Her eyes were a strange, beautiful gray and green mixture, and even in the darkness, gave so much away. There was more there, emotions I couldn’t handle, ones that had the power to burn us alive.
“Push me away. You have to.”
“No.”
“Push me away!”
“I can’t!”
Her tears returned, and I rested my forehead against hers. “Why? Tell me why…say it.”
Torture me more.
“Because I want you! I want you so much it hurts! I need all of you, and I can’t deny it anymore.”
Part of me reveled in her confession, but part of me feared it, knowing full well the consequences.
I brushed a strand of hair behind her ear and cupped her face. “I can’t give you what you want, beautiful. I’ll only hurt you.”
She shook her head, her fingers flexing against my skin. “It’s okay. If it’s you, I don’t mind.”
Fuck!
“Stop,” I begged as I held my hands up. “Let’s just go back to bed.”
She paused, then nodded. “Okay…okay.”
I helped her stand, and we climbed back into bed.
A woman was in my arms. A woman who had feelings for me. It wasn’t a good situation, but I didn’t know how much longer I could resist her.
CHAPTER 15
The push and pull was maddening. Not just with Lila, but within myself. I wanted more of her. I wanted more with her, but that was an impossibility. Logically, we could never be anything more than coworkers. The problem was that logic and the will of my cock were two entirely different forces.
Opposite ends playing tug of war while Lila sat next to me, completely oblivious of the battle she created in me. The blame for my mania rested solely on her.
Jesus. Every fucking day was a struggle beyond any struggle I’d ever experienced. Instead of day by day getting better, I fell deeper and deeper into a storm, churning and violent, and I didn’t know how much longer I could hold on.
Lila wasn’t a victim of the storm—she was the storm.
And I hated her for it. I hated the emotions, the way my dick got so fucking hard that I couldn’t keep control over my actions.
She would be my demise.
Guilt crushed me. Every day with Lila was a deeper hole into a dark area that was full of the danger I’d avoided.
It took every ounce of energy to stay away.
We’d crossed the line of just sex. She wanted to be, to continue on with the warped relationship we had evolved into, but I couldn’t.
Still, my dick was constantly hard, the memory of being inside her a driving force of multiple-times-a-day masturbation.
I managed to keep my distance throughout the week, but come the weekend, I failed.
Multiple nights in a row I tried to stay away but ended up at her door. The resulting anger in my failure only served to up the intensity. Everything was harder, needier, and borderline abusive, and it wasn’t all coming from me. She inflamed my sexual deviancy, accelerating an already high sex drive.
Another night of resisting, of sitting alone in my condo willing myself not to go to her. I was going to do it, resist her call.
I sat on the couch, my dick hard, begging to fail again. The urge was great, so I slid my hand into my pants and pulled it out. The head was red, angry, beads of precome leaking out. All I did was think about her, remember her mouth, her pussy wrapped around me, and I was aching for release.
The sound of my doorbell shook me from my thoughts and sent an ice-cold shock through me. It was enough to cool my dick down.
Looking through the peephole I saw her, and a groan rolled through me. It seemed, though I had managed to stay away, she couldn’t.
Fuck.
Why? Why couldn’t I stop this? Why was it so hard to stay away from each other?
“Go away, Delilah,” I said through the door.
She shook her head. Her unmasked eyes were almost lifeless but held an edge of desperation.
“No.”
She needs us.
She shouldn’t.
With a sigh, I twisted the two locks and swung the door open.
“I can't save you,” I said, holding my hands up.
She shook her head. “I'm not looking for a savior.”
“I can't love you.” Definitely not. “So what is it you want?”
Her head tilted slightly to the side, fingers twisting in front of her as her brow scrunched while she contemplated.
Most women would have lashed out at me, but she kept coming back. No matter how many times I tried to push her away, she stared up at me with those beautiful, empty eyes and called to the beast.
“I want you to not stop,” she said.
I blinked at her, stunned. Stopping was necessary for her survival. “I have to.”
She shook her head. “No, you
don't.”
I needed to stop my internal comparisons of her to average women. Lila wasn't and would never be average. I didn't know what happened to her, but I did know it created the tortured, empty soul in front of me.
And the darkness from that was a beautiful pit that my own darkness wanted to crawl into.
“I know you want me as much as I want you,” she said.
Even though her words were said with clarity, they lacked the strength. She wasn’t sure, which was odd to me as I’d pretty much attacked her with how much I wanted her on more than one occasion.
“Want is a passing fling, and it will pass.”
“I don't want it to.”
She stepped forward, a determined look on her face. I blinked down at her, once again surprised by her tenacity. Normally she was so submissive to everyone, wanting approval, clawing at favorable emotions. She placed her palms against my chest, fisting the loose fabric of my T-shirt.
“What are you doing, Lila?” I asked as my heart kicked into high gear, hammering inside my chest.
She pulled on my shirt, yanking me down to her level. Her lips ghosted mine, fucking obliterating my resistance down to a small thread keeping the beast at bay.
“I need you, Nathan.”
A groan left me as I shuddered. Fuck. A few more words and there would be no way to stop myself from taking her to my bed and fucking her until we both passed out.
“I need your body over mine, your cock inside me. I need you to touch me. Bite me. Mark me.”
My cock thumped hard in my pants, barely restrained by my boxer briefs, while my breath picked up.
Fuck, I wanted her, needed her just as badly as she did me.
I reached up and cradled her head in my hands, my fingers fisted in her hair. The last fraying edges that held me back began to snap.
What was it about her? Why couldn’t I stay away?
She was wrecking me, and I reacted like any other animal fighting against their end.
“You’re killing me.”
My lips were on hers, drinking her in like she was an oasis in the desert.
My dreams were often filled with nightmares. Some I remembered, but more often forgotten. Glimpses of memories mixed with horror. It was my wife. Always my wife.
But something shifted one night.
“You’re not helping me, Nate. You’re not helping me. Why aren’t you helping me?” Grace screamed, her body melting, morphing.
I shook, watching as my wife’s blue eyes faded, the hue changing to a familiar gray-green.
Lila.
She looked down, her hands rising. They were covered in red, her face pale. “So much blood,” she said, then collapsed to the ground.
I sat straight up in bed, gasping for breath. Sweat covered my face. A scream filled my ears, and as the room came into focus, I realized it was me. My whole body shook, a wave of nausea rolling through me.
I swung my legs over the edge of the bed and fumbled for the switch on the bedside lamp. It was blinding, but necessary as I pulled open the drawer and dug through the bottles. As the names passed by, I became more and more frustrated. I was tempted to take them all when finally I found the name I was looking for—Xanax.
The pills inside were small, and I emptied a few onto my palm before tossing them in my mouth. I’d perfected taking pills without a drink, and the smaller ones were easy to do.
My nightmares had shifted, and it was no longer the woman I was missing, but the woman that I had.
The bed bounced a little and I quickly shut the drawer. She sat beside me as I tried to calm down. The problem was, I couldn’t. It was overpowering.
Why was it Lila?
I jumped at the feel of her hand cupping my face. Her eyes were filled with worry, and I leaned into her hand. I needed the soothing, but more importantly, the reminder that she was fine. That she was alive.
“Ssshhh,” she soothed as she brushed strands of hair that were stuck to my sweat-covered forehead. “It’s all right, baby. Everything’s all right.”
I pressed my lips to hers, needing the connection, to feel her. We lay back down, and I wrapped my arms around her, ducking my head into the crook of her neck. I needed to keep her safe. Protected.
She ran her fingers through my hair, and it didn’t take long for her to lull me back to sleep.
CHAPTER 16
Keeping my dick out of Lila was quickly becoming a complete joke. Between the teasing, I took any excuse and opportunity to get inside her. After shoving my cock down her throat at the office, I was hating us both for my lack of control.
I kept a cool disregard toward Lila as we entered our building. It was necessary after what I’d done. Sure, it was after hours, but I’d still lost control at the office again.
Though there was no way I regretted having my cock down her throat or the way I came with her nose pressed against my abs. She deserved it for teasing me.
As we entered the elevator, I made sure to punch the button for my floor along with Lila’s. When the doors closed, I was left with no moving air and her so close. I could almost feel her looking at me, and when I glanced at her, that wide-eyed, blank expression stared back, only this time with a bit of expectation.
I needed to tell her it wasn’t going to happen, that we needed to stop, that I wasn’t going to break and she shouldn’t either. All of that was decimated by my fucking stomach. How a stomach could make a high-pitched sound and turn into a gurgling rumble, I’d never know. The wonders of the human body. It was especially loud echoing off the metal walls of the elevator.
Lila giggled. “Hungry, are we?”
The tension fell from me, and my lips twitched up. “Maybe just a little.”
The elevator slowed and pinged, then the doors slid open. She stepped off and turned, her hand extended.
“Come.”
Come where? On her? With her? “Lila, I…”
“Have dinner with me. Come.”
I shook my head. “You don’t have to cook for me.”
“Well, I have to do it for me, and it’s usually enough to feed four. So, come.”
I stared at her hand as I contemplated her offer. If I went with her, I knew there was no stopping me from fucking her. Acceptance equaled sex, pure and simple. It may have been an offer of food, but it was also an invitation for so much more. What lay in the more was what worried me. Sex wasn’t all Lila wanted from me.
The doors started to close, and I made the decision that could be the beginning of my destruction, all because I couldn’t stay away from her.
I followed her down the hall, and resisted the urge to touch her while she unlocked her door. Thankfully, with seconds before I just grabbed her and pinned her against the door, she got it open and stepped inside, ushering me to follow.
“So, how long have you lived in Indianapolis?” she asked as she disappeared into the master bedroom.
I wasn’t sure getting to know the details of each other’s lives was a good thing, but what could a few generic answers hurt?
“My whole life, with the exception of college. What about you?” I asked as I pulled my jacket off, followed by my tie.
“Indiana native, born and bred,” she admitted. “I moved to Indy just before college and stayed. No reason to return anyway. Not much demand for lawyers in the middle of nowhere.”
Her entire life in a few miles’ circle? With what little I knew about her I began to wonder if she’d ever left the state.
“You didn’t go out of state for law school?”
We moved into the kitchen, and I watched her chest expand before a sigh escaped. “No. Too much to pay out of state tuition. I’ll be paying off my school debts for another few years as it is. Even with my grants.”
“Yeah, I don’t have those. My parents paid for my undergrad and Harvard Law.”
“Wow. How was Harvard?”
“Hard,” I chuckled. “And the east coast… That is an experience. Very different from here.”
“You know, that mask of yours is slipping a lot lately.”
I stared at her before shrugging my shoulders, my smile fading. “There’s no point in the pretense around you.”
Not with all we’d been through the prior weeks.
“But I still don’t know your secrets,” she said as she rifled through the fridge.
“No, but you know there are secrets. That’s much more than anyone else. It’s nice not to have to always pretend everything’s perfect.”
Less fucking exhausting, even with as dangerous as it was to get close enough to someone for them to see.
“So, why pretend, then?”
“It makes things easier.” I reached up and rubbed at my neck. Her questions were getting a little too in depth, too close to me. “It didn’t take long to learn that after… People don’t really want to know that your knee and wrist ache every day, your body hurts in ways you can’t describe, that you’re plagued by migraines and nightmares, or your depression and anxiety continue years later.”
Fuck.
It just spilled from me, part in agitation and part because I had a feeling out of everyone I knew, she might be the only one to understand. Nobody understood, but from what I’d learned about Lila, I knew there was so much she kept hidden. Whether for emotional stability and protection or just trying to fit in, Lila’s charade was just as orchestrated as my own.
“What about you?”
Her spine straightened almost imperceptibly. “What about me?”
There was no way I was going to let her play that fucking game after what I just told her. “You really want to play that game? Do you want me to say it?”
“No,” she whispered.
“Why, then?”
She let out a huff, her face scrunched as she set a can of pasta sauce down a little hard on the counter. “The same. It’s easier to say I’m fine then go into detail about how I put out a confident front, but inside I’m holding the darkness at bay and one word can send it crashing down.”
One word?
Those two little words confirmed some of my suspicions. Verbal abuse was rampant in her life at one time, probably her childhood.
