by M. Pierce
Understanding dawned on Matt’s face. A smile moved his lips. My heart thumped, and I felt his beat harder against my chest.
“You remember our word?” he whispered.
I nodded. He meant our safe word, peaches, which I chose not long after we moved in together. Matt worried peaches might sound too much like please, but I wanted peaches, and so it was peaches.
Besides, I never needed the word. Not yet.
“Say it,” he murmured.
“Peaches.” I tried to pull out of his arms. They tightened around me and I gasped.
“Run away,” he whispered in my ear. “Make this good for me, Hannah. Make me believe you don’t want it. Fight me.”
He gave me a push and I stumbled into the wall. My purse fell.
I was viscerally reminded of Seth’s force, and of Nate with his black hair. This hour is dreamlike, Matt once said when I arrived at the cabin, and nothing feels real in this light. I understood as we faced off in the condo. Nothing feels real. The light goes out. We can be whatever we want to be.
I sprinted past Matt, my boots sliding on the hardwood.
The bitter taste of panic coated my tongue.
My night picked up where it left off at the mall. I was being chased. A stranger wanted me. He wanted to touch me in the most intimate way, and I wouldn’t let him.
I flew into the office and locked the door. Papers rustled in the dark. I never worked in this room, never sat in this room. The memory of Matt lived here.
I crouched in a ball behind the desk, my breasts pressed into my knees.
And I waited.
In the silence, I heard the loud rush of my breath and hammering heart.
“Come out, come out,” Matt called, “wherever you are.”
His voice echoed eerily through the condo. His footfalls sounded in the hall.
I scooted under the desk.
He tried the knob—lightly at first, then harder, the brass rattling.
He pressed against the door. “In here, is it?”
Then came a long, weighted silence, and a crack like a shot. I yelped and scrambled out from under the desk. The door hung open at a slant. Matt stood in the frame rubbing his shoulder. When he saw me, his eyes widened.
I leapt past him.
He caught me, and the air burst out of my lungs. We went down struggling.
I didn’t need to remember Matt telling me to fight him. I felt real fear—cold terror.
I twisted onto my stomach on the floor and scrabbled at the wood, but I couldn’t crawl away. Matt pinned me with his body. His strong legs locked against mine, and with one powerful hand he held down my neck. Air whistled through my windpipe.
“There you are,” he crooned. “Ready for me now?”
I kicked and spat. I clawed at the arm holding me down. With his free hand, Matt yanked up my sweater dress. He squeezed my breast through the cup of my bra.
Unbidden desire wet my thong.
“No,” I moaned, and a low thrill went through me. “Stop!”
“Your tits feel good,” Matt growled in my ear.
He squeezed harder, fondling me with his hand trapped between my chest and the floor. He pushed up my bra and pinched my nipples.
I rasped.
Fuck, that felt good …
Matt’s hand dove down the back of my leggings, between my legs, inside my thong. I squirmed furiously. I was practically humping the floor, slamming my ass against Matt and driving my hips into the wood, and the motion played right into his hands—literally.
He poised two fingers at my entrance; I jammed my sex onto them and cried out.
“Stop!” My voice was hoarse.
On some level, I knew that Jamie might hear us from her condo, but I didn’t care. I screamed bloody murder while Matt laughed and fingered me.
He told me I must want it. He told me how wet I was.
I writhed on his fingers, trying to get away and succeeding only in stimulating myself.
The pressure of Matt’s body lifted. I had a moment. A moment to move. I gave a great push. Matt’s fingers, though, were hooked over my leggings and thong, and when I lunged forward, the fabric dragged down my thighs.
The cool air of the condo hit my bare ass. I moaned.
Matt pounced on me. He wound my hair around his hand and yanked.
The skin of my inner thighs was slippery with lust, and though I squeezed my legs together tight, I felt the head of Matt’s cock pressing between them.
Damn … I wasn’t the only one enjoying this.
I closed my eyes and panted. “Please. No…” God, but it felt good to say no. Why?
“Shhh,” he whispered. “You see how hard I am? Now, where do you want it?”
Between my clenched thighs, Matt’s cock felt larger than ever. It throbbed and I groaned. My arms were sore. I couldn’t catch my breath.
If this were real, would I give up the fight? I felt exhausted, and Matt wasn’t even winded. His superior strength overruled me.
“Where?” he taunted. He nudged his cock against my pussy and then up, toward my ass. My breath caught. “If you don’t say your pussy, I’ll put it in your ass.”
“No, no…”
“Say it.”
“My pussy,” I whispered.
Matt penetrated me in one thrust. My body tightened, resisting the invasion, and my low, humiliated moan cut away when he wrapped a hand around my neck. My eyes rolled. My nostrils flared. Fuck … this felt amazing.
Matt moved against me ruthlessly, and he whispered yes, yes … God, yes, lost in his private ecstasy. I stopped struggling. I saw spots, white and yellow. Matt hadn’t undressed; he’d only freed his cock. The zipper on his jeans scraped my thigh. Our bodies slapped together and thumped against the floor. I lapped at his palm. I was close, so close.
“It’s over,” he groaned. “Just lie here and take it. It’s over baby, it’s over.”
He was right.
I came—a spasm that squeezed Matt’s hardness, then pushed with equal force—and made a sticky mess on the floor. My pleasure was a throaty howl.
“Fuck!” he snarled. “Ah—I’m coming, Hannah, Hannah—” As he sometimes liked to do, Matt pulled out and jerked off, and he came on my bottom.
I felt his pleasure dripping down my crack. It trickled over my swollen pussy.
We lay together on the floor collecting our wits.
I caressed Matt’s face and he checked me over for scrapes.
A moment ago, he was convincing in his force. Now he was convincing in his gentle concern. I didn’t ask myself which was the real Matt. People are light and dark.
“Who knew?” he murmured, kissing my throat. “You like it so rough, Hannah.”
“I didn’t know until today. Hey, you like it, too…”
“Mm, you noticed.” He smiled and pulled me to my feet, rolling my leggings back up and smoothing my sweater back down. When he saw my wet spot on the floor, his smile turned to a satisfied smirk. “You really enjoyed it…”
“Is that horrible?”
“Not horrible. It wasn’t real. It’s not real.” Matt tucked my head under his chin and stroked my hair. “It’s a fantasy, and you trust me, don’t you?”
I nodded. With the euphoria of orgasm still moving through me, it was easy to forget my troubles: Nate, Seth, and the fact that Matt had risked everything by taking a cab here.
“What we do in our bed is no one’s business,” he said.
“On our floor,” I mumbled.
He laughed, the sound purring in his chest. “Yes, on our floor, too. Behind closed doors.”
I grinned impishly. “Behind broken doors.”
At that, we dissolved into laughter. We inspected the office door. One of the barrel hinges was loose, torn out of the frame. The mechanism inside the knob was busted.
“Oops.” Matt jiggled the knob. His eyes were bright, his expression amused and apologetic. Sheepish Matt … so fucking adorable.
“Baby, did �
�� did you use your shoulder?”
He glanced at me. “Mm. I was feeling manly. Should have used my foot…”
“Oh, sweetheart.” I ruffled his hair.
“I’ll fix it. Tomorrow or something.” He took my hand and we went through the condo closing blinds. When we were sure no one could see in, I turned on a lamp in the living room. Laurence dashed back and forth in his hutch.
“He’s excited to see you.” I smiled.
“He’s fat and he wants a treat.” Matt fed raisins through the wire mesh.
More Matt adorableness: pretending he didn’t love that rabbit to death.
I sat on the couch and watched Matt prowl around the condo. He glared at everything. He studied the plants and books, opened the kitchen cupboards, looked through the fridge.
“Feels good to be here,” he announced.
“You look good here, Matt.” I worried a pill on my sweater. “Like you belong here.”
“Don’t I look good everywhere?” At last, he returned to me. He wore a small self-deprecating smile. He knelt at my feet and pushed apart my knees. He rubbed my thighs and stared up at me. Beautiful, I thought. Larger than life. Matt filled the rooms of our condo with his anger and his electricity. Did everyone see that, or did I see it because I loved him?
I covered his hands with mine.
“Matt, did you seriously take a cab all the way out here?”
“Mm. Don’t worry, Hannah.” He produced a hat and sunglasses from his coat pocket. A scarf dangled around his neck. “I wore my disguise.”
I sighed and laughed.
“I feel like a spy.” He grinned.
Matt continued massaging my thighs, pushing my dress higher and higher. He looked good on his knees, and I was exhausted, so I let it go. If Matt wanted to take a cab from the cabin to Denver, I couldn’t stop him. He couldn’t be stopped.
The tempo of his hands changed. His expression sobered. Subtle changes I recognized.
I slid off the couch and onto the floor with him. I touched the front of his jeans. Beneath my fingers, his cock twitched and expanded. He exhaled softly.
“Hannah…”
I grasped a handful of his hair so that I could hold his head steady. I didn’t want him hiding his face against my neck. I wanted to watch his eyes, his mouth.
His lips parted as I touched the shape of him. His arousal grew.
“Lift your shirt,” I whispered.
Matt complied. In rare moments, he let me call the shots. He gathered his coat and T-shirt up his chest, and I leaned in to flick my tongue over his nipples.
His cock strained into my hand. Now I could grip it through his jeans and boxers, a taut prison of fabric. I handled him gently as I sucked on his nipple. He began to tremble, but he wouldn’t ask me to stop. So proud. I knew how sensitive his nipples were. Almost too sensitive, he told me once. I bit down and pulled on his other nipple. He hissed. His cock tightened.
“H-Hannah. Take it out…”
“Look at it with me,” I whispered. I tongued saliva over his nipples and lifted my head. His expression was tense—jaw clenched, brows knit, nostrils flared. He nodded and my fingernails scraped against his scalp. I wouldn’t let him go. I wouldn’t let him hide.
While Matt held his jacket, exposing his toned abs and chest, I undid his jeans and tugged at his boxers until his cock sprang free. He sighed again and closed his eyes. If he were given to blushing, I think he would have blushed then.
“Matt, I love it,” I said. I palmed his smooth sac and he groaned. “Please, don’t close your eyes. Look at it with me. I miss you. I miss this.”
His eyelids lifted partway. He watched my hand and his erection, which stood out like a ramrod between us. The golden hair around the base was neatly trimmed. Here, even here, Matt was beautiful. The skin of his shaft was velvet, subtly veined, and thick and long. It ended in the sleek bell of his head, which leaked cum at the slightest attention.
I watched the fluid gather on his tip.
“Look,” I said. I trailed my hand up his shaft to his head and rolled my thumb over it, smearing the cum. He trembled. I brought my thumb to my mouth and spread Matt’s desire like gloss on my lips. I licked them clean while he watched.
Again, I gathered his cum on the pad of my finger. I rubbed it on his nipple and he moaned. “Hannah, enough.”
I wanted to jack him off and watch him while I did it, but Matt wanted to be inside me again. My hold over him broke. He dropped his shirt and took my hand. He rose unsteadily.
Without a word, he led me to our bedroom.
Chapter 28
MATT
On Saturday evening, Hannah dressed in a black-and-white skirt suit for the release party. I tied a silk scarf around her neck to hide my love bites. We’d been in bed almost nonstop since my impromptu arrival, emerging only to bathe and eat.
And the sex was different—tinged with violence. Hannah struggled every time, and I fucked her hard while she begged me to stop. It gave me a terrible thrill.
“Why do you have to go so early?” I pulled her into my arms. “It’s my book you’re celebrating. I should have some say in this.”
I kissed her neck and cupped her ass. She wriggled against my hands. Such a tease.
“Because,” she said with a sigh, “I promised Pam I’d help set up, like I said. Several times.”
“Let me look at your ass.” I turned Hannah around and bit the back of her neck. I tucked her bottom against my groin. “You wouldn’t leave me alone with a hard-on, would you?”
“I might.” She grinned over her shoulder. “Lube’s in the bedside table.”
“You’re a bad bird.”
We fooled around halfheartedly, and then Hannah left. I was instantly miserable.
I wandered the condo, trying to comprehend Hannah’s life apart from me. Nothing looked different. There was her yoga mat, her exercise ball, a few manuscripts from work. The rooms were tidy. I found leftovers from various meals in the fridge.
I checked the wall safe. Everything was in order: the cash, her TracFone, the unit cards.
Hannah’s life went on without me.
I peeked through the blinds at Denver by night. The shops were lit. I saw friends barhopping and heard car horns honking. People rushing to their Saturday evening plans.
And me with nothing to do, dead to everyone but Hannah. And Melanie … my “cab.”
I called her.
“’Sup, Cabin Fever? Hey, can I call you that?”
I sneered. The new nickname was too apropos.
“Checking in,” I said.
“Uh-huh…”
“Mm, can you blame me? You’re alone in a new city, twenty-two, prone to doing very illegal things on the Internet.”
“And you’re bored and lonely,” Mel said.
“What? No.” Yes.
“I know Hannah’s at the release party. You told me, Matt.”
“I’m not bored. I’m home on a Saturday night. I thought you might be bored.”
“Sure.” Mel chuckled. She was silent for a while, and then she clicked her tongue. “I’ll pick you up in a few minutes, okay? I am pretty bored, come to think.”
“I want to be back by eight.” I think Mel knew she was doing me a favor, and I didn’t care. “And don’t meet me out front. I’ll go out back.”
“Fine.”
“Fine.” I hung up.
I killed time cleaning Laurence’s hutch, then bundled up in my coat, hat, scarf, and sunglasses, and slipped out of the complex by the back exit. Mel’s Corolla idled at the corner.
I climbed in. “The color of this car, it’s like a neon sign. Ridiculous.” I was trying not to smile. The condo wasn’t home anymore, not without Hannah, and it felt good to escape.
“Whoa, what happened to you?”
“Hm?” I adjusted my sunglasses. After wrestling with Hannah over the last two days, I looked a little worse for wear. She’d inadvertently elbowed my eye, purpling the orbit. A bruise darken
ed my jaw. Scratches lined my neck and I had hickies and other bruises all over my body. Hannah had a few marks, too, but no black eye, thank God. “Fight club,” I mumbled.
“Tough love.” Mel sighed. “Lucky girl.”
“Drive.”
“Okay, yeesh.” She pulled away from the condo. “Wanna … watch TV? I’ve got HBO at the hotel. I have a deck of cards, too.”
I glanced at Mel as she navigated Denver. She was a good driver, confident on unfamiliar roads. She didn’t make one wrong turn during the two-hour drive from the cabin.
Tonight, she’d straightened her red hair. It was thick and glossy like shampoo commercial hair. She wore a tight puffy vest and a hooded sweater beneath, the hood fur-trimmed. Fur again. She owned a jacket with fur and furry boots.
“You like fur,” I said.
“Profound observations from the late great author. So, the hotel?”
“No. I don’t think we should … be in your hotel room.”
“Oookay. Even though we’re staying at the cabin together?”
“The cabin is different.”
“Am I too tempting, Mr. Sky?” She flipped her hair. I snorted. “I’m kidding, kidding. I’ve seen Hannah. I know I’ve got no chance.”
“I didn’t realize you wanted a chance.”
“Oh, please.” Mel turned the wheel on a whim, taking us closer to the heart of Denver. “You’re attractive, you’re unmarried, you have an actual brain, and you’ve got that whole”—she gestured—“brooding artist thing going on. Do I need to spell it out for you? Nine in ten women would want a chance.”
“That’s not true.” I shifted on my seat. “And I don’t have a thing going on. You make it sound pretentious.”
“You know what I mean.”
“You’re cute, Mel. You shouldn’t have any trouble finding someone. And even if circumstances were different—” I shook my head. The lights of the city scrolled past, muted by my sunglasses. “You’re too young for me.”
Melanie grew quiet.
A crowd crossed the street in front of us, friends laughing and shouting.
I glanced at Mel. The excitement was gone from her face.
I meant it when I said Mel was cute—she was on par with Hannah, at least—but the world is full of beautiful women, and love, which starts as a feeling, always ends as a choice.
