by Brynne Asher
I flip the deadbolt but leave the swing bar locked and pull the door open, allowing only a tiny space. “If you get me banned from the Langham, I swear I’ll take you down myself. This is my favorite place to stay when I’m in Chicago.”
Eli’s eyes are heavy and he smells like whiskey. He rests his forehead on the doorjamb, slurring, “Of course, it is.”
“How did you find me?” I demand.
When he lifts his eyelids, it looks like it takes every muscle in his body to do the job. “I installed a tracking app on your prepaid phone and flashed my badge at the desk girl. She was scared shitless and gave up your room number in a flash.”
My face falls. “Shut up.”
His drunken lips tip on one side and that hint of his playful self tugs at my heart. “No, you shut up.”
“You’ve been tracking me? Spying on me?”
“Baby, it’s not like I don’t know where you are all the time anyway.”
“Don’t call me baby.”
He tries to push a drunk hand through the small space, but lucky for me, his forearm is too thick. “You like me calling you baby when I’m inside you. Or when I’ve got my hand between your legs. It made you go fuckin’ crazy when you were sucking my co—”
“Stop,” I snap and swat his hand away. “How did you get here? I hope you didn’t drive.”
“Uber. Why’d you drag your sweet ass across the country?”
“Because I was nosy.” He blinks slowly before exerting more energy to open his eyes wider. I sigh. “And I was worried. But really because I was nosy.”
His face falls.
I lean into the wall and lower my voice. “Why don’t you want me here?”
“If you don’t open the door, I’m gonna lie down right here,” he points to the floor, “and go to sleep with my boot wedged in the door because I’m not letting you shut me out.”
I don’t open the door. “You mean like you shut me out?”
His eyes do a lazy roll.
“Why don’t you want me here?” I repeat.
He stands up straight but doesn’t move his boot. Shaking his head, he lets an arm fall to his side, as exhausted as his eyes. “I don’t know how to deal with all this, Jen. My dad, his illness, me leaving for years and coming back to how he is now. I’ve got a new job and have just been slapped with an OPR case, and then all of your shit, and…” he pauses and slaps his hands on the wall and door again, “and just fucking you. Bringing you into my shitty world right now was not my plan. Yesterday I had to tear out their kitchen ‘cause he lit it on fire. I was out all day trying to find affordable daycare places for my mom to take him. I’ve been struggling for months with this shit. Then you waltz in and make two phone calls—two fucking phone calls and offer to foot the bill.”
I can’t help it. He sounds more defeated than he looks and that’s saying something. I reach through the door easily and touch his face.
“Jen,” he breathes and opens his eyes. “I’m exhausted. Open the door.”
I pull my arm away and try to close the door so I can flip the bar.
“Wait.” He stops me and all of a sudden looks a little more alive. “You promise you won’t shut me out?”
I roll my eyes. “I promise. Now move.”
He pulls his foot from the door and I shut it to flip the bar. When I pull the handle, he pushes his way in and the next thing I know, my face is captured between his big hands and his mouth is on mine.
I’m pushed backward as the heavy door falls shut, closing us in. He thrusts his tongue into my mouth and our teeth clash. The next thing I know, I’m being pressed up to the wall with his big body and he’s devouring me.
I should be angry. I should make him go away until he’s sober and he can explain why he kept his dad’s illness from me—why he felt he couldn’t trust me. The way he treated me today hurt. It stung in a place that can only be wounded by the ones we love the most—that in and of itself scares me. What scares me even more is my heart hurts for him because I feel his agony over his dad, his family, and their situation. I know that’s why he lashed out.
But having his hands on me like this—like he has no control and needs me like he needs his next breath? There’s no way I can push him away.
He needs me and I like it.
No.
I love it.
I want him to need me as much as I need him.
With this, forgiveness isn’t even a question.
He rips his mouth from mine but presses me tighter, caging me in. When he looks down at me, it’s like he’s afraid I’ll run or yell or push him away.
“Fucking lost my mind when I saw you sitting in my parents’ house. It’s easy to fit into your life. Taking care of you is second nature.” He presses his hips into my stomach, his cock hard. His grip on my face tightens and he leans in where I see nothing but him. “Like I was meant for the job. It makes me crazy thinking about anyone else doing that but me. But when I walked in today and saw you with my family,” he closes his eyes and shakes his head, “with my dad—it was too much. You looked out of place in my world, a world I can’t get a grip on or, for the life of me, fix.”
I pull at his neck and he rests his forehead on mine. “It’s okay.”
He shakes his head. “It’s not.”
“You can’t do everything, Eli. No one can.”
His hands drop to my shoulders and roughly feel their way down my chest where they land on my breasts and squeeze. “I don’t like feeling out of control. Fucking life … it’s in a tailspin.”
He rips my thin tank up, bringing my arms with it, and it’s gone. Dipping his hand straight into my pants and panties, he cups me between my legs.
“Let me help you,” I breathe, grinding onto his hand as he takes what’s his, doing it without permission or apology. “I want to help you.”
Holding my sex tight and finger fucking me, pressing the heel of his hand into my clit, I’m already wet and needy. He rips at the button of his jeans and frees himself. When I look between us, my breasts are heaving and his thick, veined cock is pressed into my stomach, its tip glistening.
Ripping his hand away from my sex just long enough to drag my yoga pants and panties down my legs, I’m up, pressed against the wall, and Eli surges inside.
I wrap myself around him, lift my knees, and press down. His hand comes under my bottom and I groan when he pushes a finger inside me next to his cock, stretching me impossibly wide. But when he drags it out and to my ass, circling me there before pressing in, my breath catches.
He pulls out before thrusting back in, hard, mirroring the action with is finger.
My head falls against the wall. “Oh. It’s too much.”
He puts his lips to my shoulder and sucks. “I want all of you.”
Getting used to the sensation of being full everywhere, he presses his groin into my clit with every thrust and I hang on for dear life. This could wreck me. My voice is ragged and shallow when I answer, “That’s why I came. To be here—for you.”
“I hate that you did,” he breathes into the side of my head, thrusting and fingering me with no sort of rhythm whatsoever. This is out of control, carnal, and so very raw. “I hate that I need you. Not like that.”
The skin on my back is burning against the wall, but it’s nothing compared to the heat he’s creating between my legs. He thrusts harder and deeper, relentless and unyielding until it comes over me. An orgasm that’s strangling and leaves me gasping for air but begging for it to never end. His finger presses deeper and his cock plunges harder until a groan vibrates through his chest and into me.
We stop, our lungs begging for relief as I cling to him, still filled everywhere by everything Eli. He rests his head on the wall next to mine, spent and exhausted—mentally and physically.
“You can’t do it,” he utters under his breath. “What you did today. It’s too much.”
I know what he’s talking about and he’s wrong. If I built his parents a house and hire
d twenty-four-hour care for his father, it wouldn’t be enough. “You don’t get to tell me what I can or can’t do.”
He sighs—resigned and just as stoic as he was when he got here—as he slips his finger out of me. “Did I hurt you?”
I squeeze him tighter with my arms and legs. “Not as much as you did earlier today.”
He presses his semi hard-on into me one more time and mutters, “Fuck. You know how to break a man.”
I put my lips to his jaw. “Come to bed. We’ll talk about it tomorrow.”
He doesn’t let me down. He picks his head up and his heavy eyes gaze into mine, broken and stoic. “How did you find me?”
I shrug and sort of shake my head. “The phone book.”
His brow puckers. “The phone book?”
“Yeah. The one on the internet. Whatever it’s called—the white pages. It was easy, you mentioned your dad’s name once. I’m not tracking you or anything creepy like that.”
He wraps me up and pulls me away from the wall. “Only freaks do shit like that.”
When he lays me down, him coming with me, the cool sheets are a relief to my abused back, and I agree. “Freaks with big egos.”
We’re still connected when he kisses me, the whiskey lingering on his breath. “You really shouldn’t put up with assholes.”
“I’m willing to overlook a lot for the people I care about, Eli. Just don’t push me too far.”
He stills at my words before he closes his eyes. Then he rolls, taking me with him—no, crushing me to him.
This is how we lie—him fully dressed—besides his cock—with his legs hanging off the bed from the knees down. Me, naked, straddling him with my legs by his sides, and leaking out from where he came inside me.
Now, I realize it.
This is what it looks like for two people to need each other with a desperation so deep, it hurts.
Chapter 27
Adrenaline
Eli
“Do you want salami or turkey?” Jen asks my dad.
He tips his head, wondering how to answer and my mom intervenes. “You like salami, don’t you, honey?”
He nods. “I guess.”
Jen goes back to making sandwiches on the kitchen table and I haul another trash can of rubble out the back door.
Sarah is back at work and my mom needs to get back to it soon. Larry, the philandering dickhead, told me to take as much time as I needed. I’m afraid he just wants me out of the office but it’s not my fault he was stupid enough to meet in a public park and go at it like a horny teenager with his subordinate. Get a hotel room like a normal adult.
Speaking of hotel rooms, I woke up this morning with a hangover and a hard-on. That’s never happened to me but I’m experiencing all kinds of firsts when it comes to the very down-to-earth millionaire who has me twisted in knots. I’m doing shit I don’t normally do—like drowning myself in a fifth of whiskey to keep from putting my hand through a wall because I’m so pissed at life and how I’m handling it.
Which, in my case, means handling it with the precision of a rusty saw that’s been mangled to hell and back, which is exactly how I feel right now after the whiskey.
Then I saw the wall-sex burn she had on her back this morning. If I could kick my own ass, I would.
Something to know about Jensen Montgomery—she does not travel light. She had salve for her back and PMS meds for my headache. I was grateful enough to take whatever she gave me because I felt like shit about not being careful with her while I was drunk. I deserved to feel like I’d banged my head against the same wall I fucked her against.
When I told her I had to finish cleaning up my parents’ house today, she pulled sweats and running shoes out of her bottomless suitcase and offered to help. Then she called her protection detail and told him he’d better not wear a suit today unless he wanted to ruin it while he helped me tear out a kitchen. Between the three of us and my mom, it’s going fast.
“What would you and Sam like for dinner? I’ll order takeout since we can’t cook,” Jen asks my mom as I’m on my way out the door.
My mother looks at her like she hangs the moon and the stars.
This after my mom dragged me into their bedroom this morning to ask me ten million questions about the surprise woman who showed up yesterday. She couldn’t be happier and it has nothing to do with any phone call Jen has made since her pricy shoes landed in Chicago. As my mother put it, it has everything to do with the way that woman looks at her son. She even added that she doesn’t give a shit that she’s not Catholic, but she left out the shit part.
So, there you go. It was love at first sight for my mother, because never in my life did I think she’d be abso-fucking-giddy about me being with someone who wasn’t Catholic. It’s who she is.
“That’s so sweet. Anything you want would be great. No!” my mom exclaims. “Maxwell’s. It’s a greasy spoon but you have to try it while you’re here. We’ll get you the pork chop and the Polish sausage—you can try both.”
I’m about to inform my mom that her new girl-crush doesn’t eat much meat, but Jen’s eyes cut to me in a flash and she lies, “That sounds great. I’ll call ahead so we can pick it up.”
I shake my head and watch as she hands out sandwiches on paper plates before she parks her sweet ass next to my dad on the sofa.
Simple. Someday, maybe we’ll get there, but today is not that day.
*****
Jen
We just took off and Chicago wanes behind us. Andrew took a seat facing the back, which I appreciate. He’s good at staying close yet pretending he’s not here.
Eli, on the other hand, has contemplative written all over him since we said goodbye to his family this morning. I told him he didn’t need to fly back with me, but he insisted he needed to get back to work, as well.
I have a feeling I know what’s eating at him since he basically spilled it all when he came to me drunk the other night.
I look to him. “I know what you’re thinking and you need to stop.”
He runs a big hand across his scruffy jaw before shifting to face me and throws an arm over the back of the sofa where we’re buckled in. “Yeah? What am I thinking, my little mind-reader?”
I narrow my eyes and kick him with my old-school white Adidas with black stripes. “We’re not different. There’s no your world and my world and fitting here and fitting there. I’ve been through this before and I certainly don’t want to go through it with you.”
He gives my hair that he was twirling around his finger a little yank and smirks. “You know what they say about people who assume shit. For your information, I think you fit with me like a glove and I’m not interested in you fitting with anyone else.”
I’m taken aback. “Oh.”
“If you want to know the God’s honest truth, I was wondering if private jets come with snacks at the same time cursing your security detail for being here. I’d like to put my mouth between your legs and make you scream to show my gratitude for showing up, but I don’t feel like doing that in front of Andrew.”
I wet my upper lip with the tip of my tongue and watch him watch me do it. I’m sure Andrew heard him say that, but I’m also sure he could hear us through the adjoining door the past two nights. “Oh. That’s not what I thought you were thinking.”
His eyes meet mine and they turn serious. “I don’t give a shit how much money you have or that you can fly off on a moment’s notice in your private jet.”
I tip my head. “It’s not my jet. I only have access to it.”
He raises a brow but ignores me. “Your job is your job—everyone has one. Just because yours comes with a bigger paycheck, doesn’t mean you work harder or have it easier than anyone else. It is what it is. I do find your shoe fetish obnoxious and your taste in food annoying, though.”
I frown and start to defend myself, because I ate an entire pork chop sandwich with French fries last night and enjoyed it. There’s nothing annoying about the way I eat.
But he doesn’t let me get a word in and unbuckles me, dragging me across his lap.
“Hey,” I complain but he throws a heavy arm over my lap and reaches around to grab my jean-clad ass.
“What you did for my folks over the past few days is too much, but it’s you. We’ll work something out because I can’t let you do it all.”
“But I want to do it,” I insist and hate that this is an argument. “I want to do it for you.”
His jaw that hasn’t been shaved since last week relaxes and he lowers his voice. “I know you do, baby. Which is why I’m letting you, but we can work it out and do it together.” He pulls me tighter into his lap.
I sigh and sink into him. “Okay.”
He shakes his head. “How did I get you out of such a fucked-up situation?”
I bite back a smile. “My mom would say that someone hit you over the head with a lucky stick.”
“Baby.” He dips a hand in my hair and leans in to kiss me. “You’re Jensen Montgomery. I don’t feel like I got hit with a stick. With you, I feel like I ran into a damn brick wall.”
“You really know how to charm a woman.”
He turns smug. “You like it.”
I feel my face soften. “It surprises even me, but I think I love it.”
He stills for a moment before his lips find mine. When he lets me come up for air, he tips his forehead and his breath is heavy on my face. “Baby, I just love you.”
My breath vanishes. My eyes well. My heart swells.
No. My heart bursts.
“Really?” I’m not sure why I ask that. He looks as serious as the situation we just left in Chicago and the one that’s still brewing in Dallas.
He shakes his head, the action conflicting with his words. “You’ve knocked me on my ass and I’m happy to stay there if it means you’re in my life for good.”
My tears spill and I fall into him, pressing my face into his neck, where I’d be content for the rest of my days.
“I love you, too,” I murmur into his skin.
And that’s where we stay for most of the flight until I hear Eli’s stomach growl and he deems it time to raid the kitchenette and see what people eat on private jets.
