Accelerate

by Tracy Wolff

She sits up straight and looks me directly in the eye as she continues, “And the people he lets in feel exactly the same way about him.”

  I nod, because it’s hard not to when I’m being stared down by a woman who looks fragile, but whose eyes promise a whole lot of suffering if her message isn’t received—and heeded. It’s not that hard to believe she can deliver that suffering—not when those badass eyes are almost identical to her brother’s. To Nic’s.

  It’s that similarity that keeps me from being offended by the talking-to that she’s giving me. Well, that and the fact that she’s obviously looking out for her brother, something I heartily approve of. Nic might be a badass, but it also sounds like he needs a keeper. The guy did try to give me a two hundred thousand dollar car—if I was a little more unethical, I probably would have taken it and run.

  Still, just because Lena has a point doesn’t mean I’m going to roll over at her little talking-to. Especially since it’s her brother who dragged me into this whole situation to begin with. I was minding my own business, going out to my car for a study break, when he busted into my life and made all hell break loose. None of what’s come after has been my fault and I’m not going to take the blame for it.

  “Why do I feel like I’m being warned off?”

  Lena shakes her head. “Not warned off, just strongly cautioned.”

  “Aren’t they the same thing?”

  “Not at all. If I was warning you off, I’d tell you in no uncertain terms to stay away from my brother. But I’m not doing that, am I?”

  “I don’t know. Are you?”

  She smiles. “No. I’m just telling you how Nic is. And that, for whatever reason, he’s accepted you. You’re one of his now, which means he’ll do anything to protect you. Anything to keep you safe—even sacrifice himself if that’s what he feels he needs to do. I’m asking you not to let that happen.”

  “I would never ask him to—”

  “You don’t get it. You don’t have to ask him. None of us has to ask him. Nic takes the weight of the whole fucking world on his shoulders. He blames himself for everything, whether he has any control over it or not. I guarantee you, he’s upstairs right now beating the hell out of himself because of Joe. That’s who he is, that’s what he does. He feels responsible for everyone he cares about and he takes that responsibility seriously.”

  “I do get it. I just don’t understand why you’re telling me this. Nic and I barely know each other—”

  “Don’t start playing stupid now, Jordan. Nic could have put you up in a hotel, he could have stayed with you at Hotwired. He brought you home, to his house. Where his family is. He doesn’t do that unless he cares about a person. He doesn’t do that unless he considers them one of his.”

  She slams her mug down on the table, and when she leans forward her eyes are emerald fire. “So if you don’t feel the same way…if you truly feel like ‘you barely know him,’ then you should get the hell out now.” She gets up from the table, crosses to a drawer next to the fridge where she pulls out an envelope loaded with cash and throws it on the table. “I’ll give you the money for a hotel myself—”

  “I don’t want your money!” I jump up from the table, nearly knock my chair over in my haste to get away from the cash.

  “What do you want, then?” she demands, her eyes hard on mine as she waits for my answer.

  “I want—I want—I want—” Nic. I want Nic, my brain screams, even though it’s too soon. Even though things are such a mess. Even though I’m such a mess. I want the man Lena described, who gives freely of himself to those he cares about. The man who looks at me like he wants to devour me, who looks at me like I hold the whole world in my hands. The man who holds me so carefully even though he doesn’t know my past, doesn’t know why he needs to.

  I want him more than I’ve ever wanted any man, more than I’ve ever wanted anything. The knowledge tears through me, has my knees shaking and my breath catching in my throat. And when I look at Lena, when I stare into eyes that are so much like Nic’s that it’s a little bit eerie, I can tell that she sees it. That she knows exactly what I want, even though I can’t bring myself to say it out loud.

  “Just don’t hurt him,” she tells me, picking the envelope of money up off the table and tucking it back into its drawer. “That’s all I ask.”

  And then she’s gone, leaving me standing alone in the kitchen, feeling like I’ve just been hit by a runaway train.

  I’m not sure how long I stand there, staring at the pale green walls. Staring at nothing as the truth runs around and around in my head. Long enough for the house to settle for the night. Long enough for my hot chocolate to grow cold. More than long enough for my racing pulse to finally settle back to normal as I accept what even two days ago would have been completely anathema to me.

  That Nic Medina—drag racer, former car thief and criminal at large, and all-around badass—is the guy that I want. After years of avoiding men, years of turning away from every guy who so much as looked at me because I couldn’t trust them, couldn’t trust myself, I’ve found one I want to give my body to, which for me, is a million times harder than giving him anything else.

  I’ve found one that I can trust.

  I’ve only known Nic for two days, but even I know he’s that guy. The one who shoulders everything that comes his way. The one who thinks he’s responsible for everything and everyone around him. The one who believes—really believes—that he can change things.

  Oh, a lot of people who have known him a lot longer than me have labeled him things. They’ve labeled him a bad boy. A lost soul. A criminal. And while he may be a little bit of all those things, he’s also so much more. He’s a warrior, a man who fights for those he loves and for those things he believes in. Trying to take that away from him is trying to take away who he really is. And no matter what Lena says, I won’t be the one to do that to him. Not now, not ever.

  When I can think again—when I can breathe again—I cross to the stove. Fill another mug with hot chocolate and whipped cream and chocolate shavings. Then head quietly up the stairs. I should go to bed. It’s three A.M. and I should really try to get some sleep before my psych test tomorrow. But even as I think it, even as I tell myself that’s what I should do, I know the truth. I know that when I get to the top of the stairs I’m going to turn right, not left.

  I’m going to Nic’s room and not just to deliver a cup of hot chocolate.

  Except when I get there, the shower is still running and he doesn’t hear my knock. So I let myself into his room, setting the hot cocoa on a book on his nightstand. And not just any book, but John Keats: The Complete Poems. Whatever small resistance I might have had left melts when I see that. Nic Medina, all around badass and lover of romantic poetry. The description tickles me more than it has any right to.

  And so I stand there for long seconds, wondering what I’m supposed to do next. Wondering if I should sit on the bed and wait for him. Or if I should leave and try to catch him tomorrow. Or if I should send him a text and wait for him to come to me in my room.

  In the end, I do none of those things. I can’t. Not when the feelings inside of me are so new, so tentative, so terrifying. And not when my past looms over me like a mushroom cloud, threatening to destroy whatever progress I’ve made in my present.

  No, if I leave Nic’s room now, I’m desperately afraid I’ll never work up the nerve to do this again.

  And so, very carefully, I slip my tank top over my head. I fold it very neatly, very precisely, then do the same with my panties and the Minnie Mouse pajama bottoms Lena lent me. When I’m finally naked and shivering and left with absolutely nothing else to do, I make my way—with trembling knees—toward the half open bathroom door.

  Once there, I close my eyes. Take a deep breath. Count to ten. Slowly, slowly, slowly push the door open. Then nearly gasp when I catch my first glimpse of Nic.

  My fantasies in the hall earlier have nothing on the reality of him.

  He’s s
tanding in a glass shower cube, his back to the door. His head is bent under the water spray, his dreads soaking wet where they frame his face. His arm is bent at the elbow, his forearm resting against the tile as water sluices over his body.

  His naked body.

  His gorgeously muscular naked body.

  I can’t see all of him, but what I can see is perfection. His ass is round and just a little bit full. His legs are strong and well-defined. The backs of his arms are lean, his hair wet and sexy as it streams over his shoulders. And his back…I don’t even know where to start with his beautiful, beautiful back. It’s heavily muscled and perfectly defined beneath the thick, dark lines of a tree tattoo, its trunk running up his spine while its bare branches cover his upper back and shoulders. It’s the most gorgeous ink I’ve ever seen and for a moment all I can think about is how much I want to kiss it, how badly I want to run my hands and lips and tongue over every line and curve of it.

  But standing here like this, watching him when he’s unaware, makes me feel too much like a creeper. It’s that thought that finally gets me moving, that finally gives me the strength to cross the last few feet between us. Then I’m reaching for the shower door and, with one more deep breath, pulling it open.

  Nic whirls around at the sound, eyes wide and dark and so, so sexy as he registers that I’m the one interrupting his shower. That I’m the one standing in front of him completely stripped of any and all protection.

  Chapter 16

  Nic

  Holy fuck. Holyfuck. HOLY FUCK.

  It’s all I can think—all I can feel—as I stare at Jordan standing naked in front of me. She’s beautiful, so beautiful, and for the first time since I walked in the house earlier, I’m not thinking about Joe. Or Benji. Or the shitstorm my life has suddenly become.

  All I’m thinking about is her.

  Jordan.

  She looks scared to death. Her eyes are wide, her cheeks pale, and though she’s here—she’s really here—it looks like she used up every last ounce of courage she had to get this far. At least if I take into account the way she’s clutching the shower door like it’s the only thing keeping her upright.

  “Jordan, baby, are you okay?” I ask, trying to keep my eyes on her face even though her beautiful body is on display right here in front of me.

  She nods, and I can tell she doesn’t have any such reservations as her eyes are roaming freely over my body. But still she doesn’t move, still she doesn’t step into the shower or try to touch me or do any of the other things I’d expect a woman to do in this situation. Instead, she just stands there looking at me, teeth sinking into her bottom lip and body swaying just a little.

  “Do you want me to come out?” I ask hoarsely, hanging on to sanity with bloody, battered fingertips.

  She shakes her head no.

  “Okay. Well, do you want to come in then?”

  She hesitates for long, insanity-inducing seconds before finally nodding.

  “Okay.” I wait, but she doesn’t make a move to enter, so I step back to give her a little extra room. Still she doesn’t step forward.

  I don’t know what to make of it. What to make of her. At least not until I tamp down my lust enough to remember her desperate fight in the parking garage and how she nearly dove out of a car going eighty miles an hour just to get away from me.

  My heart breaks a little—at the memories and at this newest proof that Jordan’s life hasn’t been as easy as I would wish it to be.

  “Oh, sweetheart.” Because I have to touch her—have to hold her as my hunch crystallizes into the realization that some asshole hurt her, really hurt her—I reach for her with a tentative hand. When she doesn’t pull away, I slowly, carefully, interweave her fingers with mine.

  I forced her into that car yesterday against her will, and in my own way forced her back to my shop today by giving her the Mercedes. I promise myself right now—and silently promise her, as well—that those are the last things I’ll ever force her to do. From here on out, everything she does will be of her own volition.

  Which is why I don’t grab her, don’t pull her inside the shower where it’s warm and comfortable and I can have her naked body pressed intimately against my own. Instead I wait, for her to flinch or pull away or show me somehow that this isn’t what she wants, after all.

  That doesn’t happen though. Instead, her fingers grab on to mine like they’re a lifeline and her gaze lifts to meet mine. Her beautiful brown eyes are nearly black with trepidation and desire and I want nothing more than to pull her to me, to hold her and kiss her and promise her that I’ll take care of her. That I won’t hurt her…and that I won’t let anyone else hurt her ever again.

  But before I can do any of that, she whispers, “I want…”

  “What do you want, sweetheart? Whatever it is, I’ll give it to you.”

  “I want—” Her voice gives out on a shudder and she swallows convulsively then tries again. “I want—”

  When her voice breaks a third time, I can’t take it anymore. Praying I’m right, I whisper, “I know, sweetheart. I know what you want.”

  And then, using my free hand, I peel her fingers away from where they are still clutching the shower door. When I have both her hands in mine, I tug softly, pulling her gently into the shower and beneath the still hot spray.

  I watch her carefully, looking for any sign that I’ve misread her. That this isn’t what she wants. She doesn’t give me any. Instead, she steps a little closer to me—not so much that we’re pressed together, bare skin to bare skin, but just close enough so that her nipples scrape against my chest with each deep breath that she takes.

  It feels amazing—she feels amazing—and I pray that my self-control is as good as I think it is.

  With that thought in mind, I lift a hand to her face. Cup her cheek in my palm as I slide my thumb gently across her trembling mouth. “Okay?” I ask.

  She nods. It’s not much, but coupled with the way she sways toward me, the way she keeps her eyes pinned to mine, it’s enough to keep me going. Very, very slowly.

  “Is it too warm?” I move my fingers into her hair, smooth it back from her face. “Do you want me to turn it down?”

  “It’s perfect,” she answers, and this time she’s actually smiling at me, tremulous though it may be.

  “Do you want—” Shit, I’m so nervous at this point that my own voice is breaking. But I can tell what a big step this is for her and the last thing I want to do is scare her or make her uncomfortable in any way. “Do you want me to wash you?”

  “No.” She shakes her head even as she reaches for the shower gel.

  “Okay.” I’m a little disappointed, but I step back to give her room, nearly plastering myself against the shower wall in an effort not to crowd her. At least until she says, “I want to wash you.”

  At first, I’m certain I’ve misheard and I stand there, waiting for her words to rearrange themselves in an order that actually makes sense to me. When they finally do…Fuck. What little blood I have left in my head rushes straight to my dick and for long seconds I just gape at her as she soaps up her hands. That is so not what I was expecting her to say.

  “You don’t have to—”

  “I want to,” she interrupts me as she skims her slicked up hands over my shoulders and down my chest. “I want to make you feel good.”

  “You do, baby. You—” I lose my train of thought as she stands on her tiptoes, pressing her lithe, beautiful body to mine even as she blows a long, slow stream of air into my ear.

  “Fuuuuuck.” The word escapes without my permission, my hands clenching on her hips of their own volition. Part of me is afraid I’m pushing it, pushing her, but shit. How am I supposed to help it when she’s wet and naked and wrapped around me like a vine? Her hands feel so fucking good—she feels so fucking good—that I can barely breathe as they glide over my pecs, along my rib cage, down my torso.

  More curse words catch in my throat and I arch helplessly against her,
my dick desperate for any attention she wants to give it.

  Jordan laughs then, and this time when our eyes meet, hers are a little less wary, a little more confident. It’s what I’ve been waiting for, and when she teases the tips of her fingers across my nipples, I let go of the last of my reservations and give myself over to whatever she wants from me.

  “Is this okay?” she asks as her fingers circle my too-sensitive nipples again and again and again.

  I bow my head, press my forehead to hers. “Baby, anything you want to do to me is okay.”

  Her grin is wicked, her eyes even more so, when she tells me, “You should be careful giving me carte blanche over your body. How do you know I won’t abuse it?”

  “I trust you,” I answer, because it’s true. And because I want her to know that she can trust me, too. That she can let her guard down without worrying that I’m going to hurt her somehow. Because I won’t. I can’t.

  I see my message register in her eyes, feel it in the way her body sags against mine just a little. It’s more than I expect, more than I deserve after everything that’s happened these last two days, but I’m taking it. I wrap an arm around her waist to hold her up, and to hold her close.

  “Still all right?” I ask when she doesn’t say anything more.

  “Yes,” she murmurs, before pressing hot kisses against my jaw. My mouth. My throat.

  I tilt my head back on a groan, let it fall back against the cool, wet tile as Jordan licks and kisses and sucks her way across my collarbone. I want to return the favor, want to kiss and touch and worship every inch of her, but I’m afraid of pushing her too hard, of expecting too much, too soon. This is her show and I’ll do whatever makes her—

  “Fuuuuuuuuck.” Her hands are on my stomach now, her fingers lightly teasing around my belly button, over my V-cut, down the happy trail leading to my—

  “Fuuuuuuck,” I say again. I swear, she’s reduced my vocabulary to that one word, and reduced my entire existence to the feel of her soap-slicked hands on my skin.

  She’s cupping my balls now, wrapping her other hand around my dick and it feels so good I can barely breathe. I arch into her touch, and she tightens her grip so that I see stars every time she slides her palm over me. Then she’s bending to lick water from my throat before nibbling her way down my chest so she can take my nipple in her mouth.