by Daws, Amy
He releases my nipples to pull my top off over my head, revealing my lacy red bra tucked firmly beneath my breasts, pushing them up for his lustful perusal. He drops an open mouthed kiss on each of them before standing back up straight. Groaning in frustration, he pauses his assault and looks into my eyes. A warmth blossoms in his gaze as he wraps his arms around me, holding me close.
“I’m terrified, Vi…Of so much. But I don’t have the strength to walk away from you again. You make me weak.”
I exhale with relief and anxiety over his comment, feeling my emotions at odds. I’ve been wanting Hayden Clarke to let me in since he first kissed me outside my building. But what does it mean when he says he feels weak around me? Am I capable of hurting him?
I lick my lips and guide him down to my level. “Maybe with time I can make you strong.” He swallows my words with his mouth and our lips move against each other more passionately than ever before. This kiss is less frenzied and desperate. Less lustful and hard. With this kiss, our lips mould in synchronisation, equally giving and taking, like two flames licking the night sky in perfect, rippling unison.
“Stay the night,” I demand against his lips, forgetting everything that confuses me and wanting to keep him with me long enough to figure it all out. I moved into this flat to assert myself in my life and become more independent. I refuse to let my entire happiness rest in the hands of this stunningly complicated and somewhat broken man.
He swallows hard and nods as if he knows what he’s agreeing to is huge and he’s making a commitment to himself as much as he is to me. “Okay, but no spanking,” he smirks and his chest rumbles beneath my hands with his silent laughter.
A grin splits across my face. “As long as I don’t stamp my foot, right?” I giggle softly. “How about some good, old-fashioned cuddling?”
He nods and allows me to take his hand and lead him through the French doors to my bedroom. I quickly pull the cups of my bra back up over my breasts, feeling a bit shy now that things have tamed down. Tamed down is good. I’m not ready to jump into the deep end with Hayden. Not yet. He’s shared a lot with me, but there’s still so much more I want to know about him.
Blue moonlight swirls with glowing orange city lights as they pour into my room through the floor-to-ceiling windows. That’s one benefit of being on the eleventh floor. Curtains aren’t necessary when you’re in the tallest building for miles. Bruce’s paws clack on the slate floor behind us as he trots over to his bed in the corner of my room. He’s such a good dog, even if he is a slobbery beast. I make a mental note to give him extra cuddles in the morning since I haven’t paid him much attention tonight.
Hayden lets out a huff of a laugh as he looks down at my bed.
“What?” I ask, smiling at him while rifling through my dresser for a nightshirt.
He shakes his head and rubs circles around his wrist. “From the second I saw your room for the first time the other day, all I could think about was you spread out and completely naked on this magnificent bed.”
My jaw drops from both shock and excitement. “I love my bed,” I croak, dropping the shirt on the duvet and nervously looking into his eyes. The butterflies in my belly can stop anytime now.
He swallows hard and glances down at my bra-covered chest and then to my skirt. “Are you sure you want this, Vi?” he asks, his grey eyes turning from sexual to serious in the blink of an eye.
I notice he says “this” instead of “me.” I don’t quite know what this even is to know how to respond. I’d be lying if I didn’t admit that a very tiny, inconsequential part of me wants to run for the hills. Hayden’s given me a laundry list of reasons he’s not ready for a relationship, yet here we are, in my bedroom. Now all I can think about are his arms wrapped around me all night.
“I want what you’re willing to give me,” I reply, placing a gentle kiss on each side of his neck. “As long as that’s just cuddling for tonight, of course.”
He groans as I pull back. “Then you better toss this on, Bunny.” He chucks my T-shirt at me and I let out a hearty laugh as I catch it.
“Bunny?” I ask mockingly. “So if I’m a bunny, what does that make you?” I reach forward and begin slowly popping the buttons of his shirt, feeling dizzyingly excited to see what’s underneath.
He grins playfully. “A very rude rabbit.”
Completely unable to keep up the sexy facade, I burst into giggles while removing his shirt from his arms and feasting my eyes on the lean planes of his chest. He grins cockily at me, clearly proud of his little joke.
“Give it here,” he groans and yanks the T-shirt down over my head, smoothing back my blonde strands that come loose. He brushes his finger along the top of my nose with a warm affection in his eyes. “Off to bed with you.”
I giggle and shimmy out of my skirt, leaving my red thong and bra on. It at least makes me feel sexy underneath the very unsexy nightshirt. I crawl beneath my crushed velvet duvet, and my eyes snap up when I hear the buckle of Hayden’s belt. I follow the action and stare for a moment at his thick brown leather cuffs. Coupled with his watch and muscled forearms, the look is masculine and attractive in a style I’ve never seen on a bloke. But I know he doesn’t wear them as a simple fashion choice, so I can’t help but wonder if I’ll ever see beneath them.
My thoughts are quickly distracted by the sight of Hayden standing before me, wearing only a pair of pure white boxer briefs. The material hugs his muscular thighs, and my eyes greedily rake up his body, taking in every trim line of his abs. He’s not overly muscled, but he’s lean and toned in all the right places.
“Not an innocent bunny at all,” he purrs, crawling into the bed beside me. “Your bedroom eyes are making it really fucking hard to be good.”
I smile in contentment as he tucks his arm beneath me. Snuggling in, I lay my head on that perfect place on a man’s chest. The place that dips in just above their peck and below their neck, which allows you to hear their heart thundering beneath the surface.
“What’s this?” I ask, touching the black ink on the side of his rib cage that I hadn’t noticed before. It’s a small tattoo with the digital time display of 11:11 in thick gothic font. It’s resting on top of a flat line that shoots up in several peaks that look like waveforms on a monitor, like a heartbeat.
He stiffens slightly. “Just something I got after rehab.”
“What does it mean?” I ask, wanting to push for more information about something that is clearly very important to him.
“Just a little superstition. It’s nothing.”
My brows lift curiously, but I decide to let it go. We still have a lot to learn about each other, but I want him to tell me everything on his own time. I nuzzle into him and pull the blanket up a bit.
“Vi?” he asks quietly into the night.
“Yes?”
“Thank you.” He drops a soft kiss on my head and lets out a large sigh like he was holding his breath.
Rather than ruin the moment with a self-deprecating comment, I remain silent and close my eyes, allowing myself to drift away in the arms of this mysterious man.
A SOFT GIGGLE FOLLOWED BY cursing causes me to stir. My eyes crack open and I find myself alone in an enormous bed with bright daylight pouring in on me. This is definitely a first. My past experiences with women have included me ducking out before they woke up to avoid any awkward encounters.
Everything is different with Vi.
I chuckle, amused by how I must look wrapped in her duvet. Honestly, who has crushed velvet anymore? I throw my legs over the edge of the bed and stretch while ruffling my hair. Fuck, I slept well. That’s quite different for me as well. I grab my jeans up off the floor and slide them on as I pad barefoot into the attached bathroom that I never even got around to seeing last night.
I’m stunned by the sight of a huge soaker tub resting in front of yet another floor-to-ceiling window. It faces north over the city, and a surge of possessiveness rushes over me as I envision Vi’s naked body cov
ered in bubbles, bathing out in the open for all of London Bloody England to see. Surely she doesn’t use this bathroom. How the fuck does she think this is a good idea? I make a mental note to have a proper talk with her about window fixtures.
Fuck, Hayden. You need to put a pin in your brooding caveman.
A large, glass, walk-in shower with two stainless steel waterfall showerheads sits on the opposite wall. Straight ahead is a modern black and white double vanity sink.
“Bloody hell,” I say, marvelling a bit over all things Vi. Her style and her personality are all over this flat. Minimalist and strikingly beautiful, with an edge of surprise around every corner.
I relieve myself and head over to the sink to wash my hands. She obviously is not hard up. Truthfully, as far as money goes, we are similar. My father’s furniture distribution centre made us very comfortable growing up. My mother was able to stay home with us when we were kids, so we had a traditional English upbringing.
But Vi being raised solely by a former professional footballer turned manager had to be different. I know from news articles that her brother Gareth makes millions a year. It’s not even the money that impresses me, or the fame. It’s the lifestyle. I wonder what Vi does for fun outside of her brothers’ very public lifestyles?
It appears she’s trying to gain some independence from her family, whereas I’m relying on mine more than ever. Last night with her was definitely unexpected. I was trying to convince myself I had to leave her be and avoid her at all costs, but seeing her at the club with Ethan pushed me over the edge. I realised in that moment that if it isn’t Ethan, it will be somebody else. That’s when I knew just how tightly Vi has me in her grips. Possessiveness isn’t a trait I’m familiar with, but fuck I feel it when it comes to her.
Vi is refreshing. She’s beautiful and warm, a bit quirky, and a mess in some of the most adorable ways. And she’s so fucking charming that I can hardly stand being away from her, even right now. I pop a new tip on her electric toothbrush, brush my teeth, wash my face, and then quickly head out to find her. My body actually aches to touch her again. Sleeping with her all night was oddly calming.
I used to sleep with Reyna occasionally during our dark and twisted time together. She’d have these horrid reoccurring dreams, and I was her anchor to help bring her back down to reality. I rarely fell asleep at her flat because all I could do was stew about the fact that I was falling for her and could never bring myself to tell her.
Now, after only one week with Vi, I’m laying everything out on the table. Fucking therapy has ruined my alpha bloke status.
The large glass patio door in the living room is wide open and I see Vi outside, walking carefully with a large dog bowl full of water. Suddenly, Bruce bounds toward her from the other side of the deck. She cries out for him to stop, but it’s too late. His momentum is out of control. He clobbers into her, and the bowl and Vi both go flying into a slopping heap on the ground.
“Bugger…Fuck a duck, Bruce!” she cries as he pounces on top of her until she’s forced back on her arms. He laps happily at her face, shoving his nose against her neck. “You vile monster! I’m getting you in classes. I mean it. You’ve pushed me for the last time!”
I chuckle quietly, crossing my arms and leaning against the doorway to watch her. She’s dressed in a tiny pair of black spandex shorts and a loose white tank. My dick stirs when she stands up and turns and I get a full-frontal glimpse of her. A crystal clear outline of a pair of pert pink nipples shows through the wet front of her tank.
She starts giggling as Bruce licks water off her leg. “Stop buttering me up, beast. It won’t work.”
My eyes twinkle at her with an affection I feel everywhere in my body. “You know you’re not fooling anyone,” I say from the doorway.
She jumps and her blue eyes fly up to me in surprise. “What do you mean?” She awkwardly tugs her wet top away from her breasts. Her blonde locks are hastily scraped up into a high ponytail in that “I just rolled out of bed” way.
“You can call him all the ghastly names in the book, but it doesn’t take a mind reader to know how much that beast means to you.”
“Well, don’t tell him.” She covers his ears and whispers, “If he thinks I like him, he’ll be even more of an arse.”
I smile and stride out onto the patio, dropping down on one of the white lounger chairs, absently realising this is the most comfortable I’ve ever felt around a woman the morning after sleeping together. Or not sleeping together I guess you’d say.
“Where did you get Bruce?” I ask, propping my hands behind my head and squinting up at her. “I’d envision you as more of a Cavalier King Charles spaniel type of bird. Or maybe a pug.”
Vi’s eyes trail from my face, to my bare chest, to my unbuttoned trousers where my white Calvin Klein boxer briefs are revealed. Finally, she looks up at me, shaking her head and answers, “Sort of a favour to an old neighbour. She passed away last year. The family couldn’t take care of him, so I offered. She was a huge Batman fanatic, so technically his full name is Bruce Wayne.”
I half smile. “What a great name for a dog. Does he have super powers? Aside from the ferocious tackling and licking?”
“If by super powers you’re referring to giant-sized craps, then yes, he is powerful.” She huffs out a laugh and drops down on the seat next to me, mindlessly pulling her shirt away from her to dry.
I scrunch my nose up. “Oh, Bunny. You always manage to surprise me.”
“What on earth is with the bunny nickname?” She pauses her action to place her hands on her hips. “Is it a term of endearment? Or shall I start calling you the schoolyard bully?”
“It’s a compliment,” I smirk. “You like to stamp your foot when you’re frustrated, like a bunny. And I find it sexy as fuck.”
She raises her eyebrows with excitement. “I can’t decide if I find that creepy or charming.”
I chuckle good-naturedly. “I do my best to walk the line in all things creepy and charming. Like right now, I’m not even staring at your sexy nipples that are showing off clear as day through your tank top. Never mind, I lied. Now I am.”
Her eyes turn to saucers and she crosses her arms over her chest. “Shit, I had forgotten.”
“No need to be shy now. I became well acquainted with your nipples last night if you recall.” I waggle my eyebrows at her suggestively.
Her eyes narrow. “Are you this cheeky with all your girls?”
I cock my head at her in surprise. “Are you my girl?” I’m not asking because I’m shocked. I’m asking out of genuine curiosity. I want her to be my girl with every fibre in my body. But there’s a layer of me that wants to repel away from her and everything she represents to me.
She swallows hard. “I didn’t mean…Of course I wasn’t inferring…We’ve just started—”
“Look, Vi. I’ll stop you right there,” I start, twisting so my feet are on the ground and we’re facing knee-to-knee. “I need to talk to you before we go any further with whatever this is between us. I’d rather be open and honest about my past, which, surprisingly, comes rather natural for me when I’m talking to you.”
“Surprisingly?” she asks just as Bruce trots over to her for a fondle. She mindlessly pets him while looking intently at me.
“I don’t know if it’s therapy that’s changed me or you, but I never liked sharing things about myself. I never did it, as a matter of fact. Ever. I just kept things bottled up. Even with Reyna, whom I considered my best friend back then. She knew relatively nothing about me.”
“What is the story with you and her? What kind of friends were you if you didn’t share things with one another?” she asks, her eyes tightening around the edges.
“The physical kind,” I reply honestly, watching her reaction carefully and feeling slightly annoyed that I don’t see the green-eyed jealousy I was hoping for. “Rey and I always had this way of mucking through life together. Like a soldier on the battlefield, it’s all a lot less scary whe
n you have someone standing right beside you on the front lines. But out of nowhere, or at least it felt that way to me, Rey wanted out of the dark place we’d found each other in. She started pulling away from me.”
“Reyna fell in love with Liam.”
I shrug my shoulders and shake my head at the fact that Vi is completely oblivious to the pain those two names together caused me while I was in rehab. “Yes. That’s exactly what happened. I wasn’t even aware that Rey and Liam had a history of some sort. Did you know Liam used to date my sister, Marisa, back at Oxford?”
“I had no idea.”
“Well he did. I don’t know the details…It’s probably a story that could fill an entire book. Regardless, it is funny we’re talking about Rey right now, considering she’s a large part of day one on my countdown.”
Vi’s eyes widen. “Your final countdown day? How so?”
I sigh heavily, feeling the familiar aching in my chest that I feel every time I transport myself back to that night.
This is it, Hayden. This is the final day of your Countdown Challenge. You’re strong enough for this. Don’t hold back now.
“The night of the gala, I was completely wasted. As you know from the other days I described, things had been going from bad to worse for me. I’d been drinking most of the day because I had it in my head that I was going to do it that night. I was going to kill myself.” I pause, swallowing hard. Damn, those last two words are still hard to say. “But I started having second thoughts. Namely because of Reyna and how awful we’d last left things. So I thought maybe if I saw her just one last time, something would click. Something would make sense again. She’d see me differently, or I’d see myself differently, and I could get out of that place in my mind.”
“But it didn’t work,” Vi says softly. Her eyes are trained on my cuff-covered wrists.
“No. Our conversation was painful, horrid, awful shit.” I shrug helplessly. “I fell in love with her. It’s that simple. And she was in love with Liam. And Theo was in love with Leslie, and it just seemed like everybody around me was getting on with their lives except me.”
