Trouble: Tyler and Katie

by Selena Kitt

  First world problems, I thought with a laugh. Once I was clean, I couldn’t resist just standing in the middle of the shower over the drain, my hands against the wall, letting the heat of the water just soak me. It was like an all over water body massage.

  Steam rose all around me—I loved hot showers, the hotter and longer the better. Sometimes I’d come out of a shower feeling weak and a little dizzy, I liked them so hot. But this was like the king of all showers. If I had a shower like this, I’d never leave, I thought. And then it hit me—I did have a shower like this. Tyler had taken hundreds of showers in here. Standing right on this very spot.

  I smiled, lowering my head and letting my hair fall like a wet curtain around my face—it gave me a little pocket of air to breathe while the shower pounded me with its hot spray. The thought of Tyler made me feel warmer if that was even possible. It wouldn’t be the first time I’d stopped everything to fantasize about him, to remember his hands and mouth on me, but he felt so close now.

  We’d been apart for months, and it felt like years. Now it was just a matter of hours—still too many hours, granted, but still, just hours—until we were together again. I’d imagined our reunion every night for months, had woken up thinking about him every morning, and I wanted it to be perfect. I wanted us to click, like two puzzle pieces, right back into place. I wanted us to be Tyler and Katie again, in an instant, like slipping into a second skin.

  But would we? Could we?

  That thought gnawed in the back of my mind, a little mouse nibbling around the edges, searching for a way out of its cage so it could run rampant through my brain. I didn’t want to let it loose. I wanted to at least pretend I believed that it was just that easy to slip back into what we had, while we were on tour together. I wanted to believe in that more than anything.

  With a sigh, I pushed my wet hair out of my face, my eyes squeezed shut against the spray as I groped for the nozzle to turn off the water. That’s when a giant whoosh of frigid air made me scream with both surprise and fear. I stumbled and probably would have fallen and knocked myself out cold on the tile floor if Tyler hadn’t caught me.

  Chapter Two

  “Jesus mother-fucking jumped up Christ in a sidecar, what the ever-loving hell are you doing here?” I gasped, clinging to Tyler for dear life.

  Not that I had to really worry. He had a firm grip on me, even though I was soaking wet and slippery as a fish.

  “Is that any way to welcome me home?” That smirk. One corner of his mouth lifted, and his hands moved down my back to grab my ass and pull me hard against his chest. He didn’t have a stitch of clothing on.

  “Tyler! What the fuck?” I wasn’t quite ready to let go of my shock, but I couldn’t help putting my arms around his neck and squirming in his arms to get a little closer. “You’re not supposed to be here!”

  “You want me to go?” He shrugged one shoulder, loosening his hold on me and turning toward the shower door. “I can go…”

  “Fuck you!” I laughed, yanking him back, my hands behind his neck, fingers moving through his already wet hair. I wanted to drink him in with my eyes, memorize every bit of his face, the stubble on his cheeks shining with little beads of water, but I didn’t want to waste another minute with my eyes open.

  So, I went up on tiptoe and kissed him so hard he actually winced. Then I bit his lip for good measure and he growled and bit mine back, pulling and gnawing on my lower lip, then sucking it, making it fat between his. It was like he was trying to turn me inside out, splay me wide open for his pleasure, and I was more than happy to oblige.

  “What are you doing here?” I whispered when we parted, my lips already aching for more of his kisses. I really was an addict—and now I was addicted to him. “You aren’t supposed to be here until tomorrow.”

  “I left early.” He nosed my wet hair aside and started trailing kisses down behind my ear, sending delightful shivers down my spine. “I wanted to be here last night. I wanted to be here before you. I wanted to surprise you.”

  “You succeeded,” I told him with a snort.

  “Surprise?” He lifted his head to grin at me and I couldn’t decide whether to laugh or hit him, so I did both, although the latter was just a girl-punch to his solidly muscled bicep.

  “I’ll say!” I choked. “It was like a scene out of psycho. I was ready to beat you over the head with the shower massage.”

  “I can think of better uses for that shower massage.” He cocked one wet, bronze eyebrow at one of the removable nozzles.

  “Oh hellz no.” I traced a fingernail down the center of his chest, following his midline down, down, down. “We don’t need no stinkin’ shower massages, señor. Not when I’ve got this…”

  Air hissed between his teeth when my fingers reached his cock. It was already half-hard and stiffened even more in my grip.

  “I can’t believe you’re here,” I murmured, watching his dark eyes grow even darker as I lazily stroked him. “Am I dreaming?”

  “No, baby.” His hips moved, matching my rhythm. “I am. You’re my dream, and it’s finally coming true.”

  His mouth covered mine and I melted against him.

  The heat of the water rose all around us, but we were making our own heat now. I’d dreamed about us coming together like this, like two missing pieces, but had never really believed it was going to happen like that. That gnawing little rodent in my head had squeaked long and hard enough to make me doubt. Enough to make me dread the awkward silences, the feeling that we were strangers to each other, that we hardly had enough sober time together to know who we were, let alone to discover who we were together, as a couple.

  But none of that happened. Not even for a minute.

  “I can’t believe you’re h—” I whispered, but Tyler didn’t let me finish my sentence or even my thought.

  We’d been apart far too long. My desperate need for him was matched by his own for me. I couldn’t keep my hands off him, running my palms over the smooth, wet planes of his back and shoulders, my mouth opening under his, surrendering to the force of his tongue.

  “Tyler, oh God, Tyler,” I cried, wrapping my legs around his waist as he pressed me up against the tile, the heat of his cock trapped between our bellies—I just wanted him inside of me, now and forever.

  The needling spray was softer here in the corner, but Tyler paused his onslaught to reach over and turn a knob. I gasped and looked up in wonder as the multi-directional spray of water ended, and then began to fall from the ceiling like rain.

  But I didn’t have time to remark on it, because Tyler was kissing me again, his hands moving over my body like a blind man reading Braille, expertly memorizing every soft shape and curve, my skin communicating all on its own.

  My whole body screamed for him. I sucked his tongue, greedy, aching, but Tyler wasn’t having it. His fingers played me softly, coaxing cries from my throat with every stroke. My nipples hardened in his mouth and my clit throbbed under his rocking palm, as he pinned me to the wall, a splayed butterfly, completely caught. He kissed me all over, and I cried out when he went to his knees before me, spreading my legs wide.

  And he kissed me there, too.

  Soft, warm rain fell on my upturned face as I climaxed for him.

  It was all for him, every bit of it. Tyler buried his face in me and moaned like a drowning man who thought dying would be a final, glorious release. I shuddered and dug my nails into his shoulders, and he grabbed my hips, holding me against the tile when my knees threatened to buckle.

  “Ty,” I whispered, my fingers tangled in his thick, wet, dirty-blonde hair.

  He looked at me, water falling onto his upturned face, and I saw everything I needed to know in his eyes. He gave a low growl, rubbing prickly stubble over my shaved mound, up my belly, over my breasts, taking hungry nips of my skin along the way, making me moan and tremble in the aftermath of my orgasm.

  “You fucking break me,” he croaked, hooking his arms under my knees and hefting me against
the tile. “I can’t stop wanting you, needing you. Goddamnit, Katie, I’m so fucking crazy for you, I can’t even think straight. I couldn’t wait to get home to you. I don’t even know who I am without you anymore.”

  I knew exactly what he meant.

  Everything else disappeared when we were together. Somewhere out there, a planet was turning on its axis, and people were living their lives, but not us. We were our own planet together, with our own center of gravity. I wasn’t me without him, either, and that should have scared me a little, but it didn’t. It felt righter than anything else ever had in my whole life.

  When he entered me, it was as if I was finally complete.

  I wanted to keep him forever inside of me, my walls trembling with the effort to hold onto him. Tyler moaned and buried his face in my wet hair, his chest crushing the breath out of me, not that I cared.

  Then he began to move.

  I was slick and more than ready for him, as we rocked together in the rising heat of the shower. We could have been in the Amazon somewhere or a prehistoric jungle. I lost all sense of time and place when we were together like this.

  “Oh Katie,” he groaned, hands sliding down to grip my ass and tilt my hips, allowing him to slide even deeper into me. “Fuck, you feel so good.”

  “Don’t stop,” I pleaded against his neck, my arms wrapped tight around them. “Oh God, Ty, please… don’t…”

  “I can’t,” he panted, thrusting fast and hard, pounding me against the tile. My body was bent in half, pinned under his relentless weight, my knees hooked over his arms at the elbows, giving him complete control. “Oh fuck, Katie! Oh!”

  “Come for me,” I whispered, seeing his dark eyes flutter open to meet mine, a desperate hunger there. I saw him go past the point of no return, saw that line come and go, watched him give into the feeling as he shuddered against me.

  He gave a deep, primal cry as he came inside of me, and I realized in that moment, it was the first time I’d ever felt the white-hot pulse of his cum with no barrier between us. We’d always used condoms before.

  We didn’t say anything, not at first.

  I kissed his wet head, his cheek, rubbed mine against his, thrilling at the feel of his stubble, so wonderfully masculine. Slowly, Tyler’s breath returned to normal and he unhooked my legs, letting me slide slowly down so my feet were resting on the tile again.

  But he didn’t let me go.

  His arms stayed wrapped tightly around me, enveloping me. I don’t know how long we stood there, reveling in the touch of skin-on-skin, water falling all around us.

  Eventually, Tyler turned off the water and pulled me out of the shower. He shook his head like a dog coming out of a lake, making me laugh and hold my hands out against the spray.

  Then he wrapped a towel around his waist and sat on the closed toilet lid, pulling me between his thighs so he could dry me with another big, fluffy white towel. I let him rub me all over, not cold at all. Maybe it was because Tyler had turned the heat lamp on over our heads, but really, I thought it was because he was finally here. All of my other needs melted away.

  Maslow had missed a level in his hierarchy of needs, I decided. He’d missed the Tyler level. It came way before food, water and shelter, as far as I was concerned. But maybe Maslow had never met Tyler Cook.

  “You’re so beautiful.” Tyler kissed my navel, licking a stray water droplet from my belly. His hands moved over my now mostly dry skin, the towel he’d rubbed me down with abandoned on the floor. “My God, you’re so soft. How do you get so soft?”

  “I’m not that soft,” I said with a laugh, running my fingers through his wet hair. “You didn’t even give me a chance to shave my legs.”

  “We can get back in?” He canted his head toward the still-steamy shower.

  “No.” I straddled him, his arms going fully around me. “The next time we get wet, I want it to be a midnight swim.”

  “Midnight?” His eyebrows went up. “It’s the middle of the afternoon.”

  “I know.” A slow smile crept over my face.

  “What are we going to do until then?”

  “What else?” I pressed my mouth to his, stroking his lips open with my tongue. Tyler’s arms tightened around me, and before I knew it, he was carrying me out of the bathroom and into his bedroom.

  I laughed when he tossed me onto his bed, whipping off his towel and crawling in after me. The bed that had seemed so vast and solitary when I’d contemplated spending a night alone in it now felt too small as we rolled all over its surface, chasing each other across the mattress. Shivering—the air out here was much cooler—I got under the covers, and Tyler followed me.

  “Did you lock the door?” I poked my head out when I heard a faint noise, somewhere down the hall.

  “Uhhhh...” He rolled me toward him, so we were belly to belly. “I think so…?”

  “No lying!” I protested with a laugh. “Remember the bed-rules.”

  “Okay, okay.” He laughed, too. Our first night together, we’d established those rules. It had been kind of joking, but also kind of not. “No, I didn’t lock it. I was too busy thinking about getting my hands on your hot little body.”

  “I haven’t thought about anything else for weeks.” I sighed happily, tucking my head under his chin. A perfect fit. We really were like two puzzle pieces. All our parts fit perfectly. We were quiet for a while, and I thought he might have fallen asleep. But then he spoke.

  “I came inside you,” he said softly, half-dreamily.

  “I know.” My smile spread a little wider. The memory of him filling me, finally, completely, that way, gave me a rush of feeling I didn’t even quite understand.

  But Tyler was quiet, thoughtful. I lifted my head to look at him and realized then what he was thinking. So, I reassured him.

  “I’m on the pill.”

  He swallowed and nodded, his fingertips brushing my shoulder, stroking lightly. There was no way I was getting pregnant. I might have been the kind of girl who wouldn’t turn down a night with a rock star, but that kind of girl had to be careful.

  Maybe even more careful than the sensible ones.

  That had been Sabrina’s mistake, I thought. She thought she wasn’t that type of girl, and the first night she’d spent with Rob Burns had gotten her just a little bit preggers.

  “Do you want to know something?” His fingertips trembled against my back, and his voice caught. “I’ve never done it without a condom before. Ever.”

  “Ever?” I blinked at him, trying to let that sink in. “What about your first time?”

  “Condom.” He shrugged. “She had it on her, thankfully. I was fifteen.”

  “And every time since?” I was incredulous.

  Hadn’t there ever been a time when he was just carried away by the moment? That was why I’d put myself on the pill, to be honest. I knew I was far too spontaneous for my own good. It gave me a nice layer of protection against pregnancy, anyway, if not STDs.

  “You know Rob.” Tyler rolled his eyes and I laughed, remembering the giant bowl of condoms on the coffee table in Tyler’s hotel room the first night we’d been together. It was a prerequisite in all of Trouble’s rooms, and there’d been a huge cardboard box of them in the closet on the tour bus.

  Safety first was Rob’s motto.

  “He obviously didn’t follow his own advice,” I reminded Tyler, smiling.

  When I told my mother Sabrina had gotten pregnant—by a rock star no less, during a one-night stand—she had replied, shocked, “What? That’s not like her at all! That sounds like something you would do, Katie.”

  Thanks, Mom.

  But it hadn’t been me. It was Sabrina who had found herself in trouble. Smart, sensible, sane Sabrina. Go figure. Not that I could blame my mother for her disbelief. I never would have believed it either.

  “You could have grabbed a few on your way into the bathroom.” I glanced at Tyler’s bureau, where the dish I thought might hold candy sat full of condoms. It was
his room—he had to know they were there.

  “I know.” He nodded, slipping a hand behind my neck and bringing my head closer so he could press his lips to the top of it. “I decided not to.”

  Decided not to.

  A conscious choice then. For some reason, that thought thrilled me.

  “I won’t get pregnant,” I reassured him, snuggling closer. “Don’t worry.”

  He was so quiet, I lifted my head to look at him again.

  “Are you worried?” I asked.

  “A little, I guess. I mean, birth control isn’t ever a hundred percent effective. Even condoms.”

  “Well, look at Rob and Sabrina. They didn’t mean for it to happen, but… they’re happy about it now.”

  “Yeah.” Tyler’s brow knitted as he stared up at the ceiling.

  “What would you do?” I asked, almost afraid to ask. “If I was?”

  “Katie…” He sighed, giving the slightest shake of his head.

  “I’m not,” I assured him again. Why couldn’t I leave it alone? I knew I should just let it drop, but for some reason, I couldn’t. “But… hypothetically. I mean, like you said, birth control isn’t a hundred percent effective, right? What if I did get pregnant? What would you do?”

  “Do?” He shrugged helplessly. “What could I do? It would be totally out of my control. That’s what scares me.”

  Was that it? I remembered something he said while we were on tour, when he first found out that Sabrina was pregnant with Rob’s baby. Sabrina told me first, and I’d let the secret slip to Tyler, making him swear on his life that he wouldn’t tell Rob before Sabrina got a chance to.

  I would never forget the expression on his face, something caught between abject horror and outright terror. Is that what I had to look forward to if, someday, Tyler and I decided to start a family?

  I knew I was getting ahead of myself—like way, wayyyyy ahead—but his reaction had bothered me then, and it still bothered me now.

  “What would you want, then?” I pushed, peering at him, studying his reaction.

  “I don’t know, Katie.” He stared at the ceiling, not looking at me.