Enigma (Laurel Springs Emergency Response Team Book 3)

by Laramie Briscoe

  Out of nowhere our lips meet, and it’s like an explosion of lust between the two of us. Our tongues tangle in an age-old dance, his cock presses deeply against my core as he pushes me harder against the wall. This is how I like my Tucker, hungry and ready for me.

  My fingers and his fight over which ones will take off his shirt, and eventually he reaches behind him, pulling it up and over, before throwing it over to the side. He’s gotten hotter since the last time we were together, looks like he’s worked out some more. Muscles on his abs that had been there before are still there, but more surround them. I make a sound in my throat, running my fingers up and down his flesh.

  “Had to do something,” his deep voice speaks to me in the semi-darkness of the room. “Jerking it only sated my hunger for a while.”

  A blush works high onto my cheeks. This was something I’d almost forgotten about him, the way he loves to talk. If anyone could make a woman come just by uttering a few words, it’s Tucker.

  “I need you,” I moan, pushing against him, hoping he drags me to the bed.

  When he does, I almost trip over my feet in my eagerness to be with him. He sits me down on the bed in front of him, spreading my legs so he can stand between them. My bed is high off the ground, because I always want to see if someone is hiding under it. That’s my own secret.

  Because of the height, it puts us almost even with one another, when I’m sitting. He doesn’t have to bend, I don’t have to reach up, he can kiss me with this crazy pace that’s both fast and slow. It’s enough to drive me insane.

  “Why?” I stick my fingers in the waistband of his jeans. “Why are you making me wait?”

  “Because I’ve wanted it so bad.” He grins before leaning forward, grabbing hold of my shirt.

  Getting that over my head, he presses me back against the blanket. I wait for precious seconds with my eyes closed, hoping he’ll continue, but he doesn’t. When I open my eyes, he’s looking at me, almost like he can’t believe I’m here with him.

  “What?”

  He rubs a hand over his mouth. “Just takin’ this all in. I never thought I’d have you spread out like a goddamn buffet ever again.”

  I giggle slightly, but then his fingers touch my skin with the slightest brush. It’s enough to bring ridges of gooseflesh across every inch he brushes.

  “You like that?”

  His dark eyes meet mine as his fingers head northward, to where my nipples are straining against the cups of my bra. Working where I do, I have to have the padded ones because we tend to keep it cold in the office. I nod, closing my eyes as his touch gets to the top of the lace edging.

  “Let’s see how much. I always hated you had to hide these tits while you worked.”

  He pulls the lace down, making a noise in his throat as he catches sight of my hardened nipples.

  “Oh yeah.” He leans forward at the waist, slightly blowing.

  “Fuck,” I groan. “Don’t.”

  “You love to be teased, Karsyn, don’t think I forgot that.”

  Right now, I’m wishing he had, the only thing I want between my legs is him naked, and by the looks of things, I’ll be waiting a long time for that tonight.

  Chapter Nine

  Tucker

  If this is a dream, I one hundred percent don’t want to wake up. I never gave up hoping I’d be right here between her legs again, but I didn’t think it would be now. Because her bed is so high, I’m able to bend at the waist and situate my shoulders comfortably, grabbing her thighs, putting them over my shoulders.

  She gasps. “Tucker.”

  “I’m gonna give you everything you deserve,” I promise, burying my head in paradise. I don’t ease in, like I know she assumes I will, because that’s the way I’ve always been with her before. It’s all been me easing her into who I am. Something clicked with me on the way over here. Maybe she didn’t need me to be easy with her, maybe she wants me to be who I am.

  So this is how I’m trying it this time. Hoping we’re on the same page, and praying that she accepts the real Tucker. My tongue flicks at her clit, causing her to tighten her thighs around my head. Her hands move down her body, tangling in my hair, holding me tighter to her.

  “Oh my God,” she moans. Her body is strung tight, like she’s trying to keep herself from reacting to what I’m doing.

  I pull my mouth back from her. “Don’t hold back, Karsyn. Give it all to me.”

  She opens her eyes, looking down her body at me. This is one of the sexiest things she could have ever done. It gives me a look at her vulnerability, the way her eyes turn dark with her arousal. Normally so light, they look like she’s been overtaken with the Devil himself. A switch flips in her when I give her permission to be the woman she is. Her fingers dig deeper into my hair, as short as it is, she’s managing to tug on it.

  “Do it again.” She opens her thighs wider.

  Smirking, I bury my head deeper, growling when she starts thrusting against my face, riding the crest of my tongue and going after every bit of her pleasure. This shit is hot. This woman in my arms the sexiest I’ve ever had. Releasing the flesh of her leg, I get my fingers involved, thrusting them along with my tongue. Helping her ride the edge of passion.

  “Don’t stop,” she begs. “Please don’t stop.”

  I don’t even let go of her clit to tell her I’m not going to. I just keep working her harder and harder. Wanting her to get hers first.

  “Fuck, Tucker”. She presses harder against me, clasps her thighs tighter around me, and that’s when I feel her let go. She’s moaning and making these noises that go straight to my cock.

  I don’t even remember getting out of my jeans and boxer briefs, but the next thing I know, I’m covering her body with mine, tonguing her nipples as she shakes. “You still on birth control?” I question before twirling my tongue around her flesh.

  “Yes,” she answers on a sigh.

  “Nobody else since you.” I push myself up on my arms, pulling my knees under me.

  Her eyes meet mine, and her arms go up over her head to grip the edge of the bed. Lining my cock up with her, I tease her slightly, wetting the tip with her juices before I slowly slide in. “Ohhhh,” she moans.

  “God.” I let the oath slip out as I sink myself balls deep inside her.

  We both still for a moment, allowing ourselves to get reacquainted with one another. I feel the resistance in her pussy let go, and then I start my rhythm. The two of us, we know each other well. I press my thumb to her clit as I work in and out of her body, she runs a hand up and down my lower abdomen. The bed squeaks as I push in, pull out.

  “Still didn’t get this thing fixed?” I grin down at her.

  “No reason to.” She grins back.

  That answer makes my heart lift. Maybe I didn’t fuck things up as badly as I thought. Lowering my body down over hers, I wrap my arms around her back, rolling over so that she’s on top.

  Her long hair flows down her body, covering those tits of hers. “Ride me.” I grab hold of her hips, helping her find her rhythm. This is something she wasn’t always comfortable doing. She didn’t always like showing this vulnerable side of herself, but as we got to know one another and as we got more comfortable, we started to do things with one another we’d never done with anyone else.

  She cants her hips against mine, moving up and down, her stomach tightens and loosens, tightens and loosens, as she goes for hers. When I steady her with my strong grip, her hands go up into her hair, holding it above her head. The motion lifts her tits so they sit high and proud against her chest. I push her hips down onto my length, hold her there, and press up, hammering into her. The movement makes her gasp, falling on top of me. I grip her around the waist, turning her over again so that I’m on top.

  She grins up at me, her eyes glazed with passion. She’s smiling so sweetly, and I can see it in her eyes. The love she’s always had for me. I halt my thrusting, looking down at her. “I love you,” I mouth, because I can’t give voic
e to the words yet.

  She nods, wrapping me up in her arms. My weight on my forearms, I wrap them around the top of her head and thrust again, setting the rhythm that will finally get me off. My fingers tug on the root of her hair, knowing she likes a little hair pulling.

  Her hand sneaks between us, rubbing against her clit. “I’m gonna come, Tucker, gonna come.”

  “Come on,” I encourage her. “One more time.”

  “Oh, oh, oh,” she moans before she thrusts up into me, throwing her head back against the bed. I bury mine in her neck, trying to keep my shit together.

  With superhuman strength I stop, letting her ride out what will probably be her final orgasm. Sweat covers both our bodies, and her chest is heaving against mine. I struggle to sit on my knees, but somehow I manage it, pressing her thighs farther apart, gritting my teeth as I pound home. My cock hardens even further, lengthening as it searches for its release.

  Every muscle in my body is pulled tight as I ride her. “Oh my God.” I close my eyes as I thrust into her, pressing down on her thighs, wanting nothing more than to finally come. But I’m not there yet. Right on the edge, not yet pushed over, it’s a hell of a place to be. Each part of me is ready for it, wants it more than anything. Chasing it, I pull out, push in, grasp the flesh of her thighs in my fingers, and use it to fuck her. Opening my eyes, I take one last look at her before I close them again, throw my head back and don’t stop thrusting until I come.

  “Oh my God.” My breath is stuttered as I get closer. “Yes, yes, yes,” I chant, knowing this will be the culmination of so much wanting, wishing, praying that life was different.

  Bottoming out, I finally come, holding her thighs tightly down on me as I empty inside her. It’s a relief I’ve never felt before, a lifting of not only my balls, but my spirit. Almost as if all the bad shit I’ve been dealing with pours out of my body, cleansing me, cleansing us, letting us move forward without all this shit in between us. I collapse on top of her, breathing heavily. She runs her hands up and down my body, cradling me in the comfort of her arms.

  “I missed this,” I whisper as I try to regulate my heart rate. “I missed you holding me after this.”

  She laughs. “I always thought you hated it because you couldn’t seem to get out of my arms fast enough.”

  “It makes me vulnerable,” I admit. “I’ve never been vulnerable for anyone except for you.”

  Her lips land on my forehead, kissing me softly. As her fingers make circles on my flesh, I can’t tell what she’s thinking. Maybe it’s about what she wanted to tell me, maybe it isn’t. I hope sooner rather than later she tells me what I’m fighting, but I also know from my experience as a law enforcement officer, you can’t rush these things.

  It could be fifteen minutes or maybe an hour later when she readjusts herself underneath me, and takes a deep breath. “I always wondered what we would be doing when I finally told you,” she starts.

  I hold still because I don’t want her to stop. In my experience, you can easily spook someone and they’ll just stop talking. I want her to talk to me, I want to know all her secrets and fears.

  “Never thought it would be like this.” She digs her nails into my skin slightly. “I tried to convince myself it didn’t matter that I hadn’t been completely honest with you, and then tonight happened. I now know I have to come clean. When I was thirteen I was kidnapped,” she whispers. “For two days there was a manhunt in Tennessee for me and the man who took me.”

  As the realization of what she’s said washes over me, I have no words.

  Chapter Ten

  Karsyn

  He isn’t saying anything and that’s maybe the scariest thing about this situation. I’ve never known Tucker to be a man of no words. Few words? Yes. More often than not, but speechless? Never. The longer he stays quiet, the more disconcerting it is.

  “You’re gonna have to explain this to me babe, what the fuck happened?” He pulls away from me, pushing himself up into a sitting position.

  I sit up too, grabbing the sheet up to shield my nakedness from him. I’m about to lay myself vulnerable and the comfort is needed. The breath I take isn’t nearly deep enough, but it will have to do. “We lived in Tennessee,” I start. “Jackson, and my dad was working for an aluminum plant. Mom was staying at home back then, but that day she had a doctor’s appointment. Thirteen was old enough for me to stay by myself, obviously.” I grin.

  He smirks. “I think I was staying by myself at six.”

  “You’ve always been an overachiever.”

  We’re quiet for a few minutes as I think about how I want to continue. So many things that day could have gone differently, and for a long time I thought about my part in what happened. I took more of the blame than my parents did, and for years, I struggled under the burden of inadvertently causing this to happen to me.

  “It was okay for me to go to my best friend’s house two streets over,” I start again. “I had to call my dad at work and let him know if I couldn’t get in touch with my mom. Since she was at the doctor’s office, she wasn’t answering her cell phone. Dad worked in the offices at the aluminum plant, and I guess that day he had meetings, because he didn’t answer either.” Tucker starts rubbing my hand as I play with a string on my comforter. “I got impatient. I’d called five times and left five messages, I’d called my mom three times and left three messages. My best friend had a new puppy and I badly wanted to see it.”

  “Any kid would have wanted to see it.” Tucker gives me the support I didn’t even know I needed.

  “I loved puppies, still do, but back then, Mom and Dad wouldn’t let me have a pet. Which meant everyone else’s I adopted as my own too. Neither one of them had answered and I was done waiting.”

  “So what did you do?”

  That day is both clear and hazy in my mind. There are some parts I can remember like they were yesterday, other parts, I must have blocked from my memory.

  “Grabbed my backpack, locked the house up, and took off for my friend’s. I wasn’t going to be denied any longer.”

  “You’re still the same today, ya know?” He moves his hand up to my jawline, cupping it and pushing his fingers back into my hair. “You go after what you want, and hardly ever let anyone stand in your way. You’re a strong force of nature, Karsyn.”

  “For a long time after this, I wasn’t.” I shake my head. “I just couldn’t seem to figure out who I was. But I’m getting ahead of myself.”

  “I’m ready for the rest if you wanna give it to me.”

  “Normally I would have taken a shortcut through the back of our yards, but one of our neighbors was doing construction on their back deck, and it messed up my normal path. This day I took the main road. I didn’t like the main road because people drove like idiots, and I was always scared I’d be hit.”

  In my mind, I go back to that day. It’s weird the things that stand out. The heat of the sun, the smell of the grass, the chirping of the birds. It was a perfect day, nothing warned me it would turn into what it did.

  “I was about four houses away from mine when I noticed the truck behind me.” Goosebumps raise on my flesh, and a dark foreboding overtakes me the way it always does. “I have no idea how long it’d been following me. I wasn’t the type of girl to take in my surroundings. My parents hadn’t taught me to be watchful, they didn’t teach me to be respectfully scared of people. I mean we lived in a nice neighborhood, and back then maybe we thought we were safer? I don’t know. But I noticed him. I walked faster, and he sped up. I walked slower, and he slowed down. He didn’t ever get completely even with me. He stayed either slightly behind or slightly in front of me. I was getting nervous. My heart was pounding and I was scared. I hoped there was a neighbor outside, but this was summer and everybody was either at work or on vacation. I thought about leaving the main road and going back through the yards, but I didn’t know if I had gotten to the house with the construction yet.” Tears start streaming down my face. “In my panic, I cou
ldn’t remember whose house it was. Isn’t that stupid? I’d lived there my whole life, had walked through those yards for years, and in that moment I couldn’t remember.”

  “It’s normal.” Tucker wipes at the moisture. “It’s perfectly normal. Happens to everybody.”

  “As I turned onto the road my friend lived on, I had to stop, a car was turning too sharply and I stopped to avoid them. Some teenager who didn’t know how to drive yet, and didn’t realize what was going on. I remember thinking, can’t he see I’m scared? Couldn’t he have just stopped? Me stopping gave the guy all the time it took. He stopped the truck, reached out, and grabbed me. I screamed, threw my backpack at him, and ran. He was taller and the backpack was no match for him. Within steps he had me, his hand over my mouth and I was in his truck with him.”

  “Don’t scream again.” He flashed a knife at me. “I’ll show you how easy it is to carve up flesh.”

  “That scared me enough that I didn’t say a peep, not when my best friend stood outside her house, watching as we drove away. I waved at her, hoping she would see what was happening, and praying someone would help.”

  “What did he do?” Tucker’s jaw is tight and I know it’s not because he’s mad at me, he’s furious at the situation. I was too.

  This is the hardest part to talk about.

  “He took me to a nearby motel and made me change clothes.” I close my eyes as I remember the embarrassment I felt.

  “Smart, he didn’t want people looking for you in the clothes you were wearing. Which means he probably had a history.”

  I nod; he did have a history, and we would find out this wasn’t the first time he’d taken a girl.