The Bronze Garza

by S. Ann Cole

  Worrying my lip, I watch him go. Through the living room and up the stairs. I don’t know what to make of it. Am I supposed to follow him? Am I supposed to just wait? Is this an “I’ll call you” situation?

  When I was making the card today, I envisioned that after I gave it to him he would pounce on me and have his wicked way with me. Not walk away from me leaving me bereft and confused. I’m so desperate for his touch, his attention, it’s pathetic.

  I linger downstairs for over an hour to see if he’ll come back down.

  He doesn’t.

  Tired of waiting, I head up to my room and leave the door open as I shower and get ready for bed. Thinking maybe he’ll come then.

  He doesn’t.

  Sometime around 1 a.m., when I’m on fire and finding it impossible to fall asleep, I give up the wait and decide to go to him instead, ambling down the hall on anxious legs.

  Hand on the doorknob, I take a deep, shaking breath before I turn it.

  Locked.

  ~

  I WISH I’D known that giving Torin that card would be an initiation of my own personal torment.

  It’s been three days, and, despite my efforts to be in his proximity at all times, he hasn’t laid a finger on me.

  In his office, I sit on his desk while he’s on phone calls or exercising, making a mess of his things on purpose.

  In the basement, I lean over on his worktable when he’s making furniture, baring my cleavage and filling his ears with pointless words.

  After a shower, I walk around in my towel.

  In the kitchen, I “accidentally” brush up against him as I grab things.

  In my room, I leave the door open and blast “baby-making” music from a Bluetooth speaker.

  But none of those desperate and pathetic gimmicks have yielded results. He hasn’t been avoiding me, doesn’t seem to mind having me in his space anymore, and even engages in my erratic conversations. He’s just not showing intimate interest in me anymore. In fact, since I gave him the card, he hasn’t touched me. At all. Not even a poke on the arm to nudge me, which he used to do whenever he was annoyed and wanted me to get lost.

  Regardless, the stench of lust and repressed desire is all over this house. So thick I could run a chainsaw through it. It’s becoming unbearable.

  Unable to focus, I haven’t written a single word in three days. Not when my body seems to be locked in a perpetual state of rabid sexual hunger. There’s this distant din, this hum under my skin, that grows louder and louder each day. Like it’s building to something, and any day now I could combust.

  I need Torin Garza to look at me with lust, touch me, kiss me, claim me and make me his. But I should’ve known it wouldn’t be that easy with him. I should’ve left well enough alone, take what little he was giving. Let him continue to ask permission. Because that was better than nothing at all.

  Now, a thick ache between my thighs wakes me, and I groan.

  Not again.

  The night clock reads 2:05 a.m., almost the same time I was woken last night by the same intense ache. An ache that throbs, heavily, begging me to slip my fingers down inside and sooth it myself.

  But I can’t. It won’t work. I need him.

  With another groan, I squeeze my thighs tightly together. It doesn’t help. Arrrgh.

  Laced with frustration, I kick the sheets off and roll out of bed. The only thing that’s worked for me the past two nights was giving myself a brain-freeze with an ice-cold glass of water.

  As I pad down the hall, I stop and glare in the direction of Torin’s room. I’m tempted to go try his door, but don’t. It’ll be pointless. Several nights ago, he was clinging to me so I wouldn’t leave his bed. Now he’s locking me out of the damn room. Gah, I hate him so freaking much.

  The low sound of the television in the living room hits my ears as I descend the stairs. He hadn’t been down here the past two nights I woke up aroused and in heat, so seeing him now, watching TV in his favorite recliner, catches me off guard.

  He doesn’t look in my direction as I trek across the back of the living room and toward the kitchen, but I know he’s aware of my presence.

  In the kitchen, I grab a glass and press it under the ice-dispenser, then hit the button for water. Once the glass is full, I stick my finger in and swirl it all around. It’ll need to be North-Pole chilled to quell the fire inside me, so into the freezer it goes. Three minutes inside usually does the trick.

  As I wait, leaned against the island, I glance over at Torin in the living room. He’s so relaxed, completely unperturbed while I’m a roiling, flaming mess. Always one breath away from arousal.

  I blame him for the maddening, unquenched hunger within me right now. For holding my hand. For kissing me. For making me think there would be more.

  And I blame myself for giving him that stupid permission card. It might as well have been my V-card.

  “Don’t submit. Don’t show them your hand. Don’t leave the ball in their court, ever. You hold on to what you have. Keep your leverage.”

  The words my mother gave me before I went off to college crash into me. It was her version of the birds and the bees talk. Where Dad is dominant, dogged, and defiant, Mom is somewhat submissive. But she told me she wished she wasn’t, hence the advice.

  I used to believe I’m more like Dad in that regard. Defiant, stubborn, unmalleable.

  Until Torin.

  With him, I have no desire to keep the ball in my court, to hold on to what I have, or keep my leverage. With him, I just want to surrender. Bare my neck to him like an animal.

  Alas, I’m starting to regret not following Mom’s advice.

  Torture.

  It’s pure, unadulterated torture.

  In a fit of pique, heat, and frustration, I flounce into the living room, stopping in front of him.

  Lazily, his eyes shift from the flat-screen to me. Apathetic. Bored. Then, slowly, they glide over me.

  I’m wearing my purple satin and lace nightgown, which doesn’t show much considering it’s brushing my ankles. But from the way the look in his eyes morphs from bored to blazing, I might as well have been wearing a two-piece lingerie.

  It’s not worth getting excited over, though. By now I know nothing will come of it. He must be walking around with the worst case of blue balls.

  I hold out my hand. “Give it back.”

  He drags his gaze from my breasts to my face. “What?”

  “The card,” I clarify. “I want it back.”

  Eyes cooling from molten to impassivity, he scrapes his teeth over his lower lip. “Why?”

  “Because I’ve changed my mind,” I grit out in exasperation. “Give it to me.”

  “It’s in my room.”

  I fling my hand upward. “Then go get it.”

  “You go get it,” he replies with all the indifference in the world. “Watching a movie here, if you don’t mind.”

  God, he’s infuriating! In a whirl, I flounce upstairs to his room. And oh lookie, the door’s open.

  As I enter, I’m once again hit with the heavy, skin-tingling aura of him. Just the sight of his messy bed sends shock waves through me. It’s utterly ridiculous.

  Senses heightened, I drift around his space, dusting my fingertips over his things, opening drawers and touching his clothes.

  With a longing sigh, which sounds more like a whine from a wounded animal, I move to sit on the bed in the exact spot he’d been when I watched him touch himself.

  Remembering the stiff, venous hardness of his cock, how bronze and beautiful it had been, I reach up and pinch my nipples over the satin material of my gown, my eyes fluttering closed.

  Squeezing my breasts, imagining my hands are his, I recline on the bed. The ache between my thighs worsens, and I writhe in frustration, overwhelmed, a foreign noise vibrating in my throat.

  “Not so easy, is it?”

  My eyes fly open, and I turn my head to see Torin leaned casually against the doorframe, watching me. Only then do I
remember my reason for being in here.

  Cheeks aflame, I shot up from the bed. Shit. He’ll no doubt think I’m an obsessed headcase now.

  “I can’t find it,” I say, amazed I’m able to get the words out without stuttering.

  He straightens from the doorframe and reaches into the pocket of his sweats, then out comes the thin cut of wood between his index and middle finger.

  Bastard! He’d had it with him downstairs.

  “Give it back,” I say.

  “Do you really want it back?” He advances into the room. “Or are you just upset I haven’t used it?”

  Don’t leave the ball in their court, ever. Hold on to what you have. Keep your leverage.

  “I—” I start, then change to, “Why haven’t you?”

  “Maybe you should’ve put a ‘use by’ date on it.”

  “I hate you.”

  “‘Cause I make it easy for you to.” He stops in front of me and holds the card up between us; not closer to himself or me, just dead in the middle.

  I stare at it, but I don’t reach up to take it. Because I don’t really want it back. I want him. I want him to stop torturing me, stop making me wait.

  The silence between us grows until it’s its own living form. Lust and indignation war with swords of fire inside me.

  He lets the card slip from his fingers. It clatters on the hardwood floors.

  I don’t pick it up.

  His next move is so sudden I gasp. He grabs my hand and brings it to the front of his sweats. He’s hard. So hard.

  “This is not the problem,” he tells me, voice hoarse. He then lifts my hand to his chest, pressing it over his heart. “This is.”

  A pocket of air catches in my throat, but I manage to breathe past it. “I don’t—I don’t understand.”

  “What I feel in here, for you...” He shakes his head. “It scares the fuck out of me.”

  Feeling the thud thud thud of his heart under my palm, I swallow around the thickness lodged in my throat. “And...what’s in there, for me?”

  “Chaos. Madness. Greed.” His eyes flicker, then darken with something wild. “In my mind, I’ve already fucked you fifty different ways on every surface of this house.”

  “Fucking me in your mind doesn’t benefit either of us,” I say miserably.

  “But it’s safe.”

  “It can still be safe.”

  “How?”

  I pull my hand away and let it fall to my side. The tight narrowing of his eyes tells me he doesn’t like that, but I don’t care. “I’m not expecting anything from you, Torin,” I say. “I’ve already convinced myself you don’t have a heart. I already know you hate that you want me. Just hate-fuck me and everything will be fine.”

  “You think that’s how it works, huh?” he asks through a scoff.

  “Isn’t it?”

  He steps around me and goes to sit on the edge of the nightstand. “You asked me some time ago what consensual sex was like.”

  “Yes, and...?”

  “You were a virgin when—”

  “Yes.”

  “Then I can’t hate-fuck you, Lyra.”

  I’m on the verge of ripping my own hair out. “Well just—just normal-fuck me then! Do with me what you did with all the other non-Lexis you slept with to keep your heart out of it.”

  “Why?” he asks, voice dry.

  “Why what?”

  “Why do you want me to fuck you?”

  “What do you mean why?” What a ridiculous and bizarre question. “Because l-look at you. I mean, look at you. You’re the sexiest thing I’ve ever seen. Because you’re a jerk and an asshole. Because every time I’m near you my body sings to life. Because your eyes are moss and emerald and fire at the same time. Because you’re like a bronze god. Because your voice melts me from the inside out. Because you turn me on in every possible—

  He moves. Swift and smooth. Lifts me up and crashes his mouth to mine. Caught off-guard, I grip his biceps for stability, then kiss him back with a satisfying moan.

  It feels as if I’ve just stumbled on a vat of water after wandering the Sahara for ages. With every clash of our tongues, a dryness in me is quenched, drip by drip.

  Gripping him harder, I tilt my head and kiss him deeper, wanting more—gushes instead of drips. I want to drown.

  We break apart when he throws me down onto the bed. With sparks of fire in his eyes, he glares down at me like I’m offensive, chest heaving.

  The thin satin of my nightgown gives way down my thighs, bunching in silky ripples around my hips. Slowly, I let my legs fall apart, luring him.

  Hate and restraint wrestles with desire and greed in his eyes, and he rakes his teeth over his bottom lip in a way that can’t not be painful.

  Resent it or not, he’s hate-fucking me tonight.

  Battle lost, he crawls above me, and before he can, I take his face in my hands and kiss him. Irreverently, hungrily, thirstily. He growls low in his throat as our tongues lap around each other, rubbing, laving, feeding.

  He grinds his erection at my center, and a long, shivering moan transfers from my mouth to his.

  Ohgod, yes, this...Pressure...

  Again and again, he grinds against me, soothing the thick, throbbing ache I’ve been suffering and enduring for days.

  As if rejoicing, blasts of pleasure spreads from that spot throughout my body, ripple after ripple after ripple. I dig my fingers into his skin and roll my hips to meet his hardness.

  I haven’t felt sensations like this since college. I’m so close to orgasming it’s embarrassing. But I’m afraid to come. If I do, he won’t take it further than this. At the same time, I can’t stop rocking against his erection, can’t stop kissing him. His kiss is like drugs, his lips like sugar, and I…can’t…stop. I don’t want to stop. I’m so close. So—”

  He stops, and I whimper in protest.

  As he draws back onto his knees, he glides his hands down my inner thighs. They settle at my hips, gripping the waistband of my panties in his fists. On a heaved breath, he drifts his gaze up to mine. And it’s so intense, so angry, so hot.

  Do it. You don’t need permission. I’m yours. Do it.

  With a feral groan, he rips them down and off. Cool air drifts across my sex, and the ache, the throbbing ache, returns.

  A hiss whistles through his teeth as he brushes his knuckles against my folds. “Fuck, you’re glistening.”

  On its own, my pelvis jerks upward, my sex quivering, starving.

  “Settle,” he orders me through a hoarse breath.

  Not possible. I’m a coiled ball of need and desperation right now.

  With the heel of his palm, he applies pressure to my clit, then makes small, tight circles. And holyfreakingwow that feels amazing.

  Pleasure rockets through me and I grip the sheets and mewl. “Oh, yes, please, don’t stop...don’t stop doing that...don’t stop…”

  With his other hand, he slides a finger inside me. My greedy walls immediately start clenching around it. But he withdraws it, lifts it to his mouth, and sucks off my arousal. Through lidded eyes, I watch it all, driven closer and closer to the edge as he rubs me with his palm.

  “Know how you taste, Lyra?”

  Legs trembling, I shake my head.

  Again, he slides his finger inside my slick, wet heat, withdraws it, then leans forward and smears it across my lips.

  No hesitation, my tongue darts out and laps it up.

  “How do you taste, Lyra?”

  It’s impossible to describe what I taste like, so I shake my head. It’s sexy and arousing, but to put it into words…

  “Trouble,” he growls at me, “and temptation and fucking worship.” His eyes close, and he breathes heavily, his face twisting like he’s in agony. “And a taste isn’t enough.”

  With that, he jerks my hips upward and dives down between my thighs.

  A cry flies out of me as his mouth covers me and sucks. Only then do I understand what he means by a taste not bei
ng enough. Because he drinks me like he’s an alcoholic and I’m a vat of aged whiskey. The intensity that washes over me is more than I could’ve ever prepared for. More than my fantasies could’ve ever conjured.

  Unable to withstand it, I grip fistfuls of the sheet, press my head back into the mattress, and let it consume me.

  Lights burst behind my eyelids as a guttural noise forces its way up my throat and spills through my lips. My toes curl tightly, my legs stiffening even as my body vibrates like a motor.

  Like an endless wave, my orgasm crashes over me again and again and again, drowning me, making me gasp for breath.

  Oh, how I ached for and craved this with him. Yet this is more. So. Much. More. I don’t want to come up for air. I want to stay submerged. This is divine. Glorious. Nothing I’ve ever experienced before.

  Eventually, the waves recede, leaving me tossed and ragged on the shore. I become aware of Torin kissing his way up my body, with sucks and licks and nips, tugging up my nightgown as he does. Gah, he makes me so heady, so muddled.

  He pulls the nightgown off me, tossing it aside. Then his mouth is on mine. I taste myself and try to get as much of it from him as I can.

  His mouth drifts from mine, to nipping the flesh of my cheek, scraping his teeth along my jaw, down to my neck and chest, bathing me in kisses and tiny bites.

  He peppers kisses around my taut, swollen nipples, teasing, torturing.

  “Please,” I rasp out, writhing beneath him.

  “Shh.”

  I arch into his touch when he cups my breast and squeezes slightly, his thumb dusting over the puckered nipple. Still teasing, still driving me insane.

  “Please,” I beg again.

  This time he gives in, sucking my nipple into his mouth, his tongue swirling around it. And I exhale on a whimper, a rush of heat settling between my thighs like an anchor.

  Holy hell, I can’t possibly be this greedy.

  I scrape my nails along the cut of his muscles as he sucks and licks and laves at my body. This is all I’ve ever wanted. Him. Touching me. Kissing me. His weight on top of me. I don’t want this night, this moment, to end.

  “Tell me to stop, Lyra,” he grunts into my skin, even as he pushes his sweatpants down with one hand.