by Whitley Cox
“I did. But not how you would think. I didn’t go looking to beat them up. Didn’t even swing the first punch or the last. But I hit them all where it hurt the most—their pride. I stole their top spots on all the major sports teams, stole their girlfriends, stole their limelight, their popularity. Almost overnight, I became this school sensation—a freshman who looked like a senior, dating senior girls, all that. I was awkward and bumbling at first, but the guys at the gym helped me overcome that, and by my sophomore year, I was playing for the senior varsity football team, varsity wrestling team. I didn’t have to land one blow to anybody’s gut or temple to cripple them.”
The sexy line of her throat bobbed on a hard swallow. “Wow.”
Why did he get the feeling she wasn’t as impressed as most women would be?
She lifted her gaze to his. “And what did you do with that new fame besides steal girlfriends, throw around a ball and party every weekend?”
Ouch!
“I didn’t party every weekend,” he said, shaking his head. She was forming the wrong idea about him. He needed to put a stop to it. “My parents were killed by a drunk driver, don’t forget. My grandparents drilled the dangers of alcohol and drunk driving into Adam and I from day one. I didn’t drink until college when I lived on campus and home was just a stumble away.”
Her eyes dropped down to her lap and her chest deflated on a slow exhale. “I’m sorry.”
He needed to continue. She needed the whole story, she needed to know him. “I was nominated student body president, and I was captain of the debate team. I took the football team to nationals—and we won. I was awarded a wrestling scholarship to USC. I led the fundraiser for the twenty-four-hour cancer walk around the track.”
Suddenly, he felt like her approval of him was all that mattered in the world, that she needed to know he didn’t abuse his power or prestige in school, that his grandparents kept him on the right track and insisted he continue to do well.
He shook his head. “That’s not what we’re talking about right now, though.” He tugged on her fingers and laced his with hers again. “I need you to know that I’ve never abused anything in my entire life. Power. Women. Drugs. Alcohol. None of it.”
Okay, well maybe not none of it. Not if you counted that summer after his first wet dream where he spanked the monkey like five times a day for two whole months. That was a lot of self-abuse—and lotion.
His grandfather joked that they should have bought stock in Lubriderm.
“I told you that only drink on the weekends.” He tilted his head toward their wineglasses on her nightstand. “And I mean that. This is a one-off for me, I swear it. Loni claimed that I was a raging alcoholic, that I took performance-enhancing drugs and did doping. That I had ’roid rage.” He cupped his balls over the duvet. “Does this look like the sac of a fucking steroid user?” Her lips twitched as if she were trying to hide a smile, but instead she simply shook her head. “I’ve never touched that fucking poison in my life. Everything that I am, that I have, I have worked my fucking ass off for. I eat healthy, I work out and fucking meditate, and that’s all to keep me being the best person I can be. To be the best person I can be for my kids. Because I know that I was granted a big fucking gift when puberty hit and I sprouted and grew and was finally healthy. And I’m not about to abuse that gift. I just thank God every day that neither of my kids developed any of my childhood ailments. They’re both healthy as horses.”
Emotion hung heavy at the back of his throat, and he made to clear it but coughed instead. He stared at their knotted hands. She hadn’t said much, simply let him vent, let him dump all his pain and past on her—and yet she didn’t seem to mind.
Unless she did mind and was getting ready to make a quick exit.
Had he said too much?
Adam always chastised Zak for being a bit of an oversharer, saying that he came on strong and if the person wasn’t into that kind of personality, they were immediately turned off. Was Aurora turned off? Had he gone too far? Had he overshared?
“I’m going to go get you some water,” she said quietly, disentangling their fingers and sliding her lithe frame from the bed. She pulled his T-shirt on over her head and then gently padded across the bedroom toward the door. “We can talk more when I get back if you want to.”
Then she was gone. Leaving him staring at the doorway to the dark hallway where the most incredible woman had just left, wondering if he’d scared her away or if she’d be interested in staying with him until the new year … and maybe longer.
7
Aurora flicked on the light in the kitchen and went in search of a couple of drinking glasses, her mind reeling after all that she’d just heard. She needed to be careful not to pity Zak though. Nobody wanted anybody else’s pity—she knew that firsthand. But she did feel sorry for him—at least the younger him—and the older him when it came to his ex at least. She sounded like a real piece of work. Lying before the judge, accusing Zak of heinous actions, all to stick it to him even further than she already had.
She thought back to the last divorce case she’d worked on and shuddered. It’d been an ugly one too. Only in this case, the husband had cheated—with his wife’s ex step-mother, no less—and both he and his new mistress were dragging Aurora’s client through the mud.
It was enough to swear her off marriage and children for good—had she not had the best marriage in the world as an example of how to do it right. Her parents were more in love now than they ever were. The way her mother cared for her father after his heart attack kept that one ember of hope alive and still burning inside Aurora, that maybe she could also make the whole till-death-do-us-part thing work. She just needed to find the right man.
After opening up a few cupboards and coming up empty for glasses, she finally found them and went to the fridge, where he had one of those fancy water dispensers built into the front of the door.
And here she was drinking tap water at home.
Their lives were so different.
Too different?
She finished filling up their glasses, then turned to leave when a dark shadow at the foot of the stairs made her halt and nearly drop the water.
Slowly, almost cautiously he approached her.
She set the glasses down on the island and walked toward him.
“I thought maybe I’d scared you off and you decided to take your chances with the snow,” he said quietly, stopping directly in front of her but not close enough to touch. That didn’t mean she didn’t have to keep herself from swaying where she stood from the heat and strength radiating off him in powerful currents.
She lifted her eyes from his abs up to his face before reaching out and placing her fingers over his perfect stomach. “I’d have to be wearing a bit more than what I am to brave that blizzard,” she teased, pushing up to her tiptoes and nipping his chin with her teeth. “I’m not scared of what you told me, not in the least, if that’s what you’re worried about.”
He was in his boxer briefs now, but there was no mistaking his need for her as he pressed his hips against her belly and guided them over to the couch.
He plopped down first and helped her straddle him. She was in nothing but his shirt, and when the crown of his cock through his boxers brushed her clit, she trembled in his hands and ground herself down farther, rocking against him at the same time her lashes fluttered closed.
“Thank you for sharing all of that with me,” she said, playing with the hair at the nape of his neck, twirling it around her fingers. “I know that was probably hard for you. But it means a lot. Especially since we hardly know each other but that you trust me enough to let me in like that.” She leaned forward and brushed her lips against his. “Unless you want me to leave, I’m not going anywhere.”
He growled against her mouth. “I don’t want you to leave. I’ve only started to get to know you.” His hands worked their way beneath the shirt and pulled it free over her head. “And something tells me there are a lot of unexp
lored layers to you.”
Oh, if only he knew.
But that was the point, right? She didn’t want him to know—not yet, anyway. Her layers were not altogether charming, nor did they paint her in an overly favorable light. Zack needed to see a different side of her, the untragic layers, before she showed him the tragic ones. Otherwise, he’d run for the hills and never look back.
He dipped his head and drew a nipple into his mouth. “And I plan to uncover every single one of them before the weekend is through.”
Focus on the now. Focus on Zak.
She tilted her head skyward and pressed her breast against his mouth, loving the way he teased and tormented her, bringing her so close to that sweet edge of bliss, only to bite her and tug her back down the mountain.
“Condoms are upstairs.” The disappointment was palpable in this voice.
Right!
Crap!
Twisting her lips, she swirled her hips around him. “I’m clean, and I have an IUD, if that helps.”
The thought of Zak inside her with nothing between them made her nearly come on the spot—that and the fact that he was tugging so hard on her nipples, she felt it in her toes.
“I’m clean too, but Violet got pregnant with an IUD in, so … ”
Her eyes went wide, and she stopped her gyrating and stared down at him. “Seriously?”
He nodded. “Yep. Nothing is a hundred percent, darlin’.”
Jesus.
He removed his mouth from her chest. His lips turned up into a wily grin. “Doesn’t mean I can’t take care of you down here.” He helped her off his lap, sitting her on the cool, brown leather of his couch, then he swung his body over and reclined down. “Come sit on my face, darlin’. Let me drink you down.”
Let me drink you down.
Had she ever heard anything hotter in her entire life?
No, she damn well hadn’t.
Zak’s mouth split into a big smile as he glanced down at Aurora. They stood in his bathroom side by side in front of the mirror, brushing their teeth. He’d found a brand-new spare toothbrush in his medicine cabinet and gave it to her, as she didn’t have one in her gym bag. He’d also lent her one of his white tank tops and a pair of his boxers to sleep in—at her request. He slept in the buff, but to each their own.
He leaned over and spat into the sink. “You look good in my clothes,” he said, rinsing out his mouth. “Look even better out of them, though. I can’t convince you to sleep naked with me?” He stepped aside so she could spit and rinse as well.
“I’ve never been one to sleep naked,” she said simply, spitting water into the sink. “Can’t do it. I’m always worried there’ll be a fire or an earthquake or a break-in and I’ll be forced to run outside in my birthday suit. To me, clothes just make sense unless you’re in the shower … ”
“Or doing other things,” he said, bobbing his eyebrows up and down playfully as he reached into a drawer beneath the sink and pulled out a box of floss.
She rolled her eyes. “Yes, or other things.”
“Need some?” he asked, offering her the floss. She nodded and thanked him. Then they both stood there once again, quiet, staring straight ahead into the mirror as they flossed their teeth.
Why did he get so much joy out of that moment? Why did it make him practically giddy?
Yes, giddy.
What a terrible word, but nevertheless, he felt something akin to that ridiculous word.
Maybe it was because he wanted that domestic bliss back. He wanted the routine, the blissful monotony and comfort that came with having a person in your life—someone who appreciated you for who you were, accepted your faults and celebrated your strengths.
He wanted a partner.
He hated the dating scene with a passion, had never really liked it to begin with. Maybe that was why he’d only had a handful of girlfriends over the years. And then Loni came along. She was gorgeous. He’d just lost his wrestling scholarship from an injury and was quitting college. She gave him hope for a future.
Then she told him she was on the pill—when she wasn’t—and then she gave him Aiden when he was all but twenty-four years old.
He’d had domestic bliss with Loni for a few years. The quiet family life with the two-point-five kids, small house in the suburbs in a good school district. And then it all went to hell.
“You’re thinking awfully hard over there,” she said, breaking his train of thought and bringing him back to the moment. She’d tossed her floss and was now fixing her hair up into another messy bun on the crown of her head.
He’d been flossing the same spot for a while now, and his gums were sore.
“You okay?” she asked.
Zak started flossing a new spot. “Yeah, sorry. I guess I’m more tired than I thought.”
She glanced at the watch and fitness tracker on her wrist. “Well, no wonder. It’s nearly three in the morning. Jeez, I’m really sorry.”
He dropped his floss into the garbage and turned to her, grabbed her around the waist, tossed her over his shoulder and loped into the bedroom, only stopping to shut off the bathroom light in the process.
Aurora squealed when her belly landed on his shoulder and then squealed again when he tossed her onto the mattress. He climbed onto the bed with her and pulled the covers up over both of them before he leaned over and turned off the lamp on his nightstand. Then he reached for her, turned her over onto her side and tucked himself in tight behind her, until her butt was nestled right against his cock, his chest to her back.
“Now, we sleep,” he said, planting a kiss just behind her ear.
“But what about you?” she asked, the sound of disappointment in her voice making his balls cinch up and his cock stir.
He chuckled and kissed her again, his hand cupping her breast and fingers pulling on a tight nipple through the fabric of the tank top she wore. “I appreciate your dedication, but I can wait. If you stay the weekend, I assure you I’ll even the score.”
He buried his nose in her hair and inhaled her spicy, feminine scent.
“What’s that in your hair?” he asked, unable to temper his curiosity. “It smells amazing.”
She turned her head and then gently spun in his arms until she was facing him. “It’s ginger. I use this locally made hemp and ginger shampoo. It’s really great. Found it at a craft market last month.”
He leaned in and put his nose next to her temple, inhaling a deep breath once again. “I like it. It’s so you.”
Although it was now dark in the room, they were close enough he could make out most of the features on her face. He loved the way her lips tilted up on one side in an almost skeptical smile.
“Yeah?” she asked.
He nodded. “Yeah. Spicy but also sweet.” He ran his hand down over her hips and the curve of her ass. “I love your body. It’s strong and feminine, fit and fierce, but not rail-thin. Curves in all the right places.” He gripped her butt cheek and tugged her hard against his body once again, his cock now like an iron bar between them. “Curves I can hold on to.” He wedged her legs apart with his knee until she was riding his thigh. “Curves I can run my tongue over. Curves I can kiss.”
The kittenish noise deep in her throat made his blood pump hot and heavy in his veins.
“Curves I can sink into and hammer into the mattress without the fear of snapping you in two.”
“Yes.” Her words were more like a whisper on a harsh wind, barely audible, but just enough for him to hear.
He brought his hand up and pushed beneath the waistband of the boxers she wore and moved his fingers around to the front, cupping her mound and pressing his thumb against her clit.
“What about sleep?” she asked, her hand between them finding his length and beginning to stroke him.
Gently, he rolled her to her back, then he reached into his nightstand, pulled out a condom and had it on in a flash.
“We’re going to be exhausted in the morning.” She chuckled, opening her legs
for him and letting her arms drift up around his back.
He settled down between her warm, welcoming thighs. “I’ll sleep when I’m dead,” he said, sinking into her wet heat. “But while I’m awake, I’m going to fuck you until we both pass out. Sound good?”
Her breath hitched when he made sure his pelvic bone hit her clit. “Sounds perfect.”
8
Aurora blinked open her eyes and tried to shift where she laid on her side, but she couldn’t. Warm—no, more like hot—bars of titanium wrapped around her chest and waist, pinning her back to a rumbling furnace behind her. A furnace with an even harder bar of titanium, which was currently prodding her in the backside.
Obviously, this was some crazy Inception-style dream within a dream she was having. This couldn’t be real. She waited for her brain to wake up, revealing her asleep in her crappy apartment, her dead cactus glaring at her—but nothing. This was no dream.
Well, it was a dream—a dream come true.
She was in Zak’s house. She was in Zak’s bed. She was in Zak’s arms. And for a large portion of last night, Zak had been inside her.
A giggle bubbled up in her throat as an enormous smile spread across her mouth.
Maybe wishes do come true.
After all, it had been what she’d wished for the last time she saw a shooting star. Because there most certainly hadn’t been a birthday cake or a candle to blow out for her birthday last week. Nope.
Her parents had sent her a card with a twenty-dollar bill in it—which she’d promptly re-deposited into their bank account—and they’d talked with her on the phone. That had been the extent of her thirtieth birthday. No drinks or dinner with friends. No breakfast in bed with her boyfriend—what boyfriend? He was long gone by the time her birthday came around. Had he dumped her so he wouldn’t have to celebrate it with her? She wouldn’t put it past him. All her boyfriends dumped her eventually. Some picked arbitrary dates, while others, like her college boyfriend, picked the day before Valentine’s Day. Maybe Pressley had been thinking the same thing. Kick her to the curb before her birthday or Christmas so he didn’t have to get her anything.