by London Casey
I grabbed his shoulders and let out a sigh. “Cass.”
“Yes, darlin’, keep purring my name,” he said, kissing even lower. “I’ve waited for this moment all damn day.”
I looked down and felt him kissing me, stripping me. I stepped out of my pants and panties, kicking them to the side. His right hand eased between my legs, touching my body. I was wet. He words and kisses had that effect on me.
Cass leaned back on the couch. I watched as he grabbed at his jeans. He was so bold and sexy, it was almost impossible to process. He opened his jeans and pushed them right down, not an ounce of shame in his blood. Not that there would be. Not with a body like his. Not when his thickness popped free, standing hard and tall.
Cass moved forward and grabbed me at the small of my back. “Come here, darlin’. I want to fucking feel you. I want to love you.”
He pulled and I let out a whimper.
I was straddling him on the couch. I lowered myself down and felt his cock against me. My nails dug into his shoulders and I took him inside me. The most comfortable, pleasure filled feeling in the world. Being lost in him as he was lost in me.
I lowered my mouth down to his and started to kiss him.
His hands went right to work, guiding my body where he wanted. Pushing and pulling, lifting and lowering, showing me the way he wanted to love me. But I was the one loving him. Thrusting my hips against his hardness, I took him to the hilt, moving all the way, almost letting him exit me, only to crash right back down.
Fucking him. Loving him.
Our lips and tongues battling for control.
The faster I moved, the better it felt. I reached climax, my body clenched around him and kept me in frozen in place. Cass’s strong hands at my hips, still moving me, fucking me as I came. My head spun as fast as my heart raced.
“I love you!” I finally cried out. “Cass, I love you.”
That’s when the entire moment stopped.
Him deep inside my tender body.
Lifting his left hand, he touched my face. “I love you, darlin’. Fuck, do I love you.”
“What about everything else?” I whispered.
“It doesn’t matter. Right now matters. I’m in love with you, Diem. I’m going to take care of you for the rest of our lives. That’s what I want.”
Yeah, there were a lot of things to talk about. But I was on top of Cass. His beautiful dick still hard and waiting for its own climax.
Priorities.
I kissed him and he put his hand to the back of my head.
We kissed like we were splitting up tomorrow and would never see each other again. And I rode him as hard and as fast as my legs could handle.
It was my new favorite workout ever.
Cass
NOW
Diem’s heart may have calmed but my heart was still a mess. I told her I loved her. After she told me she loved me. So there it was, the three of us as a family. It seemed so much easier than it was, easier than it would really be. I wrapped my arms around her and kept her tight to my chest.
“Cass, I have to tell you something,” Diem said, breaking the silence in the bedroom.
“What’s that?” I asked.
“I was thinking about selling my house.”
“Oh?”
“I don’t want to leave here,” she said. “Not just tonight or tomorrow. I don’t want to leave here ever.”
I started to sit up a little. The words were music to my ears. But they were shocking. “Darlin’, are you saying?”
“You offered,” she said. “If the offer stands.”
“Oh, shit, yes,” I said. “I want you here. I want my daughter. My family. You two are my everything. I wasn’t just throwing words out there before, Diem. This is a huge thing, okay? You shouldn’t have to uproot your life.”
She grinned. “I have no life, Cass. At least, not there. I bought that house when I graduated college. Everyone was getting apartments in the city and I was the smart money one who bought a house. I have no ties to anything there. I have ties here though. You, Cass. The people here. I mean, I’m not popular or anything, but—”
“Trust me, they all love you here,” I said. “The guys break my balls all the time. Want to know why a woman as beautiful as you even gives me the time of day.”
“Stop it.”
“I’m serious. And Paisley …”
I sucked in a breath and turned my head. I couldn’t talk about Paisley’s beauty because Diem wasn’t her birth mother.
“Cass, it’s okay,” Diem said. “She’s a beautiful baby.”
“You made her beautiful,” I said. “I mean, yes, I get it, you look at her and you see these big blue eyes, right? You see the precious little features on her face. Her tiny hands and her little fingernails. I get it, darlin’, that you didn’t make that. But you know what you did? You made her happy. You gave her a life. You gave her to me. You did something nobody else did, Diem. You gave me my daughter.”
Her chin quivered. “Thank you, Cass. I really want to be here with you. I can sell my house and help pay stuff around here.”
“No, darlin’,” I said. “If you sell your house that’s your money for yourself. For what you’ve been doing since Scarlett died. You do whatever you want. Trust me, I’m okay. For a long damn time. That means you’re okay. That means Paisley is okay.”
“We have to figure out the legal stuff too,” she said. “My lawyer got wind about you. I’m nervous.”
I touched her face. “We will cross that bridge next. And there is nothing to worry about. Paisley is your daughter. She is going to grow up and call you Mom. You are going to have to punish her. She’s going to hate you.” I smiled. “I’m going to have to deal with her as a moody teenager and you as a moody mother of a teenager.”
Diem blinked fast and laughed. “Can we just stay in the present first?”
“I’m right here in the present,” I said.
“I want this, Cass. I swear, I do. I’m trying to figure out everything that’s happened. Make sense of it. Find closure in it all. I still can’t believe you were the one that saved me from that fire, Cass. You’ve been saving me all my life.”
“When you say it like that, you make me sound like some kind of hero. I’m far from that.”
“No, you are though. You were there at the worst times to give me the best. I hope you know what that means to me.”
“Thank you, darlin’.”
“I know it’s a lot to ask,” she said. “But how do you feel about the entire situation, Cass?”
“I’m getting through it,” I said. “I promise you. I’m in the moment, darlin’. I can see my future. And for the past? It’ll move along with time. It’s hard, you know? I still want to be mad. I still want answers. I’ll never get the answers though. In exchange for not getting those answers I have you, Diem. I have Paisley. I have this house, this life, and how can I be pissed about that?”
“I do love you,” Diem whispered. She inched up and kissed my lips.
“I love you too,” I whispered. “I have something else to tell you.”
“What?”
“Our little girl is turning one on Saturday.”
“I know that already. I’m in complete shock over it all.”
I smiled. “Me and the guys from St. Skin are throwing her a birthday party.”
“What?”
“My little girl is not turning one without some fun. Yeah, it’s going to be in a tattoo shop. Yeah, it’s going to be with a bunch of rough and tough inked up wild men. Yeah, Prick is going to make some obscene jokes. But that’s our family, Diem. That little girl is going to grow up with those men as her family. When she needs to cry, she’s going to have some really strong shoulders to cry on.”
“You did that for her?” Diem asked.
“I did it for you. And her. There’s going to be balloons, decorations, everything. I know you said something about a cake, so that’s fine. You take care of that.”
�
�Oh, Cass. I don’t know what to say. It’s been eating me up that she wasn’t going to have a birthday party.”
“One less thing to worry about, darlin’.”
She crawled up on me and kissed me again. We kissed over and over. I wiped a stray tear from her eye.
In my heart, I had done it. All that I set out to do with her and Paisley. We were going to be a family. A real family. Maybe a family built on tragedy and a bunch of outcasts built in, but that was okay.
Diem fell asleep a few minutes later, smiling.
I watched her sleep and felt a little hole remaining in my heart.
Scarlett.
I had done all I wanted, except take care of Scarlett. I would have taken care of her while she was pregnant. Maybe I couldn’t have stopped her from dying. But that didn’t mean I couldn’t settle my feelings.
Maybe it was a bad decision but in that moment it felt like a good decision.
It was time to find the guy who killed Scarlett and settle up once and for all.
Diem
YEARS AGO
I slowly opened the bedroom door and heard crying. I couldn’t see Scarlett but I knew she was in there. I crept into the room and found her sitting on the floor, against the side of the bed. She had a shoebox on the floor, filled with pages of stories, notes, ideas, and the coveted half sheet of lyrics she wrote with the man who fathered her baby.
Her stomach was swollen, her right hand resting on her belly while her left hand held a piece of paper.
“Scarlett,” I whispered. “Are you okay?”
She looked up at me. “I made a mistake, didn’t I?”
I crouched down. “What mistake?”
“My life. I’m pregnant. I’m alone. I’m writing stories about my baby’s father like he died or something. Like the baby is going to read them and think she had this amazing guy …”
“Shhh,” I whispered. I touched her shoulder. “You know you shouldn’t be crying right now. I don’t want the baby to get stressed.”
“I know, I know,” she said. She wiped her face. “You’re right. It all just gets to me sometimes.”
“What does? Tell me.”
“What have I done?” Scarlett asked. “Should I find him? Call him? Talk to him? I don’t know what to do. This baby is coming soon.”
“And you won’t be alone,” I said.
This was a bit of a routine right now. Scarlett spending a lot of time in my house, crying, worrying, questioning everything. We’d talk for hours, come up with a plan, and she would do what she wanted anyway. Sometimes I seriously didn’t know who to be mad at more. Her or the guy that got her pregnant. I wanted to really be mad at him but he didn’t even know Scarlett was pregnant.
I heard the story over and over. She met some musician at a concert and they had a one night stand. Scarlett messed up her pills (big shock there) and got pregnant. I thought about just finding the guy myself but I didn’t want to betray Scarlett’s wishes. It was her situation. I was just there to support her in any way that I could.
That included holding her while she got upset, which I did right then.
“What were you writing about?” I asked.
“Nothing,” Scarlett said. “That’s where I’m at now. I have nothing. My mind goes blank when I try. I used to write about him. Now it’s like a blank screen. Nothing there.”
“Okay,” I whispered. “Maybe that’s a good thing. Maybe that’s your body trying to move on from it all. So you have a chance to take care of yourself. You’re strong enough, Scarlett. Right?”
Scarlett looked up at me. “Why are you such a good friend? Such a good person?”
“I don’t know,” I said with a grin. “I just keep picturing you when we lived in that row house. You got me in so much trouble.”
“You wanted the trouble,” Scarlett said, sniffling. “Admit it.”
“And you liked me holding you back,” I said. “You knew you would have gone too far.”
Scarlett touched her belly. “I think I did go too far. I’m pregnant. Alone. Terrified.”
“Let’s get this straight,” I said. I had to be the tough one. I always had to be the tough one. “Yes, you’re pregnant. Yes, you can be terrified. Having a baby is scary, sure. But you are not alone, Scarlett. You will never be alone. I will always be there. I will raise this baby alongside you. Got that?”
Scarlett smiled. “Thanks, Diem. You deserve someone good. Great. Someone that loves you the way you love me and this baby. I want that for you.”
“Why don’t you climb into bed and get some sleep,” I said. “Put this writing stuff away. Take care of your baby. There’s not much I can do until it comes out.”
I helped Scarlett into bed and she hugged me. She pulled me next to her. Just another one of our routines. I was the motherly figure. The protector. The one to absorb all the pain.
“I have to confess something,” Scarlett whispered as she rested her head on my breast.
“What?”
Scarlett grabbed my hand and put it to her belly. There was something about feeling her stomach. It just got to me. It made me emotional.
“I know.”
“You know what?”
“Boy or girl.”
“What? I thought you were going to wait.”
“I couldn’t. I needed to know.”
“So tell me. Spill the beans.”
Scarlett opened her eyes. She had such pretty blue eyes. I knew whatever the sex of the baby he or she was going to have amazing eyes.
“It’s a girl,” Scarlett whispered.
“No.”
“Yes.”
Tears filled my eyes. Tears filled her eyes.
We both started to cry.
A baby girl.
I couldn’t wait to meet her. To hold her. To spoil her with kisses.
“I need a name,” Scarlett said.
I said the first name that popped into my head.
“Paisley.”
“Paisley,” Scarlett said. “I love it.”
“Yeah?”
“I do. I love it. Baby Paisley.”
Scarlett and I kept crying.
I was so emotional and the baby wasn’t even mine.
Cass
NOW
The night before my daughter’s first birthday, Diem was at the house with Paisley. She had been an emotional mess, rightfully so. Paisley turning one was a big deal, but I knew it went deeper. The fact that a year ago Diem watched Paisley come into the world.
I hadn’t been there though.
I had been left out of it.
And yeah, that really did hurt me.
So there I was, on the road, maybe trying to clear my head a little. But I knew right where I was going, though. I had a town. And of all damn things, I had a bar. I was going to find Matthew and talk to him. Matthew, the man that was driving the truck that killed Scarlett. He was at a bar. Can you believe that? The asshole who got away with murder was drinking. Probably driving home drunk, too.
Thinking that kept my wheels spinning. My motorcycle crying out into the night as I cruised along, knowing I was heading into nothing but damn trouble.
The trouble was easy to find.
Only a half hour ride away.
A little dive bar on the corner, connected to a barber shop, a nail salon, and the second story converted into apartments.
I parked my motorcycle and walked it backwards and sat there. I had two choices. Go inside and raise a little hell. Or just go back home. I thought about Paisley. Her big day was tomorrow. She’d never remember it. So maybe it was more of a big day for Diem.
I sat there for a good while … right up until a third option presented itself.
Matthew came stumbling out of the bar—alone.
I watched him walk to his truck. He was swaying like he was trying to walk in a hurricane. That’s when I finally got off my motorcycle. I couldn’t let the moment slip by.
I walked right up to him as he tried to stick his key in
to the truck to unlock the door. I swung a fist, punching the keys out of his hand.
“What the fuck?” he yelled.
He turned and looked at me.
The drunk eyes of a killer.
I grabbed him and put him against the truck. “Do you know who the fuck I am?”
“No,” Matthew said.
“You fucking still drink and drive, huh?”
“Who the fuck are you?” he yelled in my face.
“You killed her. You drove your truck right into her car. Then you drove away.”
His eyes went wide. Yeah, he knew exactly what I was talking about.
“I didn’t do anything,” he said. “There was a trial. Everything—”
“You got out of it,” I said. “You fucking weaseled out of it. And that woman you killed was the mother of my daughter.”
“Oh, shit,” Matthew said. “Shit, shit—look …”
“No. No more. She gets justice now.”
I brought my knee up and slammed it into his stomach. He let out a loud groan and dropped right down to his knees. He reached for me, already starting to blubber.
“I’m so sorry,” he said. “I’m so fucking sorry.”
I brought my knee forward and hit Matthew in the face. His head hit the side of his truck. He fell to the side and I wasn’t done just yet. I took a handful of his shirt and brought my right fist back.
That’s when I met his eyes again.
The version of me before meeting Diem and Paisley … I would have probably killed the guy. But I stared in his eyes. The man who killed Scarlett. The man who set up a path of fate that was tragic yet beautiful in the same twisted, fucked up way.
He grabbed my wrist. “Please, man. I’m so sorry for what I did. I don’t even remember it. I was—”
I shoved him harder into the ground and then let him go.
“Fuck,” I growled. I took two steps and spun around. He put his hands up in defeat. “You even think about driving that goddamn truck and I will hurt you. I will kill you, asshole. You took someone away from me who meant a lot. You took away a little girl’s mother. And I now am raising that little girl, knowing that one day I’m going to have to explain that her mother was killed by a drunk driving piece of shit like you.”
“Please,” Matthew said. “I won’t drive. I swear. I won’t drive.”