Say You Love Me : a novel of romantic suspense and forbidden love (Reclaiming Heaven Book 1)

by E. R. Whyte

  I start to edge closer when I feel her tug her head back, as if she’s trying to look at my face. “You know this is just a dare, right, Gunner?”

  “Uh, yeah. Of course. I mean, I know you wouldn’t be going after a ninth grader, or any—”

  “Ninth grader. Right. Fuck my life.” I feel, rather than hear her sigh, the gentle waft of air on my face and the rise and fall of her chest so close to mine.

  “I’m older, though.”

  “Yeah? How old are you, big man?”

  “I’m fifteen.”

  “How are you fifteen? Aren’t most freshmen fourteen? At the most?”

  I shift uneasily, wishing I’d never brought it up. “I kind of flunked kindergarten. Or got held back, whatever you want to call it.”

  A short laugh escapes before she captures it. “Oh. Well, that’s no big deal, Gunner.”

  “Thanks. I’m not dumb or anything.”

  “I know.” Her voice is soft. Sympathetic. “So, Gunner.” With the lights out, I can feel her regard. “I don’t want to sound mean, but I just want to make sure we establish a few ground rules. Especially with you and Sammy being friends.”

  “Okay.” I would agree to dance naked in front of the varsity team right about now.

  “No groping. Your hands stay in one spot and that spot is not my boobs or my butt.”

  I nod, then remember she can’t see me. “No problem.”

  “And don’t be running around bragging about this. It’s a dare. And what happens in the closet stays in the closet.”

  “I don’t kiss and tell,” I tell her, liking the way the words sounded in my head. Rico... Suave, as my dad would say.

  I lean into her all the way before I can think of anything else, or worse, open my stupid mouth and start talking again, and I kiss her. It’s great—warm and not too dry and not too wet—except it lands right on her fucking nose. “Fucking light!” I curse and try again, but she’s reared back and is wiping her nose, laughing a little. I love her laugh. It’s low and husky and so sexy.

  “Gunner,” she says, and places her hands on my face again. “Let me.” Her skin is so soft against mine, her fingertips cupping the base of my jaw and sliding into the hair curling at my neck. It sends tingles down my spine. And then her lips are on mine, warm and electric and delicious.

  I hold my breath, not daring to breathe as she teases my lips expertly with the tip of her tongue. Then, growing bolder, I release my breath with one giant gasp—shit, was that too much? Now I’m sucking air—and tilt my head to the right. Our noses bump, but I feel her lips crinkle in a smile as she maneuvers her own mouth into position so our mouths can meet more firmly. I’m moving my lips happily against hers, exploring but not daring to go too far, when her lips part and I feel her tongue reaching for mine. Our mouths mingle, hers tasting faintly of beer. All right, I think... I think maybe I got this. I move my hands to her waist, and she sighs a little into my mouth. I open a little wider, dare to nibble at her lush bottom lip the way I’ve seen them do in the movies. I’m getting the hang of this now.

  Shiloh is swaying gently back and forth in my hands, her head tilting first one way, and then the next. I think maybe she’s a little buzzed because she’s not kissing me like I’m a ninth grader. It’s making me a little light-headed. She’s so soft pressed up against me… she feels so good… and then the door opens behind us and the light pops on, blinding me.

  We separate slowly, catcalls behind us. And then Shiloh glances down at my pants and a rosy blush stains her cheeks. I made her blush. Despite my embarrassment, pride swells up in me. I turn and raise my fisted hands in the air like a heavyweight boxer who has just won the championship. I’m a champion, I think. I’m a fucking king.

  I glance behind me, but Shiloh is slipping out and down the hall to where the other upperclassmen wait. They are giving exaggerated slow claps and wolf whistles, and she dips into a cute little curtsy. I feel my heart lurch in my chest and know there is a fucking goober-worthy grin on my face, but I don’t even care.

  I’m officially stupid for this girl.

  3

  Shiloh

  NOW.

  “You’re up in ten, Shiloh.” Danny sticks his head around the door jamb of the dressing room, eying me up and down dispassionately as he chews on a pen.

  I’m frowning down at the sweater I’m knitting, unsure about the scale of the pattern I chose. It does not look like it is going to fit —

  “What the hell is that?” he asks.

  “It’s a sweater. I think I’m going to give it to Jay. It’s looking kind of big.” Jamal, or Jay, as we call him, is our bouncer-extraordinaire here at Kendrick’s Club. He is the big brother I never had, sweet and over-protective and a plain old asshole to the deserving. I adore him. Danny raises his eyebrows and shakes his head.

  “I see. Well, if it’s all the same to you, don’t make me one. Good thing you’re gorgeous, huh? Get out there and shake some ass.”

  “Yeah, okay, boss.” He disappears, and I place the knitting in my big bag on the floor, shoving it under my station. I stand to survey my appearance in the floor-length mirror of the club’s dressing room, searching for any wardrobe flaws that will detract from my performance. I’m dancing tonight, doing my irony-filled sexy teacher routine. Irony-filled because I actually am a teacher during the daylight hours. Dancing in a club is so far off from what my contract states I’m allowed to do for supplemental income, it’s just not funny.

  Beggars and choosers, though. My options have been narrowed down to stripping a few nights per week or working a call-center for ten bucks an hour. As distasteful as it is to flash my boobs at strangers, stripping gets me where I need to be. I can earn in a single night of stripping what would take me several weeks to earn working customer service or retail.

  And I need the money.

  As I survey myself in the mirror, Leila “Coco” Carnes walks in, her completely natural and completely massive boobs jiggling. She likes to walk around topless, her way of free balling things and driving Jay crazy in the process. Being a little fuller than most on top, I don’t get it. It is not comfortable.

  “How’s it looking out there tonight, Leila?”

  “It’s a crowd,” she says. “They’re rambunctious, too. I think we got some young blood in there.”

  I nod. “Leila, wait.” She stops, about to walk off, and looks back curiously. “Do you know where that came from?” I point to the single red rose sitting on my station. I saw it when I arrived earlier, but there was no card. “I asked Danny about it when I got here, but he had no idea.”

  Leila shakes her head with a frown. “Neither do I, sorry. Looks like you have an admirer, though.” She sits down at the station beside mine and starts touching up her make-up.

  “How’s that brother of yours?” she asks, nodding to the photo I keep on my mirror of the two of us. She knows it’s my reminder; knows he’s my why.

  The photo was taken shortly after I moved to Virginia to live with him and Mom. In it, I’m making duck lips at the camera and he’s got his arms around my waist, eyes squished shut as he hugs me. I remember that hug, those skinny little boy arms wrapped so tightly around me. I complained about him not ever giving me enough space, but he was such a good little brother.

  “He was doing great when I went to see him last weekend. Same goofball, trying to hit on all the nursing staff from his wheelchair.”

  Leila hooted. “I bet they love that. He’s such a cutie.”

  “They love him there. We lucked out, but I’ll be glad when I can bring him home. It is so freaking expensive, Leila.”

  I don’t like to think about our financial needs. I don’t like to consider how long I could conceivably be dancing to get everything paid. The bills are mind boggling and a little depressing. Sammy’s medical costs are nothing short of robbery on the one hand, but necessary on the other. His spinal and brain injuries required much more care than I was equ
ipped to handle without special intervention. I am just thankful he’s still here with me.

  I kiss my fingers and place them softly on the photo, and Leila sends me a sympathetic look.

  Mom’s private insurance coverage had always seemed perfectly reasonable until I needed it for Sammy’s private care. When she was killed in the same collision that injured Sammy during my freshman year of college, it helped expense a piddling portion of her funeral and the mounting medical debt, leaving entirely too much to pay with additional college costs and no real job. I learned fast that the complicated care for a person with Sammy’s kind of injuries came with staggering bills. When I was faced with how much I was going to be responsible for afterward the amount was enough to make me consider—for one brief, shameful second—climbing in my car and running far away. It just wasn’t fair. But then I looked at Sammy’s beautiful face, unmarred by the damage to his brain, and I couldn’t do it.

  There was no one else. Both our parents were dead, and there was no other family, leaving my options to either make Sammy a ward of the state or take on his guardianship, myself. Giving him over to the care of the state wasn’t an option. I was terrified that his care would be less than optimal, and his eventual recovery would end up delayed or impossible.

  A low buzzer mounted over the door leading to the stage draws my attention, alerting me that it is almost time. Other than this single stage dance, during which the bright lights lining the lip of the stage prevent me from seeing the faces belonging to the catcalls and whistles that echo up from the floor, I’ll be in the peeps for the rest of the evening. Maybe it’s strange, since tips are much less in the peeps than they are out on the stage, but I prefer it.

  Although it’s one on one and in some ways, I’m much more on display, in the peeps, I’m kind of distanced from my clients. A clever lighting effect reflects my own image back at me and helps me pretend that I’m just dancing for myself, rather than dancing for the mortgage, Sammy’s care, and plain old desperation. I can pretend I’m in my bedroom, dancing for my imaginary lover. I never have to look into someone’s eyes and see my own limited choices looking back at me, compounded by greed and lust and things that make me feel small and vulnerable.

  But it’s the stage, first. So, I take a final look in the mirror, and one last breath before I head out on stage.

  I’m dressed in a deceptively conservative pencil skirt that fastens at the waist and a white button up blouse, along with a pair of spinsterish spectacles perched on my nose. For some reason, guys love the dichotomy of the straitlaced glasses paired with the pure sex that my body becomes as I dance. My hair, a warm chestnut color, is pulled up into a prim bun. My mom used to tease me that it was the color of her brandy. Aside from the fact that the skirt is cleverly designed to give so I can move in it with ease, the costume could be part of my everyday teaching uniform. I pull a single wavy tendril of hair down to tease my face and start for the stage.

  The stage is darkened between acts to conceal set-up activity and the dancer’s appearance until the music starts and the act begins, so I make my way to center stage in relative darkness. It is set with a sturdy wooden teacher’s desk situated just behind the pole. There’s even a shiny red apple placed atop it. I run my hands nervously down my hips and take my spot in front of the desk, bent just slightly over it with my backside facing the audience. Regardless of how many times I’ve danced this dance, nerves and an unsettling sense of vulnerability always assail me at its start. I swallow them down, though, and fix a blank mask in place as Danny’s disembodied voice introduces me and the spotlight flicks on.

  “Give it up for Miss Cherry Pie, the hottest teacher you fellas never had!” Inwardly I roll my eyes at the stage name Danny came up with for me. Cherry Pie. It’s the very epitome of high skank and sweet innocent at the same time.

  Scattered applause and a few raucous whistles break out as the opening bars of Hozier’s “Make it Rain” tag the end of his words, and I begin to swivel my hips unhurriedly.

  I’m on.

  As the sex-filled notes of the music fill the blackness beyond the spotlight, I move seductively through my routine, marking out the moves in my head. As always, I place myself squarely in the world of the act. For these next few minutes, I cease to be Shiloh Brookings, twenty-one-year-old novice teacher at Kennon High. I become, instead, Miss Cherry Pie, sexiest schoolteacher ever to write on a chalkboard. It’s the end of the school day, and with her door securely locked, Cherry Pie likes to indulge herself in blowing off a little steam.

  It’s not how I envisioned myself making use of my dance background, but I guess my youth wasn’t misspent, as it is proving useful.

  Walking around the desk with deliberate steps, I face the back of the stage and raise a hand to my hair, releasing the heavy bun to allow my heavy hair to fall half-way down my back. I shake it loose and move back to the front of the desk by simply sliding my body across its surface on my rear, and then take up a provocative stance before it, moving my hips sensually right to left and then leisurely down into a squat. I take the apple in one hand as I do so, and then pivot one-hundred-eighty degrees until I’m facing the audience.

  Releasing the desk, I trail the fruit along the side of my body and to the insides of my knees before I press them abruptly apart, offering the audience a tantalizing glimpse of my thong-concealed goodies in the split of the skirt. Then I coyly press them closed again and rise, apple still in hand. Trailing the fruit back up to my mouth, I turn my head to the side and give it a long, slow lick before tossing it lightly out into the audience.

  I hear a series of cheers and hoots rise from the watching audience, and as they die down, I’m able to just catch snatches of a conversation from a rowdy group at a table just in front of me. “Hot as shit.” “Like that ass.” “Damn, girl. I want an apple.”

  A groan emerges from the group, catching my attention. It’s almost indiscernible, low and rough-edged, but it scrapes against my nerve endings and sends a spike of electricity dancing along my spine. I tilt my head back and expose my throat back in a blatantly female response and keep moving. Gazing blindly into the general area, I infuse my expression with intent, and with a lack of speed I know is excruciating, unbutton and begin to lower my skirt. I let it hover for just a beat at the apex of my thighs, circling leisurely until my butt faces my audience. Then, with a teasing look over my shoulder, I let it fall and kick it back into the crowd.

  As always, catcalls arise at the sight of my butt, clad in a scanty black thong. As I do every night, I offer up a brief thanks for barre and butt clenches. My ass, while a little on the round side, is high and tight.

  My white button up just brushes the tops of my hips as I shimmy a series of risky business-style steps that I know from experience will have my audience intent on my thighs as I work to free the buttons of my shirt. Even as money begins to rain, though, I’m more interested in that single voice rising from the group in the front. I can’t quite identify what it is that’s caught my attention—just that it has, which is a rarity with the music in my ears. Turning back around, I maneuver back to the edge of the stage by the owner of the sexy groan and fling my shirttails open.

  And there it is. The group of men are talking again, and there’s a muttered “holy shit and fuck me sideways,” accompanied by a grunt of something that sounds almost like pain. Although I can’t see the man’s face and fully recognize he could be seventy, obese, or a bona fide creeper, a little smile crosses my lips at the sheer power I wield in that moment. It’s one of the first times I haven’t felt vulnerable up here. Oddly, I feel empowered, full of an age-old feminine influence.

  His voice sounds young and I haven’t done any flirting in… well, ever. I choose to imagine he’s hot. I reward the faceless, but maybe hot, man with a single digit trailed between my lips and then slyly down, over my chin, my throat, my chest, and between my breasts. They’re encased in a sheer white lace bra that contrasts with the black thong. I t
hrust my chest out and move to the pole to swing around in a series of erotic arcs before landing and continuing to dance. The sound on the floor has grown to deafening proportions, almost drowning the music out by now. I’m dancing purely by routine by now and in accordance with the thrum of bass I can feel in my bones. There are bills, business cards, and flowers littering the stage, and I know in a minute a couple articles of clothing will need to accompany them.

  So, I give them what they want. Stepping to the very edge of the stage, right in front of my sexy groaner’s area, I look blindly out and crook a finger into his general area. Come hither, it says, its language old and timeless and spoken by all. I hear the shifting of chairs and then see a masculine shape standing before me, silhouetted by the stage lights glaring up. He is solidly built and tall enough that his head comes up to just under my chest even as I stand on a stage that elevates me a couple of feet. His hand reaches out and softly grazes my belly. His skin is calloused and rasps against the smoothness of my skin, raising chill bumps. It catches me off guard and my stomach flips, my breath catching in my throat. I peer out at him intently, but all I can see is a strong, shadowy jawline and the glint of pale eyes under a ball cap. Our eyes catch and hold as his finger takes a slow path upwards until it stills on the underside of my breast.

  “Take it off!” Someone belts out, and the odd connection breaks. Deftly, he unsnaps my bra, but instead of looking down as my breasts spill free, his eyes remain on mine. His finger, though… his finger trails a lick of fire as it glides down the center of my stomach to rest on the elastic band of my panties, which are suddenly, strangely damp. I’ve never gotten turned on during an act before. I feel a tug and realize he’s tucked some cash in the band of my thong. Blanking my face, I give him a saucy wink.

  “Thanks for the assist.”

  I back away, let my shirt slide off my arms to the floor, and release my bra to one hand so I can toss it playfully after that wink. Then I bend to remove my heels and saunter smoothly off-stage, routine complete.