Hardwired

by Meredith Wild

  “I care about you. I’m falling in love with you, and I’m going to do whatever I need to do to protect you. Do you understand?”

  My heart slammed in my chest. Shit. Shit. Shit. His words couldn’t have hit me any harder. My palms prickled with heat and became damp. I rubbed them nervously on my jeans as the silence grew between us.

  “Heath has ripped our family apart with this. My parents worry every day about what they did wrong and I’m trying everything I can to set him straight again, praying something will work before he kills himself one day.”

  I relaxed a little, grateful that he’d spoken. I was nowhere close to making sense of the emotions rioting through me.

  I needed coffee, or sleep. Mainly I needed to be somewhere outside of Blake’s bubble of earth-shattering sex and emotional intensity. I was fucked up enough without all of that. I shook my head, trying to focus on the argument I was determined to win.

  He’d thrown me a curve ball, but somehow we needed to find a middle ground, though I worried that Blake wasn’t used to negotiating middle ground much when he wasn’t with me. I took a deep breath and placed my hands on his chest. His heartbeat quickened, mimicking my own.

  “Blake, Alli is my best friend. If she’s going to stick this out with Heath, I need to be there to support her, the same way I’ll support you.”

  For a split second, he looked lost. His expression changed again and he straightened. “I don’t need support, Erica. I’m used to dealing with this. I just don’t want you getting hurt. I couldn’t bear it.”

  My anger faded into an overwhelming desire to take the pain away, to help him fix this mess. “Listen to me. You can’t play master of the universe and refuse help from the people who care about you.”

  Blake covered my hands with his own, squeezed them slightly.

  “Listen, it’s been a long night. Let’s talk about this later… when we’re not so wiped out.”

  I sighed and nodded, accepting that we were agreeing to disagree for the moment.

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  The buzzing wouldn’t stop. I hid under the covers, clinging to sleep and wishing Alli would answer the goddamn door.

  Oh shit. My eyes shot open and I sat up straight. I was back at my own apartment. I jumped up to answer the intercom by the door, seeing no signs of Sid.

  “Hello?”

  “Hey, baby girl,” the voice sang through the speaker.

  I smiled. “Come on up, Marie.” I buzzed her in and opened the door. I set to making coffee, glancing at the clock on the stove. I had missed lunch along with most of the afternoon. My stomach grumbled. Coffee first. Marie joined me a few minutes later, looking fresh in a floral dress, the bright colors contrasting with her enviable skin tone.

  “Wow, nice place.” She surveyed the main living area, which now looked a lot less empty since the furniture had arrived. Sid had assembled everything while I’d been away, which I hadn’t been able to thank him for yet. Soon though. We were probably on the same schedule for once.

  “Thanks, I’m loving it,” I said. “Coffee?”

  “Water’s fine.” She hopped up on a stool by the counter and dropped her purse and a shopping bag to the floor.

  She seemed to study me a moment, her brow wrinkled. “You look like hell, Erica. Is everything all right?”

  I sighed, feeling as haggard as I probably looked. “Long night and long story. I’ll spare you the details,” I said, willing the coffee to drip faster. I needed a few extra minutes to wake up and figure out my current reality before I could even think about talking about it. “What’s new? Any updates with Richard?”

  “Oh, I don’t know.” She shrugged, taking the water glass from me. “He’s got his life, I’ve got mine. We’ll see how it goes, I suppose.”

  “I’m not hearing wedding bells.” I leaned back against the counter to face her. Marie had spent years on the dating circuit, and I was used to hearing about every new beau’s husband potential. She had a kind heart, but couldn’t ever seem to find Mr. Right. Heaven knew she was a hopeless romantic and deserved a good relationship more than anyone.

  “Doubtful. We’re both used to having our freedom. I guess when you get older, it’s harder to change your life for someone.” She sighed a little and twisted her glass on the countertop. “Sometimes I miss the days when I could lose myself in someone completely, and he’d do the same.”

  “That doesn’t exactly sound healthy.”

  “Maybe not always, but it’s intoxicating. There’s nothing quite like it. You should try it sometime.” She winked at me.

  “Unfortunately, I think I’m knee deep in it at the moment.”

  “Mystery man?”

  I blew out a breath, realizing she didn’t know half of my recent history with Blake. “Yeah. Mystery man. Blake is his name. He lives upstairs, actually.”

  She cocked an eyebrow. “Did I miss something?”

  “It’s complicated, but he seems to want to be with me. I want that too, I think.” I trailed off, not knowing how to put into words how I truly felt about Blake.

  “So what’s the problem?”

  I grabbed a mug, filled my cup before the pot brewed completely, and took a cautious sip. She had a point. Even I questioned why I’d fought so hard to temper my feelings for Blake.

  “It’s… frightening,” I said. “First of all, he’s very intense, and secondly, I’ve never needed anyone, but the more we’re together… It’s like I can’t think about anything else. It’s so distracting.”

  I closed my eyes, trying to clear my thoughts of him, an impossible task. He was everywhere, even when we weren’t together. And when we weren’t together, I yearned to be with him. Obviously the sex was unmatched, but when we weren’t ravaging each other, being with him always felt right. I had nothing to compare it to other than my string of lackluster flings with guys who were killing time with me until their parents forced them to marry a senator’s daughter or something. There was no comparison.

  “You’re in deep, baby girl,” Marie said.

  “I know. But I don’t want to lose myself, Marie. I’ve come this far, and this is who I am. I like my life and my independence, just like you. Why would I want to change all that and lose myself for someone I barely know?”

  “You lose yourself, Erica, because with the right person, who you become together is something so much greater, more than you could even realize right now.”

  Her words rang through me, rattling me to the core. My lip trembled a little, and I blinked away the tears that stung my eyes.

  “I think I love him,” I whispered. “And it’s scaring the hell out of me.”

  Marie hopped off the stool and came around to hug me tight. I hugged her back, so thankful to have her in my life. How could I surrender my heart to someone like Blake though? He had so many secrets, not to mention serious control issues. I couldn’t imagine how we could make it in the long run with all these hurdles. If we didn’t make it, how could I survive it with everything else I’d been through?

  “I have something for you.” She interrupted up my troubled thoughts and stepped away to retrieve her shopping bag from the floor.

  She pulled out an old shoebox and handed it to me. I brought it over to the counter and opened it. Inside were stacks of photos of my mother from their college days, early on when Marie was just beginning to dabble with photography.

  “I was going through some things and found them. You should have them.”

  I sifted through the stacks and studied each photo. My mother’s face and her smile warmed me. At times like these, I missed her more than ever. I tried hard to remember what she sounded like, her voice and her laugh. So much time had gone by, but the memory of her love echoed through me, a wordless melody that held my heart through time and distance.

  Marie leaned over my shoulder as if she were seeing the photos for the first time in a long time, making comments about where they were around campus in some of them. I stopped on one that showed a
group of five friends with arms linked, dressed in light jackets for a cool fall day judging from the foliage behind them. Something about the photo gave me pause. My mother was laughing, her long blond hair whipping around her face. She was turned to the man next to her. Unlike the others, their expressions revealed more than the frivolity of the moment—a fleeting look of adoration that I only recently had come to know.

  “Who is that?” I pointed to the man who had short sandy brown hair and blue eyes that I recognized.

  When Marie fell silent, I turned to find her shaking her head.

  “An old friend, I guess. I can’t remember.”

  “It looks like my mother knew him though.”

  “Patty had a lot of friends. She was very charismatic. Half the campus was in love with her, I swear.”

  “Marie—”

  “Erica, I don’t know who that man is. I wish I could tell you.” She collected her purse and touched up her makeup in her compact mirror.

  Marie was carefree and energetic, even a little immature at times, but she wasn’t much of a liar. She wasn’t telling me something. I had a niggling suspicion as to why, but I didn’t push her.

  “Sweetie, I’m off. Keep me posted on Mystery Blake, okay?” She smiled as if the past five minutes hadn’t happened.

  “I will. Good luck with Richard too.”

  She responded with a weak laugh that didn’t give me much hope for Richard. She opened the door and shrieked when Blake met her at the entrance. He looked as surprised as she did.

  I laughed and joined them at the threshold. “Marie, this is Blake. Blake, this is my friend, Marie.”

  “It’s a pleasure, Marie,” he said, greeting her with a heart-stopping smile.

  She mumbled something unintelligible before leaving, waving me off with a knowing grin.

  Blake leaned on the doorway, freshly showered and barefoot, his hands tucked into a pair of board shorts paired with a plain white T-shirt. Only he could make something so casual look so impossibly sexy.

  “Can I interest you in take out?” he asked.

  “Actually that sounds perfect. I’m still feeling pretty wiped out.”

  “Me too. Thai?”

  “Sure. I’ll meet you upstairs. I need to change.” I gestured to my pajamas.

  “You don’t need to. Clothes are optional, you know.”

  He smirked, and I rolled my eyes and smacked his shoulder, trying to hide my smile before heading back to my room.

  ***

  “Oh my God,” I moaned. “I don’t think I’ll ever cook again.”

  “I can’t allow that,” Blake said between his bites, eating noodles out of a tin container.

  He thought I was joking, but this had to be the best Thai food I’d ever had. We settled back into the couch, exhausted and full.

  “Do you want to watch a movie?” he asked.

  “You mean, go out?”

  “No, we can stay in, unless you want to go out?”

  “What about your no electronics rule?”

  “It’s more like a guideline.” He opened a drawer in the coffee table in front of us and reached for one of several remotes. Whatever he pressed pulled a large flat panel television out of a hidden pocket of the mantle.

  “Sounds good to me. Pick something out and I’ll go clean up.” I collected our mess and took it to the kitchen. My eyes lighted on a square black velvet box, if only because it was solitary in its place on the counter. I tried to ignore it and focused on putting away the leftovers.

  “That’s for you,” Blake said, leaning his hip against the counter on the other end of the kitchen.

  My eyes widened in surprise. “That?” I pointed to the box.

  “I wanted to give it to you in New York, but we rushed out of there before I had a chance.”

  Oh.

  “Open it,” he said, his voice low with that sexy rasp that made me forget myself.

  I tentatively reached for the box as he crossed the space between us. I held it in my hands, unable to open it. After a few awkward seconds, he popped the lid open for me, revealing two diamond bangle bracelets, each with a tiny charm hanging from the clasp. I lifted one out and identified its charm as a miniature roulette wheel in solid matching platinum.

  “For being my good luck charm,” he murmured.

  I smiled at the memory. That was pretty lucky, I had to agree.

  I lifted the second out. On it hung a delicate woven heart. My own heart started to beat wildly, my nerves suddenly on edge.

  “Every charm has a meaning,” he said quietly, setting the box to the side and clasping both bracelets around my left wrist before pressing a soft kiss into my palm.

  “Thank you.” My voice wavered. I admired the bracelets, which were simple and elegant. Knowing Blake, they had no doubt cost a small fortune, but the meaning behind the gift was what took my breath away. I had been running his words from this morning over in my head all afternoon, wondering if he’d said he loved me on a whim, or just to make his point in the heat of the argument. But the gift solidified the sentiment. He’d known it before he’d said it.

  Words caught in my throat. I wanted to say more. I loved Blake too. Trying to convince myself that I didn’t was beyond ridiculous. The words, and everything they meant, were tearing me up inside. I wanted him to know it too, but something kept me silent.

  I toyed with the bracelets—the cool metal on my skin and the faint clinking of the charms that would always remind me of him, even when we were apart. Before I could try to say anything, he cupped my cheek and bent to kiss me. I ran my fingers through his hair and kissed him back with every ounce of passion I felt, telling him the only way I knew how. He met my intensity, holding me tight and lifting me to him with his strong arms.

  “Erica—”

  “Shh.” I pressed my fingertips to his lips before he could say more. I couldn’t bear hearing the words again, knowing I couldn’t say them back right now. Instead I kissed him gently, closing my eyes to avoid his.

  He stepped back before we could go further, holding my hand and leading me back to the living room. Relieved, I got comfortable in the nook of his arm as the movie started. We settled in and I relished the moment. I couldn’t remember feeling so completely content with anyone else. No words, no expectations—we spent the next two hours unwinding together, forgetting the drama that had surrounded us the past few days until I fell asleep in his arms.

  The apartment was quiet and dark when I woke. Blake carried me into the bedroom as if I weighed nothing. He sat me down on the bed and helped me out of my clothes. Feeling rested from my recent slumber, a quiet energy stirred in me. My skin came alive under his touch.

  “I thought you’d be tired.”

  “I’m not anymore,” I murmured. I pulled off my tank top and bra, undressing myself from where he’d stopped. I shimmied back onto the bed where I waited for him.

  He pulled off his t-shirt, revealing his naked chest. “I can see you’ll be keeping me busy.”

  I smiled. “You were the one who said relationships could be distracting.”

  “I was only hoping to be that distraction.”

  Pushing down his shorts, he revealed his thick arousal. In the soft light of the room, he looked beautiful. Shadows played against the sculpted angles of his toned body. I bit my lip hard at the sight of him.

  “Then by all means, distract me.”

  He crawled onto the bed, the mattress dipping as he crept closer.

  “Lie back and I’ll do more than distract you.”

  I leaned back. He slid my panties down and went right for the tender flesh between my legs, licking me with expert finesse. He moaned, vibrating the sensitive tissues as he teased them lightly with his tongue.

  “I fucking love it down here,” he said, his breath gusting on my wet flesh. “I could lick your sweet little cunt all day long.”

  His words set my nerves on edge. I quickened, the promise of release brewing like a storm inside me. He dug his finge
rs into my hips to keep me still as I bucked against him. I held on, gripping the sheets beneath me, as the orgasm crept closer. I cried out, my body reacting beyond my control, but before I could ride out the last of the aftershocks, he’d nestled his hips between my legs and pushed into me, angling my hips to hit the deepest part of me on his first thrust.

  My breath caught as I stretched to accommodate him, my body exquisitely tight.

  “It’s so good,” I breathed.

  He moved slowly, easing into a rhythm that I eagerly met. Slow and intense. Nothing felt so right. Like coming home. This was where I wanted to be every night, in his arms where I could savor the pressure of his body over me, around me, inside me, filling me completely and fucking me tirelessly until we disappeared into each other—until we felt that magic together.

  “God, Erica. You’re so tight,” he murmured into my neck. “Perfect.”

  I pulled in a sharp breath and a blinding love rushed in with it. Chills erupted on my skin. I was crazy to think I could go on without him, without this. I was his, in every conceivable way. I’d never wanted him so badly, and I never wanted this moment to end.

  We made slow love, though it was no less profound for its lack of kink. Wrapped in his smell and his lingering caresses, I clung to the rigid curves of his muscle-bound body and to the promise that he would sate the burning hunger that consumed me every time our bodies met. He held me tight as another orgasm built inside me, slow and steady, pleasure taking me over. Overwhelmed by the emotions ripping through me, I closed my eyes, but Blake stilled.

  “Look at me,” he whispered.

  My body responded to the smallest of his commands. I opened my eyes into his, and the passion and love I found within them made my chest ache. There was no denying that I loved this man.

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  When I woke, the sun was up. Blake was gone, but he’d left a note.

  Morning, boss,

  Made you fruit salad for breakfast, in the fridge. See you tonight.