Controlled Burn- To Publish

by Lani Lynn Vale

  My eyes opened, and I stared into her beautiful baby blues.

  “You’re going to hell,” she whispered.

  I grinned at her and pulled out, my release following my exit, reminding me why she felt so good.

  I’d never had her without a condom before. Never had anyone without a condom before.

  Leaving her for a few seconds, I cleaned myself up in the bathroom, then grabbed a hot pink wash cloth off the shelf and wet it before returning.

  She was still bent over exactly how I’d left her.

  Something she must’ve instinctively realized I’d wanted her to do.

  “Thank you,” she whispered, straightening and turning around.

  Her breasts were red and swollen from our intense lovemaking, and I couldn’t help but reach a finger out to run my finger over the swollen nipple.

  “Get in bed,” I demanded roughly.

  She rolled her eyes at me, but didn’t argue as she did what I asked.

  Her acquiescence had me pondering exactly why getting her cooperation was so easy, but I took the boon and ran with it.

  Sliding in between the sheets, she settled on her stomach, burying her face into the mattress as embarrassment flooded her face. I followed quickly behind, then pulled her into my arms.

  “I should really hate you right now…” she said to the mattress.

  I gave her a slight squeeze, letting her know that I should probably hate myself right now, too.

  I didn’t, though.

  The fantasy that July had mentioned had played in my mind for nearly twenty-four hours before I decided to act on it.

  At first, I wasn’t going to act on it.

  But then I’d seen her at Lowe’s in a pair of short shorts and a tank top that clearly showed she wasn’t wearing a bra, and I’d gotten upset.

  That upset had turned into determination, which resulted in me waiting outside of her house to confront her.

  And that led to now.

  “How’d you know?” July panted breathlessly beside me. “How’d you remember?”

  She was referring to a conversation we had in the dark one night after we’d made love. She’d told me she had dark fantasies, ones that were embarrassing and she’d have to work up to telling me about.

  I’d given her that play, and before she could work up her courage to tell me, we had broken up. It was pure luck that I’d heard her talking about them the afternoon before.

  “I remember everything about you,” I assured her. “The way you talk in your sleep when I wake you up abruptly. The way you smell when you get out of the shower. The sound of your voice first thing in the morning. The way you get cranky when you’re on your period and crave chocolate and pizza.” I moved in close, rolling over her once again so I pinned her to the bed. “There’s not a single thing about you that I don’t have buried in my memories. I torture myself every goddamn night with everything that used to be you and me.”

  She closed her eyes.

  “I do the same,” she whispered. “There’s not been a night that’s gone by that I haven’t cried myself to sleep.”

  I leaned my head forward to rest against hers.

  “I miss you so much it hurts,” I whispered. “Give us a chance.”

  “What if you die?” she whispered. “What if you leave me by myself like everyone else has? Like you already have?”

  “What if I live?” I countered.

  “I don’t think I can lose you all over again. It almost killed me the first time,” she promised me.

  I took a deep breath, inhaling the air she’d just exhaled.

  “I’ve been living as half a man since I called it quits,” I told her. “I miss you with every breath I take,” I said. “I’m tired of not living. Come back to me. We’ll make it work. I swear.”

  “You’re going to break my heart, I can tell,” she countered, devastation clear in her voice.

  “And it’s mine to put back together,” I said gruffly. “If I break it, I’ll always fix it. Swear to Christ.”

  She laughed.

  “You have an answer for everything. You always have,” her eyes rolled with annoyance.

  I grinned at her.

  “So is that a yes?” I asked her.

  “Fuck yeah,” she said in defeat. “It’s a yes.”

  She leveled a hard glare on me, but the effect was lost on me when her hand rose to run through my hair, causing her nipple to pop free from beneath the sheet and my eyes to become fastened to the sight. “But it won’t be easy. I’m not an easy woman.”

  My smile broke out over my face.

  “I’m not an easy man,” I told her. “We’ll get to discover each other’s faults.”

  “I don’t want you to know any of my faults,” she shook her head. “I’m not exactly of the best stock. Just wait until you get to meet all my classmates and you hear all the bullshit they’ll spew tomorrow.”

  I grinned.

  “They’re welcome to try to disrespect you,” I told her. “And we’ll cure them of any misconceptions real fucking quick.”

  She shook her head.

  “You’re going to be good, aren’t you?” she asked hopefully.

  I shrugged and lifted up on one elbow so I could let my finger trace around her free nipple.

  “Since when have you ever wanted me to be good?” I challenged her.

  Her eyes dilated, and her legs shifted restlessly between mine.

  “I take it back. I take it all back. Be as bad as you want to be. I’m always your willing servant,” she teased.

  I grinned and dropped my mouth down to her hip bones where my marks lay bright and obvious.

  She shivered as my tongue slipped out and traced the dark mark.

  “I’m here to please.”

  Chapter 13

  One does not simply walk past his woman in the kitchen and not smack her ass. If she’s there, and your hand is free, you do it.

  -Man code

  July

  I was going to hell.

  I’d been leading Dean on.

  I wanted to get back at him for leaving me, which was why I’d let him do what he wanted to me even though I should’ve told him no.

  This was going to end up in a disaster, and I would have no one but myself to blame.

  But I couldn’t leave. I couldn’t tell him no.

  I had no resistance left in me when it came to that man.

  I couldn’t even pull off this lie.

  I wanted to tell him the complete truth, and I wouldn’t be able to live with myself if I didn’t.

  I wasn’t a vindictive bitch. No, that was Alexa, but not me.

  That just wasn’t me. I knew exactly what it felt like to be jerked around, and I could not do that to Dean. Not if I could help it, anyway.

  “Dean,” I said the next morning, looking at him as he dressed in his clothes from the night before.

  He had to be at work in less than an hour and had spent entirely too long making love to me this morning for it to be possible for him to be on time now.

  He was going to try, though.

  And I was about to make him even more late.

  “What, honey?” Dean asked, taking a seat on the bed and lifting one thigh as he slipped one black sock over a large foot.

  “I lied last night,” I blurted.

  His big body froze and only his head turned to me.

  “Lied about what?” he asked so softly I barely heard him.

  “I didn’t actually plan to make a go of it with you last night. Last night I was going to make you hurt like you hurt me a year ago. I was going to make you suffer like I have, but then you woke me up with breakfast in bed this morning, and I realized I couldn’t do that to you,” I said, swallowing hard. “I think it’s best if you leave and don’t come back.”

  Because if you don’t, I just might fall deeper in love with you than I already have and when you inevitably lea
ve me again, I won’t survive it a second time.

  He moved quickly up to his hands and knees, and I fell back into the bed in my haste to back away from him.

  I got my hands underneath me and my feet flat on the bed when he was suddenly just there, all six foot five, two hundred and forty pounds of pissed off him, preparing to pounce on me.

  “Say again?” He stalked across the bed toward me.

  I kicked off and tried to roll to my back, but he grabbed my foot before I could get purchase and yanked me back to him.

  My breath left me as I saw the seriousness in his eyes and tears started to form.

  “I’m sorry,” I whispered. “I’m just so tired of hurting, of constantly being in so much pain.”

  “I won’t leave you,” he promised instantly.

  I blinked, opened my mouth to argue with him and was interrupted by his declaration once again.

  “I. Won’t. Leave. You,” he reiterated. “End of story. I won’t fucking leave you. Unless you decide to shoot me and then I’ll only be gone for as long as the hospitalization lasts. Then I’ll be right back here in your bed, waiting for your next shot.”

  I laughed, a hiccupy, watery laugh as the tears slowed to a stop.

  “My cat hates you,” I informed him. “If you don’t make friends with him, he might attack you in your sleep, but that’s the only way you’ll ever be hurt by something that belongs to me.”

  He grinned and leaned down, pressing his lips to mine before he was up once again, slipping his feet into his boots without another word.

  Bending at the waist, I crossed my legs and stared at him and his muscles working as he finished dressing.

  I hesitantly lifted my finger and ran it down the length of his spine, stopping when I met the top of his pants where a holster, sans gun, was tucked into the back of his pants.

  “That’s new,” I said to him softly. Hesitantly.

  He looked over his shoulder at me, nodded once and stood. Then, surprising the absolute shit out of me, he reached under the pillow I’d been laying on with him all night and pulled out the biggest black handgun I’d ever seen.

  Tucking it into the holster at the small of his back, he reached for his phone and keys and stared at me once they were tucked into his pocket.

  “When I come back tomorrow morning, are you going to turn cold and ignore me?” he asked bluntly.

  I hesitantly shook my head.

  “No,” I whispered.

  He stared at me, those deep, soulful brown eyes practically caressing me even from six feet away.

  “Breakfast tomorrow?” he hoped.

  I paused, testing that on my tongue. “Breakfast?”

  He nodded.

  “Will Alexa be there?” I asked.

  A small smile tilted up the corner of his mouth.

  “Alexa’s going to be a problem, isn’t she?” he asked.

  I nodded.

  He held his hand out to me.

  “Walk me out as we finish this conversation,” he said.

  I took his hand and followed him out the door to my room, paused to slip my feet into my cowboy boots by the door, and followed him out into the shared breezeway I shared with six other tenants.

  Four of which opened their doors the moment mine opened.

  My stomach knotted.

  The men spotted Dean, eyed him for a quick second, and slammed their doors shut.

  “What the fuck was that?” he barked.

  I bit my lip.

  “That would be my fan club,” I explained carefully.

  His mouth tightened and the muscle at his jaw started to tick.

  “You’re not walking me down to the truck,” he insisted. “Not in that.”

  I bit my lip, looking up at him like he was something I’d never seen before.

  “I’ll be okay, Dean,” I said. “I’ve been living here for a while now. I’m used to dealing with it.”

  He gave me an annoyed look.

  “That’s not comforting information, July,” he relayed to me.

  He sighed, and I chose to stay silent in case he had any other anger that he hadn’t expressed already.

  “As for Alexa,” he said, pulling me in until my chest was flattened against his belly. “Alexa’s never going to be you. She knows that. I know that. You know that. She hates that, and she knows I don’t return the feelings she so obviously feels for me. You have nothing to fear from Alexa.”

  “I was being serious about breakfast. If she’s going to be there, I won’t. It’s not me trying to be petty. I just flat out don’t like her, not a single bit. Please don’t try to force it. It’s unlikely that we’ll ever be friends. You’ll be lucky if I’m cordial to her if I see her in a grocery store.”

  He chuckled underneath his breath.

  “Okay,” he said. “She won’t be going to breakfast anymore. Or lunch. Or anything. If I have to choose, you or her, it’s going to be you every single time. Do you want me to completely stop talking to her altogether?”

  Yes!

  “No,” I lied.

  He read that lie on my face, and his grin reappeared.

  “I’ll save any interactions with her to the hospital only, then,” he promised.

  Relief poured through me.

  “You could introduce her to Bowe,” I offered, the words slipping out of my mouth and surprising the shit out of me.

  Dean shook his head.

  “Bowe doesn’t like her,” he said. “And, I think he has the hots for your friend slash assistant who I haven’t seen actually do anything for you since I met her.”

  A laugh burst free of my lips.

  “Angie is a take her as she comes type of girl. She’s useful when she wants to be, and when that happens, she’s hella efficient,” I explained. “I pay her a fair wage for what she does do. When she’s not working with me, she works with her brother as an office assistant, and she’s also a PCT—or patient care tech—at Good Shepherd Kilgore.”

  He gave me a look that clearly said ‘yeah, right.’

  Then he kissed me, pinning me against the door with his body, leaving me breathless and panting.

  “Bye, sweet cheeks,” he called over his shoulder.

  I could do nothing but raise my hand in a small wave, completely unsure about nearly everything but one thing.

  Dean was serious. He wanted us to be a thing again, and I would either have to take it or leave.

  I’d also be incredibly stupid if I left before I figured out whether Dean and I could work.

  First, and most importantly, because I was still in love with the man. Even more so now than I was a year ago. Absence really does make the heart grow fonder, because despite being apart for this long, my love for him had only grown.

  Which sucked.

  Because that led into the second point.

  Dean wouldn’t sit back and let me leave. He’d force me to face my fears.

  Which led me to what was really my biggest fear.

  Was I just another project for Dean to fix? And when he did fix me, would he just flip me like one of his project houses? Because if that happened, I wouldn’t just be left broken again, I would be irreparably shattered.

  Chapter 14

  Do you think the guy that invented vibrators heard voices say, “If you build it, they will come?”

  -Random thoughts

  July

  My stomach was crawling with nerves as Dean pulled his shiny truck into the parking spot next to an old beat up truck that looked like it could compete in rock climbing contests on Mount Everest.

  Or not.

  But it was big and mean looking, so surely it served some sort of purpose, right?

  Then again, in the South, where we were, everyone lifted their trucks. Even people whose trucks would likely never see a puddle of water, let alone mud.

  My favorites were the cute little blondes who were the size of a toothpick with their ja
cked up trucks that they could barely maneuver through the Walmart parking lot, let alone a country road where mud would be involved.

  Kind of like the girl who was getting out of her jacked up, new model Tahoe next to me with her cantaloupe-sized breasts and unnaturally blonde hair.

  She didn’t look like that when we were in high school.

  I swallowed thickly as I pushed my hair back over my shoulders.

  I’d curled it and had worn it half up, half down, in a semi-updo that would allow the curls to float over my shoulders each time I moved.

  I eyed the necklace, the same one I’d worn since high school, and grimaced tightly.

  I should’ve taken it off.

  It was the only diamond I had, and it hadn’t occurred to me that it’d been the same one everyone had teased me relentlessly about in high school.

  “What’s wrong?” Dean asked, his eyes going from my necklace to me.

  “I wasn’t very popular in high school,” I murmured softly, my fingers worrying the chain of the necklace as I spoke. “I hated it, in fact. I was the kid everyone loved to pick on and the whore of the trailer park, even though I’d never actually slept with anyone.”

  When he didn’t say anything, I looked up at him and smiled at the scowl on his face.

  “I wasn’t a whore, obviously,” I informed him. “But you’re going to hear a lot of whispers, I’m sure, and I wanted to warn you before you actually heard them. Don’t freak out. Don’t overreact. Just be calm.”

  I looked up at him, and I could see his jaw clenched.

  “I’ll tell you this now,” he murmured softly, reaching forward and grasping my hand with his. “If someone in there calls you a whore, and I hear it, I’m going to react to that and you’re going to let it happen. Got it, sweet cheeks?”

  I snorted.

  “They’ll send you to jail,” I told him. “They’re not worth it. Trust me.”

  “What’s the worst thing they ever did to you?” he asked. “It can’t be worse than mine. When I was fourteen, I was all skinny legs and arms, a freaking beanpole,” he explained. “And I wanted to play football. When I went to tryouts, one of the seniors thought it’d be hilarious to sack me when I wasn’t paying attention and the ball wasn’t in play. He broke my femur and collarbone,” he sneered. “And I got a new nickname that day.”