by Nashoda Rose
My stomach dropped as we fell plunging into the depths of the cool lake. Ream still had his arm around me as we surfaced, and this time it was him laughing and my mouth open spitting out water.
He brushed aside the hair in front of my eyes with the tip of his finger. He looked all serious as he stared at me, lips slightly parted.
“Fuck, I love you wet.” Ream didn’t give me a chance to do anything but take half a breath before he kissed me again.
He was a great kisser, hard then soft then sweet until I was putty in his arms.
“Bed,” I managed to mumble beneath his mouth.
“No.”
“Ream, come on.” I would never beg, but I could do sweet. I nipped his lower lip then kissed his neck, my hands beneath the water, running up his chest to his nipples.
He cupped my chin, his thumb caressing my lower lip. “My cock sinks inside you again … it’s just me. No other cock. No other lips. The flirting stops, Kat.”
“God, Ream. It’s just sex.”
His expression got dark and I saw the anger simmering beneath the surface. “I hate just sex. I abhor just sex.” That was so not a guy thing to say. What wasn’t he telling me? I remembered how he tried to leave after I went down on him, how he pushed me aside, the way his body was stiff and cold. At the time, I didn’t think much of it, but with these words I knew something was off. “So, no … this isn’t just sex, Kat. With you … it’s something else entirely. That is not how it’s playing out.”
I remember Crisis saying woman were just objects to Ream. Had he never had a relationship? Had he never cared or loved a woman?
“And if I say no?” I wasn’t. I knew that.
“Then I’m going inside and jerking off in the shower.”
Damn, I was getting tingly just thinking about his hand gripping his cock and jerking up and down.
His fingers tightened on my chin and his eyes flashed dark. Yeah, the teasing he was so not going to tolerate on this. “You telling me you’re going to keep up with the flirting, Kat?”
“I like flirting.”
“I don’t.” He leaned closer. “But I’ll let you flirt with me.”
I liked that idea. “I would like to see you jerk off. So what if I say no just so I can get that?”
His arm tightened around me. “Oh baby, you can watch me jerk off any day. All you need to do is ask. Come on. By the time we reach the dock, you need to tell me that you’ll give all of you to me. Only then do we get back the sex.” He began swimming and I followed thinking the entire time that Ream was going to be inside me in less than five minutes. There was sex and then there was Ream sex, and I wanted Ream sex—bad. Because the truth was … I wanted Ream.
As I swam, the familiar tingling started in my legs. I slowed the kicking and fell behind Ream. I hadn’t swam since the new symptom after the shooting, and the movement was obviously too much for my legs.
Jesus. First dancing which I loved to do, now swimming. So far the horseback riding had been fine, actually my legs felt better after riding. The nerves worked in extraordinary complex ways.
By the time I reached the dock, my legs were in full-blown electricity zinging haywire. Not numb, but every movement sent a spark through me. It was like a wire that was short-circuiting in my body.
Ream took hold of my arm and pulled me to the ladder. “What’s up?”
“Nothing.” I just needed a minute to rest and then I’d be good.
“Bullshit. I see it in your eyes. Something’s off.” Realization hit and he frowned. “Too much swimming. Fuck. I should’ve known. It’s like the dancing.”
“Ream, seriously, why the hell should you know? I didn’t know. It was just too far. I swam this morning and it was okay.”
He ran his hand over his head and then down his face. “Jesus, Kat. You have to tell me this shit.” He slammed his fist into the water. “We did too much today. Fuck.”
“Ream—”
“Out.” He helped me onto the ladder and was right behind me, his one arm wrapping around my waist. “We’ll go lie down.”
I stepped onto the dock and tried to whirl around to tell him I was fine when he picked me up into his arms. “Ream!”
“Shut it. You’re so fuckin’ stubborn, Kat. If I didn’t notice, you’d have tried to walk up to the cottage. Just like you kept dancing when you should’ve sat down. No. This ends now. I want full disclosure.”
“Full disclosure?” I wanted to laugh and instead it came out as a huff-laugh because he was looking scary again and laughing in his face would not help my cause.
“Yeah.” I had my arms linked around his neck as he carried me up the path. His face was stern, unrelenting. He was completely serious. “Hold on,” he warned as he held me with one arm and opened the screen door then proceeded to the bedroom.
He plopped me down on the bed. “Give me a sec.” He walked into the bathroom and came back with a towel. “Strip.”
I hesitated because I was in shock. Ream was really serious and I was realizing that no matter how much I fought others looking after me, Ream would do it anyway and … it was sweet and I felt like I wasn’t alone in this. His brows rose when I failed to move and he reached for me.
I did a girlie squeal, to my utter horror, and then he lifted my soaking wet top up over my head and tossed it toward the bathroom.
“Bra.”
Ream was my ultimate cookie-dough Haagen Dazs, and I wanted to taste him again. He was more concerned about my health right now than kissing me and I needed to change that. Biting my lower lip and tilting my head slightly to the side, letting my wet strands of hair fall forward as I reached behind my back to fiddle with my bra. It took me a while. A long while and I could feel Ream’s eyes on me. I didn’t have to look to know his eyes smoldered.
“Do you mind?” I asked and half turned. “It’s all wet and I can’t get it.”
I didn’t dare look at him because I’d be ripping off my bra so fast I’d probably hurt myself.
The moment his fingers touched my cool skin, shivers went through me in a domino effect. I closed my eyes as his fingers slid down my back to my bra. Then in one movement he had it undone, the straps slipping down my shoulders as it fell.
His fingers trailed up my spine and over my shoulders. He slowly pushed the straps lower until they caught on my elbows. I stopped breathing.
He didn’t move. Hands resting on the nook of my arms, straps between his fingers, and my bra no longer covering anything as it hung just below my breasts.
I closed my eyes as I finally inhaled a shaky breath, the edges of my control beginning to teeter as he paused.
And then … Oh God. He leaned in and his lips touched the back of my neck. It was a stroke of velvet and moisture clinging to my skin. “Ream,” I whispered.
He kissed up the side of my neck to my ear then took the lobe into his mouth and suckled. It was long and slow, a languished taste. His teeth grazed and sent tremors up my spine. Then he bit down and I gasped in pain. He licked the sensitive spot and I sighed exposing my throat and leaning back into him.
“This is a bad idea.” He went to move away and I panicked, spinning around, reaching up and grabbing his head on either side.
“No. You’re not leaving me like this.”
“I’m not leaving you. I’ll never fuckin’ leave you, Kitkat.”
Oh God. My heart cracked and so did my voice as I said, “I didn’t mean it that way.”
I turned into him and looked up. He was staring at me as if assessing the situation. Ream was cautious, I knew that. He didn’t jump until he knew where he’d land.
But his coping skills sucked. There was a good chance I’d be in and out of hospitals at some point. Ream had a past with needles, with hospitals, then someone he loved and tried to protect died and he blamed himself. Then there was the uncertainty I often saw in him, a darkness hovering over him. Everything was stacked against us for this to work. But I wanted it to. I had hope that it could.
> He showed a side of himself I hadn’t expected bringing me to the cabin. He was spontaneous and I was getting that it was a part of himself he rarely showed others unless he … unless he trusted them. Him talking to doctors about my MS, that was something I’d never expected. It showed he cared and knew exactly what he was getting into.
He was frowning and I guessed he was calculating whether it was the right move to fuck me or not. I wasn’t sure why.
“Ream.” I grabbed the front of his soaking wet shirt and put my other hand on the bulge of his jeans. He groaned. I smiled then slowly undid his pants.
He grabbed my hands. “When we leave here, you’re mine.”
“Ream—”
In one sudden movement he had me on the bed and straddled me, my hands locked in his above our heads.
“Ream, the bed. You’re getting it all wet.” Who was I kidding? I was happier than hell he was on top of me. There was something about the feel of a guy on top that felt so dominant and hot. It was his power and control and that was all Ream.
“We get back … we’re together—entirely. We change my room back into your art studio and I sleep in your bed.” Before the band moved into the farm, my art studio had been Ream’s bedroom. I went to open my mouth when he said, “Not done yet.” I shut it because I really wanted to get this over with so he’d kiss me. “Crisis … him grabbing your ass … that does not happen.” He leaned closer, his mouth so close that if I inched my tongue out I’d touch his lower lip. “Dancing with other guys … does not happen.” His weight leaned into me, and I felt his cock pressing into my pelvis. What did he just say, something about dancing? All I wanted him to do was shut up and kiss me. “I’ve had one woman to look after in my life and I fucked it up. That does not happen again. I don’t make the same mistake twice—ever. That means I make certain you’re looked after.”
That got my attention. “I don’t need looking after.” Jesus, I didn’t want to be babysat. The ache between my legs got a hard kick and plummeted off the edge of senselessness into the depths of cold reality.
“Kat, I’d say the exact same thing if you didn’t have MS. Looking after you means I’ll be there for you. Protect you. Care for you because your mine. I hope you’d do the same for me. Except for the protecting. I don’t want you anywhere near dangerous shit. That’s my job for the both of us.”
Okay, maybe I could do that.
“No bullshit this time, Kat. I’m possessive and I don’t take chances with your safety. I check every angle before I make a decision. You know that first hand.” He grabbed my chin and forced me to look at him. “My past … it screwed me up. Once I’m in, I won’t let go. I can’t. It’s who I am and it’s too late to change. You have to get that. I need you to get that, Kat. So, you need to be damn sure.”
I wanted to scream yes. But Ream was serious and there was something else in his eyes that I thought looked like … uneasiness. I didn’t say anything at first because this was the second time he mentioned his past being screwed up. I was starting to put the pieces together and I didn’t like where they were fitting. Something happened to him and his sister. She’d died of a drug overdose, they didn’t have a father, and his mother he said was dead to him. What happened to Ream? Why was he responsible for caring for his sister? How did she get on drugs?
I knew Ream had a temper and that he was overbearing and needed control. Did that all stem from what he’d been through as a child?
The thing was, I felt like I balanced him out. I didn’t break down at his overbearing attitude. I held my own and he held his own against my bullshit.
Ream moved off me then climbed from the bed and ran his hand back and forth over the top of his head. I sat up as he peeled off his shirt then his wet jeans. He had no qualms about letting me see his cock hard and ready.
I bit my lower lip as my gaze ran the length of him. “Ream.” My whispered word was breathless as I stared, wanting, needing and maybe finally believing that this man who stood in front of me would stand by me no matter what happened.
Suddenly, he turned and walked into the bathroom and shut the door.
I sat stunned as I heard the shower turn on then the shower curtain on the metal rings. What the hell just happened?
***
I scooted off the bed and stormed into the bathroom, thanking God that he didn’t lock it as I banged into the door.
I jerked the curtain aside and then everything I was ready to spurt spiraled down the drain as I stared at Ream naked and gleaming, his hand on his cock, his face tight with tension, almost as if he was in pain.
His eyes flashed open and locked with mine.
“I need you to be sure, Kat. I can’t have you once then lose you again.”
Yes. Whatever damaged key he used, Ream was already inside me and it fit. We fit.
I nodded. “Yeah. I’m sure.”
He grabbed me under the arms and pulled me into the tub then backed me into the tiled wall. His palms slapped up against the tiles making a loud whack. “Tell me you trust me. That you’ll be mine.”
“I do. I am.” As I said the words, I felt a wave of relief fall over me because I did and I was. He gave me that.
Then he kissed me.
It was raw and gritty, something overflowing with so much emotional abandon that I swear it was almost painful the way his mouth took mine. We were uncontrolled, like we often were together, our heated passion boiling over into a danger zone that I should’ve been leery of, but instead I wanted to embrace it.
He unlocked everything.
His hands were rough as he kneaded my breast then pinched my nipple. I arched into him and moaned, the desire so frantic that I was afraid I would come before he even got inside me.
“Jeans, baby.”
Shit. Right. I still had on my jeans. With one hand he undid them then tugged them down and I stepped out.
“Fuck you’re beautiful.” He ran his hands over my abdomen then between my legs, his finger slipping between the folds then hesitating at the opening. “And wet.”
I ran my hand up his chest to his shoulder then curled my fingers in his hair. I remember I couldn’t do that before; he’d had it too short. I liked it longer though.
His mouth slammed into mine again and it was so hard my head hit the tiled wall. There was a mumbled apology, but I didn’t care. I’d wanted this man for nearly three years. I knew what I was getting into, Ream was crazy possessive and maybe that shit did stem from whatever happened with his sister. We were going to clash, I knew that, and I suspected he did too, but we clashed together and that was all that mattered. And right now, all I could think about was the sweetness of him filling me again.
“Condoms,” I murmured under his mouth.
“Shit.” He groaned. “I didn’t bring any.”
Oh. My. God. “What?”
His hand stilled between my legs, and I gasped as he slipped two fingers inside me. “The plan was no sex this weekend, so I didn’t bring any.”
I closed my eyes and moaned partially from complete and utter disappointment at not getting his cock and also from the pure pleasure of his fingers inside me.
“You on the pill?”
Fuck. “No.” Goddamn it. Really? And I was mid-cycle, but maybe if he pulled out then—
He knew what I was thinking. “No. Not taking that chance, Kat. Us—we are too important to fuck this up over something neither of us want right now. Besides, I don’t want to share you for a long while.” He kissed me again, long and hard, until I was moaning beneath his mouth. “I’d have them with you, beautiful. Never cared to before. But with you … I would if it’s something you wanted. But only if it’s safe. We don’t take chances with your health.”
Kids? He was talking kids? How crazy was that? The doctor said I could have kids. Studies showed that pregnancy was no different for someone with MS than someone without. The issue would be chasing after a two year old.
He hooked his arm under my leg and brought it up onto hi
s hip. His thumb began to slowly caress my clit in circles. The party in my sex became a riot of warmth and tingles, and Jesus, I was going to come … and it was too fast. And I wanted this to last forever. “Ream,” I whispered.
“That’s it, baby.” He kissed me again and the swirling tornado that was building started to teeter on edge.
“God, Ream. Harder.”
His movements stopped.
I inhaled sharply, my eyes flying open. He was so still, his eyes wide open and staring, but he wasn’t staring at me. It was as if he was somewhere else. “Ream?” He didn’t move and I felt the tremble shift through his body. “Ream?” I said louder.
“Kat?” He suddenly shook his head as if he was clearing it from whatever place he’d been, and then it was like nothing happened and the desire swam in his eyes.
“Baby, where did you—”
“Grab my cock.” His jaw was clenched and his tone was gruff as if he was in pain.
“Ream—”
“Now, Kat.” He cut me off again while taking my hand. He wrapped it around his cock and squeezed. I saw the deep grooves between his eyes as if he was fighting something. “We’re coming together.”
My fingers curled around his length and the throbbing heat of him jerked. “Fuck. That’s it.” He groaned as I tightened my grip and then moved up and down before stopping and stroking farther down to cup his balls then back up again.
His pushed two fingers inside me again and I forgot all about the look on his face.
I pumped then caressed until I felt the tension in him rising. “Christ,” he said as he started stroking me with his thumb again. “Oh God. You close, baby?”
I nodded because honestly words were not in my realm of capability right now.
“Faster,” he ordered.
I did and he did, just before I felt that sweet tightening in my belly and then the slam of a tidal wave over me like a wall of heat. His cock shuddered in my hand, jerked, then I felt liquid heat spill onto my skin, only to be quickly washed away by the water.
I was still tingling and sensitive as he pulled his fingers out of me and let my leg slide back down. I leaned against the wall, eyes closed, deep breaths, as I took in what just happened.