For now.
***
Olivia
Bash kicked off his pants almost violently. I’d seen the shadow cross his face. Was he thinking the same thing I’d been thinking? This was so good…all of it…and we might never have it again.
I pushed the sadness away and smiled. “I’m going to get rid of this.” I sat up, refusing to think about whether my stomach looked fat or my skin too pale, and focused on Bash’s expression instead. His hot gaze roamed my body hungrily as I stripped off my bra. Apparently, he liked what he saw, because he was on me a second later, body covering mine, his glorious weight pinning me to the bed as he kissed me.
He tore his mouth from mine and trailed kisses downward, pressing his lips to my jaw, then to my neck. One big, firm hand closed over my breast and I groaned as he closed his molten mouth over my nipple. I couldn’t get close enough, and my hips twitched restlessly, searching for something to relieve the mounting pressure between my thighs. He must have sensed the desperation because a second later, his mouth was on the move again. Down, down, until the heat of his breath washed over my center and my heart skittered.
His fingers curled around the thin fabric of my underwear and with one sharp tug, the thin straps snapped. I risked a glance down at him and he was staring, enthralled.
“God, you’re beautiful,” he groaned, and then he dipped his tongue between my folds and pressed it against the straining bundle of nerves hidden there.
I forgot to breathe as sensations like I’d never felt before crashed over me. His mouth was magic, taking me slow and soft one second and then wild and hard the next. Licking and sucking until I was chanting his name in broken cries.
“Bash, please,” I begged. For what, I didn’t know. I didn’t want him to stop, but I didn’t want to finish, either. It felt like the end and it was too soon to face that.
“Come for me, Liv. I want to feel it against my mouth,” he growled.
The words sent another blast of need tearing through me, but I resisted. “I don’t want it to be over.”
He pulled back far enough to send a look my way hot enough to sear my soul. “Over? This is just the first round, babe.”
He lowered his face between my legs again and this time, there was no teasing. He was relentless, massaging my clit with his tongue even as he slid a finger deep inside me. With a flex of that digit and one last suck, I screamed, my head tossing wildly against the pillow as wave after wave of sensation crashed over me. My hips jerked helplessly and I clutched at the blankets, desperate for something to ground me. He hummed his encouragement and the vibrations only made me come harder.
As the tremors slowed, I finally remembered to breathe.
“Amazing. Beautiful,” he whispered, kissing each of my hips in turn. “Perfect.” And then he set his mouth on me again. I protested, sure I was spent, but not five seconds later, the ache was back.
“Oh, God,” I murmured, the hands that had been urging him upward one second I now used to hold him in place. Right. There. He worked me into a frenzy, until I was biting my lip to keep from crying out again. One more touch, one more lick and I was done for.
He crawled up the length of my trembling body and slanted his mouth over mine. His lips were swollen and warm and tasted like me. I reached between us and wrapped my fingers around his length. He nipped my bottom lip hard and groaned my name.
“Condom first.” His voice was low and harsh and I knew he was on the edge. I ceased my teasing and waited for him to take care of business. With a tear of foil, he was back and poised over me.
Our gazes locked as he used his hand to guide himself into me. Just the head at first. Swollen and ready, nudging at my entrance, pressing slowly…so slow…inch by inch.
His jaw clenched and released and he squeezed his eyes closed as he pressed deeper. “You feel so good,” he ground out.
I wanted to respond. To tell him how good he felt too, but there were no words.
His muscles shook with the effort of holding back as my body stretched to accommodate him. I tried to savor the sensation, tried to stay still as my body clenched around him in gentle waves. Soon it became too much, and I had to move. I clutched his ass in my hands and pulled him deeper. The pleasure-pain of it made me want to weep. He pulled back before sliding deep again, and I cried out.
“Bash, God, please.”
The thrusts came faster now, in measured, long strokes, each sending me hurtling closer and closer to the end. My body was like a wire about to snap. The pressure built like a wildfire, heat suffusing my whole body, my skin tingling.
“Oh, God, yes.”
“Yeah, that’s it. Come for me,” he said, his voice an urgent whisper as he thrust faster and deeper.
He bent his head low, and sucked my nipple into his mouth as he plunged forward. Then I was flying. I let out a yelp as my body imploded, clenching tightly over his hard length again and again.
“Fuck, Liv. Jesus…” Bash flexed one last time and stiffened above me, quaking and straining as he came.
I closed my eyes and held him tight until our breathing slowed. My heart hadn’t even stopped galloping and already reality was creeping in. Why did it have to be this way? It didn’t seem fair that we had to let this go before it had even begun. How was I going to go back to normal after this?
“Stop it,” he whispered, and kissed my forehead.
“Sorry.”
I should’ve known he would sense it. The last thing I wanted to do was to ruin even one second of the time we had left.
“When do you have to leave for work?” I asked, forcing the words past the rock that had lodged itself in my throat.
“I don’t.”
“What?” I put a hand on his chest and pushed him off me. He rolled to his side with a smile.
“They have some benefit going on at Shorty’s tonight and they brought in their own staff so they didn’t need me.”
I didn’t want to assume anything, but already my pulse was racing. So did that mean—
“We have all night. Will you stay with me?”
Chapter Eight
Olivia
I woke up the next morning wrapped in Bash’s arms. It was bittersweet. Joy and heartache.
“You awake?” he asked, his breath stirring my hair.
I nodded. “Yeah.”
He pulled back and looked down at me before leaning in to kiss my nose. “How are you this beautiful in the morning?”
Tears sprang to my eyes. Some small, twisted part of me almost wished he’d been distant and cold instead of saying the sweetest thing a guy could say the morning after. I couldn’t bring myself to answer him.
“Do you want some breakfast?”
I pursed my lips, close to bursting into tears. I just shook my head.
“My brothers will be home soon.” His gaze was as gentle as his words. “I don’t mind if you don’t, but I didn’t want to make you feel uncomfortable.”
And it was almost 9:00 a.m. Andy had taken the red-eye back from Cabo and would be home any time. The fantasy was over and it was real-life time.
“I have to go anyway. I need to talk to Andy and get that over with. It’s going to hang over my head until I do.”
“Do you want me to go with you?” he asked. “I feel like I should.”
I sat up, taking the sheet with me. “It will only make things worse. Don’t worry. I’ll do like you said and meet him in public. If you want I can call you when it’s over so you’re not worried.” And so I could talk to him one last time…
He traced his finger over my collarbone and nodded. “Do that.” We were quiet again for a long minute before he broke the silence. “Actually, why don’t you just come over when you’re done?”
I jerked from his touch and stared down at him, my emotions so raw, I was sure I’d heard him wrong. “Bash, we talked about this. I thought we decided that—”
“That this can’t work.” He sat up beside me and blew out a ragged sigh. “I know
that. But it’s bullshit. It doesn’t make any sense to me.” He faced me and took my hand in his. “Look, I know we don’t have any idea how to make it work. I still have to go in a couple months and you don’t know where you’re even going to be come May, but I’m not through with you. I can’t walk away from this. Not yet.”
The tears I’d barely managed to hold back sprang free and I crumpled against his chest with a sob. “Everything is so fucked up right now. The thought of facing all this shit without you makes me sick. And the thought of never seeing you again and never knowing if this could’ve been it…my one shot at happiness?” I wrapped my arms around him and squeezed.
“I’m willing to deal with whatever comes our way, Liv. I still can’t make you any promises, and I’m not asking for any in return. But I want to try and I’m willing to fight for us to have a chance at something.” He pulled away and lifted my chin until we were eye to eye. “You?”
I didn’t even have to think about my answer. “Hell yeah.”
###
An hour later after my good-bye kiss with Bash had turned into a whole other kind of send-off, I walked into Everley Hall, whistling. So maybe we hadn’t slain the demons. They were quiet for now and Bash and I had a reprieve. It was more than I’d even hoped for. Once I called Andy and we got this over with, I’d have one less thing dogging me. I reminded myself again to make sure I contacted my parents to schedule a visit.
Olivia Beckett, tackling problems head-on like a boss.
I reached my room and slid the key in the lock, but the door swung open on its own. Strange. I stepped in and closed it behind me, cursing myself when I realized I forgot to check my mail bin.
“Miss me?”
I let out a yelp and jumped back, pressing a palm to my pounding heart. Andy sat at my desk, kicked back, a smile on his tanned, handsome face. It hadn’t even occurred to me after the way we’d left things between us that he would use my key and let himself into my place. Had I said something that would lead him to believe we’d be able to work it out?
“Hey,” I said cautiously.
He looked happy to see me, but there was something in his eyes that had me clutching the keys more tightly rather than hanging them on the hook next to the door. I could almost hear Bash’s voice in my head.
“In desperate times, anything can and should be used as a weapon.”
But my own inner voice followed close behind, reminding me that Andy had never laid a hand on me when he was sober, and from what I could tell, he hadn’t had a drop to drink. The boy I used to know was in there. And while we weren’t in public, the hall was filling up fast. Surely I wasn’t in any real danger…
I worked up a smile and set down my purse, wondering if I looked as guilty as I felt. Andy had done some bad things, but him finding out that I slept with someone else seemed like twisting the knife. “How was your flight home?” I nearly cringed at the false brightness in my tone, but he didn’t seem to notice.
“Long.” He stood and held out his arms for a hug. “Just like that whole trip. I’m so glad to be back. I hated every second of it without you.”
For a tense moment, I hesitated, but then I held up a hand. “Look, I know you just got home, but we have a lot to talk about. I didn’t want to do this while you were away and ruin your vacation, but it can’t be put off any longer.” I motioned for him to sit back down, and then sat across from him on my mattress, folding my legs beneath me. Just be honest about your feelings and keep it short. “I think you need help, Andy.”
His tawny brows wrinkled and he looked genuinely perplexed. “Help for what?”
Seriously? The last time I’d seen him, he’d been flat on his back after grabbing me by the neck in a drunken, jealous rage. But by his expression, you’d have thought nothing had happened. Had he not listened to anything I’d said the next day? Or did he just not believe that I was strong enough to walk away?
Irritation ate away at the guilt and tested the lingering fondness years of friendship and memories had created.
“Help for your drinking. Help for your anger.” I made sure my voice stayed strong and my posture firm as I spoke. A weak-looking target was an easy target.
His nostrils flared like he smelled something bad, but other than that, his face remained neutral. “I told you already, it won’t happen again. It was one time, Olivia, and I—”
“It wasn’t one time,” I cut in, beseeching him with my eyes. “You’d put your hands on me in anger more than once.” I was flat-out begging now. “Andy, something is wrong. You have a problem and you need to deal with it before it ruins your life. You’re not the same. What happened to the guy who used to leave funny poems in my locker and stay awake talking to me on the phone about nothing at all until the sun came up?”
“You finally gave up the pussy, that’s what.”
He said it so pleasantly, so matter-of-fact, that the words took a while to sink in. When they did, though, I could feel the color draining from my face. The admission was bad enough, but the delivery was positively chilling.
I swallowed hard, my mouth going bone-dry in an instant. “What are you saying?”
He leaned in and put his elbows on his knees, like he was talking to a child. “I’m saying, Olivia, that nothing has changed. I did what I needed to do to get what I wanted. Like I’ve always done. Like people all over the world do. You wanted someone to send you funny poems and talk to you on the phone until the sun came up. I wanted to fuck you.” He shrugged. “Do the math.”
I recoiled, bile rising in my throat. Had I truly been that blind for all this time? “That’s not true, Andy. You’re saying that because you’re angry. We’ve spent almost three years together. Why would you—”
“Because if I wanted to get the inheritance I deserved from my parents, they expected input on my future wife. You were as good a choice as any. But then you had to fuck it all up by acting like a whore, flirting with other guys.”
He slashed a hand through the air before scrubbing it over his face with a hiss of frustration. It the first sign of even a hint of anger from him. I almost welcomed it at that point, because smiling, sociopath-faced Andy was far more terrifying.
My brain was reeling and it was a struggle to hold on to a coherent thought beyond “How could I have been so stupid?”
Bash had been right. He had seen it in a matter of ten seconds when it had been right in front of me for years. Memories flickered through my mind, little things that seemed so inconsequential at the time. Like when I fell and twisted my ankle and Andy had laughed. Once he realized I was really hurt, he stopped, but when he told the story of me falling, it was always with a chuckle. Or the time I’d found him and Echo in the bathroom together at a party. They’d told me he was helping her find a lost earring, but the smug expression on her face told another story. And still, I trusted him. Because, first and foremost, we were friends. Or so I thought.
But it was all a lie. Every second of it.
I stood on shaky legs and stared down at him. Time to get tough. This person was a stranger to me, and I didn’t him owe a damn thing. Not anymore.
I glared at him, but managed to keep my anger in check and my voice low. “I need you to contact Shorty’s and tell them to give Bash his job back. Then I need you to get the hell out of my room and never speak to me again.”
Andy leaned back in the chair again, lips spread in a lazy smile that didn’t reach his eyes. “And why would I do either one of those things? I’m not done talking to you yet.”
“Because I’m done with you. And if you don’t, I’m going to tell both your parents and mine what you’ve done. They all think you’re some golden boy now, but do you think your family is going to hand wads of inheritance cash to an alcoholic abuser?”
I said a silent prayer that it wouldn’t come to that. My parents couldn’t handle yet another blow. Not right now. I was breathing fast now but it seemed like I wasn’t getting any oxygen. Was this what a panic attack felt like? I pres
sed a hand to my ever-tightening chest and tried to find some calm.
“What’s it going to be, Andy?”
He rolled to his feet in one motion and got close enough that the hairs on the back of my neck stood up. All I had to do was scream. People would come, but how quickly?
“I’m going with option number three,” Andy said, tipping his head close enough that I could smell the suntan lotion on his skin.
My stomach pitched, but I didn’t back up. If there was any way to get Bash his job back, I had to at least try. He didn’t deserve any of this. So I played along.
“Which is?”
“Whatever the fuck I want,” he said, his tone soft and menacing. “Your family is on the verge of bankruptcy and your father is potentially facing something far worse than that. My parents won’t even be seen in the same room as yours, never mind want me to marry you, nor will they care if you claim I mistreated you. Your value as a potential bride is dropping every day.” He shrugged and chuckled. “Now it’s just a point of pride. And my pride is chafing at the idea of you walking away from me.”
He took a step forward and I took a step back. Time to make a decision. Scream, or aim for a soft body part and get the fuck out of there? I opened my mouth but before any sound could come out, Andy started talking again.
“Speaking of which, how was your week with your little boyfriend?”
And icy trickle of horror licked its way down my spine. How could he possibly know what had happened between Bash and I?
“Don’t look so shocked. I knew you were probably out whoring around the second I left, so I tracked you.” He held his cell phone up and shook it gently in the air. “I know where you were last night, all night, until this morning.” He rubbed a thumb over the tiny cut still visible on his lip. “Some shitty apartment over a shittier gym. Sad that an actual boxer would have to sucker punch a guy to knock him down, but whatever.”
I stared at the phone in his hand and the missing pieces of the puzzle fell into place with an almost audible click. “You activated the GPS on my phone?” I whispered incredulously. “Who the fuck do you think you are?”
Fix You, Bash and Olivia Book One Page 7