by KD Robichaux
Notebook…school supplies…college…classes! Oh, hell, so much to do. I gotta sign up for another semester. Should I take classes this summer, or just wait until the fall? I wonder what Jason has planned. If he’s not planning to do a summer semester, maybe I won’t either, that way we can spend more time together. Or maybe I should anyway? I don’t want to smother him. I don’t think Mark and Kim would be cool with me staying with them longer if I’m not actually going to school.
Shit, I gotta talk to them. I never planned to stay longer than just the one semester. What if they tell me I can’t live with them? I’ll have to find somewhere else to live. Maybe I could move closer to Friendswood so I won’t have to drive so far every day. Then I could enroll at the school down here that Jason goes to.
Oh, my God, how cute would we be going to classes together? And then we could study late into the night at IHOP. He’s been thinking about getting his own place. Maybe we could get one together. My heart skips a beat at the thought. I know I’m letting my imagination run wild right now, and I’d never voice any of this aloud, but I can’t help it. Things have been so perfect with Jason. I know he’s the one. He’s been so open about how he truly feels about me; I feel confident he’s ready to take our relationship to the next level.
I turn off the ignition after taking a deep breath and let it out as I step out of my car. I make an effort to settle myself as I walk into his garage and knock on the side door. His mom’s SUV isn’t in its bay, and I smile to myself at the possibility of him having something special planned while his parents are in Galveston for the night.
He opens the door and I can’t help myself. I step up to him and immediately wrap my arms around his neck, pulling him down to me to kiss him feverishly. I feel his hands at my waist as he caresses the bare skin of my back. I’d worn my cute Hollister short-shorts and a teal crop top since it’s so flippin’ hot out. The kiss goes on forever, and I enjoy the feel of his erection pressing into my stomach as he gives me one final peck on the lips before he pulls away. “Well, hello to you too,” he says, and then walks into his kitchen.
When I walk in, he’s already plated food and set the table. He gestures for me to take a seat, and then grabs a glass of wine off the kitchen counter he must have poured before answering the door.
He comes over to the table and sits down, placing the wine in front of me. “You trying to get me drunk?” I tease, picking up the glass and taking a sip.
“Something like that,” he says, and takes a drink of his beer. “Dig in.” He points to my plate, and I look down and see he’s grilled us some steaks and made green beans and baked potatoes to go with them. He’s even sautéed me some onions and mushrooms, knowing that’s my favorite way to eat a steak. I pick up my fork and knife and cut into the beef, and it’s cooked exactly how I like it, perfectly seared on the outside and pink on the inside. I stab a slice of onion and a mushroom, along with a bite of meat and lift it to my lips, the smell instantly making my mouth water and my stomach growl. He watches me as I try the first bite, and I see him smile before my eyes roll back and I moan in appreciation. So fucking good.
Our meal is mostly quiet. I’m excitedly waiting for him to bring up the conversation I’m dying to have, but in true Jason form, I know he’s going to torture me and make me wait until the last possible moment. Damn him and his surprises. Regardless, I smile to myself; I always love his damn surprises.
We finish eating and I help him clean up the kitchen before we head outside for a smoke. Again, we barely speak. This game he’s playing is making me anxious, causing me to smoke another cigarette as I put out the last one. Why doesn’t he just go ahead and spit it out? Is he nervous? I know he hasn’t been in a real relationship in a very long time, but shit. We’ve been close and sleeping together for nearly three months. The only thing that would really change is the fact that people would know.
The tension inside my body is building to a fever pitch, and I’m about to blow a gasket and just yell for him to spill it already, when he puts out his cigarette and stands. He reaches between my fingers and takes mine, putting it out in the ashtray before taking my hand and pulling me to my feet. He tugs me along with him to the door, through his living room, down his hall, and into his bedroom, where he closes the door behind him. I turn around to face him, and before I can make a sound, he crashes his lips down on mine, wrapping his strong, tattooed arm around my back to catch me from the force of his demanding kiss.
I can barely catch my breath. He gives me no time to inhale as he alternates between deep licks of his tongue and rough presses of his pillowy lips to mine. Suddenly, I hear him growl, and the next thing I know, I’m landing with a bounce in the middle of his bed and his heavy body is coming down on top of me.
His intensity is like nothing I’ve ever experienced before. If he wanted to make this night something special, one I’d never forget, then he’s doing a damn fine job. He grinds his pelvis into mine, his thick erection pressing into the hot hollow between my legs, making me moan. He takes the opportunity to lick into my mouth, and the familiar taste of Shiner, cigarettes, and Jason fills me. The way he’s moving against me, if he doesn’t stop, I’m going to come before he even gets me naked. I find that thought amusing, seeing how before this all happened with the amazing man above me, I was never able to reach my orgasm, and now I have them almost every night.
Over and over, he’s satisfied my body, taking me above and beyond anything I ever thought I could feel. He takes my hands and places them both over my head, holding them in only one of his, and I gasp as he uses his other one to slide up my shirt and up under the cup of my bra to pinch my nipple. It causes my hips to jerk upward, and he hisses in a breath when our centers collide. I wonder for only a second if I’ve hurt him, and then my worry flies out the window as he glides his hand down my stomach to snatch the snap closure of my jean shorts open. He pulls down the pathetic excuse for a zipper—it being only about an inch long since my Daisy Dukes are super low rise, showcasing my hipbones, which he normally loves to lick and nibble, driving me crazy since he’s so close to where I need him to be.
He somehow works the skin-tight denim over my hips and down my thighs, low enough to where I can work my legs the rest of the way out of them. He presses himself against me once again. With me only in my black thong, I feel the outline of him through his jeans clear as day. His cock behind the zipper of his jeans rubs right against my clit, and the way he’s devouring my mouth, taking my breath away, makes me see stars. My breath comes out in pants and he continues to thrust against me, making me whimper and shake my head.
I don’t want to come yet. I want him inside me. But he carries on with his assault on my now tender lips and my soaking wet pussy. My tiny thong is doing nothing to contain my arousal. I can feel I’ve drenching the front of his pants as he grinds into me. I fight against his hand holding mine above my head, but he’s just too strong. Finally, all I can do his cry out into his mouth when I can’t hold out any longer as he forces me to come. I shudder and convulse, and he doesn’t let up, even as my body goes limp beneath him.
All of my strength is completely depleted, and I can only lie there as I feel him reach between us to undo his jeans. He kicks them off, along with his underwear, and I quiver helplessly as I feel him hook his finger in the crotch of my thong and pull it aside. “So fucking wet for me, baby,” he whispers against my neck as he dips his finger inside me. Even the stroke of just the one finger makes me gasp because I’m so sensitive after the orgasm he just gave me. I open my eyes and look up at him as I feel him pull his hand away from my pussy and I see him bring it up to his mouth to lick my wetness from his finger. “Mmmmm, I’ll never forget how good you taste,” he says against my ear. I want to tell him he never has to worry about that, because I’m his to taste for the rest of his life, but the words leave my brain as he moves my thong out of the way once again, and without warning, he thrusts his huge cock inside me, balls deep.
My breath leav
es me in a silent scream; I can’t even make a sound. The force of his claim on my pussy is so overwhelming I lose all sense of where and who I am. I become the sensations he’s pounding into me, only aware of the dizzying, tumbling, spinning feeling that’s consuming every sense I own. There is no more bed beneath me; we are no longer in his bedroom, in his house, in his neighborhood, fuck, even in this universe. I am delirious with pleasure, reaching a level I didn’t even know existed.
As he pistons his hips into me, still holding my arms above my head, he uses his hand to clamp it over my mouth, and it’s not until then that I realize my throat is raw. I hadn’t even been aware I was screaming. He places his palm high enough to block most of the oxygen from my nose as well, and before I start to panic, I see he’s doing this purposely, calculating the measurement of air to allow me as he continues his assault on my pussy.
That’s all it takes. My eyes clamp closed. I take as deep a breath as I can force behind his hand, and my body convulses. Then I’m falling. I’m weightless, detached from everything. I’m so out of my mind I even imagine I’m floating above our bodies, looking down at Jason as he thrusts into me without relenting. After a few more minutes of hovering in what I’ve absently realized is subspace, something I’ve only read about, but have never experienced, he growls as he delivers one last punishing plunge of his cock, coming violently as he shudders against me, bringing me back into my body and making my world tilt.
He rests his forehead against mine as we catch our breaths, removing his hand from my mouth to slide his arm beneath my neck, holding me tightly. He runs the tip of his nose up one side of mine and then down the other, making my heart clench at the tender movement. Instead of dreading our ‘after-nooky cigarette’ like I usually do, fearing the normal closed-off way he acts after we’ve made love, I’m excited. I soak in the loving way he’s caressing my face, looking at me like he’s trying to memorize my every feature. He leans down and kisses me sweetly as he finally carefully pulls out of me.
I allow myself to relish the way he cleans me up, taking care of me, instead of the way I usually can’t enjoy it, since I’m always worried about the way he’s going to act once he’s finished and we get dressed. He presses his gentle kiss to my lower lips, and then takes my hand to pull me up.
We get dressed in silence, my heart pounding with excitement, not anxiety of shuttered Jason. As I slip my feet into my flip-flops, he steps up in front of me, circling his arms around my waist to pull me to him as he buries his face in the side of my neck, breathing me in like he loves to do.
He’s never been so affectionate afterwards. I can’t help but let the giddiness bubble inside me, knowing he’s about to ask me to make our relationship official. He pulls back to kiss me, lingering against my lips, and I feel his hands rubbing up and down my back, lulling me into a comforted state, calming my nerves a little. He takes my hand once again and then guides me out to the driveway, where we sit in our usual spot against the closed garage door. We each pull out a cigarette, and I turn my face toward him so he can light mine.
He’s silent for so long I’m afraid I’ve misjudged what today was going to be—the day I officially become Jason’s girl—but then he turns to me and threads his fingers through mine. I look down at our entwined fingers, and then up into his beautiful dark brown eyes. I take a deep breath, and listen as he begins to speak.
“I can’t tell you how much I’ve enjoyed our times together. There’s no one I’ve ever been able to open up to so honestly before, who hasn’t judged me or tried to change me. You’re my best friend,” he says, and then slumps down a little, looking down at our hands as he runs his thumb over the back of mine, sending tingles up my arm.
“You’re mine too, Jason. It’s so different with you, not having to hide things, telling you everything without having to worry about being embarrassed. I love…being with you,” I tell him, catching myself at the end, not wanting to jump the gun and be the first one to say I love you.
“I love being with you, too, and that’s what makes this so hard.” He drops my hand and picks up his pack of cigarettes, pulling another one out and lighting it. He turns his body back around, closes his eyes, and then leans his head back against the garage door as he blows out his smoke.
My brow furrows. What does he mean, ‘that’s what makes this so hard’? How can loving being with each other make it hard to ask me to be his girlfriend? “What do you mean?” I ask quietly, and then let out a nervous laugh.
“You going back to North Carolina,” he replies, still not looking at me.
“What are you talking about? I told you I have to choose whether I’m going back home or staying for another semester of school,” I say, my voice trembling as my heart pounds, making sickening icy tendrils start to rise from my stomach.
“That’s just it,” he says, and finally turns to look me dead in the eyes. His voice is monotone, but stern when he adds, “There’s no reason for you to stay in Texas. There is nothing keeping you here. You need to go home, back to North Carolina.”
I stare at him for a moment; I have no words. I can literally feel my heart hammering against the wall of my chest before it feels like it completely stops. This is not happening. This is not how today was supposed to go. Why is he saying these things to me? I have every reason to stay in Texas, even if my only reason is him.
“There is something keeping me here. I have a reason to stay,” I manage to whisper. Does he not realize I want to stay for him?
“No…you don’t,” he states, the tone of his voice making it perfectly clear he knows what I want, but that I’m not going to get it.
I feel the nauseating chill inside me rise up into my tear ducts, filling my eyes with the sting of tears. “Why did you bring me here tonight?” I choke out. Why did he make me such a nice dinner, and then practically brand me with the way he fucked me, holding me and making me feel cherished afterwards, when he knew he was about to end it all? My breath quickens as I begin to panic, reality crashing down on top of me.
He speaks words that would later haunt me for years to come. “I wanted us to have one last time together. I wanted to have you one more time, knowing it was the last time, so I could savor it. It’s time for you to go back home. I’m not going to be your reason to stay in Texas.”
With that, my heart that had frozen in my chest splinters. The crack grows, slowly making a jagged, painful circle around the center before the two ends meet, and then it explodes into sharp shards, cutting into my lungs and stealing my breath. One of the strident pieces travels even deeper, slicing into my soul and making it scream out in pain inside me, knowing its mate is throwing it away, rejecting us, telling my breaking heart it doesn’t want us. I feel like I’m dying, but all I can do is stare at Jason. How can he be doing this to me? After…everything.
“I thought you were going to ask me to be your girlfriend,” I murmur. “I thought…I thought all of this was a date you’d planned to make it special…and you…you’re telling me to leave? You had me drive all the way down here thinking everything was great, made me dinner, and th-then made lov—no, fucked me, practically fucking marked me as yours…” I trail off, my mind flashing back to when he said he’d never forget my taste, the way he studied my face like he was committing it to memory. “Why? Why are you doing this? Why don’t you want me to stay?”
“Kayla,” he snaps, and it’s not his tone that feels like a slap to my face; it’s the use of my real name. He never calls me Kayla, only ‘babe’. “We’re twenty and twenty-one years old. Where do you think this was leading? You knew I didn’t want anything serious. Fuck, you gave me enough shit for my POF page to know I only wanted casual encounters. You want to know what NOMAX4ME really means? It means the number of women I’ve been and will be with. There’s no maximum. I already broke my rule and fucked you more than once. You want something from me I’m not ready for. Will never be ready for. I’m not the settling-down type.”
His harsh words slash at me
. He’s never been so cruel toward me before. The strikes hurt, but nothing he can say will make me believe what we’ve shared meant nothing to him. He’s trying to hurt me, trying to push me away. “Jason, I know what we feel for each other is real. You can’t convince me, after the things we’ve done and the things we’ve told each other, you don’t feel what I’m feeling.
“This is pointless. I’m not going to argue with you about it. I’m fucked up. I’m not the one for you. You deserve someone who will treat you like gold, who will settle down and be the one to give you everything you want and need. Yeah, I feel something for you, but it doesn’t change the fact that we,” he gestures between the two of us, “will never happen. There will never be an us.”
I’ve tried my damnedest to hold it in, but I can’t any longer. The dam bursts and my face is flooded with tears. He looks at me blankly, my anguish seeming to have no effect on him as he stubs out his cigarette and stands.
I’ve been hurt after a breakup before. It sucks. It’s a mix of pain, embarrassment, sadness, and even a little bit of fear of what will come. But this? I’ve never felt this before. My heart is more than broken. It’s shattered beyond repair. Those lethal shards did their damage to my insides and then melted away, leaving an endless black hole in its place. My soul clutches at its wound as it stands and takes one last valiant leap toward its mate, only to fall into the gaping pit that was my heart, spiraling down, down, never to feel its fated companion’s closeness again.
I try one last time to break through to him, but all that comes out is a whispered pitiful, “Please.”
He rests his hands on his hips, looks down to the ground, and shakes his head. “Go home, Kayla,” he mutters, and I know he doesn’t mean my brother’s house.
He’s right about one thing. Without him, I have no reason to stay in Texas.
End of Book One