by Emerson Rose
Our small-town Police Chief Sully, informs us that no one was found inside the house and nothing looks to have been disturbed.
Great, now everybody is going to think I’m some paranoid crazy city-girl. That ought to be great gossip on the town square tomorrow.
“Thanks, Chief. So, you think it’s safe to go home?”
“Looks like it, I don’t see hide nor hair that anybody’s been in there.”
“I’m not going back into that house. I don’t care what you say. I saw a man looking at me from inside my bedroom. He was there, you guys and your flashing lights probably scared him off.”
“Well, if that’s all it took to scare him off, lil lady, y’all probably don’t have nothing to worry about.”
I roll my eyes and huff, “Whatever, go, leave, I can take care of myself.” I snatch the Glock off the table and shove the magazine back into it.
“Whoa, lil lady! You need to put the weapon down slowly, put it on the floor and step away with your hands up,” says the Chief.
“I’m on private property and I have a license. If you’re not going to protect me, I’ll do it myself.” I purse my lips daring him to argue with me. When he doesn’t, I turn and go back upstairs to Drake’s room and lock the door.
“Tiana! Where are you going? You need to come home with me. I won’t go anywhere I promise,” Jayden yells.
I don’t answer him. I let the sound of the door locking say it for me. I’m staying right here in Drake’s bedroom, the second safest place I know. The first is in his arms but I’ll have to wait for that.
Chapter 20
Drake
My flight was long and uncomfortable and I hate being out of contact with Tiana. The second the wheels hit the ground, I take my phone off airplane mode and send her a message. It’s hard typing instead of speaking the words, but I do it, not without a couple of spelling errors, I’m sure.
I’m glad to find that she’s at my house and even more so when she tells me she’s locked in my bedroom and that she slept in my bed all night. I don’t ask why she didn’t go home, although I can imagine, or where Jayden is. I can’t see shit on my phone and it’s frustrating the hell out of me.
I feel like I’m in a race against time getting to Tiana. My sight’s deteriorating rapidly and I want to spend as much time as possible memorizing every inch of her. Max picks me up at the airport in his own car and drops me off at home just in time for my usual morning run. I’m not going to need the exercise today, though, I’ll get enough without leaving my bed.
I glance next door to Jayden’s house. Everything looks quiet, his truck is in the driveway which is not like him, but last night was hectic, I’m sure he forgot about it.
On the porch, I take out my key and go to slide it in the keyhole when the door flies open and Tiana flings herself into my arms wrapping her legs around my waist and nuzzling her face into my neck.
I could get used to this.
“Mm,” she moans and I drop my bag and slide my hands under her supple ass and carry her inside.
She aligns her lips with my ear and shushes me before pulling away and nodding toward the couch. Jayden is sleeping on his back with his gun on the coffee table next to him.
I nod and close the door with only a click leaving my bag on the porch. I’ll get it later, there’s nothing valuable in there anyway.
I toe off my shoes and slide them under the stairs with my foot and carry her up to my room without waking her protector. Inside I lock the door and do what I’ve been longing to do for almost two weeks. I cover her mouth with mine and cup her ass harder pressing my solid cock against her pussy.
She moans into my mouth and I take her straight to the bed and toss her into the center.
“Take your clothes off.” She’s only wearing a pair of white lace panties and a button up shirt that’s already unbuttoned, no bra. She shrugs off the shirt and slides her panties off while I undress.
This isn’t the time for an hour of foreplay; we’ve been missing each other for nine days. I need her now, no games, no kink, no playing. I want to be inside her making her come over and over until we’ve made up for lost time. I need to fuck her, make love to her, connect on a level like I’ve never done with anyone else.
When she’s bare, she lies on her back propped on her elbows and I crawl up the bed like a wild animal with my cock bobbing up and down skimming along her hot skin. I want to feel her around me without a barrier between us. “Are you on the pill?” I ask spreading her knees apart with my hands positioning myself between them.
“Yes, and my doctor said all my tests were negative after that night when…”
I press my long pointer finger against her lips. She doesn’t need to explain herself any more than that and I sure as hell don’t want to talk about her lost time right now.
She stops talking and I slip my finger between her plump lips into her mouth and she sucks it as I drag it out slowly. She’s so fucking beautiful with her dark hair fanned out on my pillow and the peaks of her nipples stiff and ready on top of her soft perfect breasts. Her brown skin glows in the early morning sunlight streaming in through the window. Dust motes float through the streak of sunshine cutting across her flat abdomen and her right eye sparkles like pale blue glass while her left one is dark and full of lust.
She lifts her hands to my chest testing the water, seeing what I will allow.
“No rules this time, just you and me, baby.”
I drag my finger down her chin between her breasts and over her quivering navel until I slide it into the drenched folds of her pussy.
I moan with appreciation, All of this and she’s insanely responsive too. I don’t deserve her. I push that thought away and slip two fingers and then three inside and curl them around to stroke her sensitive G-spot.
“You’ve been thinking about me, haven’t you?”
“Yes.” Her hands slide down exploring my abdomen, she follows them with her eyes.
“Did you touch yourself while you waited?” Her eyes snap up to meet mine. My tone is accusatory, but I don’t really give a fuck if she got off without me if she was in my bed thinking about my cock pleasuring her.
“Yes.”
I love that she’s honest. “Did you come?”
She hesitates and bites her lip unsure of how to answer. I slip my fingers out and circle her clit letting her off the hook.
“It’s okay if you did. We’ve missed each other, but from now on save your orgasms for me, understand?”
She nods in agreement. I settle over her and enter deep, holding the position. I drop my chin to my chest and moan. Her scent billows in the air as she sinks into the mattress under my weight and I’m intoxicated with the peachy vanilla combination.
“It’s like you were made for me. Fuck, Tiana, you feel so good.” Her hands slide around to my ass and she wraps her legs around my waist digging her heels into the small of my back.
She doesn’t talk a lot during sex. I think she prefers to let her body do the talking and there’s no fucking way am I complaining about that.
I slide out and begin a slow deep penetrating rhythm. I want to kiss her but I want to watch her more. I want to see her face every time she comes until I can’t see her anymore. I want that image burned into my memory so deeply, that even when I’m blind I’ll see her coming apart in my arms.
Her soft breasts brush against my chest with every thrust until I rise and slide her legs over my shoulders to go deeper. Her arms fly out to her sides and she grips the sheets arching into me and I pick up the pace pounding into her sweet pussy.
I’m not running a marathon this morning. This is more of a fifty-yard dash. I rise to my knees and delve so deeply into her hot sex she cries out, curling her fingers around my biceps and digging her nails into my flesh.
I watch as her facial muscles twitch and she alternates between parting her lips and biting the bottom one until she clenches her jaw tight and her eyes roll back into her head.
The signs of her impending orgasm spur me on and she meets me thrust for thrust using my arms as leverage until the walls of her sex are convulsing around my swollen erection. She whimpers and gasps tiny little breaths like she’s drowning in desire, it’s a beautiful sensual sound that pushes me over the edge with her.
I sink into her one last time and lose myself in the feeling of coming with nothing to separate us. I have never had sex without a condom, ever. Everything about sex with Tiana is different. Better, more intense, but the idea that an actual part of me has now become part of her is enslaving.
Sex will never be the same after Tiana. If she can’t accept my impending blindness, I am ruined for all women. No one will ever live up to her. She is my perfect woman. She is my Empress. She is my Queen.
Chapter 21
Tiana
I can’t sleep. I’m tired, but I have so many things running through my mind. Drake and I are spooning. I can feel his warm breath on the back of my neck and his signature sandalwood scent is magnified after making love.
I’ve tried to get up three times and three times he has tightened his hold on me and mumbled in his sleep. He must not have slept on his flight because he’s exhausted. I can’t blame him. I hate flying. I can never get comfortable enough to fall to sleep.
But I need to get up and go see what Jayden is doing if he’s awake. He doesn’t know Drake is home yet and as far as I know, he isn’t aware that we made up for lost time the second he arrived.
It still blows my mind that Drake told Jayden that he loves me. Loves me. How did this happen? One week I’m at the lowest point of my life, and two weeks later I’m in love with the perfect man.
Sure, he’s eleven years older than me, but I can’t find one thing that I’m not attracted to. He’s successful, drop-dead gorgeous, we both love to run, and he’s practically family to my brother, although that can be a positive and a negative now. From what I can tell he’s a tidy guy and one hell of a protector. And the sex, it’s like nothing I’ve ever experienced.
The natural way he takes control and makes me feel like I’m the only woman in the world is astounding. I’ve been missing out all these years with my unskilled amateur boyfriends, maybe because they were only boyfriends. Drake is one hundred percent, pure man, through and through. Sometimes I see a tiny bit of vulnerability in his eyes that doesn’t seem to fit his personality but everyone has something that makes them weak. Drake is that something for me.
I glance at the clock on the bedside table, 0830, Jay should be up by now. The Glock still lies on the table with the magazine next to it. I wonder if he left it out on purpose or just didn’t take the time because he was too tired.
“You’re awake.” Drake’s sleepy voice fills my ear and my body switches gears. The urge to get up is gone and I want to stay here in bed and hide from my problems indefinitely.
I twist around in his arms and face him. “So are you.”
“The difference is you want to be and I don’t. Why do you keep trying to leave?”
I reach up and place my hand on his scruffy cheek. He needs to shave, it’s been more than a day or two since he has from the looks of his new beard.
“I’m not trying to leave. I just have a lot of restless energy after last night and a lot of things on my mind starting with the fact that my brother is sleeping on your couch.”
“Don’t worry about your brother, I’ll handle him.”
I bend my elbows and tuck my hands in between our warm bodies and adjust my leg on his thigh. “Do you think he’s going to be able to accept this?”
“If he gives a shit about either of us he will. His main problem with me is that he sees me as a player who’s going to mess around on you, but I won’t.”
He softly kisses my lips and brushes a strand of my wild hair off my forehead tucking it behind my ear.
“Tell me more about you. I feel like I’ve known you forever but I don’t have any real facts other than you’re a Marine who lives next-door to my brother.”
He smiles, “What kind of facts would you like to know?”
“You’re an only child?”
“Yes.”
“Where were you born?”
“Here in North Carolina. My mother’s name is Giselle. She’s sixty-five. My dad was ten years older than her. He was a career Marine, so we moved around a lot. When he died, Mom wanted to settle here and I ended up being stationed here a few years ago.”
“How did your dad die? If you don’t mind me asking.”
“No, it’s alright. It was a heart attack. It was sudden and unexpected, of course. He died in his office when we were stationed overseas in France.”
“I’m so sorry, Drake. How old were you?”
“Seventeen, it was a long time ago. Mom’s been remarried for fifteen years to an oil tycoon. He makes her happy.”
“Did you go to high school here?”
“No, I went wherever we were stationed. I graduated in France a year early and then my dad died so we moved back here. I went to college and joined the Corps when I was twenty-one.”
“Where did you go to college?”
He shifts his leg and nuzzles his head into his pillow and I wonder if he doesn’t want to tell me.
“Princeton.” He rolls his eyes and I laugh. I thought he was embarrassed about where he went, but I don’t think anyone could be embarrassed about going to Princeton.
“Wow,” I say, impressed.
“Yeah, I don’t tell many people that. My stepdad, Dan, paid for it. I sort of think he was trying to impress my mom and it worked. She married him a few years later.”
“So, you’re super smart and nice to look at. How’d I get so lucky?”
“I’m the lucky one, Tiana. Don’t ever doubt that.”
“I’m just a North Carolina grad wannabe singer working as a waitress in a small-town diner. God, my life sounds like a country song.”
“Sing something for me.”
I groan. I never know what to sing when people say that.
“What’s the matter? You are a singer, aren’t you?”
“I am, but you’re putting me on the spot. It’s early and I haven’t warmed up my voice yet.”
“Sing something for me,” he repeats, squeezing me tight. I slide my arms up around his neck and think of a song.
“What song do you use for auditions?”
“Still Fallin’ For You by Ellie Goulding.”
“Did you sing that for your Just Sing audition?”
“Yes.” It feels like a hundred years ago since I auditioned for the show that was supposed to change my life. It’s funny that not being on the most famous talent show in the world is what changed my life forever. If getting kicked off that show is what it took to bring me to Drake, I’m glad it happened and I’d do it again if given the choice.
“Sing that then,” he says.
I clear my throat and take a deep breath and blow it out before easing quietly into the lyrics. I can blow like Ariana Grande and Christina Aguilera, but Ellie’s songs are softer and my brother is downstairs sleeping so I do my best to keep it down.
I sing two verses and he loosens his grip and props up on his elbow listening with growing interest. By the third verse, he’s sitting up with his lips parted and a scowl puckering between his eyes. I can’t tell if he loves it or if he’s pissed. With that expression, it could go either way.
I finish with the lyrics still fallin’ for you and look at him with apprehension. I wasn’t this nervous on stage in front of six of the most powerful music producers in the world auditioning for Just Sing.
Obviously, it mattered what the panel thought, that’s how you get chosen for the show, but it feels like singing for Drake matters more.
“My God.” He covers his mouth with his hand and scrubs his short beard with his palm. “Your voice is… you’re, fuck, Tiana, you’re wasting your life here in this tiny town working as a waitress with talent like that.”
“Thanks, there are a
lot of people like me, though. It’s a hard industry to break into, especially when you fuck it up and get kicked off a major talent scouting show.”
“No, no, you’re not understanding me. You are phenomenal. You don’t need that fucking show. You need a little money and an agent with powerful connections. Jayden always bragged about what a good singer you were, but he never said that you could be the next Whitney Houston.”
He’s really hyped up about this, so much so, it’s making me blush. Love makes you stupid, so he’s biased but it’s nice to be appreciated.
“Well, thank you. Whitney Houston, huh? That’s quite a comparison, you’re so sweet.” I reach over and rub his bicep to show I appreciate the compliment but I don’t take it seriously.
He narrows his eyes and stares at me for a long time until I’m compelled to break the silence. “What are you thinking?”
“I have to tell you something. I’ve been keeping a secret that could affect you,soyou deserve to know before we go any further.”
Oh no, this sounds bad. Nothing good ever came from the words I must tell you something.
Just then a loud crash comes from downstairs. I sit up and pull the sheet up around me. Drake jumps off the bed, yanks his boxers on and snatches the gun that’s still on the nightstand beside me. He shoves the magazine into the gun and moves fluidly across the room to the door.
He turns to me and holds one finger over his lips telling me not to make a sound while he presses his ear to the door.
That’s when I hear him yell, “Drake! Where are you? I’m gonna fucking kill you!” It’s Jayden and he sounds insane. His voice is loud, but at the same time shaky and disturbed.
When he doesn’t get an immediate response, he pounds up the stairs and bangs on the door.
“I fucking know you’re in there with her, open the door!”
Drake lowered his weapon the second he heard Jayden’s voice downstairs. I know it’s stupid but I want him to just pretend we aren’t here and hope Jayden goes away. That is never going to happen and we need to face him eventually, so it may as well be right now.