Sinner (Shelter Harbor #1)

by Aubrey Irons

  “We- someone might see us,” I gasp into his lips.

  “Why do I get the impression I’m not the only one that thinks that makes this even hotter?”

  I moan as he pulls me against him, and I can feel his…his thickness pressing into me. He’s pulling at my shirt, pushing it up over my skin. I break away, pausing just long enough to decide I don’t care how crazy this is before I lift my arms and tug it over my head.

  I cross my arms over my chest immediately afterwards, suddenly feeling not as bold.

  Rowan pulls them away. “Stop.”

  “I-”

  “You’re fucking gorgeous,” he growls into my ear as his hands skim up my arms.

  Oh God.

  His hands slide over the skin of my back, teasing me, stroking me, making me melt into him as we kiss. My hands go to his chest, pulling at his shirt. My fingers find his bare skin and I shiver as I trail them over the grooves of his stomach. I explore his skin, tentative, feeling bolder and bolder with each inch I move up, until I can feel his heart beating under my palm in his chest.

  He yanks his own shirt off, and I whimper as I feel him skin to skin with me.

  “I’m not- I mean, I don’t think we-”

  “Shh.” He kisses me. “There’s a lot of stuff I can teach you before that, if you want.”

  I nod, biting my lip. “Yeah,” I say, nodding, feeling the fire roaring inside. “Yeah, I do want that.”

  I kiss him then, melting into his lips and moaning as I feel his hands trail over my hips, following the edge of my jeans.

  “We need to be quiet,” I gasp.

  “As a church-mouse.”

  “No, I mean, if my dad catches us-”

  “Angel,” he growls into my ear. “You should know that is exactly the kind of thing you don’t say to a guy like me.”

  I moan as I kiss him hungrily. “And what is tonight’s lesson?”

  “I’m about to show you.”

  I shiver as his fingers move over the soft skin of my belly, moving to the front where they pause at the button. He pops it, and I gasp. His hand slips lower, tugging at the zipper, and I whimper. And when they slip inside and find the edge of my panties, I moan.

  His hand curls down, fingers sliding through my wetness until he finds — oh God.

  That.

  He rubs the little nub with a fingertip, slow circles as my world goes blurry around me. My hands stroke his skin, loving the way his muscles ripple as his hand moves lower. A finger slips inside, and I silence the cry into his shoulder. His thumb finds my clit again, circling it as his finger slides in and out.

  In and out.

  “The lesson,” he husks into my ear. His other hand finds my hand on his chest, and slowly brings it down.

  I shiver. I can feel how hard he is under his pants. A hardness I’ve never felt before.

  “I’ve never-”

  “I know you haven’t. This is your chance.”

  My breath comes short as I melt into his eyes. And then I’m quickly pulling at his belt, feverishly yanking at the zipper.

  “You don’t have to, you know.”

  “I want to feel you,” I husk, not even knowing the girl I am right now.

  But I like this version of me.

  My hand slips inside and I feel a pulse a raw desire shoot through me as my fingers touch his…

  Cock.

  The word sounds so filthy in my mind. It’s so raw, so non-clinical sounding, like penis.

  And this is not a penis, not like I’ve seen in health class before my father forbade me from attending.

  This is a cock.

  And it’s so hard for me.

  I slip my hand into his briefs, and this time, he groans.

  “Shoot, sorry,” I say quickly.

  “For what?”

  “Did I hurt you?”

  He laughs. “No,” he kisses me hungrily. “Hell no.”

  I curl my fingers around him, pushing down on the elastic and pulling him out before I glance down.

  “Holy shit.”

  “Did you just swear?”

  “Uh, yeah, I-” My eyes go wide.

  Sweet Jesus, he’s huge. And I feel like I should be scared, but I’m not. Not at all.

  I’m just more turned on than I’ve ever been.

  I start to stroke him in my hand. “Like this?”

  “Fuck,” he groans, his head dropping back. “Yeah, angel, like that.” His fingers slide back inside of me and I gasp. “Just like that.”

  “Uh-huh,” I whimper, my hips rocking to meet his hand. He growls, sitting up and pushing my bra up over my breasts. His lips move to them, and I cry out before silencing myself as he kisses the skin there. His lips move lower, and when I feel his tongue over my nipple, I moan loudly in the hot darkness of the truck.

  “Shhh,” he whispers. “Better be quiet or Daddy’s going to hear you.”

  I moan loud again, the pleasure rocking through me at his crude words. My hand moves faster, and I can feel him getting harder, like silk and iron under my hand his wicked fingers move faster, curling inside of me and rubbing my clit as the whole thing starts to get to be too much.

  And I’m going to crash.

  “Fuck, angel,” he growls. “You better stop.”

  “Why?”

  “Cause I’m going to come, that’s why.”

  “Good,” I whisper, kissing him.

  “No, I mean, when I do-”

  “I’ve been to health class,” I whisper with a grin.

  Once.

  “I’m not completely clueless here.”

  “Just fair warning.”

  “I want to make you come,” I whisper into his lips, stroking his cock faster and feeling my core start to tighten as his thumb swirls over my clit.

  “Keep stroking my cock like that and you will.”

  “Yeah?” I husk.

  There’s an edge to my voice — a sultriness I’ve never heard from myself before.

  He slides as second finger into me, and I can feel the walls start to crash.

  “I’m going to- oh God, Rowan-”

  “Remember our first lesson,” he whispers in my ear.

  “Uh-huh,” I whimper, clinging to his chest.

  “When I say come, I want to feel this pussy come for me.”

  I start to fall. “I’m oh- I’m-”

  “Come for me, angel.”

  I bite his shoulder, hard, screaming into his skin as the climax shatters through me. He growls loudly, and I think it’s from the bite until I feel his cock pulse rock hard in my hands. Suddenly, there’s wetness on my hand, on my belly and on his. I just keep stroking, still moaning into his shoulder as his fingers push me over the edge a second time, and everything blurs.

  “Holy fuck,” he gasps.

  “Oh my God,” I giggle, holding up my hand to look at it.

  “I warned you.”

  I laugh. “You did.”

  “Here, use this.” He reaches for his shirt.

  “Hang on, let me just…”

  I know it’s dirty.

  I know it’s beyond filthy.

  I know it’s the only thing I want to do right now.

  I bring my hand to my lips, and I lick one of my fingers.

  His eyes flare, and his jaw goes tight.

  I smile coyly.

  Coyly; me.

  When the heck did I even learn to smile coyly?

  “You are full of surprises,” he murmurs.

  “Maybe I am.”

  “Well maybe we should find out some more.”

  I bite my lip. “Here?”

  “Yeah, right here,” he growls, his fingers sliding back into me. I moan.

  A light goes on in the house, and I feel my heart jump into my throat.

  “Shit!”

  “Here.” He gives me the shirt, which I use to quickly wipe my belly and my hand. I grab my own shirt, yank it down and straightening my bra before I quickly button my jeans.

  I slid
e into my own side of the car, instantly missing the heat of his skin, the feel of his hands and lips. I start to open the door, when I stop and turn back.

  “Thanks for the lesson,” I say quietly, grinning.

  “Anytime, angel.”

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Evangeline

  My heartbeat thunders in my ears as I pace the floor of my bedroom again and again. My pulse races, and I want to blame it on the fact that I just snuck back into my house at twelve-thirty in the morning, past my sleeping parents, but I know that’s barely a blip on the radar.

  Not compared to what I just did before that.

  I can still feel his hands on me, his lips on my skin. I can feel the heat still lingering between my thighs where his fingers slid inside of me — a wetness still there like a little reminder of what I’ve just done. I can still feel his…his cum, on my belly, even after wiping it off.

  I want to say I feel dirty, but that’s not the right word at all.

  I feel sexy.

  I feel alive.

  And I want more.

  It’s a terrible thought. It’s…wickedness. I swallow, my heart still beating a mile a minute as I make another turn and pace the room again. This time, my eyes land on the book lying on my bedside table.

  A Bible.

  I didn’t put it there, and it wasn’t there earlier. I swallow again, knowing that Chastity probably stuck it there like some sort of ominous warning.

  A warning that I’ve been bad.

  Really, really bad.

  But that’s not the worst part, because the worst part is that I think I might like being bad.

  At least, I like being bad with Rowan.

  I shiver as I pull my clothes off and pad into the bathroom to shower — to wash the traces of my trespass from my body.

  Sleep comes fitfully, and full of wicked thoughts of him.

  God help me.

  “You were in late.”

  I glance up from my coffee. My father is looking at me intently, the paper open in front of him.

  “Oh, yeah, time got away from me.”

  I glance past him to my mother, who’s cooking eggs behind him in the kitchen area.

  “A bit too late, Eva,” he says sharply.

  Right, because I should have a curfew at the age of twenty-one.

  “I heard you walking past our room after twelve-thirty.”

  I freeze, mentally trying to figure out which end of the house faces the street where…

  Well, where last night happened.

  I look back at my coffee but not before I catch a glaring look from Chastity.

  “Yeah, Sierra’s book group went late.”

  “Hmm.” My father glances back at his paper, and lasers practically shoot out of Chastity’s eyes.

  “Chastity was in before you.”

  My heart does a flip-flop. “Yeah, I was going to come home with her, but-” My father is still eying the paper, and I shoot Chastity a quick look. “But we went to a late place for some food because we were so hungry.”

  My father’s face sours. “Sounds awful.”

  “No, it was fun.” I quickly cover the lie with a sip of coffee. “I was thinking about checking out the downtown area today.”

  The Grace Church of Salvation and Divine Retribution and its vague Protestant lineage believes Saturday is a day of rest. Which means no volunteer work at the Center today, even for a man as driven as my father.

  He nods, reading the paper and saying nothing.

  In the back of my mind, there’s the pulsing, nagging feeling of lying — of sitting here lying to my parents.

  And Chastity knows it.

  “Okay, well, I think I’ll get going.”

  “Oh, don’t you want some eggs?”

  No because if I sit here another moment I’ll turn into a pillar of salt or, burn up or something.

  “No, that’s okay,” I smile at my mother.

  Chastity catches up to me at the staircase.

  “Evangeline Ellis!” she hisses as she snags my arm.

  I sigh, whirling. “Look, I’m sorry, but-”

  “You’ve got me lying to your parents now!”

  “You don’t have to,” I snap.

  “Oh, I should tell them we went to a rock and roll show last night and that you drank, and that we almost got into a fight?”

  “If you want to.”

  Her face goes pale. “Eva! This isn’t you!”

  “You’re right, it’s not,” I say evenly, feeling my pulse beat quickly under my skin. “And I’m having fun with it.”

  “How did you get home?”

  “Rowan drove me.”

  Her eyes go wide and she quickly crosses herself.

  “Yes, Chastity?”

  “Sweet Lord,” she murmurs, staring at me like I’ve just confessed to murder.

  “Chastity, it’s a ride. It’s nothing scandalous.”

  “Trust me, it is to me.” She leans in. “And it is to God.”

  “Nothing happened!” I lie.

  She just shakes her head. “Have fun downtown.”

  “Do you want to come?”

  “No,” she says quietly, still shaking her head at me and fingering the cross around her neck. “No, I’m going to stay here.”

  “Um, okay-”

  “And I’m going to pray for you.”

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Rowan

  The engine roars to life under the hood of the Mustang. My dad beams.

  “Hey! There it goes!”

  I unhook the latch on the hood of the red ’69 coupe and slam it shut, listening to the engine purr as he revs it.

  “Told you it was the alternator.”

  Dad chuckles as he shuts off the engine and pulls his large frame out of the car. “Well, I’ll let you in on a little secret.”

  “Yeah?”

  “I don’t actually know a thing about engines, that’s why I keep you around.”

  I laugh, grinning at him. “Yeah, not a secret, Pops.”

  I like this.

  Dad and I weren’t always this close, that’s for sure. When shit went down with Silas way back in that summer before college, I wasn’t actually sure if we’d talk again for a while there. Hell, I even left town for a good year somewhere in there.

  I mean, I’d always flirted with danger, and getting mixed up in it. But it was that night, lying broken in that hospital bed, knowing my scholarship was gone, and knowing I’d never really tried with grades hard enough to get into college any other way, that it came crashing together.

  Yeah, that night sucked.

  Dad had been ecstatic about me going to Boston College, hockey scholarship or not.

  After that, shit got dark.

  But, since then? Since then, it’s gotten great. We’ve had ups and downs — what with me still fucking around and not settling down like a good first-born Hammond son should. And we haven’t seen eye to eye on plenty of things, like tattoos, motorcycles, the girls I could never in a million years bring home to meet Mom. And we agree to disagree on most things religion, and that’s okay.

  ‘Cause in a way, we’re closer these days than we ever were before. And I like that.

  “The only reason you keep me around, huh?”

  “Well, that and I’m waiting for that bar of yours to get bought by a Starbucks so I can collect on my investment.”

  I roar out a laugh, shaking my head. He grins.

  “Nice, thanks for the support.”

  “Nah, I’m just messing with you.”

  “You think?”

  “You’ve done good with the place, Row.”

  “It’s a dive bar, Pop.”

  “Yeah well, it’s less a dive than it was before.”

  We both grin.

  “Slightly.”

  He chuckles. “Hey, baby steps. You want some lunch?”

  “Sure.”

  I follow him up the back steps and inside to the kitchen.

  “I want to
thank you for helping out so much at the Center, you know.” Dad sticks some leftover lasagna in the microwave.

  “No problem.”

  “Well, you’re a help, and I know you’ve got a full time job along with it. It might be a dive, but you’re running your own business. Anyways,” he waves his hand, “thanks.”

  “Yeah, of course.”

  I get up and go to the fridge to grab a beer.

  “You sure are finding time to get over there,” Dad says evenly from behind me.

  “Yep, just looking to help.”

  “Sure it’s got nothing to do with Eva Ellis?”

  I freeze, my hand on the bottle cap. I swallow, twisting the cap off with a hiss. “Nope?”

  “Sure about that?”

  I turn back, eyeing my dad, and suddenly, it feels like I’m in high school again. It’s that moment when you know you could be in trouble, but you aren’t yet. It’s that moment of coming home high and trying to figure out if your parents know.

  “Yep,” I say with a shrug, slugging the beer.

  “Careful there.”

  “Dad, you’re seeing stuff that isn’t there. Eva Ellis? Really?”

  The timer goes off on the microwave, and my dad’s eyes linger on me a second before he stands. I sit, trying to wipe the guilt off my face. He comes back to the table with two plates and the lasagna.

  “Do me a favor.”

  “Yeah?”

  “Give me a little credit.”

  I shake my head. “Dad, it’s nothing.”

  “I’ve got eyes, Row.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “And so does Leonard Ellis.”

  I dig into the lasagna. “Nothing to see, Dad. And by the way, that guy is…” I look up, arching my brows.

  Dad smiles. “Yeah, he’s-”

  “A psycho?”

  He grins. “Intense. He’s an intense man.” He takes a bite of his lasagna and looks up at me again. “Evangeline is a sweet girl, but, c’mon Rowan.”

  “Dad, what?”

  “She’s young, son.”

  “She’s twenty-one, that’s hardly robbing any cradles.”

  He arches a brow at me and I laugh and shake my head. “And anyways, I’m telling you, you’re seeing this wrong.”

  “Fine, I’m dropping it, since you don’t want to have an honest discussion with me.”

  “Can we just enjoy this lasagna?”