Mad Love (Guns & Ink Book 1)

by Shana Vanterpool

  “No, you’re not. That’s an excuse. Saying you’re an asshole isn’t a done deal. You don’t have to change. You’re not an asshole, you just get angry and snap and hurt those around you. Why?” She touched my face, and for the first time, I believed her love went past friendship. “Why do you expect so little of yourself?”

  “I don’t know,” I admitted sadly, uncomfortable with the entire topic, with her unhappiness, with the fact that I was being forced to look at myself. Maybe I wasn’t my favorite topic. “I wasn’t aware that’s what I was doing.”

  She gave me a kiss that felt like she was showing me she didn’t feel that way, and it was the only thing that kept me from saying something lame, like please don’t leave me.

  “If you want me to expect more, then you have to start realizing you’re worth way more than you give yourself credit for.”

  I wanted to steer it back on what had gotten us there. “I’m sorry I set a bad example. I’m sorry I treated someone badly after we slept together, but mostly because I did it in front of you. Now you think I’m going to treat you like shit after we make love. Because that’s what we’ll be doing.” I kissed her back slowly, savoring the taste of her. “It won’t be emotionless sex. I’ve never made love to anyone. Never even said the words.” She kept up with my kiss, turning the reins around, so her kiss controlled me.

  “Does this mean you won’t be piercing anymore? I mean other women. You’re not going to have sex with anyone else.” When I didn’t help her out with her mumbling, she smacked my chest. “Don’t have sex with anyone else. I don’t know how else—”

  I cut her off by putting my hand over her mouth. “I have to admit this little jealousy streak is hot. No,” I chastised her when she tried to talk. “I’m talking. You’re allowed to tell me what you want. Tell me, Madison, so I can give it to you.” I removed my hand.

  She wiped her mouth off roughly, eyes angry. “I don’t want you to pierce women in intimate places. I don’t want them to think they can have you whenever they want. You’re mine,” she insisted petulantly, still unsure of that. “They can’t have you.” Tears sprang to her eyes, but I let her keep talking. “I want to be yours the same way you’re mine. I don’t know. Calling you my boyfriend sounds silly. I know you’re older than me, and I’m only twenty. I know I’m not going to be like those girls and just have sex with you. Because I can’t. I won’t be able for a long time. I know I’m going to have a lot of days that revolve around puke and tears, but I want moments like this.” She touched my face again. “Moments where I’m just me with you, and nothing can hurt me while I’m right here in your arms.”

  I let my forehead rest on hers, staring into every open part of her through her eyes. “I’d kill every asshole in my way to be your boyfriend. Your age doesn’t bother me. It should, I know it should, but it doesn’t. I tried to convince myself of it, but it obviously didn’t work. I don’t want those other women. I want you. I don’t want sex unless you want to give it to me. If you don’t, then we’ll find a way to work around that. I’m a creative guy. I don’t want your tears, but I won’t hide from them. And you’ve puked all over me. I think that shows where I stand. You want moments like this, and I want them to be longer than a moment. There’s no pressure on my end to do, be, or feel anything you’re not ready for. But I need some things from you first.”

  “What?” She looked like a puddle. Wet, wide, gray eyes and love in every part.

  “You have to heal. And you have to do it because that’s what you deserve. I’ll be right here when you forget you’re strong on your own, to remind you of all that you’ve done. You got here because of you. Because of your strength and trust.” I kissed her tears away. “And you’ll get there because of you. I’ll help, I’ll do what I can, but you have to realize how strong you are. You have to,” I told her.

  “I don’t feel strong,” she admitted. “I know I should, but it feels like every ounce of my strength was taken from me.”

  “It wasn’t. Your control was, not your strength. They’re not the same thing.” She had to take her control back before she realized she was still strong. “You have control with me. I do what you want. Let’s practice.” I gave her a small smile and struggled to my feet and off her body. “Control the situation.”

  She rolled onto her back, resting her hand on her bare stomach, legs crossed, naked body open for my eyes. She looked confident and sexy, a little siren who knew she had me in her clutches. She pointed at my half-cocked dick. “Why is it so big?”

  “Thank my old man.” I shrugged.

  “Why is it making my mouth water and—” She slid the hand on her stomach between her thighs, cupping her pussy. “Making me wet?”

  I didn’t take her bait. I decimated it. “Is this your way of asking for something?”

  She glared. “Don’t talk unless I tell you too.”

  “Madis—”

  She pointed at me. “Hush, Klayton.”

  I did what she told me.

  “Thank you.” She lifted her leg to block her pussy from me, and then her hand started to move, and the playfulness in her eyes turned to lust. “I can’t believe I’m doing this.”

  My breaths were growls.

  “You want me to show you?”

  I gave her a nod.

  “I want you to watch. Is that bad? You can talk.”

  “No. It’s sexy. Confident. Tempting. Everything you are. I want to watch you too.”

  Her eyes softened around her lust. “You make me feel things no one ever has.” And then she dropped her foot to the floor, showing me she was stroking her clit. “Sexy. Like a woman. Like I can be a part of everything I’ve only watched others do.” She rubbed herself faster, the sound of her wetness making me drool. “I want you to touch yourself too.”

  “Where, Mad?”

  “Your …” She closed her eyes and smiled. “Cock.”

  My breath left me in a whoosh. I grabbed my cock and fisted it, waiting until she opened her eyes to stroke my shaft. This was one of the kinkiest things I’d ever done. It was intimate in a way that went past lust. It was testing the waters to find out if they were as trustworthy as she hoped they were. I stroked my cock slow and tight, watching her fingers slide inside of her. I wanted inside. The possibility of how tight and wet she’d be had me stroking faster. I jacked off to the sight of her fingering herself. Sweat dripped down my chest, and the scent of our lust was thick in the air.

  I took a deep breath of it as I felt myself coming. She exploded a moment before I did, twisting and arching her back as her muscles tightened.

  The sight of her head thrown back, cheeks flushed, lips swollen and stained pink, sent me over the edge. But I didn’t want to come all over the place. Or all over her. Or all over myself. I tried to hold myself back, but her husky words told me what to do.

  “Come here, Klayton.” Her mouth was open, and she was sitting up. My feet took me to her, and before I knew it, the head of my cock was nestled between her lips. This time I chose her eyes as my load shot into her mouth. And at that moment, I knew. I was hers in a way I had never even been my own. I loved her past her fears or my discomfort with the emotion itself. She swallowed me down, and then cleaned me with her tongue, taking as much of my cock down her throat as she could, leaving me glistening with her saliva. “Sit down.”

  I did. She straddled me, taking my face in her hands. “Is the control still mine?”

  Right now, she could have anything she wanted.

  When her eyes switched from siren to mine, she knew it. “I want to go home. To your house. And live there with you.”

  I didn’t even think. I couldn’t. All I saw was her.

  “We don’t have to go right now, but you’re not leaving here without me. I’ll talk to Georgy. I’ll let him know that I’ll come visit often, and he can stay over on the weekends. Can’t he?” I nodded mechanically. “I’ll let my parents know how I feel. That I love them, but I’m not a child anymore. I can’t breath
e here. I feel like if I don’t do what they want, then I lose myself to my fear a little more.” She stroked my cheeks with her thumbs, owning the shit out of me. “I want to be better. I just don’t see how. It could take forever, or not. But I’ll do it because it hurts to not want to be myself.” Tears burned in her eyes. “How can you love me when I don’t even know who I am anymore?” She blinked, having an epiphany. “And Klayton, I want that love. I want to remember what it feels like to not want to be a different person. I used to love me. Now I don’t even know who I am anymore.”

  I held her against me as she grieved for herself. It was long past due. For her to realize that this had always been about her, not me or anyone else.

  “Okay?” she finally said.

  Why bother fighting? I wanted her with me. She wanted to be with me. Why make it harder on us? “Okay. But I have some things I want also.”

  “What …?”

  “I don’t want you anywhere near where you were hurt. And you were hurt close to my shop. You know that, and I know that.”

  She nodded unwillingly, finally admitting how close the monster had been. That living with me was more torture, and yet for some reason she still wanted it. Because of me. That hurt deep in my heart.

  “We move. I move the shop. We go somewhere you’ve never been hurt.”

  She pulled back, eyes wide with shock. Frankly, so was I. “You can’t move your shop. What are you saying?”

  “You can’t live in that city. I’ll kill him, Mad. I’ll find him and kill him. Brando already warned me to leave the investigation to him. There’s only so many places he’d be. And Brando and I both know it.” When the horror entered her eyes, I took advantage of it. “We’ll move.”

  “You looked for him? Klayton! You can’t do that.”

  I didn’t want to talk about that. If I got within choking distance, that’s what I’d do. “We move.”

  “I can’t make you do that.”

  “Yes, you can, remember? You control the situation. Where do you want to go?”

  “Klayton—”

  “You think about it. You’re not going back to Denver until I know where we’re going. I’ll give the owner notice. Let Wayne and Corey go, or invite them to follow. Cat will go anywhere I go.” I couldn’t believe how quickly this plan unfolded. I was pulling from random desperate thoughts. Anything to keep her safe and with me. “We could do it. Start Guns & Ink somewhere else. There are places it could thrive in other than Denver.”

  “Then why haven’t you gone there?”

  “Maybe I was waiting for you. Smart ass,” I tacked on, pulling a giggle from her. “So, it’s done. We’re moving. You’re mine. And you’re turning out to be one hell of a kinky mermaid.” I leaned my head back, exhausted. I wanted to shower with her and go to sleep with her.

  “Mermaid?” She snorted. “Okay, Cookie Monster.”

  I shrugged, guessing those nicknames only made sense to us. “Let’s get dressed.”

  She sighed sadly. “I’d rather stay naked with you.” She got up anyway, picking up her panties and staring at them in dismay. They were soaked from both her and my tongue. Her face was burning, and she hid it behind her hand. “I can’t believe I had almost sex in my dad’s office.”

  Almost sex? I chuckled, zipping my jeans on after putting my boxers back on. “If that’s what you want to call it.”

  I put my shirt on and then grabbed her panties. I wiped her body off as best I could with them. Leaving her clean of my semen. Then I stuffed them in my back pocket as she got dressed. I ran a hand through my hair to smooth it down and then moved the couch back to where it had been. We both looked tired and wired, high and low. Her lips were puffy from my kisses, and her flesh was still flushed. I didn’t realize how hot it was in the room until she’d passed me to the door.

  “Your hair’s down.”

  She scurried back over to find her hair tie I’d managed to loosen, and then put her hair up, cheeks ablaze. “How do I look?”

  “Almost sexed up.”

  She laughed, snuffing it with her hand. “Let’s go.”

  “Wait, how do I look?” I asked.

  She sighed lightly. “Gorgeous. And totally almost sexed up.”

  “Gorgeous, huh?” I smiled before I could stop myself.

  “Right now, you’re teetering on beautiful.” She looked up at me with wide, adoring eyes. “Your smile is one of my favorite parts.”

  I didn’t know compliments could turn me on, or that I could even be turned on again after all the almost sex we’d just had. “Let’s get out of here before you wreck your dad’s office.”

  “Make sure it’s safe.”

  I unlocked her father’s door, peeking my head out. I could hear chatter down the hall toward the kitchen. Two men, not George, followed by Joanna and her grandmother. “There’s someone here.”

  She ducked under my arm and listened. When she looked at me, her face was paled of the color I’d flushed her with. She didn’t look afraid at all. She looked upset and disgusted.

  “Who is it?”

  “Leigh.”

  Chapter Sixteen

  Madison

  What was he doing here?

  Of course, he showed up when I felt good, normal, in control and loved.

  How’d he get through the reporters? Should I be flattered he’d braved them? I backed into the room, smells colliding. It smelled like our love, like sweat and lust. Outside it smelled like shepherd’s pie, like oil and cooking meat. The two aromas could go together at a different time. It wasn’t that time.

  “Great,” Klayton grumbled. “I need to shower. Can we meet your boyfriend afterward?”

  That hurt. “You are my boyfriend.” Even if the term felt inadequate. He was so much more than that. But they didn’t make names for what Klayton was. “I’d kill every asshole in my way to be your boyfriend.” Everything he said to me in that office had been like caressing his piercing over my clitoris. It hit me in the right way so deliciously. All my fears and confusion had made sense. It was so much easier to breathe with him around. I could think and be afraid without worrying I was doing the wrong thing.

  He cringed. “I’m sorry. You’re right. I’m just pissed. I don’t want to meet the douche. And you shouldn’t have to talk to him. He’s your ex. Get lost, shithead.” He glared down at me. But he wasn’t mat at me. “Let’s shower later. Meet him covered in me.” His glare became a grin.

  That grin was more mean than beautiful. “There’s no need to mark your territory, Klayton. I’m yours because I want to be. Not to upset someone else.”

  “Hey.” He took my chin in his grasp, locking our eyes together. “You’re right. I’m an uncivilized beast. Let’s go shower while they’re preoccupied.”

  He’d been a beast back there, but his beast was beautiful. Strong, open, supportive and enticing. I felt so much around him I hadn’t had a moment to stop and think. I loved that. Thinking led to remembering, and this way, we were only operating on our emotions, not what came after them. Or what had hurt. I wondered if it would always be that way with him. Never stopping to think, only having time to feel. The thought gave my heart so much to yearn for.

  I took his hand and led him past the hall and then stopped at the end by the stairs, peering around to listen. Everyone was still talking.

  “You like shepherd’s pie, right, Leigh?” Mom asked.

  “Yes, Mrs. Hart. Thank you.”

  My fists tightened at the sound of his voice.

  “Leigh, relax. She’ll be down soon. Madison!” Mom shouted, an edge to her voice. “Get down here!”

  I harrumphed and pulled Klayton after me upstairs to my room. He immediately undressed, setting his clothes on my bed. I wanted to leave out the window with him. Run to a new place and start over. It sounded like magic.

  Saddened, I took my clothes off, following him into the shower.

  He washed my body with my peach butter and then my hair, leaving me clean and refreshed. When
it was his turn, I grabbed the bottle and returned the favor, loving the feeling of his hard, muscled body beneath my fingers. I enjoyed washing his penis. It was thrilling and intimate. And still mine like kissing and oral sex. I lathered his thick hard shaft and testicles until they were the soapiest part of his body. I wasn’t sure if I was supposed to point out his erection or ignore it. When I looked up, his gaze was tight and less beast, more genuine anger. I knew it was because of Leigh. I let him wash off as I went to get towels out of my closet.

  I felt a twinge of guilt when I thought of leaving home. But I didn’t know what else to do. I couldn’t stay here. I’d have to move out eventually anyway. With things still so much like they were before, it had to be sooner. I wrapped myself in a towel and then brought one to Klay.

  Spying my backpack, I pulled it over and sat on my bed, taking out the things he’d left me. I wore his clothes for days. I picked a pair of white panties and a bra, pairing them with his black sweats and a plain black shirt with a little cupcake on my pocket. I hadn’t noticed it was there before. I played with the yellow and white cupcake, finding the fact that he’d bought this for me sweet.

  He was in the middle of redressing. His tight white briefs hugged his cock and taut ass. He put his jeans on, and then his shirt, fluffing out his damp hair. “You have a blow-dryer?”

  “It’s on the counter.”

  He took off into my bathroom. A moment later the whir of the blow-dryer started. I finished dressing, and then went into my bathroom to put deodorant on and then sprayed myself with the perfume he’d bought me.

  “Come here,” he said softly, aiming the blow-dryer at me.