It Was Always Love (Taboo Love Book 2)

by V. Theia

  “Come with me,” he groaned, hitting bottom and the place that made my eyes cross.

  And the thrusts didn’t stop.

  “Do you know how beautiful you look taking it?”

  The sucking at my neck was felt between my legs. I held on tighter to my churning man. “Oh, I love that you think so … god, that feels good, Noah ... but can we discuss that later when I’m not about to…?”

  I didn’t finish. I was busy splintering in half.

  Then we were both shuddering as the cataclysmic pleasure crashed around us.

  Noah filled me and filled me.

  And just like he said, my greedy, grasping pussy drained him dry.

  “You are mine. Forever. Always. Mine.”

  “I’m yours, lion.” I answered, pressing my face into his throat. The scent of sex-sweat and Noah was enough to get me started again and just as soon as my legs worked properly I would climb that giant villain and fuck his brains out.

  That’s how my too early morning started. Being railed in the hallway after hearing Noah arrive home from work.

  Fucked before my fake caffeine.

  But as I knew, any fix from Noah was better than the fake caffeine hit.

  ~*~*~

  “Take the Maybach.”

  “I’m good to get the subway.”

  A shared shower and a good breakfast later I was almost out the door.

  “It’s raining, Sena. I don’t want you out on the streets as it is without worrying you’ll slip in a puddle and break your neck.”

  He was so cute, but I was late for a team meeting with my guys at Ellison Towers (as I’d been calling it) four weeks into working for Gray it was full speed ahead and I found I loved each work day.

  “Either take mine or I’ll get you a town car and driver to take you.” Noah threatened in that robotic no-nonsense you better listen to me voice.

  His blue eyes as clipped as the shorn hair on his scalp.

  It wasn’t the first time he’d threatened to make me use a driver to get around the city. I complained one time of being tired. One time, and the man wanted to hire a whole fucking care service that would cost thousands a week. Not to mention I’d feel like a real fraud going to work like a damn princess.

  I’d firmly turned him down.

  “Fine. I’ll take your car, but only because it’s raining, and I don’t want to ruin my new Converse.” I held out a red foot. They’d been a just because gift from Noah.

  Noah moved and bent in to take my mouth in a deep kiss, prying my lips open I indulged until I was purring and scratching my nails over his nape. “Go and get some sleep, lion. I’ll meet you at Sammie’s at five?”

  We’d volunteered to babysit while his sister and her husband had a night out at the opera.

  Cupping hands over my baby bump, he kissed first me and then the bump.

  “Take care of my life.”

  Total swoon.

  Today felt like one of those perfect kinds of days.

  ~*~*~

  I was wrong.

  I was so fucking wrong.

  ~*~*~

  “Did I tell you I love that coffee machine? Hazelnut whip today!” Mack declared bounding through the office door like he was on roller skates and cocaine. He was all of nineteen and a tech whizz with a brain too big for his own good. We might have crossed paths when he was sixteen and he tried to hack a system I was working on.

  Of course, Tech Doc stopped him in his tracks.

  Little punk.

  But I’d kept an eye on him over the years and once I came on board with Gray Ellison I knew who I wanted on my team and since Mack was right here in New York attending Cornell to get his degree in software engineering it was his name I thought of first to offer a few hours of work a week in between his studies.

  I liked the tall, mohawked kid with his row of studs in each ear and his fitted jeans and baggy band tees and two sleeve tattoos. Not to mention his run-on conversations he blamed on his ADHD and addiction to caffeine.

  But if he waxed lyrically one more day on how great the coffee station was down the hallway from our office I might strangle him.

  I missed my caffeine bae so badly.

  “Shut up and pass me my cup.” I grumbled holding out a hand while I typed on my MacBook with the other.

  He smirked. The little punk.

  And he brought my cup of coffee over I could only inhale its caffeine fumes.

  “Just have a sip. Bubs won’t mind.”

  No caffeine for me for at least three more months. Fuck. I might die.

  I lifted the cup to my nose, inhaled and got down to work on the new app I was developing.

  “You know, we could easily do this for ourselves. Apps are straight forward, and we could make a crap ton of money in no time. I made one for the skater crew a few years ago. Man, it flew out of the stores.”

  Over at his desk, Mack was working to fix a patch of coding that presented certain glitches on the check-out pages according to our beta testers. The work was ridiculously easy for the boy, but he’d lightened my load considerably.

  I laughed under my breath. Jesus. This kid was going to take over the world in a few years. I’d probably see his Dr. Evil face on the nightly news.

  I’d be so damn proud.

  “Easy there, Judas. We’re getting paid to do a job and paid well, now shut up, drink your delicious coffee and get on with it.”

  He cackled and twisted one of his many stud earrings. “Sure thing, boss-ma’am. Just saying. We could be rich.”

  One day. But that day wasn’t today.

  ~*~*~

  “I’m ten minutes away, lion.”

  “This kid is a monster.” His deadly serious voice came through the speaker of my phone attached to the dashboard as I idled in traffic while sheets of rain continued to fall all around New York.

  Gloomy and wet outside and I was so ready to slouch on Noah’s sister’s sofa for a few hours with some junk food and my man’s arms around me.

  “I mean it, Sena. We’re not having a demon kid who screams for milk and when you give them milk they scream more like you’ve just kicked their puppy because you put in the wrong fucking straw in the Sippy cup. The wrong straw, Sena!”

  I chuckled at his babysitting uncle distress watching the windscreen wipers going left and right. “We won’t have a monster kid,” I assured. But between his grumpiness and my extra energy I was thinking we might just have a badly-behaved kid, but I wouldn’t tell Noah that not until he was stuck with our own screaming kid.

  Besides which, that was future Sena and Noah’s problem. Those poor sleepless idiots.

  “Goddamn this traffic, it’s taking forever to get anywhere. I miss you,” I whined reaching into my purse on the passenger seat to grab a Chapstick for my dry lips.

  “I miss you, too, baby. I’ll show you how much when you get here.”

  The silk in his voice had me grinning like a big in love idiot as I sat back in my seat.

  One second that was all it was.

  But by that time, it was too late.

  Just one second.

  Too late to notice the white heavy goods truck barrelling down on me from the left.

  Too late to realize what was happening to even attempt to put it in drive and avoid it as the whole of Noah’s car was propelled violently out of place and I was forcibly shoved onto the driver’s side window, my head cracking against the glass.

  Funny how it was that noise I registered.

  Not pain blasting through my temple.

  But that awful, terrible crack of glass against skull.

  And then it was just eerily still.

  One second.

  And nothing.

  TWENTY-THREE

  “SENA!!”

  Vision hazy.

  It was like a dream occurring in slow motion.

  A dream I held no control over.

  What happened? Where was I?

  It was raining all wrong. Why was it raining the wro
ng way?

  Oh, yeah, it came back to me in a scared rush.

  Inside a damaged car that was now laid on its side. The side I was on.

  I don’t know how many minutes had gone by.

  It felt like seconds and years.

  My eyelids struggled to open all the way, but I knew I had to force them.

  “SENA! Baby, talk to me?”

  I couldn’t move, and my head hurt so badly.

  Nausea with the slightest moved inches.

  I’d been in a car accident!

  I needed to get out. Jesus. I had to get out!

  “Kitten, help is coming, okay? Hang on, baby. Talk to me, say something, baby.”

  I heard Noah far away through my ringing ears and all the rain battering the side of the car. Over the screaming of my brain sending out danger alerts and through my rushing blood I heard him. My boy.

  I couldn’t move to see the street. Couldn’t reach to where the phone was.

  “Noah…”

  And then a pain unlike anything I’ve ever felt before sliced all down my side.

  I was being ripped from the inside.

  It took a while to realize it was me screaming. That god-awful screaming was coming out of me.

  Pain made me blind.

  Oh, it was bad. It was so fucking bad.

  The baby. The baby!

  No. No. No. No. No. No, this wasn’t happening.

  This couldn’t be happening.

  It was too soon.

  “Noah!” I think I shrieked his name, fingers desperately trying to get purchase on anything to get myself out of my seat.

  My head foggy and my vision spotty. I couldn’t reach my seatbelt. I was sitting in the wrong position and everything felt odd. Blood rushed to my head causing dizziness swamping through me.

  Just like the rain, my seat was all wrong.

  “Help is coming, Sena. Hold on for me, baby.”

  “Love...you. Noah. The baby, please. I can’t—it hurts, Noah.”

  Bile curdled into my throat.

  He cursed.

  And swore.

  And roared through the speakers.

  I’d never heard Noah’s voice like that before. Stripped down and terrified.

  I didn’t know if it was because my hearing was distorted, my fucking bells ringing, or I was listening to my own rapid heartbeat, but I felt somehow, I had to tell him everything. “It’s okay, Noah. I’m fine. I love you. You know, that right? I love you so much. I’ve always loved you.” What if I never shivered again from seeing his raw achingly base passion? A sob caught in my throat. “Noah. I adore you, don’t forget, okay? I have no regrets,” other than I might not get out of this.

  Crap. There went my tears again.

  “Jesus. Sena, don’t. Fuck, don’t. You can tell me how much you love me in a few minutes when I see you. The ambulance has been dispatched, they’re coming, baby. I’m gonna be at the hospital waiting for you.”

  My boy always taking care of me. I blinked, watched a path of rain drops running down the window.

  “A few more minutes, be strong for me.” I hiccupped a louder sob listening to his panicked voice. Noah was never in a panic. “Christ, it fucking crushes me when you cry. Just a few minutes, baby. Hang on.”

  Breathing.

  I’m a mom. This couldn’t be happening. I needed to get out. I was a mom.

  If I never got the chance to become Noah’s wife I was still a mom right now and my baby needed me to get out of this car.

  The only problem being, I was in agony.

  I couldn’t tell which part of me hurt more, it was all over and everywhere.

  I felt like I’d had the stuffing knocked out of me.

  It was difficult to take in air with the tightness of my seatbelt.

  And I’d been right; I was hopeless in a crisis.

  I touched around for the clasp to my seatbelt and found it fixed tightly in place powerless to unlock it. The airbag brushed against my cheek and I slowly realized it had deployed on impact.

  I heard people nearby. And throughout Noah’s constant reassurance I tried to signal to whoever was outside that I needed help.

  This couldn’t be happening.

  Not now.

  Not now we had everything.

  We were happy, dammit.

  This wasn’t supposed to happen.

  When I blinked, my head swam, and nausea attacked with a vengeance, roiling through my stomach.

  Noah’s voice drifted into a blur, though I tried again to tell him how much I loved him.

  He needed to know he was my everything and I’d been so damn happy because of him.

  The rain was loud like thunder in my ears. I figured it was going to be hard for anyone being outside in this. I hoped they wore a thick coat.

  Noah.

  Our baby.

  I prayed so hard.

  Please God. Don’t do this to us.

  We were happy.

  I prayed until the blackness took me under.

  ~*~*~

  “Ma’am. We’re gonna get you out, okay?”

  “Neck brace.”

  “BP dropping.”

  I roused to too many voices in my head and hands I didn’t recognize touching me.

  “Noah…”

  “Ma’am, it’s gonna be okay. My name is Tyrell, we’re here to help.” The voice to the left of me said. “Can you tell me where it hurts?”

  “Baby. My baby. Please help my baby.” My garbled words came out croakily. “I’m six months pregnant. Check my baby first, please.”

  “We will, ma’am. We need this door off now!”

  “Ma’am, can you tell me your name?”

  “S—Sena. Like John Cena but with an S.”

  The deep voice above me chuckled.

  “Hey, that’s real cool, Sena. Just relax for me, we’re just gonna give you some oxygen.”

  Noah.

  I needed Noah.

  “Spotting of blood …. Legs ... chance of labor … move her …”

  “BP… low … move her now …”

  My lower portion was being torn in half. I groaned sucking in good clean oxygen.

  I desperately wanted to stay awake to tell them to help my baby. It didn’t matter about me, just make sure my baby was okay.

  But the blackness was too strong, and it swallowed me whole.

  Then there was nothing.

  No pain.

  No rain spitting down on me.

  Just … nothing.

  And in the nothing I found relief.

  TWENTY-FOUR

  Noah

  Two years ago.

  “Can we just talk about this?”

  Shrugging out of the slate-gray herringbone jacket, I tossed it on the back of my chair and proceed to meticulously roll up the sleeves of my white shirt one at a time.

  While I heard irritation and a considerable lacking calmness in Tom’s voice, I’m his opposite. I didn’t feel whatever that he wanted me to and for that I was sorry.

  Tom’s question wasn’t a surprise, but he’s wasting his breath in asking.

  I looked on as he marched my small office on the first floor of Frost.

  It’s after 11pm, prime time for nightclubs, and my place was packed solid, but then holidays always brought in the crowds.

  I’m pandering him, when all I wanted to do was walk the few steps to look out of the blinds overlooking the whole club and survey the dance floor and bars.

  “What is there left to say? We were coming to an end anyway, Tom. You expedited it up by sucking, how many other cocks was it while you were in Paris?”

  “Fucking hell. At least I told you. I didn’t have to.” He’s frustrated I’m not giving him another chance.

  He assumed I’m hiding my anger.

  What he didn’t know was I told him the truth.

  If not for him confessing many infidelities on a work trip, then I would have called us a day. I’ve known Tom more than a few years as acquaintances in
the same circle, and this past six months was a pleasing distraction for what it was, but I was never in any doubt what we were.

  He’s hot as hell, can work a dick with his pouty mouth but as for more than that, we’d come to the end.

  I cast a steel gaze at him. “You know where I stand on this, Tom.”

  “Jesus, can you stop saying my name like that. I feel like I’m being reprimanded.” He rubbed both hands around the back of his neck and blew out an irritated sigh.

  A month ago, I might have put the handsome model on his knees for doing something wrong. Might have fucked him over the desk just because it filled the time and occupied my head. While I recognized all the same attractive elements I saw in him months ago I no longer felt them.

  It would be fucking for fucking’s sake and I’m not about that.

  I can get an empty climax anywhere.

  I want the fucking connection.

  And it’s never been with the guy looking at me with pleading eyes.

  “Can’t we just get over this?”

  “I’m over it.”

  He appeared encouraged. Turning his dark almost brown-sometimes hazel eyes on me and that flicker of a smile I’d initially found striking. “So, we can try again?”

  “As I said, we were going to be over anyway. I’m sorry if it’s not what you want to hear. I didn’t know you were serious about us.” With his job travelling and mine as busy as I made it we hadn’t collected that many actual days together.

  “I fucking love you! You, asshole!” he yelled.

  I could remind him falling on other dicks wasn’t the way to show love, but then it would only prolong the conversation and give him encouragement that I was jealous, and already my tolerance was fraught at the edges.

  All I wanted to do was look down to the fucking club floor.

  “Noah, please.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  There’s no more to be said. Not for me anyway. I wasn’t invested in this relationship or the last one and I think he knew that.