by A. L. Zaun
“Sometimes, what?” he asked impatiently as his fingers traveled along my body.
Shivers radiated to my core and made concentrating on what I had to say very hard.
“Things can happen even when we’re careful,” I mumbled. It was a weak attempt at convincing him. Let go. Trust him. You’re making it seem like you’re the only woman this has ever happened to. Pathetic, Madison, really pathetic.
He placed small kisses along my collarbone. “I’m not worried about that…not with you.” His hands caressed my face. “We’re safe.” His lips traveled along my neck as he pressed his erection against me. “But whatever happens, happens. We’re good.”
He was saying all the right things, but still, every muscle in my body went rigid. At the end of the day, he was such a fucking liar and manipulator. I knew too much. Although, I had to give him the benefit of the doubt. He could have been lying to himself. I tried to force myself to relax, but I couldn’t.
He pulled back, noticing my rigidness. I could see the hurt in his eyes. “What the fuck, Maddy?”
But I couldn’t let his hurt distract me. This was too important to me. “Don’t bullshit me, not about this.” My lip quivered, and I turned my face away from him. “You can bullshit me about anything else, but not this. Don’t—”
He turned my face back to him. “Don’t do that,” he urged me. “Don’t shut me out. What the hell are you talking about?” Frustrated, he sat up on the bed and ran his hands through his hair. “Don’t what, Maddy?” His fingers combed the hair off of my face, and our eyes locked for a long moment. “I wasn’t bullshitting you, I swear it.”
“I’m sorry,” I apologized. This wasn’t how I had planned to tell him. Everything was coming out wrong. I looked away as my heart twisted in my chest. “Tonight was supposed to be about you and us. I’m making it about me. I’m sorry.”
A tear in the fiber of my being began to rip. For years, I had buried this pain deep in the recesses of my heart. Betrayal. Abandonment. Rejection. The unthinkable. A queasiness came over me. I didn’t talk about this. I couldn’t.
“Maddy, us, me, you—it’s all the same. What are you sorry about? This isn’t you,” he said with concern in his eyes.
You’ll tell him all your secrets. I could almost hear my grandmother’s voice echoing in the air.
“I want to be with you without secrets,” I mumbled, unable to force my voice higher. I didn’t know if he’d heard me or if he even understood what I was saying. I fixed my gaze on an empty spot on the wall. “I want to love you without anything between us.”
“What secrets?” His breathing changed, and his chest began to rise and fall rapidly with fear. “What secrets?”
I turned to face him. “My grandmother lived it with me, but she’s gone.” A numbness enveloped me while tears pooled in my eyes. “No one really knows everything. My grandfather does, but he won’t talk about it, not that I want him to. I don’t want to talk about it.” I rolled over and clutched a pillow to my chest, keeping my emotions at bay.
“What don’t you want to talk about? What happened?” he asked, moving his body against mine, comforting me with his arms.
I stared vacantly out the window. For so many years, I’d kept everything bottled up. Now, the mere idea of actually hearing the words spoken was moving everything from the detached compartment in my heart to a front and center reality in my life.
“Maddy, you can tell me anything.” He pulled the covers over my body and held me tighter.
“My mother somehow found out.” I cleared my throat. “She told me I was a selfish and irresponsible bitch who needed to fix the problem and quickly.” My body trembled as I relived that moment. “She reminded me that my grandmother was a saint, but my mother wasn’t one, and she wouldn’t deal with the scandal. This was after she had emptied my drawers on the floor, pushed my mattress off my bed, and yanked everything off the hangers in my closet. I had been her mistake, and she wished she would have aborted me when she’d had the chance. She got in my face and told me I shouldn’t make the same mistake she had.”
“Maddy,” he whispered in my ear, dragging me into his chest, “your mother is a fucking cunt, whore, and a bitch.”
“I hate her, too,” I admitted candidly. I released a heavy sigh and wrapped my arms around myself in an attempt to control my shaking body.
He blew out a deep breath. “What happened with the guy?” he asked, figuring enough out. His heart pounded against my back.
“I don’t want to talk about him.” I stared out the window, focusing my gaze on a bright star in the sky. Now, I would always think of Rick when I saw stars. I’ll name it MaRi. “Let’s just leave it at him hating me for trying to trap him and ruining his life.”
“Maddy…”
I continued with a blankness in my voice. “My grandmother was there with me. She held my hand and stroked my hair.” A lone tear fell down my cheek. “No one knows what it’s like to have your heart ripped out. What choice did I have? Choice? Really? I was seventeen years old, a month shy of eighteen. I was a senior in high school with my future ahead of me.”
He placed a comforting kiss on my shoulder.
“I’m Madison fucking Stuart,” I recited out loud just like I’d done so many times in my head. “I live life by my rules. Look at me. Look at who I’ve become. I’m an empty shell of a woman.” A small sob escaped me on the words empty shell. I hated how true they sounded coming from my own mouth. “Why do you love me? I’m a heartless bitch.”
“Shh…stop it.”
He held me tight, and I wished—more than I’d ever wished for anything before—that he could be the one to quiet my demons. I wanted him to be. As unrealistic as it seemed, I wanted him to be everything. He was trying. I had to give him credit.
He buried his face in my neck. “Stop it. Just stop it.”
My body shook under his hold as I let myself clutch on to him for dear life.
“I love you, Maddy. I love you so fucking much,” he hushed into my hair. “Just…I love you, babe. God, I love you.”
As much as I didn’t want to believe him, I knew he meant it. I could feel it. Yet, even with his beautiful declarations, they wouldn’t silence the raging guilt inside of me.
“I didn’t want to do it.” I let go and let it all out. “What choice did I have?”
“Shh,” he cooed softly.
If only he could hear the screams in my head…
“I changed my mind, but it was too late,” I finally said the truth that had strangled me for years. “I have no one. It’s all my fault. I have no one.”
“You have me,” he whispered, catching me as I fell.
Everything I’d kept bottled up over the years poured out of me in the broken wails from my heart. The only thing I needed now was his forgiveness.
Chapter 31
Rick
Her tiny body shook under my arms, and I didn’t know how to make it stop.
God, how do I help her? “Shh, it’s okay, Maddy. I have you,” I whispered in her ear.
Her body shook harder, and I hated that I couldn’t stop it.
“I love you.” I kissed her neck. “I have you, I promise.” I turned her to face me, and I wiped the wet hair off of her face. “I have you. I caught you, babe.” I placed soft kisses at the corner of each eye. “I didn’t let you fall. I have you.”
“My baby, Rick. My baby…” she sobbed as tears streamed down her face.
I couldn’t stop them. The more I wiped, the more they fell. My Maddy was broken, and I didn’t know how to fix her. This was worse than being dropped in hell, surrounded by every ex-girlfriend armed with weapons. Maddy was the one who always held it together. She was the strong one. She was my glue, my rock, my fucking life. I couldn’t stand seeing her like this.
“Shh,” I hushed, hovering my mouth over hers. “Shh.” I looked in her eyes, hoping that somehow she’d see who she was to me. “Shh.” I kept softly shushing her.
I lower
ed my mouth over hers, feeling the softness of her lips against mine. She clung to me as I ran my tongue gently over her lower lip.
“Shh, I’ve got you,” I promised her, holding her face in my hands.
“Love me,” she whimpered, bringing her hands around my neck.
“I do.” I kissed her. “So much.” Our eyes locked. “Nothing is between us. It’s you and me. Always.”
“Yes,” she murmured, running her fingers in my hair.
Her wish was my command. I made love to her, finally understanding what that was. We fucking made love. Love wasn’t just a word. It wasn’t just some irrational and unexplainable feeling. Love wasn’t the force that made me do crazy things for her. Love wasn’t the motivation behind me buying her gifts or chasing her to New York. It wasn’t my wanting to take care of her, protect her, and keep her safe. Or it was those things but so much more. Whatever I knew about love, I learned as our bodies came together. She took me in and opened her heart and body for me. She let me in. She let me love her. She let me take care of her. She lay there, naked under me, and we were one, moving slowly together.
She held on to me like her life depended on it. We were connected in every way humanly possible. We made love. She was my first, she would be my last, and she would be my everything in between.
***
I’d been up for hours. The blinding sunlight had flooded into the room at some godforsaken crack of my ass hour. Her room had to fucking face east. The sunrise had actually been pretty nice, but she had finally fallen asleep, and I didn’t want her to wake up just yet. She needed to rest. I needed to fucking sleep, but I was too wired to lie still, so I had slowly peeled her off of me and closed the curtains.
I spent the next several hours sitting on the floor across from her with my hands wrapped around my knees, just staring at her while she slept. Then, I paced her apartment, going over everything she told me last night.
Her hair fell across her face. She looked so innocent and peaceful on the outside. It was hard to believe she was so broken on the inside. My eyes followed the curves of her naked body. The sheets were hanging over her long legs and tight ass. My dick twitched, thinking about how awesome it felt to be inside her last night. Her warm, wet pussy had wrapped around me like a fucking glove.
Why the fuck did I get out of bed? At that moment, the only thing I wanted to do was be balls deep inside of her. Maybe I could just touch her tits, run my hands down the sides of her body, cup her ass, and slide my fingers into her pussy.
I tilted my head to the side and inched a little closer, shifting my throbbing dick. Even asleep, she was stunning, but she wasn’t just a pretty face or a tight pussy. I reminded myself of that just as I was about to touch her. When she let out a soft sigh, my mind did a one-eighty, and all I could think about was how sad she had been last night. More than sad, she had been devastated.
I ran my hands through my hair and sat back against the wall. I couldn’t believe she’d been carrying that fucking guilt for almost ten years. She was too damn hard on herself. She had been a kid then. She hadn’t had a fucking choice.
I buried my face in my hands. I didn’t know what I was thinking. I just couldn’t picture Madison ever letting something like that happen to her. She was too much of a control freak and a royal fucking pain in the ass. Then again, she had been right. No matter how careful we were, shit happened. I wasn’t going to judge her. I hadn’t been there, and it hadn’t been my call.
Thank God her grandmother had been there, though. Her mother, on the other hand, was the biggest piece of shit, and that asshole…was a fucking punk. She hadn’t gone into details, and that was fine by me. I knew more than I needed to know. I had no clue what to do with the information I had or what she needed from me.
I rubbed the back of my neck and thought about that dickhead. He needed to have his ass kicked. But as I thought about it, I realized I could have been him ten years ago.
They were just fucking kids. That was a long time ago.
What would I have done? I hoped I would have been more sensitive, but I probably wouldn’t have been.
I shook off those thoughts. They weren’t productive. I wasn’t going to feel like shit for something I hadn’t done, and I sure as fucking hell didn’t want to think of her with anyone else. The only thing that mattered right now was Madison.
I scooted up to the bed and kneeled in front of her. Then, I lightly brushed the hair off her face and kissed her forehead. To her sleeping form, I whispered, “I’m going to take care of you. No one is going to hurt you again.”
With that resolve, I needed to start getting things in order and putting people in their places. I reached for my phone on the nightstand and pulled up Chris’s contact information. I needed to get to the bottom of what had or hadn’t happened with my sisters. Madison denied everything, and my sisters had been plastered. In my opinion, none of them were reliable sources. Something had to have gone down. Chris wouldn’t fuck with me like that. Or would he?
Me: Need to talk.
I looked at the time. It was a little after ten in the morning. He was a solid noon-riser, so he was probably passed out or hungover. I wouldn’t be hearing from him for a while.
Me: Call me. Want to know what happened with M and my sisters.
Me: Sometime today.
Me: The sooner, the better.
“Hey,” Madison greeted me groggily, getting my attention.
A smile spread across my face. She rubbed her sleepy eyes and then stretched her arm toward me.
“Morning. What are you doing on the floor?”
I sat up on my knees in front of her. “Good morning.” I placed a kiss on her forehead. “I had a lot of pent-up energy, and I didn’t want to wake you up.”
She ran her hand along the side of my face. Her gaze followed the path of her touch until her eyes landed on mine. They sparkled like diamonds. I thought I knew which Maddy personality I was dealing with—sex kitten. Then, she threw me for a curve with a sweet smile I’d never seen before. It was like I was seeing her for the first time, and she was fucking beautiful.
“Hmm, really?” She sat up and brought the sheets over her naked body. “You had all of this energy, and what you decided to do was sit on the floor like a creepy stalker?” She arched an eyebrow at me.
“Creepy stalker? Come on, I’m just admiring your beauty.” I winked at her and tapped the tip of her nose. “Anyway, I wanted to be the first thing you saw when you opened your eyes,” I said. I stood up and kissed the top of her head. “Hungry? I made you breakfast.”
“A little.” She pinched her brows together as she stretched, and the sheet fell off of her very naked body. “Can you hand me some clothes?”
In one lithe move, she stood up while my dick shot up at attention.
“Why are you acting weird?” she asked.
I pulled a T-shirt and panties from her drawer and gave them to her.
“What?”
I forced my attention on her face while she slipped her T-shirt over her head, but when she stepped into her panties, shimmying as she got close to her ass, my eyes traveled the full length of her body, and my dick pulsed in my pants.
“You were on the floor and made me breakfast. That is very unlike Rick.” Her eyes examined my face, searching for some sort of explanation, and then they landed on the very obvious bulge in my pants. “The eye-fuck though is very you.” She laughed, walking off to the bathroom.
I dragged her into my arms before she reached the bathroom door. “What’s weird about me spoiling you?” My dick was in heaven, pressed against her ass. “I like taking care of you.”
She pulled back and put her hands on her hips. “I’m not a lesbian, so don’t become a pussy.” Her eyes lowered straight to her favorite spot. “Lose your dick, and you lose me.”
I gave her a look that said, like that’s ever going to happen.
She pivoted toward the bathroom, but I held her in place and pressed my hard-on against the smal
l of her back.
“You feel that?” I brought my arms around her and cupped her tits, squeezing her nipples until they were hard. “The only place my dick is going is inside your pussy.”
“Mmm,” she purred, laying her head against my chest. “That’s how I should have woken up.” Then, hard-ass Maddy made an appearance. “I don’t want your pity.”
“I hate to break it to you, but I don’t feel sorry for you,” I said, trying to keep things light.
I ran my lips along her shoulder blades. I’d told her the truth. I didn’t feel sorry for her, and she needed me to show her that.
“You matter to me. What can I say? I don’t like to see you cry.” I nipped the tip of her earlobe. “I loved you more than my dick this morning. That’s not pity. That’s being a gentleman.”
She paused to think about what I’d said. “I don’t want you to change the way you are with me.”
I turned her to face me, and I could see in her eyes that she believed I saw her as the same amazing woman I had fallen in love with and not someone who was broken and weak.
“I’m not some porcelain doll you have to handle with care.”
But she couldn’t take back last night’s confession and her breakdown. She was different to me now. She was gorgeous and fragile and tough as nails, and I loved every side, every facet, every fucking personality that made this woman who she was.
“Too late.” I tilted her chin up with my finger to show her how fucking serious I was. “You’re mine now.” I lowered my mouth over hers. “Everything has changed.”
“Rick—” She hesitated, but I didn’t give her a chance to ruin the moment.
I kissed her slowly at first but increasingly deeper and more intensely. She always had to argue every single fucking thing I said and every declaration I made, and every detail was always met with her goddamn resistance. Enough already. One minute, she was falling apart in my arms. The next, we were making love. She slept like a fucking angel, and now, she was being a bitch.
Welcome to my fucking life, and I love every second of it.