Blazed Trilogy

by Corri Lee

  “They’re not completely incapacitated, but accidents happen and concessions have to be made. Job opportunities come and go—being on standby compromises my time. I can’t take work outside of the city and I don’t like to start something I can’t finish. If there’s a risk of anything interrupting the little time I get with Emmeline, I’d prefer to sacrifice seeing her rather than give her just half my attention through phone-watching.”

  And that was how it would always be. A watered down version of my role in Hunter’s life. He too only called when he could give me his undivided attention, so the concept didn’t distress me too much. How could it when I knew that Blaze’s motives were much more honest and noble?

  The gaps were shorter, a few days at most. Whether it was just lunch or a night out, I knew that the flying visit was always good for at least one cervix-destroying orgasm that sent me searching for a place to catnap. Mrs. Reynolds didn’t object to my post-lunch snoozes when I found my way to and from them smiling.

  Blaze was like my own brand of Prozac. The all-encompassing woe that usually drove me subsided and the fat girl disappeared from my mirror in the mornings. By no means did I love myself, but I could bear to be me. For the first time in as long as I could remember, I didn’t think about Hunter and how I lacked the qualities he desired from the moment I woke up. I stretched my arm across my bed and remembered who’d been there, talking to me as I nodded off. Complicated or not, whatever we were doing worked and it worked well.

  It worked through the scorching heat of June that had us peeling our sweaty, replete bodies off the leather interior of the goblin car on occasion. It worked through impromptu lunch dates and nights out at Esme’s. I wore the clothes he’d chosen for me and my hair loose on the off chance he arrived because I liked to imagine what he thought when he opened the door into Double Booked and saw me looking just how he liked me. For some reason, he was attracted to me and made no effort to hide it, kissing me when he saw fit and making vulgar yet endearing propositions regardless of the company we were in.

  We didn’t talk about it, but we both knew that we felt too much for each other. Neither of us cared as long as the other was still on the same page of our bizarre ‘don’t ask, don’t tell’ understanding. We were inextricably bound by our denial, a bond so honest that it might have been devalued if we’d forced ‘I love you’s like everyone else.

  We were functionally dysfunctional and not even the summer heat could compare to how moltenly hot I burned for him at every given chance.

  A few days became a week, and a week became ten days. The space that we left for him at our table in Esme’s grew cold but stayed open for him to warm up when he could. My friends fussed, sure that I’d crack in his absence. They saw how close we’d grown but were so negative about the outlook of our ‘relationship’ that they didn’t believe in my blind conviction.

  “Aren’t you worried?” Esme walked home with me through the side-streets after lunch in a quiet little bistro I’d discovered near my flat during a walk with Blaze early the week before. The world hadn’t found it yet, which meant that the beastly Saturday crowds had yet to taint it’s Mediterranean serenity with popularity. London was in full flow with older children enjoying their summer holidays after exams, students shopping for university essentials and tourists absorbing the fascinating landmarks we natives took for granted. My fear of that mania remained.

  “Worried?”

  “That he’s not coming back.” Her reluctance to say the words manifested in a whisper, pausing me for only half a beat.

  “No, I’m not. He told me that he’d always come back for me and I believe him.”

  “Oh, Emmy. Even you aren’t this naive.”

  That stopped me for a moment longer. “You think he was lying?” I challenged her with a raised eyebrow. She immediately relented, knowing that the man was despicably honest to the point of it sometimes being too much. I wasn’t sure that he know how to lie. “He’d tell me if he wasn’t coming back, Esme. He wouldn’t just leave me flailing.”

  We scaled the staircase up to my flat on the first floor in silence before she sighed and held up her hands. “I just don’t want to see you throw yourself under the metaphorical bus here. You’re setting yourself up, but I’m not sure which direction the punch line will take yet. Don’t be foolhardy. He may not have been lying at the time, but you don’t know how or when the wind might change direction.”

  “I’m prepared for this to all go wrong. I know that it will so I’m at peace with it.” I shrugged and pulled my keys from my pocket. “I’m a realist, you know that. Ask me how I’d cope if it all went right, well, that’s a different mat—”

  My sentence was cut short by the door swinging open and hand shooting out to pull me inside. The door kicked shut behind me, putting an abrupt end to my conversation with Esme.

  I was tugged so quickly my head spun, eyes barely clear of stars when a familiar mouth closed around mine. I’d never been kissed so passionately before, like I was so essential and life-defining. I shivered at how mighty I felt; an evil harpy done hexed this poor unsuspecting man. Hexed him like he’d hexed me.

  My feet left the ground, my legs were wrapped around his waist, and I smiled against his lips. I knew you’d be back. Not only did I have him here, but I also had the satisfaction of a big ‘I told you so’ for my friends.

  “Blaze, quelle surprise. Have you been working hard or hardly wo—” My back swiftly found the fabric of the couch the same moment his mouth found mine again and kissed me hard, quietening my satire to a needy moan into him.

  God, the ten days had been too long. All the craving I’d been able to block out while he was gone flooded back into me in a deluge of heat and lust. My face flooded with colour and my eyes with life, reigniting a flame he snuffed out every time I woke up alone. I never knew how much I’d miss him until he came back, and this time was almost painful. Just because I didn’t feel the hole he left expanding didn’t mean I didn’t feel it being plugged up.

  My fingers raked across his back and held him until he shifted, breathless and flushed. “That was one hell of a greeting.”

  “I was checking if I was still damned.” Like he needed it to breathe, he pressed his lips to mine again and moaned softly. I felt his longing surge through me and aggravate that volatile little flame that burned for him.

  “And?”

  “Very damned.” His lips trailed across my jaw to my ear. “I missed you, cupcake.”

  “I...” Had never been ‘missed’ before. Not like this. I didn’t know where the boundaries lay in an association like ours, but I was certain that they were being pushed with pet names. Still, I couldn’t deny that I was right there with him, though maybe a little less confident about it. “I missed you, too. Especially when you call me sweet names like that. But I’m really turned on right now and your erection is digging into my leg.”

  He laughed softly and kissed the frantic throb in my neck. “It’s a shame you’d just fall asleep if we made love.”

  My mouth dried. I could tell that if I looked at him, he’d be regarding me with that almost carcinogenic glare I felt so guilty about evoking in him, but if it came with the sweet nothings reserved for treasured lovers and long term partners, was I misinterpreting it? I was so confused, and so reluctant to let myself get carried off in a pipe dream fantasy.

  “Actually I could really go for a power nap. I’ve been awake for a whole two hours.”

  “Oh. Well, then.” He sucked and nipped at my skin as he pulled me up to sit and wrestled me out of my clothes, carefully folding the arms of my glasses and putting them safely on the coffee table.

  This, I could deal with. I never felt more certain about my actions where sex was involved, particularly sex with Blaze. I’d quickly learned that it was impossible to make a wrong move with him because he was just so hungry to be inside me. He was still selfish but liked to feel me writhe beneath him, carefully taking his time to drive me crazy. He did so quite c
apably and in more ways than he knew. Small stupid things like the noises he made and the way his back beaded with sweat when he was close to his limits made the experience for me.

  We seemed to fit so well together that I swore the mould used to make him had somehow been turned inside out and fitted inside me. Not a single one of the casual encounters I’d had in Blaze’s absence could compare or satisfy the lust that took over. I’d started to leave feeling short changed and a little dirty, wondering if I was acting habitually or keeping up appearances.

  I’d fashioned myself a protective cocoon during my four years in London and Blaze was starting to find the cracks in it. He could exploit my weaknesses the way only one other could—someone who had no business being in my thoughts when a mouth-watering male stood topless in front of me. He’d undressed me in record time and was quite openly ogling me, tongue trapped between his teeth.

  “I went to the bookshop first. You weren’t there.” Blaze scrunched his t-shirt up into a ball and threw it at my face, promptly scooping me up while my guard was down and carrying me into my bedroom. Somehow, the space seemed bigger and tidier. How long had he been there and what the hell had he been doing in my absence?

  “Day off. It happens sometimes.”

  “You need a mobile phone.”

  “I have one.”

  “I need your number.”

  “I don’t give men my number.”

  “I’m not ‘men’, am I?” I inched back to look down at him from my almost prone position across him and frowned. No, I didn’t suppose he was ‘men’, but I’d promised myself that I wouldn’t break trends for him. “Am I?”

  “No.” Sitting back on my heels, I tugged at the waistband of his jeans as a hint for him to lose them, and quickly. “And I’m not ‘women’. So you’ll get my number when I get your surname.”

  “Oh, touche.” He wriggled out of his jeans and pulled me back over him, eyes burning like two emerald green beacons. The fact that he’d gone commando turned me on and I had no idea why. “You, on top. I need to see this.”

  “See what?”

  I got my answer from his face. His gaze slid down and rested at the point where our bodies would connect. A low growl rumbled in his throat as he watched himself fill me up, fingers restlessly flexing against my hips while the balls of his hands held my weight and stopped me descending too quickly. He snarled a curse, jerking up to meet me, and flipped me onto my back to drill into me hard, fast, and so roughly I battled to catch my breath.

  Blaze lacked his usual finesse and I knew that it was because he was feeling tormented. His earlier kisses had said as much. He fucked like he had a point to make, maybe not to me, but to himself. What that point was, I didn’t know. Maybe he was trying to reassure himself that it was just the driving urge to screw me senseless that made him miss me as much as he had and we really did just use each other as implements to get ourselves off. Whatever the reason, he charged through, determined and unrelenting, sparing me no time to recover between orgasms that began to roll together and snowball.

  It was too much. Pleasure became painful, but I didn’t want it to stop. No matter how hard my toes cramped, he drove on and licked away the almost sadistic tears that dripped down my temples into my hair. I was lost to him, forced into a place where I could focus on nothing but him. My new most favourite place in the world, away from all my neuroses and memories—the only place I could connect so deeply with another human being. An activity I’d spent four years using to validate myself had become a meaningful bridge to a bigger place. Had he turned my life upside down like I’d wanted? Maybe. Given half the chance, Blaze might have ploughed away at me until I was no longer gifted with eyesight, foresight or hindsight, so I might never see for myself just how much damage he’d done.

  I whimpered feebly when he sank his teeth into my neck and moaned my name, finally finding his release after I don’t know how long. His weight pushed me down into the mattress, making me feel gloriously overpowered and well-used. Immediately, my eyelids drooped, but his nose nuzzling my hair kept me just about conscious.

  “I’m sorry,” he whispered, spending a wave of goose bumps across my skin. “I lost control.” Unable to speak, I grunted quietly and found enough energy to catch his hand in mine and squeeze it. “I’ve broken you, haven’t I?”

  “You’ve ruined me for other men, that’s for damn sure.” I forced one eye open and winked at him. “I’ll be good to go again in five minutes.”

  Blaze scoffed gently and traced his fingers across his bite mark. “Did you really miss me this week?”

  “I did. I just didn’t know how much until you came back. You always come back.” My trust was rewarded with an indulgent, typically contagious smile. I’d believed in him and clearly it meant a lot that I had. It meant so much more to me, too—it meant that I could.

  “What would you do if I was still here when you woke up?”

  My forehead creased slightly. Our situation was what it was. Why would I consider it being any other way when this was all it could be? What would be the point of conjuring idyllic scenarios that would never become reality?

  “Make you get me coffee and do my hair.” He cocked his head to the side a little, a gesture seeking my honesty. “It would be weird for me, like it was ‘real’.”

  “Real how?”

  “Real like no complications. No reasons ‘why not’, I guess. If I woke up and you were in the kitchen or something, that’s like Chris or Esme being here. But if I woke up and found you sleeping next to me, I think I’d be forced to do something really stupid like think you were mine.” Inhaling sharply, I blushed crimson through my already flushed cheeks and closed my open eye to avoid seeing his reaction. I couldn’t filter my thoughts when I was sedate, and the last thing I want to do was scare him off with hints at how deeply he affected me. “Can I have my power nap now?”

  “Of course, cupcake.” He kissed the tip of my nose and pulled me over to lay my head on his sweat slicked chest. His heart was still racing, visibly straining at the confines of his chest. “And I’ll be in that kitchen making you coffee when you wake up.”

  Maybe he wasn’t as scared as I thought.

  I woke up feeling hungover and raw. It took a moment for me to recall the events that had led to me ending up sprawled out in bed, hugging a pillow wrapped up in a t-shirt I didn’t recognise. But I knew the smell that clung to it and it was one that didn’t exactly encourage me to move. Blaze’s scent set me up for the day, along with the memories it provoked of the night before.

  But this wasn’t the morning after the night before. It was the same afternoon after the afternoon before, and I had absolutely no reason to feel so disgraceful.

  Dragging the t-shirt over my head, I winced as I sat upright and surveyed the murder scene that was now my bed. Blood spotted the cream cotton valance sheet that was torn in places, and sweat and other...fluids stained the fabric under where I’d laid to sleep. I hadn’t realised just how carnal the sex had been at the time, but seeing how rough it could get when I didn’t even know it made my mouth snap open.

  Blaze was dangerous—a serious threat on my sanity and self-control, but how savage was I when I lost my head? It had taken less than five minutes from front door to bedroom to reach this level of indecency...

  “Oh, Esme!” I remembered her rude exclusion from my afternoon and knew that I had to explain myself. Or rather explain Blaze. “Blaze!”

  The sight of him standing in my kitchen stopped me in my tracks. He wore nothing but black briefs and was covered in small, red crescent marks left by my nails. His skin glowed red under the scratches but he looked none too perturbed, leaning over a tablet computer set down on the breakfast bar, watching music videos while he swigged milk from the carton.

  He was at home here, looking far better off than I did even if he had been brutalised by my hand. All elements of that scenario combined, he looked fucking hot.

  “You helped yourself to my WiFi password?”
He glanced up, seemingly surprised to see me in my own home, and shot me a smile that made my insides melt enough to forgive the host of violations he’d committed. I loved that he felt comfortable and confident in my small space. It only made sense when he was so happily underneath my skin. “And you’re getting your germs in my milk.”

  “You’re getting your germs in my t-shirt.”

  I walked into the arm he held out and leaned into him, sliding a hand down the front of his underwear to stroke the trail of hair that crept down from his navel. If he stuck around like this every time he fucked me into slumber, we’d never leave my flat. “God, woman. You’re insatiable. You might be ready again but I need longer than half an hour to recover from something like that.”

  “Half an hour?”

  “Hmm.” He nodded and reached around me to pour a large mug of coffee from a steaming hot jug he’d already made. I usually used instant, and was amazed to see that I even owned a coffee grinder. I definitely didn’t have the beans... “I thought you’d sleep longer. I was going to sneak a shower and make myself look pretty before you woke up. I brought a change of clothes.”

  “Quite good at taking liberties, aren’t you? Making up for lost time?” The playful atmosphere dissolved with the reminder that we’d been apart for what seemed so long but was really no time at all. We were becoming too emotionally involved in our tryst. I didn’t want to pry into his absence but I had to. “Has your uh... ‘caree’ been ill?”

  “Nothing else could have kept me from you, Emmeline.” The mood lifted with the tenderness of his tone. “This would be another good case for you giving me your number. I couldn’t leave her but I wanted to talk to you; let you know that I was thinking about you.”

  “Phone sex isn’t my thing.” I muttered into my coffee and smirked. “It would be too easy for you to just send me a picture of your cock and spare the words.”