by SM Olivier
“I didn’t realize back then, but he was a controlling man. He didn’t want my mother to work. He forced her to quit dancing. He wouldn’t even let her teach classes any longer. My mother was raised to please her husband, and she tried to, but dancing was our thing. It brought us closer together.” He paused then, turning his head to look out the window. “I didn’t know he hurt her that night. The next day, I noticed Mom could barely walk, and her face was covered in bruises. Eventually, she told me Dad had hit her, but he had been drinking, and he didn’t mean it.”
He turned back to me. “I decided dancing wasn’t worth my mother getting hurt again. I signed up for football with Crew. I learned how to throw a ball. I thought if I was a good boy, Dad would never hit her again. He didn’t stop. After that first time, he thought he got away with it. He began to push her around some more. It wasn’t as bad as the first time, but he left bruises. I begged her to leave, but she never would. She became a prisoner in her own home. She wasn’t allowed to have any friends. He cut her off from everyone, and she had no family left to realize what he had done.
“When I was thirteen, I finally confronted him. He laughed at me right before he knocked me out. Mom finally left him. Mam let us stay in one of their rental homes downtown. One day, we came home from grocery shopping, and he attacked us. Luckily, Mam was stopping by to invite us over for dinner. When the cops arrested him, it caused a snowball effect. It was revealed that my father was a con artist. He was embezzling money, a lot of money. During the trial, I found out that my father also had two different mistresses. One in California and one in New York City.”
He shook his head, ruefully. “I have two brothers and a sister out there. It devastated my mother because he told her he didn’t want any more children. She always wanted a big family. He took that away from her, too.”
He closed his eyes briefly, and my heart went out to him.
“I tried to make her happy again,” he said softly. “I tried to dance for her. I told her I would compete again. When I tried to get back on the stage, I froze. I couldn’t do it anymore. All I get are these flashbacks of when she was hurt. I remembered the names he called me before he sent me to my room that night. Logically, I know he can’t hurt us anymore… psychologically, I still hear him screaming at me, at her.”
He squeezed my hand. “As much as I would love to dance with you, Peyton, I’m not sure if I can. It’s different when I’m teaching classes or when we fooled around for my mom’s grand opening. There’s no pressure. I couldn’t care less about how I look or appear. When I competed, I took it as seriously as I do football, if not more so. On the field, I’m surrounded by my teammates. It takes a team effort to win or lose a game. When I’m dancing, all my flaws, all my missteps, any hesitation is visible for everyone to see.”
By the time he was done telling his story, I was entirely in his lap. I could feel him trembling with the memories. I could see the emotions he held at bay. I grabbed his face and softly kissed his lips.
“Then don’t compete,” I told him softly. “Competing with me isn’t worth your mental health.”
He went to open his mouth, but I placed my mouth on his, giving him another kiss. “Shh,” I bade him. “It’s fine, honestly.”
He sighed before he took my lips. His tongue traced my mouth, and when I opened to him, his tongue sought entrance. His kiss was full of regret and passion. When we finally pulled away, breathless, I smiled.
I nuzzled his neck. “Now, let’s go shopping, I’m hungry, and we have some Calculus homework to do.”
I hated having to tell Anya that I couldn’t convince her son to get over his stage fright, but more than anything, I hated the thought of trying to push Zane into something he wasn’t mentally prepared to do.
12
●
Partners
“Can you look at this?” Zane asked as he handed me his English packet. “Does this look, right?”
I started to giggle. “No, she asked us to write it in paragraph format, so basically you have to reiterate the question in the first sentence. Give her three or four sentences to support your answer and then summarize it. ‘He wasn’t a nice guy’ isn’t a detailed explanation.”
He groaned. “It wasn’t that bad. I have three sentences there. I don’t mind reading, it’s the writing that sucks.”
“I will trade writing for Calculus any day.” I frowned. “I don’t know why I thought it would be a good idea to take AP Calculus this year since I really have no desire to work in any field that needs this kind of math if I can’t be a dancer.”
After we went grocery shopping, I made us dinner. I kept it simple and made us chicken lettuce wraps with brown rice. Then we turned our attention to our meal prep for the rest of the week and a little into next week. I knew I needed to eat more. When I tried on my costumes today, they had been too loose on me. I couldn’t afford to lose any more weight, but I didn’t want to eat a lot of junk food to maintain it. Eventually, I would feel bloated, and my dancing would suffer.
Zane and I had bought two dozen eggs, broccoli, baby carrots, cheese sticks, almonds, celery, almond butter, bananas, little to-go containers of hummus, grapes, blueberries, and bell peppers. We boiled the eggs and prepped the fruits and vegetables before dividing everything by three into individual sandwich baggies. Now Crew, Zane, and I had healthy snacks readily available all day. We hadn’t told Crew that we included him in our snack prep, but we knew he would appreciate it.
Afterward, we went straight to Zane’s room and started studying.
Anya and Zane lived in a modest home; it wasn’t tiny, but it wasn’t large by any means. Their house was in a little cul de sac by the elementary school and seemed to be surrounded by a lot of young families and a few retirees.
When I stepped into the house, it almost looked like a model home. Everything was so clean and pristine, and the moment I stepped into Zane’s room, I knew precisely what Golden had meant. He was unnaturally organized and sterile for an older teenager.
His room was minimalistic in design. The floor was a light hardwood, the walls white except for the one where the bed was. That wall was painted a really dark gray, almost black. His bed was a simple platform bed with bedding in black, white, and gray accents that matched the curtains. His white dresser ran across the whole length of the wall, opposite his bed.
What surprised me the most about his room was the lack of the typical clutter—jacket over a desk chair, loose change on the nightstand, stuff like that. If I didn’t know better, I would think this was a guest room.
There were no pictures or art to indicate his likes or hobbies. All his walls were bare, and no trophies to be found, although I knew he won several championships in football. According to his mother, he used to place a lot in dancing competitions as well. I wondered if they were in storage, or he if even held onto memorabilia like that.
We ignored his sterile white and black desk and elected to sit on his bed to do our homework. I was still studying my Calculus homework, and Zane had moved onto our Literature assignment. I wasn’t too worried about my Lit assignment since I never struggled in it. No, it was Calculus that was worrying me. I really had to study in this class to get good grades.
“I don’t think you’ll have any problems becoming a dancer,” Zane said confidently.
I smiled. “Thanks, but you know how competitive the dancing world can be, and the more I think about it, the more I know I don’t want to be a ballet dancer, so that reduces my chances of finding a niche.”
“What do you want to do?” he asked as he put down his book and laid back, now staring up at me.
I looked down at him and scrunched up my nose. “Promise you won’t laugh?”
He made a cross-motion over his chest. “Promise.”
“I want to be in music videos or become a member of Cirque du Soleil,” I admitted to him.
He smiled. “You’ll get there. I feel it deep down in my soul. You’ll reach your goals.”
<
br /> I put my book down onto his end table and leaned down, my hair curtaining his face. “Thank you.” I smiled softly at him. “And what, pray tell, does Zane Nicolae Chapman want to do when he graduates?”
Someday, I was going ask him how he had gotten such an English sounding name, what with having a Russian mother and a Greek father. Today was not that day. I knew he had already revealed more to me then he felt comfortable with. He was a disciplined, controlling male, and admitting he had a weakness had to be hard on him. His revelation of his past exposed so much to me, though.
Maybe that’s why he felt the need to have so much discipline and control in his life. His dad lying and hurting his mother had taken away his power. His father going to jail and having to become the “man” of the house entirely too soon had created the man in front of me right now.
He reached up and framed my face with his hand, threading his fingers through my hair. “I want to get a division one scholarship for football and then the NFL. With my first big paycheck, I’m paying off all my mother’s debts. But let’s not rush that, just yet. Right now, I want to pause our homework and make out with you like I’ve been dying to since I saw you working on your motorcycle.”
My heart lurched for a moment. My mind wanted to dwell on the fact that our time together may have an expiration date, but I couldn’t. His dreams of providing for his mother, and my visions of dancing, had to come first no matter where fate may take us. I had to savor the time we did have together.
Then my eyes widened as his other words sunk in. I had been so focused on everything crowding in my head I’d forgotten we were alone. In his bedroom. Alone in his house for the first time.
“Then what are you waiting for?” I whispered.
Truth? The idea of being able to escape in this way for even a little while was entirely too enticing.
I didn’t have time to dissect my feelings further, because within seconds, I found myself flat on my back and Zane hovering over me. His lips captured mine. His tongue pursued entrance into my mouth, and I met him with just as much enthusiasm.
We made out for several minutes before I felt his hand on my bare hip where my shirt had ridden up.
“Can I touch you?” he asked huskily as his hands slowly lifted my shirt.
I nodded wordlessly before his mouth came back down on mine. I barely noticed the dueling of our tongues as his warm hand began to gently trace my hips, my stomach, and the outer curve of my breast. His touch was driving me insane. It was too teasing. It was perfect, yet not enough.
I whimpered against his lips as I tried to feel his own skin under my fingertips. My fingers found the edge of his shirt of their own volition. I barely registered that he was removing my shirt as I was removing his. For a brief moment, he pressed his bare skin against my bra-clad torso.
I traced his smooth, hard muscles and enjoyed how they twitched in the path of my stroking. I adored the way his darker olive skin tone looked against my fair skin. The contrast was art itself.
Soon his hands were tracing the outside of my bra, his fingertips skimming across my nipples. They were already hard, and they ached as he brushed against them. Warmth pooled in my lower stomach and into my core.
“Please,” I whimpered.
“What do you want?” his eyes were dark as he looked up at me.
“I want you to suck on my nipples,” I told him honestly.
He made a deep sound in the back of his throat as his tongue slipped out to moisten his luscious lips. He wasted no time unhooking the clasp in the front of my bra.
“Beautiful,” he murmured as he gently caressed my breasts. His fingers danced around everywhere but where I wanted him to touch me.
I didn’t argue with him. I knew my flaws, and my breasts were among them. They were too small. I had seen better racks on thirteen-year-old girls. They might be high and perky, but they were tiny. But all my insecurities were forgotten as he continued to tease me.
“Zane,” I implored, not recognizing my own voice.
He groaned before his head swooped down, his lips captured my nipples. At first, he gently licked them, then suckled them. It wasn’t enough, I wanted more. I thrust my hips up into his. I could feel his erection briefly.
“Harder,” I begged.
He growled once more as he tugged on my nipples, allowing his teeth to barely scrape them. I cried out in satisfaction as I continued to seek the hardness between his thighs. He was rigid, and the silky material of his pants caused delicious friction against my lycra shorts.
He moaned once more before his hands stilled the thrusting movements of my hips. His thumbs hooked the waistband of my shorts.
“Can I go down on you?” he bit his bottom lip. Indecision and desire warred in his face. I could tell he had a tight leash on his desire.
“Yes,” I breathed out.
He gave me one more intense look before he peeled my shorts away from my body. He moaned before he knelt between my legs.
“I’ve wanted to taste your whole body.” His voice was velvet. “I wanted to savor you until you couldn’t take it anymore, but I have no self-control. For weeks now, I’ve wanted to see if you’re as delicious as you smell.”
I didn’t think I could get any wetter, but I knew I was. Without preamble, his head dipped down. He licked my outer lips before he finally dipped his tongue into my slit.
He moaned in satisfaction. “Better,” he rumbled against me. “Better, than I imagined.”
His words incited me further.
He continued taking long, broad strokes against my slit with his tongue before he latched onto my clit, sucking it into his mouth before pulling back. The pull of his mouth drove me insane. He did this motion a few times more before his tongue swiped out and swirled around my nub.
He slid one finger inside me, and I could feel him gently push in and out. Eventually, he added a second finger, and I moaned. His mouth and fingers were expertly working me up to a frenzy. I felt the tingling down my neck, coursing down my spine until the feeling settled in between my legs. I cried out his name as I felt my orgasm overtake me.
It took me a moment before I realized he hadn’t stopped. Instead, he was licking me clean. When his tongue met my clit I whimpered. It was too sensitive.
“I won’t stop next time,” he murmured. “I wanna see how many times you can come apart on my tongue. Damn, you are so sexy and those noises…mmm.” He grunted in the back of his throat.
I smiled at him as I floated back down from the high I was on. He sighed in contentment as he laid his head on my stomach. His hand gently caressed my knees and up to my thighs. Suddenly I felt like I wanted more. Crew and Kyler had both brought me to this point already. Their oral and hand ministrations were terrific, but I wanted to know what it felt like to be taken entirely by a man I cared about.
My heart argued that I more than cared for them, but my logical mind said it was way too soon to have developed deeper feelings. After all, didn’t loving someone mean unconditionally adoring them for all their flaws and strengths? The guys wore their strengths like mantles, but I’m sure I still hadn’t seen all their shortcomings.
I always thought I would lose my virginity to someone I loved and respected. Someone I was madly in love with. At this moment though, I wanted to lose it to somebody I cared deeply for, someone who had been there for me time and time again.
“Do you have a condom?” I asked him softly.
His head whipped up quickly. I saw hope in his eyes but caution as well.
“Peyton,” he husked. “I didn’t go down on you in the hope that you’d reciprocate. Believe it or not, I really, really enjoyed that. I’ll be fine.” He shrugged, and his whole body shifted slightly. I could feel his erection against my outer leg. He was still aroused, and he had made no move to ease his own ache.
I smiled at him. “I know that. That’s why I want to feel you inside me. Do you have a condom?” I asked again.
I was on the pill, but I still didn’t
trust it yet. I took it religiously at the same time every day, and it had been more than the seven days they recommended, but I still wanted the extra precaution.
He rolled over and reached into his nightstand drawer. I watched as he opened a brand-new box and then withdrew one of the foil packets. I didn’t know how to process that. I knew he hadn’t been active with Leah for some time, but it was apparent he was prepared.
“Are you sure?” he ran a hand through his dark locks. His usually well-kept hair was mussed in a sexy way.
I shook off my insecure thoughts. I nodded. I really was sure. Him asking me again when I could see the desire and need in his eyes was enough for me to know this was the right choice. I wanted to know what it would feel like with him inside me. I was tired of stopping at a certain point. I wanted to know what it was like to feel like half of a whole.
He stood up and pulled his pants and boxer briefs down together. He took his time, folding his clothing before he placed them on top of his dresser. His long cock bobbed as he moved around. He wasn’t huge like Crew and Kyler, but he was definitely big. I saw enough male dancer’s packages to know he was way above average. I saw the precum on the tip of his head, and the sight did funny things to me. He tore open the foil packet and slowly pushed the condom down his length. He was taking his time, and I knew he was giving me the opportunity to change my mind.
I wasn’t going to. I laid back and opened my thighs. “Zane,” I bade him.
He needed no further bidding. He crawled up from the bottom of the bed and placed his eager mouth on my own. His kisses earlier were exploratory, his kisses now were hot… desperate.
“How did I get so lucky to have a beautiful girl like you want me?” he murmured before he settled between my thighs.