I couldn’t quite remember what manners were taught by my parents or if they’d ever been taught at all, but at the group home, it was every man for himself. Waiting to eat until everyone was there meant not eating at all.
“My mistake,” I deadpanned, but a curl of a smile still found its way to my lips before it fell away.
I was stalling, scared of what my pregnancy would mean for us, terrified he’d look at me differently. Hell, I was just plain scared.
I was going to have to do this Band-Aid style if I was going to do it at all.
“So, I went to the doctor today on my lunch break,” I blurted when Levi took his first bite. I’d like to think I did this on purpose so I could get all of the things I needed to say out before he could say anything, but I didn’t. The words just seemed to vomit up my throat before I could stop them.
“I’m pregnant. It isn’t yours. I-I knew I was pregnant before I ever came to town. I didn’t tell you because at first, I didn’t think I was staying, and then when I knew I was, I wanted a doctor to confirm it just in case the test was a false positive,” I said almost without pause. My gut churned a little at the complete lack of reaction on Levi’s face as he chewed his chicken.
“I know,” he said simply once he’d swallowed his bite.
“What do you mean you know?” I asked, my voice like a whip in the air. Levi’s answering indulgent smile seemed to only piss me off.
“I mean exactly what I said. I know. I’ve known for a while. Since the ordeal with Pippa.”
“But… How?”
“Well, Sugar, you have a dizzy spell any time you go without food for twenty minutes, you eat more than a grown man, and you rub your belly when you’re stressed. Kinda like right now,” he offered, his eyes trailing down my body to rest on my belly where my hand seemed to be making comforting circles without my knowledge.
Fuck. He was right. How about that?
“Why didn’t you say anything?”
“Well, Sugar, you are skittish at best, and I figured you’d tell me when you thought you were safe. You are safe here, baby. I’m not going to let anyone hurt you.”
“You don’t know what I did to get safe,” I breathed, unable to break the hold our eyes had on one another.
“I know you only did what you had to.” His voice, his face… he believed that. With everything in him, he believed I was good.
But was I? Could I have done something different?
My lips trembled as I took a deep breath, deciding that if I was going to tell Levi, I was going to tell him everything.
“I… killed a man to get free,” I whispered, my lips trembling as I let those words pass my lips. I’d told Smitty, but Smitty would have done the same. I didn’t know if Levi would have taken someone – anyone’s – life like I did. “I killed my child’s father. I don’t know how safe I’ll ever be. I’m always going to be looking over my shoulder. I’m always going to have that stain on me.”
I felt cold, trembling with the guilt I probably shouldn’t feel. Then I was in Levi’s arms, his strength and warmth wrapped around me, and I could tell him the rest.
“I’d been planning to leave for ages. I had a new ID, new accounts. My friend Smitty helped me get everything set up. Got a new car. Everything. His family is connected. Big money, so I couldn’t just walk. Not after what he’d been doing to me. He always told me he could find me wherever I went.
“His family was planning their annual trip to Grand Cayman, and they were leaving the next day. I planned to leave the day after they did to give myself enough time. I didn’t want him to come back and find me gone if I wasn’t far enough away. But that day I realized my period was late, so I took a test. I didn’t mean to leave work so late. But I’d been trying to balance an account all day, and I wasn’t getting anywhere with the bank. I didn’t think I could leave with that much money missing. I mean, it was damn near a hundred million dollars just up and gone from one of the accounts, and I wanted it resolved before I left. I’d given up and went to leave for the day, but Cole startled me, and I dropped my purse and the box with the tests sp-spilled out.”
A full-body tremor rocked me, and I almost couldn’t say the rest. But then Levi’s fingers found their way into my hair, his fingertips playing with the strands, calming me enough so I could say the last bit.
“He-he was choking me, trying to get in between my legs, and I… grabbed a letter opener and…” I trailed off shaking my head. But I couldn’t bury my head in his chest and forget. Levi pulled me back, staring right into my eyes with his every-colored ones. They were molten with banked rage and… pride?
“I saw your face, I saw your neck. You were fighting for your life. You had every right to do that, Sugar. You had every right to protect yourself, your child. I don’t care who he was, you didn’t deserve to be beaten, to be choked. You didn’t deserve a lick of that shit. That baby isn’t his. He or she is yours. Not his. Never his. You got me, Isla?”
I didn’t know how much I needed to hear his words – his absolution – until right that second. It wasn’t just me telling myself I had the right, it was Levi insisting on it. And he knew – he knew about the baby. He’d known, and still, he was here. I couldn’t bring my voice above a whisper, but I answered him – the relief stealing all the power in my body.
“I got you.”
“Good,” he growled, and then his lips were on mine. Soon, I was off the floor, my ass in his hands and my legs around his waist. Smart legs. Fucking genius legs. But his were smarter because they took us to the couch where we landed in a tangle of limbs and lips.
In the end, we ate our chicken cold.
19
LEVI
The rough silk of Isla’s hair threaded through my fingers as I pulled, tilting her head up and back so I could claim her mouth. The bite of the pull made her moan, and it made my balls draw up when I swallowed it. Her noises were the fucking best.
My other hand was busy, making slow, deliberate circles around her clit as I thrust into her from behind. I loved this position, loved the way her knuckles would turn white as she clutched the headboard, the way her back would bow, and her breath would hitch as she worked herself on my cock, giving me everything I didn’t even think to ask for.
But torturing Isla with the slow was only half the fun. The other half was the inevitable moment when either of us would snap and take over, and I never really knew which one of us it would be.
Isla moaned again, this time plaintive and needy and it was me this time to snap. I pulled out, shuddering still at the lack of condom and the loss of the searing heat of her around me. Moving off the bed, I dragged her with me, but Isla was smarter than me. She flipped over, and as soon as her ass was at the edge, I drove back in, hooking one arm under a leg, and gripping her other ankle for dear life as I plunged into that silken warmth over and over again.
Isla was a fucking goddess. Every single thing about her was designed by a goddamn deity to make me lose my fucking mind. The way her pale skin flushed with her oncoming orgasm, the way her hair splayed over the covers tangled with waves and curls, the way her blue eyes seemed to sear into me even though I knew she fought against closing them to the raw pleasure.
Even her mouth, the way she either bit her lip or let it go slack in a moan. I’d known it before, but every time I watched her – whether it was around the office or her in her kitchen or in bed like this – it made me fall in love with her all over again.
I loved her strength and grit. Her softness, her snark. I loved her for a whole host of reasons that could take days to enumerate. I just knew without a doubt, no matter what she’d done or endured, she was mine, and I was hers.
Isla’s moans got louder, her slick heat squeezing me like a vice. She had to come – had to – or I would lose it and soon.
“You’ve gotta come, Sugar.” Maybe it was my plea or my voice which sounded like I’d just gargled glass or the way my thumb brushed over her clit, but Isla exploded, the long p
laintive moan of it erupting up her throat as if she was being torn apart and put back together all at the same time.
Fuck, I loved that, too.
Then the fire I’d banked came roaring back, I and couldn’t keep myself from lifting us both deeper into the bed and surrounding her as she tilted her hips to give me more of her.
“Levi,” she whispered, the needy pleading of it pulling at my balls. It sounded like a beg from her, and I liked that sound. Fucking, fuck. She could come again. I wanted her to come again. She needed one more. Just one more.
Threading my fingers in her hair, my mouth collided with hers again, my thrusts turning frenzied and jagged, so close to my own orgasm, my rhythm was shot to shit. The feel of her skin on mine, the way her body shivered every time I pulled out only to moan when I thrust in. Jesus.
“Oh my god. Please, baby. Pleasepleaseplease.”
Her voice drew higher, and I knew she was coming with me. Hell, this one might kill us both.
Isla’s legs tightened around me, meeting my thrusts once, twice, and then the pair of us let go. Her with a scream and me with my face buried in her neck, the smell of her skin, her sweat in my nose as I came.
Both of us drifted, me with my fingers still in her hair and Isla with her hands doing slow circles all over my skin. It was like she was pulling me into her even though I was as close as I could be.
And I loved that, too.
But I didn’t think I could tell her – not then. Not when we were still joined, not so soon. I could tell she doubted us, still doubted I’d stick around, that I wasn’t hiding a shitty side.
It burned deep in me that she’d gone through so much that she couldn’t trust me right away, that she couldn’t trust her own feelings – the ones that showed on her face every time she thought I wasn’t looking. She loved me too, I could feel it in my gut.
But love or not, she could still run.
I just hoped she wouldn’t.
* * *
“Are you sure about this?” Isla asked for the third time. I got it, she was practically a hermit, so going out on the town to meet people might have been a little outside her comfort zone. But the Antler Pub was the local watering hole, and Isla needed to have some friends that weren’t me, Graham, Ben, or Carl.
Isla’s big blue eyes seemed a little scared as she plucked at the hem of her dress, a mustard yellow floral number that hit her about mid-thigh with long belled sleeves and a wide ‘V’ at her chest that stopped at an empire waist. Despite the loose skirt, Isla’s baby bump was starting to make itself known. For weeks, her stomach was flat, and then a few days ago, her belly just popped, blossoming into a gentle curve that showed the life growing inside her.
And fuck me, that was sexy, too.
Everything about her was sexy and effortless – I had to fight against going hard just looking at her. She paired the dress with cognac braided wedge heels that did fantastic things to her legs. She eventually gave up on the hem and went to twisting one of the rings on her fingers. She had so many, I was sure she had one on every finger.
Her hair was teased out full with a pair of braids pulling the top away from her face, and her makeup was done up to eleven. Smokey bronze shadow and full lashes, and I had no idea what she did to her skin to make it dewy like that, but I freaking loved it.
“Yes, Sugar. I think I’ve kept you to myself long enough, and it couldn’t hurt to get some friends under your belt. At the very least it’ll be a night out where you don’t have to cook,” I said trying to entice her to come out of her shell a little bit.
Isla was hiding, plain and simple. But she didn’t need to do that here – not anymore. No one would ask her questions about her past – at least none that would hurt. Her face was healed except for a tiny crescent scar high up on her cheekbone which she had expertly blended into her makeup. And my dipshit of a brother would leave her alone. It didn’t matter to me what she’d done to get here, and what Orin didn’t know, well, he didn’t need to know.
Not that I thought he’d do anything about it if he did.
Orin may be my asshole older brother, and he may be a cop, but he had a righteous streak about him that didn’t lend to putting pregnant, battered women behind bars. Not ever.
“You look fucking stunning, Sugar. Let’s go have some fun.”
My compliment must have done the trick because Isla took a deep breath and put her hand in mine, a blush coloring her cheeks.
Success.
The Antler Pub was at the end of the main drag, on the opposite end from the garage. Other than Connie’s, it was one of the best places to eat in town and the steaks there were freaking phenomenal – a funky little place that was half dive bar and half steakhouse. The lights were low, the bar battered and long, and the beer was cold.
“Do you want to sit at the bar or at a table?” I asked Isla as I opened the heavy, wide-planked door for her.
“Bar. We can eat at the bar, right?”
Of course, Isla was worried about food. After the workout we’d had today, I couldn’t blame her.
“You can eat anywhere, babe. Bar it is.”
“I’ve never really been to too many bars,” she admitted, slipping her hand in mine as we headed to the gleaming if battered bar top. “Where I lived before was such a tourist trap, I never wanted to really go out.”
“And the hermit bit had nothing to do with it,” I said wryly, pulling a barstool out for her to sit.
She held her fingers an inch apart and shrugged. “I grew up in foster care, and I’m not good at making friends. Staying home was always the better plan.”
Well, shit. We’d talked about how we grew up, but until now I didn’t realize Isla hadn’t ever had a home. If she was in foster, then she might not have made friends on purpose not wanting to deal with the loss of them when she inevitably moved on.
“You’re better at it than you think.”
A pair of drink mats were plopped on the bar, and my favorite bartender stopped in front of us, the grin on her lips practically splitting her face in half.
“Isla, meet my favorite bartender, Avery. Avery, meet my girl, Isla.”
Avery was the only decent person to come out of the Wells family in probably a few generations. Despite the Wells being just as much an Evergreen legacy as mine, they were known to be the degenerates, the reprobates, and the scoundrels of Evergreen. It kind of made sense that they would own all the bars. Of the three bars in town, The Antler Pub was the only one to not feel skeezy, which made sense since it was run by the single honorable Wells.
“Pleased to meet you,” Avery said, her voice light even though her eyes were tired. “What’re you having?”
“I’ll have a Fat Tire.”
“Good choice, and you, sweetheart?” Avery asked Isla.
“Juice if you have it.”
“Sure do. Orange, apple, cranberry, pineapple? We also have a homemade raspberry lemonade if you like,” Avery offered.
“That sounds good. I’ll take the lemonade, thank you.”
Isla’s belly let out a dull roar. “And we’re going to need a few menus, too.”
“On it.” Avery rapped her knuckles on the bar as she left us to make our drinks.
After we got our beverages and ordered some food, I sat back just to look at Isla. She took in everything, watching the locals, the servers, watching how Avery made drinks. She even managed to open up a bit more, telling me a little about how she grew up and her friend Smitty who helped her come here.
“So, Sugar, what do you think?”
“About what?” Isla asked after she finished her bite of steak. Her baked potato decimated, salad gone, all that was left was a tiny strip of meat left on her T-bone that she was determined to get.
I asked the questions I couldn’t help from falling out of my mouth. “About this town? About staying here?”
I wanted her to stay. Needed it. I needed this woman more than air. Needed her more than anything.
Isla’s eye
s flashed up from her steak to meet mine, her expression startled before smoothing out into something close to amusement. I didn’t know what that meant, but I hoped it was good.
“I’m not going anywhere, silly man. I signed a lease weeks ago,” she said simply as if her signing a lease made even a lick of difference to me.
“Signing a lease can’t make you stay, Isla.” I hated how desperate my voice sounded. It wasn’t like she’d packed her bags and was getting in her car. She was sitting here at the bar with me, her foot hooked around my leg, as we sat side by side eating steak together.
But I needed the words from her, needed that promise.
Then she dropped her utensils, sliding over in her seat, closer to me even though I was practically swarming her with how close I was.
“A piece of paper might not be able to make me stay, but you – your roots in this town, your love of it – can. I’ll stay if you stay, and I’ll go if you go. Now tell me what you really want to say, Levi,” she murmured, her lips almost brushing mine.
We were probably causing a stir, and I could feel the eyes on us, but fuck it. All I saw was her. All I felt was her breath on my lips and her heat filtering through my shirt. All I wanted to do was take her home and fucking consume her.
And she knew what I’d been holding back – what I couldn’t say before. My lips brushed hers as I whispered the words that were eating at me all day – turning them from the worry, the acid in my gut to a balm on my skin.
“I love you,” I breathed.
My words brought a wave of relief to her face, and I didn’t give a shit if we were in public, I was kissing her as if my life depended on it.
When we came up for air in a sea of wolf whistles and catcalls, she said the words I was dying to hear.
“I love you, too, Levi. So much.”
If I could have frozen time in that one moment, I would have. But I didn’t see what was coming.
Seeking Sanctuary_A Shelter Me Novel Page 12