They stopped in front of the last door, which was actually the one closest to the stairwell. He paused, his hand on the doorknob. “This is the room, the one that would have told you everything.” She smiled, curious, eager to see what secrets the room held. She didn’t have the heart to tell him that, so far, nothing in his house gave away his past—he could have just put a lock on this door if he’d been so worried about it.
He pushed the door open and turned on the light to reveal a room crammed with music stuff. There was not one but two drum kits in the room, as well as a guitar, keyboard, and a couple of amps. “Come on in,” he said, and that was when she realized she’d been standing frozen in the hallway, almost as if the room were a shrine that she didn’t dare step inside, because she wasn’t worthy. There was so much to take in—awards on the walls and shelves, framed albums hung on the wall (she’d known that Spawn had been successful, but she hadn’t paid attention to how many albums they’d sold), posters and pictures everywhere. There were magazines on one of the bookshelves, and she had no doubt the band could be found within those pages. There were even a couple of sets of framed drumsticks.
Seeing his picture on the wall—both with the band and alone—when he was younger made it real. How had she not seen it before?
She walked around the room as though she were in a museum. Lady had already sauntered inside and laid in front of one of the drum kits. Part of Kory wanted to touch things but she stopped herself. On one wall, she saw a big machine set up with a computer. “What’s that?”
“It’s an old recording and mixing device.”
She raised her brows, looking him straight in the eye. “You still making music?”
“Nah. It’s just a leftover. What the hell would I do with it?”
“I don’t know. Maybe give it to someone who could use it?”
“Yeah, I guess I could, but that seems disrespectful.” She continued walking around the room with care, not wanting to miss a detail. “It happened, didn’t it?”
She didn’t like his tone. It sounded stressed, worried, a quality she’d never heard in his voice before. She turned. “What do you mean?”
Yeah, he looked uneasy. “I mean…you’re going to look at me differently now. The way they all look.”
It was time to stop gawking. She closed the gap between them, shaking her head. “Stone.” She took his hands in hers and looked up into his eyes. “You are more than your past, and somehow…” Her voice drifted off, because no matter how she worded it, she was going to sound fucking stupid. “Somehow you have become my hero. You’re the only man I’ve felt one-hundred percent comfortable with, the only one I’ve told even part of my story to. So why the hell would I look at you any differently? Why would your past influence the way I feel now?”
He touched her chin with his index finger. “Kory…you are wise beyond your years. You could teach a lot of girls out there a thing or two.”
“This is…we are…” Her voice once more trailed off, because she wasn’t sure how to say what she needed to. “Telling you my past, I think, is helping me heal. I want to tell you the rest…someday. I’m just not ready yet.”
“I know.”
“I just wish you’d stop feeling like you can’t touch me—like I’m fragile.” She sucked in a deep breath. “Like I’ll break.”
“I haven’t—”
Her voice was quiet but firm. “Yes, you have.” She stroked the side of his face with the slender fingers of her right hand. “Stone.” He raised his eyebrows. “We’ve hardly made love. Ever.”
He looked guilty then and swallowed. “I want to be sure you’re ready.”
“I am.” She stepped back from him. “I’m ready. Please don’t be afraid of damaging me. I’m strong, and I’ve survived so much.”
“I know.”
No better time than the present. She grabbed the bottom of her t-shirt and brought it up over her head. His eyes grew wide as she dropped it to the floor. “Make love to me, Stone.”
He didn’t say a word, seemed almost stuck in place, much like she’d felt before she’d entered this room. She kicked off her sandals then and unbuttoned her shorts, letting them fall to the floor. That was when she saw the desire in his eyes. He did want her. That was all she needed to know to feel more than ready.
She was ready to completely shed her past and be the sexual creature she knew she was—not a slut but a desirous woman who needed to pleasure her man and feel the pleasure he could give her.
She stood still then, biting her bottom lip. She was perfectly willing to continue stripping, but she wanted him to do it, wanted him to find her impossible to resist, so she got close to him and looked up, but her eyes couldn’t move away from his lips.
Propelled by her inner desire rather than conscious effort, she touched the bottom of his shirt, lifting it up his belly until he grabbed it and pulled it over his head. It was then as if all he’d needed was a little push, because he palmed her cheeks and drew her into a smoldering kiss. All she wanted right now was for him to look upon her as a woman of desire, not a girl who was fragile and vulnerable, and that had been the sense she’d had from him lately. No, she wanted him to want her like she did him—to consume his thoughts, to become the water to quench his unending thirst…because that was what he had become to her.
His warm tongue dominated her mouth, told her that he did indeed feel the same way, and he could no longer deny it. She touched his chest with her fingers, and she could imagine in her mind the tattoos she was grazing with her nails—the gun, the swirls, the skull, the rose, the spider web, the star, more swirls, and as her fingers moved closer to his neck, the words across his collarbone that read You Only Have Today, up his neck where the whirls and curves and colors ended abruptly, just below his jawline, and she could feel prickly stubble against her palms. She continued her journey with her fingers even as her mouth tasted his, even while her body grew taut and warm, and that familiar humming inside told her she needed to feel him inside her.
His hands on the small of her back felt feverish, matching the way she felt inside. She was burning, aching, and she needed him, not to quench her fire, but to tame it, help her manage it, contain it, because right now, it felt like an inferno was erupting inside her, and it was out of control. Feeling his fingers on the back of her bra unhooking it didn’t help. She felt her nipples stiffen once more as he moved his lips to her neck. Her breath caught in her throat, almost as though she’d forgotten how to breathe…and if she had, that would have been okay, because she was with Stone and they were in the perfect moment.
Instead, he placed his palm flat against her back, just under where he’d unhooked her bra, and he leaned her back, laying down a trail of kisses down from her neck to her cleavage. With his other hand, he grabbed the bra in the middle and tore it away, not violently but enough that she sucked in a quick breath. He touched a nipple with his tongue then, and a loud moan, louder than it had any right to be, escaped from her lips, and she felt her right hand tighten around the back of his neck underneath his hair, her nails digging into his flesh. Even at that precarious angle, she couldn’t help but respond to his touch, her back trying to arch even higher so that her breast could fill his mouth. She felt his hand slide up her back so that his arm was holding her up, but she was better balanced, and she could feel his bicep bulging against her skin.
Suddenly, she felt even hotter, ready to break out in a sweat, even as he pointed his tongue against her flesh and traced a line from one areola to the other and the wetness left a cool trail. She moaned again, needing to be filled by him. Her breathing had become erratic even as she tried to maintain focus, but her entire world had become his tongue and the throbbing need between her legs. She wrapped her other arm around his back, hoping to lose that feeling of falling.
But it was all in her head…and it was more than a physical feeling. It was a sensation of completely losing herself, burying herself, and she didn’t know that she wanted it to end. It d
id end, though, at least in the corporeal world, when he straightened his back, bringing her up with him, and she felt grounded once more. He slid his hands underneath her ass then and lifted her up, and she wound her legs around his back as he started walking across the room.
At first, she thought he was going to set her on the desk that held the recording equipment or in the chair in front of it, but he kept walking. It wasn’t until she saw a drum kit in the corner of her eye that she realized he was approaching the big ass amplifier against the wall. He sat her on it, and that was when she could tell it was solid, in no danger of tilting. He grabbed the back of her panties with his hands and pulled them down under her ass so that the fabric bunched and dug at her skin, so she shifted, helping him ease them off her. He was still wearing his jeans, and she thought that was a damn shame. Yeah, she could appreciate the tats on his exposed upper body, but she wanted his cock ramming into her right now. She could imagine the tats in her head with her eyes closed while she enjoyed the sensation of him being inside her. She fumbled with his button and then felt his fingers at war with hers while he yanked down his zipper.
His hands were just as rough and demanding with himself as they’d been with her panties, grasping both the denim and the cotton boxers underneath and pulling them down hard. Once they were halfway down his legs, he kissed her while fishing out his wallet and pulling out a condom. It didn’t take him long to cover his cock, but he couldn’t quite figure out how to finagle the angle to shove himself inside her pussy. She was almost panting then, desperate, needing him, and she realized her fingers were digging into his ass as if they would help guide him inside her warm, wet flesh. She even wrapped a leg around him as though it might move the proceedings along.
Without warning, though, he lifted her back up off the amp and sat on it himself while wrapping her legs around him. Then she was sitting in his lap facing him, her pointy nipples digging into his chest, his hands possessively gliding up her back, sending shivers up her spine. She was almost eye to eye with him and she drowned in his dark eyes. She lifted herself just enough to guide him inside and let out a loud breath. Yes. That had been all she’d wanted and everything she’d needed.
Stone made a noise that sent another charge through her nerves. God, he was hot and felt like heaven inside her, and she couldn’t help but move her hips so that he ground into her twice as hard as he would have had she been passive. One of his hands held her at the small of her back, but he brought his right hand up to her cheek. It felt so possessive, especially when she opened her eyes again and saw the way he was looking at her, consuming her with his eyes. He pressed his thumb against the corner of her mouth and so she tilted her head, pulling it into her mouth and sucking. His eyelids fluttered and he clenched his teeth, and she knew she was imagining it, but it felt like his cock had turned to solid steel. She gasped and he removed his thumb, only to slide his hand down the front of her body, wedging it in between them. She tilted back a little and he found her swollen clit and began rubbing against it, the friction causing her to soar. She mumbled something incoherent then, but her babbling soon became a kind of singing as she felt the walls of her world crashing down around her.
She didn’t know that she’d ever felt this good…or if she would ever be able to again.
Chapter Twenty
KORY WAS GIGGLING, her legs dangling like a rag doll’s with every step. After she and Stone lay on the floor of his trophy room for what felt like hours (but she knew hadn’t been), he picked her up in his arms and carried her, up one flight of stairs and then another. When he reached his bedroom, she asked, “Aren’t you tired?”
He shrugged, setting her down on the bed with a gentleness that belied his strength. “Yeah, but not from carrying you. What the hell do you think I do with all those weights down there?”
She laughed and heard Lady in the room, her dog tags jangling. Stone lay on the bed next to her, but his face hovered just above hers. “Can I get you anything to drink?”
“I dunno. Maybe later.”
“I don’t think I’ll be able to do it later. Now or never, babe.”
She giggled again, loving the strange feeling of being alive down to her core. “Fine. A glass of water would be great.”
“One glass of water comin’ up.” He stood and walked toward the stairwell, and she was able to appreciate the canvas that was his body. His arms, his back, his legs were covered in magnificent art, and she couldn’t help but marvel at the beauty.
As soon as he was down the stairs, though, Kory felt sleepy, unable to keep her eyes open, and when Stone got back with the water, she was out like a light. She woke up when he said, “Let’s get you under the covers” and pulled them out from under her so he could lay the sheet and comforter on top. As she awoke, she realized he’d turned off the air conditioning, and she could hear rain on the rooftop. He stood in front of the window and pulled a glass panel aside. In seconds, Kory could smell the fresh air filled with the scent of rain, damp earth, and pine trees, and she could feel the coolness, a chill she hadn’t felt since early spring. It was refreshing.
Stone got in bed next to her and held her close, her back snuggled up against his chest. “I live for moments like these.”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah.”
They were quiet for a few minutes, just listening to the steady patter of rain on the roof and the ground below, and Kory felt Lady jump up on the bed, next to her master Stone, the little dog’s favorite place to be. Kory wasn’t able to drift off right away again, so she asked, “Now that I know your secret, tell me about your days as a drummer.”
“What do you want to know?”
“Anything. What did you like the most about it?”
Stone was silent, seeming to give her question a lot of thought. After a bit, he said, “My favorite part was visiting new places. I’d never left Colorado until I went on tour. My parents were too poor to be able to afford trips. Okay, no, that’s not true. Well, the poor part was, but my grandparents took me to the Grand Canyon once, before I started school. That was the only time I’d left the state. My parents were way too into drinking. That’s where all their money went. Doesn’t matter, though. At first, it was just us guys, a dinky little nobody band who wanted to be heard, so we traveled here, there, and everywhere, but settled for a while in California, because there was no lack of places to play there, but J.C. and Riley had already sent demos to labels, and those people started arranging to see us live. It was no time before we got signed. I knew right away how lucky I was to be part of it, but I felt like a fraud. I hadn’t been part of the demo-making process. I hadn’t gotten those folks to listen to the music, and, speaking of, I hadn’t written any of the songs. I just played the drums for those guys, and I got damn lucky that the old drummer had known me and put in a good word for me. It wasn’t until we recorded the actual album that I felt like I had anything to do with it, and even then, I felt like a shyster. I wasn’t throwing in my own stuff—I was just playing it the way it had already been written.”
Kory was getting drowsy, but she still had a question. “What about for other albums? You know, once you guys worked on other stuff?”
“Yeah, then I felt less like a fraud. Still…I was no dummy. I just kept the beat.”
“Shut up.” Kory started laughing. “Now you sound like a lot of fangirls. What they don’t seem to know is that the songs would totally suck if there wasn’t some bad ass drummer at the back keeping the beat. I know this. The band knows this. So shut your mouth.”
Stone laughed too. “Goddamn. I think you’re a keeper.” He kissed her on top of her head. “But, like I told you, that was just my job. It didn’t feel like a lot of work, though. Sure, I didn’t want to drum for the rest of my life, but I loved seeing new places. Everyday felt like a new adventure. And then our first European tour. Holy shit, was that cool. And I was too young to be pissed off that three band members were missing it all because they were too stoned to appreciate any
thing.”
Kory was getting sleepier, but she couldn’t help asking. “What was your favorite place in Europe?”
“I don’t know if I can name just one thing.” He grew quiet and Kory felt her hold on consciousness fading. “The Coliseum was incredible.” She faded in and out as she heard him talking about castles and the Eiffel Tower, Barcelona, and rolling hills, but it all jumbled in her mind, and Europe was heavy on her brain as it gave it all up for the land of dreams.
* * *
Blood. White knuckles. Blind fury.
A wailing beyond her reach.
The glint of a blade. Pure and utter helplessness.
Kory awoke with a scream. She might have drifted off into a peaceful sleep, but it didn’t take long for her mind to torment her once more.
She felt Stone’s arms around her. He too was sitting up in bed, comforting her in the cool darkness, asking her if she was all right.
No, she wasn’t. She leaned into his chest, feeling warm and secure, grateful for his comfort. He asked, “Are you going to be okay, Kory? You’re really starting to worry me.”
She let out a soft, inaudible sigh. “I think maybe I need to talk about it.”
“That’s cool. Go ahead. I’m a good listener.”
She couldn’t help the wry smile that spread across her face, even though she knew he couldn’t see it. “Better than me, anyway.”
He chuckled. “No worries. I was surprised you stayed awake as long as you did.”
After a few moments, she said, “I just…I’ve never talked about this to anyone.”
“What? About what that Art guy did to you?”
“No. Natalie’s heard that story. So have the cops.” She was quiet, trying to find a reserve of courage deep in her belly. “I’ve never been able to talk about the rest of the story…and no one’s ever forced me to. They were able to piece it all together based on the evidence. I just—” She choked, her words sticking in her throat, as she forced air into her lungs. “I feel like it’s time, like he won if I don’t talk about it, if I can’t find a way to just let it out.”
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