I struggled to keep up with her, tugging her back against me as she wove through the suffocating crowd. I let my hands wander down her front, knowing it was too dark for anyone to see much of anything. And hell, anything Aly and I had going didn’t come close to touching on the brazen debauchery half the people in the house were partaking in.
“You think we’re going to be difficult, huh?” My palms pressed flat into the top of her thighs, my fingers wandering for a flash in between.
Aly’s breath caught.
“I thought things had been going pretty damn easy,” I said.
“Oh, things are definitely good, Jared,” she purred back with her face pressed all the way up under my jaw. “I’m just committed to seeing it through.”
I was feeling playful, set free in the ease of Aly’s touch, in the strength of her words that together were about the most powerful thing I’d ever experienced.
And a whole lot aroused.
I groaned, wishing we’d skipped stopping by after all.
“You need to stop,” I warned, because while Aly might not expect it, I wasn’t better than dragging her down the hall and finding a place to hide us behind a closed door.
A husky giggle wobbled up her throat and passed through those full lips. Aly let her hands do a little wandering of their own.
“You are evil,” I accused, burrowing my face in her neck.
“I’m evil?” she mumbled through mock offense. Demanding fingers made their way up to scrape over my head, twisting and tugging at my short hair.
“In the sweetest possible way,” I promised.
Aly stopped to chat with a few people she knew.
And did the girl ever like showing off her ring. She was damn near giddy, flicking her fingers around, catching the cut of the diamonds in the faint shimmers of light.
I tossed out some pleasantries when she gave introductions, doing my best not to feel uncomfortable under all the scrutiny.
Most everyone had heard about us, had heard about the baby, knew Aly’s life was heading in an entirely different direction than the rest of her friends. It was kind of strange having her here, too. Most of us were about the same age. Now there was something that separated us, defined us as different, set us apart.
One choice had changed everything. My decision to come back to Phoenix had shifted the course of Aly’s life and granted me a new one. That one action changed it all.
If I hadn’t have come, Aly would still be just like the rest of her friends, focused on college, getting her degree, instead of working on making a family.
Was it wrong?
I wasn’t blind. I caught the looks, the outright shock when we ran into a few of Aly’s acquaintances who’d somehow missed the gossip and hadn’t heard she was pregnant. The eyes that scoured my skin, then turned back to Aly like she’d lost her mind. But Aly wasn’t ashamed, not for a second, and I knew without a doubt she wanted all of this, too.
She leaned in for a quick kiss, patted me on the chest. “I think you’ve earned yourself a beer.”
“Thank God.”
She grinned, leading me by the hand into the kitchen, where the music wasn’t so loud, where the secrets we whispered didn’t have to be delivered on a shout.
“See, this wasn’t so bad, was it?”
I roughed my hand over my face. “Nah… I love all your friends wondering what the fuck you’re doing with an asshole like me.” Sarcasm dripped from my tongue.
Playfully, Aly smacked me on the arm. “Ha… all those girls were wondering what you were doing with a girl like me. I don’t know how we didn’t slip on all the drool as we made our rounds. I think our announcement broke half the hearts in the room.”
I shook my head, because sometimes my girl was ridiculous. “You are completely blind.”
Soft fingers touched my face. “Twenty-twenty.”
I grabbed those fingers, brushed my lips across the tips. “Love you.”
“Love you back,” she said.
Smiling, she turned away, leaned over to dig into an ice chest, giving me a good look at that sweet little ass.
Not a soul here could blame me.
Aly was just exquisite. Her ass and those legs were wrapped up in a pair of dark jeans. Jeans that were progressively getting tighter by the day, and goddamn, for Aly, pregnancy had managed some really fucking miraculous things.
I didn’t think it was possible for this girl to get any more appealing, but each day, I only wanted her more.
Beer in hand, Aly spun back around. Her brow shot up when she caught my expression.
There was no denying the need stamped plainly on my face.
She sauntered up, pressed the beer into my hand. “Twenty minutes.” She murmured the promise, knowing full well I was about to toss her over my shoulder and drag her the hell out of there.
I twisted the cap, flicked it into the garbage, and took a deep, satisfying pull. Ice-cold liquid took a freezing path down my overheated insides. I smacked my lips as I pulled the bottle away. “Fifteen,” I corrected, cocking my head.
Incredulous, she laughed and shook her head, busying herself by grabbing a bottle of water. “Fine,” she mouthed, passing by me with a wink. At the fringe of the crowd, she spun on her heel. She walked backward to keep an eye on me. “I’m going to find Calista before we go. I haven’t seen her in forever. Can you stay out of trouble for that long?” she challenged, all playful like the tease she was.
She knew I loved it, too, how she got me all hot and bothered by that body. She also knew if I trailed her around this house I’d be pestering her until the moment I talked her out the door.
“I think I can manage.”
Okay, probably not. But Aly wanted to be here, so I’d make do.
Leaning up against the wall, I kept a keen eye on her as she moved about the room, never far enough that she stole her presence from me.
I relaxed into it, into the atmosphere and the beat of the music and the smile on my girl. I nursed my beer. Contentment glided through my veins.
Christopher eventually made his way over. He bumped my fist. “Hey, man, how’s it going?” He’d exchanged his bottle of death for a bottle of beer. “Figured you were standing over here suffering through some sort of mortal pain. You know, having to come out into the real world, and all.”
I sipped at my own. “Nah, I’m good. Think Aly really needed this.”
She stood across the room, talking to a girl I’d never seen before who was about a foot shorter than her with a crop of short brown hair. Aly was showing off her ring. Again.
“Just because my sister’s probably the coolest chick in the world doesn’t mean she doesn’t get off on all this girly shit.”
My gaze locked on her. Like she felt me, Aly turned a fraction, catching my eye. Affection swelled on her face and swam in her eyes, something lush and whole and sweet emanating from her skin.
I rubbed at my chest.
God, this girl made me insane.
A small frown pulled at Christopher’s mouth. “So why didn’t you tell me you had this planned? You could’ve let me know so I didn’t go through all that shit trying to convince you to come tonight.”
I shrugged. “Wanted Aly to be the first to know.”
“I get that, I guess.”
Standing there, Christopher let his gaze wander, appearing all easy and nonchalant. But I felt him twitch. A loose thread of strain trickled from him, and the muscles flexed on his exposed forearms.
“So what’s up with all of this?” he asked out into the room, although he was talking directly to me.
Lines creased my brow, and I looked across at him with a scowl gaining in intensity. “What do you mean?”
He shook his head a little. He blinked, calculating, adding it up. “The house… and now that flashy ring… seems to me like someone is trying to prove something.”
A blink of agitation lifted in me. There was nothing I could do to stop it. I fisted my hand, doing my best not to los
e my shit with my best friend. What the fuck was his problem? Little more than a month ago he was demanding my loyalty, telling me to get my stuff and go if coming back wasn’t permanent, and now I was taking things too far?
“All I’m doing is trying to take care of my girl… to take care of your sister,” I punctuated with a hard emphasis. “Now all of a sudden I’m doing it wrong?”
“Didn’t say that.”
“Then what the fuck are you trying to say?”
His gaze shifted to the statement scored across the knuckles of my left hand.
2006.
He pinned me with sharp, green eyes. “Seems like a hell of a lot of demons chasing you, Jared. You sure you left all of them behind in Vegas?”
Goddamn it. I rubbed my jaw, doing my best not to lose my cool. Aly was always trying to drag this shit out into the open. Couldn’t deal with Christopher doing it, too. “I’m fine.” It grated from my throat.
“You sure?” It wasn’t a question, but an accusation.
A heavy breath shot from my nose. “I’m not trying to prove anything to anyone. I just want to make her happy.”
From across the room, I watched Aly. Her voice was completely washed out by the throb of music and the clamor of the crowd. But on her lips was ease and joy. She stole a furtive glance my way. Her gaze caressed over me. Gentleness danced at one side of that sweet mouth. Peace and a cleansing calm. Like she’d finally caught the breath she’d been dying for when she looked over at me.
I covered all my displeasure with a tender smile.
Christopher scoffed and took a swig of his beer. “Pretty damn obvious you’ve already accomplished that. But what about you? Are you happy?”
“Of course I am.” I said it without hesitation.
“I’m not talking about being happy with Aly. Not talking about the way she makes you feel. I’m talking about my friend who disappeared when he was sixteen because he had his world shattered around him. What about him? You think I don’t know he’s still in there?”
Silence fell between us, amplifying the tension stretching us tight. Suffocating. I swallowed around it and forced the words from my gravelly throat. “You’ve got a lot of fucking nerve to talk, man. Don’t think for a second I don’t know there’s something not right in that warped heart of yours.”
“Yeah.” He didn’t even stop to deny it. “But I’ve got absolutely no one relying on me.” He drained his beer. “Don’t you get it? The way Aly looks at you? That’s a fucking gift, man. No one has looked at me that way in a very long time. That’s what you have to protect. But what scares me is the way you look at her… like you don’t deserve to be in her life but would still do absolutely anything it takes to stay a part of it. That is dangerous.”
Christopher pressed on, plowing right through the dread that built up in the center of my chest. “The house and that ring? All of it is good, Jared. I’m not implying it’s wrong. Not for a second.” He shook his head. “Marriage and a white picket fence… you two should have that. But I’ve known you a long, long time and building up the perfect exterior isn’t going to be enough.”
“Aly will always be enough,” shot from my mouth as my only defense.
Because that’s what she was. My shelter. My balm.
“But will you?” He looked over at me. Dark eyebrows almost touched he had them drawn so tight, concerned lines cutting all over his worried face.
Pretty sure I preferred the asshole over all the psychoanalytical bullshit.
“What do you want me to say, Christopher? I can’t change anything that happened in my past.” All I was doing was trying to build a future.
He blinked like he didn’t know how to break through to me. “You need to stop pretending that past didn’t happen. One of these days you’re going to have to face it.”
Stark images of the family I’d destroyed flashed.
My mother.
My father.
My sister.
Christopher might as well have kicked me in the gut.
A harsh breath rushed from my nose, and I slammed my eyes shut, shoving it all back down, lost to the darkness somewhere deep inside. “Just drop it, Christopher.” My voice was hard. “It’s done. Over. I love her, and that’s all that matters.”
I had to believe that.
Christopher tapped his empty on his thigh. His expression turned grave. “I’m not worried about how much you love my sister, Jared. I’m worried about how much you hate yourself.”
My throat thickened, and I rushed a shaky hand though my hair. Agitation prowled like a beast in the pit of my stomach. I felt caged. Blips of that old rage battled for a resurgence.
Shifting, Christopher blew out a heavy breath. “Sorry, man… You have to know I’m not trying to attack you. I’m just worried. That’s all.” He yanked his fingers through the tousled mess on his head. “Probably could’ve picked a better time and a better place to approach you about this.” Self-contempt flowed from him. “Apparently I’m not so great at keeping my thoughts to myself, especially when it has to do with the people I care about.” Christopher’s regard jumped all over the room, skidding from one indistinct face to the next. “God knows there aren’t many of them,” he said almost too quiet for me to hear.
My attention cut in his direction, trying to make sense of him. Resentment flickered on the outskirts of my consciousness. It struck up a war with the margin of truth he spoke. I got it, knew exactly what he was saying because he was speaking straight to those sins I would never outrun.
But he was wrong when it came to Aly.
She was enough.
When she touched me, all those scars didn’t hurt so bad.
Christopher cracked a smile, the wiseass set firmly back in place. “You should take it as a compliment.”
Interest widened his eyes, his gaze suddenly distracted. It aimed somewhere over my right shoulder. “Oh, you’re going to love this.”
I jerked my attention to where he looked. It landed on Aly, like it was trained to seek her out. Then it wandered to the left.
Possessiveness surged, darkened my sight like the coming storm. My pulse took off at a sprint, pounding blood so hard through my body I could feel it in my ears.
I forced myself to breathe.
Gabe stood in front of her. He dragged his fingers through the flip of brown hair hanging in his pompous face. He smiled like an arrogant jackass when he brushed it back, intruding on the conversation Aly was having with the tiny girl.
That girl hugged Aly quickly and waved a good-bye as she gave up her spot. Dickhead didn’t hesitate to take her place.
His lips moved with unheard words as he edged forward, that cocky smile planted on his face when he pulled her into an overbearing hug. Aly hugged him back, her face disappearing somewhere in his body.
My jaw clenched.
He seemed reluctant to release her, but for his own safety he finally stepped away. Still, he kept hold of her hand, letting their arms swing between them. The same hand wearing my ring.
Dickhead didn’t even notice.
He just stared at my girl, eyes tracing her with hunger, murmuring something I couldn’t hear.
Fuck no.
I was most definitely not okay with this, not okay with him. My leg bounced with the nerves prodding my anxious feet.
“Dude, you should see your face right now.” Christopher’s voice cut into the upheaval brewing up chaos in my mind, the words offhand but his eyes narrowing just as tightly as mine.
Aly nodded, her mouth moving slowly as she answered whatever Dickhead said. I could feel it radiating off Aly, too, this shock of discomfort that had chased away all the ease she’d been wearing before.
I knew he’d texted her, that he’d sought her out in the months I’d been gone. Knew he wanted.
I also knew the asshole had trouble taking no for an answer.
There was no question now he’d ever give up on the fascination.
She ran her free hand tenderly do
wn her stomach. That bright smile again resurfaced on her face. Her shirt hugged the little bump. Aly cradled it, talking while she showed it off.
Then she tugged her hand back, not hard enough that he let go, but enough to draw attention to the ring on her finger.
Blatant shock rocked his expression.
Come to Me Softly Page 24