“Now I want to press you against the wall and fuck you until you scream my name so much, your throat is stripped raw.” My voice is gruff, letting go of my soft edges. I’m all-around hard now.
Hard for her.
Her eyes are swirling with too many emotions. She’s licking her lips and staring at mine. I want to hear her speak. I’m afraid I’ve scared her into silence. But then she looks into my eyes…and slowly, her lips spread into a smirk.
“Then do it,” she whispers.
I lean down and graze my lips against hers, holding onto the last restraint I own. Surprisingly, enough. “No protection. I’m young but not stupid.”
“I’m on the pill,” she answers and latches onto my shoulders.
I open my mouth to say something, but she interrupts.
“Now shut up and kiss me, pre—” she begins to hiss.
I smash my lips into hers, swiveling us around and pressing her into the tile. Our tongues glide and our teeth nibble on our lips. The kiss is filled with zapping passion and hunger. As if we’ve been starved for each other for years and years and are finally getting a taste and we’re obsessed. Needing more and more and—“Fuck,” I groan.
The water feels steamier as I grab her thigh and raise it. She hooks her foot around my lower back and threads her long fingers into my hair. I fist her hair and yank. A loud yelp leaves her mouth, but it smooths into a moan as I kiss her neck. I bite and lick and nip. I kiss up the length of her neck before kissing her mouth, starved for her bewitching taste.
“I. Need. To. Feel. Yo—” she gulps between our feverish kiss.
I silence her with one, swift move. I enter her hard and fast. She sucks in a large breath and shudders with a yelp. I nearly come just being inside of her. She’s tight and warm and—
“Holy shit, Red.” I press into her neck, assaulting her neck with my kisses and teasing bites. It’s taking every fiber in me not to cave into her, to her nails seeping into my hard muscles, to her head ducked in the crook of my neck, licking my skin.
“Fuck, you feel so goood,” she purrs, raking her nails down my back. I hiss and cup under her chin, pushing her head back slightly. I lead my lips down her red, swollen lips to her slender neck. I kiss and suck, hard. And she moans and whispers my name, “Noah, Noah—oh God.”
She feels so god damn unreal, like a fucking dream. I murmur, “Beautiful, so mmm…beautiful,” in her ear before picking up speed, getting deeper. She and I fall into a rhythm of sighing and moaning.
“Mmm—Noah,” she groans and kisses me hard and needy. I give her my all. Our tongues spark heat. Her nails drag against my back, no doubt leaving marks. Her marks. But I don’t give a damn. I’ll wear them with pride. Marks made by My Sexy Red. I drive into her again and again, sucking under her chin. Kissing her mouth. Nose. Forehead. I just need to kiss her. Make sure she’s real. This is real.
“You like the way I feel inside you?” I groan against her ear before nibbling on her earlobe.
“Yes, please.” She gulps for air. “Faster,” she commands around a breathy moan.
“Gladly.” I thrust faster, harder. I feel every single inch of her, and my stomach tightens and whirls. I bring her other leg up and get more leverage, find a treasured spot most don’t find even the first time.
“Oh, fuck!” she cries out loud, unapologetically. She throws her head back, eyes screwed shut in pleasure as I hit that spot of hers again and again and again—on repeat, harder each time. She struggles to breathe, to say anything other than curses and my name. It is the most beautiful sound. She is so sexy. Cheeks flushed, eyes shut, mouth ajar. I look down at her, hardening again and feeling myself go as I admire the marks on her neck.
“Fuck, Red.” I thrust into her as she tightens around me, gasping for air. She presses into me and arches her back. The world tilts, and I slam into her, filling her with my excitement.
“Shit! God damn it, Noah!” she screams, and it echoes off the tiles. She completely obliterates my back with her nails, and it makes me come even harder. I jam into her, sinking my mouth onto hers. I swallow her cries and moans. I groan into her, cursing beneath her tongue.
When we finally calm down, our heavy breathing clashes with the water hitting our bodies. I feel sedated and drunk on a high I don’t think I’ll ever come down from. And then she says something that shatters the silence and freezes my heart.
“I love you,” she whispers.
I smile and take her bruised, puffy lips for a soul-searing kiss. She smiles and wraps her arms around me. The kiss is smooth and gentle but filled with a heavy emotion that overtakes me, consumes me—love.
“I love you, Red. I love you so damn much,” I reply in her open mouth.
I pull back to look into her eyes and find her mouth open with a response, but the shrilling sound of a phone cuts her off. She furrows her brows and pecks my mouth, asking for a moment before she gets out of the shower. I frown, feeling cold without her presence. Moments go by, and my sadness grows into worry.
“Everything all right?” I ask her as I stand under the pounding water.
No response.
I pull the curtain back. “Red?” I ask, but she’s gone.
Chapter Twenty-Six
Red doesn’t answer any of my calls or texts after I find her missing from my condo. Worry and confusion powered through me, consumed me until I could barely sleep last night. I tried my best to will myself not to go there, to the dark place in my mind. The place that was created when she began to disappear from me, in her words: out of guilt for luring me in for that asshole Link’s plan.
That place is seducing my entire mind to think that she’s up to the same, or even worse, shady shit. Trying to ignite panic and get me to break things off. Granted, I am paranoid that she’s involved in a monstrous storm headed my way, but I can’t think that way. Sure, her disappearing is making it hard to focus on anything else, but I just got her back. I won’t let speculation and fear push her away.
I just got her back. And I’ll do just about anything to keep her.
“Heads up, Noah!” A scream jars me from my thoughts.
I catch a football headed my way, and Ty jogs over.
“Sorry, Mike can’t throw for shit.” He takes the ball, and Mike slaps him on the head as he walks over.
“And you can’t catch for shit,” Mike says with a playful eye roll.
I smile wordlessly, preparing to walk away and sulk in thought over my complex girlfriend. Girlfriend. My beautiful, amazing, but terrifyingly confusing Red is my freaking girlfriend. And yet…I feel so distant from her. I want to close that gap and know everything about her, hold her without the chance that she’ll vanish the second I release her.
“Hey, you okay?” Mike grips my shoulder, forehead creasing. There’s a purple bruise under his left eye, and his lip is scabbed over from the party. I still feel like shit, but he’s told me multiple times that he doesn’t want to talk about it.
“Yeah, I’m good. Just a bit distracted,” I half-lie. I’m irrationally hesitant to admit that Red’s acting strange. They’d probably warn me about her, bring up the last time she acted odd. My heart constricts, and I wave the idea away. She wouldn’t do anything as messed up as that. She loves me; I know she does. I’m not some naïve kid who loves a manipulator, not this time…ugh.
“Lying to your friends is not only offensive but one of the Ten Commandments,” Ty says matter-of-factly. He runs his tongue over his cut upper lip, and I slightly wince at his bruised cheeks.
I frown, and my busted lip hurts when I do. “No, it isn’t.”
“Offensive or one of The Big Guy’s big no-no’s?” he questions.
“The rules of the Ten Commandments are things you should do,” Mike informs Ty, whose eyes blow wide open with the correction of something I’m pretty sure he believed all his life.
“That explains a lot…I have a lot of things to repent…” Ty rubs his jaw.
Mike rolls his eyes and looks at me.
“Tell us what’s happening.”
I sigh and cave in. “Red’s gone AWOL again.”
They share a look then look at me with sympathetic expressions.
“Do not tell me that I need to be wary for the next bomb to drop, because she isn’t like that. She never was. She was practically forced into what she did. And that asshole is long gone. He wouldn’t dare show his face,” I rant and gasp for fresh air. I look around aimlessly to calm down and not blow up; everyone’s dressed in shorts and is lounging around since all late classes were over half an hour ago.
“Whoa, calm down, buddy.” Ty chuckles nervously.
“And what asshole?” Mike questions.
“Oh.” I forgot to mention that to them. I don’t know if I should tell them now. But I decide not to; he’s already gone, and there’d be no point. “No one. I just don’t know what to do. She won’t answer any of my calls.”
“Maybe because it makes you come off as a pussy,” Ty jokes, and I sock him in the shoulder. “Ouch! But it’s true…pussy,” he mutters.
My eyes roll, and I sigh.
“Or she had a family emergency,” Mike offers.
“But why wouldn’t she tell me about it?” It’s moments like these where I feel the disconnect and the pain from not being close enough for her to confide in me. What do I have to do or say to get her to open up to me? I thought we left the secrets and BS in the past when we got back together. But I guess not.
“I don’t know,” he says. “Red can be very…complicated.”
You’re telling me…
“Hey!” a small, familiar voice echoes behind me. And when I turn around, I see a blur of brown and trembling lips before I’m tackled with a hug. Rachel.
“Hey, Rach.” I smile and hug her back. I was wondering where she’s been since I didn’t see her after the game. To have her in my arms, safe and sound after the party turned to shit, I feel a sense of relief.
She pulls away and briefly hugs Ty and Mike then comes back to me with widened eyes and flushed cheeks. “I heard what happened at your party. Are you guys all right?” she asks frantically, and when we nod in response, she notes Mike’s flash of anger and breathes, “I’m sorry about what happened. If I was there…”
“You would have settled racism, I’m sure,” Mike jokes in a dark humor, and we all shift, and I rub the back of my neck. “I have to go make up a test for English. You coming? We can grab a burger after—Noah, you down for that?” He looks to me expectantly.
I nod, smiling. “Of course. Text me the details,” I say and watch them walk away then turn my attention to Rachel. She’s nibbling on her lips with crossed arms like she’s trying to dismantle a nuclear bomb. I chuckle nervously. “What?”
“You’re all beaten up.” Her voice is soft.
“Wow, thanks, my ego really needed that.”
“Noah,” she whines, eyes taking in my bruised right eye and busted lip. If only she could see the nasty purple bruise on my rib. But what she does notice are my bandaged hands. “Oh, Jesus.” She sounds like she’s in pain, and I rub her shoulder to comfort her, but it doesn’t seem to be helping any. “I want to kill whoever did this to you.”
“I’m fine, Rach. And it was worth it to stop that asshole from laying a hand on her.”
“Who?”
“Red.”
Something flashes across her eyes, and she hums. “How are things between you two, anyway?”
I shrug and honestly tell her, “Everything was going perfectly, until she ditched me yesterday morning.”
“Ditched? Why?” she questions with a frown.
“I have no idea,” I say.
“I don’t like her,” she says.
“Rach,” I sigh. I’ve always known she didn’t care for Red, but I can’t have her against her when I’m wary myself; she isn’t helping anything.
“I’m sorry, but I don’t. She continues to hurt you again and again, and I’m sick of it. Sick of her. I want to be happy for you, trust me, but it’s hard to be when she continually does stuff like this,” she rants.
I can’t even be upset with her speaking her mind like this. She just cares about me a lot and doesn’t like to see me hurt. But what she doesn’t understand is that I love Red more than I think I humanly should. She does hurt me, but I don’t believe this is one of those times. I know I should be more wary and defensive to protect my heart, but I can’t get past my love for her. And deep down, I know my love for her will be the death of me one day…
I don’t respond to Rachel because I don’t know what to say without remotely proving her right by the shakiness of my voice. So I swallow the words, and she sighs.
“I’m sorry,” she mutters lowly.
“It’s all right.” My voice is shaky, and I try to cover it with a cough.
Her eyes are soft with sympathy as she reaches for one of my bandaged hands, and I let her take it when she says, “I wish she could treat you how you deserve to be treated.”
My heart squeezes in my chest when I smile pathetically and respond. “Me too, Rach. Me too.”
***
The Burger Joint, the name of the diner, is buzzing with activity. Students are lined up at the counter chowing down on greasy burgers and salty fries. My group and I get a booth at the back, where a pretty brunette waitress named Teresa takes our orders. Ty flirts shamelessly on cue, and everyone laughs. I even join them, painfully so, but I do. I need to stop freaking out every time Red isn’t around. She has her own life. Just because we’re together doesn’t mean she can’t go through whatever.
I just wished she’d allow me to go through it with her.
If there is one thing I wish would change, it’s her pushing me away all of the time. Together or not, she does it, and it drives me nuts. I just want to grab her hands, look her in the eyes, and get her to let me in, smash whatever is remaining of the wall I found when we first started, and stop the panic that’s found a home inside of my chest.
I’m chomping on a handful of the delicious fries when Rachel gasps beside me. “What’s wrong? Don’t like your fries? I’ll generously take them from you,” I joke around a mouthful of fried potatoes. I reach for my soda and slurp on it. God, this stuff tastes so good.
“No, it isn’t that,” she says. Her voice is so soft, so…hurt.
“We should come here more often.” I’m so engrossed with picking up my half-eaten burger that I don’t realize how quiet our table is. I lift my eyes—everyone’s staring at something behind us. “What is it, guys?” I laugh nervously, and they quickly dart their eyes toward me, flush, then look around and fumble into a half-assed conversation.
What the hell has them so spooked?
I begin to turn around to see what had their attention like that when Rachel mutters a quick apology and races out of the booth. Her hair whips behind her as she pushes past a group of friends to scold her brother, Ian.
My heart cracks like a china doll hitting the ground. And it isn’t because of him, the guy who is a suspect of putting me in a hospital bed four months ago. It’s the girl who put my heart in a coma.
Red.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Don’t freak out, don’t assume—don’t freaking freak out, Noah.
I have to chant this in my head to not get up and run over there and put him in a freaking hospital bed with a concussion. Even though the reasonable part of me reminds me that the two guys haven’t been identified and probably never will be, he’s with my girlfriend, who has been ignoring me ever since running out on me yesterday. I couldn’t sound any more pathetic.
“You’re going over there?” I hear Mike ask, his voice full of worry.
I look at him and then down—I’m standing, but I don’t remember getting up. I feel like I’m on autopilot mode, unable to deal with the many emotions coursing through my veins. My head feels heavy and is swirling with anger and confusion and worry. I don’t even know how to respond to him without sounding like an idiot.
“Yea
h, I’ll be right back,” I tell him with an unconvincing smile.
“Can you bring back ketchup? Ours is out,” Ty says, and the others shush him. I zone out his rushed apology as I walk over to them in the calmest manner possible. I don’t want to appear like the damn fool I am.
“Red,” I say breathlessly, losing my cool for a short moment. “I didn’t think to find you here. And with him, nonetheless.” I shoot Ian a look, and he gives me a loaded smirk in return. I don’t like the way he’s looking at me or how shocked and guilty she appears.
Oh no, Red…
“Noah,” is all she says.
“What are you doing here with him?” I can’t help the venom that slides between my words. And it swells in my chest when I look over at him; he’s grinning wolfishly, ignoring his sister who is telling him something that gets drowned out by the restaurant’s buzz.
“She was enjoying a lovely meal with me until her purse puppy came waddling over,” he coos in a scrappy voice. It sends chills over my skin and makes it hard to breathe. I want to punch him in his smug face, wipe it away with my fist.
“Shut the hell up, Ian.” Red rolls her eyes. So she can say more than one word to him, but not to me. And why the hell are they looking at each other, saying more of a conversation than she would with me? Did she leave me for him?
The insecurity and doubt that surrounded me like a wet blanket when I first involved myself with her makes an appearance, and I take a staggering step back. What will it take for her to drop her past and truly, honestly accept me as her present and hopeful future? Am I not good enough for her or something? I hate that I sound like an insecure schoolgirl, but she makes me think this way. Makes me feel not enough, and I hate this feeling, hate it so fucking much, I just turn away and rush out of the chaotic restaurant.
I ignore my friends calling after me, rip my hand away from Rachel’s desperate hands, and storm to my car. I don’t know what it is with her that makes me break down so easily. I have ignored all the warning signs and the unsurmountable pain she brought me after she played me, and yet here I am, crying over her because she keeps fucking up—fucking with my heart. I will not have it again. Not anymore.
Red: Fiery Finale (Spectrum Series Book 8) Page 18