“She did?”
“Yeah. At least we think it was him. He called her a slut and told her he was watching her.”
“Watching her? How?”
“Don’t know. I don’t think he really is. I think him calling yesterday and saying she was a slut after we’d been kissing on the beach is nothing more than coincidence. I think he’s just trying to harass her.”
“Slime-bag has nothing better to do.”
“I called Doc this morning and asked him to check to see if the jerk was still around up there, just to ease Gabrielle’s mind. I haven’t heard back yet.”
“Did you call Derrick?”
“Yeah. He said he hadn’t seen him, but it’s only been a day. He told me he’d give me a call if the asswipe showed up in the bar.”
“Did he mention how Rufus was?”
“Yeah, and I asked too. He said he was moping around like he’d lost his best friend.”
“Ha. Well, what else is new? Rufus is always like that.”
“That he is.”
After the run on the beach, I felt a little of the stress I’d been harboring flow from my shoulders. Holding Gabrielle throughout the night was the most wonderful thing in the world, but sleeping was not easy to do with her luscious body so close to mine. I’d lain awake most of the night, my arm draped around her midsection, dreaming about what her skin felt like underneath the thin cotton tank top she wore.
Practice with the band went fairly smooth considering the nervous anxiety we all felt. We all knew what this gig meant. If they liked us, we’d get more chances to perform down here. Playing in a small town where we lived didn’t get much exposure. We were lucky that event planner, Piper Smith, had ventured into our bar that night a few weeks ago when we’d just happened to have the best night in a long time. Excitement was in the air, as we were all hoping to meet the infamous Gerard Butler.
Nerves rattled, but we all managed to hold it together when he greeted us at the door. He even helped us set up. Nobody, not even Lena had any trouble singing with him, and it was amazing how relaxed he made us all feel. He sang a few songs with us, then excused himself and re-joined his party.
The next day, I received a call from Doc. He told me that he’d run into Jeff at CVS that morning. The guy’d had a black eye and seemed to go out of his way to avoid letting Doc notice him. Every time Doc strolled down an aisle Jeff was in, Jeff would nonchalantly turn as though he didn’t see him and leave the aisle. He finally caught up with him at the register. He asked him what had happened to his eye, but Jeff waved it off with a laugh and told him he’d been wrestling with his dog and the big lug’s head caught him in the eye. Doc admitted it was a good and believable story considering the dog was right outside the store’s sliding doors waiting for him. A big dog too, maybe a Great Dane, Doc had only been guessing on the breed since he didn’t know much about dogs. Knowing Jeff was still up in Turtle Lake gave Gabrielle a little reprieve. I had to wonder why Jeff had even bothered to call and harass her in the first place. Was he still pissed off that she’d fought him and tried to get him convicted for assault and attempted rape? She’d had every right, but she hadn’t gotten full satisfaction of having him put in jail thanks to the little filly that’d lied for him.
Chapter 36
Gabrielle
I opened my eyes to see telephone pole after telephone pole whiz by the window in the passenger seat of the SUV. The view outside as we headed north consisted mostly of farmland with a few mountains in the distance. Not great for sightseeing. Glancing at the time on the dashboard, I realized I’d been sleeping for three hours. We’d spent an extra day in Malibu taking in some of the sights. We’d partied in downtown Santa Monica, visiting several bars. Brodie and Jackson said they wanted to check some of them out, just to see what they had going on. “For ideas,” Brodie said, but we all knew it was more for just having a good time.
We pulled into the driveway a little after nine in the evening. Jackson and Lena dropped us off, and we dragged our bags and our tired, limp bodies into the house. I was glad to be home. I loved the beach, I missed the beach, but nothing beat the feel and smell of your own bed. I stood in my bedroom, my bags in my hands and stared at the bed. Would Brodie join me in it? Or would I join him in his? Maybe neither. For the past three nights Brodie and I had shared a bed. That’s all we’d shared, well, except for a lot of really hot kisses. But Brodie’d never made any move to go any further than kissing. I sort of wanted to change that.
You’re a slut after all.
The words reverberated in my mind over and over until I couldn’t see anything except Jeff’s mocking face laughing and his finger pointing accusingly at me. A loud bang startled me, and I realized the noise was the bags hitting the floor after I’d unconsciously let them slip from my grasp.
How had Jeff known that Brodie and I had been kissing?
Brodie came up behind me, wrapping his arms around my waist. “Hey,” he whispered in my ear. “How are you?”
I turned to face him and put my arms around his middle, linking my hands behind him, mimicking him. “I’m okay,” I lied.
He glanced at my bed. “You sure about that?”
“Yes.”
He nodded. “I’m tired. How about you?”
“Yeah, me too. Long drive.” Say you’ll stay, the little voice in my head begged. I knew I had no right to think that what happened in Malibu would have any bearing on our living situation here, but I had high hopes.
“Yeah. I guess I’ll call it a night. I have some stuff to do in the morning. I need to get to the bar and make sure everything ran smoothly while we were away,” Brodie said, and my hopes of having another bliss filled sleep were shattered as sharply as a pane of glass hit by a hammer.
I didn’t think I could stand being alone with my own thoughts tormenting me, but I didn’t want to appear as needy or desperate as I felt, so I nodded in agreement. “Yeah. I have some stuff to do too.” At the moment though, I couldn’t think what any of them were. Regardless of the fear of the phone call, all I could think about was Brodie pulling my top off or yanking my shorts down and his big, strong hands voraciously roaming over my body. I’d never thought of myself as a slut, particularly since I’d really never officially been with anyone. Officially.
It’s funny. When Brodie and I were in Malibu and sort of forced into sharing a bed, those thoughts hadn’t really entered my mind. I mean, I thought about doing more than just kissing, but this sudden burst of lust seemed to come out of nowhere. It was almost as if my bed was telling me to jump into it and bring Brodie with me. I wanted to squelch the stupid voice in my head that kept telling me I was a slut. Was I a slut because I liked Brodie? Because I wanted his hands on me? I shook the thought away, reminding myself how the claim was unjustified and most likely prompted by jealousy given the source.
Brodie kissed me on the forehead, released his hold on me and turned to leave the room but stopped in the middle of the doorway. He stood there for a few seconds facing the hallway, his hand propped up on the wood jamb and his head lowered. I stood rigid as a pole, my feet planted in-between my suitcases, afraid to take a breath, watching him, waiting for him to leave.
He didn’t leave. Instead, he turned around, pulled me against him, and with great precision, planted his lips on mine, wrapping one arm around my waist, tangling the other in the long strands of my hair that hung loosely down my back. He tugged at it slightly. And I liked it. I moaned into his mouth as the kiss intensified and grew urgent. My body involuntarily arched into him, aching with desire for him, and I lifted my right leg, wrapping it around both of his. He let go of my hair and grabbed my leg, hoisting me up, and all I could do was hang on and wrap my other leg around him too.
He stepped closer to the bed and slowly lowered me onto it, positioning his body so he hovered a few inches above me, his hands on either side of my head. He swiped a stray strand of hair from my cheek then kissed me again. The way his tongue explored my mouth was so p
assionate and urgent. He hadn’t kissed me this way before. I wanted to be touched. I wanted to feel. I needed to know what it was like to feel this way when I actually wanted it to happen.
His tongue glided down my neck from the bottom of my ear. I shivered at the sensation. I ached for him to touch me. To touch me in places I’d never been touched before, but at the same time I was scared. Would he be able to tell? What if I sank back into that place I’d gone before?
I must have closed my eyes at some point.
“Gabrielle, open your eyes,” Brodie whispered softly against my neck.
I did, amazed at the intense pressure my eyelids had held against my sockets. I must have been squeezing my eyes shut. When I opened them, I realized I had my arms crossed tightly over my chest. I looked up to see Brodie’s beautiful green eyes, the green so light they looked almost silver. “Don’t,” he whispered, placing his hand on my wrist he unlocked my hands, pulling my arms away from my chest. “I won’t do anything you don’t want me to do.”
“I …” I swallowed the bit of saliva accumulating on my tongue. “That’s not why I …” I couldn’t get the words out. It seemed I was incapable of processing my thoughts into coherent words. I didn’t want him to think I didn’t want him to touch me. I wanted that more than anything else at that moment, but my arms went there by themselves. I wanted to tell him that.
“You’re beautiful.” The two words flowed from his lips like honey, smooth, sweet, making me see myself in a different light. I didn’t know what to say to that, but he didn’t really give me a chance since his tongue was back mingling with mine.
He moved his mouth from mine and skimmed his tongue down my chin to the front of my neck. I thought he would stop there, but he kept going. The blouse I wore left most of my upper chest bare, the material stopping right at the top of my cleavage and that’s exactly where his tongue licked and tickled. He pressed little kisses there and I shivered at the sensation.
Without much warning, Brodie moved off of me and sprawled out next to me on the bed. His head propped up on his elbow, he stared at me. “What’s wrong?”
It took me a minute to comprehend what he’d asked because I didn’t think anything could possibly be wrong. I must have frowned, because he traced his finger down my forehead where I knew those lines showed up whenever I did. I managed a slight shake of my head.
“Something’s wrong,” he said.
When I didn’t say anything, he added, “I want to tell you something.”
“Okay.”
He continued to trace parts of my body. He’d finished with my face, tracing down my cheeks, now he was on my neck. The touch so faint I hardly knew he was doing it. “I like you.”
I smiled and started to say I liked him too, but he shushed me with his finger on my lips when I opened my mouth.
“I like you a lot, Gabrielle. A whole lot. You know … I’m usually hopping into someone’s bed most every night. Someone new almost every time. Before you came here, I did that, but I haven’t been with anyone since you arrived. Not for lack of prospects, there were plenty, but mostly because I didn’t want to. None of those women could ever begin to interest me the way you do. None of them gave me that sense of worth that you make me feel.
“I’ve gone without sex, which everyone is astounded by, even me, but I’ve done that because I want to be with you. I can’t get you out of my head. Other women are meaningless and transparent compared to you. But, I want you to know I’ll go even longer if I have to. I mean, Jesus, Gabrielle, I don’t even know how you feel about me. I do know that when I kiss you, my entire world stops. My head buzzes and my body goes into overdrive, making me dizzy. Just like with a car, my body goes into high gear to maintain the speed my heart is pumping because of the way I feel about you.”
That statement made me grin. Leave it to a guy to explain the way his heart worked using the mechanics of a car.
“What I’m getting at, is, I know you must’ve had something horrible happen to you in the past.”
I started to protest. I did not want to go there.
“Shhhh, shhhh, I know something happened. And I know it’s affected you, the way you react to me sometimes. You know you can trust me, Gabrielle. There is nothing in this world that you could have done or have had done to you that would ever make me lose respect for you or change the way I feel about you. I want you to feel comfortable enough with me to tell me.”
I shook my head. “No. You’re wrong.”
He sighed and closed his eyes briefly. When he reopened them, he said, “I have another thing I want to tell you.” I watched the Adam’s apple in his throat move as he swallowed. “Beth didn’t just kill our baby. She also killed herself. She killed herself because she couldn’t forgive herself for what she’d done.”
I sat up. “Oh, Brodie, I’m so sorry.”
“It’s okay.” He gently pushed me back down. “It’s done and in the past. It took me a couple of years to realize that it wasn’t my fault. I’d hated her for killing our baby. I even told her that. I always thought she killed herself because of what I’d said, but after talking with her sister, I realized she was troubled about a lot of things. Things I could never have known about. Things she never told me. She’d witnessed her little brother’s kidnapping and couldn’t do anything about it. A man had come out of nowhere while she and he had been on a hike through the woods. The guy snatched her brother up right off the trail. She ran after him, but the man ran too fast for her to catch up. They’d found her brother’s body two weeks later, two miles down the trail from where he’d been abducted. She’d been the one who’d coaxed him into going for the hike and she felt responsible. She’d been eight years old and her brother six. Her sister thought I should know that it wasn’t just the baby. Her sister told me that Beth didn’t want to bring a baby into a world where such horrible things could happen, but then after she had gotten rid of it, she couldn’t accept the fact that she had. There was more to her troubles, but this isn’t the time or place to go into them.”
I didn’t know what to say to him. The lump in my throat prevented me from speaking. The story about Beth was so tragic, my heart broke for him.
“Anyway, after she died, I decided that relationships were not for me and that I might as well enjoy women for the only thing I thought they were capable of giving me. Sex. Uncommitted, unadulterated sex. I’d shut myself off from all emotions regarding women.
“You can’t blame yourself for what happened to Beth.”
“I know that. I don’t blame myself anymore. I stopped blaming myself a long time ago, but I still continued to use women and they used me. I thought it was a beautiful way of life, and it worked out just fine. Until you came along.”
He kissed me then, softly, tenderly.
“I don’t want to have sex with you, Gabrielle.”
I frowned, I think, and I felt like my whole world just came crashing down on me. I wanted to ask why, but he shook his head like he wasn’t finished.
He kissed the spot below my earlobe. Then spoke in a very hushed, soft tone very close to my ear. His breath was warm and sweet, giving me an intoxicating sensation. “I don’t want to have sex with you. I want to make love to you.”
My breath caught in my throat as my lips formed a small “Oh.” I was unable to utter a sound as the brief feeling of rejection melted away and my stomach fluttered at the sensual way he spoke to me.
I couldn’t move as he trailed little kisses down the front of my chest. He lifted my shirt and kissed my stomach, starting from the top of my shorts and going all the way up to the bottom of my bra.
“I won’t go any further than this if you don’t want me to,” he said, returning his lips to the spot on my tummy that seemed lost and lonely during the few seconds his lips had left it.
“I want you to.” My huffed voice barely able to speak.
“You want me to what?” he asked in-between the kisses.
I licked my lips and closed my eyes.
“Gabrielle, I need you to say it.”
“Make love to me, Brodie.”
Chapter 37
Brodie
God, those five little words stiffened my cock to a degree I didn’t think possible. Hearing her tell me to make love to her made me realize how much I’d been in love with her all along. The sensation of her body underneath mine and the way she shivered when I spoke seemed very erotic to me. I’d never taken this much care with a woman before. I needed her to know I wasn’t just having sex with her. If things worked out between us, which I’d do my damnedest to make sure of, I doubted I’d ever just have sex again. It would always be love-making with Gabrielle.
I took the liberty of kissing her thighs, caressing her soft skin, taking in the sweet exotic scent of jasmine and vanilla she always wore. A scent that drove me crazy.
I loved how her breath hitched when I told her I wanted to make love to her. Her entire body quivered. I wanted her to know that I didn’t want to treat her like all the other women I’d been with.
I inched her shirt up, revealing perfect breasts begging to be released from the black lace bra she wore. I glanced at her to make sure she was okay. “Can I take this off?”
She nodded and I pulled the tank up over her head. Her hair caught in the folds and she winced a little, but I managed to get them free. “Sorry.”
She placed her arms over her chest again and I slowly removed them. Something triggered a thought in the back of my mind. A conversation we’d had weeks ago on the way to town, and I had to know. “Gabrielle, are you a virgin?”
A tear dripped down her check and I was sorry I’d asked, realizing I could have just waited and found out. The last thing I wanted to do was spoil the moment, but she nodded. I don’t know why, but the idea of her never having been with anyone before me filled me with joy. “I’ll try and be gentle, I promise.”
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