“Everything was so messed up,” he answered as he ran both hands through his hair. “I don’t even know where to start.”
“The beginning,” I implored, placing my hand on his knee. “Just start at the beginning.”
“Ok. The beginning. Well, let’s see. It was your birthday. We went to the carnival and then spent the night in the bed of my pick up,” he said looking right at me. “Best day of my life. Hell, best thing that ever happened to me,” he added. I could see the truth in his eyes and I felt a piece of my heart fall back into place. “You left the same day to go to that special needs camp to be a counselor. At first everything was fine. Boring, but fine. I met up with the guys for summer practices. We hung out after, chilled, drank, whatever. You and I talked every night, and the first two weeks were hard, but not unbearable.”
I nodded, needing to hear what came next. His expression slowly turned deadly as he began the next part. “It was storming one afternoon so practice ended early. I had nothing else to do so I headed home. Dad’s truck was in the driveway, which was weird, but I remember thinking he must have finished his route early. He was probably watching some damn John Wayne western or really bad ad-lib kung fu movie. I walked in the front door,” he paused as he ran his hands through his hair again. He looked directly into my eyes when he finished with, “to find him fucking your mother doggy style.”
“Oh. My. God.” I tried to think of something else to say, but my brain literally stopped working as I just stared at him with my mouth gapping open in shock.
“He didn’t hear me, so I got the jump on him when I pulled him off and started to beat the shit out of him. Your mom tried to stop me and couldn’t. She was all strung out and looked even skinnier than normal.” He snorted. “Probably because you weren’t there to cook for her. She was such a bitch.”
“Cage,” I uttered, not sure what else to say. He shrugged me off as he continued.
“So she ended up calling the cops. They hauled me down to the station. My mom was beside herself when she came to get me and found out why I was there. She moved out that night into that shitty motel at the end of town while I sat in jail and fumed. My father’s lawyer convinced them I was a flight risk and they would not allow bail. Your mom completely disappeared. So in the end it was my word against my father’s. He claimed he was just talking with your mom and I went ape shit crazy for no reason. I gave my side, and the judge took a middle of the road approach. He put me on probation, but with a restraining order that kept me away from my dad, our houses, his work, church; pretty much anywhere he went I was not allowed even close. I was really only allowed to go to school and the motel. My mother lost her job because of me. It was a mess.”
“It sounds insane. Why didn’t you call me, tell me? I still called every night to no answer.” I would have left camp to be there for him.
“How? You called me. I didn’t know how to reach you. Your mom was gone. I was forbidden to go to my house. I even snuck into my dad’s one night to try and catch your call, but he came home and caught me. He called the cops and they took me back to the motel with a stern warning of jail time if I did it again. I was beside myself. I was going fucking crazy without you.” Cage got up and started pacing back and forth. He ran his hands through his hair again and again. The torment he experienced, still felt, was evident in his eyes, his movements.
“I hated myself. My father. Your mother. Hell I blamed everyone, including my own mother. I used to yell at her that if she would have pleased my father he never would have had sex with your slut of a mother. Then my father started really fucking with me. He would come to the motel with other women for mom and me to see. He would wait after practice for me and say how the apple could not fall far from the tree with you. He said you would call and talk to him. He even implied you two had phone sex. When I beat him up for the second time, my mother moved us to California to live with her sister. The judge pretty much said I was never welcomed back.”
I wiped away the tears, but they continued to flow as Cage told more of his story.
“When I got to Cali, I hated everything, everyone. But I didn’t give up on you. I even called school a few times that fall, but the principle never let my calls go through to you. I tried leaving messages with my coach and teammates, but they just went unanswered.”
“I didn’t know. No one ever told me,” I sobbed.
He looked at me. At seeing my tears, he crumbled to the ground. Racing to him, I put my arms around him as he rocked back and forth.
“I had no way of telling you.” Each word timed with his body rocking. He kept repeating himself as his rocking intensified.
“Shhhh, it’s ok,” I promised. “I got you.”
Cage
“Charlie,” I murmured, burying my nose in the crook of her neck. Everything I ever needed to say had spilled out, but I knew I was not done. I had to finish, to get it all out. Nothing could stop the dam once it opened.
“I came to hate myself.” I felt her surprised intake of breath, but her arms never wavered as she held me. “My head was so fucked up. I blamed everyone and everything. I quit football, started smoking weed. I was a mean son-of-a-bitch. I got a fake ID my senior year in high school and started hanging out at a hole in the wall place. I was sitting at the bar when this Irish piece of shit started arguing with the bartender, who was also the owner. The band wanted to be paid for past performances, but the owner wouldn’t because their lead singer was too fucked up to sing that night. Locke caught me staring at the exchange and tried to start shit with me. When I gave it right back to him, he offered me the gig for the night, and well the rest is history.” I sat back so that I could look at her, knowing the next part was the most crucial.
“Locke, Linc, and Shutter introduced me to a lifestyle I never knew was out there. The bigger we got the better the drugs, the prettier the girls, the more lavish the set-up. By the time I took my first trip back to find you, you were gone. Both of our houses were boarded up. When I asked around they said you went to some college in California. Imagine my surprise and heart ache knowing you were so close and I never knew. But you had to know. You had to know about the band, my fame. It would have been so easy to find out I was living in Southern Cali. You went to USC for God’s sake.”
“I know,” she replied. “But things weren’t good on my end either Cage. I came home to two empty houses when camp was over. My mom came home about a week later with the scariest boyfriend yet. Home life was bad before, but this guy was a walking, talking nightmare. There were a few that hit me, a couple that tried to touch me, but nothing bad really ever happened. I either ran to my room or to you and I was always fine. But this guy wanted me from the moment he saw me.” My breathing picked up the more she talked. I could feel my face getting red with rage, but it was her time to get the whole story out so I held my tongue as she continued.
“He kept my mother under the influence to keep her out of his way. I had nowhere to go, no one to help me. I fought him off at every turn, until one night he got so drunk he beat me. My mother came to long enough to call the cops. The state got involved. But I was lucky.” Lucky? How could she say she was lucky?
“My day nurse as I recovered was Nate’s mom. She took me under her wing, and brought me home with her when I got released. I finished my last two years of high school at Prep with Nate. He became my big brother and protector even though he was only a month older.”
“Baby, I am so sorry.” I scooped her up and carried her to the overstuffed leather couch and sat down, pulling her down to sit on my lap. I buried my nose into her hair and took a deep breath.
“You always smell so good. Still wearing Happy?” I felt her nod.
“I could never part with it even when I hated you for being with all those women in the tabloids.”
“I came to hate you too.” She gasped in surprise, but I kept her glued to me. “That was when the drugs went from green to white and eventually from recreational to a lifeline. But in the end
I knew I didn’t hate you. I still loved you so much. I did it at first because it made me happy and I got a break from having you on mind. Then I did it to forget what I did when I was on it, because it was never pretty. Then I did it to so I stopped hating myself. The music awards was my lowest.”
Nothing was said for some time as we sat holding one another. Lifting her head from my chest with wet eyes, Charlie softly said, “I was at the rehab facility.”
“I thought it was a dream,” I replied, in awe of the woman before. There she was being strong for someone else in her life. Who was ever strong for her? “I am so sorry you had to see me like that.”
“I’m not.” Charlie did not even hesitate. God, I love you! I felt that realization from the tips of my blue hair to the very soles of my feet. I loved the very essence of this person, from the girl she once was to the woman she had become. “Locke called me,” she said, interrupting my thoughts. “The doctor said your depression was getting worse and they were afraid you would check out like you had done before. So Locke thought since our seeing each other pushed you into rehab, that maybe me being there would keep you there. But God, you were so skinny. So sick.” Fresh tears sprang to her eyes as her hands cradled my face.
“I had dreamt of you so much those first few days, that I could not tell what was real and what was a dream. It felt like an angel was by my side. How long did you stay?”
“Just one day. When the worst was over and you started to come around I left because I did not want to send you back to that dark place you made it out of. I wanted you to get better,” she whimpered.
“I am better now.” She nodded, but the tears did not stop. “I promise. And if you give me more time I can make us better,” I whispered leaning in, pressing my lips to hers. “Charlie? Tell me I can make us better. Starting. Right. Now.”
CHAPTER NINE
Charlie
Could he make us better? Did I even want that anymore? I came with him today to get the answers to the questions that had plagued me for ten years. Now that I had them, what next? My heart finally felt like it was on the mend. Until now, I never realized how caged in I was; helpless to move forward and powerless to change the past. But today changed all that. I knew I had the closure I needed to move on. But did I want to? Did I want to ignore what I saw in his eyes when he looked at me? Could those feelings transcend the pain of young love and grow into what we both needed to be whole?
I took a deep breath, smelling Cage and all his masculine glory that surrounded me. Did the new beginning I wanted so badly begin in Cage’s arms? Was he the man to be at my side or was he the boy I should leave behind as I took my next steps?
“I don’t know,” I answered honestly.
“Just give me a chance to prove I am who you need. I can be that man. Hell, I am that man. I just need to show you.”
“Cage . . .” His lips crashed into mine silencing my protest and my mind as I gave myself over to the kiss.
“Charlie.” His whispered words danced across my lips, as his tongue traced the seam of them. “Please.” That one word had me granting him entrance as he took the kiss from gentle to ravishing in a matter of moments. Deeper and deeper he dove, stealing my breath and my sanity as my need for him grew. My core throbbed with each swipe of his tongue. I clenched my legs together trying to soothe the ache he was building at a crescendo so intense I knew I would never be the same after. He repeated my name as I broke the kiss and stood up. “I want you so bad,” he murmured, taking my hand and rubbing it against the growing bulge in his pants. Cage lifted his hips as he continued to push my hand against him. “Yes,” he hissed through his teeth, picking up speed.
The need to take him in my mouth, to see he if still tasted the same overrode any self-preservation instinct I might have had. My other hand made quick work of his jeans as the quiet of the room was filled with his rapid breathing and the sound of his zipper. Not wasting any time, he stood letting his jeans pool at his feet, showing off his commando preference. So fucking hot! His rock hard cock jutted out from his body as if it were a heat seeking missile and I was its red hot target.
“Oh baby,” he moaned as I pumped once, twice. Cage threw his hips into it, extending my hold on him. His desperation for me making me breathless. I needed to slow myself down or I was going to cum from the sheer pleasure he was receiving from my touch. “Don’t stop,” he gritted out as he pumped his hips again as I held on tight. I took a deep breath to try and calm myself, but his masculine scent bombarded me, only intensifying my desire for this man. Running the palm of my hand up his shaft to his engorged tip, I moaned as the feel of silky smooth flesh over steel made me wetter than I could ever remember being. His hands came to cup my breasts as one of mine slid down my stomach and under my panties to my swollen core. “That’s so fucking sexy. Keep touching yourself,” he encouraged, as his precum beaded. My tongue darted, eager to taste him.
“YYYUUUMMM.” His salty essence exploded across my tongue. Not able to wait a moment longer I took him into my mouth ever-so-slowly, wetting each inch of him a little at a time. My fingers mimicked what I wanted his cock to do as I slowly slid them into me until they were coated in my juices. I hummed in satisfaction as he howled in frustration at my lack of movement. His control was slipping and I would do anything for him to lose that last shred, as long as it was with ME, on ME, in ME. I did not care as long as it was ME that he lost it on it and not drugs, or other women. JUST ME.
“Please baby,” he begged. Cage’s whole body, which mirrored my own, was strung so tight. One heartbeat, then another before I hollowed my cheeks, easing his cock out of my mouth before taking him to the back of my throat once more. On and on I moved at this slow pace as his hips matched each hollowed pull and my fingers mirrored every one of his thrusts. Cage’s growls grew in frequency when I continued to draw out both of our pleasure, until it became too much for him and the beast he was trying so hard to keep caged in came roaring out to play.
Cage
“Please baby.” Charlie’s playtime was about to be over if she did not pick up the pace. I wanted to give her time to explore, but this slow and steady was torture. The control I prided myself on since rehab was being laid to waste by this stunning woman kneeling in worship at my feet. Each slide of my cock across Charlie’s tongue and slip of her fingers out of her wet pussy had another thread of that control tearing under the weight of what we were about to do together.
I moved my hands from her breasts to her hair, tugging on it until her gorgeous eyes cleared of their lust and she focused on me. Her hollowed cheeks continued to work me as grunts and growls fell from my lips. Almost as if that beast I sang about truly was roaring to get out. But instead of my walls breaking, I let them crumble as everything I kept bottled up came pouring out. I let Charlie see everything I had in me. Not holding anything back I gave her all the frustration, self-hatred, and pain, knowing she would dismiss them without a second thought. A shadow of fear skated across her green-as-grass eyes before she shook it clear, and all the emotion I knew she felt for me came shining through. In that moment, I knew I was forever lost to this woman. No matter what happened after this, there would be no others.
Needing to be in her like I needed my next breath, I abruptly pulled Charlie into my arms. Stepping out of my jeans, I made quick work of her cut-off jean shorts and tank top. The sight before me made my heart thump wildly as I took in her matching fluorescent, pink, barely there, lacy bra and g-string. My cock hardened to the point of pain. Cupping her breast, I stepped closer as I took one lace-cladded nipple into my mouth. The rough material tortured us both as I worked my tongue around and around until a stiff peak poked through.
“Cage.” My name on her red, swollen lips was something I never thought I would hear again. Our lips met in a flash of teeth and tongue as our need for each other turned savage. Her bra and g-string did not last long as I ripped them from her body, leaving her completely bare before me. Any thought of gentle was replaced with a v
icious demand that I take her strong and hard.
Turning her around, I got the first view of the sexiest back I had ever seen. Sharp shoulder blades bled into a long, narrow waist that ended at two deep dimples right above her glorious ass. I ran my hands up along her ribs to her shoulders and then back down her spine, following every contour and curve, memorizing them. Charlie arched into my touch, like a pussy cat begging to be touched. “So fucking sexy,” I murmured, placing kisses across her shoulders and then up her neck. Palming her ass, I worked my hands up her back massaging every inch. A contented sigh or small moan came from Charlie with each stroke until my hands rested where I started. Applying the slightest bit of pressure, I pushed Charlie face first into the couch as I spread her feet apart.
As she obeyed, I got the first view of my tattoo on her lower back. “When did you get this?” I asked in shock, running my fingers over the same symbol that lay over my heart. The very same symbol that I had drawn on her back whenever she let my hands on her soft skin, whether we were in public or having a private moment.
“On my eighteenth birthday,” answered Charlie as she peered up at me over her shoulder. A hint of nervousness showed when she bit into her bottom lip, driving me over the edge. An urgency to make this woman bent over, ass up before me MINE took over as she pushed her butt against me, willing me with her eyes to take her. My cock came to rest between her folds as she slowly worked me back and forth, covering me in her slickness. I pumped my hips in response, eliciting a moan from her.
“I want this . . . you so bad.” My voice deep from the lust this woman brought out in me. No amount of dreaming could prepare me for the warmth that greeted my rock hard cock as I pushed into her. Inch-by-inch her walls stretched around me as her heat seared me. “Oh baby,” I groaned as her hips rolled allowing me deeper access. My body took over as pure bliss clouded my mind. In and out, in and out I pumped my cock into her building to a steady rhythm. When I felt her pussy begin to tighten around me, I slid my hand around to her front, finding her clit. Rolling it in between my thumb and index finger had Charlie screaming her release. Stars danced across my vision as her pussy became a vice on my cock. I felt the first stirrings of my orgasm at the base of my cock, sending me into a frenzy as I rammed in her over and over again. Sounds of wet flesh echoed in the room as moans of ecstasy filled the space between us. Her greedy pussy sucked me so deep that my balls slapped against her clit with each thrust. My name was on repeat from Charlie’s sweet mouth as I exploded into her, sending her over the edge once more.
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