Carly had been quiet since she’d woken up. We had both been a little hungover after the night with wine and friends, and I had assumed it was about that. The drive to the airport had been strained, and on the plane, Carly had put on earphones.
I knew her well enough to know that her silence meant something was wrong. When she was in a good space, she was talkative, her eyes sparkled, and her face lit up. Now, she was dulled and quiet.
I had hoped she would be on the same high as I was. Everything had gone well this weekend. There was no reason for her to be down, was there? Even the bad publicity had blown over, replaced by the success of the charity event.
“What’s wrong?” I asked.
She turned her head to me, her blue eyes glistening. “I’m okay,” she said.
“That wasn’t very convincing,” I said. “Are you sure?”
She nodded, but as she looked at me, her eyes welled with tears. Carly was crying. I couldn’t remember when last, I had seen her cry. Carly was the type of person that hid her emotions when they were serious. If she was at the point where she couldn’t hold her tears back, something was clearly wrong. And here, I had been thinking that everything was fine.
“Sweetheart, what is it?”
Carly shook her head furiously and wiped at her eyes, not bothering about her makeup. “I’m fine, really,” she said.
“You’re not fine. You’re crying. Talk to me.”
When Carly wouldn’t answer me, turning her face back to the window instead, I checked my blind spot and pulled over onto the shoulder of the road. I switched on my hazards, switched off the car, and turned to her.
“Come on, princess. Talk to me. I hate it when you cry. Let’s find a way to fix this, whatever’s bothering you.”
Carly took a deep breath and let it out in a shudder. “I think I’m in love with you,” she said.
I raised my eyebrows. “Is that why you’re crying?”
“No,” Carly said. “Or rather, it is.”
I shook my head, confused. “I don’t understand.”
Carly took another deep, shuddering breath. “What I’m trying to say is that I’m in love with you, and that makes everything more complicated. If I didn’t love you, I wouldn’t be scared to lose you.”
Her confession of love made me feel warm inside, but it was overshadowed by her tears, and I couldn’t quite understand the reason she was crying.
“You know you won’t lose me,” I said. I was planning on holding onto her as tightly as I could, as tightly as she’d let me. “What makes you think you will?”
“Because you’re in Miami, and I’m all the way over here in Fort Collins. Or at least, I will be when I start studying again. If I can find the money to study again now that my dad has cut me off. I thought about staying with you out there, if that happens, but really I should do what I can and work more jobs to try to graduate— I’m so close. What if you find someone else? We don’t exactly have the best track record of staying together.”
I shook my head. “First of all, the reason why we don’t have the best track record is that I was an idiot. I didn’t fight for you when I should have, and I have six years of regrets to pay for that.”
She wanted to interrupt me, but I lifted my hand to silence her. I wasn’t done.
“Secondly, I don’t care how far apart we are, we can make this work. I’ll pay for the rest of your studies and then when you’re done you can join me. Which brings me to my third point; there is no way in hell I will ever find someone else.”
“You say that now,” Carly said. “But there are models and actresses and a million-other woman interested in you. You can have anyone that you want. Why would you choose me?”
She didn’t understand what I was trying to say to her. I wasn’t being very eloquent about it. Her tears had made me flustered. But I was shocked that she thought I would want anyone else at all.
Of course, we had spent six years apart, and one of the reasons was because I had been a coward. I hadn’t fought hard enough to get her back. It hadn’t been wrong not to stand up to her father that day— I had just been a teenager— but there had been many times since then that I could have made it right. I hadn’t done that, and I was wrong for it. I understood why she would think I wouldn’t fight for her again, but this time, everything was different. I was a different person, and I knew exactly what I wanted.
And what I wanted was Carly.
“There will never be anyone else,” I said again.
“You can’t know that,” Carly retorted.
“Yes, I can. I know there will never be anyone else because there hasn’t been. None of the women I met in the past six years came close to you. They never have. You’re the only girl I’ve dated, princess.”
Carly shook her head, and she didn’t look like she believed me. I wasn’t happy about it, but there was nothing I could do, other than try and convince her.
“That doesn’t make sense,” Carly said.
“You don’t seem to understand how amazing you are, or how much you mean to me. You’re the only woman I want. It’s always been you.”
She looked at me with a mixture of flattery and awe. Apparently it was hard to believe a man could only have one true love in his life— even if the person trying to believe it was his one true love. I was here to show her that it was entirely possible.
I pulled up my shoulders. “You are the only woman I have ever given my body, mind or heart, Carly Donovan. You can ask my closest friends, who you just met. I might have went along with some locker room talk so that I wouldn’t get teased for never being a player like other guys on the team, but in reality, I turned women down left and right. None of them compared to you, and I won’t settle for less. You are the one that I want, so it doesn’t matter how far away you are, or how long it will be until we see each other again. No one can ever take your place.”
“How does someone like you hold out for someone like me? I’m not cut out for the life you are living, and I’m just a small girl from a small town.”
“And I’m hopelessly in love with you,” I said, interrupting her. “That’s all there is to it. Nothing else matters. I don’t care where you come from. All I care about is who you are to me, and you are everything to me.”
Carly was crying again, but this time it was different. She was smiling through the tears. She was happy. Finally, I was able to communicate how I felt about her. I was scared I wouldn’t have been able to put it into words at all.
“You love me?” Carly asked. “It feels good to hear you say it after so long,” she added.
“More than anything,” I said.
I leaned forward, closing the distance between us. It had been enough talk. I pressed my lips against hers, kissing her. This was the woman I wanted to be kissing for the rest of my life. I wanted her and no one else. I wanted to do it all with her, love, marriage, children, growing old together. Carly was the girl for me.
When we finally broke the kiss, I knew exactly what I wanted to do. I put the car into gear again and pulled into the road, adding a three point turn and turning the car around.
“What are you doing?” Carly asked.
“I saw a sign for a hotel back there,” I said. “That’s where we’re going. We can tell our parents our flight was delayed.”
Carly shook her head. “I don’t understand.”
I took her hand and squeezed it. “I want to be with you. I want you. If we go to that hotel now, chances are, we won’t be found out. The media has no idea where we are—we’re traveling. We aren’t expected yet. This is a stolen moment that we have to take advantage of.”
I kept my eyes on the road. When I glanced at Carly, she was smiling. It seemed she was still fond of my spontaneous ideas. And that was part of why I loved her.
Chapter 23 – Carly
The hotel we found wasn’t the kind of place Brad would ever choose if had the option to book in advance. It was two steps up from a motel; I would have rated it th
ree stars. Still, it was out of the way and private, and we wanted a room so that we could do what we needed to do without running the risk of being caught again.
Brad sent me inside to book a room and pay with cash. He waited outside until I came to him with the key card and a receipt. He pulled a hoodie over his head, and we walked back inside together so that he wouldn’t be recognized. I kept looking around, sure I would hear footsteps approaching or a camera flashing.
We were sneaking around, and I should have been upset about that. We had snuck around our whole lives, and at our age, it was getting tedious. But this time, it was a thrill.
We were hiding a secret that only the two of us knew (although it seemed his friends had already figured out, and I was pretty sure my mom and Dana knew it, too). He loved me, and I loved him. He was famous, and we needed a place to show each other how we felt. I sucked on that information, rolling it around in my mouth like a piece of candy, and found that I liked the taste.
We got into a dingy elevator, and the doors slid closed. I looked up to see if there was a camera in the elevator. I couldn’t see anything. Brad must have had the same thought I had because he pressed me against the elevator wall, pinning me with his body. I felt his erection in his pants. His body was taut against mine, and my breath hitched in my throat.
The door pinged on the third floor—it had been a short trip—and we got out on brown carpets that stretched down the corridor. It was faded along the paths where many feet had trod before. Brad and I were arm in arm, trying our best to behave. I was burning with desire, and Brad held my hand, squeezing it, telling me how much he felt it, too.
We slid the key card through the machine on our door and waited a thousand years for it to beep, and the red light shifted to green. Brad opened the door and let me walk in first. He followed me and hung out the do-not-disturb sign before he closed the door behind us.
When he turned to me, he pulled the hoodie back, and I could see his face again. His eyes were dilated, pupils eating up the green of his irises. His lips were parted, and I could feel the desire dancing in the air between us.
I had a sudden need to feel his naked cock in my naked pussy, now that I knew I was the only girl he had ever been with. But, I was afraid of getting pregnant, since I wasn’t done with school and we had only just now solidified our status. I decided not to say anything.
Brad was on top of me in the blink of an eye, pressing me against the wall, pinning me as he had in the elevator. I loved it when he took control like this, when he was in charge. I felt like he was doing something about us, like he was fighting for us.
He ran his hands over my arms, all the way to my wrists, and brought my arms up. With one hand, he pinned my wrists above my head against the wall, and I whimpered as he kissed me again. His other hand was on my breast, kneading, squeezing before he slid his hand down and cupped my pussy. The whole concept of holding me down like this and having his way with me was such a turn on, I could barely breathe through the lust in the air.
“You’re so fucking hot, princess,” Brad mumbled against my lips. He removed his hand from my crotch and ground his cock against me instead so that my response was nothing more than a moan.
Brad let go of my hands and led me to the bed. He stopped in front of the bed and turned to me. He pressed his forehead against mine, his one hand on my neck, and he looked into my eyes. His eyes were evergreen, a deeper green than I had ever seen before. I wondered what my eyes looked like because I was sure I felt what he was feeling. It was the perfect combination of love and lust, an eternal affection that could only come from the connection between fated lovers.
Too much? Probably, but it was poetic, and it was how I felt.
Brad started to undress me. He took his time with my clothes, peeling them off me piece by piece as if he were unwrapping a present. He was teasing himself just as much as he was teasing me, I was sure of that. His breathing was fast and shallow through parted lips, and his tongue darted out now and then to lick his lips as he slowly pulled every piece of clothing from my body until I stood in front of him naked.
I took the liberty to do the same to him. I slowly undressed him, looking him in the eye often and running my hands over his body, making contact with his skin. We were dragging it out, making every event as serious as the main course.
When we were both naked, Brad pulled me against him. His cock was hard against my stomach, and I reached down and lifted it so that it pointed up and didn’t poke me. I cupped his balls for a second, and they were heavy. When Brad wrapped his arms around me, I did the same to him. We were pressed against each other, nothing between us, skin on skin. I was aware of how hot he was, his skin scalding against mine. My nipples were hard against his chest, and I had goosebumps, not because I was cold, but from anticipation.
Brad kissed me again, letting go of me with one hand to run his fingers through my hair. He stroked my face, traced my profile with his fingertips as if he was memorizing every inch of me.
When he nudged me backward, I laid down on the bed while I waited for him to put the condom on, although I wished he didn’t have to. He wanted me on my back, and when he crawled onto the bed between my legs, my thighs fell open for him. He wrapped an arm around each thigh, pulling me down a little. He glanced up at me, and the sight of him between my legs was hot as hell.
I was splayed open with him holding me like that, vulnerable and on display. Brad knew it. It was where he wanted me.
He blew on my pussy, and I shivered, the cold air and the sensation dancing over my skin. I gasped when he licked a line from my entrance to my clit. He did it again and again, lapping at my sex. I was so wet I could smell my own scent. It mingled with the smell of Brad’s arousal, and it drove me crazy.
When Brad closed his lips around my clit, I cried out. He started sucking on me, varying how hard he sucked, and I squirmed. He held me in place with his arms like manacles, and that just made it so much hotter. Brad continued to suck on me, his tongue dancing over my clit every now and then. I closed my eyes and let myself go. The sensation washed over me, and I focused on how it felt. Brad was so good with his mouth I couldn’t hold back for very long.
The first orgasm rocked through me, and I cried out. I wasn’t sure if the neighbors could hear us, if there were any neighbors. I wasn’t sure I cared.
Brad joined his mouth with his fingers in my pussy. He pushed a finger into me while he licked and sucked on my clit, and I writhed beneath him. The sensations had spread now, and my attention was divided. I didn’t know which one to focus on.
Brad moved his fingers in and out of me, faster and faster, keeping his tongue on my clit and swirling it in small circles. I bucked on the bed with Brad’s one arm still around my thigh, holding me down. At this rate, I was going to work through all my orgasms right here, right now.
Suddenly, he stopped. I moaned in protest. He sat up and held onto my legs.
“Ready?” he asked and flipped me over onto my stomach before I could respond. He crawled over me and lowered his body onto mine. I was pinned beneath him, the length of him pressing down on top of me, and I felt his cock, hard and eager, resting between my ass cheeks.
“Lift your hips,” he whispered in my ear, and he lifted his hips for me to be able to do the same.
He guided himself to my entrance with his hand, and as soon as the tip was in, he let go. Brad positioned himself on top of me again, his arms braced on either side of me, and he started sliding in and out of me. It was strangely intimate, being held between the bed and Brad’s body, pinned even though it didn’t feel like I was trapped. In this position, Brad touched every spot that mattered in my body.
He kissed my cheek, nibbling my neck as he slid in and out of me so painfully slowly it was pushing me closer and closer to the edge. Who would have known that fucking hard and fucking slowly had the same effect?
Brad slid his hands up my arms until he found my hands. He interlinked our fingers, holding onto both hands, a
nd it became even more intimate. He kept up his rhythm, sliding in and out of me so slowly I didn’t think anything would come of it, other than how good it felt.
An orgasm tackled me out of left field, and I bucked and shuddered beneath Brad’s muscular body. He was still pinning me down, and it was amazing. Heat licked my body from my core, and I cried out as it intensified instead of fading again. I didn’t know how long I orgasmed, but it was better than any orgasm I’d had before.
When I relaxed beneath Brad, he pulled out of me. I lay on the bed, feeling him between my legs.
“On your back, princess,” he said. “I want to see your beautiful face when I fuck you.”
The way he said it made me feel shy and blushing, and hot and horny, all at the same time. I had the feeling it had been his intention. He knew exactly what he was doing. And he was more than welcome to do it all to me.
Brad positioned himself between my legs again and pushed into me with ease. He was on top of me, the length of him pressed along my body, and his face was only inches from mine. He was shiny with sweat on his face, his hairline wet. I knew I looked about the same. We were both sweaty and slippery, but that made it so much better.
“I was wishing I could fuck you without a condom,” he said.
“Me too,” I admitted. “I’ll go to the doctor and get on the Pill, so that next time we can.”
“Now I’m even more turned on,” he told me.
He started sliding in and out of me again, fucking me with that same, slow, torturous rhythm. I moaned and gasped and squirmed, but Brad was right there with me, pinning me with his eyes.
Slowly, he picked up the pace. He fucked me harder and faster, and it was what I needed. What I wanted. Brad started pounding into me, pumping harder and faster. He kissed me, the kiss only a little uncoordinated, given what we were doing.
I felt another orgasm building as Brad pounded away, and I waited for it. It built and built and started from my core, blasting through me in an explosion of pleasure. Brad released at the same time, pushing into me to the hilt before he himself exploded.
Out of Line: A Bad Boy Stepbrother Romance Page 116