by London Casey
“Slade?” I called out.
He lifted his head. Gosh, I wanted to see his beautiful face so badly. I wanted him to whisk me away like he had promised once before. We couldn’t fix the past but we could design the future together, right?
When he looked up at me, his face was bloody, beaten up. His left eye puffy, swollen with a dark purple color, dried blood on his face. The left side of his jaw was red, the corner of his mouth bloody.
I ran toward him. “What happened?”
Slade put the bottle to his lips and took a drink. He then slid from the hood of the car and put the bottle down. He grabbed the bottom of his shirt and lifted it up to his mouth to wipe blood away. When he did, my eyes looked at his stomach. Holy fucking hell... the cuts of muscles were layered on top of each other, deep ridges on each side of his body that slipped right down into his jeans.
He dropped the shirt but the image was plastered in my mind forever.
Slade had muscle when we were younger, but nothing like this now. This was muscle earned from life on the road. From danger, risk, fighting, survival.
Speaking of fighting...
Slade just stared at me.
The blood on his face dried as a deep crimson color. I stepped another step toward him. I reached for him, wanting to wipe it all away. I had no idea what the hell was going on. But the second I got close enough to him, he grabbed my wrist and kept me away.
That’s when I knew...
“Slade,” I said. “Tell me what happened. Right now.”
“It doesn’t really fucking matter right now,” he said. “Go the hell home, Liv. You don’t belong here. I don't belong here. This was all a big mistake.”
“Owen did this?” I asked. “I’ll kill him...”
Slade shook his head.
His dark eyes had the slightest hint of being vulnerable. The only time I ever saw Slade like that was when his father would beat him senseless and right after his mother passed away. I never forgot his face when he stood at my front door, tears running down his face, just wanting me to hug him. Hold him.
“No,” I said.
Walker did this to him.
But that didn’t make sense. Slade could take Walker. But what if it wasn’t a fair fight? Owen and Walker together.
My mind raced with it all.
Slade grabbed his bottle of whiskey and started to walk away. I grabbed for him and he shook me away.
“Go the fuck home, Liv,” he growled. “Don’t piss me off. I’m not in the fucking mood.”
“Fuck you, Slade,” I said.
He stopped. Slowly, he turned. “Feel better now?”
“No, I don’t. Fuck you. You fucking... you fucking fucker. You left me. You fucking left me.” I moved toward him. He lifted the bottle to his lips and that’s when I saw his wrist. The deep red mark on his wrist. It took all the hatred from me instantly. “Owen cuffed you. And then Walker...”
I felt sick.
Slade stretched his jaw. “I’m alive. I’m not worried about.”
“Oh, Slade. I’m so sorry.”
“I guess I had it coming.”
“No. Not that.”
I reached for him and again he jumped back.
“What are you fucking doing to me?” I asked.
Slade then pointed to me, down, at my stomach.
“Go home and take care of your baby,” Slade said.
My jaw dropped and Slade walked away.
I ran toward Slade, my eyes filled with tears. I reached for him and missed him once. I reached again and took a handful of his t-shirt. Slade kept moving and started to drag me like I weighed nothing.
“Wait!” I said. “Slade, I’m begging you. Wait.”
He kept moving.
My heart pounded.
I couldn’t let this destroy us once and for all.
“Slade, please. You have to listen to me. You fucking owe me for what you did.”
He stopped walking again. I stumbled forward and put my other hand to his back. Christ, it was like touching steel. Was there any spot of his body that wasn’t ripped with hard muscle?
“What do you want to say right now?” he asked.
My lips quivered. Slade had always been the one to keep my deepest secrets. From my body, needs, worries, fears. He was the one who held them all.
Why change that now?
“I’m not really pregnant,” I said. “I lied to Walker about it.”
It felt like a weight had eased a little off me.
Slade reached back for my hand. I dreamed of him pulling me toward him, turning around, holding me. Protecting me from myself and saving me from the life I had been all but forced to live in.
Instead, he let my hand go. He shook his head.
“I can’t do this right now,” he said. “I’ve got to get this car done for Jack and then I’m leaving. I’m never coming back to this fucking town again.”
“Slade, I’m not pregnant. I can prove it to you. Okay?”
Slade finally turned around again to face me. “You do what you have to do, Liv. You know where I am. If you do come back, don’t bring any tails.” He pointed to beat up face. “I let it happen this time. That was respect for your brother and all he’s done and been through. But if he ever tries to again, I will kill him.”
The words shook me.
Slade walked by me again.
My body shivered from the sight, size, and smell of him.
I had to prove to him that I wasn’t pregnant.
That would be easy.
The hard part?
Finding a way to prove to him that we were meant to be together forever, just like we promised each other a long time ago.
I tossed the shopping bag right under the hood of the car at Slade. He turned his head, a cigarette in his mouth, grease and blood on his hands and face.
“Back so soon?” he asked.
“There,” I said. “Right there. Look.”
He stood and took the smoke from his mouth. He tossed it aside and grabbed the shopping bag. He took out the box with the pregnancy test in it. He squeezed it and looked at me.
“You’re fucking serious right now?”
I nodded. “If you would listen to me, I could explain everything.”
Slade handed the box back to me. “Fine then. Explain.”
“I told Walker that I was preg-“
“After you take the test,” Slade said.
“You’re serious right now?”
“Why the fuck did you buy it then?”
“I thought that would be enough.”
“Well, it’s not. Do it right here, right in front of me then.”
“Fuck yourself, Slade,” I said. I grabbed the box out of his hand. “I haven’t had sex in a long time. Okay? Even the last time I did, nothing could have happened. But you want me to do this? After everything you did to me?”
Slade leaned forward and pointed to his face. “Your brother and your boyfriend did this to me. I hung around after the old man was put in the ground because I wanted to see you. I wanted to talk to you, Liv. The last thing I expected was for you to show up here with a blown out tire. Even then, you let me kiss you. You came right back at me. Then I find out your pregnant?”
“I’m not goddamn pregnant!” I yelled.
“Then prove it.”
“Fine,” I said.
I put the small box in my mouth and grabbed my jeans.
It wasn’t the first time I stripped in front of Slade, but it was definitely the weirdest.
(SLADE)
What the fuck was I doing?
I watched as Liv unbuttoned her jeans. There was a little hint of skin, the special spot between her belly and her pussy, just before her mound. That’s where I used to drive her mad with my teeth, grazing against her skin before my tongue would curl around her clit. I had her body memorized. I could make her come in seconds or stretch it out for hours.
She had the pregnancy test box in her mouth and stared at me. She t
urned to the side and wiggled her hips side to side, pushing her jeans and panties down. The panties were a bright red color, tangled up against the inside of her jeans. My cock quickly sprang to life, filling almost instantly. Pressing against the inside of my jeans, I knew if there was any more light it would be pretty obvious that I was getting rock hard.
Her hips were beautiful, creamy, and when she rocked left to right, I saw her hip bone jut out just a little. She had more meat on her bones than before, which didn’t bother me one bit. I could see myself grabbing those hips tight, just like before, my fingers locked around her hip bone like a fucking handle as I pulled her back and drove my cock into her.
I gritted my teeth and turned to face the car. My cock was actually hurting by that point. I put fists to the hood and tried to take a breath.
I couldn’t believe she was actually listening to me. Christ, the second that asshole said she was pregnant, it was like all the wind had been taken out of me. The asshole, Walker, got into his car and drove away. Owen pointed at me, nodding, and walked to his SUV and drove in the opposite direction. I sat there on the side of the road, against my motorcycle, bleeding, feeling completely dead inside. The truth was that my destiny was supposed to be Liv. Being with someone else was one thing. But a baby with another man? That was a whole new set of shit.
I wanted to believe her when she said she wasn’t pregnant but I needed proof. My mind and heart were locked up tight in a struggle where nobody was going to win. That’s just how my life always seemed to go.
“A lil hel,” Liv asked with the box in her mouth.
I looked to my left and she had her right hand in front of her thigh, trying to cover up so I couldn’t see the slit of her pussy.
I grabbed the box from her mouth. “What?”
“A little help? Can you open that?”
I tore the box open and took out the little, skinny wrapper. I tore it open and out fell a pregnancy test. Skinny on one end, fatter on the other with the symbols for pregnant or not pregnant.
“Here,” I said. “You don’t have to piss in front of me, Liv. I’ll walk away for a minute.”
I moved away from the car and kept my back to her.
I thought about that night with her on my motorcycle. It was our last hurrah in town. Hell, it was her idea to go up the ridge and fool around. She wanted to get as close to the moon as possible. It was such a dumb thing to say, right? Just some silly romantic shit and I played into it. I never heard or felt a woman come like she did that night though. In fact, I had money stashed to get her a goddamn ring. But then Danny showed up and in the blink of an eye, I was being threatened with a murder charge.
I punched his wrist and the gun fell to the ground. I swung a backhand at him, knocking him in the jaw. I thought about going for the gun, but resisted. I didn’t want anyone to get hurt. I stopped right there and gave him a second to calm down. But his eyes went wide. He took out a knife. I saw the look in his eyes... the same look my father gave me hundreds of times... one of us was going to end up hurt or dead...
“I’m done.”
I snapped back to reality and turned to see Liv buttoning her jeans. She had her top shirt tucked in her chin, leaving me to see a tight tank top against her belly, lifted up enough to show more skin. I saw the bottom half of her belly button and it looked as though it were smiling at me, remembering all the times I had shot loads of myself into it, always spilling over.
She dropped the pregnancy test to the hood of the car.
“Let me see it,” I said.
“It takes a few minutes, Slade.”
“Oh. Okay.” I took a drink of whiskey and held the bottle out. “Drink?”
Liv smirked at me and reached for the bottle.
“Hey, what about the baby?” I asked.
“There is no baby,” she said.
I let my grip go and she took the damn bottle and put it to her lips. I grabbed for the bottle and tore it away.
“No. You don’t get to do this to me right now.”
“Do what?”
“I want to see the test first,” I said.
“What the hell do you want from me, Slade? You stayed here after your father died. I didn’t make you. As far as I knew, you were gone, free and happy, living to drink and fuck anything with a pussy.”
I grinned. “Damn, beautiful.”
“What?”
“I love when you talk dirty.”
Her face turned red and she shook her head. “You don’t get to say flirty things with me and make everything seem okay.”
“Then I won’t. Can you maybe tell me what the hell is going on here though? Why you’re telling certain people you’re pregnant and others you’re not?”
“It’s hard to explain.”
“Try me, Liv.”
“That right there,” she said. “You’re the only man that calls me Liv. The only one that ever has. Walker calls me Olivia. I feel like a child in his presence. But you never made me feel that way. I never wanted you to go away, Slade. I cried so hard for you. I begged Owen to tell me what happened. You were going to get charged with murder and then it disappeared? Along with you? What happened that night with Danny?”
I stepped forward. I reached for Liv’s face and touched it. “You tell me. Do you think I killed him?”
“Truthfully? I don’t know.”
“Why?”
Liv swallowed hard. “Because... if he was there to hurt me you would do anything to protect me. Because it was our chance to escape and I knew once Owen got wind of it, he’d do anything to stop me. And we all knew how crazy Danny was...”
“So you think I killed him?”
“I think you killed him if you felt you had to.”
“How does that make you feel, Liv?”
She stared at me. Those blue eyes settling the inner beast in my heart, but bringing the beast inside my jeans to life even more.
“It terrifies me,” she whispered. “I love you for defending me if that’s what you did. If you didn’t... then I need to know why it all happened the way it did. My heart has been broken everyday since. With the exception of a few moments.”
“Which ones?”
“When you kissed me,” she said. “That was the first time I felt alive...”
I couldn’t stand it anymore. I put my other hand to her back and pulled her close, kissing her again. The voices in my head screamed to stop. My body and tongue wanted something else. I flicked the tip of my tongue against her soft lips. She opened her mouth for me, kissing me right back. As the kiss got hotter, I pulled at her harder, feeling her tits press against my chest. My hand inched down, wanting to feel her ass again, when her cell phone beeped.
“Fuck,” she said, her lips still touching mine.
“That your boyfriend?” I asked, grinning.
“No,” she said. “I set a timer. Now you can see the truth for yourself.”
I grabbed the pregnancy test and stared at it. There was one pink line. That was it. Just one. I shook it like it was some kind of drawing toy and I wanted to reset the picture. I looked at the test again. There was still just one line. I brought it close to my face and tried to see if there was even the faintest of a second line.
What the fuck did it matter to me though? It wasn’t my kid. It wasn’t my girl either. All this belonged to someone else. Someone that got a few decent punches at my face earlier that night.
“Happy?” Liv asked.
I dropped the pregnancy test to the ground. “What the fuck, Liv?”
She stared at me with those eyes again. She was weak, scared, vulnerable.
“I don’t know what to say,” she said. “You don’t understand what you did to me, Slade. I’m so mad at you.”
I inched in on her, knowing she definitely wasn’t knocked up now. My hands touched her hips and I pulled her close to me. Her hands clutched right at my shirt. The temptation was growing by the second, the danger swelling just as much. This was as real as anything could ever
be.
“I need you to tell me something,” I said.
“Anything.”
“Do you love him?”
“No,” she said without hesitation.
“That was fast.”
“Because it was honest.”
I wanted to ask her why... but what the hell did it matter? Liv was my girl. She’d been my girl from the day I sank my teeth into her heart. From the day I touched her, kissed her, and from the day she offered herself to me. Time may have fucked us over in the past, but the future waited.
“This is really bad,” I said. “For both of us.”
“At least we’re sort of together.”
I pressed my lips to hers and had myself a taste. She was perfectly delicious. Those weren’t going to be the only lips I’d be tasting.
“Beautiful, I’m only going to say this once, so listen.”
“I’m listening, Slade.”
I looked her dead in the eyes.
“I’m going to fucking devour you and never let you go, ever.”
I opened Liv’s jeans and slipped my hand down her panties. The smoothness of her body gave way to the curve of her sex. My fingers pressed against her folds, feeling they were already tender and sopping wet.
“Goddamn, beautiful, you’re soaking wet.”
Liv bit on her bottom lip and nodded. “It’s been a while.”
I curled my fingers and pressed two of my fingertips to her core. I thrust and entered her, feeling just how impossibly tight she was. Could she have been tighter than before?
“How many men, beautiful?” I asked.
“What?”
“How many men have you fucked?”
I slid my fingers another inch deeper, feeling her pussy give way but clench at me. Shit, it was going to be amazing to rip her open again. She’d get used to me though, like she did before.
“Slade...”
“I fucking need to know,” I said.
I pressed my thumb to her clit.
She tightened up even more and gasped. I then twisted my thumb, watching her eyes lit up with pleasure. Her hands grabbed my arms and she let out a whimper.