Reed (A Redemption Romance Book 5)

by Anna Scott

  Sitting on the side of the bed, I ran my fingers over her forehead and noticed that the furrow was gone between her brows. I hoped that meant that the headache was subsiding. She turned her head and glanced up at me. As she rolled to her back, the smile on her face blinded me with its brilliance.

  "You feeling any better?"

  "So much better. Thank you. You and your mom have been amazing."

  "Do you think you can eat something?"

  Nodding her head, she sat up and started to move to the side of the bed. It was a difficult maneuver, since I was sitting there taking up the space. Instead of being a gentleman and moving aside, I took her in my arms and held her to me. I kissed her perfect lips, intending it to be chaste, but when she opened her mouth, I accepted her invitation. The kiss was heated in seconds and it wasn't until I heard Blazer's whine that I broke away. Glancing at the dog, damn cock blocker, I noticed that he was looking toward the door. Turning my head, I saw my mother standing there, a huge, knowing smile on her face.

  "Do you want me to bring some food in here, sweetheart, or do you want to try to come to the table?" Mama asked Gillian, who was blushing and trying to hide her face in my chest.

  "I can come out there, I think. I'm so much better, thank you for everything."

  "You're more than welcome. Unfortunately, I suffered from migraines for years. My mama was a firm believer in the old ways, so she taught me what to do."

  "This is delicious," Gillian exclaimed after she took her first bite of chicken soup. My mom beamed at the praise.

  We finished our meal, mom and I cleaned up after I settled Gillian on the couch with a blanket and a big glass of ice water.

  "I'm fine, Reed. Let me help clean up. Your mom should rest, she worked so hard to make it all." Gillian had protested, when I bullied her into the front room.

  "No, baby. You need to rest tonight. Let me spoil you a little more, okay?"

  "Oh, all right. Twist my arm why don't you?"

  After the dishes were done, mama kissed Gillian's cheek and said her goodbyes. I was glad she was leaving on one hand and sad to see her go on the other. I enjoyed spending time with the two women I cared so much about, but I really wanted some alone time with Gillian.

  We cuddled up on the couch and watched a show. Neither of us watched much TV, so we flipped through channels for a long time, before Gillian snatched the remote from my hand and settled on a police investigations show. Later, Gilli fell asleep in my arms. Her body felt perfect cuddled up against mine. She was soft in all the right places, smelled great and made the cutest moaning sounds while she slept that made my traitorous dick go hard. I carried her to bed that night and held her all night as we slept. I knew, right then, that it was something I wanted forever.

  Chapter 6

  Present Day

  As the memories flood my mind, I continue to chant every song and verse I ever memorized.

  "In you, Lord, I have taken refuge;

  let me never be put to shame;

  deliver me in your righteousness.

  Turn your ear to me,

  come quickly to my rescue;

  be my rock of refuge,

  a strong fortress to save me."

  Months Earlier...

  Gillian

  I woke up and mind still hazy, struggled to figure out where I was. Something warm and firm was wrapped around my waist. My back was pressed into something, or someone much bigger than myself and a fluffy red dog was pressed into my front. I was sandwiched between Reed and Blazer. It was an oddly wonderful sensation. Reed and his mom had taken care of me the day before, helping me to get over my migraine. Now, in the light of morning, the pain was gone and all I had were the remnants or migraine hell. I couldn't remember a time when anyone, aside from my own mother had taken such great care of me, and she only seemed to do it when my father was watching.

  "Good morning, beautiful," Reed purred into my ear. His voice was even deeper than normal, which was a feat, considering his voice was low and rough normally.

  "Good morning." I wiggled around a little, and Blazer's head popped up and looked at the two of us, like we were disturbing him. He had been incredible the day before too. Even through my fitful sleep, I knew that Blazer hardly left my side. I hadn't had a dog in years. On the farm, we always had dogs and cats, but I had one special dog that was just mine. He was a yellow lab named Booger. Yes, I knew that was a stupid name, but I had been six when he was born and my daddy had let me choose the name. Booger stayed with me until the day he died when I was nineteen. I cried and cried when he finally died, old and tired, Booger had finally succumbed to cancer. Once Booger had been by my side, I'd felt like I had someone, someone to love and care for me aside from my dad. He protected me too, never liked my brother Adam and would growl and snarl at him when Adam was particularly cruel to me.

  "What's on your plate this morning?"

  "Nothing, since you asked Clark to cover me this morning. I have some things I should be doing, but I'm not feeling one-hundred percent yet, so..." I left the sentence hanging, not sure what he was looking for. He was the one who had cleared my morning after all.

  "You actually have a day off?" Reed asked, humor and a hint of teasing in his voice.

  "I do, what about you?"

  "Well, I will probably need to go into the office later to finish up some reports, but this morning, I'm all yours."

  "Oh," I replied, not knowing what on earth to say to that. I was nervous about the implications he was making, but kind of excited too. I wondered if we would mess around like we had the previous week.

  "Oh?" He asked, sounding put off by my lack of enthusiasm.

  "No, it isn't that, it's great. Just, what did you have in mind?" I was nervous and I knew that my voice was giving that away. I was such an idiot. He wasn't going to just hold me down and make me do stuff I didn't want to. I trusted Reed, probably more than I had ever trusted anyone before.

  "Baby, I would love nothing more than to make love to you all day, right here in this bed, but I promised you that nothing would happen between us that you weren't ready for. Do you remember?"

  "Yes, I'm sorry, I'm just...I don't know. I've never done any of this before and I really don't know what the expectations are."

  "I don't have any expectations, Gilli. You're here with me. We've just slept all night together and holding you in my arms was the best thing I've ever felt in my life."

  "Really?"

  "Really, being next to you, holding you against me is amazing. I love waking up to you, Gilli."

  "Me too, I've never done that before, but it was really nice," I admitted hesitantly. Things were so good with Reed, so easy that I was terrified to mess them up.

  "Good, I'm glad. How's your head?"

  "Much better. Thank you so much for taking care of my yesterday. You and your mom were remarkable." Right then Blazer let out a bark, as if he knew I'd left him out of my appreciation. "And you too, you good boy," I assured him, reaching out to scratch his neck. He moved his nose to my shoulder and rested his head there.

  "All right, you rest a little bit. Let me deal with Blazer and make some coffee. I'll be back as fast as I can."

  Instead of obeying, which wasn't something I was good at, once Reed and Blazer left the room, I got up and went into the bathroom. I took care of business and found the new toothbrush his mom had brought me the day before. I freshened up, then made my way back into the bedroom, just in time to see Reed bringing in two cups of steaming hot coffee. As I took my first sip, I realized that Reed really was an expert observer, he got my coffee just right. I was surprised for a minute, then realized that I knew how he took his coffee too, mostly because I was the one who made his coffee when he came into the cafe.

  "Do you want to lay around and be lazy for a while?" Reed asked, a mischievous grin on his handsome face.

  "Sounds good."

  It wasn't long before our coffee cups were empty and placed on the nightstand. We talked and laughed an
d long ago had slid back under the covers. Reed's massive arms were wrapped protectively around me, and as he had promised, nothing had happened.

  "Are you ignoring me?" Reed asked, a perplexed expression furrowing his brows.

  I looked up at him, I'd been completely lost in my thoughts. I wanted him, wanted something anyway. I wasn't sure I was ready for that but I was getting really close. We hadn't been dating for very long, but we had known each other for over a year. I'd liked him all that time and if I were reading him right, he had liked me that long too. There was nothing, aside from maybe his job, that I didn't like about him. He was kind, strong, gentle and strong.

  It wasn't that I disliked his job, it was just that it took him away from me for days and I had missed him, but really, I was impressed, proud even of his work. I didn't have a good idea of exactly what he did, mostly because he couldn't talk about much of it, but I knew what he did everyday was important.

  I hadn't answered him, but was still looking at him. His face changed, he lost the confusion and stared back at me intensely.

  "Oh, screw it," I mumbled just before I turned fully, aligned my body with his and kissed him. He was still for a long moment and I worried that he didn't like what I was doing. Just before I pulled away from him, his hands moved down, one at the small of my back and the other cupped my ass and dragged me up and over him. His mouth started to play and I was done in. Reed's hands were everywhere, stroking and caressing, setting my skin on fire.

  My core was alight with sensations so strong I felt like my body was calling out to his, like my cells were magnetically pulled toward his. My hands began to roam over him, last time he had done everything, but this time, I wanted to explore. I broke our kiss and remembering how he had kissed me before. My lips followed a path of their own making down his chin, to his neck and down to his collar bone. I found a little resistance at his shirt. I didn't have any idea how to get it off him. I let my legs drop to either side of his hips and pushed up on his chest so I could straddle him. Reaching down, I lifted my butt and scooted back to pull up the bottom of his tee. When I rested back down on him, I landed on something extremely hard, hot and frighteningly large. He throbbed beneath me and nestled right at that perfect spot. My eyes flew to his, startled and aroused all at once. I wasn't sure if I should move, or stay right where I was. To be honest, the spot he was hitting was perfect and I'd rather not ever move, but I didn't think that my weight on his manhood could feel comfortable.

  "Sorry," I whispered and began to move off him. Reed's hands shot out and gripped my waist. Instead of moving me away, he seated me right back where I was and pressed up. I could feel the thick mass easily through his basketball shorts. He held my waist like that for a little bit, thrusting up lightly giving me just the right amount of friction.

  Deciding to go with it, because really, it felt way too good to stop, I ground down. Reed gasped and I started to move off him, terrified that I'd done something to hurt him.

  "No, baby, you feel incredible. Don't stop," he pleaded, pressing me down once again.

  I enjoyed the ride, and within a few breaths, my heartbeat was racing and I felt something amazing. I was about to climax and I knew it. This one was different though, I felt hungry inside, needy, I wanted more.

  "Oh, oh, my, Reed," I breathed, panting and lowered myself to lay on his chest. It took me a minute to steady myself and slow my pulse back to normal.

  "Hey," I scolded after several minutes, propping myself up onto my elbows and looked up into his smirking face.

  "What, baby?"

  "I wanted to kiss your chest, and you distracted me."

  Reed rolled me to the side and I slid off him. He sat up and took off his shirt in one fluid movement. When he turned to toss the soft cotton tee to the floor, I got a look at his rippled, tattooed back and the wicked scar just under his left shoulder blade. It was jagged and though I could tell it was old, the skin was still puckered and discolored. It ran at least six inches long, and I wondered what on earth could have happened to him. Without thinking, I reached up and traced the scar. Reed grunted, sounding really irritated and pulled away from my hand abruptly. When he turned to look at me, some strong emotion flashing in his eyes, I dropped my hand and looked away. He obviously wasn't comfortable with me looking at him like that and certainly didn't want me to touch him there. It was a step too far, something too intimate.

  In all honesty, I didn't know him that well. Sure we had talked, we had been dating, but we hadn't gotten into anything too deep yet. All of a sudden, his look and my realization was like a bucket of ice was poured over my head. What was I doing? Was I seriously in bed with this guy after dating him for a few weeks? I'd been about ready to go way farther, maybe all the way with a guy I barely knew. What was I thinking? I didn't know him. I certainly wasn't in love with him, though if I were honest, I could see me falling for him not too far in the future. We all had demons, we all hid secrets in our past that we didn't want to talk about with acquaintances.

  If there was one thing I learned growing up, it was to stay out of other people's business. I actually learned a lot of valuable lessons from my dad, but aside from being kind and never judging others, I learned to never butt in when I wasn't wanted, which was part of the reason I struggled getting mixed up with my cousin Missy's drama.

  Thankfully, I was still fully dressed, so I didn't have to shield myself as I rolled to the opposite side of the bed. Another good thing was that Blazer wasn't there to block my escape, so I was able to make it to the bathroom without any delay. I needed a few minutes to pull my head together, so I was going to close myself in the bathroom.

  As the door shut, I glanced up and noticed Reed's confounded expression. I'd left him unsatisfied yet again. I didn't know a lot about sex, but I knew enough to understand that guys probably didn't like to be left hanging like that. I couldn't tell for sure, but I thought that he might be irritated about that too. If he was upset with me for touching his scar or for leaving him high and dry, I wasn't sure, but I didn't really want to find out right then.

  After locking the door, I flipped on the light and set in to righting my appearance. Glancing at the clock on the wall, I realized that it was after one. I should have gone to work hours before. I had plenty to do, even if my schedule was flexible.

  "All right," I whispered, giving myself the raised eyebrow in the mirror, "You can do this. Just go out there and ask him to take you home." Nodding in encouragement, I tried to psych myself up. Maybe he wouldn't argue with me, maybe he would be cool with me going. He did seem pissed after all, maybe he wanted me to go.

  As I opened the bathroom door, my cell phone began ringing from my purse on the chair in Reed's bedroom. Very few people called me, and usually there was a good reason. No one just called me to chat like old friends, I didn't have very many.

  I opened the bag and fished around for a minute, before locating the ringing device. Sliding my finger across the screen, I accepted the call from the cafe and as I said "Hello," walked into the living room to find my shoes. Reed hadn't followed me and I didn't look at him when I left his room. The one thing I did do though, was to carry my bag with me. Sliding on my shoes, I listened as Clark spoke animatedly about the computer glitch that had taken them completely off line. They could still make sales, but only cash ones, which was a huge problem since eighty percent of my customers paid with a card. The only bright spot was that it was late in the day, close to closing and the cafe wasn't busy, I would, however need the system up and running to close out the day.

  "My stars, Clark. I'm so sorry, I should have been in hours ago," I apologized, hearing his denial and concerns about how I was feeling at every pause. I promised him that I was fine and would be there in fifteen minutes. I hoped that was true, that I could get Reed to take me down there. I could walk it, but that would take longer since we were a couple of miles away. I had left my car in the back the day before, since Reed had carried me out - literally - and taken me to his place
. As Clark and I said our goodbyes I heard Reed enter the room. Looking up, I noticed that he was pulling on a shirt and had his running shoes in his hand. That was good, he apparently got my need to move and wasn't delaying.

  My back was up and I knew it. For whatever reason, I'd let down my walls and had let Reed in farther than anyone before, but that whole thing with his scar unnerved me in a way I didn't understand. We weren't at the stage where you shared every personal thing from your past, we weren't even at the point where we would ask for those kinds of details, so why I had gotten so upset about his reaction to me touching his scar, I didn't know. The one thing I did know though was that I had waited this long, I wasn't going to sleep with a man unless I had seriously strong feelings for him and I wanted to be certain that he felt the same for me. Obviously, Reed and I weren't at that stage yet either and I didn't know if we ever would be. With the way I was feeling right then, I was leaning toward not.

  "I have to get to work, do you need me to take you to work?" Reed asked, obviously overhearing at least some of my conversation. He was cold and distant, focused maybe?

  "Please, I need to hurry."

  He nodded, and after another few seconds, I was following him out to his truck. Reed walked next to me, as he always did, but instead of giving him the opportunity to hold my hand again, I busied myself with scrolling through the messages that had come in. It was a deliberate maneuver and I wouldn't have been surprised if Reed knew that. As irrational as it was, I was hurt and being childish, didn't want Reed to hold my hand.

  I feared him, not physically of course, but I was afraid that he would someday break my heart, I had to wonder if it was better to end things now, then to let them go on. I knew that ending things now would be hard, but later would be so painful I wasn't sure I could recover.