Whisper My Name

by Renee Wynn

  Her thighs clasped his head—tight and he increased the pressure, twirling his tongue around the engorged lips of her pussy.

  Danielle groaned again, louder this time.

  She came against his mouth as he continued to lap at the released juices.

  Danielle gasped and climaxed long and hard. The sight made him harder than he had ever been with any woman. But Danielle wasn’t just any woman—she was his and he wasn’t letting her go a second time.

  He took his cock in his hand and guided the tip inside, letting it caress the tender opening. She moaned deep in her throat and shivered.

  He surged forward and buried deep—hitting the back of her womb. He groaned at the sensation and went still. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. He struggled not to release his semen too early but it was a battle.

  He bent his neck, dipping his face to hers, and murmured. “I missed you like hell, baby.”

  She whispered, “Brody.”

  “I like kissing you. I like your smell, your smile…every damn thing about you.”

  “We need—”

  “A new beginning,” he muttered, his arms tightening around her. “We both need it.”

  She shook her head in denial. “You can’t give me what I want.”

  “Try me.”

  “I want fidelity…to be first…”

  His arms squeezed her before one of his hands entangled her hair around his fist. “I’m already there.”

  She exhaled a short breath and he caught it in his mouth. It was warm and collided with his. In that instant, blood swam through his veins without stress, warming his heart—something he never thought was possible.

  It felt good—Damn good.

  “Brody,” she said his name with such angst, something he’d never heard before, husky and rich with raw emotion. He so wanted to make it good for her but he was too strung to the breaking point that he thought his control would splinter into pieces. He released her hair and wrapped a hand to the back of her head. He pulled her mouth to his again and felt her sigh of surrender…release…no it was freedom.

  He wanted to fuck her in his bed—his room where he released the demons that hound his soul—and then make love to her as the sun struggled to flood light into his dark thoughts.

  He cupped her ass in his hands, massaging the softness and the hard curves that dipped below her ass. Then he held her head so he could go even deeper, and then slid his other hand between them, sliding his fingers inside her vagina.

  Her hips lifted from the bed. “Too much…Too deep,” she murmured.

  “Slow, baby. Rock with me.”

  “I can’t…”

  “I’ll wait for you. Come with me, sweetheart,” he coaxed. “We’re doing this together.”

  “Fast…I’m going to fall…I want to…”

  “I got you, baby.”

  “Oh, Brody.”

  He felt her convulsing around his cock and he shook from the force of it. He placed his mouth over hers to capture the essence of her moans, sending him over the cliff along with her.

  He fell on her totally spent and he felt her, still clutching his penis inside her, the ripple effect sending electric shocks through his body. He continued to glide, gently, in and out of her, wanting desperately to savor the moment.

  Finally his strength gave way and he rolled to his side, taking her with him. She kept him locked in her arms and legs.

  “I got too rough.”

  “Hmm,” she answered, her hand making circles on his chest. Then she lifted her head and placed a kiss on his lips, ever so lightly, before resuming her position, throwing her arm around his stomach.

  “Did I hurt you?”

  “I ache.”

  “I’m sorry, baby.”

  “I liked it.” She lifted her head and looked at him. “It was different.”

  “How so?”

  She shrugged. “It’s hard to explain…this feels like…it’s our first time having sex…”

  “Good. It is.”

  She glanced at him.

  “We’re in a different place now, Danielle. Hell, I’m different. This is a new start.”

  She dropped her eyes and rested her head on his chest without comment.

  Brody stared blindly into the dimly lit bedroom. He opened his mouth and then closed it, trying to form the right words.

  He pushed up against the headboard and sat straight, bringing her with him. He wanted to see her eyes.

  “This isn’t a one-night stand, booty call, or whatever you may think. It’s a different time for us. I want you more than I have ever wanted any woman. I don’t know what it means but I want to take the time to explore it.”

  Danielle sucked in her breath and released it slowly. He felt the warmth of it on his face. Her eyes went intense and seeing it he managed to keep his emotions in check. It was something that became increasingly hard to do. He could make her want him but he wanted her to choose him not because she was in a sexual haze. He lowered his mouth to take her mouth but her head tilted away from him.

  His eyebrows lifted.

  Danielle whispered. “Don’t do this, Brody.”

  “Do what? Kiss you? Tell you how much I want you?”

  She rolled her eyes. “Please be serious.”

  But before he could respond, she pulled out of his arms and left the bed. Brody watched as she dressed, his mind in turmoil. Then she sat in a chair near the bed and slipped on her boots. He grabbed the jeans he had discarded, pulled them on and nothing else.

  He stopped her at the door, baring her from going through.

  “I tell you I want you for us to start something together…and you’re just going to walk out?”

  She pushed her hair behind her ear. He noticed she did this when she was pissed or nervous. Right now, he would call it a mixture of both.

  “You don’t have to do this, Brody. I don’t expect anything from you. It was consensual sex. Remember, you said no drama.”

  “Damnit, Danielle. Stop putting words in my mouth. I’m asking for a commitment. I don’t know how much plainer I can get.”

  “This isn’t you, Brody. You do one-night stands not commitments. I knew when I agreed to sleep with you the first time and I know it now.”

  “Why won’t you believe I have changed?”

  She looked at him incredulously. “No, you haven’t. In the last couple of months, I’ve seen the pictures of you online and in all the rag magazines. You are still Brody Beaumont, screwing every woman that comes across your path.”

  He felt the heat rise in his face but he didn’t say anything. What was the use denying the truth?

  “That’s who you are…It’s who you want to be. I don’t expect you to change…I don’t want you to change…at least not for me,” she said sadly.

  “What the hell are you talking about? You don’t want me to change? I have changed.”

  She threw a hand his way, running it up and down. “This Brody I know. The real you.” She looked hard at him for a long moment. “I can deal with him. I know where I stand.”

  “You have become my judge and jury. I don’t get too testify on my behalf?”

  She pointed a finger at him. “You’re a man who will take a woman to bed without thought or consequence.” She laughed, harshly.” And give her the best orgasm she ever had. Don’t pretend otherwise. Not with me.”

  “I have never pretended with you, Danielle.” He ran his hands through his hair, twisting handfuls of it in his hands in frustration.

  She shook her head in denial.

  “Unbelievably! I don’t believe this shit. You are the first woman I have ever wanted to commit to.”

  “I’m the first woman who didn’t make it easy for you.” She shrugged. “But in the end you won.”

  “Sarcasm doesn’t look good on you. I want you. Hell. I only want you. No one else.”

  “Stop it, Brody.” She held a hand up between them. “Please. Just stop. You made it abundantly clear in the beginning there would be no rela
tionship, which I understood and accepted.”

  “What happened between us at the start of us getting together has no relevance on where we are now.” He ran his hand down his face, trying to not release his tempter. He felt helpless, which was alien to him. “What was tonight?”

  “Sex…Lust. We wanted each other. Let’s leave it at that.”

  How could this have gone so wrong? How could he make her understand how deeply she was embedded into his heart? He wanted her with a fierceness that he couldn’t explain in words. He ached. She was part of every fiber of his being—Damn. For the first time in his life, he was afraid of something—losing her.

  “Lee is probably outside waiting for me,” she said, smoothing the non-existence wrinkles in her blouse.

  “Lee?” He frowned. “I didn’t see you make a call.”

  “I didn’t. But in the car, on the way here, I texted one of our stress codes.”

  Confused, he just stared at her. What the hell was she talking about?

  “We have several codes, 1-4. Each number has a time attached to it, fifteen minutes to two hours.”

  “Should I be happy you gave me two hours?”

  “Don’t.”

  “How did he know where you were?”

  “I told him in the text.

  He wanted to touch her, to wrap her in his arms and carry her back to his bed and start over. So he stood in her path, hoping she could see what he couldn’t express in words. She just stared, unmoving at him. Emptiness hung in the balance with the silence. His throat clogged with unshed tears, he dropped his head, cleared his throat and looked at her. She remained clear eyed and firm in her stance. Defeated, he moved aside; she walked out the door and he followed behind her.

  Downstairs, she grabbed the jacket and purse she had discarded from the sofa, opened the front door and rushed down the steps without giving him a second glance. Pain clutched the muscles in his heart.

  He wanted to beg her to stay but he remained rooted in the doorway, watching as she slid into the passenger seat of the car waiting for her. Lee was behind the wheel. The strong urge to take the few steps to the car and pull her from it almost consumed him. He struggled against himself, the pain of loss cutting through his gut like a two-edged sword, sharp and deadly.

  He didn’t move.

  He didn’t breathe.

  He didn’t feel—the cold whipping across his bare face, chest and feet.

  They didn’t immediately leave. Lee was animated and talking with his hands, while she looked straight ahead. Finally she turned to Lee and said something. He shook his head, turned the wheel and sped out of the driveway.

  Brody willed her to turn and look at him.

  She never did.

  He stood there in the opened doorway until he couldn’t see the car any longer.

  Slowly he turned and walked over the threshold of the door, feeling emptiness and darkness following him. Tonight he didn’t fight it; he willingly let them in and closed the door.

  ###

  Danielle entered her hotel room with Lee at her heels. She tried to close the door in his face.

  “Oh, no you don’t, heifer,” he said as he stepped through the door and slammed it behind him.

  Her back steeled with anger, she said, “Not tonight, Lee,” rubbing at the tension near her temples.

  He stared for a long moment. “Talk to me, girl. What happened?”

  “We left the bar, went to his house, then dinner and back to his house. End of story.”

  “You slept with him.”

  “We didn’t sleep.”

  “Only semantics, darling. You sent me the two hour code, which means S.E.X.”

  She pressed her lips tight. How could she explain what happened between her and Brody? She’d agreed to everything they did. God, she had hated how treacherous her body became when he touched her. “Don’t get it twisted.”

  “Dani,” Lee said, using the nickname he gave her years ago. “You are a strong woman and I have never known you to run away from anything. Even with that asshole, Rio, I had to practically pull you from the apartment because you wanted to go toe to toe with him. I knew you didn’t love Rio but you wanted to have a family something you could claim as your own. I’m not going to talk about asshole number two, Brian, but then you met Brody.”

  “Where are you going with this?” she said impatiently.

  “The Silenator lit a fire in you that is still burning. And I know for damn sure he wants you.”

  “What makes you think he wants me?”

  “Because when I was pulling out of his yard, I glanced in the mirror and saw his wounded expression.”

  Danielle rolled her eyes. “You’re imagined what you wanted to see.”

  Chapter Eighteen

  In the den, Brody awoke with a start. Slouched in a chair, still dressed only in his jeans, he felt for the whiskey bottle sharing space with him in the chair. He fumbled for the empty glass on the side table, poured more liquor and drained it in one gulp, ignoring the burning sensation cascading down his throat.

  He stumbled from the chair with the bottle in his hand, to the long glass panel window, looking at the rain hitting against the smoothness of the glass. The rain was powerful, harsh and uncontrollable, just like his emotions—just like his life.

  Damn. Damn. Damn.

  He took a long swallow from the bottle. Eyes tight he waited for the sensation of numbness. It didn’t come. What time was it? He turned and glanced at the wall clock and saw it was one o’clock in the morning. How long had Danielle been gone? One hour…two? Shit. Did it matter? She was gone, out of his life. He stared at the rain, again, raging like a masterful tidal wave.

  His mind revisited the scene with Danielle, him practically begging and her turning a deaf ear to his words—to his heart.

  She didn’t believe his declaration. Hell. He was a lot of things but lying wasn’t one of them. It pissed him off that she thought otherwise.

  He rubbed a hand across the breastbone of his chest.

  “Shit. I don’t need her,” he said to the silent room. “I don’t need anyone.’

  He threw the bottle of whiskey against the wall and it smashed into pieces, brown liquor running down the wall like a slow waterfall.

  “Shit. I need to get the hell out of here.”

  He walked out of the den at a hurried pace. Reaching the front door of the house, he threw it open, and stumbled from the force of the rain that came through. He walked and half ran barefoot and shirtless to the stable where he housed his prized stallion.

  Taking longer than usual, he saddled the horse and rode out into the elements. It was still dark but the rain had slowed to a steady pace.

  He galloped into a fast run, pushing the stallion to unbelievable lengths. The rain hit his back, slashing across his skin like lightening but he still pushed forward, kicking the heels of his feet into the horse’s sides.

  The big animal grunted but kept going against the rain, against the darkness, against the beat of his heart as he pressed into the curve of the stallion’s back.

  They were both lost in each other’s madness, trying to outrun the demons that controlled them. The stallion against his owner and him against the hand that life had dealt him. The animal knew his master and strived to please, but it was too much. They came around a bend that was sharp and slippery. The horse reared his front legs, kicking at thin air, throwing Brody to the ground, knocking the wind out of his lungs. He rolled until he was lying face deep into the muddy ground. Slowly he turned on his back and peered through the darkness. He couldn’t see anything but he did hear the horse nearby.

  He sat up, grunting at the sudden pain in his shoulder, and came to his knees, his hands on his thighs. He took in deep breaths that hurt, threw back his head and howled into the depths of blackness surrounding him and the rain beating on face. He emptied out everything that had controlled his life.

  Anger

  Rejection

  Loneliness—and fear
.

  Breathing hard and fast, he dropped his head to his chin and wiped away at the now slow drizzle of rain mixed with his tears.

  He crawled to where the animal stood, silently waiting. Brody pulled on the reins to help him stand. The recklessness of the ride caused him unbridled shame. Never had he ever hurt a horse. He dropped his face into the animal’s neck.

  “I’m sorry, buddy. I’m so sorry.”

  The horse shifted on his feet in acknowledgement.

  Brody hoisted himself onto the back of the stallion and steered his companion in a slow pace towards home.

  After rubbing down the stallion and covering him with a warm blanket, Brody made his way to the house. Ignoring the pieces of glass mixed with splatters of liquor on the floor, he reached for an unopened bottle of bourbon and flopped into a nearby chair.

  He twisted off the cap, flicked it on the floor, lifted the bottle to his lips and drank deeply. After drinking more than half the bottle, he found no peace. He stumbled to the phone on his desk and punched in a number and waited.

  “Hello,” a rough voice filled with sleep uttered.

  “Ashton, I fucked up.” He took a long swallow of the liquor. “I don’t know what to do to make it right. I need…”

  “Brody?”

  He squeezed his eyes tight, fighting back unwanted tears.

  “For the first time in my life… I’m…I’m ashamed.”

  “Brody, let me—”

  “No! Just listen. Danielle…”

  “What about Danielle?”

  “She…was the best thing that ever happened to me, you know?”

  “Brody, are you drunk?”

  “No.” He took another swig from the bottle. “I’m trying but it’s not working.”

  “Where are you?”

  “Nowhere Land.” He laughed at the irony of it all. He was alone. Brody drank deeply once again from the bottle. “Can you believe that? I’m no…where.”

  He placed the phone on the hook, tilted the bottle to his lips and drained the contents.

  Brody shifted in the bed and came up against something hard. He hit at the offending object but it wouldn’t move. He opened his eyes slowly and realized he was slouched in a chair in his den.