by Kreig, K. L.
I need to convince her to stop running. I need to convince her to let me back into that place that I, and I alone, own. I must get her to trust me with her secrets, so they don’t eat us both alive. I have to make her understand that I do, and always will, love her.
I hold her eyes as I unbutton my dress shirt and take off my slacks. She skittishly watches every move I make and the intense lust I’d felt earlier returns with a vengeance.
She’s torn. She wants to run, but she wants to stay. My precious angel is in as much agony as I am, but for very different reasons. Reasons that she alone knows and won’t share, and it not only infuriates me, it breaks my fucking heart that she won’t trust me enough to tell me.
Once all of my clothes join hers, I grab her face and press our naked bodies together. I kiss her mouth, tasting the salty tears that have spilled. “I don’t care how fast and how far you run, I’ll run faster and farther. I’m not letting you go. Ever,” I say, between brushes of my mouth on hers. “Run to me, Livvy, not away. I can’t live without you again.”
I lay down on the bed, pulling her beside me so we’re lying side-by-side, flesh-to-flesh. We silently stare into each other’s eyes. I want to marry her. I want to have babies with her. I want to grow old with her. I just want to love her all the days of my life. She’s my downfall. Now that she’s back in my life, I can’t fathom a single day without her. I run my finger gently down her face. I know she doesn’t want to hear this, but I can’t keep it in any longer.
“I love you so goddamn much, Livia Kingsley.” Her eyes water again, but I take that as a good sign. “Tell me you love me,” I beg. I’m not above begging. I checked my ego at the door a long time ago with this woman. I need to know we’re in this together, that I’m not the only one feeling this almost unbearably throbbing intensity between us. Even though I see it in her eyes, I need to hear the words.
“So much I ache with it,” she whispers.
Our bodies and mouths meet in a fury of unrestrained desperation. Hands, lips, legs entwined as one. Soon I have her on top of me and am slipping inside her wet, hot heat without preamble. I wanted to take my time worshiping her, but right now I’m too frantic to do anything but make desperate love to the woman I adore. The woman I need to reclaim as mine.
Chapter 22
Our bodies move in perfect sync, like we’ve danced this erotic dance a thousand times. We have. Gray’s thumb strokes the outline of my wings and that one simple act has me vaulting over the edge into pure bliss. I close my eyes and let my head fall back as waves and waves of euphoria wash over and through me. I hear Gray’s low curse seconds before he follows, feeling his hot release bathe my womb.
I want to both laugh and cry. Laugh, because everything he’d described in sensual detail in the car earlier just came true. And cry for all that I’ve lost, because what I want most with Gray can never be.
“I love you,” he rasps, cocooning me in his safety and love.
“I love you, too.”
He sighs, holding me closer. It feels good to say it, like a confession. I feel lighter and happier. Light fingers whisper up and down my back and I can’t think of anything other than how happy I am. Maybe it’s the endorphins coursing through my bloodstream, but, no…it’s more than that. It feels incredibly amazing to be held and loved by this man again and the reality is far better than my dreams of it. It’s comfort, warmth, home.
“Tell me what you’re thinking.”
“That I’m happy for the first time in a very long time,” I answer softly. I don’t mean to confess something that I shouldn’t voice for fear of jinxing it, but it’s too late to take it back. Other than Alyse and more recently Addy, Gray was the only person that ever made me happy. My mother did, I think, until she left us. Now my faded memories of her are clouded with hurt and betrayal.
A finger hooks under my chin and he tilts my face up. “Me too,” he confesses, looking deeply into my eyes. Knowing that he’s missed me as much as I’ve missed him does funny things to my insides. I close the small distance between our lips and kiss him slowly, deeply, deliberately. Our tongues lazily duel. Then he palms my head and quickly takes control. Suddenly I’m on my back and being filled to the brim again.
“Stay,” he commands. Gray knows that anytime I’m in his arms I’m as pliable as hot glass.
“Okay.” I’d do anything he asked of me as long as he keeps moving…just…like…that.
Our lovemaking is frantic, but tender. Wild, but heartfelt. Desperate and full of passionate longing.
“Christ, Livvy, you feel like heaven,” he grates against the column of my neck. Teeth nip at my sensitive skin and another orgasm looms in the background, waiting for just the right pressure in just the right place. Which my talented lover delivers. Repeatedly.
An hour later, sated and exhausted, I snuggle into Gray’s side and let my heavy lids fall closed. Just as sleep is pulling me under, I hear, “Stay forever, Livvy.”
My last thought, as I succumb to the blackness, is I hope you want me forever.
Chapter 23
I’ve only been home for two hours when my phone dings, indicating a text message. It’s just after nine p.m., but I’m already snuggled deep under the covers. After spending nearly all of Sunday in Gray’s bed, making love, I am dead-dog tired. And sore. The man is insatiable. I pick up my phone to read the message, not at all surprised to find it’s from Gray.
Gray: u belong in my bed. naked and wet for me. ur body begging for my cock
Tingles race like wildfire to that needy place between my thighs. I guess I’m insatiable too. Gray always had a way of making dirty words sound like the sweetest of music. Cock and fuck roll off his tongue like a melody that should win an American Music Award.
Me: i was…all day
His response was immediate.
Gray: i want more than a day
My heart flutters and his unspoken words shred me. So do I, I want to respond. I want forever. I want the fairytale. But I know that’s not in the cards for me and I don’t know how to respond, so, like the coward I am, I don’t. I know it’s a self-preservation mechanism because when the truth comes out, he’ll dump me faster than a bad habit and I’ll be back at square one in my recovery. Hell…I’ll be in a hole a mile deep, and I’ll have to figure out how to crawl my way back to square one. It won’t be pretty. It will be fucking ugly. And I’m not at all sure I’m strong enough to survive a second time.
Gray: i’m sending henry for u in the am
My mind hasn’t been far from the unknown man I’ve seen twice now and while it may be smart for me to take what Gray’s offering, I am not about to show up to work in a chauffeured car. Hell no. The train station is only four blocks away from my apartment and there are enough people milling around in the morning that there’s no way this man would try anything, if that’s even his intent.
Me: absolutely not. pls don’t hover. let me do my job or i’ll have to find a new one. one that’s not at ur company
Gray: over my dead fucking body
Ugh. The man is infuriating. It’s one thing to get involved again, but I can’t have people at work knowing that I’m sleeping with the owner of the goddamn company. I need this job and I don’t need to be fodder for gossip at the water coolers or the break room. It’s already bad enough that Wes will be suspicious because he thinks I have a boyfriend and now he’ll think it’s Gray. No one in that room on Friday could mistake the possessiveness and desire emanating from him. For me. Shit.
Me: u wore me out the last 24 hours. i need sleep. stop texting
Gray: goodnight livvy. dream of the naughty things i could b doing to u if u were here.
I always do.
Me: ur awfully bossy. now you control my dreams?
Gray: i own every single part of you, livvy. like you do me
I stare at his blatant claim. Yes he does, and I’m having a hard time fighting it. Or him. I knew the second I opened that door last night that I was headed down a p
ath from which I could not turn back. I’m stuck moving forward at warp speed until the mother of all potholes, aka my past, suddenly comes up so fast I cannot veer and I’ll sink. We’ll sink. Will it be this week? This month? Next year? Because it’s not a question of if, but when.
Gray: tell me you love me
A smile takes over my face. That was our “thing” back when we were together. He told me early on that he loved me, but it took me a long time to say those three words back—over a year of dating. They seem so simple to most people, but to me, they’re so powerful and meaningful they almost take on a life of their own. Once I finally confessed, he’d always beg me to tell him again. And I always obliged.
Me: i do…i love u
More than life. More than anything.
Gray: i love u 2, angel. sweet dreams
I throw my phone beside me, lie back on the pillow and wonder what in the hell I think I’m doing. I feel like I’ve jumped onto a ride that I can’t get off of, because the speed is steadily increasing and if I try to get off now, I’ll break a leg. But if I wait much longer, I’ll not only break a leg, I’ll break myself completely beyond repair.
Gray tried his best to convince me to stay the night again, but I couldn’t. I need to think. I need to breathe without inhaling his intoxicating scent. I need to keep reality front and center of what my life is like without him, and I can’t do that when I am immersed in him. With his arms around me or his cock inside me, it’s far too easy to get lost in an alternate reality. One with rings and devotion and white picket fences.
The desire to give myself over entirely to that fantasy is almost too great to resist, so I’ll just dip my toe in it instead and that will have to be good enough. I need to keep some distance between us so when my world comes crumbling down around me once again I at least have some hope of surviving. If I start spending every minute of every day with Gray, I know survival won’t even be an option. The worst part of being with Peter wasn’t the forced sex, never being allowed outside or even the beatings. It was being without Gray.
So I’m going to tuck every moment, every kiss, every touch, every memory into a special place reserved only for Gray. I need new ones to fill that space anyway, because God knows I wore the other ones threadbare during the last five years. And when I’m so far in my pit of despair, I’ll pull one out and remember that I was happy once again.
If only for a short while.
Chapter 24
I walk outside, not at all surprised to find Henry standing beside the black Lincoln Town car that I rode in on Saturday night.
He tipped his head as he opened the back door, “Morning, ma’am.”
“Good morning, Henry,” I say, walking right on by. I hear the door close and the sound of quick footsteps behind me.
“Ma’am, please. I’m to take you to work today.”
I stop and turn, surprised to find that he’s right behind me. He’s surprisingly quick for a sixty some year old man. “Look, Henry, I’m terribly sorry to have to put you in the middle of this, but I already told Gray I didn’t need a ride. I’m perfectly capable of getting to work on my own, believe it or not. And I need to get going if I’m going to catch the train.”
I pivot and start walking. I quickly scan the street to make sure I don’t see my stranger before picking up my pace. If I did, I’d quickly be changing my mind about that ride, but I don’t feel the prickly sense of being watched, so I continue forward.
“Mr. Colloway isn’t going to be happy,” he calls after me.
“Yeah, yeah,” I mumble. I throw my hand in the air, acknowledging him. I don’t particularly care if Gray is happy or not. If I thought Gray was possessive before, he’s downright controlling now, and while a tiny part of me revels in it, the part that cares about protecting my heart can’t give in. I may love Gray with everything in me, but I cannot be dependent upon him for simple things like getting to work.
A few minutes later I’m boarding the Red Line for my twenty-minute ride into the city. As I take a seat on the crowded steel tube, I get lost in my thoughts of Gray and the dreamlike weekend that we spent together. I swear I can still feel him between my thighs. I’m already seeing the small ways he’s trying to take control of little parts of my life and I’m torn. Because I want it and need to reject it in equal measure. Somehow, someway, I must keep a small shred of distance between us so I’m not completely lost in him, even though I can think of nothing else I want more.
The announcement for my stop draws me back to reality and I’m quickly exiting the train, along with a horde of others, all diligently making our way for another week of working for “the man”.
When I get up to the twenty-sixth floor and to my cube, something doesn’t look right and my heart drops into my stomach when I realize what it is. I didn’t bring a lot of personal effects to work, but I had a small flowering cactus that Addy had given me on my first day. I had a picture Alyse and me from my high school graduation and one of Kam, Addy and myself at a Cubs game from last summer. We had a great time that hot Saturday afternoon at one of the many rooftop bars that overlook Wrigley Field. The two pitchers of margaritas we had at this quaint little Mexican restaurant beforehand probably helped too.
But the only three things that I’d brought, indicating that the person who occupied this space actually had some semblance of a life, were gone.
Shit…was I fired and not told? Is this retribution from Wes because of my make-believe boyfriend, or God forbid, he thinks I’m involved with Gray?
“Why are you here?” Wes’s voice snapped.
“I…I, uh…” Because I work here? Or at least I did.
“You should be up on the thirty-fourth floor. I hear Mr. Colloway doesn’t tolerate lateness. But you probably know that already.” His caustic tone grates on my nerves, not to mention I have absolutely no idea what this asshole is talking about.
“What do you mean I should be on the thirty-fourth floor?” I’m genuinely confused as to what’s going on here.
“What? You don’t know?” His laugh is filled with malice. “Apparently over the weekend you were reassigned as Mr. Colloway’s new assistant. Better get that pretty ass moving, sugar, you don’t want to keep the boss waiting.”
“What?” I breathe, not at all believing what I just heard. Disbelief quickly morphs into anger, which is escalating rapidly into pure rage. Why would Gray do this? I told him not to hover. I told him to let me do my job. Just as Wes opens his mouth to make another biting remark, a grey-haired, heavier set woman rounds the corner. And she looks to be on a mission.
“Livia Kingsley?” she asks. Her voice is cheery and she radiates motherly warmth. I nod, unable to speak through the fire building in my belly, which is spreading like hot lava through my veins.
“Good, good. Come with me dear. You were supposed to be upstairs almost ten minutes ago.” She starts walking back in the direction from which she came and I have no choice but to follow or be left behind.
“I—I didn’t know,” I stammer.
“Really? I’m surprised someone didn’t at least call you. I mean, it is sudden, but you certainly must have impressed Gray, because he wouldn’t pick just anyone to be his assistant. He’s very particular. But boy am I glad he did, because I’m down to less than two weeks before I retire and I want to make sure I leave his new assistant behind with everything she’ll need to succeed. It’s going to be pushing it, but we’ll manage, don’t you worry, dear.”
We enter the elevator and the woman, who has yet to introduce herself by name, still continues to babble, but I’ve stopped listening. I can’t hear anything through the blood rushing in my head and the fury roaring loudly in my ears.
As soon as we exit the elevator, I blindly follow the woman down a series of hallways until we reach a large corner office with frosted windows. The nameplate on the outside says Gray Colloway in large black block letters. His door is closed and I hear voices coming from inside. I don’t give a shit if he’s hosting th
e President of the motherfucking United States, I march past the desk that is now supposedly mine and I head straight for that door. I throw it open so hard it bounces off the wall behind it and two sets of eyes turn my way.
One, I’m all too familiar with and is the target of my wrath, but the other belongs to a stunning woman in a clingy white blouse and tight black skirt who is presently standing next to Gray’s seated form, leaning over his desk. From where I stand, I can see directly down her cleavage and if Gray turns his head slightly, those girls will practically be smothering him.
“Livia, I’m in the middle of something. Can this wait?” He looks past me, adding, “Bonnie, it’s fine.” Bonnie must be his current assistant’s name and I hear her reply “okay” from behind me.
“Livia?” I mock, stretching out my name into practically three separate words.
“I guess not.” He looks at the woman next to him who is now standing so at least I don’t have to see her big-ass tits. And Gray no longer has a birds-eye view of her nipples. “Thank you, Camille. I’ll call you if I have any questions.”
The blond seductress makes her way toward me and surprisingly holds out her hand. “Hi. I’m Camille Hayes, Vice President of Human Resources. You must be Gray’s new assistant.”
Now not only don’t I like the way she dresses, I don’t like the way she says Gray’s name like she’s intimately familiar with him. And as the head of HR, perhaps she should dress a little more conservatively. Like…wear a gunny sack or something so she covers those bad boys up. I look at her hand for a moment like it’s a cobra, but decide that I shouldn’t take my ire out on her so I extend mine. “Livia Kinsley.”