by Tessa Bailey
“Yeah.” His shoes scraped on the floor as he rose from the bed, pacing away, the warmth of Grace’s leg lingering on his own. “Yeah, I can do that. This is our cause. This place. I’ll have to figure out a way to convince the senator, since it’s obvious he resents what happened to you—to which I say, no shit—but okay. Come tomorrow, we’ll start working on getting it done. Now excuse me while I go make a couple phone calls.”
His progress toward the door halted when Grace shot to her feet, arms stiff at her sides, those green eyes like glowing jade moons. “I…that isn’t what I was asking for. I just meant, let me help you, in general. I—I didn’t think…”
Aaron’s neck heated. “If you don’t like the idea, we can change it—”
She jumped. She actually jumped straight up in the air, hands flying to her cheeks. “I love it. Oh, please don’t change anything. I was just so surprised.”
He inclined his head, mentally cursing the way his heart decided to make its presence known at such an inconvenient time, walloping his rib cage with thick booms, courtesy of Grace’s pleasure. How juvenile. “I’m kind of surprised myself,” he admitted, then wished he’d kept his mouth shut.
At least until Grace floated toward him. All shining eyes and rosy excitement, she spurred a lust storm in his stomach. “It’s so much better when you say what you’re thinking, Aaron.”
“You mentioned that.”
And of course, it made him want to say more. Say whatever it would take to get her legs wrapped around his hips. To rock between her thighs until her wetness drenched the fly of his pants. “Get away from me, Grace,” he rasped. “It would be just like me to take advantage of you after having to tell that story.”
Silence deepened around them. “How can you say that after you just found a way for me to rebuild the camp?” It seemed as if her entire body lifted and fell on a harsh sob. “Last night, you asked me if I still saw some good in you…and I didn’t answer. How could I not have answered you?” She shook her gorgeous head. “I didn’t mean to—”
Aaron shot forward, capturing her unspoken words with his own mouth. Guilt. There had been even more guilt in her eyes. Aaron’s response was pure denial. Not because of me. Not over me. But as soon as their lips joined, his mind wiped clean of anything but Grace’s one-of-a-kind taste. She was juicy, sweet, refreshing, intoxicating madness. He let it pull him down into its depths—her depths—gathering up her taste greedily so he could live with the effect as long as possible, even though surely a man couldn’t withstand this type of arousal for an extended length of time. He’d want to fuck her again as soon as he came. It was a certainty his body was all too eager to confirm. Yet protectiveness held him in a state of limbo. Wanting—needing—to mate with her delicious body while determined to protect her from himself.
Couldn’t she sense the past meaningless encounters he wore like gloves, cheapening everything he touched? Couldn’t she sense his inability to be meaningful to her? Grace should have someone with substance, not someone who couldn’t even garner the love of his own family. Someone who considered the ramifications of his actions and how they would serve as betrayal. This is how you repay me?
The voice from his not-so-distant past had Aaron tearing his mouth away with a guttural growl, clasping Grace by the shoulders. Too hard. Ease up. “Get away.”
“If you really want that, let me go,” she whispered.
God, he couldn’t do it. Not with her face tipped back, lips swollen and shined up, those eyelids halfway fallen. He’d never in his life had trouble resisting sex. It was always a logical decision based on his needs. This? There was nothing cut and dried about it. His attraction to Grace was messy and wild and untapped. Made his chest expand with the effort to contain the expanding of something unfamiliar. Crazy and blinding. His dick needed a good, rough handling from one woman only. Grace. And she wasn’t pushing him away. Seemed like she wanted the job, too, her tits sliding up and down his abs with every breath. Give her one more chance. Show her what she’s in for with a bastard like you. With a muttered epithet, Aaron raked his hand up the back of Grace’s thigh, sliding it down the back of her tights, and settling his middle finger in the valley of her ass. “Get away from me,” he managed, wedging his straying digit a little more securely, earning him a closed-lipped noise.
“No,” she gasped after a few seconds.
Aaron’s tether broke. Recapturing Grace’s mouth with an obscene amount of tongue, he backed them toward the bed, satisfaction rippling in his middle when she went down beneath him, her legs falling open in welcome. He draped his body over Grace’s slighter one, eager grunts leaving his mouth as he positioned himself over her pussy and bore down with his erection. Their groans were pain-filled, reaching every corner of the cabin, breaking off when Aaron got back to kissing that addictive mouth, yanking the oversized sweater up, up to her belly, so he could rock against her sex with only his pants and her tights as obstructions.
“Aaron.”
“You were warned,” he reminded her with a strangled shout, delivered into the space above her head. “Three times, Grace. That’s three times more than I’d give anyone else.” He slid up and back in the cradle of her legs, groaning over the rasping friction her tights delivered to his stiff, fuck-hungry dick. “Make it four times. I gave you an out back at the house. You should have taken it.”
When Grace should have been trembling or alarmed by the cut steel in his voice, she only stretched out beneath him like a cat, opening up for him. Almost preening beneath his rough ministrations. “Maybe I should have. But we’re here now, so stop trying to scare me.” Her fingertips moved down Aaron’s chest to the seat of his pants, where she smoothed her palm over the curve of his cock, which started him panting like a marathon runner. “You don’t really want to scare me, do you, Aaron?”
Christ, her soft words, the sight of her, were choking him up. Her hair was a haphazard display framing her face, those crooked front teeth somehow making him twice as eager to seal their mouths together again. He was a hunter who’d discovered a sprite dancing in the woods and dragged her home, intending to use her body for vigorous relief, but got forgiveness in return. “No, I don’t. I don’t want to scare you.”
“I know,” she breathed, unfastening his belt buckle. “I just know.”
Aaron’s hands were shaking again. Fuck. What was wrong with him? Grace, who’d stolen his concrete sense of self, finally lay willing and pliant beneath him. Grace, who must also be a mind reader, because she didn’t greet his cock with a gentle squeeze. No, she stroked it like a…“Good girl, good girl, good girl,” Aaron grated, driving into her grip as if it were a wet pussy, causing his words to slur like a drunkard’s. “How’d y’know what I like, huh? You going to fuck as hot as you’re fisting me?”
“Yeah,” she breathed, her hand moving, pumping, against his stomach. “With you, yes, I think I might.”
He’d never equated sex with honesty before, but hell if he wouldn’t always recognize the lack of it for the rest of his life. Life without Grace. It would have to be without Grace, wouldn’t it? This couldn’t last. “I need to lift your sweater,” Aaron said unevenly. “When we were driving, the seatbelt…it crossed right between your tits, and goddamn, you’re not wearing a bra, are you? You have any idea the way that material molds to your little nipples, Grace? I kept the window rolled down to make them hard. I love them hard.” Using his left elbow to prop himself up, Aaron took the hem of her sweater and started to lift, exposing her shuddering belly, the beginning of her rib cage, before letting it drop, drifting his hand lower. Over the opaque tights, beneath which her white panties were visible. “You took our discussion about panties to heart. Remind me what I said.”
The hand around his dick turned caressing, almost luxuriating in his flesh, her pupils dilating as she stared up at him. “You said…” She licked her lips, but with a surge of possessiveness, Aaron took over the job, wetting them for her as she spoke. “You said, girls who get
w-wet from kissing shouldn’t leave the house without underwear on.”
“That’s right.” He gave her mouth a final lick, vowing to return to her sweet, supple lips soon. “Your tits have no such problem, do they? They don’t get wet unless they’re being sucked. Correct?”
Grace gave a breathy moan, eyes squeezing shut.
“I can’t wait much longer to get these tights off, baby.” He drifted the heel of his hand over the crotch of her tights, pushed down, before retreating back up to her belly button. “Better give me an answer.”
“Yes, wet....” She spoke through trembling lips. “Only when you suck them.”
You, she’d said. As in, Aaron. Him. Responsibility swamped his being, bringing with it a fresh wave of lust so extreme, his cock leaked a hint of liquid from the tip, ripping a curse from his mouth, which he repeated when Grace used it to lubricate the tightest, most perceptive jerk job of his life. He shoved his hand up beneath Grace’s sweater, fondling tits that had been formed with men’s hands in mind. They were small, but plump, conforming to his palm like a sex dream. “You don’t leave the house without a covered pussy, Grace, but forget about wearing a bra. These were meant to bounce, meant to be cupped from behind when you’re not expecting it. You leave them free for me, understand?”
Aaron made that demand, and then actually glimpsed her tits for the first time, realizing he hadn’t done them justice. Round, dusky nipples strained for attention, made even more prominent by her doing a veritable back bend to get her breasts closer to his mouth. She was so motherfucking glorious, his hand went to his pocket in frantic search of a condom, because if he didn’t ram his dick into Grace’s slick body now—now—he would die of neglect.
“No one can hear us out here,” he groaned into her neck. “You remember that. Be as loud as you need.” His tongue licked out to trace her earlobe. “Don’t worry, I’m going to make sure you need to scream yourself hoarse.”
Instead of the condom, his hand closed around the ribbons. And it took Aaron a few seconds to realize why his racing pulse, his demanding libido, ground to a halt. Such a severe one, he choked on his own breath. Ribbons. Friends. The camp. His mind dragged him back to last night, when she’d left him in the woods. I’ve doubted my judgment around someone like you before and it ended badly.
Someone like you.
Someone like you.
Aaron jerked back, moving off the bed like a shot. His erection rebounded against his thigh and he welcomed the pain of shoving his hard flesh back into his pants. Leaving it in such a dire state. Maybe it would distract him from the crater rapidly expanding in the center of his chest.
“Aaron…” Grace pushed up on her elbows, not bothering to cover her naked body, not bothering to hide a single thing. Confusion, hurt, sexual need, all playing across her features like a movie reel. “What’s wrong? I—I don’t understand. Did I—”
In seeming slow motion, both of their gazes dropped to the red ribbons hanging out of his pocket. Something sarcastic, something hurtful, was right on the tip of his tongue. Anything to close himself off, force him back into a familiar version of who he’d been before she’d shown up and rearranged his priorities. Hurting Grace would accomplish that, while putting her back at a safe distance. But he’d kept the ribbons. And that fucked him. She was too goddamn perceptive, and Aaron watched in muted horror as she started to cry, seeing every exposed inch of him. Seeing she’d gotten to him.
“Stop crying,” he ordered roughly.
Grace jerked her knees up to her chest, in a mirror image of how he’d found her in the cabin closet the day before. Eons ago. “I’m sorry for what I said, and how I acted…I think maybe I was wrong—”
Maybe. “No. You were right.” His raw laughter made him want to cringe, made him feel like such an obvious fraud. “If you think I chose this camp to help you in some way, that’s where you’re wrong. No maybe about it. I…” Lame, lame, he sounded to fucking lame.
Grace dropped her forehead onto her lifted knees, her body starting to shake with silent tears.
“Please, stop crying.” His throat was on fire. “I don’t know what to do about it.”
“You can hold me,” she said, her voice muffled. “You can come back and pretend like we just met…and I didn’t say any of those awful things. M-maybe?”
Oh, Christ, that was tempting. It was also impossible. First impressions didn’t vanish into thin air. Neither did third impressions, fourth. And after exposing parts of himself to this girl about which he’d barely been cognizant, she’d drawn a comparison between him and a lunatic murderer. Worse, she’d been right. Sure, Aaron hadn’t killed anyone. Yet. But he made his living performing mind tricks, the kind Grace had endured at the hands of Ray Solomon. Yeah, she’d pegged him right.
There was a reason she’d refused to ask him about his departure from California. His lack of a job. What he’d done to get fired. Yeah, she could see the ugly in him. She’d known it was there all along. What kind of a man lacks enough morality to do what he’d done that night, all those months ago? To harm a family bond with so little thought or feeling. Not the kind of man Grace needed.
Why was he still standing there?
Aaron tugged out his cell phone. “I’m going to get Peggy up here. She can…” His gesture encompassed Grace on the bed. “She’ll be better at this.”
He walked out of the cabin with his eyes closed, the sound of Grace’s tears following closely on his heels.
Chapter Fourteen
Through gritty eyes, Grace watched Aaron’s family arrive in a rental van he’d arranged, which they’d used to drive to YouthAspire. Peggy hopped out of the backseat first, holding a hand over her eyes to block the sun, a smile brightening her face. Belmont came next, alighting from the driver’s side to assist Sage—unnecessarily, in Grace’s opinion—from the back. Grace started to turn her attention away from the pair when Old Man bounded out of the van, running in circles around the courtyard, but gravity sucked her interest back to Belmont and Sage. The petite woman circled behind Aaron’s visibly tense brother, wrapping her arms around his waist from the back. And he just kind of…sagged. Like Sage’s touch had caused some vital release he hadn’t been expecting, which was obvious from the way he propped a hand on the van, head falling forward.
Aaron’s voice made Grace jump guiltily from her position on the cabin steps, as if she’d been watching a naughty movie or something. Although, while she’d observed a decent amount of adult film in her time, none of it had ever seemed as… intimate. Grace’s cheeks burned when Aaron glanced over, even though there was no sign of their encounter in his no-nonsense expression. No, he looked calm and unruffled, ready to take on the world. Unlike Grace, whose shaky legs had forced her down onto the step an hour ago, and she hadn’t bothered to move since. A bear had taken a swipe at her insides, shredding all her organs to pieces, and if she stood, they would all decorate the ground at her feet.
It seemed she’d made a horrible mistake about Aaron. Since taking up permanent residence on the cabin steps, the differences between Aaron and the man who’d turned her life upside down at age sixteen had bombarded her. Since the night they’d met in the woods, Aaron had done nothing but push her away. Even when he’d found out she was the senator’s daughter, he’d attempted to create distance between them. God, he’d warned her about himself so many times, she’d lost count. Bad men—the real ones—didn’t draw attention to their flaws. They overcompensated for them. Or they made those flaws someone else’s fault. Aaron did neither of those things. He admitted them and tried to limit their damage.
Grace pressed her curled-up fingers to her mouth, watching as Old Man trotted across the courtyard toward Aaron. Looking surprised at the canine’s interest, Aaron scratched at his jaw and crouched down…just in time for Old Man to change course and bypass his owner completely. And when Aaron rushed back to his feet, clearing his throat and checking his cell phone, Grace’s legs finally got the desire to move, wanting to f
ly across the distance and launch herself into Aaron’s arms to make up for his dog’s disinterest…but she’d forfeited the privilege. The benefit of knowing Aaron would catch her, even if he would chastise her afterward for coming too close. Maybe this time he wouldn’t want to catch her at all. Why would he? After she’d done her best to confirm every bad thing he already thought about himself?
“What is this place?” Peggy asked, turning in a circle, her gaze landing on Grace. “Hey, you!”
Grace lifted her hand in a wave, hoping Peggy would be satisfied with the gesture, but manners poked her ribs until she stood and joined the group. “Hi,” she murmured, her voice sounding threadbare.
Aaron cast her a speculative glance, but it was fleeting. “You wanted to help, right?” He seemed to strive for a jocular tone, but Grace could hear the doubt blurring the edges as he addressed his siblings and Sage. “Is that, uh…still the case? If you guys want to get back on the road, I can catch up in New York, the way we’d originally planned. It’s not a—”
“We’re here. We’re helping.” Peggy looked affronted that he’d suggested otherwise. “Give us the rundown, Captain.”
His sister’s endorsement didn’t seem to convince him. “Bel, come tomorrow, there could be cameras. A lot of people.” He shifted his stance. “That’s what we’re hoping for. That’s what we need to make this venture successful.”
“Will it be safe?” Grace found it interesting the way everyone’s head whipped around toward Belmont at his simple question, but realized she’d done the same. Something about his voice demanded you quiet down and memorize the rocky nuances, give them credence. “For the girls. Will it be safe?”
“Yes,” Aaron answered, irritation apparent in his flexing jaw. “You’ll be shocked to know I’m as concerned about their security as you.”
“I’m not shocked,” Belmont said, before turning for the rental van and beginning to unload the luggage, including a doggy bed. Aaron’s surprise over his brother’s curt statement was clear, but he recovered quickly, shoving a restless hand through his hair. “Right. Long story short, we’re going to turn this place into the functioning youth camp it once was. Today is for planning. Tomorrow—when reinforcements arrive—we’ll need to delegate jobs and supervise. We’re going to need results fast, so maximizing funds and labor is key. We need something to show for our efforts by end of day tomorrow or they could deem this project a waste of time.”