First Time

by Lynn Burke

  Tingles lit in my toes and swept up my legs into my center. I cried out as my climax rolled over me, tugging at him until he growled his own release, burying his face in my neck.

  ****

  I ran my fingertips over the dip and swell of Daniel’s chest. The slightest bit of auburn hair and tight nipples … I pinched one.

  He groaned, grabbed my hand, and brought it to his lips.

  I snuggled against him. “I finally understand what it means to be insatiable,” I murmured, losing myself to his tongue flicking over and around my fingers.

  “Mmm.”

  “But”—I pulled back and smiled—“I have to work.”

  “I think you ought to call off today,” Daniel said, brushing my hair off of my forehead. “I don’t trust Stephen.”

  “I don’t either, but I don’t think he would come to my work. He never has, anyway, no matter how upset he’s been with me.”

  “Have you ever tried leaving him before?”

  “Well, no.”

  Daniel raised an eyebrow, and I considered his words, chewing on the inside of my lip.

  “I would sit outside Dunks all day if I could to keep an eye on you, but I’ve got a huge meeting today at noon.”

  Lightness floated in my chest, and I smiled again. “You’re a good man, Daniel Cooney,” I said, leaning forward to press my lips against his. I pulled back after a few seconds and heaved a breath, knowing I needed to see to my responsibilities and not allow fear to hinder the new path I found before me. “I’ll tell my boss what happened and have him call the police if Stephen shows up and causes problems.”

  “Promise?” The worry in his gaze flooded my heart with a strange, yet enjoyable emotion I couldn’t name.

  “Yes.”

  “Call me if you need me.”

  “I will.”

  He kissed my fingertips again. “What time do you go in?” he asked, rubbing the back of my hand down his bristly jaw.

  “Ten. What time is it now?”

  He craned his neck to look over his shoulder at the alarm clock on the bed stand. “Nine.”

  “I need to get moving,” I said, but I didn’t move. “Thank you.” I gazed into his dark chocolate-like eyes, butterflies lighting my stomach. “For everything.”

  “You’re coming back here after work,” he said, snuggling down lower against me, burying his face in my neck, his scruff tickling me.

  “Yes.”

  “And we’ll talk about getting your things out of Stephen’s house tonight.”

  I sobered right quick. “Okay.”

  With a groan, Daniel rolled away from me and climbed off the bed.

  My gaze was glued to his ass as he walked across the room, every step flexing his muscular cheeks.

  “Thought you needed to get going,” he said with a chuckle, bending to grab a pair of jeans from a drawer.

  “Yeah.” I scooted off his bed and grabbed the t-shirt he’d given me the night before. “Did you happen to throw my clothes in the dryer, or am I in trouble?” I asked, pulling it over my head.

  “I snuck out to do it after you fell asleep last night. You are so beautiful.”

  I caught his stare and blushed. Never had a man been so liberal with his compliments. If not for the lust in his eyes and the fact he’d already had me in his bed, I would have sworn he lied like most men wanting to get into a woman’s pants.

  Not that I’d known any other than Stephen. A tumult of emotions rolled over me.

  “You’re the sexiest, sweetest man I’ve ever met,” I whispered and hurried to the bathroom before he saw the moisture gathering in my eyes.

  Stephen.

  Daniel.

  A slew of memories and thoughts slammed into my brain, and I grabbed hold of the sink to keep me upright.

  Stephen would be livid I hadn’t been home last night. Had he drunk himself into a stupor? Driven around searching for me? Called the cops?

  I chewed the inside of my lip, thinking about work. Would he show up at Dunks and cause a scene? Closing my eyes, I drew a deep breath. Work, hurry back to Daniel, then deal with the Stephen situation with his help.

  God knew, I didn’t think I could handle it on my own.

  “Cream and sugar, right?” Daniel called through the bathroom door.

  “Yes, please.”

  “I’ll go get your clothes,” he said. “There’s a new toothbrush in the top drawer. I don’t have any hairspray, though.”

  “That’s okay.” I peered at myself in the mirror. With no makeup, the bruise on my cheek would draw all kinds of attention.

  “I tripped and fell against the table,” I told my reflection.

  My brow furrowed. Why hide the truth?

  “My ex smashed my face against the table.”

  Served him right to be exposed for what he was, what Chantelle had been trying to tell me for years. Exposing him, though, would shame me as well. I had stayed eight years too long, wasted some of the best years of my life.

  Torn on what to say, I studied my face. My eyes, shit brown and boring, sparkled like I had never seen. Pink flushed my cheeks, and my lips were reddened and puffed from kissing. Daniel’s scruff had marked up my neck, but I expected the redness would fade before I got to work.

  I looked like a woman who had been loved on all night long, and I felt beautiful.

  “Clothes are on the bed.” Daniel’s bass voice rumbled through the door, sending a needy twinge between my thighs.

  My face heated. Insatiable … I’d rather stay in bed all day long than toast bagels and pour coffee for five hours.

  “I’ll be home around six,” Daniel whispered into my hair shortly after handing me a travel mug of coffee. He squeezed me tight. “But call me if you need me.”

  “I will.”

  One last brush of our lips, and I hurried out the kitchen door and into my clunker that Daniel had heated up for me.

  He stood in the driveway, shoulders hunched against the cold as I backed onto the street. I fluttered my fingers, smiling, as he waved.

  I’d had a taste of what a good relationship could and should be like, and I had zero desire to go back to what had been before.

  I ended up being ten minutes late for work and took an additional five to quickly explain to my boss what had happened with Stephen the evening before. He promised to be on the lookout for my ex, and I made my way behind the counter.

  My bruise drew a lot of empathetic attention, and I decided to go with the truth. Yes, I had been a moron for having stayed as long as I did, but I was proud of the decision I had finally made. So were my co-workers.

  The morning sped by, and I smiled, making eye contact rather than staying to myself and watching the floor between filling orders. Encouraging smiles and kind words compounded the peace I felt over my decision. I hardly thought of Stephen.

  Until break.

  He came in for coffee, eyes red, but from booze or tears, I couldn’t tell. Lines and bags under his eyes made him appear older than his twenty-six. He looked like a pathetic, beaten dog.

  My heart sped as he neared the counter, and once he moved my way, I turned toward him.

  “Can we talk?” he asked, his voice breaking.

  I glanced around. My boss watched from the register, and I smiled to ease his frown.

  Holding my shoulders back and my head up, I turned back toward Stephen. I was done cowering under his gaze. Done submitting to the abusive authority I had given him for so long. “I go on break in another minute,” I said, my voice even and firm.

  He swallowed and nodded, but I remained unmoved by his apologetic puppy dog eyes. “I’ll wait in my car.” He shuffled out the door and toward the left.

  “Everything okay?” my boss asked as I turned toward the back room.

  “Yes. He’s in his apologetic stage of this shitty game I am so over.” I huffed a snort of unfunny laughter. “He’ll grovel and beg for another chance, but this time he’s out of luck.”

  “Just stay c
lose so I can keep an eye on you.”

  “I will, thanks.” I grabbed my coat and headed out the front door.

  Stephen’s car sat two spaces to the left, and he rolled down his window as I drew near, clutching my coat close against the cold. “Hop in,” he said, pulling papers and a sweatshirt off of the passenger seat.

  “I’m good,” I said, not moving.

  “Please, Becky. I just want to talk, and there’s no sense in you standing out in the cold.”

  He has a point, I thought as the winter wind bit my cheeks. I nodded and rounded the car.

  The interior stank of stale beer and body odor. Even though my insides shook and heart sped, I kept my inhales shallow. I had decided to keep things short and to the point, no arguing. “I’m moving out, Stephen,” I said, angling to face him.

  His gaze narrowed, all trace of remorse gone from his eyes. “The fuck you are.”

  His fist shot out, and I didn’t have time to wince. Pain exploded across the bruise on my cheek, and my head crashed into the passenger window. Black spots ate up my vision, devouring my consciousness.

  Chapter Eleven

  Daniel

  My meeting ran long, and I had a hell of a time focusing on what I needed to be saying and doing to close the biggest deal of my communications business life. A six-figure bonus if I managed it properly.

  It was four o’clock before I left Hartford, and by the time I drove down my street, darkness lay like a thick blanket over the sky. No light shone from my house windows, and my gut twisted, instant adrenaline racing through my blood. I hit the button for the garage door.

  Empty.

  “Fuck.” I parked in the driveway, yanked off my tie, and called Chantelle. She hadn’t heard from Becky, and I’d forgotten to have her call her cousin earlier that morning. My apology fell on deaf ears. I owed her big. But first, I had to find Becky.

  I put through a call to Dunks and tore back toward the highway.

  Stephen had shown up, and Becky had gone outside to speak with him over her break. She never returned, and her car remained parked out back. Her boss had contacted the police, but until she’d been missing for twenty-four hours, they wouldn’t do more than a drive-by of Becky and Stephen’s house. The police had reported back to her boss that the house appeared empty with no cars in the driveway.

  Dread curled in my stomach, and I flew like a madman up 93, granny drivers and assholes unaware of the insults and curses I spewed their way.

  I slowed to a crawl at the end of Stephen’s street. No lights shone from the interior that I could see, but with some of the windows boarded up, that didn’t mean shit.

  No car sat in the driveway or in front of the house.

  I stopped in front of the neighbor’s and killed the engine, gaze glued to the ramshackled pile of shit Becky had been living in, a million plans racing through my head. Call the police—and tell them what? Domestic violence, perhaps, but there was no evidence from the dark, still house. Sneak in and possibly get shot or arrested for breaking and entering?

  Concern for Becky decided for me.

  “Fuck it.” I grabbed my five-inch blade out of the glove compartment and shoved it in my pocket.

  I stalked up to the front door without a coat, my breath in puffs of white leading the way. I banged on the old wooden door, shaking it on its hinges. I counted to ten.

  No answer.

  I thumped again, my gut telling me I needed to get inside.

  A quick study of both windows didn’t tell me a damn thing except it was dark inside. I strode around the side of the house through a crust of snow, kicking down the rickety gate to a half-toppled fence leading into the tiny backyard.

  The back stoop was worse off than the front, a few inches of ice clinging to the broken pieces. With a lack of street light, darkness hovered. I tried the door handle. Locked.

  “Fuck this.” I fished out my knife and kicked at the door, uncaring of the dress shoes I wore. The door cracked by the lock, and I kicked again. It swung open.

  “Becky!” I hollered, entering into the dark kitchen.

  A muffled yell came from overhead.

  Without giving heed to danger, I ran down a hallway to the entrance and stairs. “Becky!” I took the stairs three at a time, mere luck keeping me from tripping in the dark.

  Her cries came from a door at the end of the hallway that stood open. A dozen or so candles burned around the dungeon-like room, but all I saw was Becky.

  Ball-gagged and tied spread eagle in the middle of a bed, cane welts and open wounds covering her chest, stomach, and thighs.

  Rage lit through me, but I remained calm. A quick sweep of the room—no Stephen.

  I hurried to Becky’s side and set my knife down beside her head. “Shh…” I murmured as she stared up at me with wide, terror-filled eyes, tears dripping into her hair. Her nose ran, mixing with the saliva oozing from around the black ball Stephen had shoved into her mouth. Breath panting through her widened nostrils, she moaned.

  “Shh…” I whispered, pulling off the gag from around her head.

  She sobbed, and the sound tore at my heart.

  “I’m getting you out of here,” I said, grabbing my knife and cutting the hemp ropes from her wrists.

  She shivered and continued to sob quietly, more like a mewing whine, and curled into a ball the second I freed her ankles. Goosebumps covered her skin, and I became aware of the freezing temperature of the room as she curled into a fetal position.

  “Christ.”

  No fucking blankets or clothes in the room.

  “Fuck.” I stormed into the hallway and through another door into a bedroom. Lit by the streetlight coming through the lone window, the room stood vacant. Clean. Homey, even though holes littered the wall, exposing the lath beneath.

  I grabbed the comforter off the bed and hurried back to Becky, carefully wrapping her up.

  Eyes closed, she lay like a limp doll, and if not for the continued tears, I’d have thought she passed out.

  I pulled her into my arms and made my way down the stairs, cradling her against me.

  “T-too heavy,” she murmured.

  I ignored her and managed to flip the lock on the front door without putting her down. The driveway and street lay empty except for my car.

  “I’m sorry, sweetheart, but I need you to stand for two seconds.” I slid Becky to her feet, cursing myself for not thinking ahead, but I’d been so focused on getting her out of the damn house that clothing, let alone socks and shoes, hadn’t crossed my mind.

  I yanked open the back door and helped her crawl in, tucking the blanket around her as she lay down.

  “Do you need me to get anything from the house?”

  “N-nothing.” A shudder rippled the comforter. “He already s-smashed my Precious M-moments figurines.” Her hoarse voice came from the confines of the blanket, and I clenched my jaw as a sob followed her words.

  I wanted to kill the mother fucker. Rip his arms and legs off, and burn every trace of him off the earth.

  Body tensed, muscles screaming for release, I climbed into the car, started the engine, and flicked the heat on full blast even though sweat soaked my button-down.

  Lawrence General was less than ten minutes away, but I hopped back onto 93, heading south to Melrose-Wakefield. Closer to home, and it was where my friend Jarod worked in the ER.

  “You’re going to be okay,” I said, the sniffling from the back seat driving me mad. “I’ll never let him near you again. Ever.”

  “Th-thank you for c-coming for me,” Becky whispered.

  “I should have come sooner. I’m so sorry. So fucking sorry.” I pounded a fist on my steering wheel. “I should have known better. Shouldn’t have let you go to work this morning.”

  “Not your fault,” she murmured, her scratchy voice fading.

  A thought near choked off my breath. “Did he give you anything? Drugs? Anything to drink?”

  “N-no, and I’m s-so thirsty.”

&
nbsp; Jaw clenched, I broke every law making my way to the hospital.

  I parked in front of the ER entrance and managed with a little help from Becky to get her out of the car and into my arms again. I hip-bumped the car door to shut it.

  The hospital doors swished open, and I strode to the receptionist, shifting Becky in my arms. “Fucking ex-boyfriend beat the shit out of her.”

  The receptionist hopped up and hurried from behind her desk. “Here—” She pushed open a door and led me into the nurse triage area.

  “Jarod Zimmerman on tonight?” I asked, following her into the small room.

  “Yes.”

  I all but fell into the straight-backed chair, holding Becky tight. “Can you let him know Cooney is here with Becky?”

  She offered a smile, glancing down at Becky’s pale face. “Right away.”

  A nurse shuffled in, and I gave a quick explanation of what had happened.

  Lips pursed, she listened and took Becky’s temperature. “Pain on a scale of one to ten?” she gently asked Becky while clicking on the computer.

  “Eight … n-nine, maybe?” Becky’s brow furrowed, as more tears leaked from the corners of her clenched eyes.

  “Let’s get you in a bed,” the nurse said, standing. “Need a wheelchair?” she asked me as I stood.

  “I’ll carry her.”

  Nothing but a hanging sheet separated the bed I laid Becky on and the neighboring person moaning in misery on the other side.

  I stepped back, hands clenched and jaw aching like a mother fucker.

  The nurse pulled back the comforter from Becky’s torso. “God,” she whispered, gaze trailing over Becky’s chest and the dozen or so cane welts, a couple of which oozed blood. She grabbed the blood pressure cuff, ignoring my presence.

  “Cooney…”

  Jarod rounded the curtain, a question in his eye, but grinning. His gaze flitted to Becky, and his lips flatlined. He swung his head my way again, eyebrows raised.

  “Long, fucking story.”

  He helped the other nurse unwind the comforter from around Becky and covered her shivering body with heated blankets. The female nurse started an IV while I explained to Jarod what happened.