by Ella Fields
He let out a short laugh, soaked in disbelief. “Clover, lying to you, saying hurtful things to make you forget about me… Next to losing Mason, those were some of the hardest things I’ve ever done.” His fingers whispered over my cheek. “Harder than living in a house full of junkie drunks. Harder than stepping over glass ten times in the place I was meant to call a home before learning to wear boots everywhere. Harder than having my friends look at me with pity. Harder than having my dad hit me until I grew old enough to fight back.”
He blew out a tremulous breath that coasted over my lips.
“I didn’t want you because I couldn’t have you. I’ve wanted you since I first saw you digging around in the dirt, planting and nurturing. Since you smiled at me like I wasn’t some grubby loser outcast who’d just moved to town. Your soul”—his finger brushed down my cheek, dipping over my chin and down my throat, then landed on my chest over my erratic heart—“and this beautiful thing inside here? It’s pure sunshine, the best form of warmth, and I’m sick of feeling like I have no right to it. I’m sick of forcing myself to remain out in the cold.”
I took his hand, bringing it to my mouth to kiss his scarred knuckles. “Do you still think you’re unworthy?” A wet laugh escaped. “Because that’s the biggest load of shit I’ve ever heard, Ever.”
He grinned. “I’ll never be worthy, but fuck if I even care anymore. I want to deserve you, so I’m going to do just that.”
Heat rushed through me, and the room seemed to shift around us as I marveled at the admiration shining from those green orbs. “Yeah?”
“Fuck yeah.”
We moved at the same time, our lips meeting, teeth nipping, and our hands clawing at our clothes. My teeth opened his mouth for my tongue to skim inside and found his waiting.
A groan shook itself free of his throat, rumbling into mine as he got my shorts unzipped and halfway down my legs. I flipped onto my back to kick them and my panties off, and he cupped my face, turning it back for his mouth to return to mine.
My hands searched and unzipped his fly while our tongues dipped and stroked in that raw, sensual synchronization they’d learned long ago.
Home. Kissing Everett, having his hands stroke over my thigh to my hip, raising my T-shirt, felt like coming home.
“Tell me,” he said into my mouth as I tried to sneak my hand inside his pants. “Tell me you love me.”
“You already know I do,” I whispered. “I never stopped.”
His eyes closed, a hissed breath cutting past his lips and over mine when I wrapped my hand around him. “God, I need you.”
I moved my leg, and he took the opening, his fingers racing down my stomach, leaving chills in their wake to drift through my arousal.
Feather soft, he explored, evoking breathy sounds from me as I watched his eyes darken and felt him grow impossibly hard in my hand. A thick finger prodded at my entrance, gently pushing inside. A gleam lit his eyes, that velvet voice. “Look what I do to you.”
I garbled out some kind of response, and his finger retreated, moving to my clit and circling.
Then he tore away, kicking off his jeans and briefs, and I laid on my back as he loomed larger than life above me, tugging off his shirt.
He’d filled out even more, probably since he’d stopped drinking so much and started working at the hardware store. Columns of packed muscle bunched as he lowered over me, his cock bobbing before the tiny hairs of his sculpted lower abdomen, and his hands lifted my shirt.
Strong yet gentle, they skimmed over my skin, lifting the material to my chin. He pulled it over my head, leaving it there as I felt his mouth drop to my pink laced bra.
Damp heat wrapped around my nipple, teeth pulling the cup down and hands pushing mine over my head.
Wrapping his tongue around one of the hardened buds, he grumbled out, “Fuck, I’ve missed these tits.” He moved to the other, giving it the same attention while one hand left mine. It ended up between my thighs, and a finger dunked inside to fuck me, slow and deep.
It was heady, too much, being laid out like this. My legs spread as his fingers tortured and his hot mouth laved at my breasts. I couldn’t see anything, only shadows through the material of the shirt that was heating with every breath I struggled to take. It heightened every touch, stroke, sound, and breath.
“Everett,” I warned. “You’ll make me come before—”
“I don’t care. Soaked isn’t good enough. I want you dripping. I want to hear it when I sink inside you.” His breathing was growing labored, matching my own as he murmured against my skin, curling his finger inside. “When I fuck you, I want you shaking from what I’ve done to you, from what I do to you.”
“Shit,” I choked out, my body stilling as ripples of tingling heat spread from between my legs, shooting everywhere.
He gripped my quaking thighs, and then he was inside me in one quick thrust.
My legs clamped around his back, and I rode the heavy aftershocks his invasion caused to roll through me.
He tugged at the shirt, and I tore it off, throwing it to the floor as my desperate hands grabbed for his face. His lips caressed, his hips gyrating into mine, circling and grinding.
A groan penetrated my foggy thoughts every time he slid out before driving back in. “I swear to God, Clover. It’s just me who gets this heaven now.” His lips brushed my cheek, moving to my ear to suck the lobe. “Understand?”
“You can’t leave.” I couldn’t stop myself from setting my worst fear free. “You can’t fucking leave, Everett.”
He paused, his hips, his mouth—all of him—stilling, and raised his head to stare down at me.
Thumbing a tear from my eye, he shook his head, remorse lining his forehead. “I’m here to stay, Stevie. So tell me, are you all mine?”
My smile wobbled as I pushed thoughts of dark eyes aside. I wrapped my arms around him, then rolled, shoving his chest until he was on his back, and I was sitting on his cock. “Does it not feel like I am?”
My hips rotated, and he sat up, hands moving up my back to grip my shoulders and push me down until I swallowed all of him and all breath had fled my lungs. My head fell back, and his lips pressed into my throat. “Now it does.”
Once I’d adjusted, I clung to his neck, my lips hovering over his as we both rocked our hips. A slow climb to ecstasy, an overwhelming sensation different from all the times we’d had sex before, but no less fervent in potency.
“So wet, so fucking warm.” His voice was as soft as the fingers stroking my back, tangling in my hair, and coasting over my ass. There was no room between our chests, our hearts echoing the same frenzied beat. “Do you feel me everywhere?”
“Every-fucking-where.” I gazed into his eyes, watched them ignite before his lips took mine, and I felt his finger glide down my ass.
I tensed. “Trust me?”
After a prolonged beat, I nodded.
He brought his fingers between us to my mouth. “Lick.” He groaned, hips jolting beneath me as I licked and sucked the two thick digits. “Your cunt tastes good, doesn’t it?”
My breath hitched as heat crawled into my cheeks, and my body squeezed his in response.
He chuckled. “So god damn beautiful.”
Our mouths met again, sliding over each other as his fingers found the tiny opening and began to rub. I jerked over him, and we both moaned.
He didn’t push inside, for which I was thankful. I wasn’t sure if I was ready or down for that, but the wet tickle of his finger was enough to make my thighs clench tighter around his hips, and all too soon, that tingling heat returned.
Our climax wasn’t fast and swift, it wasn’t pounded and beaten from us, but rather, coaxed through the slow reconciliation of our bodies.
My clit rubbed against him as he filled me deeper than ever before. I felt him twitch, felt the break in his exhale as his lips faltered over mine, and we barreled into shared orgasms that had us dissolving and melting.
Afterward, his forehead on m
ine and our skin sweat-misted, we clung to every sensation, our lips fused as it faded.
“Do you really think they’ll be up for this?”
We’d borrowed Adela’s car and were on our way home.
For the first time since I’d left last Christmas, I didn’t dread returning. I felt only slight nerves for what might happen when we got there and told everyone the news.
My hand hugged Everett’s as we traversed the back streets of Plume Grove, nearing the beach. “I think they’ll play hard to get, but I’ll give you back door entrance if they say no.”
Everett barked out a laugh, then paused, glancing over at me behind his Ray-Bans. “Wait, seriously?”
He’d been trying to ease me into it in the weeks since we’d reunited and crashed together in a way that still sent ripples of warmth cascading down my arms. Every time since had been an adventure, had evoked sensations that’d laid dormant, waiting for his touch, but that first time… it’d felt like a new beginning. And I’d never felt a beginning shake me in ways like that. In ways no orgasm ever could.
“Seriously.” I hoped like hell they were on board. Anything the size of his cock had no business trying to fit into a place as small as my ass. It didn’t seem like a fun time to me.
Everett shifted in the driver’s seat, releasing my hand to tug at his jeans. “Number one thousand and twenty-two.”
“What?”
He spared his parents’ house the briefest of glimpses before pulling into my parents’ driveway. “The number of hard-ons you’ve given me when I’m around your family.”
I clicked off my seat belt, reaching below my legs for my purse. “Only a thousand? We’ll need to work on that.”
“You’re gonna be the end of me, Clover.”
Grinning, I went to climb out when he grabbed me, pulling my face to his for those lips to kiss mine. “I love you.”
“I love you.” So surreal that after years of longing, of dreaming for this moment, it was actually happening.
I just prayed that walking inside that house together, making that big of a statement, didn’t burst this feeling that kept expanding every time I was with him.
We made it to the porch steps before the door was flung open, and Mom came rushing out.
Her arms squeezed us both, her eyes glassy as she kissed our cheeks. “I’ve got no idea what you two are up to, but I’m just…” She blew out a breath, stepping back with her hand over her chest. “So happy you’re all here again.”
Dad stood in the doorway with a pensive look on his face as he studied me and Everett.
I forced my lips into a smile, and his features softened. More hugs were had, and he clapped Everett on the back, whispering something to him that sounded like, “You really don’t wanna fuck this up, kiddo.”
Inside, we followed them to the living room, where the rest of the guys, even New Guy, sat sprawled over the couches.
Hendrix on his beanbag, thumbs moving across the screen of his phone, muttered, “Not even kidding.”
“I need me a job at the golf club,” Graham said.
“You wouldn’t score as well as Hendrix, man. Don’t waste your time.” Mom cleared her throat, and Dale’s eyes widened before he pasted on that smarmy, mischievous smile. “Well, well.”
Everyone looked up, and I went to remove my hand from Everett’s, but his grip tightened.
“To what do we owe this pleasure?” Graham crossed one leg over the other, his polo shirt looking a little more snug as his arms spread over the back of the couch.
New Guy moved away from him a little.
“Enough with the Shakespearean shit.” Hendrix slipped his phone away.
“That’s not Shakespeare, you fucktard.”
“Language, ladies,” Dad said, taking a seat on the only spare couch, then gestured for Mom to join him.
“So are you two lovebirds going to take a seat?” Dale rubbed his brow. “Or do you wanna continue standing there like stunned mullets?”
We moved into the room and sat on the floor near the fireplace. I crossed my legs quickly, cursing the fact I’d donned a dress. “We have news.”
“Yeah? Pregnant?”
Mom’s eyes popped. “Hendrix.”
Hendrix shrugged. “What else could this broken family meeting be about?”
Everett spoke then. “Keen Records. We’ve been offered a recording deal.”
Silence permeated the room, thicker than the heat invading the opened windows.
Hendrix opened his mouth, closed it, then opened it again. “H-How?”
Everett shook his head. “That doesn’t matter. What matters is Jack Keen wants us in the studio within the next thirty days. So”—he glanced around—“are we in?”
Everyone spoke at once, yelling, cheering, shouting, cussing, and then finally, Hendrix’s voice broke over the commotion. “Wait, wait, wait.” He leveled Everett with a look colder than ice. “How do we know you’re not bullshitting?”
I opened my purse, dug for Everett’s phone, and handed it to him.
Dale tutted. “You finally got a phone and didn’t even call? Harsh, man.”
“It was only recent, and shut up, I don’t know your number.” Everett found Jack’s name, then set the phone on speaker on the rug below us as it rang.
It reached voicemail, and Jack’s voice echoed, “It’s Jack, leave a message that won’t waste my time.”
Hendrix scoffed, collapsing into the beanbag. “Of course.”
Everyone seemed to deflate, even Mom, who was pursing her lips with her hand tight in Dad’s.
Everett didn’t seem bothered and just twiddled his thumbs, waiting.
The phone rang, and he answered after the third ring. “Yeah.”
“Sorry, man. Was racing to get back into the office in time. They all there?”
Everett’s eyes lifted to the stunned faces of his friends, his family, and he grinned. “They’re all here.”
Jack’s sharp laughter filled the room. “Okay, so what’s the verdict, boys?”
“Then the old bastard had the nerve to say it looked like a pancake.”
Sabrina choked on her laughter, coughing and sputtering as she wiped beneath her eyes. “Pancake ass. Oh, my dear lord.”
I set the tape down, drumming my fingers over the countertop. “How old are you two again?”
Gloria ran her hand over my hair as she flitted by the counter. “Never too old to joke about the shape of one’s ass, my darling.”
“Damn right,” Sabrina agreed, still snickering as she bent down to sort through the cellophane. “He was right, though.”
“You love it,” Gloria shouted.
A text came through, and I nabbed my phone from beside the register.
Ever: If I have to listen to Dale and Jack fight one more time…
I smirked, then read the one he’d sent straight after.
Ever: Oh yeah. Have I told you I love you today?
The band had started rehearsing at a converted warehouse studio Jack owned. They were there from dawn until dusk, six days a week. Some nights, Everett didn’t get home until almost midnight, judging by the texts he’d send. We weren’t living together, but I stayed at his place Friday through Monday. I’d hoped to spend more time with him now that school was out, but it seemed pointless to hang around in his room without him there.
The past month had been a whirlwind of band meetings, practices, and argument after argument. Mom and Adela had a good point, though, when they’d told me to steer clear and let them sort it out. They needed to clear the air in order to create and focus on what they all wanted. Left with little time, they only had enough material for half an album and failed to agree on anything new.
I began tapping out a response when another message came through, this time from Adela. I accidentally opened it but figured I’d respond quickly.
Adela: I’m fresh out of supplies. Can I steal some until I can get to the shop later?
Me: Knock yourself out.
Clicking back to Everett’s message, I got halfway through typing a reply when it hit me.
I usually had my period at least a week before Adela got hers.
The phone slipped from my hand, clattering to the wooden surface.
Gloria glanced over her shoulder. “You okay?”
Then Sabrina’s hand was in my face, waving. “Shit. What the hell is wrong?”
“I think she might faint. Quick, get the spray bottle.”
“You get the spray bottle. You’re closer.”
Their hands started slapping at my face, and I pushed them off. “I’m fine. I’m fine. I just… I have to go.”
There was no point in worrying until I knew for sure. These things happened. There’d been a few times when my period had been so light, I’d wondered what the point of it even was.
I raced into the back room for my purse. “I’m sorry. I’ll be back tomorrow.”
“Not if you’re still as pale as a sheet of paper,” Sabrina said. “Oh, hey, your phone.”
I backtracked, mumbling my thanks as they watched me with mirroring looks of concern. “I’m okay,” I repeated, hoping it was true, praying it was true. “I swear.”
Then I was out the door, practically running down the street in my haste to get to the drugstore.
I purchased three tests, different brands, and didn’t so much as glance at the young girl working the checkout as I threw a fifty-dollar bill down and scooped up the boxes, then dropped them into my purse.
One fell out as I was exiting the store, and I bent over to pick it up, when someone wearing familiar looking boots and black jeans beat me to it.
If I wasn’t going to faint back at the shop, I feared it was about to happen now.
“I’d ask how you are, Petal, but I think I’ve caught you at a bad time.”
With my heart sinking like a stone, I took the box from his hand and shoved it into my purse as my eyes welled.
Then I turned around and kept on walking.
“Whoa, wait.”
“Can’t. As you said, bad time. And even if it wasn’t, I’ve got nothing to say to you.”