Against Me (Cedar Tree Book 3) (9 page)

"Sounds good."

I have nothing more to say. In fact, I've said very little at all, but I heard every word Gus said. Trust his judgement above my own at this moment, which is why I came here.

"We good?" he wants to know; ready to dive back into whatever it was he was working on.

"We're good."

"Excellent. Now send that mouthy redhead back over this way, will ya? I think I have some grovelling of my own to do," he says with a smirk.

I rap my knuckles on the doorpost in confirmation on my way out.

The sound of voices gets louder as I make my way through the now dark guesthouse to the bedroom. Leaning against the doorway into the room, I can just catch the last few sentences exchanged between the women sitting on the big bed. It's obvious from the tearstained faces that some emotional stuff has gone down and I feel guilt eating at my insides, but then I hear Katie say that me walking out earlier meant I must have regretted what happened between us. I have to set her straight. She can't be further from the truth and it's time she knows it.

The moment her eyes meet mine, everything disappears. I barely notice Emma leaving. In a few steps I reach the bed, lean in and pick Katie up.

"Whoa!" she calls out, scrambling to hold onto my neck. "What are you doing?"

"You in my bed means I can't think, and I'm having a hard enough time thinking around you. We need to set some things straight." I tell her, trying not to get lost in the feel of her soft body against mine, her subtle scent teasing me, and her restless fingers playing against the short bristles on my neck. My dick, however, is a goner, and there’s no way to hide it when I sit down on the couch with Katie in my lap.

"Stop squirming, you're making it worse." 

When she throws me an irritated look, I'm glad to see the fire back in her eyes. There she is.

"Okay, enough of the manhandling, Caleb," Katie bats at my hands as I shift her around so she faces me. The old tank top and shorts she wears as PJ’s aren't doing much to cover her and I can't help the tortured groan that slips from me. Fucking hell, this is gonna be torture with her nipples poking through the threadbare material, and right in my face.

"What the hell is this? I honestly don't know whether I'm coming or going with you."

"Shh, don't get upset," I try to settle her before the tears I hear wobbling in her voice start flowing. "I just needed a minute."

Cupping her face between my hands, I tilt her head so I can look her in the eye. "I have wanted and waited to do this for so long, I need to make sure I don't miss a thing."

Her eyes are big and a little uncertain, and her lips are perfectly parted when I brush my nose along hers, breathing in the soft pants of her breath. A light brush of my mouth over hers, barely skimming, and then I taste the length of her full bottom lip with my tongue before sucking its plumpness into my mouth. Fucking heaven. Her taste is heaven and I need more. Katie's finger, rubbing against my scalp is all the encouragement I need and I finally let go of my hunger for her and take her mouth.
Jesus
. Delicious, wet heat meets me when my tongue plunges between her lips. Someone groans, and in the now furious tangle of lips and tongues, I can't tell anymore. I want inside her.  In one twist and without my mouth ever leaving hers, I have her below me on the couch, grinding my painfully throbbing cock between her legs. It isn't until she wrenches her lips from mine and murmurs, "Caleb," that I realize I’m fucking humping her like some deranged rutting animal. I shoot back upright and move to sit on the coffee table, my head in my hands.

"Fuck!"

Why? Why does she make me lose all control when control has always come so easy?

"Are you gonna walk out of here again?" The amused tone of Katie's voice tells me she may be a little more attuned to the struggle I'm waging than she was before. "Because, that would seriously mess with my self-esteem. You know; getting rejected based on my abilities for giving head
and
kissing?"

I throw my head back and laugh. "Oh sweetheart, you couldn't be further from the truth if you tried."

She shifts to where she’s sitting in front of me on the couch with a twinkle in her eye, and I have a feeling we may actually have crossed a barrier. I reach out and frame her face.

"You know I couldn't let you worship me without me worshipping you first, right? I’m having a hell of a time hanging onto my control around you, Katie. More so now than ever before, and it’s so foreign to me. I don't know where you’re coming from, not really. I'm usually very good at reading people, but as you've noticed, I haven't done a very good job reading you lately."

I'm pretty sure she's hearing me when her face softly rubs against the palm of my hand and the slightest of smiles hints at the corner of her mouth.

I think I've finally discovered what it means to get your socks knocked off. Hell, that kiss about stripped all my clothes right off my body. I don't think I've ever felt that kind of hunger before and I'm liking it.

This time when Caleb pulls away from me, I can sense his struggle for control, so I try to break the tension which seems to work, because he throws back his head and let’s go of that phenomenal laugh of his. Not something he does often, but when he does, it's a beautiful thing. His words go a long way to confirming what Emma had carefully suggested; that Caleb might be seeing me as more than an added responsibility. I’m thinking that panty-incinerating kiss made that glaringly obvious, and I'm kicking myself now for not seeing it clearer before. So wrapped up in my self-pity at times that it rubbed off on my view of everything and everyone else. That's gotta stop, and to be honest, finally acknowledging the feelings he gave me as something more than just 'brotherly’ is refreshingly liberating.

We spend some time talking, with him sitting safely on the coffee table lightly touching me, and me still on the couch. He tells me a bit about the job that took him to Shiprock and gives me some family insight, then I finally tell him about my attempts at searching for my biological parents.

"Wish you'd have told me. I'd have been happy to help out, you know."

"I know. I've just never been great at sharing," I confess with what I know is a sheepish grin on my face.

"Right. Just know you can―no judgement," he says with such a serious face, it makes me chuckle.

"Pretty sure that was never my concern, Caleb. More my own messy hang-ups, but I'm working on it."

"Good enough."

The sweet kiss he gives me is spoiled by a gigantic yawn I've been fighting to suppress for a while.

"Tired?"

"Mmm. It's late and this has been a day of so many emotional twists and turns, I'm surprised my head’s still attached to my body," I say as I stretch my arms over my head. A pained groan from Caleb has me look his way. "What?"

"You keep doing shit like that and it'll be impossible for me not to want to strip you naked and lose myself in you, but today is not the day, and I really want to sleep with you in my arms tonight."

With an almost angry scowl he stands up, adjusts himself and lifts me up in his arms, heading for the bedroom. 

After a quick wash and rinse in the bathroom, and warmly tucked under the covers, I feel Caleb slide into the bed behind me, wrapping his arms around my waist and tucking his face in my neck. 

"Best feeling,
Yázhí
," he mumbles, giving me tingles all over.

"What are you calling me?
Yázhí
?" I whisper.

"Little one, you've always been my little one. Now go to sleep."

"Night."

I pull up one of his big hands, kiss his palm and hold it pressed against my heart as I quickly drift off to sleep.

I
never had a chance last night to take in all the renovations that have taken place here over the last months, but now with the warm sun brightening up the morning, I let my eyes wander over the substantial changes made to what was once Emma's little one bedroom bungalow. You can't really tell from the front, it still looks like the same quaint porch-fronted, one-level house, but it was opened up and widened in the back with a larger kitchen and dining area, boasting large sliding glass doors that showcase the great view of the mountains. Off to one side it extends into a large office space with a separate entrance for GFI, a separate office for Gus, and a sizeable conference room.  Then there’s the guesthouse, set back from the main house, completely self-sufficient and bordering on luxurious, at least the shower is.

"I'm gonna want a shower like that," I tell Caleb as we take the interlock pathway to the back entrance of the main house.

"That so?" he chuckles.

"God,
yes.
It has showerheads frigging everywhere. Even down low, aiming up and reaching all those spots that never get any attention ‘cause they're hard to get to? That felt so good." I stretch my arms up, letting the sun warm my body when I feel him bending over me from behind, his mouth by my ear.

"Word of caution, little one. I was being a gentleman this morning, giving you some space and letting you have a shower alone, but now I'm done with that. We're about twenty steps away from meeting up with the boss and I have a hard-on the size of the Washington Monument. Already know my control is worth shit around you, but unless you want me to turn you straight back around to fix that, with Gus already watching through the windows, I suggest you stop teasing me."

My eyes snap up and sure enough, Gus is visible behind the glass doors of the kitchen, a mug of coffee in hand.

"But I wasn't..." I try before Caleb's deep growl from behind me cuts me off. Better not.

It'd been pretty clear this morning that he was trying to keep some distance.  I was disappointed to find the bed empty when I woke up. He walked in a few minutes later with coffee and suggested I have a shower so we could have some breakfast and a powwow at the house. The only reminder of the events of the night before was a gentle kiss on my lips.

"Morning. Better sit yourselves down, 'cause Emma's cooked for an orphanage," Gus says as he holds the door open for us.

"Shut your mouth, Gus, or you're not gonna get any." Emma pipes up from the kitchen, "And when I say 'any', I mean
any!
"

The faux-shocked expression on Gus' face inadvertently makes me chuckle, "Show me the way to the food, but I'm warning you, if I get any fatter, I'll need a sumo wrestler to wheel me around."

The dead silence should've been an indicator that my joke doesn't go over too well.

"I need a word, Katie," is my only warning before my chair gets pulled around and pushed back outside. Okay then. Next thing I know, Caleb is in my face with his eyebrows scrunched up.

"Please don't do that."

"What did I do?" I know, I just don't want to admit it.

"Tell me honestly," he asks, "is who you are so wrapped up in what you look like that you think it’s all anyone sees? ‘Cause I'm not buying it."

I shake my head because it's not. It really isn't, but insecurities pop up and spill out all over the place, unattractive as they may be.

"Aside from the fact that 'fat' is not an adjective that should ever be used in a description of you, it's a load of crap. You want it straight? You have gained weight, rounded out and softened up. You have flesh my fingers want to sink in and my body wants to rest on, but I'd have taken you any way – thin, firm, soft – ‘cause the only place you can find ugly is on the inside."

I nod. Shit, what else am I supposed to do? It's beautiful, what he says. I don't want to take anything away from that.

"Let's go eat."