Lust (22 page)

I reached my other arm under her armpit and across her body, grabbing the back of her turned head. I threaded her hair through my fingers, pulling it tight so that she had to look at me over her shoulder. With my face in front of hers, I began to nibble on her ear, coercing more eager noises from her. I couldn’t get enough of her as I pounded roughly and archaically into her. It was as if I couldn’t get deep enough, couldn’t get close enough to her.

The harder I fucked her, the more the bed creaked beneath us. At first, I was able to block it out with the noises Ivy was making, but then she grew quieter and the creaking became louder. Without realizing it, my movement started to slow some, and then slow more until it was just long, hard thrusts.

Ivy’s hand gripped my burning bicep hard. Her nails dug into my skin, bringing my attention to it. I stopped completely and waited for her to say something, but she never did. That was when I realized the overly tight grip I had in her hair. I had been yanking on it, forcing her head to twist in an odd and painful position. I immediately released my hold on her and pulled away, taking my body completely away from hers. I moved to the side of the bed and sat facing away from her, cradling my head in my hands. All I could hear was the sound of her harsh and panicked breathing. Her frantic pants consumed me and filled me with dread.

When she didn’t move, I looked back at her. That was all I needed. One look at her and everything changed. My self-loathing immediately turned into concern for her. The ringing in my ears began to dissipate, causing the voices to evaporate. The selfish fear that had consumed me turned into a fear unlike any I had felt before. I dreaded that she was hurt or scared, and all I wanted to do was fix it. I wanted to take it all away and never let her feel that way again.

I reached out and grabbed her hand. “Ivy, come here.” I tugged on her hand, pulling her closer.

She didn’t move beyond the stretch of her arm.

Without pause, I turned and took hold of her waist and pulled her up. I spun her around until she was sitting on my lap, straddling my thighs. I couldn’t decipher what she was feeling. She was looking at me instead of averting her eyes but there was too much space between our bodies and she didn’t seem too eager about getting closer. I was about to say something when she finally spoke, silencing the words on my tongue.

“I’m sorry.”

I shook my head, sure I had heard her wrong. “What?”

“I wasn’t able to make it go away for you.”

Awe over her selflessness filled me. “It’s gone… You did that. I’m okay. But what about you; are you okay?”

The room was dark and I would have given anything to see her face right then. I needed to see her eyes to know what she was feeling. Everything about her was a contradiction from the way she sat on me to the words that came from her mouth. I desperately needed clarity.

She cupped my face in her hands and brought our mouths together, whispering on my lips. “I’m fine, Cade. I just wish I could make this go away for you. I wish I could help you the way you’ve helped me. That’s all I want to do.” She sounded as if she were on the verge of tears and it felt like a knife in my chest, sending piercing pain throughout my torso until I couldn’t breathe.

“Then fix me,” I said as I grabbed her ass in my hands and lifted her until she was pressing down onto me again. “Fucking fix me, Ivy.”

She was fully seated on me and I could feel her walls convulse around my throbbing dick. It was as if our bodies were ready but our heads were not. I could feel her need for me drip down my balls, but she wouldn’t move, and I didn’t want to force her to. I would wait until her body won out.

“I don’t know… I—” She hesitated and took a breath. “I can’t talk dirty like you want me to. I can’t scream and make those porn star noises you like. I can’t be on top and make this sexy for you. I don’t know what I’m doing and I don’t want you to look at me and wonder why you’re doing this. I may read about this stuff but I’ve never done it before.”

“This is your book, Ivy. This is your scene—your character. Show me how Ivy Jaymes would fuck her therapist. Show me how she would ride Caden Morgan’s dick. Read the scene to me. And when you come, come the way Ivy Jaymes would. Not the way I want you to, but the way you would if you were alone. I don’t need anything else… I only need you.”

“But you like—”

I interrupted her, “I like you, Ivy. I’ll like anything you give me. And when the time is right, I will fuck you like the men in your books do, and you’ll love it so much you won’t be able to help but to scream my name and claw my back. But that doesn’t matter right now because this is your story to tell. So tell it. Tell me the story of how you became the only woman to ever own me.”

I was completely contradicting everything I’ve ever felt or believed. Everything I said to her earlier on the couch became a lie. I thought intimate, passionate sex was only for people that desperately needed to feel loved by someone else in order to feel anything for themselves. But as Ivy slowly and erotically grinded on me, I realized that couldn’t have been further from the truth. I believed love to be nothing but a name given to a temporary feeling that could change in a matter of minutes. But as she pulled her body closer, pressing her skin against mine, and our heavy breaths mixed between us, I found that love was more than that. It was more than a feeling. It wasn’t something you simply felt; it consumed all of you and gave you a reason to take that next breath. And although it could be temporary, if you fought for it, love would always win. Ivy fought for me, and I would fight for her. I would never stop fighting for her.

Her lips were next to my ear, blowing hot air into it in short, frenzied breaths. Her walls began to clench, squeezing me, holding on for dear life and I knew she was about to let go. Her body began to go taught, no longer moving to the same rhythm as before so I dug my fingertips into her hips, feeling her bones beneath them, and helped her ride it out. I was on the edge, straining to hold on. I needed to wait for her to fall. I hadn’t given her any instructions on what to do other than come the way she wanted to. I hadn’t told her what to say or how to act, and I needed to watch it before I gave in.

A deep sigh left her, landing on my neck as her orgasm hit her. I thought that was it; I thought that was the true way Ivy reacted to release. But then her head shifted and I felt a sharp pain in my shoulder followed by heat. That was when I realized she was biting me, sinking her teeth into me, and marking me, the same way I had marked her. She was showing her ownership over me and I couldn’t hold on any longer.

I took her hips and slammed her against me, pulling back quickly and then doing it again. Two thrusts and I was coming with the intensity of a pubescent boy receiving his first hand-job. It ran through me, setting my skin on fire and making my eyes roll to the back of my head. I had never felt anything as intense as that before in my life, and I became an instant addict, needing it again before the high was even over with.

A smile curled my lips up as I placed soft kisses on her neck. I felt like a boy winning his first trophy in soccer. In one night, I learned what love was, I found the missing half of me that I never knew was missing, managed to have sex on a bed without hearing blood-curdling screams in my head. Ivy did more than fix me because when you fix something, you can still see where it was broken to begin with. Instead, she remade me from scratch. She built me back up when I had never even known I had fallen and made me stronger.

She improved me.

She completed me.

She fucking owned me.

“Hold on, Ivy. I’m about to get up,” I said as I flipped her over, keeping myself inside of her. I hadn’t realized until it was over that I wasn’t wearing a condom, nor had I pulled out. But instead of fear filling me, an overwhelming sense of security blanketed me. I knew that no matter what we had just done, it was meant to be. Something that beautiful and intoxicating between two people could never result in something terrible.

I pulled out slowly, trying to avoid making more of a mess. Her eyes widened, sparkling with fear in the white moonlight that was cast across her face. I saw the panic first, and then the confusion. I didn’t want to focus on that because I didn’t want it to persuade me to feel the same. I didn’t want to be fearful or confused. I wanted to stay in the contented bubble we had created together. I just needed her there with me.

“I’m going to get a washcloth; don’t move,” I said calmly before leaving her to grab something to clean her up with.

When I came back, she was still in the same position. She hadn’t moved an inch. And then I placed the cool washcloth against her, causing her to jump back. I stood between her legs and cleaned her off gently, keeping my calm composure. I then wiped myself off and threw the cloth into the laundry basket by the door.

She still hadn’t moved by the time I got back to the bed so I pushed the covers back and climbed in. I pulled her beneath the blanket with me, pressing my chest to her back as I slung one arm over her body and pushed the other beneath her pillow. I had never lain in bed with a woman before, but much like I had told Ivy to let her instincts kick in, it was as if my body just knew what to do with her.

I wanted to wait until she was asleep before drifting off, but there is something to be said about sleeping peacefully. It happens to those who are content. The people with nothing plaguing their minds had nothing keeping them awake. I had never experienced it firsthand and now I knew that it was true. I let go and allowed my mind to take me places I had never been to before... and it took me there with Ivy in my arms.

I was on my back with my right arm still shoved beneath the pillow and my other arm hooked over my face. I stilled for a moment before opening my eyes; something woke me up. I needed a moment to figure out what it was. And then I realized that even though my arm was still beneath the pillow, there was nothing occupying the pillow anymore.

I moved my arm away and turned my head to check where Ivy was; she wasn’t lying next to me. Instead, she was standing next to the bed, putting her clothes back on. Worry settled into the pit of my stomach as I stared at her back, wondering where she was going so early in the morning; the sun was barely up and we couldn’t have gone to sleep long before that.

I threw the covers off and stood, deciding to get dressed as well. If she were going somewhere, I would go with her. Maybe she was just hungry and needed some food. I’d feed her—anything she wanted. Her head turned but her body stayed facing away from me. There was a look on her face that I couldn’t place and it caused the hairs on the back of my neck to stand at attention. I couldn’t understand where this was coming from. We had a good night together—no, an amazing night.

“Where are you going?” I asked as I walked around the bed to her.

She pulled her shirt over her head without looking at me. “I really do need to get home. I need a shower and clean clothes. I have work that needs to be done and I just need to go home.” She said it as if she needed a hundred reasons to leave in case I had rebuttals to any of them. That worried me because it meant she was desperate to get away from me.

“Is everything okay, Ivy?” I asked, concerned.

She nodded but still wouldn’t look at me.

I walked up to her, not giving her space to turn away, and held her chin with my fingers. I waited until she opened here eyes before talking. “I don’t know what happened between last night and right now, but I really want you to talk to me. Don’t just walk out on me without talking about it.”

She smiled up at me and her eyes softened. “Cade, I just really need to get home. I don’t have anything to talk about. I feel gross, I need my own toothbrush, I want my own bed, and I desperately need clean clothes. I feel like a bum right now.”

Her reasons made sense and I felt like shit for questioning her, but I still couldn’t shake the feeling that something was wrong and she just wasn’t telling me. “Okay, I’ll give you a ride then. I have to go to the office anyway; I have been gone for a week and need to get things in order. Just give me a few minutes to get dressed.”

“No, Cade, you don’t have to do that. I can just call a cab. It’s not problem.”

“That’s ridiculous. You don’t live far from the office and I really do need to go there.”

Her face fell as she nodded in agreement.

I dressed quickly, throwing on a tee shirt and jeans, and then rushed through brushing my teeth and slipping on shoes. I was scared that if I turned my back for too long, she’d slip right out the door. There was a new tension in the air, one I couldn’t place. It felt like she wanted to bolt and I couldn’t handle that so I rushed through it all while keeping one eye on her.

“Are you sure everything is okay?” I asked as I drove her back to her apartment. She was quiet in the car and it left me feeling unsettled. “I can’t help but think something is going on that you’re not telling me.”

“I’m just tired. Had a long few days and a rather exerting night last night,” she teased with a small smile. That helped a little. Her smile didn’t
seem
forced. Maybe she was only tired; God knew I was. I felt like I could sleep for a week.

“Okay, get some sleep and call me when you wake up. I’ll just be doing paperwork and getting things in order,” I said as I pulled into her now familiar parking lot.

Ivy opened her door without even waiting for me to get out and help her. Her feet were out of the car and on the pavement before she turned around to look at me. “I don’t know how long it will take; I’m really tired. I might just sleep all day and then through the night again. So don’t plan your day around me.”

I could only nod as she slipped from the car and closed the door behind her. I knew nothing about relationships, but I did know enough to assume couples kiss before parting. Or at least show some kind of affection toward one another. I just chalked it up to her being tired and needing sleep. I couldn’t put too much thought into it without going insane so I made up excuses and drove to the office.

Excitement bubbled up inside as I sat behind my desk. I had a purpose and couldn’t wait to get started on it. I knew what it was that I wanted to do and get straight to work getting it done. My mind was made up—I would no longer work as a sexual surrogate. I would leave that behind and move on to what it was I had gone to school for. I had to go through my list of clients and explain the situation, offering assistance in finding another form of therapy or possibly another therapist. I had been the only technical surrogate within two hundred miles, yet there were other sex therapists—they just didn’t get as hands on as I did.

I spent hours going through each and every one of my clients, calling them personally. I contacted other therapists I’ve worked with or had been in contact with to inform them of my decision and let them know I would be referring patients to their practices. I had been a joke to some, demeaning what I did to their colleagues and looking at me as if I were nothing but a pervert, but most simply accepted it and kept their opinions to themselves. Those are the ones I referred patients to. The others didn’t seem to grasp the changing in times and knew they would be of no help to the people that needed it.

I decided to take a break around noon, knowing I needed food since I hadn’t had much over the last week. It showed in my body, too. I must’ve done some training while I binged on alcohol because my knuckles were beaten and bruised and my punching bag had been yanked from the ceiling. That was going to be a mess to fix, but so would be the holes in the walls around the house. Apparently, I had made quite a mess, breaking and smashing things, but I couldn’t remember any of it and there was very little evidence left behind after Ivy cleaned it all up. The only reminders I had of the last week were my hands, my weak body, and the destroyed drywall. My break from work couldn’t have come at a better time. I had a lot to fix. And I would start it at lunch.

I picked up my phone and dialed a number I hadn’t used a long time. It rang twice before a very confused woman answered. “Hey, Krista. I know we’re not supposed to have lunch until next week, but do you think you could meet me today?”

“Uh,” she said, dragging out the word that was filled with puzzlement. “Yeah. Is everything okay?” Leave it to my cousin to assume something was wrong just because I was calling her and asking her for lunch. Granted, it had never happened before, but that didn’t automatically mean something was wrong.

“Yes. Everything is actually… really good. I just wanted to talk to you.”

We made plans to meet at our usual spot. I knew I would get there first since I was ready to leave and she still had to finish what she was working on, but I was okay with that. It would give me time to gather my thoughts before I unloaded everything on her in no particular order.

She walked into the restaurant fifteen minutes after I did and carefully made her way toward me. An awkward smile stretched across her face and I knew she’d have a million questions for me, but I also knew she would give me a chance to explain before berating me with them.

“I’ve decided to quit my job,” I said as soon as she sat down. No greeting or asking how she was doing, just the first confession.

Her lips pursed and her eyebrows pinched together at the bridge of her nose. “How can you quit, Cade? You own the practice. How does one just quit something they own?”

“Easy. Just stop doing it. And that’s what I’ve decided. I’m not going to do it anymore.”

“So what are you going to do instead?” she asked, curiosity lacing her tone.

“I’m going to go back into marriage counseling. I’m keeping the practice and the office, but I’m changing what it is I’ll be doing there. I have to file some paperwork and stuff and that will take some time, but I think I need the time to get things in order. I’ve never really taken a break from work before.” And that was true. In the last twelve years, I had taken two vacations, and those were nothing more than extended weekends.

“You haven’t practiced in over a decade; how are you going to do that?”

“Easy. I’ve kept up with my license and maintained my continuing education hours. Just because I haven’t practiced doesn’t mean I can’t. I’m not stupid. I spent all that money on school; I wasn’t about to lose it all,” I explained, speaking to her like my answer was obvious and she should have just known.

Krista’s head tilted to the side and her eyes narrowed as she scrutinized me. “Something is different with you. You’re usually broody and cynical. Now you’re just… I don’t know, lighter. Happier. I’d ask if you got laid but I think that’s a rather stupid question. And I think whatever it is that’s making you this way is the reason you’ve decided to switch gears at work. Dare I ask if it’s a female?”

I let my smile answer that, unable to hide it. I wasn’t sure what was going on with me. I had never acted this way before. The thought of a woman never made me smile before and no one had ever described me as being happy or light.

“Where did you meet her? What’s her name? I want to hear all about her,” she said enthusiastically as she leaned forward on the table on her elbows.

“Work. She was a client. Her name—”

She pushed back with wide eyes and immediately interrupted me. “No. Cade… just no. I have known you my whole life, and I’ve watched you struggle for most of it. If she’s your client, then that can only mean that she has issues, too, and that cannot end well. Two broken people cannot possibly work. You are very put-together in your professional life, but you are a mess in your personal life. You don’t need someone that mirrors that.”

“Why can’t it work? We can help each other.”

“Oh, come on, Cade. You’re a smart man; you studied psychology. You know that doesn’t make any sense. Two people that live in the same darkness will only darken the other. If she’s as fucked up as you are on the inside, then she will only make you darker and vice versa,” she argued with a flip of her hand and a roll of her eyes.

“You don’t know her, Krista. She helps me. I’ve helped her, too.”

“Does she know? Have you told her about your parents?”

I stared at her, contemplating my next words. “She knows some of it.”

“Then how can you possibly tell me that she can help you? She doesn’t even know what it is she’s saving you from. You know as well as I do that you can’t fix something when you don’t know why it’s broken. You don’t need someone that is damaged; she will only damage you more.”

“No,” I barked from across the table in a deep growl, “we are two broken people that complete each other. Like two halves that come together and make a whole. You don’t know what you’re talking about. I should have never called you. I should have known all you’d do is try to pull me down.”

She pressed her hands flat on the table in front of her and calmed her voice as she said, “Your theory of two halves making a whole makes sense. I get it. But what you’re not understanding is that you are both broken in the same places. She can’t fill in where you’re lacking because she’s lacking there, too. You need someone who lacks in the areas you’re strong, and is strong in the areas you’re not.”

“Normal people don’t get me.
She
gets me. She has talked me through two panic attacks, took care of me after a week-long drinking binge—in which I saw my dead father and he accused me of fucking my mom—and set aside her own insecurities and pain to help me work through some of my own demons. Normal people wouldn’t have done that. They would look at me and give up. I don’t need normal. I need Ivy.”

She shook her head and blinked a few times before settling her eyes back on me. “I’m going to take this one thing at a time. Let’s start with the attacks. You’re having them again? Since when? And how did she walk you through them?”

“I guess she realized what was happening and talked me through it. I don’t know.”

“So she was with you both times? Have you had others when she wasn’t around?”

I didn’t answer; I knew what she was getting at and I wouldn’t give it to her.

“And this drinking binge… before I get to the dead father part, why were you drinking that much? You’re smarter than that, Cade. It seems to me like your life has gone downhill ever since this girl came into it. She can’t possibly be any good for you.”