Authors: Jessi Gage
“You think sex will hurt me?” she asked, laughing harder.
His jaw tightened, but after a second, the seriousness melted from his face, and his eyes danced. Then he laughed too. Derek serious was a sight to behold. Derek smiling and laughing caught her body on fire.
“Sweetheart,” he said when their laughter trailed off. “You’re asking for it.”
“You’re right. I am.” She trailed her hands down his chest and fiddled with the button on his jeans, not undoing it, just flirting with it. She wanted him, and he knew it, but he’d have to make the first move.
His throat moved with a swallow. “How do you feel? Do you have a headache?” He watched her intently, concern replacing his mirth.
“I feel good.” When the meds wore off she always got a spectacular headache, but she’d learned just when to pop the pills to keep the throbbing at bay. “But I could always feel better.”
His mouth curled up at the corner. Then his eyes darkened. He made a sound low in his throat that made her body pulse in interesting places. Then he kissed her. Gentle at first, gradually ramping up the intensity, as if giving her a chance to tap out if anything got to be too much.
Like that was going to happen. She urged him on with her hands, skimming them up the warm skin of his back under his t-shirt, holding on because his kisses sent her reeling with desire. She urged him on with her legs too, bringing her knees up to cradle his hips as he lowered them.
“Yes,” she sighed. She’d needed this since the moment she’d been torn away from him too many hours before dawn last Tuesday night. She had a feeling she would never stop needing this.
He nibbled at her lips. “I’ve got you, sweetheart.” Then he kissed his way down her neck while their fingers tangled as they both tried to unbutton her shirt. She gave up and let him do it, and after a minute, he had her peeled out of her top.
Bruises from the seatbelt colored her collarbone and ribs with sickly yellow. He traced them with his rough fingers, tickling over the healing skin, making her shiver. While he looked her over, she watched carefully for signs of guilt. She saw it in the set of his jaw, dampening the heat in his eyes. Maybe this hadn’t been such a good idea. She hated when he beat himself up, and seeing more of her injuries seemed to make it worse.
But oh, it felt good when he rubbed his palms up her ribs and cupped her breasts through her lacy bra. A moment later, his mouth covered one nipple. He drenched the fabric, then sucked at it, pulling a moan from her. She forgot her doubts and rocked her head back in pleasure, only to be distracted by her helmet denting her ear and the strap tugging at her throat.
She growled and reached for the latch.
“No.” His fingers closed around hers, moving her hands away.
“My head is surrounded by pillows. I won’t get hurt.”
“The doctor said it stays on twenty-four-seven. I’m not taking any chances with you.”
He was probably right, but that didn’t keep her from arguing. “I can’t feel sexy with it on.”
“You look sexy with it on.”
She snorted.
He smiled a devastating smile, the guilt well hidden.
“It’s uncomfortable.” The protest was half-hearted. She had Derek in bed with her, finally. She could tolerate a little discomfort.
He slipped her bra straps down her shoulders, following the path with kisses. “I’ll take your mind off it.”
He flicked his tongue over one nipple, this time without the barrier of her bra. Electric pleasure raced from her breasts to her womb. Her back bowed. Derek’s hands on her shoulders kept her head motionless. Panting and on the verge of climax just from his wet kisses on her sensitive peaks, she pushed at his head, coaxing him to put his mouth somewhere even better.
He obliged with a wicked grin.
Unintelligible mutterings fell from her lips as his tongue stroked just where she needed it. His hungry moans ripped through her, whipping her into a frenzy of white-hot desire.
She would die from the pleasure. It was too much. Not enough.
He slowly pressed two fingers inside, just to the first knuckle. When he withdrew them, she growled.
He hummed, an amused sound that nearly sent her over the brink.
Then he pressed in again, this time further, then again, and again, each time coming closer to filling her.
Strangled cries came from deep in her chest.
He curled his fingers.
Oh! There, yes, there.
Liquid heat flooded her in a rush of exquisite sensation. Her hips bucked against Derek’s restraining hand. She screamed his name.
While she regained the ability to breathe, he came up and kissed her jaw, her chin, her lips. She clung to him, rubbing and squeezing the thick muscles of his back and arms through his shirt. His jeans chafed her belly where his erection made a hard ridge.
“Off,” she said, tugging at his waistband.
He stretched out beside her and traced a lazy finger over her belly and hip, making no move to obey.
“This, too.” She lifted the bottom of his shirt, exposing his firm stomach. Oh yes, she’d be licking every square inch of that caramel colored skin.
He finagled the material out of her hand and smoothed it in place, shaking his head no. Burying his face against her neck, he breathed her in and continued petting her, in no apparent hurry to move things along.
Unacceptable.
She tunneled her fingers under his shirt to stroke his chest. He moaned, soft and low, but when she popped the button on his jeans, he gently removed her hands.
“Make love to me.” As if he didn’t know what she wanted.
“I just want to take care of you, right now, sweetheart.”
Something felt off. Her shoulders tensed. “You just did. Very well, I might add. Now I want all of you. Like before. I want us to take care of each other.”
Their gazes caught and held. His overflowed with desire and love, but something dark lurked beneath, something more than the guilt she’d reluctantly gotten used to. He hid his face against her neck again, but not in time. She recognized the something else. And she didn’t like it one bit.
* * * *
“You’re punishing yourself.”
Derek couldn’t get enough of Camilla’s sweet, smoky voice. Hell, he couldn’t get enough of her. Even after seeing her every day for almost a week, he still counted the minutes at work until he could get off and meet her, like a kid with a crush. But he didn’t like what she’d just said.
The judge had ordered him to pay a fine and attend an anger management class. The punishment was only part of his sentence. The rest of it was seeing Camilla’s bruises, hearing her soft groans when she moved too quickly for her healing body, and longing to stroke her gorgeous hair, knowing it would be months before he could do it again. He had enough punishment without feeling the need to add to it.
He hushed her and said, “Let me.”
Her creamy skin felt like cool satin under his roving hand. He loved touching her, loved having this access to her body. Jesus. Her taste, the sound of her cries, the trust in her sated gaze... She was every bit as innocent and every bit as wild as she’d been those nights in his room. And now that they could truly be together, he figured he had far more to be thankful for than to regret. He didn’t need more than that. He didn’t need what his body craved. Just being with her was enough.
But she had other ideas. She pushed him onto his back and crawled over him, straddled his waist, looking so damn beautiful and delicate his breath stopped in his throat. She’d started to put some weight on, but she was still thinner than she’d been in his bed those nights. Her breasts had lost a cup size, but still overflowed his hands. Her formerly athletic body had become almost waifish. A strong wind might blow her away. But she had strength in her gaze.
“No. Let me.” She plucked his hands off her hips and pressed them into the bed at his sides as if she wanted him to keep them there.
He fought a grin and failed–seeing her exercise her newfound confidence turned him on like nothing else. Curling his hands in the comforter to keep them still, he let her pet him. He was hard as iron under her hot, wet center, but he fought the urge to lay her down and drive himself into her welcoming body like he had that one, amazing night.
Half an hour ago, he’d have said he couldn’t wait to get her alone, demanding more than kisses. But now that he had exactly that, his body had become a battleground. His head and his dick wanted to give her what she asked for–give it to her through dinner time and into the night, then hold her while they slept in her bed, then give it to her some more before he had to leave for work in the morning. But that shrinking lump in the pit of his stomach flared to new life at the thought.
Camilla didn’t just look delicate. She
was
delicate. Even with her helmet on, a single bump in the wrong place and she might have a seizure or go back into a coma. Fuck, she could even die.
He wasn’t punishing himself. Just practicing common sense. She needed time and rest. She needed gentleness from him, not the kind of sound fucking he couldn’t stop thinking about. If he gave in to what she wanted, he couldn’t guarantee he wouldn’t hurt her.
His dick would recover, but if he did anything to even remotely prolong her recovery, he’d never be able to live with himself.
So he gritted his teeth and endured her insistent explorations, knowing she’d drive him wilder and wilder with every caress, and knowing he’d lie there and take it, because to do what she made him want to do would endanger her.
She skimmed her hands under his shirt, massaging his abs, up to his pecs. Her fingers brushed his nipples, and he sucked in a breath. His dick became even harder. It ached with the need to claim her. His whole body strained to make love to her. But he just gripped that damned comforter and thought about air handlers to keep from acting on his urges.
When those lithe hands moved downward and dragged his zipper open, he let go of the bed and pulled her hands away.
“Baby,” he said, his voice ragged. His dick lay full and heavy against his stomach, the head poking over the band of his briefs. Every breath he took made the elastic rub and shoot sparks of pleasurable agony through his groin. “It’s time for dinner,” he said, starting to sit up.
She pushed him down. “You’re not letting me,” she scolded, but the gentleness in her tone revealed more than determination on her part. He recognized the slant of her eyebrows and the set of her jaw. She was concerned for him. Offering comfort came naturally to her, and apparently, she thought he needed it now.
He didn’t. He needed a cold shower and a peaceful evening with her. He’d find his peace in making her dinner, rubbing her back and shoulders, helping her with her PT, kissing her over and over again, and just being with her.
“I let you any more, and my nuts’ll explode. Come on. Let’s go eat.” He sat up again, this time lifting her with him as he slung his legs over the edge of the bed.
“After the accident with my dad, all I had was my mother. But I’d caused her more pain than anyone else ever had.”
He stopped her with a squeeze. “Don’t.” Thinking about all that past hurt would just upset her. “Don’t go back there.”
“Let me,” she said, and she cut him a look that made him shut up. She sat back on his thighs, eyeing him to make sure he didn’t interrupt again. “She kept baking all my favorite things and buying me the stupid teen magazines I used to like a few years before. It was like she couldn’t stop trying to get me to smile. But I didn’t want to smile. I wanted to hurt. I wanted to be punished.”
He bit the inside of his cheek to keep from telling her this wasn’t the same thing.
“The more she tried to be nice, the more I hated myself until finally, something had to give.” She shifted in his embrace and held out her arm. She touched her thumb to the skin on the inside, above her elbow. It was the place he’d seen her absently stroking in the hospital, when he’d pushed her too hard and almost lost her. The place would normally be hidden against her body. No one but a lover would ever touch her there.
He blinked up at her, confused. Why would she show him her arm?
“Look,” she said.
He did, and when he made sense of what he saw, his lungs contracted, right along with his heart. The perfect satin of her skin was interrupted by fine, barely visible ridges that reflected the light differently. Dozens of horizontal slashes marched up her arm from elbow to armpit, each about two inches long.