On Loverose Lane (Return to Dublin Street #1)

41. Beth

CHAPTER FORTY-ONE

BETH

T his was a mistake.

The thought finally broke through the numbness as Iain Erstwhile introduced me to people whose names I’d never remember. His hand was on my lower back, and it felt wrong there. His hand didn’t belong there.

For the first time in a week, my heart rate sped up.

There had been nothing after I lost control of myself in the shower. Like this veil had come over me to protect me from my own emotions. My mum and dad were constantly texting because the last time we’d spoken, they’d known something was wrong. My team had asked me all week if I was all right.

“I’m fine,” I kept saying.

But I wasn’t anything.

I felt nothing.

Not panic.

Not anxiety.

Nothing.

It was extreme. Even when my period came the day after, I felt nothing. Usually my hormones had me a bit all over the place.

But nothing.

Just going through the motions. The only calculated thing I did was avoid him . I didn’t think his name. Couldn’t. I got up, left when I knew he wouldn’t be around, went to the gym, got to work. Lily asked me to be a guest on her podcast. I said yes. We scheduled it in. I brought on a new author client. We lost a client. Iain Erstwhile asked me to be his date to a charity benefit he was attending in the city. We’d talk about Social Queens becoming his local SM management for Pennington’s. I said yes. I bought a dress. My period ended so silk was safe to wear. I put on nice shoes. Did my hair. Looked in the mirror.

I felt nothing.

Until him .

Until seeing him outside the apartment building for the first time in this never-ending week. It didn’t hit me like a freight train. No, it was like the first fissure in the veil of numb. As I sat in the dark limo with Iain and he smiled in the way a man smiles at a woman he wants, I felt another crack in my numbness. Because I felt a slither of panic instead.

With each step we took at the formal party, every person he introduced me to, every time he brushed his body against mine, there was another crack, another splinter. Until the numbness gave way to this compression weighing painfully on my chest.

I could feel a panic attack coming on.

Excusing myself, I hurried into the ladies’ restroom in time to lock myself in a stall. Dread crashed over me as my chest constricted, cold tingles breaking out across my face as fear rendered me frozen against the stall door.

Finally, I got a hold of myself enough to go through my mindfulness.

What I could see, hear, and smell.

The latter was unpleasant, and I wrinkled my nose at my surroundings. You’d think at a fancy do like this, they’d keep the restroom cleaner. That made me snort to myself. At my own ridiculousness.

I was a mess.

My pulse was still erratic and my legs trembled, but at least I felt like I could breathe again.

But the grief was horrendous. Seeing Callan …

I was angry at myself for letting my heart attach to him. For letting him break my heart.

And I was furious at myself for agreeing to go on a date with the biggest potential client I’d ever met. It was so bloody obvious Iain was more interested in having sex with me than a business arrangement.

I needed to leave.

I couldn’t stay here.

Not when I felt like I might burst into loud, messy sobs any second now.

There was a queue as I left the stall, and I didn’t meet anyone’s eyes in case I bumped into someone I knew. Not that it was likely. My parents might be well-known in Edinburgh, but they didn’t attend things like these anymore unless absolutely necessary.

After splashing cold water on my wrists, I left the restroom in search of Iain. I saw him chatting and smiling with an attractive brunette and felt not even a twinge of jealousy. It wasn’t that he wasn’t attractive or that past me wouldn’t consider a May-December affair.

He wasn’t Callan.

And until I was over him, I couldn’t be with anyone. Not even in the casual sense.

I approached Iain and despite the brunette’s obvious flirting, he turned into me as soon as I reached him. Iain slipped his arm around my waist, drawing me into his side. “There you are.”

I smiled awkwardly at the brunette who sneered in disappointment and strolled off.

“Let’s leave.” Iain picked up my braid, his knuckles brushing my breast in a move that might have been deliberate. “We can talk … business.”

“I’d like to talk business.” I stepped out of his hold. “But this was a mistake coming here as your date. I’m not … I can’t. Business, great. This”—I gestured between us—“I’m just … someone hurt me recently, and I’m not in a place?—”

“Beth.” Iain lifted his hands in a placating gesture. “It’s fine. I understand.”

“I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have agreed. I?—”

“Stop it.” He ducked his head, giving me a kind smile. “I got to put in an appearance here with a beautiful, poised woman on my arm. If that’s all I get from you, I still feel very lucky.”

Wow.

That was one of the nicest things anyone had ever said to me. “You’re a gentleman.”

He gave me another kind smile and raised his arm for me to take. “Let me drive you home. We’ll set up a meeting another time.”

Relief and sadness crashed over me as I took his arm.

The limo pulled away, leaving me outside the flats.

I wanted to burst into tears.

Part of me wanted the numbness to come back, but another part of me was scared shitless of it.

Feeling, no matter how badly, was better than not feeling.

It had to be.

I let myself into the building, lifting my pretty dress so I could climb the stairs. My sandals clacked annoyingly with every slow, heavy step upward. For the first time in ages, I longed for a bathtub. I only had a shower in my flat. But a soak in a tub with a glass of wine sounded like the right kind of end to this strange evening. Callan had a bathtub.

Arsehole.

Not one word from him all week!

He didn’t give a flying feck about me.

I should have slept with Iain. It wouldn’t have mattered to Callan. I wouldn’t have been betraying anyone. Callan was probably off shagging the first woman who threw herself at his cock! One of the many reasons I had deliberately avoided his routine this week was because I did not want to bump into him and one of his one-night stands.

Ooh, the anger felt good.

Much, much better than heartache.

I found myself stomping up the last flight of stairs, imagining him at a pub tonight with Baird and John, flirting with some strange lassie and deciding to bring her back to his bed.

To the bed we’d made love in.

We’d. Made. Love.

I faltered, sucking in a painful breath.

He had made love to me.

I didn’t imagine that.

Why?

Why did he do that if I meant nothing?

I hated him.

He was a shagging, messed-up, broken wee fuck boy, and I was better?—

I stumbled as I reached the landing.

Callan sat slumped at my front door, his elbows to his knees, his head bowed in his hands.

My pulse raced.

He lifted his head and the anguish in his gaze threatened to take me down. “Did you sleep with him?” he asked, his voice rough around the words.

Indignation straightened my back as I slowly moved toward him. “Jealous?”

Callan’s huff of laughter was bitter and hoarse. “Jealous?” he whispered.

That’s when I saw the sheen in his eyes.

Tears.

Oh my God.

My legs shook.

“It’s more than jealousy, Beth,” he hissed. He pressed a fist to his stomach. “I feel like my fucking guts are being ripped out.”

With my legs ready to buckle and hope ballooning too big and overwhelming in my chest, I lowered to my knees before him, uncaring if my dress got dirty.

Our eyes held, his pleading.

“I didn’t sleep with him. I didn’t even kiss him.”

Callan squeezed his eyes shut as he rested his head back against my door and a tear leaked free.

“Callan?”

“You … you terrify me.” He finally opened his eyes. “You have me in the palms of your fucking hands.”

Relief bubbled up and over, my tears springing free. I swiped at them as I promised, “You have me in yours.”

“Do I?”

“You know you do.”

“Why did you go on a date?”

“Because in order to get through the past week, I’ve been walking through life like I was on Novocain. It was Erstwhile. I wanted a business meeting with him, and he asked me to this benefit instead. I said yes. Then I saw you … and I remembered my heart was broken. So I asked Iain to bring me home.”

Callan cursed and reached out to take my hand. My fingers instinctually curled around his. It felt so good. Like a piece of me clicking back into place.

“You can hurt me as badly as I can hurt you,” I told him. “It’s mutually assured destruction, Captain. So why don’t we try our very best not to hurt each other?”

His fingers flexed around mine, relief lightening his expression. “Okay, princess.”

“Are you … are you saying you want to try this for real?”

“I can’t seem to function without you, so, aye. I want us to try this for real.”

My lips trembled and he suddenly pushed away from the door and stood. He pulled me up and I wobbled in my sandals.

“Can I come in?”

I nodded, my fingers shaking with a million different emotions as I pulled the keys out of my clutch. It was a lot to come at me after a week of nothing. I opened the door and whirled on Callan. His expression was still brooding, his shoulders seeming to bristle with tension. “You’re not … you won’t leave?”

That earlier anguish returned as he sensed my fear. “Beth, no. I’ve been miserable without you. I won’t leave.”

Deciding to trust in him because he’d never been anything but honest, I let us into the flat. My heart raced, a part of me not quite ready to believe this was real. I heard him close the door behind us as I kicked off the sandals that were biting into my feet and strolled into the kitchen. “Can I get you a drink?”

Callan stopped me with a hand on my arm.

I turned to him in question, and his answer was to draw me into him. His embrace was tight, desperate, as he buried his face in my neck and shuddered.

Tears spilled down my cheeks as I returned his hold, my fingers curling into the muscle of his strong back.

I pulled away to kiss him. His lips were gentle, teasing, searching. It wasn’t a kiss for the sake of leading to sex. It was loving and tender. It was the most intimate kiss we’d ever shared. My tears this time were of relief and gratitude.

Because I knew …

I’d found him.

The person I’d been searching for, for as long as I could remember.

“Don’t cry, princess,” he whispered, attempting to catch the tears on his lips. “It kills me.”

“They’re good tears,” I promised. “Happy tears.”

That seemed to appease him, and his lips brushed over mine. He tasted salty now. I deepened the kiss, wrapping my arms around his neck and drawing up on my tiptoes.

Callan broke away. “We don’t have to do anything tonight. That’s not what I came here for. I need you to know that.”

“I do.” I clasped his face in my palms, his stubble scratching against my skin. His words ironically only turned me on more. “But I want to. I’ve missed you. I want your mouth on me everywhere. I want to feel your stubble against my thighs.” I gasped the last part, very much aroused at the thought. “I want you to be mine. Really mine.”

Heat brightened his eyes, his jaw clenching.

Then I felt him hard against my stomach.

I wanted him all over me. I wanted his scent, his hardness, his mouth, his heat, his cum … I wanted to be covered in every inch of him. It was like a mad haze that took control of me. I tugged at his shirt, but Callan curled his hands around my wrists to stop me.

At my questioning gaze, he walked me back until my arse hit my dining table. “Sit.”

Oh.

Wet slicked between my thighs as I hopped up onto it.

Callan held my gaze as he slowly drew up my dress. I lifted my left hip, then my right so he could raise it up my torso and over my head. I laughed a little when his gaze zeroed in on the adhesive cups that covered my nipples. His lips quirked up at the sound as I peeled off the pads.

Callan brushed his thumbs over my nipples. “Do those hurt?”

“Nope. But silk and hard nipples are a match made in heaven. I didn’t want my nips showing tonight.”

He glowered.

I shoved him gently, knowing where his mind had gone. “A man’s touch isn’t the only thing that makes my nipples hard, Captain. Air conditioning, a cool breeze … my nips are kind of happy to say hello under any of those circumstances.”

Seeming to bite back a smile, he brushed his mouth over me as he cupped my breasts and squeezed. “Not any man’s touch, though.”

“No.” I reached for his trousers. “Not just any man’s. Only yours, in fact.”

Possessiveness hardened his expression, but he stepped out of my reach. “Hands on the table.”

I shivered at the command but did as I was told.

“Good girl,” he murmured.

If he’d said that to me at any other moment, I’d want to smack him. In this moment, my body visibly reacted. My nipples peaked and my lower stomach muscles trembled.

Callan smirked.

“Cocky bastard,” I huffed.

His answer was to grin harder and tear my knickers down my legs. He threw them over his shoulder, gripped my thighs in his strong hands, and spread me.

“Oh!”

“Lie back.”

I did.

It wasn’t the most comfortable position I’d ever been in, but none of that mattered at the first swipe of his tongue between my legs.

I cried out, lifting my head to watch him. His eyes were on me as he ate at me.

“Oh my …” I arched into his tongue and then scrambled onto my elbows because I wanted to watch.

“Callan,” I panted as he licked and sucked and tormented my body. When he drew my clit between his teeth, I thought my heart might explode.

I came, my back bowing as the orgasm rushed through me.

But he didn’t stop.

He lapped, devouring my climax, teasing me into another. His fingers thrust between my legs as he sucked at my swollen clit until I was nothing but the pleasure building inside.

“Callan, Callan, I can’t!” I’d collapsed on the table, my gaze on the ceiling as my second orgasm crashed over my body, proving me a liar.

Because apparently, I could.

And hard.

I was still shuddering through it, dazed and hot and sweaty, when I found myself manhandled onto my feet. “Callan?”

“I want to make love to you,” he forced out between gritted teeth, “but I really want to fuck you hard first.”

“That one,” I agreed breathlessly. “We could do the other la—” I cut off on a gasp as he spun me, bending me over the table. Excitement shivered down my spine.

“Spread.”

I did, the cool air between my legs and the wooden table scraping against my nipples as I lay on my stomach. I glanced over my shoulder at him as he fumbled frantically with his zipper.

Callan didn’t even undress fully. He’d barely released his cock from his boxer briefs when he thrust inside me. I cried out, pushing onto my elbows for better balance as he gripped my hips in his hands.

“Oh fuck,” he groaned, pausing for a second as he coasted his palms over my arse. “You’re so perfect. You feel so perfect. Hot and tight and mine .”

I shuddered again as he drove into me.

It was as promised. Hard and fast and furious and so glorious, I’d remember it for the rest of my life. It was how desperate he was, how much he needed me. It made me feel powerful.

The fact that he kept hitting my G-spot at this angle was also pretty phenomenal.

With every fierce thrust of his hips, the table moved, scraping against the floor. I was crying so loudly with each drive into me, I was pretty sure my neighbor downstairs would hear us.

“Fuck, fuck,” Callan huffed breathlessly. “Beth. Fuck, Beth.” His grip on my hips was bruising now. “Come around me, princess. Come on my cock. Hard.”

His words sent me over the edge. I screamed hoarsely as my inner muscles clamped down on him, throbbing in release and drawing him deeper, tighter into me.

“Beth!” he bellowed as his hips slammed against me one last time. I felt him unleash, his cock pulsing inside my tight, shuddering heat.

My arms gave out and I flattened against the tabletop.

I felt his soft lips on my back, his breath panting against my skin as he kissed me through the aftershocks of our climax. He brushed my braid off my back to kiss farther up my spine, his hands coasting over my hips and lower back before moving down over my ass.

His thumb slid down the crease and I let out a little moan of surprise as he prodded into me where no one ever had.

I felt his cock twitch inside me.

He pressed his thumb in a little more.

“Callan?” I shivered, glancing over my shoulder at him.

His expression was dark with hunger, despite his recent orgasm. “Have you ever taken a man here?”

I shook my head and bit my lip against another moan as he gently pushed his thumb in. It burned, but it wasn’t wholly unpleasant. Not with him growing hard inside me. With him here, too, filling me up everywhere, it was overwhelming.

Exciting.

“Are you mine?” he asked huskily, but there was emotion in the question, not just sex.

“Yes,” I answered honestly.

“Good.” He leaned over, and I gasped at the sensation of him sliding deeper into me at the same time he pushed two fingers into my ass. Gentle. Prodding. Not in too far. Merely a teaser. “I want all of you to be mine. Every fucking inch of you, Beth, inside and out. Until we don’t even know where I begin and you end.”

“Yes.” I nodded, wanting that too.

He withdrew against me and then slid his cock back in, all the while his fingers were creating a stretching burn in my ass. “Callan!”

“We need to build you up to my cock,” he said gruffly. “But one day you’ll take me in your arse, and then I’ll own every inch of you.” He withdrew from me abruptly and then gently lifted me off the table. I practically melted as he swooped me up into his arms. “Just as you own every inch of me.”

Joy suffused me as I took his mouth. He kissed me all the while carrying me into the bedroom. Didn’t bump into a single piece of furniture. Showoff. I said as much, making him laugh. Then he did his signature move and threw me on the bed.

But this time when he came over me, his touch was more tender than ever. He caressed me everywhere as I reciprocated the exploration. It was a long time of kisses and licks and petting before he moved inside me again. When I eventually came around his cock, it was from the kind of lovemaking that brought tears to my eyes.

Yet unlike last time, Callan kissed the tears away. Then he guided me to the bathroom to clean us up and after, he led me by the hand back to my bed.

We fell asleep in each other’s arms.

At some point during the night, he woke. I sensed his rawness, his desperation even as he drew me out of sleep to make love to me again. I gave him that because I perceived he needed it. We both needed it.

It would take a while for the magnitude of our feelings to settle.

Until then, we were a raw, open nerve.

But it was worth it to love him this much. Even if neither of us was quite ready to say the words out loud.