Chapter 33
33
FOSTER
The fountain in the courtyard holds me in a trance.
My forearms rest on the glass surrounding my balcony, my head buzzing from the weed and bourbon. It’s enough to help counteract the turbulence in there.
My truth shifted under my feet when Remi told me hers.
Mine shaped me. Molded me into who I am. Hers tears it all down, and now the painting I created has been scraped away, revealing one of contrasting colors underneath.
I’m replaying conversations and interactions. Doubting every move I made.
I finish the remaining bourbon and then take one more hit, holding it in until I straighten up. I drop the roach in the ashtray on the outdoor coffee table and abandon the balcony.
Dropping onto the couch, I swipe my phone from where I tossed it earlier. Chase texted me mid-introspection.
if Director = (fucking + Tour Remi), then Foster = (best friend - vital info)^(You Suck) + Asshole
I’m uncertain if his math is right, but he gets his point across regardless.
The reality is, I didn’t plan on mentioning Remi to Chase at all—or Chase to Remi. Then the other night happened, and everything changed, and I haven’t even finished figuring out what it means.
But fuck, if seeing her at Chase and Val’s didn’t make one thing abundantly clear.
Remi Sinner is absolute.
And exactly like I thought, I was wandering until I got to where I’m supposed to be. It’s her. My endpoint has always been her.
Like I said, it’s complicated.
The response won’t buy me much time, but I’ll take what I can get.
I’ve no more than hit send when Remi sends a picture. A close-up of a door, part of the card scanner visible on the bottom right and two digits in the opposite corner. The last two in my room number.
I smile, shaking my head as I leave my phone and go to my door. When it opens, her eyes pop up, but mine detour down to her sage top. The straps meet behind her neck, and lace edges the low V in front. Add the bow tied right below her tits, and she’s a gift in need of unwrapping.
My gaze returns to hers. “Eventually one of us is going to knock.”
She hums, stepping closer until she has to tip her chin up, and I have to look down. “And ruin our streak?”
A smile plays at the corners of her mouth. I capture her around the waist, dragging her inside. She laughs, but my mouth connects with hers, and it morphs into a soft, sexy sound.
As ragged as the last three days have run me, kissing her surges me back to life.
I drop into one of the oversized accent chairs, cream to match the sofa, and she’s already crawling into my lap to straddle me. My hands flex against the front of her thighs once she settles.
Her lips brush mine. “You taste like bourbon.”
“Give me a few minutes, and I’ll taste like you,” I tell her.
She bites her bottom lip and looks down to where she’s playing with the front of my shirt, but then the tiniest scrunch appears between her eyes. I free her lip with my thumb, stroke across it.
“What just happened? What thought did you have?”
“You seemed bothered earlier before you left.”
When she flicks her gaze up, I read it easily. She thinks it’s because of her.
“Not because of you, Rem.” As much as I’d love to leave it there, doubt still lingers in her eyes. Mine lower. “A lot has changed since I last had you and Chase both in my life. The two of you meeting in person … You knew him before his accident. Seeing you together made me think about it.”
My head falls onto the chair back, jaw tightening.
She softly says, “I’m sorry.”
“I’m not.” I run my knuckles down her arm. “I’ll never be sorry to see you.” I follow the bend up to her wrist and sweep over her pulse point. “I just fucking hate thinking about his accident. He fell and almost died. It still messes with me a little.”
More than a little, but it’s not her problem. I won’t let it be.
The scrunch between her eyes returns, curiosity swimming as she studies me, and I worry how deeply she’ll dissect. Through my flesh and muscle, down to the bone.
Before she has me cut open and exposed, I sit forward, clutching the back of her neck. “I also couldn’t stay there and not touch you.”
My thumb teases the denim over her pussy, and her lids fall heavy.
“Fuck,” she whispers, and her chest rises faster.
“I couldn’t not kiss you.” I press my lips to hers and tease them open.
Remi grasps my hair as I thrust my tongue into her mouth. She moans into mine and ignites herself in my veins.
Starved for her skin, I strip off her top and bra, going straight for her perfect tits. I palm her breasts, kissing and sucking through her desperate whimpers. Her hips rock against my hardening cock, causing me to groan.
“Do you get it yet, Remi?” I ask, already working open her jeans and reveling in every sexy pant escaping her. “I can’t be near you without having you every goddamn way.”
She crashes back into me, kissing me like she understands perfectly.
I scoop her up and move her onto the chair before tugging off my shirt. And then I’m dropping to my knees in front of her, slipping my fingers into the waistband of her jeans. I peel them and her panties off and hook my arms around the backs of her thighs, her pretty pink pussy calling to me.
Remi gasps as I drag her to the edge of the cushion. “Foster— fuck .”
My tongue parts her lips, licks from bottom to top, and then I devour her.
She tangles her fingers in my hair while I drag against her clit, and she moans. I coax another from her when I suck it into my mouth. A shudder racks through her, nails scraping my scalp.
I groan against her. “Jesus, you taste good.”
I’ve wanted exactly this since I left her hotel room. Thought about having my face buried between her legs countless times.
She’s already so fucking wet when I tease her entrance, and I hum in approval.
“Such an eager cunt, Remi.” I dip two fingers inside her, causing her lips to part, her face to tip up.
I pump in and out and use the tip of my tongue to make tight circles on her clit.
“God, yes,” she says on a ragged breath.
The desperate sound she makes next jerks my cock. When my eyes lift, she’s biting her lip, hooded gaze on me without command. I’ve only been possessive over a fucking look when it comes to hers. But it fuels a primal desire to claim.
Remi whimpers at a light graze of my teeth. She moves her hips, the pulling at my hair rougher as she rubs against me.
“There you go, baby. Make yourself come.”
She rides my face, taking, demanding, and I give, letting her, loving every second. I thrust faster, swiping and sucking on her clit. Her back arches off the chair, her pussy floods my hand as her climax hits. And her face is goddamn ethereal.
She melts onto the chair, and I kiss her trembling inner thigh before straightening. Even more of a flush appears in her cheeks while she watches me lick my fingers clean. So I drag it out. Make it obscene.
The color spreads, and she draws her legs up, the intention to close them.
“Not a chance.” I catch her foot. My thumb runs along her instep, and I lean in, hooking her leg around me as I draw a peaked nipple between my lips.
“Fuck,” she hisses, clutching onto the back of my neck.
She wraps her other leg around my waist, and her drenched pussy drags over my abs. I groan, my dick rock-hard and aching to sink into her.
“Turn around.” I stand, flicking open the button on my jeans. “On your knees.”
As she moves to her knees on the cushion, I shove down my jeans with my boxers and step out of them. My eyes eat up every curve of her form, and I fist my shaft.
She looks over her shoulder. Her gaze flits to my hand then back to mine, and she licks her lips. Grabbing the back of the chair, she arches so her ass pushes out in offering, batting her lashes. “You want me like this, Foster?”
My lips twitch, and I move behind her, tapping the inside of her thigh so she widens them. “Careful with the teasing, baby. It’s not a good idea.”
“No?” she asks, arching more when she faces forward. “And why’s that?”
“Because you’re mine, Remi.” I palm her ass before spreading her open. “Teasing me makes me think you don’t remember.”
“Am I yours?”
She sucks in a shaky inhale when the head of my cock drags through her soaked pussy.
“Mhmm. And I already want to fuck you until you’re swollen and dripping with my cum. So don’t tempt me to make sure you never forget it.”
I line up and push inside her, grasping her hips. Fuck, she’s perfection, squeezing me within an inch of my life and gasping as I fill her. I slide all the way out and drive back in on a groan. Nirvana.
“Holy fuck.” Remi shoves her ass back on my next thrust, and I pump into her faster, watching her take every inch.
“Christ, your cunt swallowing my cock is a beautiful thing.”
The sound of flesh slapping flesh mixes with her whimpers each time I bottom out. It makes me fuck her harder, chasing her breathy moans.
When I glance at movement off to the side, my attention catches on the sliding door. While outside, the glass reflects for privacy, but whatever they used enhances the reflection inside too. With the lights, the door’s like a dim mirror, showing me her tits bouncing with my thrusts.
I grasp Remi’s jaw and turn her face so she can witness me pound into her from behind. “See? Look at how fucking perfect you look on my cock.”
She clenches around me while my hand slides down her neck and tight body.
“Now watch yourself come on it. Eyes right there, baby.”
I find her clit, and she cries out as I slam deep.
“Fuck, don’t stop, Foster. Don’t. Stop.”
I don’t stop. I haven’t been able to. I doubt I ever will.
Everything about this woman threatens to consume me whole. The way my name falls from her lips while she pushes back against me and contracts around my cock. All of it could sustain or obliterate me. Right now, I don’t even care which one takes.
“ Jesus fuck , Rem ,” I growl as she strangles my dick.
She clamps down, coming hard, and my hold tightens on her hip. I thrust into her, cum pulsing deep inside her pussy with my own release.
I drop my head onto her back and slow the roll of my hips, dragging in and out a few more times, loving the way it makes her shiver and clench again.
She’s still trembling when I kiss her neck and her shoulder. Then she sighs as I slide out and looks back at me with eyes like a meadow. My lips press to hers, and she pulls me closer, drags me down, down, down.
I realize it’s both. Always has been when it comes to Remi. She sustains me and obliterates me, and I’ll still be begging for more.
* * *
It takes a second to peel open my eyes. Another to recognize the pounding from the other room.
I mentally groan to avoid waking Remi. She’s snuggled against my side, so I’m careful while I get up. She’s also gloriously naked. And once I deal with whoever the fuck is still beating on my door, she’ll be full of my cock.
After throwing on a pair of sweatpants, I go to deal, shutting the bedroom door behind me. The knocking is familiar enough, I already know what to expect when I swing open the suite’s door.
Colt stands on the other side, looking as unamused as I feel. He has a keycard in hand I safely assume is to my room.
“Can we not do whatever this is right now?” I ask, bracing on the doorframe.
He snorts. “If you’d have answered anyone’s texts and calls since last night, we wouldn’t need to do this at all.”
Shit . I leave him there and stroll to the sofa, swiping my phone from where I set it after seeing Remi’s message last night. He follows me in, the door loud when it shuts behind him.
Everything shifted to Remi after I carried her into the shower. I let her wash my cum from between her legs and then fucked her against the tile. I warned her it was a new obsession. Then I put her in my bed, and we stayed there.
Scrolling through the messages, I let my annoyance cool. No emergencies, but plenty of variations of what the fuck, dude . Fair, considering I haven’t responded to a soul in over ten hours. No one’s had any visual sightings either since I came back from Chase and Val’s and holed up in my room.
He texted too, unsurprisingly, responding to my it’s complicated about me and Remi.
Chase
Then include a flowchart so I can keep up. Make it a whole presentation if you want. I’m not letting you vague your way out of this, bro.
“Are those…?”
I glance up as Colton trails off. He’s in the middle of the room, hands planted on his hips. He has a smug grin that typically earns him the finger, zeroed in on Remi’s clothes still on the floor. Along with mine.
Colton shifts his focus to me.
“Don’t,” I say.
“Don’t what?” he counters. “Don’t mention the top you definitely can’t fit in? Or the jeans that are all wrong for your body type?”
“Yeah. Both.”
“Right, right.” He tips his head toward the bedroom. “So you really prefer I not call out the odd quirk you’ve developed for shutting your suite’s bedroom door when you’re not in there, huh?”
I sigh, raking a hand through the back of my hair.
There’s no point in denying. He already knows Remi and I hooked up before Wannabe joined the fray. Hell, I admitted to it happening more than once while under a disco ball. Add in my sudden be nice to Remi speech from the other day, and he wouldn’t believe me if I tried.
“Are you fucking done?” I ask. He shrugs like an asshole, and I shake my head, returning to the bedroom. “I’m alive. You’ve verified. Let yourself out.”
Then he says, “Fishing.”
And I stop. Crush my eyes closed. “ Fuck .”
Anything else I’d blow off for the sexy redhead in my bed. Any one else.
I check the time on my phone and grab the handle. “Give me ten minutes. Without you in my suite,” I add.
He chuckles as I slip through the door.
Enough light leaks in around the heavy shades that I can track back to the bed. I crawl in and kiss Remi’s bare shoulder, then her neck, then I ease her onto her back. She grabs my bicep as my lips sink lower, and she makes the sweetest sound. So sweet I need to quit now or I won’t.
As if pulling back has ever been my strong point in regard to her.
While cupping her breast, I brush my thumb over her pointed nipple, teasing the other with my tongue. She pushes against my palm and mouth. Adding a scrape of my teeth has her wrapping her legs around my waist.
“Shit.” I ease away, avoiding a temptation I’ll never pass up. “If your pussy comes anywhere near my cock, I’ll have you face down, ass up.”
I drop onto my side next to her, propping on my arm.
“Hmm, and how is that a bad thing?” she asks.
My hand follows the curves of her body. “Colt’s waiting on me to go meet Chase for fishing. We haven’t seen him since this leg of the tour started, so we planned some things while we’re here.”
Not even working on the new album trumps time with Chase. He took the week off from his cushy job as a product manager at a tech company in downtown Austin for the same reason.
By now, my vision has adjusted so I can distinguish Remi’s features, minus details. But I know them anyway.
I’ve thought about waking up beside this woman more times than I can count. Even dreamed about it one time. I was furious when I opened my eyes. Partly because it wasn’t real—a harsh taunting of what I would never have—but also a reminder of why it wouldn’t happen and the pain it caused. I clung onto the latter. I refused to acknowledge the heartache of missing her.
I had to remember she was the reason it all fell apart.
Except she wasn’t.
And now she’s here. In my bed and arms. In my life.
It’s why I need to do this right with her. I’m not risking it turning to ash or being another dream.
Remi’s quiet, but the craving coiling beneath the filmmaker’s skin is not. That hunger to capture.
“We booked a place for axe throwing on Wednesday,” I say. “They’re shutting it down for us, and there’s a bar and rage room where you break shit. Dev will be in Arizona, but Felix is coming, and probably Christian.”
“Why are you torturing me?” She has an adorable pout to her tone.
“Hmm, is it torture if I’m asking you to come with your camera?”
She lights up even in the semi-darkness when she smiles. “I guess not.”
Far too close to losing all willpower, I haul my ass out of the bed to get dressed. On my way out of the bathroom, I stop. The bedside lamp Remi switched on washes a soft glow over her. Auburn and black hair contrast the white linens. Her soft lips contrast her hard hold on me.
Detouring, I grab another shirt from my bag. She pushes up onto her elbow, watching me as I walk over.
I toss it at her. “Put it on.”
She looks at it and then at me, but when I cock a brow, she complies.
With a smirk, I duck down and kiss her. “Good girl.”
“You don’t want me to leave?” she asks.
“Never.” I stop at the door, hand on the handle. “Tell me you’re mine, Remi Sinner.”
“I’m yours.” She says it without hesitation, and I swear nothing has ever felt so right, settled me more. Not until she asks, “Are you mine, Foster West?”
“Always,” I answer, needing that to be true for both of us. “Everywhere and every second.”
When I walk out, I roll my eyes. Colt’s still in the center of the room, arms now crossed. He shakes his head, his focus on Remi through the open doorway as I gather my keycard and sunglasses.
“No one called this,” he deadpans. Then, “Seriously, lioness. We can find you someone better to hook up with than Adams.”
“She knows my real name, little bro.” I give him a condescending tap to the cheek as I pass and look in at Remi. “I’ll see you when I get back, baby.”
The tint in her cheeks is visible from out here, but her lips press together, fighting off a smile when I wink. I snag Colton by the front of his sweatshirt and haul him to the door; his face confused the entire time.
And I walk out with a smile I haven’t smiled since wandering Prague. Well aware of how fast it snowballs from here.
Remi never relinquished all of my heart. No matter how much I denied it. It’ll take no time at all for her to reclaim the rest. Either by stealing it again or me offering it while at her feet.