Chapter 33
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
ELLIE
I sit on my sofa with a book propped open, but I’m barely taking anything in. The crying stopped some time ago. Now I’m just sitting here, wrung out and empty, staring at the page without really seeing it.
Mum’s words keep circling back. What would your father have made of all this? That was like a knife to my gut.
I can picture Leah speaking to Mum, tearful, concerned, convincing. Even so, it tears at me how readily Mum took her side over her own daughter’s. Even Douglas’s news that he’s spoken to a solicitor couldn’t do anything to numb the hurt. I just can’t see how I’m going to fix this.
A knock at the door pulls me from my thoughts.
I’m not expecting anyone. My first thought is Douglas, but I told him not to come. Could it be Leah? The idea turns me cold. After what she did today—turning up at Mum’s door uninvited—I wouldn’t put it past her to come here next, to look me in the eye and take satisfaction in the mess she’s made.
Swiping at my cheeks with the heel of my hand, I approach the door. I open it cautiously, braced for the worst.
Douglas stands outside, hands shoved into his jacket pockets.
I blink. “I thought I told you—”
“I know,” he says. “But I couldn’t not come.”
For a few seconds I just stare at him, then my mouth trembles. I press my lips tight, trying my damnedest to hold it together. Douglas steps inside and closes the door behind him.
I swallow. “Are the twins—”
“My parents are at the house,” he says. “They’re staying the night.”
I nod because it’s easier than speaking.
He draws breath. “Ellie, I—”
“Shh.” I lift a hand and place it flat against his chest. I don’t want to talk about my mother or Leah or any of it, not now he’s here. I don’t want explanations or reassurance or careful words. I just want him.
Douglas seems to understand. His arms come round me, and something in me gives way. I fold into him. For the second time today—but the first in front of another person—I cry, and not in a quiet, contained way. My shoulders shake, and I grip fistfuls of his jacket.
Douglas holds me tighter. He doesn’t tell me it’s all right or that I shouldn’t let it get to me.
He just holds me, solid and warm, his chin resting on the top of my head.
After a while, though I couldn’t say how long, my breathing steadies and the tears stop.
I stay where I am, my face still buried against him, but my hands loosen in his jacket.
I can feel his heartbeat. I can smell him too, soap and salt and Douglas.
I pull back slightly, just enough to wipe at my cheeks and look up at him.
He meets my gaze, and the tenderness in his expression almost sets me off again.
He’s so heartbreakingly handsome. I’m sure my own face is blotchy and puffy from crying, but the way he’s looking at me makes it impossible to care.
I lean into him again, into his warmth, and close my eyes. His hand rubs up and down my back, slow and steady. Minutes pass. When I finally open my eyes again, he’s still looking at me like I’m something precious. My gaze shifts to his mouth.
“Kiss me, Douglas.”
He does, softly, gently, his body warm and comforting against mine.
Soon, though, I want more. I deepen the kiss, sliding my tongue across his lips, teasing them open.
My hand travels down over the warmth of his stomach to his belt, then lower still.
I brush him through his jeans and feel him stir beneath my hand.
Douglas breaks the kiss. “Ellie, I . . .” He swallows, reddening. “You’re upset, and I don’t want you to think I came round to . . .”
“I know.” I don’t stop stroking him through the denim, and despite his hesitation, his cock continues to harden. There’s something achingly sweet about him being embarrassed by how easily his body answers mine. “Don’t ever apologise for responding to my touch, Douglas.”
He gives the smallest nod, and I stop touching him to undo his belt and ease down his jeans, letting them fall to his ankles. His grey boxer briefs cling to him, outlining the rigid shape of his cock. I can’t resist tracing it through the fabric, and Douglas lets out a sharp, unsteady breath.
I hook my fingers into his waistband and draw it away from him, just enough to feel the trapped heat against my knuckles. Then I peel down his boxers.
His cock stands tall, thick and flushed. I wrap my hand around it, gripping it firmly. It’s something solid and real to hold on to when everything else has been pulled out from under me. It’s hot and pulses in my hand.
I sink to my knees and slide my grip down to the base, tugging back his foreskin and revealing the head in full.
I draw it into my mouth and suck—gently at first, tasting salt and skin, feeling the silky heat of him against my tongue.
I’m not exactly experienced at this, but the broken groans that leave him tell me I’m not getting it wrong.
The rest of the day fades away. Mum. Leah. The shame and anger and helplessness of it. All of it blurs until there’s only Douglas in front of me, his cock in my mouth.
Douglas’s hand comes to rest at the back of my head, his fingers threading into my hair.
I move my free hand to his arse and squeeze, feeling the muscle clench beneath my palm.
I take him deeper, working my tongue along the underside of his shaft, and he says my name—rough, almost desperate.
The sound of it sends a pulse of heat through me, and it settles low and liquid between my thighs.
I pull back slowly, letting him slide from my mouth with a wet sound.
His cock is slick and shiny in the hall light.
One hand still wrapped around the base, I look up at him.
He’s wrecked, flushed from his throat to his ears, his eyes dark, his mouth slightly open.
He looks like a man who’s been taken apart and doesn’t know how to put himself back together.
“I want this inside me.” I give his cock a firm squeeze. My voice is low and steady, and it hardly sounds like mine at all.
Douglas doesn’t need to be told twice. He pulls me to my feet, and the kiss that follows is hard and deep—his mouth on mine, tasting of need, his hands already tugging at my clothes.
We stumble towards the bedroom, shedding layers as we go.
By the time we get there, Douglas is completely naked, and I’m in a bra and knickers.
This is my room. My quiet, private little space, where I sleep and read and tuck myself away from the world. And now Douglas is here, with not a thing on.
We break apart long enough to get rid of the last of what’s between us—me fumbling with my bra, Douglas making quick work of my knickers—before his mouth is on mine again.
Then suddenly I’m being lifted, and a startled laugh catches in my throat as he carries me to the bed.
He lowers me onto the mattress, then climbs over me and kisses me again.
I can feel everything. The hard length of him pressing into my stomach. The roughness of his palms as his hands slide down my sides. The soft drag of his lips as his kisses move from my mouth down to my neck.
His hand slips between my thighs, and the first brush of his fingers there makes me jolt. I’m already aching for him.
“Christ, Ellie,” he moans. “You’re so wet. Can I taste you?”
“No,” I say breathlessly. “Your cock, Douglas. I need it inside me. Now.”
He pulls back slightly and reaches between us to take hold of it. He guides it to my entrance, the head nudging me, then his eyes find mine, a final question in them.
“Douglas!” I plead, and he pushes in, filling me completely.
It’s almost too much at first, the stretch and heat of him. My hands grip his back. For several seconds we just breathe. Then his hips begin to move, slowly, carefully, and I move with him.
It’s not the urgent, dam-breaking sex of our first night in Bannock, or the exploratory, growing confidence of the morning after. This is something else, more intentional, more intimate somehow. And the whole time he looks at me.
In his eyes I see everything. Want, but also tenderness. Anger at what was done to me today, and a quiet determination to take care of me. And with him looking at me like that, I can’t help wondering just how much he can see in me.
On instinct I turn away, that familiar urge to hide when I feel too exposed. But Douglas cups my jaw and gently turns my face back to him.
Stay with me, his eyes say. And so I stay, right here with him.
We keep moving together, slow and deep and utterly in sync. At one point his hand finds mine on the pillow, his fingers threading through my own.
The pleasure builds in slow rolling waves rather than one sharp climb. Each crest is higher than the last. Soft broken sounds slip out of me while Douglas presses kisses to my temple, my cheek, the corner of my lips.
I come with a gasp that turns into a moan, my whole body tightening around him, my back arching off the mattress as ecstasy ripples through me. Douglas watches me through it, and when my body finally softens beneath him, he lets go too, coming hard with a rough groan.
Afterwards, he collapses beside me, wraps an arm around my waist, and pulls me against him. I curl into his side, my head on his chest, one hand resting over his heart.
The room is quiet except for the sound of our breathing.