Chapter Fifteen
Morgan
My father pulled back and stood up. He reached into his pocket for his phone and dialed a number.
“What the fuck do you want, Sal?”
“Where the fuck is that asshole?” my dad growled into the phone.
King sighed heavily on the other end of the line. “He’s in Rosewood. I’m on my way there now.” The phone was quiet, and then I heard my brother ask, “Why didn’t you tell me I had a fucking sister?”
“Because I didn’t want her involved in this shit, and it’s not like you ever want to talk to me for longer than two seconds without telling me what an asshole I am.”
“Yeah, ’cause you’re father of the fucking year, right?”
“King,” a woman’s voice hissed. “Sal?”
“Yeah, honey?” My father’s shoulders slumped when the woman spoke.
“We’ll talk about this when we get there.”
“We’ll see you soon, Grace.”
He disconnected the call and turned. “Grace is coming too?” I asked.
I hadn’t met Grace; there was no reason I would. I’d never been to Nebraska. Never thought much about King and the others until Devlyn spilled the beans unknowingly.
“Yeah, you’ll like her.” My father smiled, and I felt a pang of jealousy.
“Daddy, I don’t want you to hurt him.”
“Baby, he left you pregnant and alone. That’s not okay.”
“That’s what you did,” I snapped.
“Morgan,” my mother scolded.
“No, Mom,” I began, turning to face her. “That’s exactly what he did. He left us to keep us safe. He kept me a secret my entire life with the notion that I wouldn’t get hurt. Then he found out I had a brother, and he kept it from me.”
“Is that why he didn’t come back to you? To keep you safe?” my father barked. “I never fuckin’ left. I was here for every important moment in your life.” He looked at me with hurt in his eyes. “The ones you told me about, anyway.”
“Low blow, Sal,” Mac clipped.
“I don’t know why Jude never came home. I wouldn’t let him explain because I’m tired of the men in my life making decisions for me. I’m tired of the men in my life thinking they know better than I do about what I can handle and what I can’t.”
I paced the room, muttering, “Do you have any idea how hard it was to keep him a secret?” I stopped and glared at my father.
“To keep you a secret? My best friend had an amazing father. One who not only was her date for the father-daughter dance in sixth grade, but he was mine too, because I couldn’t ask my father.
I couldn’t tell anyone he was the head of the Irish Mob.
You were there for the big moments, but not for all the important ones.
“I didn’t tell you about my wedding because what would be the point? You wouldn’t have walked me down the aisle. You would have been in the back of the room or watching through a window.
“You were always there, but you weren’t.
You stayed on the edges of my life. I had a father who told me every day how much he loved me, but no one knew.
I was Morgan Delany, the kid without a dad.
My whole life I had to listen to kids tease me because I didn’t have what they had.
But I did have it; I just couldn’t tell anyone. I learned early how to keep secrets.”
“Morgan—”
“No more, Sal. Not tonight. Get a room at the lodge. There’s no point in hiding anymore. When King arrives tomorrow, we’ll sit down and talk.” My mother’s word was final; I saw it in the way my father looked at me.
I wanted to take it all back and get rid of the pain on his face. But I couldn’t. For years I’d been hiding my feelings, not wanting to hurt my father for his absence in my life.
I’d done the same thing with Jude.
I didn’t tell anyone about him or our son. Because I didn’t want the attention. I didn’t want the sympathy or the looks of pity. I hid my emotions behind being the fun friend, the wild friend.
The carefree friend.
I was anything but carefree.
I was hurting inside. And I kept it to myself so I didn’t inconvenience others.
Well, not anymore.
I turned away from the look in my father’s eyes. I heard him sigh, and then he kissed the top of my head. “I’ll see you in the morning.”
Mac wrapped me in a hug and held me silently for a few minutes before he followed my father out the door.
“Get some rest, sweetheart. Tomorrow is going to be hard.”
I said goodnight to my mother and locked the door behind her. I turned and leaned against it, sliding down until my butt hit the floor.
Why did he leave?
Why did he come back?
Why was I still pining for a man who’d made it clear he didn’t really want me?
My eyes snapped open when the bed dipped behind me. I closed them tightly when I felt his warm body slide in against mine. I failed to keep my breathing even.
“I just want to hold you, baby, one more time. I know you hate me, but please let me stay,” he whispered against my ear.
I didn’t protest when he slid his arm around my waist and pulled me back against his hard chest. I didn’t object when I felt his lips brush my neck. I didn’t tell him to stop when his hand cupped my breast.
Because the truth was, I didn’t hate him.
I loved him.
I’d loved him since the day we met. And I would love him for the rest of my life.
A moan slipped out when his lips touched my shoulder. I whimpered when he pressed his dick against my ass. Desire surged when his hand left my breast and trailed down between my legs.
I was helpless to refuse him, because I wanted everything he was doing. I wanted him in my bed again. I wanted him to touch me as if no time had passed.
His fingers rubbed over my panties, and I opened my legs further, encouraging him to touch me more. He moved my panties to the side and slid a finger between my lips.
“You’re soaked, baby.” I heard the arrogance in his words. The celebration that I hadn’t tossed him out of my house, out of my bed.
He rubbed my clit in slow, agonizing circles, and I moved my hips, desperate for more.
“You want me, baby. Your heart might hate me, but your body loves me. Loves what I can make it do, what I can make it feel.”
He dipped his finger inside me, and I bit my lip, trying to hold back a moan. His lips sucked at the space where my neck met my shoulder, and I knew there would be a mark there in the morning.
A brand.
He added a second finger inside me and slowly pumped them. Enough to push me higher, but he kept me on the precipice.
“Jude,” I begged.
“Say it, baby. Tell me what you want.”
I clamped my lips shut, refusing to give him what he asked for. Refusing to let him hear me beg him to fuck me. It was what I wanted, and he knew that, but I wouldn’t ask.
Asking implied I was willing. Implied I was desperate for him, and I was, but I wouldn’t use words to confirm what my body was saying.
He picked up the pace with his fingers, enough to make me crave more but not enough to give me what I wanted. What I needed that only he could give me.
I rolled my hips, letting my body beg for what it wanted, but holding my heart hostage. His thumb rolled over my clit as his fingers rubbed that spot inside, the one he knew so well.
“I want to bury my cock inside your pussy, baby. You gonna let me fuck you one last time?”
One last time.
The words hit me like a freight train. And I understood them in a way I never wanted to. My father was here. My brother was on his way. They would both want his head for the pain I suffered.
I turned and faced him, his fingers slipping free.
I cradled his face in my hands as I stared into his eyes.
Eyes that held love. Eyes that held pain and fear, and guilt.
I brushed my lips against his, giving him permission without saying a word.
He was my husband; I had a right to his body, the way he had a right to mine.
I refused to feel guilty for taking what I wanted. If this were the last time he would be in my bed, then I would take everything he was offering.
He rolled over me, pinning me to the mattress with his body. He shoved the T-shirt I wore—the one that reminded me of him—up to my neck and dipped his head, taking a stiff nipple into his mouth.
I wasn’t silent anymore. I let out a slow, deep moan as he nipped and sucked at my breasts. My hands roamed over his back; the scars under my fingertips weren’t as prevalent as the ones on his chest, and I remembered why he’d disappeared.
I wanted to know everything. But not tonight. Tonight was just for us. Two people who needed each other to feel... something more than pain and heartache.
He moved silently down my body, kissing a path to the juncture between my thighs. He pulled my panties down, tossing them across the room. His nose nudged at the apex, his hands kneading my ass.
My legs were thrown over his shoulders, and when the first feel of his tongue hit my skin, I cried out.
My hand went to his head, gripping his hair, holding his face against me as he tormented me the same way he had with his fingers. Slow licks, deep kisses.
“Jude, please,” I begged, no longer caring if he felt like he’d won. In the end, if I let him have my body, let him use me the way he wanted to, we would both win.
He picked up the pace, his hands on my ass, pulling and squeezing, until his finger found the one place only he had been. My back arched as he pushed inside to the first knuckle.
His tongue worked harder, forcing my body to give way to euphoria as his finger found its way fully into my ass.
“Yes!” I cried, desperate for more.
“Come for me, baby. Come on my tongue,” he rasped, his voice filled with something that sounded like heartache. I closed my eyes, denying what I’d heard. Not wanting to admit that this was it.
He fucked me with his tongue in my pussy and his finger in my ass.
It was too much—too much pleasure, too much pain, too much heartache, and definitely too much love.
My body finally gave in. The orgasm hit me with such force, I clamped my legs around his head, but he didn’t stop until my body came back down to earth.
I lay there, spent. But Jude wasn’t done. He crawled up my body, pressing his lips against mine as he filled me completely.
“Fuck, you feel so good.”
He thrust into me in short, shaky movements. His arms shook as he held himself up, his head down as he stared at where we were joined together.
“Look at you, taking my dick so fucking good.” He smiled at me and pushed harder, filling me deeper. “No one will ever fuck you the way I do, Morgan. No one will ever make you come as hard.”
My hands gripped his biceps, holding on as he thrust inside me, harder, faster, deeper.
“Come for me, baby. Show me how much you want me.” He leaned down and whispered in my ear, “How much you love me.”
My arms went around his neck as I came hard. He followed immediately, and I felt him explode inside me. Filling me up with everything he had to give me, except for the one thing I needed.
He collapsed on top of me, and the weight of his body made me feel whole for a fleeting moment before he rolled to the side and pulled me along with him.
When I woke up the next morning, I was alone.