Chapter 21 #2
“Outside.” I drag my coat on as I wait for her. When she’s finished, I tow her out the doors. Thorne is watching us, his eyes narrowed, but he doesn’t call attention to us.
I’ll deal with him later. Right now, I wrap an arm around Scout’s waist as I pull her toward my truck.
She runs out of her admittedly saintlike patience. "What the hell was that? You just dragged me out of there in front of everyone."
I point at the door. "Get in the truck."
"No." She plants her feet. "Not until you tell me what's going on."
It’s hard for me to be so out of control. I round on her, hissing. "Kozlov asked you out again."
"So?"
"So?" My voice rises. "Were you going to say yes?"
"I wasn't! I tried to let him down gently. Then you got all caveman and demanded that I leave with you." She crosses her arms. "And even if I was planning to say yes, why would you care? We’ve barely even kissed."
The words hit like fists to my ribs. Using my own bullshit against me. "Scout..."
"No. You don't get to be jealous." Her eyes flash. "You don't get to act like you own me when you treat me like kryptonite most of the time. You kiss me and then you stare at me. Like… what? The math ain’t mathin’."
She isn’t getting it. "I'm trying to protect you."
"From what?"
"From me!" The words tear out of my chest. "From the fact that I'm broken and angry and I don't know how to be what you need."
“Si.” She pauses for a long beat. "I need you to stop pushing me away every time we get close."
The space between us crackles with electricity. It’s charged and dangerous, ready to ignite.
"You deserve better than me."
"You don't get to decide what I deserve." She steps closer, chin lifting in defiance. "That's my choice to make. Not yours."
"Scout..."
"Do you want me or not?" Her eyes are the exact shade of green of a juniper tree. "Just be honest. For once in your life, just be honest with me."
The truth claws up my throat. "I want you so much I can't fucking breathe around it. I think about you constantly. I dream about you. Fuck, I wake up hard and aching and hating myself because you're ten feet down the hall and I can't have you."
Her breath catches audibly. "Then why..."
"There's a line I shouldn't cross. And damn it, I keep crossing it anyway. I'm terrified that if I let myself actually have you, I'll ruin you the way I ruin everything good that comes near me. Not to mention, you’re my agent’s ex wife."
She stares at me for a long moment. Then she lets out a bitter bark of laughter. "Enzo. You're worried about Enzo?"
"He's still my agent. It's complicated."
"He's nothing. He’s in the past, a mistake I'm never making again. And if you can't see the difference between him and you, then you're an idiot."
She turns to walk away. I catch her wrist and spin her back around to face me.
I growl, "Don't walk away from me."
She sucks in a breath. "Then give me a reason to stay."
I kiss her, hard and desperate. Claiming her mouth like I've every right to, when I know I don't. She gasps against my lips and I swallow the sound, backing her against the truck. My hands are everywhere at once. Her hips. Her waist. Fisting in her curls the way I've been dying to.
"Silas," she gasps when I break the kiss to breathe. "Someone could see..."
"I don't care." I drag my mouth down her throat, sucking hard enough to leave a visible mark. "Let them see. Let everyone know you're mine."
"Am I?" Her voice is breathless but challenging. "Because half a minute ago you were telling me I deserve better."
"You do." I bite down on her pulse point and she moans. "But I'm too selfish to let you fall in love with anyone else."
She gasps, "Then don't let me go."
I look around the parking lot. Mostly empty now, growing dark. The bowling alley's back entrance is twenty feet away, nestled in shadows between dumpsters and a locked delivery door that no one uses.
I grab her hand. "Come with me."
"Where..."
"Just trust me."
I pull her into the shadows, pinning her against the brick wall. The space is narrow, barely wide enough for both of us. Anyone walking to their car could see us if they looked. If we're not careful, we’ll be heard.
The danger makes everything sharper.
"Silas, we can't..." Her protest dies when my hand slides under her shirt. I cup her breast through her bra. She hisses.
"We can." I thumb her nipple through the fabric and she arches into my touch. "And we will. But you have to stay quiet."
"Someone could..."
"Then you better not scream." I drop to my knees. My hands shake as I yank her yoga pants down her legs.
"Oh my God." Her hands fist in my hair as I push her right thigh up, zeroing in on the wet spot spreading across her lacy white thong. “Si!”
I look up at her. Her eyes are wide, pupils blown dark, lips parted in shock and arousal. She's perfect. Terrified and turned on and trusting me completely even though this is reckless and stupid.
"Hold on to me," I growl. "And don't make a sound."
Pushing the damp fabric on her panties aside, I bury my face between her thighs and lick her slit.
She bites her fist to keep from crying out.
Her other hand grips my shoulder, nails digging in through my shirt hard enough to bruise.
I devour her with no finesse, no patience.
Fastening my mouth over her clit, I kiss her just the way I would her mouth.
It’s just raw need and possession and the driving urge to mark her as mine in every way I can.
I want her to come on my beard, soak my face with her juices.
Voices drift from the parking lot. People are leaving the bowling alley. Scout's whole body goes rigid with panic.
I don't stop. If anything, I go harder. Tongue circling her clit, two fingers pumping inside her, crooking them to hit a spot that makes her shake.
“Oh god.” She clutches at my shoulders for dear life. “Fuck, Si. You’re so good at that.”
Her thighs tremble. She's close, so close I can feel it in how her muscles tighten. I pull back just enough to whisper against her wet skin. "Come for me, Pretty Girl. But stay quiet. Don't let them hear what I'm doing to you."
That’s it. She breaks, silently. Her mouth opens in a soundless scream, body convulsing, flooding my tongue and covering my chin. I lick her through it, groaning against her, cock so hard it's painful.
When she can stand again, I rise and spin her to face the wall. She presses her palms against the cool brick and shivers. "Silas..."
"Be a good girl." I free my straining cock from my jeans with shaking hands. Pressing against her from behind, I marvel at the flushed skin of her bare ass. I can only imagine how it’s going to feel when I sink deep inside her, filling her to the hilt with my huge cock.
"You said you wanted this. You said you wanted me to claim you. "
"Yes," she gasps. "God, yes."
It takes me a minute to grab a condom out of my wallet and sheathe my cock. While I’m doing that, I lean over and growl in her ear. “Make it easy for me. Step back and spread your legs, baby.”
She responds in an instant, rocking her hips so that I can see her perfect pink slit.
“Fuck yeah.” I line my pulsing cock up, notching the thick head at her entrance, then pushing inside her heat in one hard thrust. My eyes roll up in my head.
Just as I imagined, her pussy is so tight and wet, so fucking warm.
She bites her own arm to muffle the sound. I don't give her time to adjust.
I fuck her hard and fast and desperate, one hand clamped over her mouth, the other gripping her hip hard enough to leave bruises.
"Mine," I growl against her ear. "Say it."
She nods frantically, making muffled sounds against my palm that might be agreement.
"You're mine. Not Kozlov’s. Not anyone else's. Mine."
I reach down between us with my free hand, find her clit, rub in tight circles.
Her whole body goes taut. She comes again, clenching around me like a vice.
I wish I could hold out for longer, make her come again, but I’m weak.
I groan into her shoulder, biting down to muffle my own sounds, pulsing and spilling inside her.
We stay frozen like that for a moment. Both panting, shaking, pressed against the wall like we're holding each other up. I drop languid kisses against her shoulders, as though I’m in no hurry. She chuckles, breathless.
I pull out carefully. Scout moves to straighten her clothes with trembling hands and I help as much as I can while I tuck my cock back in.
I don’t know what to do with the condom so I put it in my pocket.
I’ll probably have to wash these pants a thousand times.
But I’m distracted as Scout turns to face me, putting her arms around my neck.
"Silas..." Her voice is completely wrecked.
God, she’s too good. I cup her face between my palms and kiss her softly. "I'm sorry."
"For what?"
"For being jealous. For dragging you out here. For..." I gesture helplessly at the wall. "This."
She laughs, breathless and bright and disbelieving. "I'm not sorry."
"You should be. It was completely reckless."
"Maybe I like being reckless." She looks up at me through her lashes. "When it's with you."
My chest goes tight. "Scout..."
"You can't take it back now." Her smile is gentle. "You claimed me. In public. Anyone could have seen. That means something."
She's right. It does mean something. It means I've crossed a line I can't uncross. I just staked a claim I've no right to make and marked her as mine when I'm still lying to her every single night.
It means I'm in too deep to back out now.
"Yeah," I say finally. "It means something, baby."
I kiss her then, tipping her head back, lazily tongue fucking her again. When I pull away, she stares at me, her green eyes glazed. She shivers and I curse.
“Fuck. It’s cold out. Let’s go get you warm.”
After tucking her in the passenger seat, I drive home with her hand in mine, thumb stroking over her knuckles.
Holding her hand shouldn't feel this monumental.
It's just fingers laced together, palm pressed to palm, simple contact that people do without thinking.
But I can't remember the last time I held someone's hand like this.
Her hand's small and warm in mine, fitting perfectly like it was made to be there. Every point where our skin connects sends heat up my arm, anchoring me in a way I didn't know I needed. This is more intimate than what we just did against that wall.
More vulnerable. More real. Because this is the part that means something beyond physical need. This is me choosing to keep touching her even when the desperate urgency has passed. Choosing connection over the isolation I've wrapped myself in for years.
It feels unbelievably good.