15. Rae
15
RAE
I take the stage to deafening applause.
I play some experimental shit. Some stripped down remixes, even the song I was working on that I can’t get quite right.
The crowd is dancing and loving and living, and I’m in it with them. My hands are in the air, and I’m losing myself in the music.
Leni’s right. This feels like home.
I might even know how to fix this track now.
I’m hearing the changes in my head, committing them to memory when awareness jerks me back to the present.
The champagne bucket appears at my side, full of waters.
I put off responding for thirty seconds. A minute. Even change the tracks once without giving in to the desire to look up.
When I can’t hold back anymore, I lift my gaze to the VIP.
Harrison King is wearing a tuxedo, bracing both hands on the railing. His perfect jaw is set, firm lips pressed into a hard line, his hair mussed as if he caught himself running a hand through it.
His eyes are locked on me.
In a room full of pagans dancing underground…
He’s a god.
And he’s pissed.
Part of me wishes I could tell him I didn’t do this to mess with him. Even though there’s nothing he can do. He can’t very well drag me from the stage.
Though the idea makes me shiver.
We can’t be together in public because I can’t have Mischa thinking we’re an item again.
And in private, it’s too risky to my heart.
But like this, I can touch him without touching him.
We’re surrounded. It’s the most dangerous place to be, and the safest.
Since he walked into my hotel room, I’ve been a mass of emotions. Wanting, aching, longing, regretting.
I can wish he didn’t leave me, but I can’t change that he did. But I wouldn’t rewind time and erase what happened between us. I wouldn’t even erase the hurried sex in his bathroom last week.
The more I stare at him, the more I realize…
I wouldn’t erase a thing.
We never should have been, and that only makes me cling more determinedly to what we were. What we are. Even if we’re not a couple and I’m not hoping for a happily ever after with this man, something between us is alive and teeming, now, in this basement.
So, I play for him.
I choose the songs, tracks that will move the crowd and fit the stripped-down theme of “Come As You Are,” but that also fit us. I create a new set on the fly, my fingers moving as fast as my mind.
This set is my own personal mixtape for my fuck-hot ex.
He watches like he knows it.
My body is on fire. After a couple of drinks, coupled with the power of this place, I could touch myself right here.
I could come from it.
I could beg for it.
Does he feel the same way?
He’s still watching. He hasn’t looked away.
Take no prisoners.
I flip him off, then run my tongue along the side of my finger. I swear his eyes darken.
In the VIP booth overhead, he widens his stance, adjusts his pants, then rubs the bulge in the front.
My throat dries.
I change the track to the one I made last summer, the one I told him he could jerk off to and think of me.
His movements stop as if he knows what I’m doing.
It’s a filthy dare he can’t possibly take me up on.
Maybe it’s the night or the frustration between us, or maybe I’m just that goddamned good, because the silver on his belt flashes in the light as he flicks it open.
Holy shit.
Then his hand is inside. He starts again, slower.
The expression on his face…
It’s the hottest fucking thing I’ve seen in my life.
I’m a live wire now, my skin prickling as heat rushes over me.
My core throbs. On stage, I can’t slide a hand between my thighs without being seen, but I want to rub on Harrison, on my own fingers, on anything.
This club is more than a third wheel in this transaction. It’s part of both of us, one we won’t ever give up.
For the next song, I split my attention between the partiers and Harrison. If I stare up too long, someone will figure out what’s happening.
That the most fully dressed man in this place is stone-cold sober and fucking his hand.
Every movement of his arm, his jacket, feels like he’s tugging on a string wrapped around my core. I'm so fucking turned on in this moment, I think I might come for real.
His jaw is tight, his hand working his cock like he’s my dream fantasy come to life. I’m breathless, my reckless smile impossible to hold in when I pick up the pace of the track.
His gaze narrows, but he does the same with his strokes.
The music moves every person in this club, but he’s moving me.
I can tell when he’s getting close. I can’t look away.
I want to watch him come.
I want to feel it.
His head tips back.
He’s close.
His hips jerk. Once. Twice. Then he groans—I can’t hear it over the pounding bass, but I see it.
When he comes, I do fucking feel it. The wave grips me, and I reach for the desk in front of me to steady myself as if I’m coming too.
His unsteady breathing is mine.
When confetti rains down from the ceiling, I realize this is the best time I’ve had in a long time. Maybe ever.
It’s because of Harrison, but also because of this place. It does feel like home.
* * *
The crowd is chill and happy, content to take selfies at Debajo with me, with each other. Then the crowd parts, and my breath catches.
Harrison King walks toward me, his tuxedo jacket unbuttoned and his mouth pressed in a hard line.
When he reaches me, I say, “I thought it wasn’t a good idea to be seen together in public.”
“It’s not, which is why you’re in trouble.”
He’s cool, cold even, as he gestures for me to go ahead and follow security. I head down the hall toward the VIP room. Leni’s there, along with the bartender. Harrison shuts the door before turning to face us.
“Whose bright idea was this?” His voice is deadly calm.
“I called her,” Leni admits. “We had a cancellation last minute. And Cam’s a terrible fucking DJ.”
The bartender ducks his head.
“Cam?” I call. “Mr. King could use a whisky.”
He fixes one immediately, bringing the glass over. His gaze slides to my legs, and his throat bobs.
Harrison sends the guy scurrying away with a look.
“Cam, I’ll drink the whisky.” I cross to the bar and take it from him before sipping the golden liquid.
Harrison paces the room. “Mischa isn’t supposed to know we’re talking. Tonight you all but announced it.”
“We announced that Debajo had an opening,” Leni cuts in, “and a former DJ in residence picked up the slack for an impromptu—and a fucking fantastic, might I add—show.”
Adrenaline surges through me again. It was fantastic.
“You’re the one making this worse by marching her down here,” Leni goes on.
Harrison’s gaze finds mine.
If Leni knew that her boss had jerked off to me upstairs…
“To be fair,” I say, the whisky heating my stomach, “it probably looked as if you were marching me here to chew me out. Which is apparently what’s happening.”
“There’s a car for you out front,” Harrison says.
My breath hitches. He’s sending me away? I told him to back off, but after what happened upstairs, it feels like a slap in the face.
Without a word, I turn to leave.
I make my way through the halls and out to the parking lot. A sleek, black limo is waiting. I get in, and the car pulls away. I half expect it to circle the block and return for Harrison or do some other covert maneuver. But I’m disappointed when it continues straight down the road.
A few minutes later, it turns the opposite direction of my hotel.
“Excuse me, where are we going?”
The man doesn’t answer.
Nerves dial up, and I pull out my phone to call Harrison. But before the ringtone sounds, I realize where we’re headed.
The car parks at the beach, and I get out. The familiar sound of waves crashing along the shore greets me. I scan the nearly empty parking area for Harrison’s car, the knot in my chest loosening when I spot it.
He’s already there.
On the beach.
I take off my shoes at the edge of the beach and walk to him, the sand slipping between my toes. He meets me halfway. He’s barefoot, his waistcoat unbuttoned. The breeze blows his hair, and his eyes glow like blue coals in the dark.
I spot a piece of confetti stuck to his jacket sleeve.
“Classy,” I murmur as I pick it off.
I barely have time to look back up before he drags me against his hard body.
“I know you went to see Mischa. Again .”
I drop the shoes and my bag to fold my arms in the little space between us. “And I know you fucked your hand until you popped like a bottle of Dom at a bachelorette in the middle of Debajo. So, we all have secrets.”
He shakes me hard, anger and fear clouding another emotion in his eyes. “I’m tempted to tie you to my damn bed just to keep you safe.”
We’re so close that his lips rub across mine when he bites out the words.
“Is that the only reason?” I murmur.
He hauls my lips to his. It’s possessive and desperate, and I want to fight him, but not as much as I want to hold him close.
He backs me across the sand. His hands cup my face, the initial demand giving in to something earnest and full of longing. I jerk in surprise when my heels hit the water and the waves lick at my ankles.
He pulls back an inch. His eyes are as deep as the sea, every bit as tortured. “I won’t let you pretend this is all I want from you.”
I swallow, my heart racing as I grip his wrists. “What do you want?”
“That first night I arrived,” he mutters, his voice oddly rough, “I didn’t ask Sebastian if he fucked you. I asked him if he loved you.”
Shock slams into me, tickling starting deep in my stomach like the tickling from the waves against my legs as he continues.
“I couldn’t bear the idea. When I saw the photo of you two at the event, it destroyed me. I tried to tell myself I would stay away if he was what you wanted.”
His thumb strokes the tattoo on the inside of my wrist. His words course through my veins, leave me shuddering. We’re up to our hips now, the water tugging at the fabric of his tuxedo pants. Harrison doesn’t notice, or if he does, he doesn’t care.
“Because I love you. I loved you first. And no matter what happens, dammit, I’ll love you last.”
I’ve seen Harrison King ruthless. I’ve seen him angry.
I’ve never seen him desperate.
I’m a different woman than I was a year ago. I’m stronger and weaker. I hurt more and I love more. I didn’t think it was possible to be both of those things.
He taught me how.
We’re connected in a way that will never end. Out here, where I feel as if I met the real Harrison King for the first time, I can’t deny it.
I shove off his jacket and toss it toward the shore.
“You missed,” he murmurs against my open mouth.
“Did not.”
I wind my arms around his neck as he reaches beneath the water to cup my ass, molding me to the hardness between his thighs.
His mouth closes over mine. It’s hungry and powerful, and he pulls my bottom lip between his teeth and bites down until I gasp.
I slip my hand under the water, and when I close it around that blazing hot hardness, he groans. The sound is primal and raw and goes straight to my core. I massage him, lifting up on my toes to get a better angle, and his hold on my ass tightens.
The sea tries to drag us away, but Harrison is my anchor. Steady. Relentless.
“Tell me you love me,” he rasps against my ear.
Before I met him, I never let anyone in. It wasn’t living, not really. But the way I felt about him, I was open. Raw.
“I loved you once. More than I thought I could love another person.” The words stick in my throat, and his fingers still on the zipper at the back of my bodysuit.
“Then love me again.” He leans his forehead against mine.
My heart squeezes. “Harrison…”
I understand why he left the way he did. That doesn’t mean I’m ready to start down this path once more. I have the career I want, friends I care about, a life I built myself. When he vanished from it last year, I realized how deep in me he’d been.
I could say that I want to love him, but the world is fucked up. That while I’ll stand shoulder to shoulder with him and stare down the devil, I’m afraid to do that with my heart on a string attached to his.
I can be brave, but not when everything I am is tangled up in him.
His jaw clenches. “Until you do, I’ll love enough for both of us.”
He’s holding out hope. I don’t know if it’s well founded or completely foolish, but I can’t help admiring him for it.
I reach for his pants.
He exhales his frustration but presses aside the panel of my outfit. The water tickles my bare skin, and I gasp as he brushes his fingers where I’m already hot and wet.
“I want you in my bed,” he murmurs, playing with my slickness. “I want you in my life.”
My nails dig into the muscles of his shoulders, the shirt spattered with drops of spray. He presses a finger inside me, and I moan into his mouth.
All my resolve flees, chased away by his words and the rhythm of his finger. I’m get wetter, even under the cold water.
His touch, his words, it all hurts in a way that’s so damn good. Because I can’t deny it, just like I couldn’t deny it a year ago.
This is coming home.
The realization flips a switch, and suddenly, I’m the demanding one.
Every second he’s not inside me is too long.
I reach into his underwear for his cock, thick and hard. I wrap my fingers around him, rub my thumb over his crown.
“Raegan… fuck.”
He lifts me effortlessly, and I hitch my legs around his hips. His cock presses where I’m aching. I take a breath, change the angle, and he slides inside in an endless stroke.
He’s everywhere. His big hands hold me, his cock fills me. His mouth finds mine, and it’s like he’s finally home, too. There’s nothing gentle about what we’re doing, and I drag my nails across his skin, mark him.
For tonight, he’s mine. I want him to know it.
He moves fast, our mouths still pressed together. The world is spinning around us, the faintest hint of dawn teasing the sky.
He’s me. We’re inseparable. There’s nothing but us and the water washing over our slick skin.
His rough breathing falls on my lips. “Only you. Always you.”
His conviction has my heart swelling against my ribs.
The ocean ebbs and flows around us, but Harrison sets his own pace. One for us.
When we come, the sea trembles.