Chapter 13 AllNothing
ALL OR NOTHING
PIERCE
Lex reaches over, discarding her empty plate onto the coffee table while I perv over her tiny sleep shorts sliding dangerously high on her smooth thighs. She readjusts back into the corner of the couch, and the messy bun on the top of her head flops around with every movement.
I avert my eyes and scold my cock for thickening at the sight of a bit of skin in a perfectly innocent situation. But it’s not just anyone, it’s her. And the fact that I already know what it’s like to be welcomed between her thighs. That thought just makes things worse.
“What if we each write down our choices and put them in a bowl to pick from,” she offers from the other side of the couch.
Her legs slide out toward me until they’re casually slung across my lap.
Her feet inch closer to my dick, and part of me wants to let her feel what just being in the same room with her does to me, but things have relaxed between us since the blow-up at Silas’s, and I don’t want this night to come to an abrupt end.
I snatch her foot in my hands, and she lets out a shriek at the unexpected move, but that shriek quiets into a moan when I dig into the arch with my thumbs.
Goddamnit, one solution’s quickly becoming more accelerant thrown on the problem, and I can’t keep my eyes off her.
She sinks into the couch, eyes closed, and makes little noises of pleasure. My oversized hoodie—one of many that keep disappearing—all but swallows those little taunting shorts. My mind automatically envisions her naked under my hoodie instead.
“God, that feels so good,” she moans.
That’s it, my dick’s rock fucking solid. There’s no ignoring now.
“Fuuuuck, Princess. You’re killing me,” I groan, but reach for her other foot anyway.
Her head peeks out from the pile of fabric consuming her, and those get-lost-in-stormy-eyes light with a mischievous gleam. She rips her foot from my grasp and tumbles across the couch in the blink of an eye, straddling my lap.
“Is this better?” she asks, her tone laced with dangerous lust.
“Lex,” I plead, letting my head fall against the back of the couch. “You know, having your hot little pussy that close to my aching cock is not helping.”
“Hmm, what about this?” she taunts as her hips draw back and then grind forward, tracing my dick print.
I shoot my hands to her hips, stilling her in place and lifting my gaze to lock on hers. “Don’t start something you’re not ready to finish, Princess. Because I’ll have you screaming my name in the next five minutes if you don’t stop.”
“Someone’s extra cocky tonight.”
The smirk on her lips as she looks between us to where my literal cock is trying to break through my jeans in search of her has me seconds from snapping.
“Baby, you act like I don’t remember every little cheat code I found to make your body quake for me. Those aren’t the types of things a man forgets, even years later.”
“Maybe I’ve changed,” she challenges, or so I take it.
I pull her in, my lips ghosting against her ear. “Would you still flood my tongue if I licked your clit, nice and slow, while playing with your tight little ass hole?” I whisper.
Her moan and fight against my steadying hand on her smooth thigh is all the answer I need to know she hasn’t changed that much.
Gripping her hips, I’m up and flipping her back to the couch, watching her eyes bug out in surprise.
I want to dive right in, push her shorts to the side, and sink home, but we’re nowhere near ready for that.
Well, she’s not. I’ve been ready for a repeat since that morning I woke to her riding my cock like it was a damn Olympic sport.
“Don’t let me push you to do something you’re not ready for.
Tell me no if you don’t want this.” The words fall heavy between us, and I want to hoover them back into my lungs as soon as the offer’s out there because I want this so fucking bad.
But I won’t be like he was. I won’t take the safety she feels with me from her.
“I…” She stalls, her worried eyes brimming with tears, searching my face. “I don’t think this is a good idea.”
Closing my eyes and drawing in a steadying breath, I nod once and pull away, sitting back in my spot as far from her still stretched out body as I can.
“Please don’t be mad at me, Pierce.”
Her voice is no louder than a whisper, drenched in uncertainty. I can barely hear it over the galloping thing in my chest, I thought long ago broken.
“I’m not mad, baby. I need a second… to cool off.”
Pushing up from the couch, I step to head out back and let the evening spring air do its job, but before I can, her presence pulls me back in.
Leaning down slowly, as if she’s a wounded animal on the side of the highway, I drop a kiss to her forehead and pull back until she locks her focus right where I want it.
"I want you, but only when you’re ready to surrender to me completely. Not just sex. I want everything, Lex. The house. Our family. It’s all or nothing, Princess. So I’ll wait as long as you need me to. But that’s my offer."
I can’t stomach a retort after laying my soul bare like that. So I bolt up and head straight for the backyard, the sliding glass door rattling behind me as it shuts. The air out here bites colder than I expect, sharp against the heat still burning through my chest. But I need it.
My fingers twitch in my pocket like they’ve got a mind of their own, brushing the edge of the pills I haven’t touched in weeks. One would take the edge off. Just one, and I’d stop shaking.
But then that voice—Branson’s—growls in my head. You really wanna go down that road, now? With her inside? With a baby on the way?
He’s right. She deserves more than a strung-out pill head barely holding it together. And that kid of ours? Deserves a hell of a lot more than the kind of father I had.
My old man was a drunk and a mean son of a bitch.
He didn’t die soon enough to spare me, or Ma, from the worst of it.
Most nights, I was the wall between his fists and her face.
He left plenty of scars for the trouble.
I don’t miss him. Not even a little. I swore I'd never turn into him, and I mean to keep it.
My phone vibrates, breaking the spiral. At this hour, there’s only one person it could be.
“Yeah. What’s up?”
“Look, man, I know it’s late, but I need you to come in.”
“You got a job?” I ask, already knowing if the answer’s yes, any chance of spending the night with Lexi just evaporated.
“Nah. But that thing we were worried about with Mr. Big Shot Mayor? It’s happening.”
“You’ve gotta be fucking kidding me. Why won’t this guy just let it go?”
“Man, it’s his kid. You telling me if Lex or that baby ever goes missing, you're clocking out after a few months?”
“I’d never stop.”
“And that’s what I’ve been worried about all along. Anyway, I’m heading to the clubhouse with Harlow. See you there.”
“Yeah. Be there soon.”
I hang up, exhaling hard through my nose. This night won’t let up. Just one punch after another.
Back inside, I half expect to see Lexi curled up on the couch, something light and funny playing on the TV. But the room is dark and empty, probably for the best. She’s got to be spinning after what I said.
I want to storm down the hall, rip her door off the hinges, and tell her to give me everything right now. I want to take her, claim her, make her see the life I’m offering. But what would that fix?
I can’t force this. Not with her. Not after all this time.
She has to come to me. Desperately, on her knees, and willing. Not to stroke my ego, but because I need her to want this just as bad as I do. Because she knows no one else could give her the life I would. The life I ache to give her.
Having her body is the easy part. I’ve had it before. Shit, I could have had her writhing beneath me tonight, but it’s her mind I crave. Her soul I’m starving for. A sliver of heaven I’m willing to die for, just to call a girl like Lexi Kane mine.