Chapter Fifty-Four
Grace
King leaned his head down and took my lips in a slow, searing kiss that made me forget everything but the way he felt against me. I wasn’t scared. I wasn’t thinking about what had happened, or who had shown up tonight.
All I thought about, all I felt, was him.
Until he rolled me onto my back. Then my body stiffened. It wasn’t a conscious thing. I didn’t even realize I had done it until King pulled back.
“Grace?”
“I’m sorry.”
“Do not apologize, baby.”
I closed my eyes and inhaled deeply. I didn’t want to stop, but I wasn’t sure he would continue. He rolled back over, and I sat up.
“I don’t want to stop. Not yet. I don’t know how far I can go, but I know I want you. I want to feel your lips on mine. I want to run my hands over your warm skin. When you kissed me, everything fell away.” I sniffled. “Everything, King. I want it to disappear again.”
He brought his hands up and locked them behind his head. The feeling of disappointment washed over me, and I dropped my eyes to my lap.
“I’m waiting, baby.”
I snapped my gaze up to his. “What?”
“Use me, Grace. Take what you need from me. I will lie here and let you do as much or as little as you want. You’re in charge, Grace.”
“I can’t...” Could I? I wasn’t a prude, not by any stretch. But I wasn’t the type of person to take charge either. I’d always allowed the man I was with to be in control. Allowed them to give my body the pleasure it craved. I’d never learned how to take.
“I don’t know how.”
“What do you want, Grace?”
I rolled my lips between my teeth. I wanted him. I wanted to feel his lips and hands on me. I wanted to feel him inside me, filling the ache that was there. But the thought of him holding me down, even with his body, terrified me.
“One thing, baby. What do you want?”
“I want you to kiss me.”
“Then come here and kiss me.”
“What?” My brow furrowed. “You have to—”
“I don’t have to do shit, Grace. I told you; you’re in charge. Take what you want from me. I’m yours to use, Grace.”
“But you need...” I couldn’t say it. He knew what he needed. I knew what he needed. He’d put his knee down, and the evidence of what he needed was tenting the blanket.
“What I need is for you to be happy, Grace. I need you to feel safe. I need to love you. I can do that without sex. Until that night when I brought you upstairs, and then in the shower, all I’d had was my hand.
And if that’s all I have ever again, I’ll survive.
What I don’t want is for you to push yourself too fast because you think I expect it.
Or because you think I’ll leave you because of it. ”
“I’m not. I want you. I’m surprised by it as much as you are. But I don’t know if I can go all the way, and I don’t want to tease you.”
“Stop.” King brought his hand to my cheek.
His thumb rubbed over my bottom lip. “Fucking tease me, baby. I want you to take what you want. What you need. We’ll stop when you want to stop.
When you decide.” He curled up close to me, and his hand slipped around to the back of my neck as he kissed my lips briefly before falling back and putting his hands behind his head.
I bit my lip and sat up on my knees, scooting closer to him. His eyes never left mine as I leaned forward and pressed my lips to his. I put one hand on his chest to anchor myself over him as I deepened the kiss. His mouth parted and gave me entry, and my tongue tentatively reached out to his.
I could feel the muscles in his chest tense as he held himself back. Giving me full control. I leaned in further until my chest lined up with his. He groaned, and his chest rumbled with desire.
“I love you, Grace.”
I moved my head from side to side, looking for just the right angle, getting more frustrated by the second. I wanted him to take control. I didn’t know how to be the aggressor. I knew how to receive pleasure, not how to give it.
Without thinking, I swung my leg over his hips and sat on his stomach. Finally, I’d found the place I wanted. I held his face in my hands as I kissed him and nipped at his bottom lip.
My body began to heat up as my hips moved of their own accord. I was naked under his shirt. I could feel the hair on his stomach brush against me, and I rolled my hips, seeking out the friction I needed to calm the storm rising up inside me.
I trailed my lips over his jawline, and down his neck. Taking bites of his skin, before soothing it with a lick of my tongue. I sat up and looked at him. His hooded eyes pierced mine. His hands were fisted in his hair as the muscles in his forearms bulged.
He was holding back. I wanted him to touch me, but I knew he wouldn’t. Not yet. Not until I could prove to him that I wasn’t afraid. I’d never been afraid of him. It was the memories that haunted me. Whether I was sleeping or awake, the reminder of what I’d endured tormented me.
My hands roamed over his chest, feeling the muscles ripple as he held himself still.
“If I asked you to touch me, would you?”
“No,” he rasped. “Not this time.”
I rolled my hips over his abs, and he groaned and closed his eyes. His hips jerked upward involuntarily, and I smiled. He was losing control, and I was the one causing it. I wondered if he knew how much it turned me on to watch him struggle.
I could feel myself getting wetter as he fought to maintain his composure.
I knew that he could overpower me in an instant if he wanted to.
The fact that he was holding back, letting me control his body as well as my own, healed a piece of my soul.
He would never hurt me. He would never take from me what I didn’t offer him.
I slid down further until his erection was between us. His dick was hard, tenting his boxers. I pushed open the flap, letting him spring free. I wrapped my hand around him, and he hissed, but the tension in his body was from anticipation, not pain.
I stroked his cock, memorizing the feel of him. His eyes snapped open as he watched my hand for a moment before locking his eyes with mine.
“Condom?”
“No.”
“King,” I argued.
“No condoms, Grace. I don’t want anything between us.”
My hands stilled. He groaned and shifted his hips in protest. “I did the bloodwork with Kytten. But I haven’t gotten the results.” I shook my head and released him. “I can’t... not without knowing.”
He closed his eyes and sank into the mattress. “In the nightstand,” he ground out, giving in to my demand.
I leaned over and opened the drawer. Seeing the unopened box of condoms, I tore it open and pulled one out. Tearing the wrapper with my teeth, I tossed it on the floor and placed the latex circle on the head of his dick. Pinching the end, I rolled it down his hard length.
I stared at his latex-covered cock and willed the fear away.
Skinner hadn’t used anything. None of them had.
With her father’s help, Kytten had given me a full exam a few days ago.
We were waiting for the blood test results.
All I could do was pray I was safe. But until I knew for sure, I wouldn’t risk him.
“Stay with me, Grace.”
I shook my head, trying to clear the thoughts that wanted to distract me. Now was not the time. I eyed King’s chest. My gaze focusing on the rippled muscles, the colorful tattoos. The way his chest rose and fell in time with my own.
I wanted this, and I wouldn’t let them take it away from me. I wouldn’t let them win any longer. I wanted to take back what was stolen from me. What was stolen from King. I lifted myself up, hovering over him as I stared into his eyes. Eyes filled with hunger and desire. But also love.
Love for me.
I closed my eyes; I couldn’t watch the emotions cross over his face.
Fear, anxiety, guilt—it was all there, but it was there because of the love.
He was afraid he was pushing me too fast; he was anxious that I would lose my shit and break down.
And he felt guilty because he thought I was doing this for him.
And I was, to an extent. Did I believe he would let me go because of what happened?
No, but I also didn’t want to believe he would grow to resent me.
A relationship couldn’t grow without intimacy.
Sure, there were plenty of couples who lived without sex.
And intimacy and sex weren’t always the same thing.
I needed this for myself. I needed to prove they hadn’t broken me.
That I could come back from what I’d faced. That I wasn’t dirty, or worthless.
He’d tried to make me believe nothing had changed.
But everything had. I was a different person now.
And that was okay. I’d never forget what they did.
But as I sank down on him and he groaned loudly, I heard everything he’d tried to tell me.
I felt it all in the way he filled me completely.
Not just my pussy. But my soul. All the broken pieces were filled with his love.
With his determination to make me see that I was someone he wanted.
Not because of what I could do for him, but because of who I was.
I rocked my hips as something lit up inside me.
My veins ignited. It felt as though my heart might burst through my chest as King whispered words of love and affirmation to me.
Encouraging me to lean on him. To take from him.
Tears streamed down my face as he lay there, still, letting me take what I wanted, what I needed.
Letting me use his body to heal my soul.
As my orgasm built inside of me, I placed my hands on his chest and pushed my body up, letting it fall back on him over and over.
I cried out his name as everything washed away—everything but him.
The feel of his body beneath me, the scent of his skin.
The sound of his voice as he declared his love for me.
This was a new beginning.
A new life.
A new Grace.
I collapsed against his chest, and he finally pulled his hands from the back of his head and wrapped them around me. He kissed the top of my head as I cried against him. He held me as his dick softened inside me and slipped out.
He rolled me to his side and removed the empty condom. “You didn’t—”
“Shhh, this wasn’t for me, baby. It was for you.”
“But I wanted you to...”
What did I want? For him to find pleasure in my body? I already knew he could. But he’d given me something I didn’t know I needed. It wasn’t just the orgasm. It was the release. Letting go of everything. My mother, my father, Steele, Skinner. It had all been an accumulation of pain and heartache.
And he’d taken it all.
“I love you, King.”
“I love you, Grace. Forever.”