71. Ambrose—present day #2
“Of course.” I nod, my stubble fuzzing her hair. I let her have a moment of silence before attempting to feed her again. “So, pizza?”
“You know I’m not supposed to eat that, right?” She gazes up at me.
“Doesn’t stop you when Annabelle comes over.”
“You know too much.”
“I told you, the walls are thin.”
“I can’t hear anything downstairs from here.”
“Not from up here, but in there.” I point to the walls. “I knew you didn’t believe me about the tunnels all those years back.”
“I thought it was bullshit.”
A laugh leaves us both. Hers cuts off early by the guilt weighing her down in my arms. She nuzzles into my neck, staying close as I stretch to grab a single slice—the biggest one—and guide it to her mouth.
“If you bite it once, I won’t eat the cake. If you bite it twice, I won’t go all big brother and force the rest down your throat.”
“You still wanna claim that title?”
“Do you have a different one for me?”
“Uhm,” she ponders. “Maybe, my person.”
“Your person?”
She nods, and finally, a trembling hand takes the pizza. Her stomach rumbles as she sits higher in my lap, taking the first bites. “Can I ask you something?”
“Anything. Even with a full mouth.”
A small giggle passes her lips, gone as quickly as it arrives. “Are you okay?” she asks, her mouth already empty. “Are you healthy?”
“I wasn’t expecting that.”
“I just need to know that I’m not gonna lose you, right?”
“You’re not. I’m fine. I’m not going anywhere.”
“Not without me?”
“Never.” I rub my throat, feeling that dry and dull ache there again.
“Is your throat hurting from talking?”
“Feels a little strained. I think it’ll fade out.”
Touch Dollie’s pizza three times, or it won’t. It’ll stay forever, and you’ll lose your voice for real.
Fuck my life.
“Can I have a bite?” I ask because it’ll distract her from noticing me tapping at her food for no reason.
She leads the pizza to my mouth, nudging my lips to open wide. I take the smallest bite while closing my grip on the edge three times, just like my weird fucking brain asks.
“I knew you’d hate it. It’s too greasy for you.”
I swallow the tiny piece down in lumps. “It’s vile.”
“You know, I wouldn’t have judged you for just touching it.”
“I should have known that.”
“You should know that I accept you for you.” She loosens her hold on the slice, leaving it in only my hand, grease traveling down to my wrist. “I ate more than two bites. I can’t do more right now. I’m sorry.”
“Tomorrow?”
“I’ll try. Please don’t eat your cake before it’s done.”
I nod, my own stomach rolling. It’s nothing to do with hunger. It’s all worry. How can I get her to eat? How can I make this right?
“Thank you for caring about me.” Soft lips press just off my mouth. “I should get back.”
“Dollie,” I murmur, clutching her hand and pulling her back as she tries to leave the bed. “Don’t go.”
Greedy for her, I stand, towering over her. The pizza falls to the floor, the melted cheese creating a mess on my soft carpet that I can’t even bring myself to care about.
Tiny palms land on my chest, but she doesn’t shove me away. Refusing to push her boundaries, I still waiting for her next move.
“I have to.”
“You don’t,” I whisper. “You could stay. With me.” I lay out all my vulnerabilities and desires as I sink to my knees. Pain presents itself instantly, attacking my knee with its rabid claws. The pizza smooshes into the carpet under the knee that needs no cushion.
None of it matters.
I stay before her, teeth gritted for a single second. “Don’t go back to him, not even for tonight.” My fingers run over her thighs, my eyes stare up at her—the small figure dressed in darkness.
“Please, Dollie.” Not waiting for an answer, because I fear it’ll be no, I stand, lifting her body to mine. Her hot center presses against my stomach through those tiny shorts, and my head falls against hers.
“Choose me.” Those words sound like a pitiful beg in my broken voice.
Our mouths near, and I open my lips to place a sensual kiss on hers. My fingers sink into her round hips, my nails leaving little crescent moons in her skin as her shorts slide up, and I refuse to let go.
“I can’t.” My heart stalls, shuddering in my chest at those words. Dollie pulls back, pushing at my chest. “Shane could wake, and?—”
“Fuck him.” My mouth moves back to hers, sucking her full bottom lip into my mouth when she tries to pull away again. I can make her see reason. I can show her feelings—the kind we both try to hide from.
“If he comes over here, he’ll be so mad,” she explains, while stretching her neck back for me to kiss. The skin on her neck tastes so different from her pizza-kissed mouth and all its crumbs. Like salty tears and sweet frosting… too good to pull my lips away.
She moans in that little way I like, and I can’t help when the words fall from me in another plea, “Stay with me tonight.”
“I told you, I can’t.”
“Can I change your mind?” I whisper into her skin, kissing the same spot, suckling until blood rushes and heats under my tongue.
Her legs tighten around my hips. It’s too much. Too easy for my thoughts to wander to those tiny shorts.
Remembering the things she liked last time, I let one hand trail her thigh. The other hand assists as I lay her back on the bed against satin sheets.
My mouth breaks free from her neck, kissing her jaw, her cheeks, back to her mouth that doesn’t feel as uninviting as her cold words.
“He could come in.”
“He won’t come in here.”
With a hint of reluctance, she nods. Soft hands land on my face, those perfect legs, tightening around me, finally pulling me in closer.
My intention was a little kiss, but her wanting this, her body singing to my tune, shatters my resolve.
I last about a second before I brush Dollie’s clothed pussy with the tips of two fingers and her pouty lips with my tongue.
She’s your sist— my mind tries to interrupt the moment.
Fuck off.
Ignoring everything in me that tells me this is wrong, I slip through the loose legs of her shorts.
My fingers slide up and down her soaking wet pussy, another of those pretty little moans slipping out in pleasure.
Twirling a single finger around her clit, I wait for another moan before I use my whole hand to rub over her cunt.
She’s so wet for me right now, so close to the edge as her hips buck slightly and teeth pierce into her lower lip.
Two fingers push into her, her legs spreading wider as I slide in to the knuckles a few times before rocking my fingers deep in and out of her.
My eyes fix on her, my throat drying as I picture her coming undone for me for the second time. The shitty lighting keeps the real thing from me.
But that also prevents me from seeing any looks of discomfort or disappointment, because I am totally fucking winging it here.
My hand moves to how her body responds. Each buck of her hips tells me she’s enjoying this.
The wet slapping sound that lingers between us tells me I’m touching her just how she likes.
The way her hands pull my lips back to hers shows me just how desperate she is for me to make her forget everything but us and this moment.
I need it too.
My tongue forces its way into her mouth, and I swallow down moans that come faster, harder. I can’t stop my hips from rocking my hard cock against her body. I shake with need—the need to please her.
Tight muscles pulsing around my fingers reveal how close she is.
My mouth breaks away. “Not yet, my girl.”
Pulling all the way out, I use my palm on her, teasing her engorged clit that little bit more before putting my fingers back deep inside her. But I want this to last, want her squirming below me, screaming for me before it’s fucking over.
Deep inside her wet cunt, I circle my fingers. She moans into my mouth as our lips meet again, her hips rocking to meet me, to get more of me as her tight muscles pull me in again.
A fist pounds on my door, interrupting it all. Those soft hands pull back from my face. Her head snaps away. Wide eyes are all I see in the dark, focused on the door and how the wood rattles when it bangs again.
“Dollie?” Shane calls from the other side.
“Stop,” she whispers, eyes back on me. “You have to stop, Ambrose.”
But she’s so close, it’s easy to tell by how she pants out my name.
My fingers don’t stop, swirling inside her over and over until her eyes flutter.
Even then, she whispers, “Now. You have to stop now.”
I hear the words, but they don’t register.
Pushing herself up, her tiny hands wrap around my wrist, her nails digging in and stopping my hand from moving inside her.
It snaps me out of my trance.
“Please, I said stop.”
It feels like cold water was thrown on me from somewhere. Perspiration drips down my torso as I reel back and pull my fingers out of her, falling to my heels. I slump there as she jumps from the bed and adjusts her shorts.
Stalling at the door when it pounds again, she turns to me. Even in the dark room, the panic in her eyes is obvious.
“Just a second,” I call out with a strained voice in response to Shane’s lack of patience.
“What am I gonna say? What am I gonna do?” she whispers so low, I only just catch it. “He’s gonna know something happened if he sees me in here.”
Forcing myself from the bed, too many thoughts try to hold me back as I take a step toward her.
She told me to stop, and I kept going.
I swallow down the vomit I feel rising up my throat. The bitter taste makes it to my tongue and clings there, but no chunks make it to my already ruined carpet.
I step in the pizza, forcing it deeper into the fibers.
As I move, cruel thoughts ride the wave of self-hatred that makes it to my brain.
You’re no better than that fuckwit clown. She didn’t want you touching her, and you did it anyway. You’re just like him.
Shaking my head, my brain doesn’t spare me a moment’s peace. I retreat to silence, not having any words to make things right between us right now.
“I don’t know what to do.” She still looks to me for answers, even after what I just did.
Knowing it well enough to do it in the dark, I release the lock on the secret door.
Whispering again, she asks, “You think I should go in there? In the walls? But it’s so dark. There could be spiders.”
Removing myself from her space, I clutch my phone from the nightstand and type a quick message with no contact to receive it.
Ambrose:
Use the light on this and follow the tunnels to the stairs. Be careful, they’re narrow. Look for little catches that’ll open the doors. The kitchen or music rooms are the easiest. Leave my phone somewhere down there. I’ll find it later.
He’ll never know you were here.
Part of me wonders why she’s so scared for him to find out what’s going on between us, if she’s really gonna end it tomorrow. Part of me thinks I already know. The fear in her small voice screams into my ears. She is still afraid of him, despite what she said earlier.
Thoughts of retracting my phone and telling her to stay run through my head, but before either of those things happens, she snatches it from my hand and hurries into the secret hallway.
Closing that door and sealing her in, I open the other.
“What the fuck do you want?” I snap, unable to hide my anger.
This short ass, who stretches to see over my shoulder and into my room, is exactly what I need to see to deflate my dick.
“Where is she?”
“Who?” I play dumb, just to watch his round face get redder.
“Your sister.”
“What do I look like, her fucking keeper?”
“I know she was in here a second ago.”
“Oh, really? Tell me, did she vanish into thin air?”
Shane’s still scouting behind me as my gaze drops down him. He looks clean aside from two chocolate stains, one on the front of his pants and the other on the side of his lip.
“See for yourself?” I step aside, stretching an arm out for him to enter.
A stubby finger pushes my light switch, illuminating the room. Shane’s feet pad my carpet, moving first to my bathroom, then to look under my bed. He ignores the sacks of Dollie’s stuff, not realizing my room is harboring all the things he wouldn’t let her keep. “I’m checking the closet.”
“You do that.” As I answer, he’s already dragging hangers across a metal rail to check if Dollie’s hiding behind clothes I haven’t worn since I was fifteen.
I pick up the pizza and take it to the bathroom trash can, only to find him in the center of my room when I return.
“I coulda sworn she was in here.”
I roll my eyes. My stomach rolls, too, that sour taste of vomit in the back of my throat again.
Heading to my nightstand, I open the bottle of water I keep there for bed and take a drink.
“You know what that’s called? Paranoia—a very dangerous thing.
” I return the cap to the bottle, setting it down now that I’m done.
The plastic crackles, making irritating background noises as I deliver a threat.
“Wouldn’t want you to act on those false thoughts and have someone retaliating with some very real violence. ”
I step forward. “Now, if you’re done, it’s the middle of the fucking night, go to bed. You need the beauty sleep.”
His judgmental eyes roam over me and my every scar, but he says nothing. A wise choice, given it’s my last probation meeting next week, and I won’t have someone watching my every move.
I’m not a violent person, not in the slightest, but Shane just angers me to the point I feel my blood boiling just by looking at him.
Stepping into his shadow, I stomp all over it, almost wishing it were his head as he steps into the hallway.
“Good boy,” I smirk.
The look he gives me for that comment, which brings him down a few pegs, is priceless.
“Fuck you,” he says, with a smile revealing food stuck in between his teeth.
Dollie appears in the hallway.
I dim my light to minimize the chances of her spying my clover, but it also limits what I see of her pretty face.
“I was looking for you,” Shane’s eyes move to her, his body and the ugly tattoo that covers his back, blocking her from my view completely.
“I told you I went to the bathroom. I used the downstairs one for more privacy.”
“Okay, well, let’s get into bed. It’s really fucking late now.”
“Sure.” Dollie’s head angles my way around Shane. “I saw your phone in the kitchen if you’re looking for it.”
I give her a nod, and nothing more, as she moves away. His hand on the small of her back as he guides her into her room.
Another smile lands on me, cruel and knowing. Shane’s. He knows my feelings for her. They’re too obvious to hide. Every time I see her, there’s this deep-rooted hunger. Every time she talks, my heart races a bit faster.
Her door clicks shut, leaving me on the other side of it with all my feelings. The happy ones step aside for misery to take center stage as the noise in my head continues to gnaw at me.
She’ll never want you now, not after tonight.
You’re no longer her brother, and you’ll never be more.
You’ll never be her person.