16. Ivy #2
Day in and day out, he has to face the agonizing pull of his addiction.
And now he’s lost Drew.
It’s precisely the kind of thing that could drag him back into that dark place he fought hard to get out of.
He truly does understand it.
All of it.
My grief.
The gut-wrenching sorrow I feel every day.
And the gaping hole in my chest where Drew once was.
He’s the only one who can .
This buzzing need to experience anything but pain that I’ve felt for almost two months claws at my soul, twists in my gut, vibrates through every nerve in my body as I stare at the man who looks so much like Drew but is so fucking different.
Darker.
Harder.
Full of secrets.
Tortured and tormented in a way I may never fully comprehend.
But he’s been here for me since the moment he arrived on my doorstep .
Worrying about me.
Taking care of me.
Giving me a shoulder to lean on, to cry on.
Offering me strength when I didn’t think I had it, even when he’s dealing with his own issues, his own struggles and pain that terrorize him so severely.
A tear trickles down his cheek, and I reach a shaky hand to wipe it away.
My fingers drift over his stubbled cheek and down along his strong jawline.
I brush my thumb over his lips, and he shudders under me.
His eyes stay locked with mine, his gaze hooded and filled with a thousand warring emotions I share.
“Cam…” My voice comes out uneven, as shaky and restless as my body feels. “I…”
I don’t even know what I’m trying to say . Don’t understand why I can’t seem to look away from him. Why my body heats the longer he holds my gaze.
All I know is I don’t want to look away.
I shift on his lap, sliding my thigh across his so I can face him fully.
So I can really look at him.
A dubious darkness crosses his eyes as he stares at me, but it does nothing to dim their vibrancy or striking beauty.
They churn like the waves on the beach tonight.
Tumultuous. Dangerous. Yet they somehow draw me in, make me want to dive headlong into their depths even without knowing what truly may lurk there.
His jaw tightens beneath the stubble covering it, and he lifts one hand to settle it on my hip.
Heat seeps from his palm to my skin.
And a warning plays in my head.
Don’t.
The way Cam looks at me is saying the same thing.
Yet, I can’t deny this pull, this warmth that’s spreading through my body the longer I stare into his fathomless blue eyes, the more I see his anguish that matches my own. It’s like looking in a mirror, and all I want to do is shatter it. Destroy his pain. Obliterate my own.
Any way possible…
The only way I know how.
I lean in and feather my lips across his.
His entire body stiffens, his hand going tight at my hip, the other curling into the leather of the couch with a creak.
But he doesn’t pull away.
Doesn’t do anything but remain frozen in place, his gaze still locked on mine with that same searing intensity.
I kiss him again, harder this time, pressing my mouth fully against his with clear intention. Not tentatively but with enough reservation for both of us, giving him every opportunity to stop it.
Cam isn’t the type of person to do anything he doesn’t want to.
And if he doesn’t want this, he will end it before it goes any further.
His chest rumbles with a groan, those fingers digging in even farther on my waist, and my body thrums back to life, heating everywhere after only the barest of brushes of our lips and the heady reaction to my kiss.
“Ivy”—my name comes out as a mix of warning and plea against my lips—“you don’t want this…”
The ragged waver in his voice matches the unsteadiness of my heartbeat.
I rest my forehead on his, closing my eyes and sliding my hands from his shoulders up his thick, corded neck and into his hair, holding him in place while my head spins in a thousand different directions.
He’s probably right.
I probably don’t really want this.
And it’s probably a horrible idea.
But it’s the most alive I’ve felt in months.
With my body pressed to his. His heart beating rapidly against my chest. My lips floating across his, and that taste…
God, he even tastes the way he smells.
Like something rich and sumptuous, yet somehow bright and fresh with promise, even as the darkness that always seems to envelop him coats my tongue as I glide it along his lips.
Cam groans, his body still locked up tight, but his cock stirs between my legs, and I shift along it, settling myself more fully onto his lap.
His other hand lifts from the couch to tunnel into my hair, and for a second, my heart stops, thinking he’s going to force me away and end this insanity before it really starts.
He holds me still and pulls back slightly, his eyes searching mine as uneven breaths fall from his parted lips. The heat I see blazing across his gaze matches that burning in my core and searing in my chest.
Another tear slips from my eye, and his gaze follows it down my cheek.
He lifts his hand from my hip to swipe it away.
He’s going to stop this .
I can see it in the way his hand trembles and the uncertainty in the way he looks at me, but all I can think about in this moment is how alive I’ll feel. How good it will feel. And how badly I want to just feel anything but this agony I’ve lived in for weeks, and weeks, and weeks.
This is what I need.
No matter how wrong it might be.
No matter how many reasons there are to stop.
So, before he can try to talk me out of it again—or I can talk myself out of it—I crush my mouth to his.
No hesitation this time.
The type of all-consuming kiss that tells him exactly what I want and how I feel in this moment so he can’t possibly doubt it.
He issues another throaty groan, his grip on my hair tightening, and his other hand falls back to my waist, trying to hold me still, but I can’t stop my hips from rolling over his hard length.
“Fuck…”
A single word muttered against my mouth is our undoing.
His lips move over mine. Our tongues clash. Souls collide in a way they only can when something so wrong feels so damn right. When two people come together with a shared, pulsating need that can’t be stopped even by stark reality.
I move against him, hungry for that friction that sends little spirals of heated pleasure spreading out through my limbs.
So.
Damn.
Good…
It’s been so long since I’ve felt anything good.
And this is exquisite torture.
My body buzzes, swimming in the feeling, drowning in his lips devouring mine and his hard body beneath me.
I thread my fingers through his hair, the thick strands so damn soft under my fingertips as I angle his head and adjust my position so that the head of his cock, encased in his jeans, rubs my clit with each grind of my hips.
A guttural groan rumbles in his chest, his hands tightening at my hips and around the tendrils of my hair clenched in his fist.
“Please…” The word tumbles from my parted lips, so needy and desperate I barely recognize the sound of my own voice. “Please, Cam.”
His mouth presses to mine greedily, but he shakes his head, a battle waging inside him that he can’t seem to quell. “Ivy, we can’t.” He gasps in a ragged breath. “We can’t…”
“Please.” I kiss him again, pushing all my anguish and need into the act. “Please. Please.”
I don’t stop my hips, and he doesn’t stop kissing me, even after his half-hearted objection to the madness.
And this is madness.
The kind of powerful, thought-stealing attraction and need that eliminates any ability to think. All we can do is feel.
Those reasons this is so fucking wrong disappear in the cloud of lust now enveloping us.
It consumes our entire beings, each kiss more frantic. Our clutching hands more frenzied. A feverish rush toward something we both need so desperately.
His hand shifts from my hip and glides forward to the waistband of my jeans. The brush of his calloused skin across my abdomen makes me twitch on his lap, grinding down even harder against his length, and he easily flips the button open and slides his hand inside.
Fuck…
The second his fingers find my slick core, I jolt at the contact, and he groans, so low, so deep it sounds almost painful. Rough fingertips glide up, brushing my arousal across my clit, and I buck in his hold, my hips moving faster, pinning his hand against his cock as I ride it.
Pleasure bursts through me with each of his expert ministrations.
He works me up.
Twisting me higher.
Coiling tighter.
And he slides a finger inside me as his thumb circles the apex of my thighs.
A gasp tumbles from my open mouth, and he captures it with another kiss, one that robs me of my breath and any semblance of control I may have maintained up until this moment.
My legs start shaking as he continues to devour me like I’m providing him with oxygen, giving and taking as I come apart completely. The orgasm slams into me so hard my vision goes dark before I see bright stars flashing across my lids.
My body jerks against his.
My hands tighten in his hair, tugging him closer as my mouth falls open on a strangled cry.
My pussy clenches his fingers as he continues to pump them up into me and circle and glide his thumb across my clit, dragging out my pleasure so long that my lungs start to burn from the lack of air getting to them.
Cam moves under me, his cock pinned beneath where his hand is shoved into my jeans. He groans, heavy and low, his hips jerking wildly, lips frantically seeking mine out to capture the last of my gasps, until I finally float down, and he sags back against the couch.
His hand still cups my core.
His fingers stay buried inside me.
He stills, and I collapse onto him.
A sob of relief falls from my lips but quickly morphs as something wrenches from deep in my chest.
Sorrow.
Anger.
I unleash it all along with the tears I didn’t know I had left.
They coat his skin as I bury my face into his neck, and he pulls his hand free of my body and tugs me up against him fully, holding me to him as his tears join mine, and we both completely fall apart.