Chapter Nine #2
“’Night,”
Kala said as TJ took Lou’s hand.
Lou turned slightly before they got to the door to her and TJ’s room. It used to just be Lou’s, but now there was no way to deny TJ lived with them. His boy stuff was all over the place, though she would give it to her cousin. The Army had trained him to be neat. “You sure you want to sneak in tonight? You could come in now. It’s pretty late.”
Kala snorted. “No. We’re good, Lou. Besides, he’s going to want to do stuff to you.”
TJ’s head shook. “Nah. We did that earlier, and I ate too many waffles. I got a pooch going. But I think you should sneak in. We have an excellent routine where I can pretend my cousin isn’t sleeping with us most nights.”
“I agree with TJ.”
What would she do when she wasn’t living here? Would she move to DC and deal with it? She could do it. If she lived alone, she would learn to not need anyone. Maybe that was the problem. She was codependent. Or just dependent, since it wasn’t like Lou snuck into her bed. “Why fix it if it isn’t broken? Thanks for the waffle. I had fun watching the waitress taking bets on when TJ would explode.”
TJ chuckled. “I’ll take a run tomorrow and it will all be gone.”
He grinned. “And then I’ll need another breakfast.”
“You know the word breakfast means to break your fast, buddy. I don’t think you ever fast,”
Kala quipped.
“That sounds terrible,”
TJ said as he drew Lou into their room.
They would probably still do it. Sex seemed to work for them. Lou wouldn’t lie to her. If it was terrible, Lou would tell her. Kenzie had in the past. She’d talked about one boyfriend who was terrible in bed.
So it was just her.
She stared at her door for a moment. It was her room, and it wouldn’t ever be theirs. She was solitary, and that was okay. It was okay. She would be okay and they would be okay, and one day years from now they would think of her fondly.
It was going to be okay, and she wasn’t going to end up in Lou’s bed tonight. She was going to suck it up and deal with her problems on her own. If she had trouble, she would put it where it should go—deep down in her gut or in the therapist’s office. Lou shouldn’t have to be her emotional support friend forever.
Lou and TJ would get married and then have kids and they would move on. They would have a life.
She had to be ready for that. Tash and Dare were getting married soon. Kenzie would either catch her…ick…Ben or wake up and realize he was a douchebag and find someone else. Tris had his subs. Even Zach apparently had a whole other plan no one knew about. There was comfort in evil plans.
She was all she had, and tonight had proven it.
The door to her sister’s room opened, and Kenzie stared out, Bud Two at her side. The big mutt almost always slept on Kenzie’s bed when they were home.
“Go in your room,”
her twin said, eyes narrowed. “And I swear if you try to run, I will catch you.”
What the hell? “I’m getting that a lot tonight. I’ll go to bed. No need to chase me down.”
Kenzie stood there, not saying a word. Weirdo.
Kala was happy she wasn’t cornering her, trying to get her to talk about what happened tonight. No way. No how. There weren’t enough waffles in the world to get her to talk about what happened tonight. She opened the door and turned, closing it quickly in case Kenzie changed her mind.
“Don’t scream.”
Kala turned and did not scream. She wouldn’t fucking scream. But she did feel her jaw drop.
Cooper McKay was laid out on her bed. Naked. And there were daisies. On his dick.
Oh, damn. “Tell me my father didn’t put flowers on your penis.”
She stood there for a moment because of all the ways she’d thought the night would end, this hadn’t even been a thought. Like she’d contemplated what she would do if aliens attacked but only because she’d gotten the dude from Bliss’s weekly newsletter warning of impending mating seasons for some alien life-forms. It was weird, and she kind of dug it.
But this… Nope. This was a total surprise.
Cooper’s arms were splayed out, the restraints coming from under the mattress—a setup that absolutely did not belong to her. His head turned. “No, the daisies are from your sister and Bri. They’re kind of dicks. Like leave a man some dignity. Nope. Your father is the one who tied me down. There was a sheet involved at one time. Did you know your dad trained your dog to pull the sheets off naked dudes?”
Her father was such a menace. “I think he just taught him how to retrieve stuff.”
He was naked on her bed. Naked. She forced herself to stare at his face. “What are you doing here, Cooper?”
His gaze went grim. “I’m here for you, baby. What happened… We didn’t go about this the right way.”
“Is there another way to go? We fucked. It didn’t go well. We’re not compatible.”
“Yeah, it might work like that if everyone was the same and needed the same things sexually.”
Of course. It was her fault, but then she knew it.
“Don’t,”
he said, his voice going deep. “You listen to me and not the negative voices in your head. There is nothing wrong with a couple not being able to go from zero to penetration in a heartbeat. You tell me something. If one of your subs talked to you about this, would you tell them to give up? If they said they truly cared about their partner and wanted it to work, what would you tell them?”
“To talk to each other. To try new things.”
She would likely read up on sexuality and try to help them through the problem.
“Why can’t you give yourself the same grace, baby? You deserve it, too. Unless you want to tell me you don’t care about me and you don’t want to try.”
This…this was her out. This could be payback for everything he’d done to her over the years. For every time he’d made her feel small and unworthy. Even though she knew it wasn’t what he’d meant to do, the feeling had been real all the same. All she had to do was tell him she didn’t give a shit.
He stared at her with such earnestness.
What did she want? Petty revenge or a couple of months with him? Did she owe herself grace?
Why was her father such a weirdo?
“What do you think we should do? Is this an invitation for a session? Are you submitting to me, Cooper?”
She wasn’t sure she wanted that.
“If that’s what you need,”
he offered. “I’ll give you anything you need. If you want to whip my ass, it’s yours. I don’t think you understand how far I’ll go for you. I’m not the scared kid I was when we were fifteen.”
“I doubt you were afraid. You were embarrassed.”
“I was afraid,”
he corrected. “I was afraid I wouldn’t live up to what my parents expected from me. I didn’t understand what they expected from me. I thought I had to be the best at everything, and that included socially. I thought if I was the golden boy, they wouldn’t care that I don’t look like them.”
He’d thought that? Damn. She made fun about her emotionless state, but she could actually feel emotion well. It was kind of gross and not something she could ignore. “Because you were adopted? You thought they would only love you if you were perfect?”
It was kind of hard to keep her eyes on his face. He was such a beautiful man. She’d seen him in leathers and without his shirt on. She’d seen him in shorts, playing sports, with his whole body glistening with sweat, but there was something about him laid out that made her insides shake. Her pink parts.
Hadn’t she learned she wasn’t sexual? Except she could feel an ache begin low in her pelvis.
Her sexual organs were eternally optimistic, it seemed.
“I did, but I grew up and realized they love me. For who I am. They don’t need me to carry on their DNA. They wanted a kid to love, and I was lucky enough to be that kid,”
Cooper said. “I was insecure. I was young. I know I hurt you and I never meant to, but I did. I need you to understand this right now. I don’t want anyone but you. I want you because you are everything I need in a woman. Even the frustrating parts. I think this whole let’s-have-sex thing might be a way to get me out of your system before you move on, and I’m willing to take the risk. But you should know what you’re risking, too.”
Every word threatened to shred all her plans. “What am I risking, Coop?”
“Me winning. You can try to fuck me out of your system, but the whole time I’ll be plotting and planning to find a way that I’m so burrowed in, you won’t ever be able to leave me behind. I’m going to make you love me, Kala Taggart. I’m going to be the one thing you can’t ever compromise on.”
She was fairly certain she’d never heard any threat as terrifying as the one Cooper had just issued.
I will let him know how much fun we have with you.
Nope. That was it. Yep. Twelve years later and that fucker was still in her head. Definitely scarier than Cooper thinking he might be able to love her.
If she walked away from Cooper now, the Russian asshole might always live there. No matter how afraid she was of truly loving Cooper, she was more afraid of not ever feeling anything but afraid.
So she took a long breath and gave in. “What do I need, Cooper? I’m sure my father, the sex therapist, was embarrassingly thorough.”
Cooper seemed to relax. “You need to explore to your heart’s content. You need to be in charge in any way you like. I’m not saying I won’t ever want to be in control. I can assure you I will, but not until you’re comfortable.”
Did he know? She didn’t even fucking know. It wasn’t like she’d bled or anything, but then she was pretty sure even if she’d been a virgin, she wouldn’t have had a hymen anymore. She’d killed a dude with her thighs once, and he’d been a twisty, turny motherfucker.
Not knowing. It was a curse in its own way.
“Why do you think I wouldn’t be comfortable?”
Kala asked, laying a trap.
Ah, there was the tension. “I don’t know. Probably because you’re a top. I only know what we did earlier didn’t work. We went too fast. We need more time. I’ve wanted you since we were fifteen. I want to take my time, to sink into this thing I’ve longed for almost half my life.”
He definitely wasn’t the same boy. The man knew exactly how to talk to her. The man was infinitely more dangerous.
Well, her sister had told her if she tried to run, she would hunt her down, and Kenzie could be mean when she wanted to. Kala’s brain ran through all the scenarios of her leaving this room and taking to the road to live a vagabond life, and almost all of them ended with the cops being called and her and her sister becoming viral video stars for all the wrong reasons. She couldn’t run. Decision made. “So I can do whatever I want.”
“As long as the first thing you do is get this fucking flower off my dick,”
Cooper pleaded. “I’m worried it’s like covered in poison ivy or something. It tickles.”
She couldn’t help the laugh that boomed through the room. It was funny. It was wild. It was…kind of perfect when she thought about it. Sometimes she thought things had to be normal to be perfect, but what if her life was different? What if she got to decide what was perfect and everyone else could fuck off? Why was that so hard?
She moved to the bed, staring down at everything he was offering her. So much more than merely a beautiful body. He was offering her something she’d never had. She could touch him and rub her body against his, and it wouldn’t freak her out because she was in control.
He was hers. Like a sub but with sex. And she was an indulgent Mistress—she wasn’t. She was pretty hard-core, but tonight she was playing a different game.
A thought struck her as she stared down at the pretty white flower covering Cooper’s penis. Sort of. She could see the head kind of peeking out. But she was stuck on what had to have happened. “Did my sister see your penis?”
Cooper flushed. “I mean, it’s not like I planned it. There was supposed to be a sheet. I agreed to a sheet, and your dad took it because he said he wasn’t sure my penis was like a gift or something, and your sister then decided to decorate me. And for full disclosure, Bri saw it, too. But if I have sex at the club, everyone’s going to see it.”
“I should have seen it first. I’m totally going to see Ben Parker’s dick first. You’re going to help me make that happen.”
They were being honest tonight. She usually didn’t like to ask questions she didn’t know the answer to, but she was going all in. “Why haven’t you had sex at The Hideout?”
“You know why. The same reason you haven’t,”
he replied. “Because neither one of us wants to hurt the other, and we weren’t ready.”
“I was ready at fifteen,”
she murmured, reaching out to put a hand on his muscular thigh. She loved his legs. They were strong and masculine, and she used to love the way they felt when they brushed against hers.
“You weren’t, baby,”
he said quietly.
She also loved that he was honest. She wasn’t a fool. He worked around her half the time, offering up something she could accept without giving up her pride. She was starting to wonder if her pride was overrated. “No, I wasn’t. But I might be now.”
She watched as that little flower no longer covered so much of Cooper. His cock stirred to life and lengthened in front of her eyes, the daisy falling away.
Damn, that was hot. She had to swallow her drool. Now that the formalities were out of the way, she could indulge. She could look to her heart’s content.
He was every bit as beautiful as she dreamed he would be, with long, strong limbs and a well-defined chest. She’d seen him without his shirt a thousand times, but this felt different. She put a hand on his chest, feeling the hard muscle covered by warm skin. He had a light dusting of hair that felt good under her palm. And his nipples were hard. Cooper loved to torture a sub’s nipples during their sessions. It didn’t matter if they were guy nipples or chick nipples, Cooper twisted them all the same.
She reached down and ran the tip of her index finger around his left nipple, watching it pucker even further.
His lips curled up. “You’re going to kill me, aren’t you, baby?”
It wasn’t something she would ever admit, but she loved it when he called her baby. Like they were together. Like they would never be apart again. She let her finger circle him one more time and then brought the heat. She pinched down and twisted and watched his toes curl, his cock bob, and the breath hitch from his chest.
This she knew how to do. She was the mistress of pain as pleasure. It was why all the subby boys and girls came to her. How many times had she brought a sub to orgasm? Service had become her sexuality. She’d taken no physical satisfaction from those encounters, merely the knowledge that she had a purpose in a world she felt apart from. D/s gave her a place where her violent tendencies could do good. Where she wasn’t the person Julia Ennis had told her she was destined to be.
Nope. Not thinking about that bitch or anything about that time tonight. Cooper was giving her a gift, and she was going to take it. She moved to his other perfectly formed nipple and gave it the same attention. Cooper gritted his teeth, and his hands gripped the ropes that bound him.
Did he like it? He could be pretending for her. “Is this okay?”
“Baby, you know it is. You know how to watch for signs. My cock won’t lie to you. My body won’t. I’m your sub tonight.”
Strangely, she didn’t like those words. “You’re not my sub. You’re just…mine for tonight.”
“For as long as we want,”
he said quietly. “I want the deal we made before back in place. I want to be the man you come to when you need, Kala.”
“When I need sex?”
“When you need anything.”
It wasn’t like she didn’t have people in her life who would do anything for her. Her family was wonderful. Her parents would literally go to the ends of the earth for her, but hearing the words out of Cooper’s mouth filled some place inside her she hadn’t known was empty. Why did it have to be this man? Only one. Only him.
She stared down at him as she started to unbutton her blouse, easing it off her shoulders. This was happening, and somehow she trusted it this time. She didn’t have to worry about pleasing him, about rushing through the part that scared her so she could feel his arms around her. They would get to the part where she was wrapped up in him, but now she got to explore.
She hesitated when she got to the button of her jeans.
“What is it? Don’t stop, Kala.”
She frowned down at him. “Well, if I’d known I was going to get naked, I wouldn’t have eaten all those waffles. TJ is a bad influence.”
His laughter boomed through the room.
Somehow him laughing made all her insecurities fly away, replaced with an eagerness she’d never felt before. She wanted this, wanted this time, wanted him in a way that was bigger than sex, and somehow that made it okay.
He watched her as she undressed, his eyes seeming to eat her up. He’d seen her in various states of undress, but now she wondered how much he’d hidden from her because there was no way to deny the hunger in his eyes. She couldn’t pretend this was about convenience. Oh, she likely would tomorrow, but for tonight she wasn’t lying to herself.
Tonight, this was everything.
Being naked with him felt right. So did having him tied down for her pleasure, so score one for her father. Eww. She’d thought about her dad.
“Do not think about your dad or your brother or Kenzie,”
Cooper ordered in his dommiest tone.
The man did know her. “My brother was here, too?”
Cooper’s eyes were on her breasts. “I want to fucking suck on your nipples, baby. I want them in my mouth and hands and god, at some point I want to hold them together and slide my dick in between them.”
All interesting thoughts. She never realized how easily distracted he was by sex. She could have fun with that, but he hadn’t answered her question. A feeling of power coursed through her. How could it not when he was looking at her like he wanted to eat her alive? “Focus, Coop. My dad brought Travis here?”
His eyes stayed on her as she prowled around the bed. “Seth. And your parents should have spanked him more.”
She trailed her fingertips down his body, lightly scraping across his chest down to his abs. “He would have liked it.”
“Your brother loves you,”
Cooper said, and his breath hitched as she touched his cock. “He cares about you more than he shows. Also, he’s a sneaky bastard, and he’s listening in way more than you think he is.”
Seth? She loved Seth, had always felt a connection to her brother, but he didn’t pay attention to much beyond his music and sex with lots of women. “I don’t want to talk about Seth. Tell me more about the nipple thing. I like it when you talk.”
Dirty. She liked it when he talked dirty. She could get hot listening to him tell a sub what he planned to do to them, and she didn’t get off on stuff like humiliation play. But when it came out of his filthy, gorgeous mouth, she suddenly reconsidered.
“Do you know why I had them tie me down like this?”
She climbed on the bed, finally letting her hand find the part of him she’d been fascinated with since she learned what sex was. She tossed away the flower. Her sister was a weirdo. He didn’t need decorating. He was a work of art all on his own. “I would think the headboard would be easier. You wouldn’t need an under-the-mattress restraint system.”
She licked her lips as she touched him for the first time. His cock practically pulsed in her hands, and Cooper groaned, a deep, sexy sound. She wasn’t going to think about where that restraint system had come from. It was hers now.
“If they tied me to the headboard, you wouldn’t be able to sit on my face, baby,”
Cooper said. “And I really, really want you to sit on my face.”
For a second the words didn’t compute, and then a vision of her riding his tongue washed through her, lighting a fire inside. She thought she’d wanted before?
“I want you to ride my face and then my cock. I’m your fucking stallion tonight, baby. Don’t think about it. Don’t let in any intrusive thoughts. All you need to know is I dream about eating your pussy. I think about it when we’re sitting in a conference room and when we’re on an op. It’s distracting. You have to do it or I’m going to get myself killed in the field because all I can think about is how good you’re going to taste on my tongue and how tight you’ll be around my cock. When I’m in a knife fight, sometimes I think about the way those perfect tits of yours will bounce when we fuck.”
He was saying all the right things, pushing every button that would allow her to see past those nasty thoughts encumbering her every happy moment. “So I’m doing it for my country, when you think about it.”
“You’re doing it for me. You’re saving me, and quite frankly, everyone who rides in a plane with me because I think about fucking you there, too. Remember when we dropped two thousand feet over the Atlantic a couple of months back? I said it was because I thought Big Tag needed a jolt of adrenaline every now and then. Nope. My dick was so hard, it bumped the damn yoke, Kala. Guess who I was thinking about?”
He’d been thinking about her? Well, there was nothing else to do. “I am a dutiful operative. So I just move in and put my pussy right on your face? Will you be able to breathe?”
“I will,”
he promised and looked like a man who was so very close to getting what he wanted. “It’ll be weird at first, and then I promise you won’t think about anything but how good it feels. Try it. Try me.”
How could she possibly deny him when he asked so politely? It was awkward but she moved up his body, stretching out so their skin touched. So her breasts grazed over his belly and chest. So she felt his erection against her skin. She breathed him in, shutting everything else out. What had been weird in the club suddenly seemed okay here in the safety of her room. He was giving her permission to do all the weird shit she’d ever wanted to do to him. Like smelling him and rubbing her cheek against his chest so she could feel his chest hair tickle. Like running kisses over his collarbone and nestling her face against the warm curve of his neck.
“It feels so good, baby. So good to be close to you,”
he whispered.
So good. So right. Like something fell into place, and she was whole for a moment.
She paused at his face. She’d memorized every line and plane, and yet this felt new and fresh. She lowered her mouth to his, the kiss oddly sweet. Or maybe just sweet. Maybe she needed to stop with the fucking adjectives that put her on the outside and simply accept this was her world and it wasn’t so bad.
Right now it felt like heaven.
She kissed him for the longest time and he let her, their tongues playing. She sucked his bottom lip into her mouth before running her tongue across it.
Cooper groaned and squirmed, his cock rubbing between her legs like it was trying to burrow inside. Hours before she would have taken this as a cue to get the train moving, but not now. Now she wanted to go slow, to make this last. To give him everything he wanted, and he wanted her on his face. So she was going to do it.
She kissed him one last time on the mouth before brushing light busses over his nose and cheeks and forehead. “Tell me if you’re uncomfortable.”
She brought her body up, kneeling above his mouth, her lower legs pinning his arms down. She balanced against the headboard. He was perfectly placed, and it wasn’t as awkward as she thought it would be.
“You’re so fucking gorgeous,”
he muttered, bringing his head up, and she suddenly felt his nose right in her pussy. “You smell so good, baby. Give me a taste.”
She was in a haze of lust as she lowered her pelvis down and felt the first long lick of his tongue. Heat flashed through her, a revelation. What the hell? This wasn’t the little pleasures she’d given herself with her fingers and a vibrator. This was something else entirely.
She couldn’t think. All of those voices that nagged at her fled entirely as Cooper speared her with his tongue. He ate at her pussy, drawing one side of her labia into his mouth and then the other, sucking and licking and worrying her clit with his tongue. She thought she would survive it, but she found herself moving with him, seeking more. The shy part of her was utterly muted, and she found a fierce pleasure she’d never felt before.
“More,”
Cooper groaned against her tender flesh. “Give me more. I swear if my hands weren’t tied, they would be digging into your sweet ass, pulling you down on me.”
She had zero idea how the man was breathing, but in that moment, she didn’t care. He was telling her what he wanted, and she gave it to him. She seated herself on that talented tongue of his and rode him. Moving in an instinctive rhythm, she rolled her hips and found the perfect spot. His tongue went deep and something…probably his nose…rubbed against her clit. It didn’t matter. All that mattered was the magnificent flood of pleasure invading her veins.
She felt alive. So fucking alive.
“Baby,”
Cooper was saying against her skin. “Baby, please. I’m dying. Please fuck me. I’ll beg all you like. I’ll make you breakfast in the morning and rub your feet before we go into the office, just please put that gorgeous pussy close to my dick and I swear I’ll do all the work.”
Oh, she liked it when that man begged. A languid pleasure still pulsed through her, but she worked up the will to move down his body. Now she understood what she’d done wrong the first time. She’d been wet but not entirely ready. Sex wasn’t merely about her pussy. Her mind was ready. Her soul was ready.
She felt like a new person, like some part of her had just been unleashed, and she liked this aspect of herself. She straddled his hips, taking that glorious cock in hand and placing it right where it needed to be.
Cooper’s face was a mask of desire. “Do it, Kala. Ride me.”
She lowered herself onto his cock. Cooper’s moan filled the room as his hips bucked up.
“Understand this, when my hands are free, they’re going to be all over you,” he vowed.
It didn’t scare her the way it would have five minutes before. She wanted his hands on her. They didn’t need the ropes. This wasn’t anything but love and pleasure, and she wasn’t even going to pretend she hadn’t thought the word love. This was love.
She followed his lead, moving her hips in time with his, loving the way he filled her. He stretched her pussy in the most delicious way. There was a sharp edge to it, but she even liked the ache it caused. She rode him, not expecting anything but to watch him find his pleasure. So when she found the perfect spot, she was shocked, but her body took over. She ground down, rubbing that spot deep inside her. Cooper’s jaw clenched, and she felt the moment he came. It sent her over the edge again, the pleasure even more forceful than the last time.
She collapsed on him, not minding the way they were still connected. Sex was messy and sticky and kind of amazing. She lay her head on his chest, listening to the beat of his heart. It was thundering, but hers was already slowing into a peaceful rhythm.
So often she thought she should have simply thrown herself into the deep end, gotten it over with, moved on from him.
In this moment, she was so grateful she hadn’t. No matter what happened, she would have this night to remember.
“Can I say it, Kala?”
Cooper asked quietly.
She wasn’t ready. She couldn’t believe it. Not right now. “Not yet.”
“Just so you know I’m thinking it.”
I love you. The words played in her head as she lay there, surrounded by wonder.
Deep in the night, she woke, the dream flashing through her system. It had started with Cooper on top of her and then morphed to the Russian, and she’d looked back and saw a line of hims waiting for their turn.
She shot up and forced herself to breathe.
It was okay. It shouldn’t be surprising she’d had the dream tonight. She wasn’t going to let it ruin what had been a great night. She glanced over, and it looked like she hadn’t woken him.
She eased out of bed. Kala wasn’t sure why, but she didn’t have the dream when she slept with Lou. She had in the beginning, but her bestie would pat her back and talk to her until she got back to sleep, and after a while she simply slept when she was in Lou’s bed.
She picked up Cooper’s shirt and drew it over her head. It came to mid-thigh, so it would work. She would nap in Lou’s room. Then she would sneak back here, and Cooper wouldn’t even have to know.
Moving quickly and quietly, she slipped into Lou’s room. TJ had recently replaced Lou’s bed with an oversized king they’d had to have custom sheets made for. Lou barely moved when she eased into the bed. Lou’s room always smelled like lavender, the scent immediately dispelling the dream.
“Scoot,”
a voice whispered.
She managed to not freak out. Cooper had followed her. “What are you doing?”
Lou’s eyes opened, and a grin hit her face. “Oh, this is going to be fun. I think he’s getting into bed with us. You dream again?”
Kala nodded. “Yeah. I was going to take a nap and go back.”
“I sleep where you sleep,”
Cooper said, and in the moonlight, she could see he was in his boxers and nothing else. He slid in and wrapped his arm around her waist. “And keep it down. I don’t want to wake up TJ.”
“Oh, you can’t.”
Lou turned her head slightly. “You’re not going to wake up, are you, babe?”
TJ sniffled and turned over. “I’ll take two and a side of fries.”
Lou snorted. “See. No waking him up. Now pretend you’re sleeping, Cooper. I need to talk to bestie.”
Cooper yawned against her neck, the warmth of his breath hitting her skin like a blanket. “I’m already there. But, Kala, I sleep where you sleep. Always. ’Night.”
He cuddled her like a teddy bear.
Lou’s hand came out, touching her cheek. “Was he good to you?”
There were moments when Kala felt like the world was dark, when those voices she had made it feel like she was in a constant storm. But then there were moments like this when she felt all the love that surrounded her. When she knew how blessed she was to have these people in her life. When she felt worthy of them.
“Yes,”
she said quietly to the woman who had been her best friend for half her life. It was a sort of love affair, friendship. In the beginning it was exciting and new, and if it survived all the changes people went through, it became something soft and precious. It rounded out and became a foundation to build parts of a life on.
Could she do the same with Cooper?
“I’m so glad,”
Lou whispered. “So happy. But now you’re going to be a complete perv, right?”
Probably. She kind of already wanted to do it again. “Maybe I should have woken him up and fucked him again.”
“She learns,”
he said and kissed the nape of her neck.
“Not here,”
Lou shot back like she would actually do it.
She wouldn’t. “Maybe in the morning.”
The world was soft and warm, and she fell into a perfect sleep.