Chapter 36 THEO #2
I glance over at her any time I can, and she mostly looks happy, but occasionally she looks contemplative, and once she seems downright sad.
She’s probably thinking about her parents, or about her asshole ex who ruined every possible holiday for her in some way or another.
We’re going to have to spend years building up new traditions and getting her to like holidays again.
Years. I smile at the thought.
We stop for lunch at a crab shack in Bandon, and Alex is thrilled.
She cracks open the legs with efficient, practiced movements.
She eschews the melted butter completely, just pops the tender crab in her mouth, her lips closing around her fingers and sucking quickly before she cracks open more of the leg.
I have to remind myself to eat, remind myself that I love this place, that I haven’t been here in ten years, but everything is obscured by the fact that Alex is here with me, happy and enjoying herself, stealing one of my crab legs since she doesn’t seem to like the body meat as much.
“You’re lucky I like you,” I tease as she pulls another one of my legs to her plate.
“More like the other way around,” she mutters, smiling up at me. I stare down at my food for a second, overwhelmed by the impulse to tell her I love her.
I have other plans for the day, a hike, more tidepools, maybe taking her to that ridiculous dinosaur garden down the coast, but I scrap them all.
Instead, I drive us back to Yachats, lead her downstairs, and make love to her slowly.
I bite my fucking tongue, and I try hard to keep how much I love her off my face, but I fail.
She starts tearing up, pulling me closer and kissing me so that I don’t see the look on her face, but I see it.
We’re on the same page.
I leave her asleep in bed afterward and go upstairs to finish making the panettone. I’m letting the dough rest again and making a fire when she comes upstairs in leggings and my sweater, some of my socks on her feet.
“Teddy?” Her voice is sweet and endearing, and the nickname stops me cold. Why is she calling me that? I stand up and back away from the fire, looking down at how she’s smiling sweetly up at me. She’s being different right now, but I can’t tell how. “Can you do me a favor?”
“Anything.” She smiles wider at the supplicating tone of my voice.
“Can you go away?” A pit opens in my stomach, and all the joy vanishes.
“What?” My voice is sharp, and her smile falters, her eyes going wide for a second before she exhales exasperatedly and rolls her eyes at me. She steps closer, her arms winding around my neck and her fingers combing through my hair, and I relax instantly.
“Like, to the kitchen, baby,” she says, pressing up on her toes and kissing me softly.
“I need you to stay in the kitchen and not leave until I say you can. I have to deal with the stuff in the trunk, and I’d love it if you could just be good for me and do what I tell you.
” Her voice is low and sultry, and I’m putty in her hands as she kisses up my neck and jaw, pushing me back slowly until she’s walking me backward toward the kitchen, undoing my pants as she goes.
I’m already hard from how her voice sounded when she asked me to be good for her, which is new.
She slips her hand into my pants and grips me tightly as she kisses me, and when I gasp a little, she sweeps her tongue into my mouth, moaning softly, stroking my cock in long, slow movements as she guides me into the kitchen.
She shoves me back against the counter roughly and pours a little olive oil into her hand before she goes back to stroking me, twisting her hand as it glides along my shaft.
I close my eyes for a second, overwhelmed by the feeling.
Why is she being like this?
“Are you going to stay here?” she asks sweetly, and I nod, looking down at her with wide eyes.
She gets this sly little smile on her face before she kisses me hard, biting my bottom lip and making me moan.
She pulls back, looking into my eyes as she grips me harder and starts stroking me faster, her thumb rubbing over my head with every stroke.
Her other hand moves up my chest and neck, cupping my face, her thumb grazing over my bottom lip and pushing into my mouth. My breath starts coming harder as her thumb glides against my tongue, and a wave of heat courses through me.
What is happening?
“Do you want to prove you’ll be good for me?” I’ll do whatever she wants right now, so I nod again, unable to speak. She watches my mouth as she pushes her thumb further in, her face satisfied when I curl my tongue around it and suck.
Why the fuck is this so sexy?
She pulls her thumb out of my mouth and drags it across my bottom lip, laughing a little, and then her other hand wraps around me like a vice, and a small, needy whimper I had no idea I could make escapes me as she starts jerking me off, her hands twisting in opposite directions.
“Oh, fuck…Alex…shit…”
“Yeah?” She looks me directly in the eyes and makes soft, encouraging little whines when my breath starts coming harder. I lean my head back against the cabinets as I try to hold out longer, but that’s not what she wants.
“Come for me, Theo.” Her voice is a low, breathy, insistent thing, and her telling me what to do is so surprisingly hot that I come immediately, my orgasm so intense that my vision swims and my hips jerk harshly.
Everything seems sort of hazy when I look down at Alex, who slowly holds her hand up to me. Olive oil and cum cover her palm and fingers, and a wicked smile spreads across her face as she presses one of her fingers against my lips.
“Clean it up,” she says softly, and I nod and start sucking her fingers clean and dragging my tongue across her palm.
“Look at me, baby.” I meet her eyes as I slip her pinky finger into my mouth and suck.
Her pupils are dilated, and she keeps glancing between my eyes and mouth, and she smiles at me as I suck the last of my cum off her fingers.
“Such a good boy.” My eyes go wide, and I stop breathing, my head emptying out entirely and my chest filling with warmth as I stare down at her.
I like being good for her.
She steps into me and pushes onto her toes to kiss me, sliding her tongue against mine with a satisfied moan, and being touched by her feels good in a new way.
I whine in protest and grip her tightly as she tries to pull away, and her face is smug in a way I haven’t seen before as she looks up at me, cupping my jaw in her hand.
“Stay in the kitchen for me.”
“Uh-huh,” I breathe out. She laughs a little and kisses me sweetly before turning away from me.
“I fucking thought so,” she mutters under her breath as she walks back into the living room. I hear her turn on the radio and tune it until it’s playing Christmas music, and I stand there staring after her, confused and kind of dazed.
What just happened? Why is she acting like that?
I pull my pants back up and wash my hands, reeling.
Seriously, what just happened? Alex doesn’t act like that.
I preheat the oven absently, pouring the rested dough into the panettone collar.
That’s not how she is with me usually, but I definitely liked that.
I put the panettone in the oven, turning on the oven light to watch it bake.
Did I only like that because she liked that?
Probably not, because I’m not into her rape thing, so I liked that regardless of her.
That’s interesting.
I make coffee, leaning against the counter and watching the panettone start to rise, and I struggle to think.
God, I fucking loved that. She thought so?
How did she know I would like that if I didn’t?
I want to ask, and I desperately want to be close to her, but she told me to stay in the kitchen.
She’s turned up the music so loud in the other room that I can barely hear what she’s doing. What is she doing?
A pit opens in my stomach as the haze in my mind slowly clears.
She’s fucking manipulating me.
She’s using sex and my affection for her to manipulate me.
She’s being so obvious about it, too, and I’m just letting her get away with it.
I shake my head up at the ceiling, hurt and frustration building the longer I think about it.
All I do is try to take care of her and make her happy, and she’s treating me like a pathetic fucking doormat. I didn’t think she was like that.
This is bullshit, and I’m not putting up with it.
“Alexandria, what the fu-” I storm out into the living room and freeze when I see her crouched by the tree, slipping a few perfectly wrapped presents underneath.
All the anger dissipates from my body as I look around the living room.
There are empty shopping bags, a roll of wrapping paper, and some scissors and tape discarded near her.
Alex seems exasperated when she looks up at me.
“I didn’t say you could leave the kitchen yet, Theodore.” Her voice is chastising and sexy at the same time, and I want to melt. “I was going to reward you for being good, too,” she pouts.
I blink at her, my mind emptying.
“Reward?” She smirks and I shake my head quickly, trying to focus. “Uh, we need to come back to that later. What are you doing?” Alex suddenly goes from sexy to shy, taking a deep breath as she stands up and crosses her arms, looking out the windows behind me.
“Um, I, uh…I already ruined your Thanksgiving, and since it’s your first Christmas out of prison and my first since Danny, I thought we could do…
something?” She looks embarrassed but still won’t look at me.
“Nothing big. Not whatever crazy, over-the-top bullshit you had planned, but something. A few presents. Holiday movies. Your precious ham, obviously,” she says, rolling her eyes and smiling, finally making eye contact with me, her face nervous and hopeful.
She’s maybe the most vulnerable I’ve ever seen her, and my heart skips a beat.
Oh. She was manipulating me so she could surprise me.
That was my cute, sweet, exceptionally sexy girlfriend manipulating me with sex because she knew it would work, and she apparently knows what works better than I do, because she knows me.
She was manipulating me because she knows she can, because she knows I’m wrapped around her finger, because she knows I’ll do anything for her.
This is all so new.
She’s taking photos of me, calling me by a nickname, buying me gifts, trying to surprise me, trying to take care of me. I don’t think there are any more barriers or trust issues between us anymore. I think she can feel our connection now, because she’s finally doing this with me.
I need to tell her I love her.
“There’s a panettone in the oven.” She closes her eyes and laughs, and I can tell she’s trying not to cry as she walks towards me and wraps her arms around me.
“You’re kind of the best, you know that?”