Chapter 12
Chapter Twelve
A few more days passed and it was the weekend.
For the first time since Clay had broken in, I was alone in the house.
Mac was at work. The Haven’s Rebels were at church, which was their way of saying a mandatory club meeting.
Obviously, Bram had to go, but at first I didn’t understand why Vivian had to go, too.
Turned out that wives of members sometimes brought food to club functions.
After church, everyone always ate and hung out together.
Bram had tried to get me to come with because Bash and Theo had to attend church as well, but hanging out with a bunch of strangers didn’t sound appealing.
I wanted to stay home and read. Last night, I had fallen asleep just when the story was getting good and I was dying to get back to it.
I knew I should be more productive with my time. I blamed Lemon.
It took some reassuring on my part to convince Bram that I would be okay. They were only going to be gone a few hours, and the house would be completely secure this time. After Clay had so easily gotten in through the garage, Bram made sure that all the house’s doors were always locked.
I’d also explained to him that I couldn’t go the rest of my life with people guarding me.
I was returning to school Monday, and the twins couldn’t go to every class with me.
Bram had them stay with me during the day not only to protect me, but so I wouldn’t be scared without him there.
I needed to be brave. I needed to learn to be on my own again.
What got Bram to give in was Vivian saying she’d ask Reid to swing by to check on me and me agreeing to text Bram a bunch of times checking in.
I would’ve been lying if I’d said I wasn’t nervous after the first twenty minutes of them being gone, when the silence in the house really hit me.
Annoyingly, I was too nervous to focus on my book. I can do this, I thought as I set it aside and headed to the bathroom. To distract myself, I considered washing my face, but then decided to take a relaxing hot shower instead.
As the warm water trailed down my skin, the tension throughout my whole body started to ease.
Nerves aside, I was feeling a lot better physically.
Monday was the last time I’d taken the pain meds Bobby had given me.
The bruises were almost gone. What mostly remained were the pink scars from the cuts on my side and the long cut on the outside of my arm.
I knew they’d fade over time, but they were ugly and a reminder of what had happened.
After getting out and towel-drying my hair, I wrapped another towel around my body before heading into my room.
I made my way over to my closet and stepped inside to go through the folded clothes on the shelves until I found the black lounge set I wanted to wear.
Lost in my thoughts, I unwrapped my towel as I walked out of the closet and let it drop to my feet so I could get dressed.
“Charlotte,” a male voice said.
I let out a high-pitched scream as I jumped and spun around to face the voice.
Reid was standing by my open bedroom door. His eyes slowly descended my naked body.
With my pants and shirt, I quickly covered my intimate parts. “What the fuck, Reid? You scared the shit out of me!”
“My mom told me to check on you.”
“So you thought you’d walk into my room without knocking and stare at me naked?”
“Your door was open and you took off your towel before I could say anything,” he said. “Besides, I’ve pretty much seen you naked already and you had no problem flaunting those tits in my face before. Why are you acting shy now?”
“One, I was still in a thong that morning you walked in on me and Roe. Two, I didn’t flaunt my tits. I didn’t know my shirt was see-through.”
He took a step farther into the room. “Still, you’ve never seemed shy about your body before.”
“It’s my body. It’s up to me whether I want to show it off or not.”
He didn’t argue with that. “You’ve put on weight.”
My mouth dropped open in disbelief.
“I mean you look good,” he corrected before I could go off on him. “You look healthy.”
I glanced away. “I’ve been eating.” When silence took over and all he did was continue to stand there, I had to look at him again. “Is there anything else you would like to discuss while I stand here naked?”
He smirked. “I could think of a few more things.”
At first, I was shocked. Then I was just frustrated. “You don’t get to do that. You don’t get to try to drive me away all this time, and then when you finally make me realize that I’m changing things between you three and your future, you suddenly want me.”
His smirk dropped and his expression became unreadable. “I told you I’ve always wanted you.”
“But you didn’t want to want me,” I snapped. “I may be naive about relationships and the feelings that come with them, but I understand that I deserve someone who wants to want me.”
“I do.”
It just felt like words. “I don’t believe you.” I tossed my clothes on the bed and just stood there naked. “I think you just want to fuck me. So fuck me. Maybe we’ll both get it out of our systems.”
His eyes never left mine as he just stood there silently, which infuriated me into wanting to push his buttons.
“Do you want me on the bed? On my back? Or on all fours?”
That got me a reaction. His schooled expression slipped—turning into something so hard, his jaw muscle ticked.
“What was it you called me before?” I asked as I walked toward him. “Oh, right. A spoiled, entitled rich girl.” I came to a stop inches away from him. “Would you like this rich girl to get on her knees for you?” I reached for the button on his jeans and undid it. “How do you want me, Reid?”
As I started to pull down his zipper, his hand shot up and captured me by the back of my neck. He pulled me against him before he covered my mouth with his.
He was kissing me.
It took my mind a second to catch up to what was happening. Then I kissed him back. My lips moved with his. It was like we were hungry for each other. Starving after depriving ourselves of this intimacy. Except it wasn’t supposed to be intimate. It had to be just physical. So we could move on.
There was depth in the way his tongue danced with mine, the way his hands caressed my skin as they slid down my back.
Forgetting the reasons why I started this in the first place, I pushed up onto my tiptoes and wrapped my arms around his neck, wanting to be closer, wanting more of that deep feeling from him.
His hands went to the backs of my thighs and lifted me. Without breaking our kiss, he carried me over to the bed and laid me gently on my back. I reached for his pants again and managed to pull down his zipper completely before his mouth left mine.
“I’m not going to fuck you,” he said, a little breathless.
“Then why did you kiss me?”
“To make you stop talking.” He exhaled heavily with his eyes closed. “And because I wanted to kiss you.” When he opened them again, he reached for the lounge set I had tossed on the bed prior to walking over to him. He shook them out, seeing only two pieces. “Where’s your underwear?”
“I didn’t want to wear any.”
“You’re trying to fucking kill me,” he grumbled as he tossed the shirt back on the bed and knelt to put my feet into my pants.
As he pulled the pants up my legs, I decided to be nice and lift my hips to help him finish putting them on.
Once he was done with that, he set his hands on either side of my head on the bed.
His eyes glided all over me beneath him.
He let out a groan before he brought his mouth back to mine.
His kiss this time was messy, uncontrolled, frantic.
He wanted me badly, desperately. Knowing that was enough to make me ache for him. Every inch of me.
“Please,” I begged when he managed to break away from me.
“Don’t beg,” he pleaded, closing his eyes again. His brow furrowed as if in pain. “I want to fuck you, but I don’t just want to fuck you.” He opened his eyes as he grabbed my shirt from the bed and took a step back. “I don’t want you out of my system.”
I sat up and let him put my shirt on me. “And when you three leave?”
“There’s no leaving you, don’t you get that?” he said.
“Why?”
“Fucking Roe.” He shook his head. “He may have brought you into our lives, but you made us fall for you.”
“What do you mean by that?” I asked with a racing heart.
His eyes met mine. “You know exactly what it means. Figure out how to handle it and stop torturing Roe and Wyatt.”
Do I? My racing heart seemed to. “Does that mean I get to keep torturing you?” It was a challenge and a deflection.
“You’ve been torturing me from day one.” He grabbed my chin and kissed me one last time before he stalked out.
I sat there listening to him go through the front door and drive off on his motorcycle. I got up and began pacing.
When the thoughts, the questions, began to be too much, I grabbed shoes from my closet, sent a text to Bram telling him that I was going to Roe’s, and left.
I tried not to think as I drove, which was probably why I couldn’t remember most of the drive to Roe’s house. His motorcycle was parked in the driveway, but Wyatt’s car was gone. Then I remembered Wyatt was working today.
I knocked on the front door and shifted my weight from one foot to the other nervously.
The door opened, revealing Roe in nothing more than black sweatpants hanging low on his hips. His chest and tattoos were on full display. He looked me up and down. I didn’t know what he saw on my face. I was refusing to think, so I wasn’t being careful about my expression.
He silently stepped back, a gesture for me to come in. With zero thoughts I walked in, set my keys on the coffee table, and just stood in his living room.
“What’s going on?” he asked as he closed the door.
I spun around to face him. “Do you love me?”
For a moment he was surprised. Then he recovered, looking sure of himself. “Yes.”