Chapter 19
NINETEEN
Tav
No, I didn’t want to lay down on the couch.
I didn’t want this doctor here. I didn’t want anyone in this apartment except me and Con.
I felt unstable after talking about my sister and hearing my nephew’s voice, and now I had someone who looked at me too kindly, too humanely, and it was freaking me out.
I was used to Lary’s friend who always checked me after my fights.
He was an old man who had lost his medical license a decade ago when he kept writing himself prescriptions for pain meds.
He was usually high as a kite when he bandaged me up with shaky fingers, but he took cash and didn’t ask questions.
This lady—Sam—was a real doctor and everything, with an ID around her neck identifying her as an employee at the local hospital. Her lanyard had dinosaurs on it.
Stegosauruseses ated plants.
I willed my hands not to shake.
“Tav,” Con’s voice cut through my thoughts. I turned to see him studying me. “Let her check you over, please.” For me. I heard the implication in his voice, and yeah, fine, I’d let her check me out, because that would make him happy, and my life was simple when I focused on being good for Con.
I pulled my shirt off, tossed it to the floor, and lay down on the couch. I stared at the ceiling, so unlike the stained plaster of my apartment. Which I didn’t have anymore. Because Con was a tyrant.
This couch was fucking great though, covered in a soft leather that felt like butter under my skin.
I sank into it, nearly forgetting about Sam until she leaned over me.
She did as she said, letting me know all the places she planned to touch before she did so.
As Husk, I didn’t really care who touched me.
My body didn’t even feel like mine half the time, but in Con’s apartment, this body belonged to Tav, and my skin felt brand new and tender like a soft-shell crab.
I tuned her out as she spoke over me until she prodded at my sore shoulder, and I sucked in a breath. She went still. “Does that hurt?”
I forced myself to unlock my jaw. “It was dislocated like two years ago.”
Out of the corner of my eye, Con crossed his arms over his chest. He wore a pair of joggers and a tight T-shirt that showed off his broad shoulders and lean waist. He looked so fucking hot. I decided to think about that instead of my fucking shoulder.
She spent a lot of time on my ribs, and I could have told her they weren’t cracked, because I knew what that felt like.
They were bruised to hell though. But when she reached my bad ankle, and rolled it, I couldn’t hide my reaction as I drew up my knee sharply to get away from her touch.
She went still again, and raised one dark, perfectly arched eyebrow. “Another old injury?”
“Yeah,” I said, settling my leg back down. “Sprained it. Can’t remember when. Over a year ago.”
Con pulled in a sharp breath and turned away, giving me his back, and I didn’t like it. Fuck, this was crazy. He’d done everything for me, and while he stood five feet away, I felt abandoned. My heart pounded, and oxygen seemed to grow scarce in this large apartment.
Sam’s hands hovered over my chest as a shudder trickled down my spine. “Conrad,” she said sharply.
Con immediately whipped around. “Yes?”
She didn’t say anything, just gave him a look I couldn’t decipher. And then she resumed her study of my body. And Con didn’t look away again.
Half an hour later, I stared down at a bundle of papers on the kitchen island while Con and Sam whispered about something down the hallway.
I felt like a child as I read over the aftercare instructions for a concussion.
Whatever. I had concussions before, and I managed to live without proper care.
I tossed the papers on the polished marble and leaned against the edge, dropping my head between my shoulders.
The front door opened and shut, signaling Sam had left the apartment.
I lifted my head as Con came into the kitchen.
He stopped short and shoved his hands in the pockets of his gray joggers.
It made the fabric pull tight across his crotch, and I could see the bulge there.
“Are you mad at me?” he asked.
“No.” I wasn’t mat at him. But I was something.
“Then what’s going on in your head?”
I blinked at him. “For real?”
“Yeah. For real.”
“Where do you want me to start?” Frustration flared inside me, and I hated it.
I hadn’t been like this, not for five years.
I didn’t react to things. I didn’t even get angry, or hurt, or stressed.
I just rolled with the punches because there was no alternative.
But being around Con was like being bare all the fucking time.
I had no Husk armor here. Just naked-ass Tav.
“You understand this is a lot to process, right? One day I’m Husk, and the next I’m moved into your apartment with you.
I have constant access to my sister and nephew because she has a protective detail.
And I feel—” I clutched at my chest. “I feel everything with you. And I liked it when it was on my terms, when I could come to you, but you couldn’t come to me. ”
“And you don’t like it now?”
“I don’t know.”
“Does it hurt?” His voice was soft.
“Sometimes,” I said, just as softly.
He came closer until he stood in front of me.
I angled my body to face him and reached out to hold his hip.
His pants rode low, so a strip of skin showed over his waistband.
I rubbed my thumb there. He took another step, and then our chests brushed.
He cupped my neck. “When it hurts, you tell me. You give it all to me.”
I shook my head. “How is that fair to you for me to constantly unleash my volatile emotions at you?”
“I don’t care what’s fair. You give me more than I think I could ever give you.”
I scoff. “You’re insane.”
“Look, I think… I think for the last five years, you were in survival mode, and you cut yourself off from feeling anything real. Now you’re thawing out.
You’re feeling things you haven’t felt in a long time, but those feelings are all over the place and unpredictable, which is to be expected.
They will even out, Tav. And I’ll be here the entire time. ”
That made a lot of sense when he put it that way. “How long’ll that take?”
“I don’t know.” His gaze dropped to my mouth before he let go of my neck and stepped away. My hand fell from his waist, and I missed the heat of him. I glanced over at the scattered papers, not really seeing anything until a few words on one peeking out of the pile caught my attention.
I snatched it up and squinted to read. Full STD Panel. John Doe.
My fist crumpled the paper, and I didn’t even bother to read the results. John Doe was me, of course it was. I couldn’t decide how I felt. Ashamed? Embarrassed? Angry? All I knew was that I didn’t like it. I shoved the paper into Con’s chest. “Really? Did you order this?”
Con peeled my fingers off the paper. He placed it on the island, smoothing it out but not reading it. “I did.”
“Con—”
“I told you we did a blood draw.”
“Yeah, but—”
“And I told you that you had open wounds in that filthy warehouse. Why would I not make sure you’re healthy in every way? Your results are all negative, by the way. And if it makes you feel better, Sam tested me too. My own negative results are in that pile.”
That maybe made me feel a bit better, but I wasn’t ready to back down. I clenched my jaw. “You didn’t ask me first.”
“I didn’t ask you a lot of things last night. And I’m not going to apologize for that. If you had anything that jeopardized your health, I wanted to know immediately—”
“Because now that you saw me fight, you realized how fucking low you were slumming it.” My lip curled in a sneer, and I didn’t miss the way Con’s body jerked. “Wouldn’t want you to debase yourself by sucking the cock of—”
His heat was back as his body slammed into mine, and his hand wrapped around my throat and squeezed.
Not hard. Not to cut off my air. But a warning.
“Don’t you dare finish that sentence.” Oh fuck, he was fuming, absolutely furious, eyes firing at me like missiles.
“Don’t you fucking dare.” He leaned into me until the edge of the island dug at my back.
“I don’t give a fuck if you don’t fully trust me yet, but if you ever imply again that being with you is slumming it, I will gag you, plug you, and won’t let you come for a month.
” He hissed every word inches from my face, and because I was fucked up, my cock stirred to press against the thin material of my shorts.
He was hard too, his shaft a firebrand in his pants as he pushed against me until my back bowed over the edge of the island.
“I’m going to be very clear.” His hand was still at my throat.
“If you needed to be treated for anything, I wanted to do it as soon as possible, because I want you healthy. I want you healthy for multiple reasons. One, because you deserve to be happy and cared for. Two, because you being healthy makes me happy, and three…” His chest heaved, and his tongue came up to curl around his top teeth.
I felt a touch at my hip, his fingers dancing over the skin there before rounding to my lower back.
He slipped them underneath my waistband, and I sucked in a breath as he trailed them down the crack of my ass.
His breath ghosted over my face, warm and fresh as he pressed a finger against my hole. I was dry, but it didn’t matter.
“Three,” his voice pitched low, strained, as he pressed his hips forward to rub our shafts together.
“Yes, I want to fuck you bare. I want to come from work, eat dinner with you, and then pump you full of my cum on the couch while a stupid movie plays in the background. Then I want to take you to bed and play with your stretched hole until you’re begging me to fill you again.
I’ll pound you into the mattress until you pass out.
Later when you’re asleep, I’ll slide inside you while you’re still slick with my cum and fuck you awake.
And then I want to watch in the morning as you get out of bed and make me breakfast while my cum drips down your thighs. ”
“Jesus, Con,” I whispered.
“Do you want all that?” he demanded.
Of course I did. Every single thing. “Yes.”
His finger breached me, and I sucked in a breath as my cock jerked against his. His finger worked in and out, up to the first knuckle before pulling back out to the tip, over and over again until I felt a whine crawl up my throat. And all the while he held my neck and stared into my eyes.
“Do you understand now, Tavin Ridley?” Oh shit, he full named me. “Am I clear?”
I nodded, unable to think of anything else but his finger fucking with my hole, and his cock rubbing against mine. “Please.”
“Please what?”
I blinked through wet eyes. “Please fuck me.”
His breath caught in his throat. “No.”
Oh fuck, he was really mad at me if he was refusing. I arched against him and clenched my hole around his finger. “Why not?”
His eyes closed, and his forehead thunked against mine.
“Con?”
“Sam said no orgasms,” he mumbled against my cheek.
“What? Oh, fuck her. Come on, we already—”
He shook his head. “No, that was… We shouldn’t have done that.”
I white-knuckled the island as his finger pulsed in and out of me. “Then why are you teasing me?”
“I’m teasing myself too.” His lips touched my temple as he dropped a kiss there. He plunged his finger in deeper, and I let out a strangled sound I wasn’t proud of.
“I want in here so bad, Tav.” He sounded like he barely had a hold of himself.
I felt the same. “Just a week. Seven days. I told her it’s all I can do.
” He rubbed his cheek against mine like a cat.
“Then I’ll fill you so full, Tav, you won’t be able to move without smelling me on your skin. Going to coat your insides.”
Fuck me. I gripped his arm. “You have to stop, or I’m going to come just from your words.”
He huffed a laugh and went still, finally giving me a break from fucking me with his finger. “You couldn’t.”
“Try me,” I gritted out.
With a sigh, he pulled away, and I gasped as his fingers trailed up my crack until my waistband snapped back.
His hand fell from my neck as he took a step away from me.
He rolled his lips between his teeth and glared at me, as if this entire thing was my fault.
“You’re fucking perfect,” he rasped, almost like he was pissed about it.
“Yeah?” I snarled. “Well, so are you, prick.”