Chapter 21
ZANE
Falling asleep with Sienna in my arms took me back to a time when everything was simple, the sun was always shining and we were always smiling. The shower was like that too.
But waking up was more like the reality that is my life now. She was gone from the bed, her side of it cold. Exactly like every morning for the past decade has been.
“There you are, sleepy head,” she says brightly from the doorway to the bathroom.
The scent of fresh coffee, something sugary and motel shampoo is mixing in the air. She’s smiling as brightly as I remember her always smiling, but it’s too little too late now. I’m back in the darkness where I belong. Where she left me.
“I got us some breakfast,” she says and walks over to the desk.
She picks up a cup of coffee and a paper bag, and brings it to me, still smiling.
“How about some breakfast in bed?”
She climbs into bed beside me. The heat rising from her nearly naked body—she’s only wearing my T-shirt, which looks ridiculously large on her—carries her scent and nothing else. Lavender in springtime. Fresh grass. Endless good days.
That’s how I remember her scent. Nothing has changed there it seems. Even though everything has.
“You’re still grumpy in the morning, I see,” she says and hands me a chocolate-covered donut. “This should cheer you up. It’s your favorite.”
“Not for a long time,” I say, but take the donut and coffee she’s offering to me. Because it is nice that she remembers I like these chocolate donuts and that she went to the trouble of getting one for me. And maybe that’s all I need to think about.
That, and how quickly the bed is warming, becoming a pleasant place to be now that she’s in it.
I stuff the donut in my mouth and wash it down with about half the cup of coffee. Then grin at her and do the same with the second donut she’s holding out to me.
She takes the empty coffee cup from my hand when I’m done with it and brushes the donut crumbs off my chin. “There, that’s better, isn’t it? Not so grumpy anymore, are you?”
I shrug, since I’m not sure that’s completely accurate. Or that it’s not. Because my mood seriously shifts for the better as she leans across me to deposit the empty cup on the nightstand, her long, wet hair tickling my chest.
“I got something even better in mind,” she whispers, then leans down to kiss me.
Her gorgeous hair is a curtain around us, blocking out the rest of the world, and I remember how good that always was back when it was just the two of us against the world.
She deepens the kiss for a moment, before trailing her lips softly down my neck and my chest. The curtain of her hair is gone now, but the sensation of her kisses against my skin is an even better barrier against the real world.
Especially as her lips reach my cock.
Then all sorts of goodness explodes in my mind.
Something about her scent, her solid presence in my mind and in the room just blocks everything else out. Like a concrete wall standing between me and all my troubles. It was always like that. Even back when my troubles were nothing compared to what they are now.
Her licks and kisses on my cock are slow at first, only about as firm as the hot breaths she takes in between. All enough to drive me wild with desire.
But all this softness is too good to force into anything more. So I ball my hands into fists by my sides, letting her do her thing. She always was a master at this.
It all comes back to me as she finally wraps her mouth over the head of my cock, moving her tongue gently. All the blowjobs. From the first, to the last.
It never occurred to me that she was way too good at it from the get-go, like someone used to giving them. That came later. When I realized she had played me. Had lied to me.
But thinking all that has no place in the here and now. I will just let myself get lost in the pleasure. Because that’s the only thing I really want.
And the pleasure’s intense. Just like everything else about her.
She takes more of my cock in her mouth. Then releases it, rubbing it with her soft palm as she smiles at me.
I grin back. Can’t help it.
And then grin even wider as she bends her head again and slides my cock back into her mouth.
A little teeth to let me know she’s there, but mostly just softness, warmth, and bliss.
I could let her do this all day.
Up and down, her mouth like the home I’ve been searching for all these years.
What a dumb thing to think!
But she could always work my mind like her own little plaything and the blowjobs had a lot to do with it.
I’m close and I don’t want this end. But all the memories are like spikes of fire in my mind, growing hotter, growing annoying, growing into anger.
I do want this to end.
She is not good for me.
Never was.
No matter how good her mouth feels wrapped around my cock. No matter how much she once meant to me.
I grab the back of her head and ram my cock down her throat on one of her downward slides, making her gag. She tenses for a moment but then relaxes, opens herself to me as I do it again and again. Even smiles at me with her eyes, which are soft with desire and sharp with lust.
Like two green gems shining just for me.
Fuck my stupid thoughts that won’t just let me hate her. Fuck all the memories. Fuck how good she makes me feel.
I bury my cock deep in my throat and let myself come, needing to escape the bliss. Get back to reality.
My come dribbles from the sides of her mouth and she’s still smiling at me with her eyes.
Then smiling at me for real as my cock slides from her mouth.
And all I want to do is hold her.
The orgasm she just gave me was supposed to break the pull she has on me.
It’s done the opposite. Because nothing will ever break that pull.
And that frightens me more than anything ever has.
Frightens me more than spending my life in prison.
More than killing innocent men. More than spending the rest of my life friendless and alone, riding down some empty, endless dark road.
Because nothing good can come of it. No matter how good it feels.