Chapter 15 Oak #2
I control myself while I still have the will. But I fear tonight is the night where I lose because all it will take is one more temptation.
She sees it. And like the predator she’s become she’ll sniff it on me and attack.
“Everyone ready to go?” Pax’s asks with Stella on his arm.
Yeah, I’m ready to fucking go but not for what he’s asking about.
I grunt in reply and I see Grace smirk from the corner of my eye.
As we all exit the compound, each couple ahead paired off, Grace walks in front of me fully aware of what she’s doing.
I lean towards her and the scent of jasmine fills my nostrils. “You keep swaying that ass of yours and I’ll have it red.”
She looks over her shoulder at me innocently and then provocatively pushes her ass against my cock. It twitches in my slacks, no doubt she feels it. She then moves her hips subtly from side to side. My cock hardens against her and I bite back the moan that wants to tear out of my throat.
I place my hands firmly on her hips to stop her ministrations. She pouts up at me. I have the urge to bite down on her luscious lower lip.
“If you don’t behave I’ll make sure you won’t be able to sit for a week.”
She inhales sharply but from the blush that overtakes her features I can tell she more than likes the idea. “You promise?”
A strained laugh leaves me. “You don’t know what you’re asking for, baby. I’m not a soft man.”
Despite my firm grip on her hips she wriggles her ass against my cock again. “You act like I don’t want it rough.”
I hiss through clenched teeth, hanging onto my sanity by a damn thread. “Most women don’t.”
Her eyes flash. “I’m not most women, Oak. I’ll have you any way I can get you. If you like it rough then so do I.”
“You don’t know what you’re saying, Grace. Now be a good girl and get in the car before I take you over my shoulder and show you what you’re asking for.”
She laughs. “You can’t threaten me with something that I want.”
“Grace,” I growl.
She leans upwards and presses a chaste kiss on the underside of my jaw.
“Okay, big guy. I’ll be good. For now,” she promises me sweetly.
I then let go of her hips, expecting her to follow everyone else who are waiting.
But she doesn’t. Of course she doesn’t because Grace isn’t predictable nor does she do what she’s told.
“But once I enter the club who knows what will happen,” she promises darkly and winks at me before she sashays away joining everyone who has been patiently waiting.
Fuck me.
I have a raging hard on, my blood is pumping hot and all I can imagine is fucking her.
She’s going to be the death of me.
Snake, Nora and I all are residing in the VIP room that Daniella has given to us for Grace’s celebration.
Nora and Daniella did a fantastic job on the decor.
Golden enlarged balloons span the entire back wall saying, Congrats.
Streamers in black, gold and silver are hung strategically from the ceiling.
Bottles of champagne chilled in steel black ice buckets are in each corner of the room.
A tray of appetizers fill the table and bouquets of flowers are placed everywhere.
Snake sits by the mini bar that comes with the room while Nora is on the opposite end, picking at her freshly painted nails. A coping mechanism since the incident she’s never seemed to break.
She isn’t dressed for the club either. Not with her loose fitted long sleeve shirt and jeans that are a size too big. Her glasses swallow her face but they always have.
Honestly, I’m just proud she’s overcoming her fear, forcing herself to come out of her shell to be here.
No one questioned the way she’s dressed when we arrived. Everyone was just happy to see her.
Grace threw her arms around her with a megawatt smile upon her face, complimenting her beautiful auburn hair.
On multiple occasions throughout the night thus far the girls have tried to coax her onto the dance floor. Nora politely declined each time with a small smile and a shake of her head.
One day she’ll be that girl again.
The girl who isn’t afraid of human contact.
“You look like you’re going to kill someone,” Snake snickers before taking a swallow of his beer.
My jaw clenches as my eyes cut back to the dance floor.
The red and orange lights creating a glow like fire on the sea of people.
It’s how the lights cast a glow on her and highlight each of her curves even in the dim lighting.
She moves sensually to the music. Her luscious hips swaying back and forth provocatively as her hand caresses up and down the length of her body.
Her eyes are closed and there’s this pout on her lips that I can’t help imagining around my cock.
As her hands massage their way down her body, touching each slither of skin exposed, she grabs the hem of her incredibly short black silk dress that fits her body like a second skin.
She raises the hem of her dress up the side of her thigh, exposing more of her skin that I’m fighting myself not to touch, not to fucking taste.
The woman is sex wrapped up in a decadent bow that I want to unravel with my teeth and leave her begging for more.
I take the glass tumbler in my hands and knock the rest of the hard liquor back. The ice clanks against my teeth and I take a cube and crush it in my mouth. The coolness of the ice helps the burn in my throat but it doesn’t stop the fire coursing through my veins.
I regard Snake with a harsh glare as my finger twitches by my side. The fucker only smiles. “I am going to kill someone.” My voice is low and thanks to the VIP room we can converse easily over the noise.
Snake’s eyes darken with mischief as he leans in and eagerly questions, “Who will it be, Oaky boy? The man who is about to close in on her or the one who has already placed himself behind her?”
As soon as the words leave his mouth my head is snapping back in her direction with a force so powerful I’m shocked that I don’t break my neck.
I see the pathetic excuse of a man behind her. His lanky frame making him look like a twig among trees. She dances around him politely. Teasing him with glimpses of her body and allowing a whisper of a touch with his hands.
My fingers twitches rapidly against my outer thigh. My jaw is clenched so tight that my teeth grind against each other.
The red dimmed lights have nothing to do with the maddening vision of red that clouds me.
I swear if he touches her I’ll rip his god damned hand off.
“So, who will it be, Oaky boy? Time is ticking and I’m growing impatient.” Snake then proceeds to make the sound from the second hand of a clock.
Tearing my eyes away from her and my potential victim I level Snake with a glare that most men fear. He winks devishily at me while his head goes from side to side in perfect cadence with each second he ticks off.
“I’m going to kill you if you don’t cut that shit out,” I tell him harshly, the bite in my voice harder than I intended, but I’m too lost in my fit of jealously and anger to care.
He smirks at me and that would infuriate me more but he finally stops making that damn noise.
Holding the lip of his beer between his fingers he regards me cautiously.
“You are aware that if you don’t claim her you have no right to stop her from finding someone else.
What our brothers were saying earlier tonight? They weren’t wrong.”
My nostrils flare as my jaw ticks. “I’m aware,” I say through clenched teeth.
“Are you?” I stare at him menacingly, daring him to say more. And unlike any other man he does. “Because here you sit looking like someone is taking your girl when you’re allowing them to take her.”
I tilt my head to the side and regard him with an icy stare. My tone even matches as I ask him coolly, “You think I’m allowing other men to have her?”
Snake arches a brow as he tips his beer in my direction. “You haven’t exactly been stopping them have you?”
There are only a few times in my life since I have met Snake that I have wanted to punch him because the fucker actually deserved it. And here I am now, fighting the urge to punch him square to the jaw.
He smirks at me. “You should change that.”
“If it was that easy I would’ve done it a long time ago,” I reply gruffly.
“Fuck,” he shakes his head before returning his eyes back to mine, “Was I this stupidly stubborn with Alice?”
“Stupidly stubborn, no, but you were insufferably stubborn,” I comment dryly.
He snorts. “Care to tell me which is worse?”
“I’m going with you.”
“And what drew you to that conclusion so fast?”
“Because you were blind about all of it. Blind because of your rage. Blind because of your demons. Blind because you chose to be. You thought you were right and didn’t want to see the opposing side.
But I see everything, Snake. I see my faults, my flaws, my fucking sins.
I see the man I try to hide from everyone.
And I also see how this will end if I finally give in.
” I steal another tumbler filled with hard liquor from the waitress as she walks by us.
I knock the contents back in one swallow.
Whiskey. I can only tell by the taste because this time I don’t feel the familiar burn that follows.
“You see how this will end,” Snake mocks me. “When did you become a fortune teller? Can you spare your crystal ball on me next?”
I stalk towards him as he wears a cocky grin. My face is stoic as my eyes are as hard as glaciers. With a voice that is lethally calm I threaten him lowly, “Mock me again and it will be your face that will be the spectacle of laughter tonight.”
Snake straightens his spine and by doing so it broadens his chest. His eyes as dark as the midnight sky stare up at me unafraid. “You’re the spectacle of laughter tonight, Oak. As you should be, letting other men touch what isn’t theirs.”
I sneer down at him. The fire that was coursing in my veins turns to ice.
But as much as I want to kill him in this very second I know I’ll never be able to do it.
At then end of the day we are brothers.
Doesn’t mean I don’t want to knock him to ground and sew his mouth shut.
Because tonight there’s too much truth he’s letting out into existence and I don’t know how to dispel it.
“You say that I was insufferably stubborn because I was blind but you’re exactly the same,” he spits out.
“Did you not hear what I just said?”
He scoffs. “Yeah, you’re all seeing bullshit,” he air quotes. “But you’re just as blind as I was.”
I puff my chest, crowding him. “And how is that, fucker?”
His darkened eyes stare up at me with fire blazing in them.
They’re wide with an intensity that would be unnerving if I was a different type of man.
“You’re blind because of your guilt. Because your brothers died on a mission you led and you believe you’re to blame.
You’re blind because you choose to live each day punishing yourself because you survived and they didn’t.
You’re blind because of your grief, Oak.
You have a choice but you’re blinded by your past to see it.
You can choose her. Choose to be happy. Choose to fucking live.
But you won’t because you’re insufferably stubborn and too blind to see what’s in front of you. ”
“You don’t think I see that?” My voice doesn’t rise but it’s rough with a hard bite.
“I see all of that. That’s the problem. That’s always the fucking problem.
I don’t know how to live without punishing myself.
I don’t know how to wake up without feeling guilt.
And I don’t know how to move on when they can’t.
This guilt I feel, this punishment I endure, this grief I suffer, it’s what I deserve. ”
“Says who!?” Snake explodes. “Who says you have to deserve any of that?!”
“I do!” I snap at him. I can feel myself starting to unhinge and I hate it. I was trained to be calm and collected under pressure. To form into a diamond, not to fucking crumble. “It’s what’s fair.”
He shakes his head. “That’s not fair, Oak. What you’re doing is torturing yourself. And if you don’t stop you will die one day. The mind can only handle so much before it snaps.”
I swallow. “I don’t know any other way. I don’t know how to live any other way.”
“Then let her teach you. She’ll show you that life is worth living again. She’ll make you happy. You can find peace with her. Isn’t that what you want?”
Glancing away from him my jaw ticks.
Of course that’s what I want. I want nothing more than that.
“Oak, tell me you want that. I fucking worry about you. All the time I fucking wonder if you’ll lose the war inside your head and I’ll never see you again,” he confesses to me with a vulnerability he rarely shows to anyone. I look back at him and see the concern drowning in his eyes.
“I do want that, Snake but-”
“But what?”
I sigh heavily, my shoulders slumping with defeat. Lowering my guard I confess to him something I never have before. “I’ll be betraying them if I do.”
Snake’s eyes soften. He lays a hand on my shoulder and gives me a tough squeeze. Looking me directly in the eyes he says, “You’re only betraying yourself. If they were anything like you say they were they would want you to be happy. They wouldn’t want you to suffer.”
“Yeah but they did.” My voice is pained.
“But it doesn’t mean that you have to. You survived, Oak. It’s about time you start living again.” He gives me one last reaffirming squeeze before letting me go.
Then he tips his head towards the dance floor, to where she is. I follow his gaze and see that the man who resembles a twig has his hands on her hips. He moves with her in time to the music and my heart fucking skyrockets.
I’m going to fucking sever both of his hands off.
No one touches what’s mine.
“You can’t tell me that’s what you want to see.”
“It’s not,” I reply darkly.
“Then fucking fix it. Show that fucker and every other fucker who has had their eyes on her tonight that she’s yours.”
Mine.
Gracie Mae Vale is mine.
“Look after Nora, will you?”
Snake nods his head. “With my life.”
I spare a glance at my sister who sits on the far end of the VIP room. When her eyes meet mine she smiles at me and mouths, go.
I nod my head and begin to push my way pass the throng of people on the dance floor. The sound of the music overpowers the beat of my heart.
People part for me easily as I push them aside effortlessly. I’m a few feet away from her when her eyes connect with mine across the floor.
My eyes harden when I see the man behind her move his hands from her hip to across her stomach.
He’s fucking dying tonight.
The man doesn’t notice me as he has his eyes closed, lost in the feel of the music and the feel of her.
“Get your fucking hands off of her or I’ll break them off.”