14. “LIKE A HURT, LOST, AND BLINDED FOOL, OH NO, I’VE SAID TOO MUCH”
“LIKE A HURT, LOST, AND BLINDED FOOL, OH NO, I’VE SAID TOO MUCH”
Soren threw his keys against the wall of the foyer and let King off his leash. The dog ran straight to the kitchen where his food bowl waited, oblivious to the world burning down around them.
“Fuck!” His voice cut across the cold tile and ripped up to the vaulted ceilings.
He should have known she’d pull this shit. This was so typical of Jocelyn and yet… He honestly thought this time would be different.
He thought she was right there with him, feeling what he was feeling. He was a fucking fool to—
His thoughts cut off as headlights fanned across his walls as someone pulled into his driveway. Soren flung open the double doors, not in the mood for visitors, but then did a double-take as Jocelyn’s car raced up the driveway.
He stepped onto the porch, his anger immediately replaced with the fear that something was wrong. He rushed to her car. “Joce?”
She sprang out of the car and practically catapulted into his arms. “I’m sorry! I’m sorry!” She was frantic and dripping tears. “I don’t know what’s wrong with me. I panicked. I don’t want space. I don’t want to push you away, Soren. Don’t let me. Please. I’m so sorry.”
Jesus, she was a mess. “It’s okay.” His lips pressed into her hair as he held her close. Her entire body was shaking like a leaf. “I’m not going anywhere.”
She continued to sputter apologies, rambling about being crazy. She wouldn’t stop until he assured her there was nothing to be sorry about. “We’re fine. It’s okay.”
“It’s not okay. I freaked out. I didn’t mean any of it. I never meant to… I’m sorry.”
His arms tightened around her, the knot in his chest loosening as relief flooded in. He kissed her temple. “It’s okay, Joce. I forgive you.”
“Sometimes I get crazy.”
“I know. I’m used to your crazy.”
She sniffled. “I don’t even know what I said.”
“It doesn’t matter.” It only mattered that she was there, in his arms where she belonged.
As she tried to breathe, she continued to tremble with adrenaline. He dragged a soothing hand down her back, hating how upset she’d made herself.
“Shh. Take a breath.”
The jagged, wet sound that came out of her split him in two. As if compelled to keep talking, she looked up at him with a tear-streaked face and opened her mouth, but the words seemed trapped in her throat.
“It’s okay. You don’t have to say anything else.”
Relief flashed in her eyes. She nestled closer to him, her arms tightening around his ribs with such fierceness he couldn’t draw a full breath.
He’d never seen her this way, so fragile and scared. Didn’t she know she’d have to do more than throw him out to ever get him to willingly walk away for good?
“You can’t get rid of me that easily.”
“Promise?” she murmured, words muffled in his now damp shirt.
“Promise.”
She looked up at him. Her lips pressed into a trembling line as a fresh flood of tears filled her eyes.
“Just…please don’t cry anymore.”
She blinked back her tears and hugged him tighter, pressing her ear to his chest, her grip now tight enough to break a rib.
He took it. He’d take almost anything from her as long as she let him. It was a frightening realization that told him more about himself than he was ready to admit.
After several minutes, her breathing finally calmed, and he softly suggested, “Come inside.”
Once in the den, he used a wet hand towel from the powder room to clean up her face. She was so wrung out from crying, she let him.
After he wiped the smudges from under her eyes, he dabbed her rosy nose. “Blow.”
She shook her head. “Not on the branded bath towels.”
He laughed. “I don’t care about the towels. I care about you.” Her chin trembled as she smiled, then he said, “No, no. No more tears.”
“Sorry.” She reached past him and snatched a tissue from the box on the table and blew her nose with enough gusto to be mistaken for an elephant stampede.
“Good girl.” He took the crumpled tissue and set it aside with the hand towel then he pulled her into his side. “Feel better now?”
She nestled into the crook of his arm and nodded. “I warned you not to be nice to me.”
What kind of villain did it make him that he found it incredibly sexy when she blinked up at him with those big, glassy brown eyes, her lashes damp and spiked from crying.
He pressed a delicate kiss to her rosy nose. “I’m afraid that’s the one thing I can’t give you.”
She sniffed. “Jerk.”
He laughed and pressed a kiss to her lips. Somehow the kiss deepened and the next thing he knew, Jocelyn was climbing onto his lap and pressing her hands under the collar of his shirt.
“Joce—” He tried to tell her this wasn’t necessary, that he hadn’t been trying to seduce her, but she wouldn’t stop kissing him, and eventually he found it easier to give in.
Maybe she needed. It was definitely something he could provide.
She kissed him the way a drowning woman grabs for shore, hungry and graceless, her teeth catching his bottom lip until a faint copper tang bloomed between them.
He didn’t flinch or try to calm her down.
When she fisted his shirt, he let her drag him wherever she needed him to go.
As long as she wasn’t running toward the door, they were safe.
Rising over him without breaking the kiss, she pushed down her leggings and panties, moving so quickly she had them off and on the floor before his hands even settled on her ass.
Her body rocked over his, grinding down against the hard length already straining behind his zipper. A groan tore from his chest, low and helpless, as she tangled her fingers in his hair and jerked his head back.
Balling his hands into fists, he surrendered the control to her, and she took the lead beautifully.
She greedily took her pleasure, just as he’d taken from her in the past, sensing that she needed this more than words right now because she needed proof that their little fight hadn’t permanently broken anything.
It hadn’t. But his reassurance wasn’t going to sink in, not while she was this worked up, so he sank back and forced himself to let go of the control he’d spent a lifetime gripping.
She grabbed his face, holding him to her as she kissed him with sheer abandon. Triumphant moans slipped past her lips, into his mouth as she rode his hips hard.
Soren’s spine curled against the cushions, angling his body as she undid his belt and reached into his pants. This wasn’t about him. That was achingly clear as she dropped her head to his shoulder and chased her own friction against the length of his aching cock.
She didn’t put him inside of her. Instead, she dragged his length through her folds, rubbing his swollen flesh over her clit.
If this was what it took to restore their bond, he had no complaints. He wasn’t immune to her greedy pleasure. Every wet slide of her pussy against his cock sent a shock of ecstasy through his veins.
Maybe she was testing him. Or maybe this was her way of apologizing for scaring the shit out of him.
Regardless of her why, his response was a resounding yes.
She could take whatever she needed to piece herself back together, use him to climb out of whatever pit she’d dug in her own head, as long as she didn’t try to chase him away again.
Her fingers were quick and certain, no fumbling, no shyness. This was his Jocelyn. Confident. Determined. A lioness who never flinched from wanting what she wanted. A woman who knew how potent she was, and knew how to embrace her boldness and take what she needed.
And right now, she needed him.
She ripped open his shirt, careless of the buttons that went pinging across the floor. Chaos incarnate. A storm with no forecast, a fiery blaze no man would ever fully contain.
She kissed him hard, taking full possession of his mouth and holding nothing back. It was honest, raw, and unrefined. Frenzied energy that burned through him and heated his blood.
She was everything his ordered life had been engineered to keep out. But he needed her disruptive force close by.
She stroked his cock from root to tip, and his hips jerked against his own will. He gave up trying to hide this hold she had over him. It was clear who was in the power seat.
He was a goner. She owned every part of him. His body. His heart. Fuck, she could even have his soul. He was going to burst if he didn’t tell her soon.
“Joce.” Her name was a plea. “Joce, look at me.” When her eyes found his, he brushed a delicate touch over her cheek. “I—”
She covered his mouth.
It was such a strange thing to do, he laughed. Maybe she was smart to stop him. He didn’t want to ruin this moment.
She rose on her knees, sinking onto his cock in one slow, punishing glide. His eyes rolled back in ecstasy. He grabbed her hips if only to ground himself as she seated herself to the hilt.
Her lips parted as she released a broken, greedy gasp that landed somewhere in the core of his soul. She wrenched his hands away, pinning his wrists to the back of the couch as she rose, dragging her tight wet heat up his shaft only to plunge her body down again.
Christ, the way she stretched his muscles and used his body left nowhere for him to hide. The truth cracked open in his chest, threatening once more to spill out in a frenzied confession, and it took everything to swallow the words back.
The last thing he wanted to do was scare her again.
She rode him hard, losing her rhythm and feigning no patience. She stripped away all pretenses, showing him once and for all that she would never be refined or poised.
Good. He preferred her frantic and real.
Loving Jocelyn was like losing his religion. Everything he knew about himself, everything he thought he was, paled in comparison to the unfathomable need she stirred in him, the absolute certainty that he would sacrifice anything, including his deepest beliefs, just to keep her.
Let her wring the salvation out of him. He’d come for his share later.