Chapter 40
Lauren
It’s still dark outside when I wake, and Angel doesn’t even stir in the bed when I climb out to head to the bathroom.
He kept his promise. I ran, and he caught me.
It can’t be this simple though, can it?
He left the things for me to find because I was messy?
I thought it was my walking papers, a way for him to tell me he was done.
It’s been impossible to fall asleep, impossible for me to let myself believe that there’s something real between us.
I’ve never depended on anyone since Liana. The letdown from that shaped my entire life from the rest of my horrible childhood with my grandmother to the profession I chose.
How can I possibly depend on him?
I’m terrified he’s going to change his mind, and I’ll be left alone.
I glance at my flat, lower belly. Well, not completely alone.
I’m fucking terrified of where my life is heading. That doesn’t mean it has to be a bad thing, but it’s impossible to shove down certain thoughts. Is there any way for me not to fuck up a child’s life? Can I be a good mother? Will the child grow up hating me? Hating him?
I scan my body, smiling at the marks left behind from our roll in the field earlier. I don’t know how long we can keep it up safely. That brings its own feelings of guilt because I don’t want to stop what we do. How fucking selfish is that?
My eyes lock on the necklace dangling from my throat.
I must’ve fallen asleep at some point because it wasn’t on me when we got into bed.
It feels foreign against my skin.
It’s a token of horrific proportions. It’s what I held onto so I never forget the pain I’ve been through.
I tug at it, easily breaking the chain. I’ve never worn the thing a day in my life. It’s not a prize, not a sentimental possession I hold dear. It’s how I’ve always hurt myself in the past.
Liana valued it. According to her diary, it was the apology gift my dad gave her to keep her mouth shut after raping her the first time.
It was payment for abuse. It was the first of many, and as a child, I sort of hated my sister for the gifts she always got because I had no clue what they stood for.
I didn’t understand how some days, she was so proud of the trinkets, and others, she was burning them in the backyard while our father was at work.
I thought she was wasteful, petty, and spoiled.
I know now she was hurting with a pain so deep no one could help her.
The necklace clinks on the counter when I drop it there, but brushing my skin where it touched doesn’t make the disgust go away. Angel has no idea how much I hate the thing, but I can’t help but be a little angry for finding it around my neck.
I swallow down that disgust and take a true long look at myself.
For decades I’ve avoided any prolonged looks in the mirror. I’ve always hated what I saw there. It was always a reminder of the pain, of the failures, of the abuse I’ve been ashamed to admit to.
Maybe my dad knew he didn’t have to hurt me the way he did Liana because I was going to be an expert at doing that to myself.
Today isn’t one of my bad days, and I’m grateful for that. These contemplations would be dangerous on a bad day.
I find myself smiling at my reflection, and it’s not forced. It isn’t an attempt to practice fooling people I may run into.
It’s real, true. It’s happiness.
I’m not the type to have lightbulb moments. I pay too much attention to things going on around me to be genuinely surprised by much of anything.
But I’m hit in the chest with the fact that I want what Angel is offering.
I want the attention, the life we could have. I want the baby growing inside of me, and if he didn’t want a child with me, he never would’ve cut my implant out of my arm.
He wanted it before he cut me loose, before I left.
He’s said it so many times. I’m his. I’m never allowed to leave. He’ll hunt me down and drag me back.
How am I only now seeing it?
Is it because I never thought I could find happiness? Because I deem myself unworthy of anything good?
My skin flushes pink with all the possibilities, my hands trembling a little as the thought puts a smile on my face.
I search my eyes in the mirror, afraid this is just another manic episode where everything is perfect, and tomorrow I’ll suffer the crash.
I straighten, refusing to believe that. I’m so sick and tired of the apocalyptic thoughts that drag me down, the worry of what tomorrow will bring.
Angel would die to protect me, to protect us, and somehow it’s taken me this long to fully understand it.
I feel lighter on my feet than I can ever remember as I make my way back into the bedroom.
He’s asleep, his dark lashes fanned across his cheekbones, arm outstretched as if he is searching for me in his sleep, despite the standing rule that we don’t touch each other during the night unless it’s for him to wake me because he has needs.
I’ve spent so much time looking for the bad in him, I haven’t paid much attention to the good. I see it. I’m not blind, but I convinced myself it was a manipulation.
The breakfast he cooks, the sporadic smiles he gives me, the way even when he’s rough with me, his eyes are searching my face to determine if I’m hurting too much but refuse to tap out because of pride.
It has fucking been right in my face all along.
I don’t know when the change happened, when his hatred for me dulled enough for him to begin to care, but it’s there, and it has been for a while.
I’m cautious in my movements as I climb on the bed. He always wakes before me, and I’ve never done this before. After we’re done playing, I pass out from exhaustion, so I’ve never woken him.
Even the time I snuck into his hotel room the first time, he was awake and just pretending not to be.
I know I’m at risk. I know he could startle awake and hurt me, but I can’t not touch him.
His eyes slowly open when I brush his chest with my palm.
“Baby?” His voice is husky from sleep, so full of gravel. That’s all it takes to light my skin on fire.
“I need you,” I confess, and from the soft smile on his lips, I know he can tell I mean more than just sex.
My heart is racing as I straddle him. I’ve avoided all soft touches, anything that could be construed as loving, but I ache for that right now.
“You have me,” he whispers.
“I have conditions,” I say quickly before I lose the nerve.
“Of course you do.” He doesn’t say it in a way that makes me think he’s annoyed. The words are spoken with humor.
“I need you to let me do this on my own.” I roll my hips in an attempt to calm my nerves.
I need to know he’s right here with me, capable of letting me see this through.
“Take what you need, baby.”
There’s a certain thrill in what he says, but it’s also marked with apprehension.
I’m not a fan of soft and sweet, and I know that has to do with meeting my own needs.
Those needs more often than not have been my form of punishment.
At some point in my life, the rough, painful, and hard were what I longed for, what I needed to get off, but I feel it in my bones that soft with him could bring me the same pleasure.
I’m not foolish enough to think I’ll want this all the time, but sprinkling it in every once in a while could be possible.
“You keep looking at me all sweet and cute, and I’m going to come the second you slide down my cock.”
“How disappointing,” I tease as I position myself higher on my knees.
He takes the initiative to stand his cock up for me, but leaves me with the decision of when to drop back down.
I don’t see this as him relinquishing power. I know the tables could turn at any second, and the chance of that makes this all the more exciting.
We both groan with pleasure as I slide down the length of him, and that’s all it takes for my legs to stop shaking.
I focus on everything—the feel of him inside me, the pleasure, the way he watches me with such adoration, and for the first time in my life, I let it all in.
There’s affection in his touch as his hands curve around my ass, and I know he isn’t doing it to try to take control but because he just can’t help himself.
He doesn’t taunt or tease me when I try to lean forward, my mouth closer to his. He doesn’t shy away despite me having bit him every fucking time he tries to kiss me. He isn’t using the opportunity to deny me what I denied him so many times.
He leans up, situating himself in a sitting position, and lets me take charge.
I lick at his lips, a swarm of butterflies in my belly with the sound he makes the second my tongue sweeps over his.
It’s a full fucking body experience, and I’m not scared. I’m not disgusted by the softness or the tender way his arms wrap around me.
We’re a mess of swiveling hips, lapping tongues, and for the first time in my life, I feel that quickening, the warning signs I’m going to orgasm without an element of pain being attached to it.
It scares me, the vulnerability I’m showing him.
“Stay with me, baby,” he begs, his hand cupping my cheek as he pulls back just to watch my face.
I nod, fighting the urge to close my eyes because I’m just too raw from it all.
When he licks his thumb, I almost don’t need the feel of him teasing my clit, and soar the second he touches it.
Tears leak down my face as I orgasm because I feel free for the first time in my life.
I’m not unreasonable. I know this feeling won’t last forever. I have bad days ahead of me, but I choose to live in this very moment. Right now, nothing else matters.
“That’s my girl,” he says, the praise still sounding awkward but not ungenuine. “Make me come.”
I smile at his command as I come down from my orgasm. There’s the guy I could see myself spending my life with.
He helps because I’m just exhausted, by cupping me under the ass and helping me rise and lower onto him, and when he reaches that point of no return, he locks eyes with me. I can read what he’s saying without him even opening his mouth, and it titillates every part of me.
I feel the pulse of him inside of me as he groans his release, and when he leans in to kiss me, I don’t back away. I was worried the crash after the orgasm would have me running from anything soft, would have me backing away or taunting him until he showed me that rougher side of him I’m used to.
I kiss him back, my hands on his face as I we take just a moment to enjoy the other.
When I pull back and look down at him, he smiles again, but then it’s there, that wolfish grin that’s more teeth and threatening than anything else.
I squeal when he pinches my ass hard enough to leave a mark.
It has me climbing from his lap immediately, but he doesn’t let me get far.
In a second, I’m on my back with him between my legs. He watches my face as he pins my arms over my head.
It makes me want to run, not because I’m afraid, but because he has that we-need-to-talk look, and it makes my skin itch.
“Thank you.”
“For what?” I ask.
“Everything. For being who I need, for letting me be who you need. I know it comes with sacrifices on your part.”
I swallow thickly. Going slow and enjoying each other that way was easier than actually hearing the words from his mouth.
“Do you think we hurt the baby?”
I tremble.
“Earlier when we were outside,” he clarifies when I remain silent.
“How did you know?” I finally manage.
He doesn’t answer me, and it doesn’t surprise me at all.
“Do you think the baby is okay?” he asks again, and I know I have to be honest with him.
“I don’t think the baby will ever be okay with us as parents.”
He considers my response for a long moment before speaking.
“I’m going to have so much fun proving you wrong.”
With that declaration, he presses another kiss to my lips before slipping beside me in the bed and pulling me to his chest.
It lasts all of five minutes before I have to pull away and get some distance.
His laughter at my insistence follows me into a dreamless sleep.