Chapter 18 #2
I cleared my throat. “I was twenty-eight, working on location in India on the next installation in the Denolta Syndicate action franchise.”
“Oh, wow,” she said, eyes wide. “I know that franchise. Loved all five movies, and that’s saying something since I don’t normally like sequels.”
I nodded. “Yeah, it’s one of the better ones.
Donovan Media produced it and they don’t play about the quality of their films.” I cleared my throat again because this next part was more of what she didn’t already know.
“It was a routine fall from a plane. I’d done it in half a dozen other movies, but on this day… ” I shook my head.
She gasped. “Wait, what exactly is a ‘routine’ fall from a fuckin’ plane?”
I finally released my clenched fists, bringing one hand up to scrub the back of my neck.
“It was during a touch-and-go landing when my safety belt broke, and instead of remaining suspended in air until the dramatic, but planned, fall into the tarp, I was released too soon, missed the drop point by a hundred stupid ass feet, and landed in a heavily forested area.”
“Noah,” she cried.
“Multiple lacerations, a concussion and a fractured spine.” I said that part fast and before she could move or say another word, I blurted out the rest, “The Donovans were great. They paid for all my medical bills, flew me back to L.A. for surgery and physical rehabilitation, and continued to pay me a disability rate until I was cleared. I spent the next year on my couch popping pain pills because every time I breathed, I hurt.”
Tears streamed down her face, and I hated every moment of this confession that was both necessary and annoying as fuck. I wasn’t supposed to tell this story again. Wasn’t supposed to revisit yet another disappointing time in my life. Yet, here we were.
“I’m not proud of it,” I continued. “Not the addiction, and definitely not being so wrapped up in my own misery that I didn’t see my roommate was also doing drugs…
until he OD’d and I found him naked in a puddle of vomit on our bathroom floor.
” Now, my eyes stung and I scrubbed both hands down my face.
“I packed my shit at the same time I packed up all of his to ship to his father. Then I checked myself into rehab. The day I got out, Rock called to wish me a happy birthday. I hung up with him and came…home.”
She was sobbing now. Not a loud, toss yourself on the top of the casket sob, but that irritatingly quiet one where you only heard the slight hitches in breathing, saw the jerking of the shoulders, and hated every fuckin’ tear that fell.
“Noah.” Her lip quivered as she said my name. “You can’t blame yourself for his death. Or for any of the things that have happened. You…”
“Don’t do that.” I shook my head.
She frowned. “Don’t do what?”
“Don’t stand there and say it’s okay. That everything I just told you didn’t make you think less of me.”
“I—”
“Because I know that’s bullshit. I know I fucked up. I knew better. Had been through this shit before with the steroids that I thought I needed to keep the career that was supposed to prove I wasn’t the piece of shit everybody thought I was.” My temples throbbed with frustration.
“I never thought you were a piece of shit.” Her voice sounded so frail, so wounded by the impossibility that I was something other than what she deemed me to be.
“You also didn’t think I was worth having a future with.”
She jerked back like I’d hit her, and all the anger and confusion that had been shuffling around in my gut this afternoon formed a ball of disappointment that pressed with enormous strength into my chest. “Shit, I’m sorry, Serra.
That’s not what I meant to say.” I finally moved from where I’d been planted at the fender of the truck, to go to her, but she inched out of my reach.
“No.” She shook her head so hard tendrils from her ponytail fell into her face. “I think it’s exactly what you wanted to say. And it’s fair.”
But it really wasn’t.
“Look,” I sighed because I was really fucking this up, “I know why you did what you did. Your family was pressuring you and they weren’t lying.
I wasn’t shit back then, but I made something out of myself.
I worked hard, made a good deal of money, and lived a fabulous life.
” Until it wasn’t so fabulous and that money couldn’t save me from walking down a destructive path.
But I wasn’t that man anymore. I wasn’t what I’d let circumstances turn me into. “Sweetness,” I said, moving toward her again. “All I’m trying to say is that I didn’t tell you this to solicit your pity.”
She blinked rapidly, like she thought that would stop the tears from falling, but it didn’t. When I was close enough, I thumbed them away from one cheek and then the other.
“Why did you tell me? You don’t owe me or anyone else any explanations, Noah. You’ve always been your own man.”
I wanted to scream, ‘no, I’ve always been your man’ but something told me she wasn’t ready to hear that.
While the night we’d spent together was still fresh in my mind, and the days since then when we’d barely been together long enough for me to touch her, kiss her, breathe her scent, had solidified my decision that wanting her back wasn’t a foolish wish, I hadn’t yet considered how to broach that subject with her.
“I needed you to know.” Cupping her face in my hands, I stared down into those eyes I never wanted to see damp with tears again. “I don’t ever want you wondering if something that’s said about me is true. You know about every awful choice, every dark moment in my life.”
She leaned into my touch, and my heart soared.
“And I still trust you more than most of the people in my life,” she said softly. “I still respect you for admitting your imperfections and always striving to be better…not just for others, but for yourself.”
This was the second time she’d said something like that, and I wasn’t sure how I felt about it.
I’d always been trying to prove the people who didn’t believe in me wrong, but my actions had the opposite effect.
Even the changes I made hadn’t seemed to change any already made-up minds; case in point the situation we found ourselves in with the permits.
Still, I could recognize the fact that none of that had stopped me from achieving anything I set my mind to.
I guess that’s what she was referring to.
“You say all the right things,” I admitted, leaning in closer until my lips were just a whisper from hers. “You show up at the right moment.” I kissed her. “And you make me feel exactly how I’ve always longed to feel.” I kissed her again, this time slipping my tongue between her lips.
She greedily welcomed me inside, lifting her arms to land on my shoulders, and when her hands rested on the back of my head, I groaned.
Sliding my hands from her face, down to brush past her breasts, then around her waist, I pulled her into me.
The kiss went deeper, so deep it didn’t seem like either of us were breathing.
The night sounds that I’d faintly heard while we’d been talking totally disappeared, leaving only the low moans and grunts that were mostly coming from me.
I loved the feel of her hands on my head.
That bit of pressure she was applying to make sure we didn’t lose the connection of our lips.
It screamed the things I hadn’t realized I longed to hear her say—that she cherished me, needed me, loved me.
Not the way I loved her, I’m certain she couldn’t be feeling anything that intense, but still I’d felt honored that she’d chosen me back in college.
I’d valued every minute she allowed me to be in her presence.
And when that was gone, I’d missed it like a starving man missed food.
In the dark of so many nights I’d craved her touch, longed for the sound of her voice, ached to be inside of her, and now she was in my arms.
I nipped her bottom lip before sucking it into my mouth. It’s soft and wet just like her ones below. My dick jumped at the thought, and my hands slid down to cup her ass. She groaned into my mouth, her nails pressing into the skin of my neck.
That tiny prick of pain sent a bolt of pleasure soaring through me and I choked out. “Do that shit again.”
She did, and fuck, I wanted to lift her off this ground and thrust into her.
I reminded myself that we were outside. The area was secluded enough and the only lights were the ones from my headlights, that I’d long since switched off, so except for a minute glow from the sliver of moon, we were in the dark.
Serra must’ve just come to that same conclusion because before I could speak, she pulled her mouth away from mine.
I had about ten seconds to stare at her quizzically before she gave me a half smile and eased down into a squat.
“Whoa. Wait.” The words were barely out of my mouth when she unsnapped my jeans and slid my zipper down. “S-S-Serra, baby.” I sounded like a snake or a babbling idiot as my hands involuntarily fell to the top of her head.
She chuckled as she reached inside of my boxers and freed my growing arousal. “You don’t know if you want to tell me to stop or feed me what I’m looking for.”
That wasn’t totally true…I knew without any doubt that I wanted to stuff my dick into her pretty little mouth. I just wasn’t certain we should be doing that right here and right now. Serra had already made that decision.
She closed her mouth over me before I could utter another word. Staring down all I could see was my dick disappearing into her mouth and I grew harder, my fingers twisting in her hair. “Shit!”
My dick was so hard, her mouth was so fuckin wet. She placed her hands on my thighs and worked my length in and out of her mouth so fast and so good I barely felt my feet on the ground.
“Baby,” I groaned and continued watching my dick glistening with her saliva as it disappeared inside of her mouth once more.
Her ass poked out as she held that squat perfectly just like she did in the gym. I wouldn’t be able to watch her doing those exercises again without thinking of this moment. My hands gripped the sides of her head, tilting it back until she raised her eyes to me. “Gimme that throat, baby.”
She blinked. Those eyes like whiskey shimmering back at me as she opened her mouth wider in acquiescence.
I eased in slowly, pushing every inch of my dick past her lips until my balls tapped her chin.
The groan that ripped through me felt fuckin unearthly.
My body trembled from my shoulders to my ankles and when she gagged on my shit. ..
”Fuuuucck!” My damn eyes watered.
I eased back reluctantly but knowing she needed to breathe. She coughed when I pulled free, spit dripping from her lips. I gripped my shit at the base, dragging the tip over her now swollen lips as her warm breath caressed it.
“Mine,” she whispered, then licked my tip before swiping my hand away.
The smirk had barely covered my face before she was swallowing me again. Sucking and slurping, licking and kissing. When she palmed my balls, I yelled out like a bitch, “Damn, sweetness, you gon’ make me bust.”
She kept going.
Kept sucking. Kept massaging my balls. I pumped with her rhythm, my hand buried in her hair again. I wanted to close my eyes to the ecstasy but at the same time watch her fine ass work this dick like it actually belonged to her. Which, shit, it did.
Never, not in my thirty-three years, had I ever felt like this. Like I was here but where the fuck was here because surely it had to be heaven.
When her soft fingers fisted my balls, a bolt of pain shot up my spine and my release ripped free, shooting to the back of her throat with such fierceness my whole body convulsed.
I don’t know how the hell I remained upright or where I found the strength to pull free of her still suctioning grip to grab her shoulders and pull her up.
When she was blinking back fresh tears, breath heaving, lips still wet from herself and my release, I picked her up and moved until I could sit her ass on the hood of my truck.
I crashed my lips over hers, kissing her so deeply I almost passed the fuck out.
Then I was yanking that tennis shoe from her left foot.
I snatched the button of her pants open, heard the zipper rip but didn’t give a fuck.
She lifted up slightly to assist as I pulled one leg free of the capris and the panties she wore.
Then one hand was on her stomach, pushing her back onto the hood.
The other was on her bare thigh, lifting that shit to drape over my shoulder.
Then I went in, hungrily licking her folds, her clit, up and down her soft, wet slit.
I eased one, then two fingers inside of her and she moaned her hands going to the back of my head again.
“My pussy,” I whispered over the pretty flesh. “My. Fuckin’. Pussy.”
She gave a breathy moan. “Yes, yes, yeesss!”
It was my turn to lick and suck and devour until she convulsed beneath me.
This might be the first time I regretted buying this big ass truck. While it had been the perfect height for me to feast on her, actually sinking my dick into her this way would prove challenging.
Wrapping an arm around her waist, I lifted her off the hood and placed her on her feet. “Put your hands right here,” I directed, moving her hands to rest on the hood. Her back was to me now and I freed her other leg from her clothes.
Smacking her ass and watching it jiggle in response, I pulled my bottom lip between my teeth. “Spread your fuckin legs!”
She tossed the sexiest look over her shoulder as she licked her lips and said, “Yes, Jordan.”
I almost came right then and there.
“That’s right,” I told her, moving in behind her. With one hand I gripped her neck, pulling her head back until it rested on my shoulder. With the other I guided my dick between her legs until it found it’s home and pushed deep inside.
She gasped, and I caught the sound with my mouth, kissing her deeply as I fucked her slowly.
There was no time. Twelve years, two days, none of it existed in this moment. No mountains, no moon… hell, not even air as I moved in and out of her slickness.
There was only her. Only me.
She looped an arm back until her hand was once again at my head holding my mouth to hers. Out tongues dueled, teeth nipped, breaths hitched as I fucked her and fucked her until we both screamed our release.