66. Summer
Chapter Sixty-Six
Summer
O ver the next few weeks, we all fall into a fairly easy rhythm.
Rafe and I are now going to the gym six mornings a week.
He’s growing stronger and more confident, though he still pushes back against the idea of starting classes again.
I’ve been training with the headmaster twice a week and the stranger four times a week, leaving just enough time to study and complete my coursework.
I’m enjoying how I, too, am growing stronger, not just physically, but also magically.
I have officially not fucked Max in ten days, and the stranger has only crossed my boundaries fifteen times.
I lean against a tree, panting. It doesn’t seem to matter how many times I do this with the stranger.
It always takes it out of me a thousand times more than any of the physical training I do.
I look up, feeling his eyes on me. He’s been acting odd today, more guarded, which I don’t care about, as long as it means he doesn’t get too close.
“We’re done for today.”
I push off the tree and roll my neck, stretching the tension.
His eyes remain on me, seeming to radiate irritation. “You’ve gotten stronger. How are your dreams?” he asks. It’s another good sign, because if he has to ask, it means he’s getting even less information from his mind strolls than before.
“Fine,” I say a little sharply. It’s easier when he is annoyed. Keeping him at arm’s length is healthier.
“Just fine?” he asks, rubbing his jaw. I’m not sure why he’s so pissed off, but I can tell he’s getting more frustrated by the second. I nod, and his energy bristles even more. “How exactly are they just fine ?”
“What are you asking me?” My irritation spikes.
“Have you started having nightmares again?” he asks, his glare deepening.
“No,” I say truthfully.
“You’re sure?” he asks.
“Stop. We made this deal to keep you out of my dreams. Therefore, you have no business asking what is within them,” I say, growing even more irate.
“I never expected you to keep it going this long,” he quietly growls.
I blink. He didn’t think?.?.?. “Are you joking?” He thought I wouldn’t be able to keep it up, that he would be back in my dreams by now.
“What?” He crosses his arms over his chest.
“This whole time you’ve been expecting me to sever the deal?”
His jaw clenches. “Your powers aren’t exactly predictable, and you tend to be rather impulsive with your reactions. Especially when you are angry.”
“Unbelievable,” I scoff again, shaking my head in disbelief. I turn from him and start walking away, anger and more than a little hurt making a mess of my emotions.
“Do you miss me?” he asks, his voice so quiet I’d be easily convinced he’d not spoken.
“At all?” he adds, and I stop walking, still facing away from him.
My whole body feels like it is vibrating, and I am desperate to keep walking, to move away from him, but I am planted on the spot.
“Or is it so easy for you to pretend?” he asks a little louder.
“Pretend?” I ask, still with my back to him, my hands curled into fists.
“That it’s all enough for you.”
I turn to face him. “Stop speaking in riddles. Ask me what you want to ask.” I know it’s a mistake. I don’t want his question to be freed, to fill the space between us, but my anger is ruling me at the moment.
The stranger storms up to me and grabs my arms, pulling me to him.
I know the oath has to be agony as he touches me without permission, but he doesn’t let go.
He towers over me, and I look up at him.
I do my best, but I can’t help but soften against him, fitting my curves against the hard muscles pressed against me.
We’ve not been this close in so long, and it feels?—
“I miss you,” he says, and I swallow as the butterflies start. No, no, no, no, no, no, no. “I miss your dreams,” he continues. “I miss watching you.” My breath grows shallow. “I miss breathing you in. ”
No, no, no.
I don’t move. All my words get lost, tangled up in the knots and butterflies that have escaped my stomach and now flutter through my bloodstream.
He tightens his hands around my arms, his gaze scorching into me. “Do you miss me?” he asks, and the longing in his voice almost ends me.
I can’t fucking do this.
“You?.?.?. you do still watch me.” It’s all I can think to say, and it’s barely a whisper.
“It’s different.”
My breath hitches. “How?”
“In every way.”
My gaze falls to his lips. Even in his avatar, I can tell they’re perfect, soft, firm.
He leans in closer, and if he were here, our breath would be mingling. “Mine,” he whispers. He inhales deeply, and a shiver trickles down my spine. “Admit it.”
My core throbs, and I slide my tongue along my bottom lip, wetting it. Fuck. I look away, trying to get myself back under control. How does he do this to me? I close my eyes and replay his words.
You will never be Summer Morningstar.
It’s unfair to subscribe to the belief that he talked it into existence, especially when Aqua killed Connor and was stalking me relentlessly. But I will hold on to the thought for as long as I can, because it is one of the last defenses I have that keeps me from succumbing to him.
“I don’t miss you.” The lie is bitter. “I hate you.” That one even more so, especially with the way I am leaning toward him.
“Liar,” he growls.
That word allows my anger to burn through the deep need I have, and I welcome the fury, its strength enabling me to pull away from him.
“You don’t fucking know me,” I snarl. “And you never will.”
“I know you better than I know myself,” he snarls.
He reaches out and snags me again, his fingers locking into my hair. He fists it at my scalp and yanks my head back hard. The pain sends a jolt of awareness to my core, and I can’t help the moan that slips free. His lips pull into a smug smile at the sound.
“Good girl,” he says, his tone filled with male satisfaction .
The praise prompts another wave of confusing emotions, and I shove him away. “You’re an asshole,” I snarl. His body barely moves, but he does release me, and I back up a step.
“For knowing exactly what makes you moan?” he asks, his voice low, seductive, dangerous.
“You don’t know what makes me moan, but I know someone who does,” I growl, turning and storming away. I yank my phone free from my shorts.
Don’t do it. Don’t do it.
I really know I shouldn’t. I am going to regret it, but I can’t stand that moment of true intimacy with the stranger. It was everything, and I ached to lean into it, to allow him to claim me, and even worse, to claim him back.
No!
Summer
You up?
I should feel guilty for what I want to do, but I have all this pent-up energy. I want to fuck Max, and getting back at the stranger is just a bonus. Plus, Max is using me for sex too, so what is there to feel guilty about?
Anticipating his response, I walk in the direction of the gym. It’s late, so I know it’ll be closed, but I’m half convinced Max lives there. He always seems to be there.
Do Not Fuck
Yes.
Grootslang Apartments. 14A.
Huh, I was wrong. I type his address into Nexus Maps and notice his apartment is right next door to the gym, which absolutely tracks.
I stop outside the apartment building and just stare up at it.
I shouldn’t do this because of the stranger.
It’s not fair to Max, but I want the release.
I need to work through this shit, and I need to have sex with someone who won’t make me think of the stranger and what he makes me feel, what he makes me want.
Max buzzes me in within seconds of my pressing the button next to 14A.
He’s on the fourth floor, and I decide to take the stairs, hoping that maybe I will talk myself out of doing this on my way up.
But when I get to his floor, I’m still pretty set on fucking him.
I knock, and the door swings open. Max smiles brightly and starts to say something, but I pounce on him and slam my lips to his.
He stumbles back, his hands going to my hips to steady us both.
I yank at his clothes feverishly, desperate to banish all thoughts of the stranger.
I don’t want to imagine how his hands would feel instead of Max’s or how it would be to kiss him.
I yelp as we fall backward onto his bed, Max’s body hovering over mine.
He takes my lips again as I wrap my arms and legs around him and roll us.
Sitting up, I straddle Max and pull my shirt off, watching his eyes flash green in appreciation as I rock my hips, grinding against him.
He pulls me down and claims my mouth, then with a powerful twist of his body, he spins us, pulling me beneath him.
He shoves at our shorts until we’re both completely naked.
He pulls back and looks down, rolling on a condom he’d pulled from his pocket. The moment he has it on, I push him back onto the bed.
“My turn to take control,” I say, straddling him again.
“As you wish,” he says with an absolutely lewd grin. He lies back and puts his hands behind his head, his biceps bulging and his beautiful body on full display.
I shift and lock the head of his cock just inside my pussy.
My muscles clench around him as I slowly sink down his rock-hard length.
Max’s moan is deep and desperate. His massive hands grip my hips, but he doesn’t interfere when I lift until only the tip remains bathed in the heat of my core before slamming down on him again.
Max arches against the mattress, and I start to ride him hard and fast. His arms bulge, the berserker begging to come forth, but he keeps a leash on it, allowing me to maintain control.
“You want to unleash?” I pant, watching him struggle as I dig my nails into his abs and move faster on him.
“I got it,” Max says through gritted teeth, arching to meet me.
“Unleash. Please?.?.?.” I whisper, the delicate muscles of my center spasm-ing around his shaft.
Max groans, his eyes locked on mine. “You sure?” he grinds out, his fingers digging into my hips.
“Please,” I moan. The word has barely passed my lips when Max lifts me off him and flips me.
I’m face down on his mattress, and I cry out at the loss of him filling me.
He snarls in response and yanks my hips up, lifting my ass in the air to bury his cock inside me once again.
His thrust drives the air from me and makes my eyes roll back.
So deep. His hand is on the back of my head, pressing me into the mattress, and I can’t do anything but take his brutal thrusts.
My orgasm crashes toward me, a roiling, almost threatening thing.
Max pummels into me, and I know the backs of my thighs are going to be bruised.
The thought brings me even closer to the edge, and I dig my nails into the mattress, trying to hold back.
But Max snarls, and there is something in the primal sound that breaks all the bonds grounding me and sends me hurtling into my release.
Max’s roar of pleasure answers my cry, and his thrusts turn ragged as he cums. His hands are the only things keeping me up as his thrusts slow and then stop.
His chest heaves against my back as he carefully withdraws and rolls off me.
I moan, my knees slipping from beneath me, my body melting bonelessly into the mattress.
“Damn,” Max pants breathlessly, spanking my ass.
I shift, turning my head to look at him.
“I mean, damn ,” he says again.
I lean up on my elbows, languidly stretching my back. Max smirks at me. “What?” I ask.
“Damn.” Max shrugs.
I roll my eyes and look at my manicure.
“Did I hurt you?” Max asks, and when I look at him, his smirk has dissolved.
“You didn’t hurt me at all. You turned me on.”
Max smirks again. “Hot.”
I roll my eyes and slip to the edge of the bed, but I stop and blink when I realize that what I thought was an actual bed is, in fact, a mattress on the floor. “Are you joking?” I ask, looking at him in disgust.
Max frowns and sits up, leaning on his elbows. “What?”
I grab his shirt and pull it on, enjoying the way I drown in it, but also mourning Connor a fraction. “A mattress on the floor?” I ask, standing up.
Max sits up, his back against the wall. “What’s wrong with it?”
“Gods. You are such a fuckboy,” I say, going to the bathroom, but there is something weirdly comforting about his consistency of being the dictionary definition of a frat boy. He’s never going to want more from me than this, and that is perfect .
“Because I have a mattress?” he calls, his voice full of true bewilderment.
“Because you don’t have a bed frame,” I say, and the memory of being in the stranger’s bedroom flashes into my mind. He had a bed frame. The stranger is not a fuckboy, and he is dangerous in every conceivable way.
I look around the bare bones of a bathroom, unsure that I could even call it that.
It has a sink, a toilet, and a shower, but there is no curtain.
There is no decor, no reed diffuser, no personal touches.
I walk to the sink to wash my hands, and there isn’t even soap.
I sigh and wash my hands with water only, and I’m not sure I’m surprised to find there is no hand towel either.
When I walk back into his room, I spend more time taking it in. It’s painted a matcha green and sparsely decorated. There is a mattress strewn with blue blankets, a brown leather love seat, and a rack filled with a selection of weights.
Max has moved to the couch and is lounging, watching some sort of sports game.
“I feel your judgment,” he says, bringing a bottle of beer to his lips and taking a swig.
I sit on the edge of the couch. “I can see why you’re always at the gym.” This place is infinitely more depressing than there.
Max snorts. “I have the essentials.”
I stand and walk back to the mattress, locate my panties, and pull them on.
“Bed, fridge. I’m good.”
“Gods,” I say, pulling my shorts on.
Max snickers, and it surprises me when he opens a textbook and starts reading while the game plays in the background. I always forget that he actually attends the university and isn’t just there for the gym. Probably because I rarely see him in the halls.
I pull his shirt off and replace it with my own.
“Happy we exchanged numbers now?” he asks, throwing me a smirk. Smug prick.
I flip him off and leave his apartment, cursing myself as I walk home for breaking my ten-day streak just because the stranger got under my skin.