Chapter 22
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
Ezekiel
The heavy throb on my injured side is the first thing that drags me out of sleep. It’s a dull, burning ache, annoying enough to wake me up.
I blink against the morning light coming from the small window. The bed is too small, the sheets are tangled around my legs and when I shift, the familiar scent of the pillow hits me.
Vanilla and clean skin… Riley.
But she isn’t next to me and for a moment I wonder if she might have decided to sleep on the sofa. I can’t remember anything that happened after she cleaned my wound last night, but I’m pretty sure that I felt a warm body sleeping next to me.
The sound of rushing water echoes from bathroom across the hallway, and the thought of Riley in the shower suddenly awakes more than just my mind. My dick twitches immediately and I have to force myself to think about anything else.
“Fuck it,” I jump out of bed, a little wobbly, but when my bare feet hit the floorboards, I chose to focus on the cold spreading through my entire body.
My pants are still on and I don’t bother looking for a shirt, I just follow the sound coming from the bathroom and the steam rolling out from underneath the bathroom door.
“Riley?” I knock once, remembering she lives with two roommates. The last thing I want is to walk in on one of them thinking it’s Riley.
“I’ll be out in just a sec!” She shouts from the other side of the door and that’s enough for me to turn the handle and step inside the small, vapor-filled room. Through the frosted glass of the shower, I can see the blur of her silhouette under the spray.
“Maybe I can just come in instead,” I grin as I slide the glass door open and the thick, hot steam hits my bare chest instantly.
“Zeke?” Riley’s eyes go wide as she wipes the water from her face. “You shouldn’t be moving around, your wound…”
“I’m fine, I know you used a waterproof bandage,” I cut her off, stepping over the ledge and right into the heat of the shower with her. The hot water hits my back as I lock my eyes on her hers. “Don’t worry so much about me.”
“Mia called me earlier,” she hesitates, her back pressed against the tiled wall as the water streams down her hair. “She told me everything, Zeke.”
I step closer, crowding her space until the heat radiating off her body mixes with the steam. “What exactly did she say?”
“How you jumped in front of the bullet to protect her,” Riley’s voice is shaking slightly, but her gaze never leaves mine.
She reaches out, her wet hand hovering just an inch away from my bandage, not wanting to hurt me.
“She told me she sent you away to get treated and gave the police a version you agreed on of what happened. The police took her statement and asked her to look at the dead man before they took away the body. She did not recognize him. You saved my best friend’s life, Zeke. She’s alive because of you.”
“She was not supposed to be there. I did what anyone would do.” The water pours over my head, dripping down my jaw. I am relieved and angry at the same time that the guy I shot was not someone who worked for us.
Riley goes on to tell me that Mia had called Cohen to ask if there was someone there to go get her headphones and that he had lent her a key.
I was wondering how the hell she had gotten into the Eden.
I make a mental note to talk to Cohen about giving the key to the girls without authorization.
But I’ll admit I am glad he did this time.
Then she stops and looks me deep in the eyes. “You could have gotten yourself killed,” she says, her voice almost a whisper.
“Riley,” I growl, my patience abandoning my body as the distance between us disappears and I reach out, gripping the back of her wet neck, pulling her forward.
Our lips collide, desperate and hungry, fueled by whatever adrenaline we have left from last night.
My tongue slides into her mouth, claiming her completely, while her hands grip at my bare waist, her fingernails digging into my skin.
She groans against my mouth, matching my pace, her body slick and pressed tight against mine under the pouring water.
I break the kiss just enough to breathe. “Let’s go to your room.”
She nods, her breath hitching and we don’t even bother drying off properly before I lead her back into the quiet bedroom, shutting the door behind us. The room is cool against our damp skin.
I get rid of my damp pants before I grab Riley’s waist, pulling her body against mine, her arms wrapping around my neck as I back her up against the bed. I press her down into the sheets, my body hovering over hers, before she can even catch her breath.
“You’re driving me crazy, Riley.” My lips find hers again, this time harder, tasting the hot shower water still dripping from her lips.
Her hands claw at my shoulders, her fingers digging into my skip as she’s pulling me down, almost as if she can’t get close enough.
“Please, Zeke,” her breathing is shallow, her hand reaching down between my legs. “Please, don’t make me wait.”
“Shh,” I continue kissing her mouth, my hands exploring every inch of her toned body. When I slide between her thighs, the friction of our damp skin is loud in the quiet room. Thankfully her roommates seem to have already left.
I don’t ease into it, I’m just as desperate to be inside of her as she is. When I drive into her all at once with a heavy trust that makes her jaw drop and her pussy stretch, a loud moan escapes her throat.
“Zeke…” Her eyes wide, her fingers instantly locking into the fabric of the mattress.
“Look at me,” I growl, my pace turning brutal. My hips continue slamming against hers with a blunt force that rattles the bed underneath. Every stroke is deep, leaving her entirely breathless and begging for more.
Riley’s head rolls back into the pillow, her chest raising and falling as she desperately tries to match the sudden, relentless weight of me.
“Good girl,” She takes my dick as if she was made for me to fuck her, her legs wrapping tighter around my waist and her hips tilting up to meet every single hard shove. A low moan escapes me as I bury myself in her over and over, the heat between us turning thick and suffocating.
My attention goes to the scarf on the bedside table and I reach out for it, knowing how much it’s going to enhance everything for her, never pulling my dick out of her. I lean down, whispering. “Riley, tell me if this is too much.”
“The scarf?” She asks, her voice trembling.
“Yes,” I place another kiss on her neck.
“Okay…” She swallows hard, her hands trembling on my back.
I sit back slightly on my knees, then, as I wrap the scarf over her eyes, pulling it tight and knotting it securely at the back of her head.
The second the darkness takes over her, her entire body tenses, her hands going out blindly as she’s searching the air until she finds my thighs and her fingers grip me tight for anchor.
“Zeke?” The vulnerability in her voice is more obvious than ever.
“I’m right here,” I lean down and start placing kisses along her collarbone.
When I slide back into her, I control the depth. First I push in slowly, bottoming out until she arches off the bed. Then I pull back almost completely, withholding the friction she’s begging me for.
“Please,” Riley whines, her blindfolded head tossing against the pillow. “Please, don’t stop.”
“I’m not stopping,” I give her one hard, shallow thrust, then hold still, letting her feel the agonizing stretch. “You want me to move?”
“Yes! Yes, please!”
“How do you want me to do it?”
“Fill me hard, like before,” she pants, her cheeks red, completely at my mercy.
“Good girl,” I give her exactly what she asks for, accelerating the pace, until the room fills with the rhythmic sound of the mattress hitting the wall and her moans.
I drive her right up to the very peak of it until her thighs are shaking against me, and then I pull back completely, leaving her suspended in the dark, desperate for the release I’m holding onto.
“Zeke, please,” she breathes.
I lean down and place another kiss on her lips, taking her by surprise, but she immediately wraps her arms around me, pulling me closer. “Let’s do it, Riley. Come for me.”
I drive into her one more time, deep and heavy, bottoming out against her cervix while my thumb presses hard against her clit.
That’s all it takes to break her. Riley shrieks, her body stiffening completely as she comes.
The violent, full-body release clenches tightly around my dick, her internal muscles grabbing me in waves.
She weeps into the pillow, her fingers digging so hard into my thighs that her nails leave red crescent marks.
I stay buried inside her, holding her down, letting her ride out the rush of the orgasm until her thighs finally stop trembling against my ribs.
I reach up, wrapping my fingers around the knot of the scarf and I tug it free. Riley blinks, trying to adjust to the sudden light. Her eyes are dark, wet and heavy-lidded as they instantly lock onto mine.
Without saying a word, she shifts beneath me, sliding her body out from under my weight. She moves purposefully, stepping off the mattress until her knees hit the floorboards beside the bed. I sit back on my heels, my dick fully erect, wet and leaking pre-cum, watching her every move.
She looks up at me, the look in her eyes full of determination, as her hands wrap around the base of my shaft, her palms are warm against my skin. She leans forward, her lips brushing the tip before she opens her mouth and takes the head in.
A growl tears from my chest when she looks right up at me through her eyelashes, her mouth sliding down the shaft, taking as much of my length as she can manage.
The heat of her throat gripping me tight is suffocating.
I tangle my fingers in her wet hair to steady myself as she sets an agonizingly slow rhythm, sucking hard every time she bottoms out.
“Riley,” The view of her on her knees, dedicated to finishing me off, wrecks whatever restraint I have left and my hips twitch forward, the tension in my lower stomach tightening.
She catches the change in my breathing, looking straight into my eyes as she speeds up her pace, her lips squeezing tight around the crown. My muscles tense, the ache from the wound completely vanishing under the intensity of the moment.
“I’m close,” I pull back slightly, letting her take just the head of my dick as I finish.
The thick, hot cum shoots onto her tongue and the inside of her cheeks.
She doesn’t flinch or pull away, her eyes staying locked onto mine, as her throat works to swallow every drop down.
She lingers on me for a second, her tongue swiping over the tip to clean up the stray wetness before she finally lets me slide completely out from between her lips.
I reach down immediately, gripping her under the arms and lifting her up off the floorboards. I pull her back onto the mattress, shifting my weight so she’s underneath me again, and then press my lips down on hers, kissing her deep and slow as she wraps her arms around my neck.
We spend some time lying in her bed, my arms wrapped around her small figured, the warmth from her skin making me aware that this is all real. It’s an oddly comforting feeling just being here with her.
“That was really special,” Riley’s voice is weak when she speaks again. “I enjoyed every second of it.”
“Me too,” I place a kiss at the top of her head.
“You know…” For a moment she is hesitant, but I can see that something is bothering her and she wants to talk about it.
“What’s wrong?” I ask, pulling away just enough to look her in the eyes.
“Oh, nothing about this,” she smiles. “This is great. I just…”
“You can tell me anything,” I lift her chin and place another peck on her lips. “But if you don’t feel like talking about something, I don’t want you to feel pressured to do it.”
“With you was my first time touching a man because I wanted to,” she says, looking away. “When I was younger, my stepfather made me touch him and it’s one of the things that made me decide not to get physical with guys for so long… Until you.”
I pull her closer to my chest, my heart wrenching, and whisper into her hair. “You’ll never have to do anything you don’t want to, Riley. I’ll make sure of that.”
“Thank you,” she pecks on my bare chest. “I don’t know why or how you do it, but I always feel safe with you.”
Her words weigh on me, the instinct to protect her from everyone who has ever harmed her taking over. It takes all of my will power not to jump from this bed, ask her for her stepfather’s address and put a bullet between his eyes.
“Hold me?” Only when she speaks again do I realize that my grip around her body has loosened and I’ve been holding my fists on both sides of my body. I release them as my eyes meet hers again.
I hold her tight.