"Yeah, that."
"He died," I said. "I'm not sorry in the least. He wasn't a good person."
River didn't say anything at first. She just nodded. "I don't know who mine is," she said. "My father, I mean."
"Fuck family," I said. "The whole blood is thicker than water thing is such horseshit."
"You have brothers, though?" River asked, her voice soft.
"Four," I said.
"I just have a sister," River said. "I mean, obviously. My sister is the one screwing Viper. What are your brothers like?"
"We used to be close," I said. "Not as much anymore." That was the goddamned understatement of the year.
"How many of you are there?"
"Mason was the oldest, died when I was a kid."
River was silent, and I just continued, this deluge of words, non-stop. I didn't talk about my brothers much, or about my family at all. Even to the guys in my unit. They knew I was going home to West Bend, but not about much more than that. Telling someone about my family felt foreign.
"My mother married the asshole -" I cleared my throat. "My father, I mean, after that. Had Mason when she was a teenager. The rest of us were from him - Silas, Luke, and Killian. There's four of us."
"Are they in West Bend?"
"Silas is," I said. "Works at a bar- bounces, I guess."
"Are you close?"
"It's complicated."
"Seems like a straightforward enough question."
"You're fucking pushy, aren't you?" I asked. River didn't seem bothered by my language or my irritation. She just shrugged and smiled.
"Been called worse," she said.
"We used to be close," I said. I didn't have to talk to her about my fucking family, I reminded myself. I could just tell her to fuck off and mind her own business.
Except I didn't want to. Not really.
For whatever the hell reason, I found myself wanting to tell River things I didn't talk about with other people. And that's the part that was scaring the shit out of me.
"And then what happened?"
"I don't know," I said. "Life, I guess. People change."
"You're so full of shit, Elias Saint," River said. But she didn't press me on it. It made me like her more. "June and Cade told me what happened with Mason."
"What the -?" I pulled away from her, irritated that she'd probed around in my past.
River put her hand on my chest, calm in the midst of my fury. "I asked them what they knew about Elias Saint. You. After what happened in town, with the sheriff, I wanted to know."
"Why?"
River pulled back from me and turned to face me, still under the blanket. I could feel her knees tucked up protectively to her chest. She looked down. "I wanted to know if I was wrong about you."
"Wrong about what?"
"Who you are."
"Who do you think I am?" My chest felt tight, like there was a vise grip on my heart. I didn't fucking want to hear what she'd assumed about me from the beginning - who she assumed I was. I'd gotten enough of that bullshit growing up.
"I thought you were a good guy," she said. "Protective. Loyal. Principled."
I laughed. "Principled," I said, shaking my head. "I've never fucking gotten called that before."
River ignored me. "June told me the town had it in for your family."
"You know the whole fucking story, then," I said.
"I know what June told me," River said. "I somehow doubt that's the whole story."
I shrugged. "Not much more to it than what she told you, probably. Mason had it roughest growing up, out of all of us, not being blood-related to the asshole. I don't remember much of it, not really - Killian and Luke remember more, but that's the way they told it. Got away from our place, worked as a ranch hand on June's dad's ranch. He and June's sister had a thing. Anyway, he killed June's parents drunk driving, died in the accident. June's sister killed herself."
"It happened a long time ago," River said, more of a question than a statement.
"I don't even remember it. I was too young," I said. "Just the aftermath. Mom already had a black mark on her from the beginning, showing up in town pregnant and young, running away from her home. Add my father to the mix, the fucking town drunk, a mean sonofabitch, and...then, the accident after that."
"You were like pariahs, then."
"Small town bullshit."
"Growing up an outsider...it sticks with you forever," River said. "Makes it hard to trust people."
What the hell would River Andrews know about being an outsider? Millions of adoring fans, a job most people dream of... she acted like she knew something about this kind of family bullshit? I looked into her eyes, at the sincerity etched into her features.
Yeah, right. She didn't know about this kind of thing. She was an actress.
“Why the hell are we even talking about this?” I asked, pulling her toward me. “How bout a little less talking and a lot more fucking?”
River bit her bottom lip, but she couldn't hide her grin. “Show me what you’ve got, then.”
***
RIVER
I collapsed against him, my breath still ragged even in the afterglow of sex, and pulled the blanket tighter against us, seeking his warmth but still shivering.
“You’re shivering,” Elias said. “I guess I’m going to have to warm you up again, huh?”
I laughed him off. But the truth was, Elias had my body aching for him, even after he’d just been inside me. I’d never known that with any other man - it had to be some kind of primitive evolutionary thing, the way he set me off.
“Maybe back at the house,” I said.
“You don’t want to stay out here?” Elias asked.
“You’re joking, right?”
“No,” he said. “I thought it would be romantic, out here under the stars. There have only been a few sightings of bears in the past few years, I think, and the coyotes don’t generally attack humans.”
“Hilarious,” I said. “You forget I’m not exactly a complete city slicker.”
“Let’s go back to the house. I can’t promise I’m going to keep my hands off you on the way back, or that we won’t have to stop for a detour, though.”
His words sent a rush of arousal through me. “I hope that’s a promise,” I said.
He kept his word.
We weren't a few miles down the road when he reached over and slid his hand between my legs.
I let out an involuntary gasp.
"Unbutton your pants," he said, his voice gruff.
"Why?" I asked, more of a reflexive response than anything else. No man ordered me around the way Elias did. I didn't know if I liked it or hated it.
Of course, no man had me instantly wet the way Elias did, either.
This was very much not who I was, the way I was with him, practically panting, begging for sex.
"Because," Elias said. "I asked you to."
It was a non-response, and it made no sense at all that I just did what he said. But I did. I raised my ass off the seat of the car, and I slid my jeans back down over my hips, my thumbs hooked under the sides of my panties, before I sat back down, my ass bare on the cool leather seat. My heart thumped loudly in my chest with the anticipation of him touching me.
But that's not what he did.
"I want you to touch yourself," he said.
"What?" I couldn’t quite believe that he was so forward, regardless of all that I've heard come out of his mouth so far.
"You heard me," he said. "I want you to put your hands between your legs and touch yourself. I want you to come for me."
"Why don't you just bring your hand over here?" I asked, but I was already stroking my clit, my finger moving absently around as I waited for his response.
I felt like I was on display. That's what he wants, I thought.
"Because I want to see you do it," he said.
I wanted him to put his fingers inside me. I wanted to feel the rough calluses on the tips of his finger
s as he stroked my swollen clit. I meant to ask him what the calluses were from. Instead, I whispered, “Then tell me what you else want to do to me.”
He raised his eyebrows, and glanced over at me quickly. “I’m not going to tell you what I want to do. I’m going to tell you what I’m going to do to you...in, oh, about fifteen minutes.” He paused, and I moved my fingers in circles around my clit while I waited for him to tell me more.
"Ok, then," I said, my fingers still moving. "What are you going to do to me?"
“I'm going to put my mouth on your tits, suck them until your nipples are hard as rocks.”
He paused, and all I could hear in the car was the sound of my breathing getting shallower, the white noise of the car traveling on the road, and his voice, echoing in my head.
“Keep going,” Elias said. “Are you wet?”
“Yes,” I whispered, my fingers moving faster.
“How wet?” he asked. Now he was the one to squirm in his seat, and I watched as he tried to adjust the bulge that was evident in his jeans.
“Really wet.” It was true. I was unbelievably turned on. My body just reacted to him, completely out of my control.
"Good," he said. "I'm going to lick you from one end to the other, clit to slit. I'm going to fuck you with my tongue until you're begging for my cock."
Elias reached between my legs, touched his finger to my wetness, and groaned, veering toward the shoulder of the road and then quickly correcting it. I was insanely pleased that I had this kind of effect on him. Way too pleased for my own good.
He took his hand away, and I sighed, but I was too far gone to be self-conscious about doing this in front of him. He talked to me, told me what he planned to do with me when we got wherever he was about to take me, and I felt myself hurtling toward a climax as he told me how his cock would feel as he slid inside me.
When I finished, I looked at him, eyes wide. I couldn't believe I'd just done that in front of him. He laughed and shook his head. “You’ve got no clue what you’re doing to me right now,” he said.
I was completely self-conscious. Elias looked over at me and I felt myself flush again. Then his eyes were straight ahead, back on the road.
"Don't even," he said.
"What?" I asked. I pulled my jeans up over my hips, completely embarrassed that I just let myself be so totally drunk with lust that I did what I just did.
"I can see it on your face," he said. "You're embarrassed."
"I'm not," I protested, but my voice sounded weak.
"You're blushing," he said. "Hope you're not embarrassed, because I'm sure as shit not. In fact, in five minutes, I'm going to bend your ass over and show you just how not embarrassed I am."
I laughed at his bluntness. I couldn’t help myself. "Do you always talk like this?"
"Like what?" he asked, his tone playful. But he grinned when he glanced at me, this smile that was a cross between child-like innocence and the most wicked thing I'd ever seen.
"Like this," I said. "Telling girls what you're going to do to them."
"Well, first of all," Elias said. "You're no girl, that's for sure. You're a grown ass woman. If no man's ever told you what he wants to do to you, then I feel sorry for you."
No man had ever told me what he wanted to do to me. Not like this. Not in the way that made me want to let him do whatever he wanted to do to me.
"Okay," I said. "Let's have it, then."
"Have what?"
"What you intend to do with me, exactly."
He grinned. "We're going to be there in two minutes."
I was disappointed when he wasn’t explicit, the way he was a minute ago. "Uh-huh."
"Don't get impatient," he said. "I'm getting there. As soon as we get inside the door of that house, I'm going to peel those jeans down over your ass. Then I'm going to bury my cock inside you."
"Oh," I said.
I was in that post-orgasmic state where I felt relaxed and drowsy, so much so that for a second it didn’t register that he was slowing down the car.
“Better put your ass back in those jeans,” he said, pulling into the driveway and slowing to a stop. "Don't want anyone else seeing what's mine."
I slid my jeans up and buttoned them. He was already out of the car and opening my door before I registered what he'd said. "What's yours, huh?" I asked. "What makes you think my ass is yours?"
He backed me up against the side of the car, eyes filled with lust. "You saying it's not?" His fingers moved to the waistband of my jeans, and I inhaled sharply, my heart pounding.
"We only just screwed," I said. "You're staking a claim on me now?"
He turned me around, his back facing June and Cade's house, his body shielding me from their view, then flicked open the button of my jeans and reached between my legs. He slipped his fingers inside me, then leaned close to me. "I think you want to be claimed," he whispered. "Am I wrong?" He stroked me with his fingers.
He wasn't wrong, I thought. But I didn't answer. I wasn't about to tell him that he'd already left his mark on me.
Then he brought me inside and staked his claim on me again. Later that night, lying in his arms, almost asleep but not quite, I had the vague sense of being at peace.
***
A car horn blared through the air, jolting me awake.
“What the fuck?” Elias’ voice was gruff but still sleepy as he pulled me against him, his erection pressing into my back.
Then I heard it- the low murmur of voices outside. “Elias,” I whispered.
“What?” His eyes were closed and he held me tight against him. “Just five more minutes of sleep.”
“Let me go for a second. I need to see what that noise is." I padded to the window and peered out. "Damn it."
"What's wrong?" Elias mumbled, still groggy. He rolled over onto his stomach and buried his face in his pillow. "Come back to bed."
"No. Shit. You don't understand," I said, scrambling for my clothes. "They're here."
"Huh?" Elias asked. "Who's here?"
"Photographers. Where is my shirt?" I looked around the room at the clothes strewn everywhere, the condom wrappers on the floor. "Damn it."
Now Elias was awake, reaching for his prosthetic beside the bed and clicking it into place. I felt myself irritated with him for not hurrying, even thought it wasn't his fault. Irritated with the photographers outside. Irritated with everything that it meant, that I'd been found.