Rock Me

  “You’re free to do whatever you want.” Even if she was only realizing it as she spoke it, it was the truth. She’d had no right to go off the way she did. Drag her poor friends into it.

  Shame settled heavy and hot on her shoulders. God, way to overreact. She really was going to die a virgin, if this was the way she behaved when a guy she liked showed the least amount of interest in her. “You didn’t make any promises to me, Brian.”

  “But,” he said, almost interrupting her before she could finish speaking. “Those first few seconds when I saw you there with him… I guess you got your point across. I didn’t like it.”

  “He’s Samantha’s boyfriend.”

  “I figured out there wasn’t anything to worry about. But I still didn’t like it.”

  “I didn’t make you any promises, either,” she said, almost muttering the words because she didn’t have the courage to put any force behind them.

  “I know.” He traced the line of her shoulder lazily with one finger. “And we ended on bad terms this morning. I feel real shitty about that, and I’m sorry I was such an asshole.”

  She closed her eyes as that finger traveled gently up her nape, raising gooseflesh on her arms. “Maybe you had a point, as far as how my parents are going to react to you. Maybe it’ll always be that way.”

  “Does it have to be?”

  “How else could it ever be? There’s no changing my situation.”

  “Sweetie, there’s no way to say this without sounding condescending, but you’re young. Right now this is all you can see, but trust me, this won’t always be your reality. Pretty soon you’ll be able to make your own way in the world no matter what they think.”

  “You don’t know them very well, do you,” she said flatly.

  He cupped the back of her neck in his hand, bringing his other over to tilt her chin toward him. Trapping her for the kiss she knew was coming if she didn’t do something fast. But he just held her that way, stroking her cheek with his thumb, his gaze searching hers as if all the answers were inside her somewhere.

  If only that could be the truth.

  “I don’t. But I think I have a pretty good handle on you. You’re going to be okay.”

  He stared at her so intently. His eyes were a dark, turbulent ocean, and she wanted to drown in it. Suddenly she became aware of the aching fullness of her lips and the weight of her breasts pushing against her bra.

  This skirt was so short, and she’d chosen it for that reason alone, but maybe it had been a huge mistake. Reaching under it and her black G-string would take absolutely no effort on his part. Not good, though she wanted that so, so badly, she couldn’t resist rubbing her bare thighs together as his gaze continued to melt through all of her defenses.

  Just when he knew she was about to go up in flames or melt right there in his truck, he leaned in. Warm lips slanted over hers as a breathless cry rushed from her mouth into his. She brought up her hands, clenching his shirt in her fists as his tongue stole past her teeth and plundered her mouth. His was the kiss she had dreamed of all her life, deep and somehow as fierce as it was gentle. It opened the gates to a flood of emotion and erotic sensation that had her almost writhing against the seat.

  His hand finding her breast seemed the most natural thing in the world. Even through two frustrating layers of fabric, she could feel his heat as he palmed her and circled the tight bud of her nipple with his thumb, forcing it to pull even tauter. When he pinched it, she moaned into his mouth, clasping his wrist in her hand. But not to stop him. To make sure he didn’t stop. The little jolts of pleasure/pain sent lightning zipping all through her body, striking at the juncture of her thighs. Her skimpy underwear was no barrier to the growing wetness there. She began to fear making a mess on his seats.

  She pulled away from his mouth to breathe, and he attacked her throat with his lips, his heavy breathing the sexiest sound she had ever heard. He was shuddering as hard as she was. His teeth raked her throat and an involuntary “Oh” slipped out before she could stop it. It seemed to only enflame him further, and he plunged a hand under her top, pushing up the cup of her bra as he finally brought his fingers flesh-to-feverish-flesh with her aching nipple.

  She had no anchor, nothing to buffer her from these insane sensations. The worry of getting caught was only a minor flicker in the back of her mind…they were in the back of the lot, it was dark, and his windows were tinted. She turned into him as much as she could, trying to bring her right leg over his, to straddle him. If he would only pull her into his lap so she could grind against him…

  He got the hint. Almost before she could cry out in frustration, he pulled his hand out of her shirt and plunged it beneath her ass, yanking her hard over him as if she weighed nothing. The new position, legs splayed over him, pushed her skirt the rest of the way up over her hips. She was bare except for a scrap of fabric he could easily rip. Instead, he ran both hands down the small of her back, allowing his fingers to become entangled in the strings as he cupped both her bare cheeks in his palms.

  “Jesus Christ, Candace,” he groaned, leaning his forehead against her shoulder as his hands massaged, soothed, played and tantalized. It felt so good, so good…

  “Oh, God.” The words were a shuddery sigh. Spread open this way, with his fingers only inches away… “Please.”

  “Please what?”

  She ground her pelvis into him hard, so that her clit barely rasped across the fabric of his jeans. She couldn’t get close enough. His hands continued tormenting her, squeezing her ass, tugging her panties, but making no move to address the need burning hot and wet at her center. “Touch me.”

  “Where? Let me hear you say it.”

  He didn’t have to ask twice, but her mouth—so squeaky clean until she’d started hanging out with him—tripped over the word she didn’t think she’d ever uttered out loud in her entire life. “My…pussy.”

  Pressed cheek-to-cheek with him, she felt him smile. He ran one fingertip lightly down the crease of her bottom, reaching under her until he found the source of all her torment. His other hand wandered up to her breast again, still bare under her shirt.

  She wrapped her arms tight around his neck and sobbed as two of his fingertips trailed through her wetness, finding her entrance and nestling there until she wiggled and pushed down against him. He evaded her, chuckled maddeningly. She was caught, and it was torture. Did she push back and give him easier access to her slick channel, or lean her hips into his and grind her clitoris against him?

  “Hasty little thing. I’ve got to teach you to slow down and savor this.”

  She didn’t want to savor it. Not now. He couldn’t understand. She’d denied herself this for so long, too long. She’d bought this skimpy freaking underwear dreaming of the day some guy would rip it off her in crazed lust. Her pent-up frustration had her running in the red, and she was about to burn down.

  He had mercy on her, snuggling his fingers into her tight passage as she let her head fall back, groaning as loudly as he did. He withdrew and reentered, slicking through her, soothing the sting that was briefer and much less intense than it had been last night. She rocked her hips gently against his hand, bringing her head forward again to kiss him and struggling to open wider to his invasion of both her mouth and her pussy. He thrust his tongue between her lips in the same rhythm that his fingers plundered her body, and she nearly flew apart. “Ohhh, Brian.”

  His answering sigh formed into the most beautiful words she’d ever heard. “Candace. Come home with me right now and I’ll give you everything you need, sugar. Everything you want. If it takes all night.” His fingers plunged deep, as if to show her exactly what he meant, and she cried out.

  But Samantha’s earlier words were somehow filtering through her frenzied thoughts, making her want to scream. Make him sweat. Then Macy’s, telling her how insane she was. Her mother’s haughty, disapproving face.

  Michelle’s expression softening with yearning and traveling a million miles away
at the memories of him.

  All at once, she was barraged with all the voices of reason in her life, every one in direct opposition to what her body was begging her to do right now.

  “I can’t,” she whispered, pulling away from his lips to cram her face into his neck. Praying he would understand, but that he wouldn’t stop. Selfishly trying to claim what she couldn’t have.

  “I feel how wet you are,” he murmured sinfully in her ear. “How much you need this. To hell with everyone else. Let me give you what you need.” His tongue flickered against the soft shell, and she moaned as his talented fingers continued to work their magic. But he was slowing his pace, touching her too shallowly, holding her teetering on the edge of a devastating orgasm. Trying to make her give in. And she couldn’t. “No one has to know,” he cajoled.

  “Please don’t do this to me,” she cried, fearing the dam stopping up her emotions was about to burst. She couldn’t let it, couldn’t do this. And Brian froze, pulling his hands away from her as if she’d seared him.

  Chapter Eleven

  Though it killed her soul, she jerked herself away from him and back to her original position crammed against the passenger door, frantically trying to right her disarrayed clothing. Humiliation burned almost as hot as her unsated arousal.

  “Hey,” he said, his voice gentle but with a rough edge, as if it was a struggle for him to contain his anger. She was a riddle to him, huh? What an understatement. She was outright insane. “Don’t do what? What is it you want, Candace? Because I’m trying here, but I really don’t get it.”

  “I…”

  “Are you scared?”

  Yes. Of everything. She shrugged. “I thought you didn’t want this,” she said a little more nastily than she’d meant. “I begged you this morning, Brian.”

  “I know you did, and I’m sorry. I haven’t been able to think about anything else all day.”

  She pressed her fingertips to the center of her forehead, where she could feel a headache beginning to blossom, and refused to let herself look at him. “I came out here thinking I need to tell you goodbye,” she said, hearing the flat exhaustion in her own voice. “And then I was terrified you were about to do the same to me. That’s how screwed up I am right now. That’s why it’s best if we not see each other again. It’s not what I want, but I’m a mess. I have enough pressing in on me from all sides. I can’t be like this.”

  He was silent except for his breathing, slow and steady where hers was still thin and shaky.

  “Is that what you’re really prepared to do?” he said after several uncomfortable minutes ticked past and she steadily swiped at her insistent tears. “After everything that’s happened since you walked into my parlor, after last night, after you followed me here tonight, you want to tell me to forget it, it was a mistake? Because you’re feeling something wild and crazy you can’t explain?”

  “It can’t happen, okay. You said no one has to know. I understand that, and you’re right, but I don’t ever want to have to hide the fact that I’m with you. No one would ever accept us.”

  “What the fuck does that matter?” He did sound angry now, his words a crack of thunder. She realized she’d essentially insulted him. Again.

  Oh, she needed to get out of here. Not because he scared her, but because she couldn’t take seeing him in any kind of pain, especially if she was the one inflicting it. “It matters to me,” she whispered.

  “What did your mother say to you? She knows about us because she’s already called my brother freaking out.”

  “What?” She’d called Evan? Already? Disbelief choked her. Oh, dear God, it didn’t stop. Humiliation burned even deeper into her chest, as if she’d swallowed sulfuric acid. She dropped her face into her hands. Calm down, don’t lose it…

  “Did you tell her?” he asked.

  “Yes.”

  “Tell me what she said, baby.”

  His gentle command didn’t register through the chaos. “Don’t you see?” she asked, hearing the high-pitched edge of panic in her voice. “It’s hopeless. I can’t do this. I’m sorry.”

  Before he had a chance to reply, she yanked the handle and flung herself out of the truck, slamming the door on his protest. Instead of heading back inside where her friends were waiting, she ran to her car, sending up a prayer that she wouldn’t hear the sound of his footsteps pursuing her. She didn’t.

  He would be a fool to do that, anyway. Or to ever speak to her again at all.

  Once in the quiet safety of her car, she dialed Sam from her cell phone, trying to catch her breath, trying to ignore the fact that Brian’s truck was still sitting across the lot, dark and still. Was he going to sit there all night? Or go back inside and get Starla to finish what he and Candace had started?

  The thought forced out more hot, helpless tears just as Sam answered.

  “You’re leaving with him, aren’t you?”

  “No,” Candace sobbed, despite all resolutions to keep it together.

  “Oh, sweetie. What happened?”

  “I don’t want to talk about it now. I just wanted to tell you guys you can take off. I’m not in any shape to come back in.”

  “Sounds like you’re in perfect shape. Come in, let us buy you margaritas all night, we’ll chauffeur you around and you can crash at my place.”

  “Sammy, I really appreciate it, but I need to be by myself. Okay?”

  “Are you sure you’re all right? You sound so awful, I’m worried about you driving.”

  “I’m fine, honest. I’ll call you tomorrow.”

  “Well, call before then if you need me. I mean it. We love ya.”

  “Love you too.”

  Even her friends thought she was a basket case. She chucked her phone back into her purse, sniffling. Well, that might all change if she could quit acting like one.

  Wretched. She felt absolutely wretched. And embarrassed. And confused. And…she shifted in her seat, remembering his touch tunneling deep inside her. Um, yeah. She was unbelievably horny on top of everything else. Every inch of her skin was so sensitized even the graze of her clothing was almost too much to bear. She knew the reason. She wanted to be naked and pressed against every hot inch of him. It’s where she could be tonight, if she could only stop freaking out. She wanted sex, dammit. Raw, scorching, amazing, merciless sex.

  The irony wasn’t lost on her. She’d just made one guy go from zero to sixty in two-point-five seconds. A bar full of guys who would probably be more than willing stood a few dozen feet away from where she sat. She should take one home and get the whole thing over with already. Lose it to an anonymous stranger, no strings attached, and come away from it with her heart still fully intact and worth giving to somebody, someday. Brian would only take a piece of her with him, and right now she didn’t own enough of herself to share.

  He still hadn’t left. Maybe he was hoping she would change her mind and run back to him. She wanted to. One night, if nothing else. Even if she left his apartment tomorrow morning and never saw his face again, would she really regret it more than taking home a complete stranger? It didn’t make any sense. He was someone she liked and respected and…well, she loved him.

  Other people might struggle with admitting that particular emotion, but to her, it was quite a simple truth, and at the root of all the confusion. She loved him. Probably from the moment Michelle had introduced them almost two years ago, her heart had been his for the taking. The first time their eyes met, the helpless organ had lost its steady, sure rhythm. It had tripped over itself, and she’d been following suit ever since.

  Her fingers tightened around the door handle before she realized she was gripping it.

  See? Even your body knows what to do. Go back, you stupid girl. Go.

  Brian’s taillights suddenly flared red and she jumped in her seat, thinking it was now or never, do or die…but he whipped out of the parking space and lurched forward so fast she could imagine he would run her down if she tried to stop him. Releasing the door hand
le, she collapsed in her seat and stared down at her hands while his truck zoomed past. She expected him to lay rubber when he hit the street, but he didn’t. He eased out and was gone.

  Well, you did it. Are you proud? Now go home and drown in misery.

  Goddamn it all to fucking hell.

  So many things he wished he had or hadn’t done. He shouldn’t have let her chase him away. But since he had, he should have gone back in the bar and drank until he puked.

  But he couldn’t. No, he was going to have to go back to his frigging apartment and jerk it so he didn’t end up with a case of blue balls to go in the books. Finding another girl to slake his frustration wasn’t an option. He would hate her for not being the one he wanted, the one he could’ve been bringing home tonight. And he wasn’t up for the hate fuck tonight.

  Home was his destination, but as he passed his parlor—all darkened and closed up tight—he whipped his truck into the parking lot without really thinking about it. Home would depress the hell out of him right now. If he watched a movie, he would only wish she were there watching it with him. When he went to bed, he would only remember that she could’ve been there with him if he wasn’t such an asshole.

  There was stuff at work he could do to mellow him out, keep him occupied. Several designs were dancing through his thoughts even now, all of them involving splattered, stabbed or otherwise mutilated hearts. He’d inked his own onto Candace the day she’d come in here. There was really no denying it.

  Entering the front door and closing and locking it behind him, he sighed with relief. This was his sanctuary. It was the very thing he’d dreamed of since he was eighteen years old: helping other people achieve their self-expression. And while he was still pretty much in Candace’s boat and in debt to his dad for helping him out, the old man was getting back every red cent. Thank God he didn’t really keep Brian under his boot heel like Candace’s folks did her.

  He guessed he didn’t have a whole lot to complain about, when he stopped to consider it. They were all looking out for him, in their own obnoxious, meddlesome way.