I wanted to tell her. The need to make promises that I intended to keep to my last breath was almost overwhelming. I knew she wasn’t ready to hear them. So I showed her instead.
I could taste myself on her lips when I kissed her. It wasn’t a great taste, and it brought back so many horrible memories. I tensed and started to draw back, but the gentle touch of her hands on my back soothed me. I left her mouth, kissing down her throat and across her collar bone.
She made a small little mewling sound as I took her nipple into my mouth, her lower body arching and rubbing against my cock almost unconsciously. My girl’s tits were super sensitive. I sucked harder, switching from one nipple to the other every few moments. Her fingers scraped across my scalp, holding me to her.
“Shane…”
My hand skimmed down her side and over her mound. Knowing that she was hurting and that I was the only one that could ease the pain, I spread the outer lips of her drenched pussy.
“Sh-shane!” she whimpered my name as my thumb teased across her clit.
“Do you like this?” I wanted to know everything she did and didn’t like, only ever wanted to give her mind numbing pleasure.
“Y-yes.”
I pressed my thumb a little harder, rubbing in little circles while I watched her eyes for signs of pleasure or pain. “This?” I felt her liquid desire flowing, dampening her thighs before she could even nod. My fingers trailed lower, diving into her wet depths.
She was so tight! I knew she was a virgin, and I had had my share of them as a teenager. But I couldn’t remember any of them ever being this tight. Her heat scalded me, making my dick ache like it had not just come the hardest it had ever come before.
“Don’t you play with this pretty pussy, baby?”
Harper shook her head. “No.”
“Ever?”
“No.” She bit her lip. “I’ve never wanted to. No one has ever even made me want this but you.”
If it had been anyone but Harper saying that, I probably would have run for the fucking hills. Instead, I was filled with proud arrogance. “No one else ever will, beautiful.”
She flinched and I was worried that I had hurt her. “Baby?”
“Say it again,” she whispered.
I frowned. “Say what, baby?”
“Call me beautiful. When you say it, I almost believe you.”
My jaw clenched. It wasn’t the first time that she had said something stupid along those lines. I wanted to rip apart whoever had made her believe that she wasn’t beautiful.
“Baby, you are so beautiful you make my chest ache just looking at you.” I brushed a kiss over her forehead. “I have never seen anything—ever—that compares to the beauty I see before me right now.”
“Shane…”
I kissed her lips quick and hard to shut her up, not wanting to hear her argue. “Tomorrow you are going to tell me who put such crazy nonsense in that pretty head of yours. But tonight, you are going to lie back and let me prove just how beautiful I know you are.”
Chapter 11
Harper
The first brush of his lips over my clit made all thoughts evaporate.
Maybe I should have felt self-conscious, but I didn’t. How could I possibly feel like that with Shane? For once in my life I really did feel beautiful.
His tongue teased over my folds, dipping inside. It was so good. That little brush of his tongue inside of me was so intense my fingers fisted in the covers beneath me. I was powerless to stop the sounds that escaped me.
Callused hands cupped my breasts, pinching my nipples and twisting gently. It made muscles deep inside clench, and I felt my sex flooding with hot desire. This was all new territory for me. I had never touched myself, never had an orgasm. Shane had awakened the woman in me.
He sucked my clit into his mouth, making me cry out his name as he let go with a little pop before sucking it again. Over and over again, he tortured me with that sweet pleasure while one of his fingers tenderly thrust into me, stopping short of the barrier that was proof of my virginity.
“You taste so fucking good, beautiful,” Shane told me between sucks. “Does this feel good?”
“Yes!” I cried. “So, so good!”
He stiffened his tongue, skimming over my clit in a barely there caress that had me begging for more. He added another finger, thrusting just a little harder as my body became accustomed to his gentle invasion. I could feel something quickening inside of me as my entire body felt like it had caught fire.
“That’s it, baby. Let go,” his throaty voice commanded.
“Wh-what about you?” I asked, panting hard. I could feel him pulsing. I didn’t want him hurting like he had been earlier.
“Do you want my dick, baby?” He lifted his head just enough to meet my gaze. “I don’t want to rush you into something that you aren’t ready for…”
I was ready for anything he was willing to give me, and I told him so. Shane grinned. “Oh, the possibilities, sweet Harper.” He lifted onto his knees and spread my thighs even wider.
I thought for sure he was going to take me, fill me, and make the empty feeling deep inside go away. Instead, he gripped his beautiful cock in his hand and rubbed the tip over my clit. My hands found his thighs and I sunk my nails deep into his flesh. That brush of his dick across sensitive tissue was so perfect. “I like that.”
“Me too.” He did it again, his free hand spreading my outer lips wide while he rubbed against me harder.
He felt like silk covered stone. His heat added fuel to my already raging inferno. His hips started to thrust gently, his dick slipping just a little lower with each caress up and down my slick folds. When the head teased at my entrance, my inner walls clenched in anticipation, but he only went back to rubbing my clit.
“Shane, I need you!” I whimpered, arching my hips in invitation to take me.
“I can’t stop,” he growled. “Don’t ask me to stop.”
“I want you inside me.”
“I can’t.” His jaw clenched in an attempt to hold back. “Condoms are too far away. I’m going to come…”
“Please…” It was so intense, and I could feel my orgasm building, building, building! But I needed him to fill me, needed him deep inside of me as I came around his hard cock.
“Baby!” Shane groaned my name, the tip of his dick slipping inside of me.
I couldn’t hold back the scream as my body came apart. He wasn’t even completely in me, but it was all I needed. My muscles began to spasm, clenching around the head of his dick. He growled something, but I was too far gone to understand.
I didn’t feel him pull out and was lost in my own paradise of sensations as he covered my stomach with his thick release.
How long it took me to recover I wasn’t sure. Days, hours, minutes. But when I did Shane was there, his arms holding me close. His lips brushed over my temple. “Sleep, beautiful. There’s no way in hell you are leaving my bed tonight.”
Shane
I’m not sure what had made me get up.
There I was, half-asleep with Harper’s sweet rear pressed against my semi-hard cock. She was sleeping peacefully, her hair over my arm and pillow in a way I would remember for the rest of my life.The sight of this girl, the only one that would ever hold my heart so tightly, lying in my bed was just too perfect. How had I gone so long without this, without her?
But there was this anxious feeling in the pit of my stomach that was telling me to get up and go check on Drake.
When it started to really hurt, I carefully untangled myself from Harper and glanced at the clock. Just after one o’clock. Frowning, I pulled on a pair of boxers that I only wore when I was working out or when I was too lazy to put clothes on around the house. Quietly, so as not to disturb the sleeping beauty snuggled in my bed, I left the room and went down the hall to my brother’s room.
That all too familiar scent of sweat and hard liquor hit me as soon as I turned the knob and cracked the door open an inch or so. Dre
ad hit the bottom of my stomach like a lead weight.
“No, Drake,” I muttered to myself.
He had called me earlier that day, and I should have stopped and thought for a minute before brushing it off as nothing. He was probably calling to tell me he was having cravings, that he needed me to take him to a meeting. Feeling guilty, I pushed the door open a little more and stepped inside.
All that guilt evaporated when I saw the girl lying on the bed with my brother and was replaced with white hot rage.
“Fuck!” I practically yelled, but the two sleeping forms on the bed didn’t even move. “Drake, what the fuck did you do?”
The next few hours were hard ones to get through, most of which I spent on my own except for the brief visit by Lana. I felt gutted after watching her walk away with that dead expression in her pretty amber eyes. With Emmie on her way—along with Jesse and Layla—there wasn’t much I could do but pace.
I could have woken Harper up and asked her to be with me through the long wait, but I didn’t want to upset her.
It was after nine before Emmie unlocked the front door, and she and Layla walked into the apartment, followed by a brooding Jesse. Perhaps I should have felt sorry for my brother, but I was still too angry to care right then.
Seeing Emmie was like a balm to my heart. I pulled her into a tight bear hug, holding her close for the first time in what felt like a lifetime but was only a couple of months. “Thanks for coming.”
She sighed. “I don’t know how much good I can do.”
“How is Lana?” Layla demanded, her face pale and her eyes blood shot.
“I don’t know, Layla,” I told her honestly. “She was so calm, so unlike herself. Lana doesn’t do calm when slapped in the face.”
“No, she runs all the way across the country,” Jesse bit out, his hands clenched at his sides. “All the good it did, too. Wake his fucking ass up, Shane!”
“I’ve tried. He’s out cold. Drake hasn’t had anything harder than coffee in months. Whatever he got into last night hit him hard. We just have to let him sleep it off.” Then I was sure that I would be picking my brother up off the floor.
I made sure my three guests were comfortable before I returned to my bedroom to wake Harper. She was still sleeping peacefully. I took a moment to look down at her spread across my sheets. One hand was tucked under her cheek, the other across her stomach, that mouth with the perfect Cupid’s bow parted as she lightly snored every other breath.
I climbed in behind her, letting her warmth chase away the coldness that had invaded my body the moment I found my brother asleep in the same bed as Gabriella Moreitti. As soon as I touched her, I felt calmer and ready to face the disaster that Drake had created for himself, and therefore all of us.
She mumbled something in her sleep before blinking her eyes open. “Shane?”
I kissed her shoulder. “Good morning, sleeping beauty.”
Her yawn was adorable and I waited until she cuddled into my chest before I told her what had been happening while she slept. The more I said the tenser she became. Worried for her friend, she started to get up. “I have to get home. She must be devastated.”
“I’ll take you,” I promised, not bothering to avert my eyes as I watched her dress. Her breasts swayed ever so slightly with each movement she made.
“But you have guests.”
“They aren’t here to see me, Harper. In fact, I’m sure it will make them all calmer if I’m not around right now. All I do is pace and that can get irritating after a while.” And Emmie was in no mood to be irritated. I would rather face the flames of Hell than get on her bad side.
When she was finally dressed she pulled her hair into a sloppy bun at the back of her neck and turned to face me. “I wasn’t exactly planning on meeting your family this soon.”
“Are you nervous?”
A small smile tilted her lips. “Were you nervous when I introduced you to Cecil?” I made a sour face and she laughed. “Then you have your answer.”
“There is no need to be nervous of Emmie and Layla. And especially not Jesse. They will love you, baby.” Just as I do…
I kissed her lips and lead her out into the living room.
From the moment I realized I had feelings for Harper, I had told Emmie all about her. She wasn’t surprised when I introduced her to the girl that had captured my heart. Emmie tried to be nice, but she had too much going through her mind to pay much attention to Harper. Layla and Jesse shook her hand, and even welcomed her to the family, but were otherwise stone faced.
As soon as I could, I took Harper home. I didn’t want Harper around the tension and would hate it if she thought that my family didn’t like her.
My girl was right by my side over the next few days. I had to be there for my brother, but Harper was always there for me when I needed her. She was strong, stronger than even I had realized. When everyone else was stressed to the max, she was the calm one. Even Emmie took notice of it and took me aside to let me know that she really liked Harper.
“She’s really sweet, Shane.”
We were standing by the double doors that went to the ICU where Lana had been for the last three days. Behind Emmie was the waiting room where we’d all been camped out since Lana’s emergency surgery to stop the bleeding from her complicated miscarriage. I could see Harper sitting with Layla and Lucy, who’d arrived with Nik and Mia two days ago.
Lucy was still looking upset, worried about her sister. But Harper was talking softly to her and stroking Lucy’s short hair back from her face.
“I know.” I was turned toward Harper, ready to go to her in an instant if she needed me.
She grasped my hand, bringing my focus back to her. “She’s really good for you. Even through all this craziness I can see that.” Emmie sighed and shook her head. “I’ve really put my foot in it with Lana. I’m not even sure why I put all the blame on her. You know I love her. She’s Drake’s other half…”
“Emmie, I think it’s obvious why you are so hard on her.” I leaned back against the wall, trying to get a better glimpse of Harper. Just looking at her calmed my nerves. “Drake has always been the one that needed you most, whether we want to admit it or not. You were acting like a mother bear protecting her cub, and that’s great. But the cub fucked up, sweetheart. And it was no one’s fault but his own.”
“Yeah, I know.”
The lost look in her big green eyes hurt me, and I pulled her close. “It’s going to be okay, Em. Lana will be alright, and you can kiss and make up. She knows how you are. She won’t hold it against you.”
“Don’t let me do this to Harper, Shane.”
I laughed. “Don’t worry. If you say one word that hurts my girl, I’ll be all over your ass about it.” No way was I letting anyone—not even Emmie—hurt Harper in any way.
Chapter 12
Harper
Lana had finally woken up and stayed awake this time.
For three days she was in and out of it, whether it was the meds they were giving her or what, I wasn’t sure. But I was so glad that my friend had finally come back to us.
Everyone was exhausted, both physically and especially emotionally. The doctor had come into the OR waiting room right after Lana had gotten out of surgery and explained to us that Lana had come close to dying. If she hadn’t gotten to the hospital when she had, she would have bled to death for sure. But there had been no complications during surgery, so she was going to make a full recovery.
With Lana now awake, and able to talk, she wasted little time in demanding everyone go home and get some sleep. Layla and Drake had argued, but Lana being Lana, had gotten her way in the end.
After sleeping in a hard plastic chair for the last few days, I was ready for my bed.
Linc and Dallas were on their way out; unlike me, they hadn’t been at the hospital day and night. Dallas hadn’t heard about Lana until the day after it had happened, and Linc had been at work. Figuring Shane would want to spend some time with his f
amily, I called my goodbyes and started for the elevators with my roommates.
“Wait!” Shane called just before the doors closed.
Linc hit the open door button, forcing the elevator to pause and retract the sliding door. I started to step forward to ask Shane what was wrong when he pushed me back inside and hugged me against his side.
“Are you okay?” I demanded, looking up at his pale face and noticing the dark circles under his eyes.
He hadn’t been lying about the pacing thing. He had paced, and paced, and paced some more. Emmie had growled at him to sit down more than a few times. Even during the middle of the night, when we were all trying to catch a nap, he would alternate between pacing and holding me. Where the hell had he gotten the energy to do all that pacing?
“I need to be close to you,” he murmured against my ear so only I could hear.
His warm breath against my ear made me shiver, and I wasn’t feeling quite as tired as I had been just moments before. Biting my lip, I snuggled deeper into his side, relaxing against him as he played with the ends of my hair and the elevator descended.
Dallas, who was always mouthy, had been noticeably quiet the last few times she had come to visit. Even as good as I was feeling being with Shane, I noticed her troubled expression as we rode home together in the back of a taxi. When we got home I asked Shane to go ahead and shower while I talked to my friend.
As soon as my bedroom door closed behind him, I tackled Dallas. “What’s the matter?”
She swallowed hard but didn’t answer as she sat down on the couch, reaching for the remote to the television instead. With Linc in the kitchen fixing a quick dinner, I knew that I couldn’t count on him for back up. So I stood in front of the flat screen, forcing her to meet my gaze. “I’ll stand here for days if I have to, Dallas.”
“I don’t want to talk about it, Harp.” Her jaw was tense, her body vibrating with emotions, but her eyes were glazed with tears.