With his lips pressed against mine, he shutters and jolts and comes hard inside me. And I don’t care about consequences or how stupid it was to let him fuck me without protection. I’m on the pill, and every other stupid thing I’ve done with Cullen has worse risks than this one. Because right now, I need him inside me. I need his risks and his trust.
He buries his face in my neck and lets his heart catch up. I feel it pounding hard against mine. With his face wet from my tears, he finally pulls away. He thumbs the tears on my face before gazing into my eyes. There are words hanging on his lips, and I wait for them, but he keeps them to himself. Instead, he lets out a heavy sigh, looks away, and climbs off of me.
When I hear the shower start in the bathroom, I peel myself off the bed and follow him. He’s staring into the mirror. I want to reach for him, hold him, stroke away his pain, but he doesn’t let me. Turning away, he climbs into the shower and leaves all the words unspoken. They stay that way for the rest of the morning, even after our showers and drive to campus.
His eyes don’t leave me for the entire class, and even if he can’t talk to me, then at least his gaze on me is enough. At this point, I’ll take any part of Cullen Ayers I can get, and even I know that’s a problem.
14
Cullen
Me: Pick me up without panties on.
Everly: And what if I don’t want to?
“Who is she?” Gina asks, leaning over the bar and breaking me from my concentration. I’m trying to formulate the perfect reply to Everly’s bratty message.
I hide my phone as I turn around to glare at the nosey hostess. “None of your business.”
She holds up her hands in surrender. “You never come hang out anymore and you’re always on your phone, so I figure there must be someone. A girl at school?”
“You could say that,” I mumble.
My phone pings again, and I grind my teeth. I missed my opportunity to reprimand Everly for her last message.
Sneaking a glance, I bite my tongue to keep from snapping at Gina.
Everly: I will if you bring me a slice of tiramisu.
Me: Tiramisu for pussy?
Everly: I never promised sex. I said I’d pick you up without panties.
Me: Which will result in me getting pussy.
Everly: So, do we have a deal?
Me: We don’t negotiate. You do what I say, remember.
Everly: I’ll go back to my original response. What if I don’t want to?
Me: Then, you’ll be punished.
Everly: Promise?
I find myself smiling at my phone, but I catch it and shove the feeling away. The past two weeks have been strange. Everly and I have fallen into a rhythm. I spend most nights at her house, and she does everything I tell her to like laundry and driving me around. On the nights I have practice, she works on the bleachers and on the nights I work she stays home and checks in until I get off.
I don’t know what this is anymore. It doesn’t feel like punishment, and I’ve lost the energy to hate her. Instead, I’ve gotten comfortable in this situation. I’ve learned she hums while she cooks, can tie her hair up with literally anything she finds lying around, and likes to sleep with her feet shoved under my body. The shit from our past feels so distant now, and when I have to remind myself who she is, it takes actual mental work to remember that I’m supposed to hate her.
So, I just stopped trying.
And now we’re in this stupid domestic routine, and I need to let her go. It’s time to just cut the cord and end things now before she gets even more attached. But the things she does for me like giving me rides to and from work and having someone to cook for me in a nice fucking house is a little harder to let go of.
Well, that and the sex of course.
Everly is a fucking animal. She has zero, and I’m talking zero fucking shame in the bedroom. I love how fearless she is and totally unafraid to get exactly what she needs out of every single time we do it. The back and forth banter between us—me trying to deny her and her fighting me for it, is an actual turn-on.
I’m keeping her around for that. I’d be an idiot to give that shit up—a beautiful woman at my disposal, with the sex drive of a teenage boy, and an insatiable appetite to please me.
But Everly has a fiery side too, and I have been getting more and more intrigued by that, like her patience with me is running thin. She fights back more, and I like it. I want her to because the more she pushes, the harder I can push back.
“You should come over tonight,” Gina says in a sing-song high-pitched voice. I notice the way she’s pushing her tits together, and I absently wonder if this is because she thinks I have a girl now, like suddenly I’m more attractive to her.
“Nah, I can’t.”
“Plans with your girlfriend?” she asks with a smile stretched across her face.
“I don’t have a girlfriend,” I reply.
“Well, you have something.”
Biting the inside of my cheek, I make my way around to my tables, picking up checks and delivering drinks and trying not to think about Gina’s words, the strange way I feel about Everly, and the nagging reminder that I need to shut it down now before it gets worse.
During a short break, I open my phone and see a text from Everly.
Everly: What time do you get off? I forgot my laptop charger in my office, and I need to run back in.
It’s so fucking casual like a goddamn relationship and I grow irritable for no reason at all. Ignoring her message, I head toward the front to cash out my last table.
“Hey, Gina,” I call toward her. “I’ll be there.”
“Oh yeah? Bringing your new girl?”
“Fuck no. Is Allie coming?” I ask, and something in Gina’s demeanor changes like she reads the sincerity on my face.
“I don’t know. Maybe.”
Good, I think. A blow job from someone other than Everly might be the palette cleanser I need, a quick reset button. It’s not cheating. I don’t belong to her. The opposite in fact. So I can fuck around with whoever I want, and she has no fucking say.
Still, I feel a pinch of guilt as I type out my message.
Me: I’m going to a party after work.
I don’t bother telling her anything else like whether or not I’ll be coming over after the party because I frankly don’t know. I want to. It feels like home already, and I hate the idea of going back to my dorm room, but Everly’s house is not my home, and she’s not my girlfriend, so some distance is good. We both need the reminder.
Everly: Okay.
That’s it, and I stare at her response for a moment too fucking long. Why does it bother me so much? Why the fuck do I care? The silence between us feels like drawn out torture so while I clean my station, I try to formulate my response, but I don’t even know what I’m trying to say.
I should just tell her we’re done, but that feels too sudden. Maybe it’s better I just keep her around for a while before we let things fizzle out between us. Until then, she needs to remember I still own her. We are still enemies, and I am here to make her pay.
Me: Don’t go anywhere. I’ll sleep at the dorm tonight. I have a game at ten in the morning. Be there.
Everly: Okay.
There’s that fucking answer again. What the fuck! Why does it feel like I’m the one being punished right now? I can feel her disappointment through these fucking text messages and it’s grating on my nerves.