“Stay,” I whispered brokenly, “please don’t leave me alone?”
His gaze narrowed and he nodded at me, placing some ice on my cheek and my lip and holding the cloth in place. He moved the ice around to the back of my head and I winced and moaned, trying to move away from him.
“Cooper,” I spoke, even though the world felt as if it was at a funny angle and my head was hanging upside down.
“Yeah, Bails?” he asked me with a small smile as he leaned towards me, just as I whispered, “Thank you.”
Everything went dark for a moment, and when I woke up Cooper was pacing around in front of me.
“Coop,” I called out, “sit down, will ya, you’re making me hella dizzy here.” I pulled myself up to a sitting position, making him smile as he sat beside me giving me a sip of water and kissing me on the head.
“Jeez, Bails, don’t do that to me.” He handed me some Advil, and as I took them, I began to relive what had happened. My whole body shuddered, and Coop put his hand on my arm to calm me down.
“It’s okay, Bails, you’re safe. I’m home and I got you.” I smiled as he spoke and managed to get half my sentence out.
“Glad you’re home… missed you.” My voice was sleepy and groggy from the pain meds and sounded funny to my ears.
He smiled down at me and for a moment it was just us, sitting in a bubble, and then his cell vibrated in his pocket. He stood up and moved away from me answering the call as he left the room. My head swam and I thought of our parents.
They’d probably think he’d done it to me. I tried to sit up further and everything around me began to spin. Nausea rose within me and I collapsed backward, breathing slowly in through my nose and out through my mouth, trying not to throw up.
After a moment Cooper returned with another cold cloth and he placed it on my head, running his fingers gently along my forehead and brushing my hair away from my face. He leaned down and kissed my lips softly. My eyes closed, but after a second, I opened them, and he was staring at me with his lips pressed to mine. I tried to open my mouth to ask him what he was doing, but something in his eyes stopped me.
Another few seconds passed and his breathing evened out. He sat back, breaking the contact between us, rubbing his hands over his face.
“God, this is so fucked up,” he spat out, his voice breaking, stood up, and walked out of the room.
I lay on the couch with my heart racing and my lips burning as I thought about how as soon as I’d heard his voice in the kitchen, my body started to relax and a ball of tension unwound in my chest despite John still having a hold of me. My eyes burned as his words after our kiss echoed in my head.
I stayed there for a few hours until I could sit up without feeling dizzy and eventually managed to walk slowly to the stairs. I met Cooper coming down the stairs, and he had changed into a green top, with faded and ripped stonewash denims. My eyes lingered on the parts of him I could see and when I raised my eyes to his, a hard look was in them and I blushed worried about the look in his eyes and the fact that he’d caught me staring at him.
He moved, hissing as he passed me.
“I’m going out. Don’t wait up.”
I nodded in his general direction, and as he moved towards the door, the scent of his aftershave lingered in the air. I breathed in deeply and the smell gave me butterflies in my stomach. The door banged closed and I climbed the stairs slowly, holding on to the banister to steady myself.
A few seconds later the front door reopened, and Cooper rushed by me, sprinting up the stairs and slammed his bedroom door. My heart thudded painfully, and I continued to climb the stairs, hurrying down the hall towards my room as fast as I could. As I passed Cooper’s room his door opened, and he plowed into me. His arm shot around my waist and his eyes dropped down to my stomach and as his eyes roamed over my body my skin tingled and burned as I realized I was still only in my swimsuit.
His fingers tightened on my waist, and he raised his eyes to mine, licking his lips as he looked into my eyes. Hunger flickered in them along with pure, unadulterated lust. For a moment we stood together, frozen in time, and then his cell rang, breaking the spell. He stepped back from me and answered the call. A girl’s voice rang out and my heart shattered into pieces. I moved away from him, walking backward with an inaudible gasp of guilt as I remembered David and how we were together.
Cooper’s eyes widened, and he looked away from me, opening and closing his fist. I reached my room door as he ended the call and I tried to open the door behind my back. Cooper turned towards me and stalked down the hall.
“You’re with David now?” he asked, his eyes darkening as I nodded.
He paused at the top of the stairs and looked back at me with glassy eyes. “Fine. I mean”— he paused and took a breath as I managed to get the door to my room open— “that’s good, right?”
The draft on my back told me that my bedroom door had swung open, but I couldn’t move; I was frozen like a mouse trapped under a cobra’s spell. Coop took a step forward and then turned, rushing towards me. He ran straight into my arms and I rubbed my arms up and over his back. His body fused to mine and his lips pressed into mine, hard and demanding. As he slipped his tongue inside my mouth, he moved us into my room and kicked the door shut with his heel as he ran his fingers down my spine. My sore lip throbbed, but I ignored it, focusing on how kissing Coop made me feel.
His hands went around my body to my ass, and he moaned into my mouth as he picked me up. I wrapped my legs around his waist as he rocked his rock-solid boner into me. I groaned and ground down onto him unashamedly.
“Coop, that feels amazing,” I stuttered as he dropped his lips to my neck and sucked on my skin, biting as his hands moved me over his erection. My bikini bottoms rubbed against me deliciously and his lips dropped down further to kiss the top of my breasts that were poking out of my bikini top.
He kissed back up to my lips and then down to my neck all the while pulling me against him and pushing against me. The feel of his rough denim against my clit was driving me wild and we moved faster and faster against each other, both chasing the release we so desperately needed.
His breath was ragged and a second later my body clenched around his as I came, and he followed a second later.
“This is mine,” he whispered brokenly as he dropped me onto my bed and stormed from the room. He slammed the door as he left, and I lay where he dropped me, staring at the ceiling wondering how we could have this when we were in one, big happy family. At least that’s what we were according to my mom and Shawn, but it wasn’t even partly close to the truth.
Another few minutes passed and I finally stood up to go for a shower. My vision swam as I got to my feet and every ache and pain rushed back to me. I moved slowly towards the bathroom but froze when I heard a thumping sound echoing from the next room.
I grabbed a loose dress and pulled it over my shoulders as I rushed from the room, ignoring the pain wracking my body. I reached Coop’s room to see the door was open. He was standing in the middle of the room, hitting a punching bag over and over again. It wasn’t that which stopped me on the threshold of his room; it was the fact he was only in boxer briefs and my eyes drank in his tight ass as he moved around punching again and again.
“Coop?” My voice was barely above a whisper and I swallowed and tried again. “Cooper?” His eyes swung around, and he sneered at me.