“I don’t want painkillers. I don’t want to be on any sort of mind-altering drug.”
A tremble rocks through her body, so I pull her closer and tuck my thigh between both of hers.
Thinking back to the cravings I’ve experienced, I understand that feeling. It enrages me that she can’t even get something to help with the pain that those motherfuckers caused because they doped her in order to cause that pain, but I keep that locked down tight and to myself.
“Okay, baby,” I murmur into the top of her hair. “Sleep then, yeah? We’ll sort it tomorrow.”
She rolls her head onto my shoulder, tucked up tight, and nods. “Will you stay?”
A nonverbal squeeze is my reply as I brush the strands of hair off her face and place a kiss on the crown of her head.
Within minutes, the tension releases from her body, and her breathing evens. It isn’t much longer until my mind quiets, and I follow her into a dreamless sleep.
Chapter Fourteen
Shelby
Something is happening to me. My insides feel hot. There’s a fire raging in my blood, licking its way from my belly to my breasts. Whenever Sin’s near, it’s like I ignite for him, and I want to be touched. Ever since the night of my pain when he held me in his bed, this feeling has lingered. This desire. This desperation.
It scares me and frees me all at once.
I’m not familiar with the sensation, and I’m positive I’ve never felt it before, but this has to be normal. Feeling something that’s normal to most of the population has to mean I’m healing.
Which means I’m moving on.
Part of moving on is accepting and embracing these new feelings. I want to explore them and take them further. I want to push them to my limits and experience them for what they are. I’m nearly certain the heat I feel in my body is nothing other than arousal. Pure, simplistic, natural arousal. My body has recognized a man, and not just any man but the strong, possessive, virile man who is Alex, and it wants more. As I think back to each caress and kiss, I crave more.
I pause while folding one of Alex’s simple black tee shirts, hugging the still-warm cotton to my chest, and let the lingering scent of him invade my headspace. I can’t put my finger on why he’s different.
In the weeks I spent with Elias while Sin was being a total jerk, he made me feel safe and protected, maybe even a little cherished. He’d held me when I had a bad dream, so it can’t be simply about physical touch. Elias was a gentle man and took great care of me. I am so grateful for his tender care, but he never made me feel much of anything. I care for him—deeply—but that care stops at platonic love.
On the other hand, Alex’s touch is fire and ice, much like his personality. It can feel like the friendliest caress and turn to a heated stroke in an instant. I find myself pulled toward him whenever he’s near, whether it be sitting on the couch beside me or across the room. The fear I first felt at his quiet, frightening demeanor has melted away into understanding. So many facets make him the man he is, and it’s easy to judge him from the outside. Knowing what I now know about his life, it’s a wonder he isn’t already in prison or, worse, dead.
I shake out the black tee still clutched in my fingers and resume folding laundry. When Alex told me he was going to run errands today, I felt swift relief. The truth is I can’t tell if he feels for me what I’m feeling for him, and I’m afraid of spending more time with him and giving myself away. Rejection? Also something I’ve never experienced, and I don’t know where I’d go to quietly lick those wounds.
Before I do something stupid, like throw myself at him and beg him to let me worship his mouth, among other things, I need to figure out if my feelings are reciprocated. He’s seemed to enjoy kissing me just as much, and the time he placed my hand on his erection sure appeared to be a genuine response. That could also be my naïvety and a normal reaction for a man.
There’s no denying I want to figure this out—with him—but I’m also afraid of my reaction to being sexually touched. What if I’m not ready? What if I completely panic and turn him off me forever? Or the hardest one to imagine, what if he doesn’t want to do those things with me? I can’t imagine myself opening up to any other man.
I finish folding and load up the clothes into the basket to bring to his closet. I learned while getting a tee to sleep in that Alex doesn’t use hangers like he did at Elias’s. He has a closet lined with shelves, each one for a different item. I figured since he was out for a while, and I’ve been sleeping in a lot of his clothes, I could take care of putting away his laundry. If anything, it’s another step in my recovery. Abduction at sixteen didn’t leave me a lot of time to learn basic life skills like living on my own. Something I’ll have to figure out now that I’m free.
Just as I’m putting the empty basket back on the floor under the racks, the front door rattles. My hackles raise for a split second before I calm myself down.
“Hey, I’m back.”
“Do you think I’ll always be this jumpy?” I spin to face the doorway and find Alex leaning against the jamb. The carpeting of his living room softened his heavy footfalls.
His brow creases in concern. “Did I scare you?”
My heart leaps at his tender expression. I can’t bear having this distance between us while he looks at me like that. Crossing the space, I reach up and run my fingertips along his bearded jaw.
“A little.” I sigh. “I knew it was you all along, but that didn’t stop my heart from pounding as soon as I heard the door rattle.”
He cups my hand against his face and smiles softly. “Give it time.”
That feeling from earlier rushes through me with a vengeance. As if a little time away from his presence made the desire that much stronger. I don’t know what I’m going to do.
“Are you okay?” His voice breaks the connection.
“Yeah,” I answer a little breathless. “I think I may be tired.”
Pulling our hands away from his face, he leads me into the other room, and we settle onto the couch in the middle. The TV remains off. After a few beats of silence, I turn to Alex with a puzzling glance.
He cocks his knee in front of him, resting on the cushions and stretches his arm still holding my hand along the back. The move forces me to turn and face him, and the look on his face stills my heart.
“What is it?”
Alex releases a sound crossed between a grunt and a huff of laughter and shakes his head. “You’re starting to read me better than Elias. That’s saying something because I like to think of myself as an unreadable man.”
“Well, when you look at me like that, it isn’t hard to tell there’s something on your mind.”
“You’re right about that. I took the liberty while I was out to make a phone call.” He launches in, not one for bullshitting around. “I spoke to Doc and found someone able to see you. A female doctor.”
Anger hits instantly. Unlike anything I’ve ever felt before, the intensity scares me. “I thought I said no.” I grit through my teeth.
“Yeah, and I gave you a week to think that through. When you didn’t talk to me about it, I made my own arrangements.”