: Chapter 26

“Do me a favor, man.” Dallas runs his hand through his hair. “Please?”

The music pounds, and I move my eyes around the room, glaring but not seeing anything but her in my head.

“Get laid,” he tells me, gesturing to the women at the table near the jukebox. “Pick one. Pick two. You need something warm. A woman. Not a kid.”

A kid …

Exactly.

Krisjen Conroy acts like a fucking child. Just like Trace. Instead of admitting she did something wrong, she gets pouty and leaves. What was I thinking? That’s how all of my days with her would be. Putting up with an endless stream of bullshit because she’s fun to fuck?

I bite the inside of my mouth. Hard.

A kid …

That kid … is a fucking planet.

God, I never wanted something so much until her. The light spilling through the windows in my room cast this purple glow on her skin tonight. All I saw were stars. Another world.

“I thought you liked her now,” Army gripes to Dallas.

“I do like her,” he replies. “But she was never going to stay. None of them stay.”

A blonde with a high ponytail, wearing a yellow tank top, holds my eyes. I ball my fists under my arms.

“She’ll marry rich,” Dallas continues, “and we’ll eventually be no more than a passing nod on the street. We’ll be mowing her lawn someday.”

She’d fucking love that, wouldn’t she? Paying me to come to her house …

“She’s theirs,” he goes on.

Allowing me to step inside her shiny, white foyer so she can write me a check …

“Not ours,” he finishes.

I drop my arms and shoot off, seeing the blonde at the table sit up straight with a smile playing on her lips.

But I veer right, heading away from her and straight out the goddamn door.

“Macon!” Army calls behind me.

Followed by Dallas shouting, “Where are you going?”

I pull my keys out of my pocket and head for my truck, but a thought occurs to me, and I head inside the house instead. Running up the stairs, I dive into my bedroom and whip open the closet door. Pulling out the garment bag, I unzip it and pull out the black suit I wore to my parents’ funerals.

I stopped attending them after that, and haven’t touched these clothes since, priding myself on being a working man. I never wanted to look like I was trying to be better than the rest of Sanoa Bay.

I don’t know why I want her to see me differently. I’m not ashamed of being a worker. Trace wears jeans and T-shirts. Iron, too.

Army wears shirts as little as possible, and Dallas knows he’ll get laid with just a smile.

I want her to know I’m not them.

I pull the gun I retrieved from Mariette’s out of the back of my jeans and walk over to my nightstand, about to drop it in the drawer when I notice the one that I had stashed there is missing.

My brothers always knew it was there. It’s been there for years.

She’s in my bed for a week, and it’s gone.

I guess I have to go after her now. I need the gun back.

I smile a little, dropping Mariette’s in the drawer in its place and undressing.

I don the suit, picking out a black shirt and black tie, and run my fingers through my hair. Grabbing my keys, I head back down the stairs and out the door, to my truck. Climbing in, I set off, speeding across the tracks to St. Carmen.

The broken dirt gives way to crumbling concrete that slowly turns into fresh blacktop, and I go from hearing the tires under the truck to hearing nothing.

The shop windows are all dark, rain shimmering like fireflies under the streetlights, and I keep my eyes forward as I pass turns that I haven’t taken in years, and businesses I was never good enough to shop in.

It still baffles me that I opted to send Liv to school over here. I just knew it was the way out. I couldn’t afford it yet with Dallas, and Trace had no interest in his education. Plus, I owed Liv.

We didn’t grow up together, so she never really knew me, and I didn’t make it easier. She had goals, and I wanted one person in the family to go to college.

But I made sure she never gave that school a reason to call me over here. I wanted to step foot in this town as little as possible.

And now, here I am … starving for one of their daughters.

I swing into her driveway, seeing a couple of lights on, and race around the patch of grass in the middle. The tires scream as I halt in front of her door.

Hopping out, I leave the keys inside and straighten my tie.

I press the doorbell.

Checking my phone, I read the time—11:03.

She said her siblings were with her grandparents. And if her mother came back early, then oh well. I guess we’re doing this tonight.

Krisjen appears at the sidelight window, but she quickly moves out of sight. “I don’t want to see you,” she calls out.

I reach my arms out and grip the doorframe. “Well, I want to see you!”

“I don’t care!”

Is she fucking kidding me? Does she know what it takes for me to come over to this shithole?

“Go home!” she yells.

But her voice is distanced.

Like she’s moved away from the door.

Good.

I don’t take time to think. I release the doorframe, take one step back, and shoot out my nice fucking leather shoe and kick the goddamn door.

It takes two more kicks to get the splintered wood to break away, and I charge in, seeing her in the middle of the foyer, breathing hard and wide-eyed as she scurries back, putting distance between us.

The alarm splits my ear, blaring shrill and loud.

I head straight for her.

“Are you crazy?” she growls.

God, she’s cute in a ponytail.

“Turn off the alarm,” I bark.

She folds her arms over her chest, not moving.

I narrow my eyes as the shrill scream of the alarm cuts through my brain.

Goddammit …

A phone rings, and I dart my gaze to the wall where a landline phone is posted next to the alarm.

She stands there.

“Answer it,” I tell her.

They’ll send security if she doesn’t.

But she just tips her chin down, a challenge in her fucking beautiful eyes.

Son of a bitch.

“Krisjen …”

The phone rings four more times and then stops. She smiles to herself.

Twisting around, she punches a code into the alarm and the shrieking ceases. Spinning back toward me, she flexes her jaw. “It’s like a three-minute response time,” she says. “Better say what you gotta say quickly.”

“Who said I wanted to talk?”

She shakes her head at me.

Motherfucker.

In two seconds, I’m in front of her, taking her hips in my hands and getting down in her face.

She scowls up at me. “You’re not old enough for me.”

I kiss her, taking her face in my hands and moving over her lips, hungry to get lost in her again. I press into her as she groans into my mouth.

Where is her bedroom?

But she rips her mouth away. “I can’t be what keeps you alive.” She breathes out. “I can’t take care of you. I can’t even take care of myself.”

“I don’t want you to take care of me!” I growl, pulling her into me. “I don’t want you to make me soup and clean up after me and tell me what to eat and what not to drink! I don’t want you to do the things a mother does!” I hover over her lips, starving as I lower my voice to a whisper. “I want you to do the things a girlfriend does.”

Her eyebrows pinch together, pained, but her gaze on my mouth is just as desperate. Hot and sweet and crazy.

But strong.

So strong.

I was made for her.

“Touch me.” I rest my forehead to hers. “And kiss me and come to bed in pretty things, or nothing, or my fucking sweatpants, for all I care, because God, you look good in them.” I trail my mouth up her cheek to her temple. “And smile at me when you’re happy, and yell at me when you’re mad, and ride with me on the back of my bike in the rain.” I come back to her eyes. “Drag me to dumb shit like plays and couples’ game nights and stick your tongue in my mouth whenever possible.”

She expels all the air in her lungs, tears welling, and I can see the smile hiding behind her stubborn mouth.

Her eyes drop to my lips again, she comes in, and then …

Red lights flash across her face.

She pulls away, and I look behind me, seeing the fucking red and blue gumballs of their neighborhood rent-a-cops.

I turn back to her, but she’s moving away, a coy look in her eyes. “I don’t think you have these cops on your payroll,” she taunts.

I match her steps. “Call them off.”

“And let them think they can leave me alone with you?”

She backs up, around the stairs, and I stalk her. The front door hangs open, the frame splintered. It’s an obvious break-in. They will take me in.

“Krisjen …” I scold.

She smirks. “I’ll tell Trace.”

Like he’s her protector now. She’s daring me.

I arch a brow. “I raised that boy to share.”

“You just want your turn, is that it?”

My turn? I break into a smile, the police lights getting closer.

She falters, seeing my amusement. “What?”

I shake my head. “Nothing.”

She continues to back up, and I match her step for step. “What if I’m pregnant?” she asks.

I pause, my heart beating faster. “Are you?”

“I could be,” she says. “It would be one of your brothers’.”

No.

It wouldn’t.

“It would be mine,” I tell her.

She breathes out a laugh. “Do you think Trace would agree that his child belongs to you?”

She better stop fucking talking about having anyone else’s kid.

“It would be mine,” I bite out. “Trace had a vasectomy as soon as he turned eighteen. He doesn’t want kids.”

She slows her steps. She didn’t know that.

“And Iron and Army always wrap it up,” I inform her. “I had to feel you.”

“But you didn’t come inside of m—”

I cock my head, and her chest caves.

I didn’t come inside of her … tonight.

She swallows. “You.”

Yeah.

Her breathing hitches as she backs up more. “You son of a bitch.

How could … Why did you push me away? I was yours!” She glares at me, pained. “I would’ve been yours in a heartbeat. A thousand more times! You acted like you didn’t want me in the garage that night we fixed the car. Why didn’t you say something?”

“You knew it was me.” I stop in front of her. “You always knew it was me. Do you think I didn’t notice you months ago? How you’d hold your breath every time I walked in a room? You knew it the next morning when I sat down at the table and the jolt hit your heart, because it hit mine, too.” I search her eyes. “The hyperawareness we have around each other. You knew the moment it happened that you didn’t want it to be anyone else.”

She shakes her head as if in denial.

Knocks sound on the broken door. “Hello?”

“Are you pregnant?” I ask in a whisper.

She just keeps shaking her head frantically. “Why didn’t you say something?”

“If you have my kid, there’s no escaping me, Krisjen.”

She looks up at me. “Why didn’t you say it was you?”

And my eyes fall to her pink mouth and those lips that were wrapped around me just a few hours ago.

I’m so fucking hungry for her. “There’s no escaping me no matter what.”

“We’re coming in!” a man shouts.

She wets her lips, her eyes darting between me and the door, and I wrap my arms around her. I yank open the door under the stairs, and shove us inside.

“Carsten Security?” the guard calls from inside the house. “Anyone home?”

I close us inside the dark room and back her up against the wall, her whimper falling across my lips.

“Hello?” someone calls out.

She opens her mouth, but I touch it with mine. “Shh …”

Shoes squeak against the marble floor outside the door, muffled talking, but her heat travels through my hand, and I suddenly can’t catch my breath. I want to be inside of her.

“Swamp shouldn’t cross the tracks,” she bites out.

But I take her head in my hands. “You’re Swamp now, too,” I say. “You’re ours.”

Tears fill her eyes, and I capture her mouth, her moan drifting down my throat as she gives in to it and kisses me back.

A man calls out again, “Carsten Security!”

She pulls away from my mouth, breathing hard as I nibble her jaw, her neck, and then her fucking lips again. She sighs. “Macon …”

I lift her up into my arms, guiding her legs around me. “How could I tell you it was me?”

She wraps her arms around my neck, kissing me.

“Hello?” a guard calls out, footfalls hitting the stairs above us.

“You didn’t hear me come into the house that night,” I tell her. “You didn’t stop.”

I felt like shit, and I walked in and saw her so beautiful on the couch. Her hand under the blanket. Her shirt pulled up and her breasts and skin …

“The way you were with yourself,” I explain, “it was the way it should be. It was like it always should be when someone touches you. The way your body moved, the way you breathed …” I catch her bottom lip between my teeth. “It’s why we’re alive. That’s how it should be.”

I’d seen women touch themselves before, but she was so soft. I could feel the heat from her body across the room. I forgot everything—all of my problems—for a few minutes.

“And then you spoke, and took everything I was thinking out of my head, and my insides took over,” I say. “I wanted you under my skin and your scent in my head. I couldn’t think. I did what we do when we’re dying. We rage, and I felt it on you, too. I had to hold you.”

She gazes at me, so much beauty and love in her eyes.

“I just couldn’t let it happen again,” I tell her. “I couldn’t keep you and bring you into my shit.”

“Is anyone here?” shouts one of the guards.

She kisses me so softly, brushing her mouth over mine. “I wasn’t made for anyone else,” she whispers, holding me tight. “I belong to you.”

Women love being owned by a good man.

Am I a good man?

“Bite me,” I beg over her mouth. “Feel me between your teeth.”

Parting her lips, she catches my bottom lip between her teeth. My cock twitches.

She tilts her head and touches her lips to the corner of my mouth. Barely a touch. Soft, gentle, quick. I close my eyes. “Again,” I tell her.

She does it again, and an electric current rages underneath my skin. She kisses my cheek the same way. My jaw, my temple, between my eyebrows, the other corner of my mouth …

Her breath, her sweat, her taste … everything is inside of me.

I inch her shirt up, my cock swelling at the sight of her breasts. God, I want to fucking eat her up.

My hand covers one, and I kiss her, cutting off her little moan.

Her tits press against my chest … I have to have her now.

Lowering her to her feet, I plant my hand on her stomach and push her into the wall. With my other hand, I unbutton her shorts and draw down her zipper. Grazing my lips over her temple, I tell her, “Take them off.”

Squirming against me, she pushes her shorts down her legs, her shirt still up above her breasts.

“Now the underwear,” I tell her.

Holding my eyes, she slides them down, letting them fall to her feet.

Lifting her high again, I wrap her legs around me and carry her, laying her body down on a small table. Extra dining room chairs are also stored off to the side, an old grandfather clock, and some cardboard boxes.

I whip off my jacket, rip open my shirt, and drop everything to the ground as she arches her back, pushing her tits to the sky and looking so fucking eatable. I slide my eyes down, my dick throbbing painfully at the sight of exactly where she feels so good.

Something between a whimper, a cry, and a moan escapes her. “Macon …” she begs for me.

And I come down, biting the soft flesh of her pussy.

“Ah,” she cries, clawing her thighs.

“Hello?” the men call again. “Who was that?”

Fuck.

I lick and taste her, sucking so hard because I can’t stop. I can’t fucking stop. I bite everywhere, my teeth aching to feel her, and then stick my tongue inside of her.

“Ah!” she cries out again.

“Carsten Security!” they call out. “Identify yourself!”

Goddammit. Can I please have this woman in fucking peace?

Unfastening my belt and ripping open my pants, I pull her down to the end of the table, plant my hand over her mouth, and press the head of my cock to her tight little entrance.

Her moan vibrates across my hand, and I lean down, sucking on one nipple before moving to the other.

And then I thrust, sliding deep inside.

“Oh,” she groans behind my hand.

I close my eyes, warmth spreading through my stomach and down my legs. My heart pounds inside my chest.

I slide out and then in again, over and over, faster and faster, until the table is banging against the wall, and her thighs are damn near touching her breasts.

Her tits bob back and forth, and I can’t get deep enough. “Fuck,” I breathe out. “Krisjen …”

I kiss her nipples, her hot breath wetting my hand over her mouth as I smooth my thumb over her clit, soft and slow.

“You want me to stop?” I ask her.

She shakes her head.

“You gonna listen from now on?”

She shakes her head.

I smile. Of course not.

I pound into her, coming in and gripping the back of her hair as I dive deep into her mouth, kissing her.

“Oh, Macon,” she moans, jerking as I work her clit. “God, I … I …”

She’s coming.

“It’s okay,” I growl. “Fuck it. Scream.”

I shoot up, taking my hand off her mouth, and fuck her hard, yanking her down on my cock over and over again.

She cries out, her body tensing, her muscles hardening, and her pussy contracting around me as I slide in again and again.

“Oh God!” she shouts, sliding up and down the table.

My dick pumps with heat, cum starting to spill, and a hard groan lodges in my throat.

But then there’s a knock at the door. “Hello?”

I don’t stop.

The table rocks against the wall, and I lean a hand down on the table, riding her. Her body goes limp as her orgasm fades away.

“Just a minute!” I bark at the cops.

“Who is that?” one calls. “What’s going on?”

“We’re not done!” she cries, tipping her head back. “Please, just a minute!”

I stutter, spill, and release a heavy groan, coming inside of her as I thrust through it.

“Fuck.” I let my head fall back, sliding in and out slower and slower as my release drifts through me and everything starts to relax.

But before we’re done, she sits up and wraps her arms around me, her hair damp with sweat and in her face as she kisses me.

I circle my arms around her, touching her everywhere I can reach. God.

She pulls back but keeps her mouth an inch from mine. “I …”

But whatever she was going to say fades on her lips, and I get it.

There are no words.

Other than I want to do that with her a thousand more times. And slower, much slower.

I step back, doing up my pants, and she hops off the table, quickly slipping on my black shirt with missing buttons.

She opens the door and steps out, and I stay behind, fastening my belt.

“Ms. Conroy, are you okay?” I hear one of the cops ask.

“Yes, everything’s fine,” she laughs out. “I’m really sorry about this. My boyfriend … Well …”

“Your boyfriend?” the other asks.

I open the door all the way, seeing the security guards notice me as I step up to her side.

“Macon Jaeger,” one says.

I know him, but I don’t remember his name. They both know me, though.

“Is … everything cool?” the one I recognize asks us.

“Yeah.” I nod, hooking an arm over her shoulder so they know what’s mine. “I’m sorry. It was my fault.”

They look behind them to the busted doorframe and back to her again. “Are you sure?”

She leans into my embrace and puts a possessive hand on my stomach. “I’m okay.” I can feel her blush. “Thank you.”

They hesitate, but eventually nod and start to turn around. “We’ll have to call your parents to let them know we responded,” one of them says as they walk for the door.

Krisjen nods. “Good luck with that.”

She walks toward the stairs, glancing at me. “I’ll be in the shower. Hurry.”

I drop my eyes to the cut of breast peeking out through the piece of shirt she neglected to hold closed, and feel my body grow hot again.

I turn to the guard, a flash of amusement crossing their faces. I follow, seeing them out. “I’ll secure the door.”

“Don’t be setting off any fire alarms tonight, either, huh?” one teases as they both leave.

And I can’t help but smile with him. “We’ll try not to.”

Her sheer curtains glow white as the moonlight spills into the room, and I hold her to me as I stare up at her canopy bed.

White fabric is draped around the frame and cascades down the four posts like some bed in a fairy tale.

Her sheets feel like water. Soft and precious and gentle, like a cloud for a doll.

“I need to get you back home,” I tell her, threading my fingers through her hair. “This bedroom is unnerving.”

A quiet laugh escapes her, but she keeps her head on my chest. “Why?”

“It’s reminding me that you’re nowhere near my age.” I stare up at all the fabric. “Something I forget a lot, given the things I just did to you.”

She still has a math book on her bedside table, for Christ’s sake. I’m feeling a little weird about how she just rode me backward.

She lifts her head. “Have you ever been with someone with a thirteen-year gap before?”

I almost smile, because no, I haven’t, but almost immediately, the smile fades. That’s not true, actually.

She stares at me, her own amusement dying. “I’m sorry,” she says.

“For what?”

She drops her eyes, opening her mouth to speak but then closing it again. I tense.

She swallows. “Army … told me, um …” She meets my eyes. “He told me about the husband and wife who made you and him an offer.”

I shift, looking away.

But I can’t move. She’s on top of me.

“He didn’t say as much,” she goes on, “but I eventually figured out you must’ve—”

“I’m clean,” I say. “If that’s what you’re worried about.”

She doesn’t falter. “I wasn’t worried,” she tells me. “I know you’d never put me in danger.”

But she keeps her eyes fixed on me, and the room suddenly feels too small.

“How many?” she asks me.

I press my teeth together and grind for a split second. “I don’t want to talk about it.”

But she pushes me. “How many times did you do it?”

“What did I say, Krisjen?”

She shuts up, but even though I’m holding her, she feels far away now.

The past is depression. I can’t change it. Why bother thinking about it?

Maybe we would’ve eventually been okay if I hadn’t gone that far, but what if we hadn’t been? I took care of my family, and I’d do it again.

Maybe.

I don’t know.

I struggle to breathe, and without thinking, I grip her tighter.

It wasn’t the sex that was hard. I just didn’t like not being seen. I wasn’t someone to them. They would never have spoken to me in public. They never would’ve held a door for my sister or thought about me after I left the bed.

I close my eyes, breathing hard as I tuck her head back into my chest. “A few,” I finally reply in a whisper.

“A few like three, or a few like ten?”

My throat is so dry. “A few like six,” I say.

I wait for another question, but she just lies there, her arm draped over my chest and her hand on my shoulder.

I draw in a deep breath. “She passed the news on to her friends,” I tell Krisjen. “It didn’t go on longer than a few months. I got cash and used it to buy other things I didn’t mind selling.”

A couple of them were nice to me. They fucking talked to me, at least, and it became clear they were just as miserable in their lives as I was. They had their own shit to deal with, and we were able to forget about our lives for a while.

But a few of the others … Jesus.

Everything was so dark in the Bay at that time. One of the St. Carmen women wanted me to pretend I was her son. One liked to hit me. A lot.

“I’d always had spells where I didn’t feel good, but God,” I go on, “I felt like an ugly piece of shit walking out of that first house, Krisjen. I never felt so worthless.”

Growing up, I acted out just like my brothers, but not with sex. Not ever with sex. Sex was important. That was always my hangup. I had to be able to connect.

“I could wash it off my body,” I tell her, “but not out of my head, and I was in a hole I was never gonna crawl out of. I hated being here. I hated the sight of the world.” I just go on, spilling my guts and getting it out, because if she knows, then she’ll know more than even Army, and I want her to know me best.

“I couldn’t pay the bills,” I continue. “Dallas was drinking, Liv and Trace were constantly fighting … The house came crashing down on my head every time I walked through the fucking front door.” I force down the lump in my throat. “It wasn’t the first time I thought about it, but … it was the first time I really wanted to do it.”

Like a fucking coward. When you feel like shit, it’s hard to remember a time when you ever felt good, and I left every one of those women thinking life would always be like that.

It wasn’t, and there were good days, but I’m so tired sometimes.

“He watched the whole fucking thing,” I murmur. “He instructed me on how to treat her. How to be rough with her. Told me what he wanted me to do to her, where to kiss her, how hard to …”

I feel one of her tears fall onto my chest.

I exhale hard, my hand going into her hair, fisting it gently. “So I dived into my head and thought about someone else. Another girl.”

“Who?”

I shrug. “No one in particular. A Saint. Someone I wasn’t supposed to have. Someone sweet and innocent.” I rub her scalp. “Always with sunshine in her eyes and smiles that felt warm.” I rub my thumb along her cheek. “I just didn’t know she was real.”

She lifts her head, looking at me.

I soften my gaze. “I’ve been dreaming about you for a long time.”

Her kind eyes smile at me. “Well, since I was like ten or eleven anyway.”

“Oh, Jesus Christ.”

She laughs and climbs up my body, straddling me. She just had to remind me how old she was when I was twenty-four.

Leaning down on one hand, she holds my face and looks into my eyes. “Life is going to kill you eventually.”

I gaze up at her.

“It’s going to kill us all,” she says. “But you’re a monster, you hear me? They will have to rip you from this world. You’re strong in your head, and you’re strong in body, and you …” She pins me with a hard stare that takes my breath away. “You. Do. Not. Stop. You will never stop.”

I don’t blink.

“They will all know …” she tells me, “that if you’re not dead, then you’re not done.”

I suck in a breath, catching her as she comes down on my mouth. I kiss her, arching up, the power of her lips coursing through mine, into my head, and down my body.

I grow hard underneath her, and she reaches down, fisting my cock.

“And I’m not that sweet and innocent,” she teases.

I gasp as she strokes me, and I grab her ass in both hands, pressing her into my body. God, I could fuck her ten more times tonight.

But I meet her eyes, coming in to nibble her mouth. “You’re not sweet and innocent? Is that so?” I taunt.

I pull away, seeing her disappointed look when I crash back to the bed. I pick up a stuffed toy between her pillows and hold it up. “And what the fuck is this?”

She sits up, her beautiful naked body on display, but her expression looking oh so sweet and innocent. “A taco.” She grabs it away from me, holding it to her body protectively. “I mean, obviously.”

I pick up another one, which she grabs.

“A burrito,” she says.

And another one.

“Broccoli.”

She snatches them all away, and I’m tempted to ask what possessed her to buy a stuffed broccoli toy, but then she’ll tell me, and I really don’t care as long as she keeps them off our bed at home.

I pluck the toys away from her and throw them to the side. Taking her hips, I push up and suck on her breast as I fit myself back inside her for the fourth time tonight.

She pants, moving up and down my cock. “I would scold you and say we need some sleep now,” she tells me.

“But I’m hard again.”

“And I’m the one who takes care of you.”

I press my lips to hers, slipping my tongue into her mouth and dying for more. And more and more.

“Swim to me,” she says.

More.

I don’t stop. I will never stop.