Keep Me (Beggar's Choice #3) (20 page)

“No Bram now,” I almost sob in my need. “Need you inside
me.”

“Jesus fucking Christ,” he groans, and lifting my hips up he
drags my yoga pants off and then reaches in and rips my knickers clean off. I
don’t have time to admire his strength because he unbuttons himself
frantically, pulling his hard cock out and fisting himself.

“God Bram,” I breathe trying to stroke it, undone with the
urge to feel the hard length in my hand. I’ve heard rumours before and his women
have tittered about the length and girth in the kitchen the morning after, but
they’ve not done him justice.

“Christ,” he groans, his pupils blown as he reaches forward
sliding one long finger into me to check my readiness. “Oh baby you’re fucking
soaking,” he grunts and I lean back arching and fucking myself on his finger. I
groan as he adds another one while his thumb spreads the moisture along my
folds before reaching my clit and strumming it.

“Oh God now,” I pant. “I can’t wait,” and he grunts some
response before grasping his cock and rubbing it through my wetness.

“Fuck Alys,” he mutters looking at me through heavy eyes.
“Fuck baby tell me to stop.” He moans, pushing it in a scant inch. We both
groan arching back to watch his slick length start to enter me.

I grab his head making him look at me. “Don’t stop,” I say
deliberately. “God don’t stop. Fuck me.”

He pants through his teeth as he twists his lean hips and
forces the rest of his length in. We both cry out when he’s fully seated and he
stills me for a second. “You’re so tight darling,” he says thickly. “Get used
to me because I don’t want to hurt you.” I stare at him and then manage a smile
which makes him close his eyes for a second, and then he nestles closer into
the cradle of my pelvis and seated deep and tight he kisses me wildly using his
tongue to simulate what movement he’ll be using down there.

I’ve never been kissed so carnally in my life, like he’s
fucking my mouth, like he needs my mouth more than he needs to breathe, and
then he pulls back slightly before forcing his way back inside. We both pant
out choked sighs. “Okay
a ghrá
?” he asks huskily.

I nod frantically as words are beyond me and then I actually
see his control snap as he rears back and starts to hammer into me. I arch back
tilting my pelvis and just moan as he shuttles back and forth, his cock
swimming in my wetness and moving smoothly in me hitting my clit spot on, and
it isn’t long before I feel the tension build and fizzle inside my pussy.

“Fuck Bram,” I moan and he nods, his teeth set and his eyes
fixed on me.

“Do it babe, come,” he mutters. I need to come so badly and
then it’s on me and I arch into him letting out a choked scream as the pleasure
goes on and on. I’m dimly aware of him shouting out as he hammers against me
and then a low groan as warmth fills me. For a second I slump against him,
content and replete and dark.

We lean on each other for a while feeling his cock twitch
inside me, enjoying the bliss and maybe trying to avoid focusing on what we’ve
just done, but then he stirs. “Jesus Christ,” he exclaims. “I didn’t fucking
use anything.”

I jerk. “Oh my God Bram.”

He presses against me insistently. “I’m clean. I fucking
swear to you that I’m clean. I never go without a condom and I’m tested
regularly. My last test was a week ago.”

“I’m clean too,” I venture and he laughs gently.

“Baby I know. You’re the cleanest person that I’ve ever
met.” I wonder what he means but then caress his face which still bears the
slackness of orgasm.

“I’m on birth control as well Bram and I’m religious about
taking it.”

He nods and as if synchronised we both look down to where
his cock is still inside me. He’s still half hard and as we watch, some of his
semen seeps out, spreading over the root of his wet cock and making jewel like
droplets in the dark nest of his pubic curls. He groans and almost as if
unaware of what he’s doing he pulls out and thrusts back in, watching the way
that my bare, pussy lips grasp at him. “Jesus,” he mutters. “That’s fucking
sexy.” He looks at me, lust riding him again. “I want you again
a ghrá.
”

I nod, unable to stop my pelvis curling into him or my hands
from roaming greedily over his shoulders and down to his arse, where I grab the
tight globes and pull him into me.

He moans and then pulls back. “Not here though,” he says
hoarsely. “I want you in my bed, your hair spread out over my pillows and me
between your open legs. I want that for my memory.”

I’m troubled for a second because he says that so
resignedly, like he knows that this might be our only time, but I’m determined
to thrust that melancholy thought away.
I won’t regret this
I promise
myself through the rising tide of passion.

Then another thought strikes me. “Oh my God the others will
know what we’re doing Bram. They’ll have heard us and how are we going to get
out of here?”

He stills. “There’s no sound out there and I heard the door
slam after I told someone to fuck off. They’re gone. They wouldn’t hang around
after hearing us.” He stares at me and my flushed cheeks. “I don’t care,” he
says deliberately. “I don’t fucking care what anyone thinks. This night is ours
and I’m going to make every second last. It might be my only chance.”

He kisses me deeply and wetly, and wrapping my legs around him
he carries me out of the bathroom and up the stairs to his bed.

***

I wake slowly in a pool of sunlight, the covers tangled
around me and a wonderful soreness in my body. For a second I bask in the
feeling and then send my hand out seeking his skin. When I feel only the
coldness of the sheets I force my eyes open and then still as I see him
standing naked at the floor to ceiling window. One arm is raised and resting
against the glass and he’s lowered his forehead to it looking deep in thought.
The early morning sun limns his body in its golden light, catching on the lean
outline of his body and glistening on the dips and swells of hair roughened
muscles.

I look at him for a long minute. It’s so rare to be able to
look at him without him sensing it. He’s a born performer and can sense
attention anywhere, and he’s rarely still. He’s so beautiful and I think it’s
then in that quiet, sun drenched moment that I fully accept that I’ve fallen in
love with him and that I have to let him go.

I knew last night that it was a mistake and yet I regret
nothing. I’d relished every sweat filled, moaning minute and I’ll remember it
forever, but I know to the last vowel the conversation that we’re going to be
having in a minute, and the soft side of me recoils like a hedgehog from the
thought of being the recipient of his usual ‘only a fuck’ speech that I’ve
heard him give to so many women. I can’t have him saying those words to me and
as much as I know now that I love him in a deep and passionate way, I’m
pragmatic enough to know that it’s hopeless.

Bram doesn’t want commitment and I couldn’t be with him
feeling as I do and have some sort of casual fucking arrangement. It would gut
me and I have too much pride to beg for scraps at his table. So I must make
sure that he knows that I’m on the same page as him.
Maybe friends will be
enough
I think despairingly.

I take one more second to gaze at him unknowing, fixing the
picture of his naked beauty in my head in this moment before everything is lost
and we go back to normal. Then mind made up I shift position wincing slightly
when I realise that I left my hearing aid in. His head shoots up straightaway,
all his attention fixed on me and an enigmatic expression on his normally open
face.

For a second we just stare at each other and his eyes seem
to drink in my face, my body, my hair spread on his pillow and I almost think
that I see wonder there, and then a shadow crosses his face and his expression
closes, and I sigh because despite my brave words to myself, a little bit of me
was still clinging to the hope that he wouldn’t regret it and would want to
keep me.
No one ever has before
I think slightly bitterly
so don’t
fucking beg
.
You never have so don’t start now
.

Mind made up I make myself smile in that carefree, cold
manner that I learnt years ago. A smile that admits nothing and asks for less.
“You alright babe?” I ask and pride myself on the fact that my voice is clear.

He stares at me for a second. “I’m alright,” he finally says
in his early morning husky voice which often makes him sound like he’s consumed
two packets of cigarettes before sleep. His accent is thicker than normal and I
wonder what he’s concealing under that locked down mask. His eyes sharpen on my
face like a laser. “Are you?”

I stall for time and reach for a hair band on the table by
the bed. The sheet slips as I reach over and I think I hear a sharp intake of
breath, but when I settle back into the bed tugging the sheet around me and
pulling my hair up his face is once more as inscrutable as a marble statue. “I’m
fine,” I finally say. “It’s all good isn’t it?”

He stares again, crossing his arms over his chest looking
like a moody model photo brought to life, and I wish passionately that he’d put
some clothes on but my wish isn’t granted.

Finally he nods as if listening to some inner voice and then
he moves forward and seats himself by me, so close that I can feel the intense
heat of his body and smell his sweet, spicy scent, darker now and under laid
with the smell of sex that lingers in the bed sheets. His nostrils flare as if
he smells it too, and then almost as if he can’t help himself he raises a hand
to push back a stray strand of hair lying on my shoulder. I don’t mean to
flinch but I can’t help it and his hand stalls in mid-air while something
fierce and unknowable passes over his face, and then his hand falls gracefully
back onto the bed lying palm up and somehow vulnerable.

I stare at it for a second, so tempted to grab it and pull
it to me but before I can do it he bounds up, moving jerkily to his clothes
lying on the floor. He pulls his jeans up his legs and I stare because he’s
moving clumsily unlike his normal grace.

When he turns to face me his expression is once more the
humorous and good natured one that he normally wears, but something in it makes
it more of a mask now. He shrugs and smiles at me. “I think I can guess what
you’re going to say,” he says, leaning against the chest of drawers with his
arms crossed.

Something in his posture looks defensive as if he’s
protecting himself against pain and I frown wondering whether I’ve misread the
situation, but his next words dispel the impression. “I’ve had this
conversation so many times but I never thought that I’d be having it with you
Al.”

“There’s no need,” I rush into speech. “It was a mistake
Bram, but can’t we just go back to the way that we were?”

A flinch passes over his face so quickly that it’s like a
sudden ripple in still water, but then it’s gone and he smiles almost wearily.
“Can we do that Al? Can you forget what we were like last night?”

I nod vigorously ignoring my inner voice which is shouting
loudly that no I can’t. “Of course I can. We’re mates Bram. You’re my best
friend. I don’t want to lose that ever.” I try to lighten the moment. “And I
know you’ll be able to do that. You’ve had enough practice. You’ve got the
sexual memory of a goldfish after all - one turn of the bowl and you can’t
remember anything.”

Something that looks very much like rage passes over his
face before it goes back to that watchfulness, but he looks paler than before.
“So you’re okay to go back to normal then?” I nod my head vigorously but he
remorselessly continues. “You’re okay with me bringing back women and sleeping
with them at the flat? That is after all just me being my normal slutty self.”

I’m so proud of myself at that moment because I don’t flinch
although the thought of that is like a fatal wound inside me. “I’m fine with
that,” I say, my voice as steady as normal. “We’re just friends, last night was
a one off.” I smile. “At least I can say that I’ve had the Bram O’Connell
experience.”

His face whitens and I know that I’ve gone too far but I
don’t know why. “Well you’re not alone in that are you Alys? I mean that’s not
a special dispensation at all. Thousands of women have had it and it means fuck
all,” he says almost viciously.

I can’t help the flinch this time and his arms uncross as if
he’s going to come to me, but I recover myself quickly pulling my shield around
me. I look him full in the face at the weary, restless beauty of him. “Do you
want me to leave Bram? I will if this is uncomfortable for you.”

He jerks upright looking as if he’s been punched. “No I
don’t want you to go,” he says loudly and fiercely. “Why would you go?”

“Well if things are too uncomfortable. I mean you’re not
exactly used to your bed mates sticking around.”

“Things won’t be uncomfortable. It’s fine and you’re not my
usual style of bed mate anyway.” I shiver inside but he seems to shake off
whatever mood he’s in and comes to the bed, standing at the foot as if drawn
nearer. “I don’t want you to go. I want you to stay here with me. If this is
what it takes for you to stay, us being friends again, then don’t worry because
we’ll never not be friends.” He takes a deep breath. “I don’t think that you
realise how much you mean to me Alys. I’ll do anything for you not to leave, so
we’ll go back to normal okay?”

I open my mouth to say I don’t know what, but he grabs my
head gently and bends forward pressing his lips to my hair. I think he inhales
deeply as if smelling the strands but then he pulls away and his face has gone
back to his normal mischievousness, although when he speaks it sounds like he
has a mouthful of glass.

“Because you were so good in bed I’ll make coffee this
morning but obviously it was a one off so don’t get used to it.” He pauses.
“It’s fine now babe, but maybe don’t roll around the floor fighting another
girl. I think we’ve discovered that might be one of my triggers.”