Keeper of the Alphas - Complete (5 page)

She unraveled completely, however, when he twisted a finger inside of her. She yelped and twisted under his touch like a piston, or tried to, at least. Jayce’s strong grip kept her in place and she felt a gruff groan vibrate from his lips through her, making her shiver. She submitted to his touch; the mix of his fingers and his tongue drove her into a new frenzy. Cami felt not at all in her body; her muscles tensed, her head was spinning, her insides quivered…

She tilted her head back in a lengthy moan—

Through the heat-stained windows, Cami saw stars. Tiny, white dots scattered in a vast, inky sky. Couldn’t see stars in New York City, a city so alive lights ran like an electric current through its veins. Here, the night had space to breathe, to stretch out, and it awakened something dormant inside of her, something wild and repressed.

Her breath hitched, coming in tight gasps now, and her legs clamped around his head as everything inside her focused on the buzzing bundle of nerves he flicked again and again under the tip of his tongue, relentlessly. Cami felt herself bucking wildly against his soft lips in the tight confines of his car. She grabbed for something—anything—to hold on to and one hand gripped the door, the other fisted his hair as a single flick finally pulled a loud, throaty cry from the back of her throat. She saw stars above, stars behind her eyes as she felt Jayce draw out her orgasm, egging her on with beckoning strokes against her inner walls, coaxing her to throb around his finger again and again and again...

Cold morning light splashed over Cami’s face, slowly waking her. Her head felt full of lead and she tried to collect herself, blinking around the unfamiliar apartment. Metal, rounded walls. A full glass of water sat on top of a trunk, a makeshift bedside table. His clothes were strewn across the floor. Empty beer bottles stuffed in corners.

You couldn’t take the trailer park out of the boy. Or the boy out of the trailer park, evidently. Cami, with all her baggage, had at least made it out of Tyburn. Jayce couldn’t even make it out of the park.
And his home had wheels.

Not that she was judging. Not that she had any place to judge. Had to remind herself of that. Cami lifted her blankets, glanced down at herself—nope, still wearing her dress from the night before. She looked over her shoulder to see Jayce flat on his back, pants still on. Mouth open, snoring lightly.
Typical
. Still. This was the first time in a
long time
she’d gotten that drunk and woken up with all her clothes in place. She vaguely remembered Jayce’s tongue, though, rolling between her thighs until she shuddered.

Hell with celibacy. Oral sex and nighttime snuggles?
Mark of a true gentleman
, in her opinion.

Tell the man what he won, Cami.

She eased in beside him and got comfortable. Now in the sober light of day, she could see the definition in his chest and the solid six-pack below it. Those V lines that ran down his hips and vanished under his loose pants. Cami thought about tasting his abs, running her tongue down the lines in his chest, his stomach, down…down…

She settled on a less intrusive wake up. She tugged her dress over her head and kicked aside her panties. She felt freer giving up all shame. Then she slipped her hand down his solid stomach and tiptoed her fingers under his pants, reaching for him. Under her slow, full strokes, he stirred in no time. He woke with a moan, blinking, which was her cue to grin, her chin perched up on his sharp hip.

“What—?” he started.

“Shhh, don’t talk,” she murmured and closed her mouth over his length. He felt sleepy, warm, and his resistance caved easily with a knowing
Oh.

His brain might’ve still been half-asleep, but his cock was certainly at full attention. Pent up from last night, it wasted no time reaching an impressive, taut height. Cami ran the flat of her tongue up his length like a meticulous cat, making sure to hit each vein and groove. She heard his breath catch in his throat and, thrilled, she continued to tease him, taking her time, examining his taste. His skin was warm, soft, tight, with a light hint of salt at the tip when she swirled around his swollen head, giving it a small suck.

His body tensed immediately. “Cami,” he said in a breath, half reverently, half in warning. Poor boy, trying so hard to hold back. He was graceful about it, at least, as she could tell from the line of his jaw he didn’t like admitting defeat, but he couldn’t silver-tongue his bobbing, sensitive cock.

She had some clever line on the tip of her tongue, something about the Tipping Point, but her brain was far too jumbled to string anything together. So she climbed on top of him instead, straddling him. “What did I say about talking?” she said.

The smart boy put two and two together and reached over the side of his bed into a plastic drawer. He tugged a condom free of its wrapper and reached down to slide it over himself.

Cami was notoriously uncomfortable in this position, all cowgirl with her tummy on full display, but Jayce didn’t bat an eye. She felt like she knew him better. But did she? She knew a fifteen-year-old boy who was on constant guard to protect her from bullies and the like. What if he’d grown up to become a bully himself, just like the rest of them?

Any doubt scattered when she felt his fingers draw her folds aside and the head of his cock eased inside of her. As though he could read her mind, he smiled and said, “What if I tell you you’re beautiful?”

“Liar.”

His eyes held hers. “Not to you.” He knew the right things to say. He was good at this game. She took him fully inside her and gasped, impaled by a bolt of pleasure.

He groaned audibly underneath her—like her, he was a noisy fuck, and she pitied his neighbors. Only a little. They’d survive.

She rode him in lazy strides. Her head bowed, and her breath came in small gasps as she found a comfortable pace on top of him. It satisfied an itch deep inside of her and she undulated against him, taking in everything he had to offer. Her nipples pebbled and her nails dug into his chest.

Jayce kicked his pants off his ankles and flipped the two of them over, tossing her onto the mattress. She squeaked with surprise and a moan caught in her throat as he moved against her in waves, his hips picking up the pace and meeting hers.

She wanted to close her eyes, focus on the pleasure building inside of her, and block the rest of the world out, but she couldn’t. Instead, she was transfixed on Jayce, hanging over her, his dirty blond hair framing his face. Jayce. This boy she’d felt so safe around. To whom she’d spilled her secrets and young angst. The last person she’d ever felt real around.

There was a fire coiling in her abdomen, threatening to consume her completely. She flushed and moaned, overtaken with this boy, this town, and her need to cum. She felt volatile, feverish, as the fire curled through her veins and added a light sheen of sweat to her body. Jayce seemed to sense it because he stopped suddenly, panting, and then said, “Are you okay?”

“Please,” she begged, “please don’t stop.” That was all he needed. He picked up the pace, thudding against her in nice, hard thrusts and she felt her skin shimmer. She was reaching it, her peak, and she grabbed his pillow above her head, arched her back, and cried out.

Her orgasm thudded inside her in time with her heartbeat and Jayce eased her down from it, slowing his thrusts. She heard him groan, but he didn’t stop until her throbbing had ceased to low, butterfly pulses. Only then did he pull out and came (politely) in his hand rather than on her stomach.

He collapsed on top of her and they panted together. “You’re so hot,” he finally came out with, breathlessly.

She slipped her fingers into his thick hair. “I like being an adult with you,” she said.

That got a genuine laugh from him. “Yeah,” he said. “I like being an adult with you too.”

She didn’t remember falling asleep again, but the combination of alcohol and physical exhaustion must have hit Cami hard because here she was, blinking tiredly in Jayce’s bed.
Comfortable
here. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d slept without nightmares. Yet she still thought about slipping out of bed and quietly bolting. It would be quite a task in the trailer park, but everything in Tyburn was within fifteen minutes of
everything else
. She could call a cab, pick up Marcus’s truck at the bar, and be out of here before he so much as woke up. She rolled over in bed, about to peel out—

When she felt an arm hook around her middle, pulling her back in. A soft kiss pressed against the side of her neck and she heard Jayce murmur, “Where’re you going, pretty lady? You running out on me?”

She let out a breath of a laugh and shrugged him off, twisting around to prop herself up on her elbows. “Yeah. Kinda.”

His hand rested on her stomach, thumb rubbing once over her skin, and he gave out a
hmm
of acknowledgement. Then he glanced up, and then added somberly, “Missed having you around, you know. I tried to look for you, hounded your mom a bit, but you were kind of—”

“Off the grid in crazy town?” She smiled, gave his hair a tug.

He let out a breath of a laugh and looked back up at her. When he spoke, however, it was genuine. “I don’t think you’re crazy.” His eyebrows knit, and then he added, “What happened?”

It was incredibly hard to talk to him like this, naked and warm beside her. He drew her closer, tucking her underneath him, and propped over her. There was that charming smile—that
familiar
smile—that made her feel both safe and sexy all at once. Something else, too—a nostalgic longing for something that
might’ve been
. She hadn’t talked about that night in years, and not to anyone but a therapist. “I saw…,” she started, and then corrected herself. “I
thought
I saw…” The image came again: orange-red eyes, human bones snapping into bear form. Cami shook her head, and then dropped it back.

Dry, hot emotion burned in her chest and the flames licked her throat, making her flush.
Control
, Cami. She imagined that the memory and all the fried, fretful emotions connected to it were in a safe inside of her. She imagined herself locking it. Tight. “I don’t know. It was a long time ago.”

Jayce’s eyebrows knitted with concern. “Cami—”

An electronic buzz interrupted her.

“Shit…one second…” Cami pulled away from him and reached over the edge of the bed, where her fingers fumbled until they came in contact with her purse. Her purse shivered with each vibration and she shoved her hand inside it and rummaged around until she managed to yank her phone out and put it to her ear. “Hello?”

“It’s a fucking disaster,” Seth spat on the other end. “I feel like I’m running the goddamn S.S.
Titanic
!”

“Slow down,” Cami said calmly, sitting up, fully accustomed to Seth’s outbursts. “What’s going on?”

“The power blew out. I mean, how are we supposed to cut hair in the
dark
?”

“Did you have all the hairdryers plugged in?” Cami’s walls went back up as she slipped into her authoritative skin. “That will blow the fuse. You have to leave them unplugged until you’re ready to use them. There’s a breaker in the supply closet. Do you see it?”

“It’s as dark as the mouth of hell here—hold on.” She could hear Seth swear and curse his way over and then he picked the phone back up with, “Alright. Got it.”

“Flip the top right switch. That should do it.”

She heard a moment’s pause from him, and then a shout of joy. “Hallelujah! Let there be light! Hey, listen—” All joy ebbed from Seth’s voice as he slipped back into a bitter tone. “I don’t know how much longer I can keep this shithole afloat, so you better come back pronto. Like, right after they put your mother in the hole. Got it? We need you, Cam. You’re our only hope.”

Never one for intros or outros, Seth hung up without so much as a
thank you
. Cami should have felt angry, used, or spent. Instead, she just felt cold inside. Her heart was carefully cased in steel-hard pragmatism.

“Trouble in paradise?” Jayce said, perched up in his spot on the bed.

“Work thing,” Cami said, tucking her phone back in her purse. She sighed, twisted around to look at Jayce, and then said, “Look…last night was fun. But I’m heading out of here first thing tomorrow. So.” She stuck her hand out, awkwardly. “Friends?”

A mild surprise flashed over Jayce’s face but, to his credit, he smiled through it. He took her hand and gave it a squeeze. “Yeah. Always.”

His eyes told another story, but that was his problem, not hers.

Jayce drove Cami back to the Tipping Point so she could pick up her (Marcus’s) truck. Jayce shut the door of his Camaro hard behind her and said, “It was really good. Seeing you again.”

“Yeah.” She’d already checked out, on the other side of the country, where hair dryers were buzzing and breaker lines were bursting and she could lose herself in the electric humdrum of the city and not have to
think
. She’d forgotten how silent a small town like Tyburn was, as though all the citizens were simultaneously holding their breath. She’d forgotten how much she hated the peace and quiet and the ever-growing presence of her own thoughts.

Jayce seemed to notice her pulling away because he, in his own way, let her. Though she knew that look in his eyes, that puppy-dog love, and it made her uncomfortable, just like Aunt Sadie’s tears. He turned back to his truck and said, “Alright, well. See you tomorrow.”

“What?” A flash of dread spread through her veins.

“At the service,” he said, as though it was obvious. At her expression, though, he changed his tune and added, “Unless you don’t want me there.”

A pang in her chest for this sweet, stupid, selfless boy who would forsake the funeral of the woman who—his words—had been like a mother to him, all because Cami was having some petty mental breakdown. She shook her head, tried to smile, and then said, “No, of course. I’ll see you there.”

Jayce gave her a small nod and then lifted his eyebrows towards her truck. “Careful on that thing,” he said as he climbed into his car. “That’ll kill you.”

Staying with Jayce had been a
mistake
. She’d allowed herself to feel—what? Safe here? Happy here?

Tyburn. It sucked you dry, like a shucked cornhusk. She’d be better off without it. Ever since she’d arrived here, she’d felt old demons start to surface again. That clean, icy control that she’d perfected so well in New York City was chipping away, bit by bit. It made her feel like screaming.

Control it. One more day and it’s over.