The Deeper We Get (17 page)

She unzipped her hoodie and threw it on a chair, her t-shirt was next, followed quickly by her jeans and socks. She was left in a matching light grey cotton bra and panties.

“Come here.” I wanted to tear the remaining fabric from her body, but tonight I would go
slowly, I would make her feel everything. I would give her the world.

She was on the bed next to me before I could blink. Her lips pressed against my chest, trailing wet kisses up to my lips.

“I want so much baby, all you have to give,” she whispered. “Make me feel.”

“Feel what?”

“Everything. I need it all.” She crushed her mouth to mine, her tongue dancing with mine.

I rolled her over so I was on top instead. I ran my lips down the column of her throat, lightly nipping with my teeth as I moved to her collarbone.

She trembled beneath me in anticipation. I slid the straps of her bra down her arms and pulled the cups down to reveal her creamy skin underneath. She was rosy tipped perfection and I needed my mouth on her—to taste her, bite her, lick her.

As I swirled my tongue around her pebbled flesh she moaned and pressed my head against her. I kneaded her soft mounds while I feasted on her
. I would never get enough of her.

“Do you need more?”

“You, I need you inside me right now,” she panted, her back arched.

“Lay back against the pillows.” I stood up and took a step back. Her eyes were glued to me as I peeled off my boxers and crawled back up on the bed, licking my way up from her toes until I reached her lips.

“Tell me you want it,” I hissed as I tore her panties off.

“I want it, I fucking want it
,” she screamed as I plunged inside of her.

“Shit
,” I groaned. “So good baby, always so good. You’re always so ready for me.” I ground my hips against hers, needed to feel the end of her, to fill her up completely.

“Chad.” Her eyes snapped shut, lost in sensation.

I hovered my mouth above hers, almost touching. “You belong to me,” I whispered against her lips.

“Yes, only for you.” She ran her tongue along my lower lip.

“I want you on top,” I growled and rolled off of her.

She straddled my hips and sank down onto me with a little moan. I grabbed her hands as she moved her hips, taking us both for a ride.

I watched her as she moved, nothing else existed for me. She was beautiful and all mine. I moved my hands down to grip her hips and moved in tandem with her.

“I’m so close baby.” She bit her lip.

“Go baby, I'm right with you,” I commanded, reaching my mouth up to lick and nip at her breasts.

“Chad!”
she screamed and fell against my chest. The world exploded into stars, the sensations were almost too intense.

She lay on top of me panting for a few moments. “Wow.”

“I know. That was so intense, more so than any other time.”

“I keep wondering if I’ll ever stop wanting you so much.” She rolled off of me and onto her side.

“Do you want to?” I studied her.

“It might make things easier. Sometimes the way I feel about you scares me.”

“You don’t have to be afraid with me. I’m in this just as deep.” I pulled her against me and kissed her senseless.

“I don’t want to be afraid
,” she whispered.

I didn’t know how to respond, her fears were totally warranted. All I could do was prove to her every day that I was worth it.

“Thank you for making this the best birthday I have ever had. I’ll remember these three days for the rest of my life.” A tear trickled down her cheek.

“I hope that’s a happy tear.” I wiped it away with my thumb.

“It is. You’re amazing.”

“I aim to please.” I smiled against her lips before kissing her.

Life was sort of back
to normal, but preparing for the trial was a lot more intense than I thought it would be. After our trip together Scarlet and I were more solid than ever. I felt like every day with her was a blessing.

“The judge denied your father’s plea of insanity.” Greg sat across the table from me in his conference room.

“Thank God. What’s next?”

“They already did the grand jury trial to see if there was enough for a case, and of course there was. In a couple of weeks we will begin jury selection.”

I had been nervous this process would be dragged out. “What am I going to have to do for all of this?”

“Obviously you will have to testify, as well as Miss Doyle.” He made some notes on his legal pad. “I’m going to have both of you meet with my paralegals to go over your testimony. We want you both to feel comfortable with how things will go. Since you’re here, after we are finished I’ll have you start with them today.”

“We can do that. What are the odds that he gets off?”

He put his pen down and looked at me
. “Slim to none. I never give odds like this, but with all of the evidence we have against him it would be a miracle for him to not be found guilty.”

“Good. I can’t tell you how much better I feel with him behind bars.”

“You both have been through a tremendous ordeal.” He looked sympathetic.

“I’ll be happier when this is all over.”

“That’s understandable. I think we’re about done here for the day.” He stood. “I’ll send in Ashley to start going over your testimony.”

“Thanks Greg, you’ve made this
process a lot easier for both me and Scarlet than other lawyers would have.”

“You’ve been through enough, we want this to be as easy as it can be on you.” He shook my hand before leaving the conference room.

A few minutes later Ashley came in. “Hi, I’m Ashley Stephens, one of Greg’s paralegals. It’s nice to meet you Chad.” She smiled and sat down across from me.

I nodded
. “You too.”

“Ok
ay, I have some questions first and then we’ll get into your testimony. Just know that anything I ask is designed to make your testimony stronger, not to make you feel bad in any way.”

“Ok
ay.” I got a bad feeling in the pit of my stomach that this was not going to be a fun experience at all.

“When you got to your apartment, why did you go inside if you thought you heard people in there?”

“I went in because I thought it could be friends or Scarlet.”

“You thought it would be Miss Doyle? Even though you had been broken up for a couple of weeks at this point?”

“I hoped it would be.” I sighed.

She nodded. “My next question is this, when your father first came to you, why didn't you call the police?”

“Why would I have? He had been released from prison and told me he had permission to be in California. He wasn't trying to harm me, just make amends.”

“At what point did you suspect he was using drugs again?”

“It was a while after he first showed up, I can’t remember the exact date.”

“When you knew he was using, why didn’t you call the police? That was obviously a violation of his parole.”

“I honestly don’t know. It never really occurred to me to call the police about it.” I shrugged.

“Ok
ay, now walk me through everything, from the very start of him showing up to the night in your apartment.”

My auto-pilot kicked on, and I told her everything. I wasn’t emotional about any of it anymore. I just wanted it all to be done and behind me.

“Okay, I’m sure we will be doing this a few more times before the trial. Greg will have questions for you. We’re all done for today.”

I followed her out of the room and continued down the hall to the front door. Scarlet was leaning against the hood of my car when I walked out.

“Hey.” I smiled.

“Hey yourself.”

“What are you doing here?”

“I thought maybe you could use some love after that.” She smiled.

“It wasn't that bad. But I’ll take the love anyway.” I pulled her against me.

“I can't wait for this all to be over.” She sighed.

I tipped her chin up to look in her eyes. “You know it’s going to be okay right? Greg has this totally under control.”

“I know he does. Just the thought of seeing him again freaks me out.” She shuddered.

“He can't ever hurt you again.”

“My brain knows that, but the irrational part of me doesn’t believe that.” She smiled weakly.

“We’re going to be okay.” I kissed her forehead and looked around for her truck. “Where’s your truck?”

“Frank dropped me off.”

“I was going right to the gym to meet Vin.”

“I can come with.”

I pressed my lips together to keep from saying no right away. This would be my first time back since my freak out and the crap with Tom. I was unsure of myself in the ring.

“What are you thinking?”
she asked.

“Nothing. You can come.”

“Just like that you’re saying yes?”

“Yeah, just like that. I’m not going to make the same mistakes I made in the past. I want to be an open book to you. So, I’m going to tell you that this is my first time back in a long time. And, the last time I was there, my head wasn’t in a good place and I sort of lost my shit and wailed on Vin. I didn’t want to tell you that, I didn't want to tell anyone about it, but I don't want to hide anything from you. I also wanted you to know why I’m a little nervous today.”

“I appreciate your honesty more than you know. But I already knew about the thing at the gym. Vin told me about it.”

My eyebrows shot up.

“He was worried about you and didn’t know how to help. I didn’t know what to do with the information since we were broken up still.”

“Well, I guess we should go then.” I opened her door for her.

“Are you okay with me being there? I don’t have to go, you can just drop me at home.” She looked at me, searching my eyes for the answer.

“I want you there. You are my safe place baby.” I put my forehead against hers.

“I love you,” she whispered.

“I love you too.” I pulled back and looked at her.

“What?” she asked.

“I’m afraid that I’ll disappoint you. I’m human,
and I know that I’ll mess up again. I can’t be without you anymore, you’ve become so enmeshed in my heart that it’s hard to tell where I end and you begin. I need you more than I need to breathe.”

“I know that you’ll make mistakes,
and I will too. I promise that I'm not going to run away anymore when things get hard. I’m giving you my trust, I don't want you to always be afraid of letting me down.”

“We can do this. We can be adults in a relationship. Work through the hard parts. I know you’re worth it.”

“Come on, let’s go so I can watch you beat the crap out of your best friend.” She smiled.

“Hey, you never know
, he could kick my ass today since I’m out of practice.”

“Somehow I don't see that happening.”

“Yeah, me neither.” I laughed.

Vin was talking with Ian
when we walked into the gym.

“Well look who it is, good to see you back in here man.” Ian grinned at me.

“It took me a while to find my way back,” I replied honestly. “I’m going to go back and get changed. Keep an eye on my girl will you Vin? I know how much of a lech your brother is.”

“Hey, I don’t lech
after taken girls.” He looked offended

“You don’t? Since when?” Scarlet shot back. “I can remember several occasions where you hit on a girl in a steady relationship.”

“Hey, well, I promise not to lech after your chick bro.”

“Yeah, like I’d let you.” Scarlet punched him in the arm.

“Truer words have never been spoken. You're too much of a challenge for me anyway.”

I headed back to the locker room listening to them argue. Life was finally getting back to normal. This was what it should be like all the time. Not dealing with crazy psychopath fathers who hold a knife to your girl’s throat and stab you repeatedly. I needed more normal, I was done with crazy for a while.

I changed quickly and grabbed my hand wraps from the bottom of my locker before heading back out to one of the benches.

“You ready for this?” Vin asked.

“I think so.” I taped up my knuckles.

“Where is your head at?”

“In a much better place. Things are good. Scarlet’s good, I’m good.”

“You just said the word good way too many times.” He laughed.

“I know I did. I don't know any other way to describe it though. Things are way better. We’re totally solid now.”

“Good, you two are great together
. You just needed to figure your shit out, and stop making an ass of yourself all the time.”

“Everything with my dad should never have happened. I should never have lied about it, and he should never have been able to get to her.”

“It happened, and now it’s done. I’m happy you could move past it.”

I nodded and wrapped my hands up. My blood was
already pumping in anticipation of getting into the ring again.

“I’ll see you up there.” He wandered off and left me alone with my thoughts.

I cleared my head of everything but boxing. I didn't want anything else to cloud this. Being honest with myself, I was terrified that this would go poorly. Either I would wig out or get my ass handed to me by Vin in front of Scarlet.

I got up and walked up into the ring where Vin was waiting. Ian was standing off to the side with Scarlet.

“You ready?” Vin asked.

“Yep, let’s do this shit.” We bumped gloves and spread apart.

He circled around me, looking for his opening. In my head I told myself I was going to let him get a few shots in for what happened last time. But the second I saw his fist come at me that changed. I dodged out of the way and rounded on him with a shot to his side.

“Good, I was worried you had gone soft with all that relationship shit back there.” He grinned around his mouth guard.

“Fuck off. I’ll show you soft.” I ran at him and threw a series of punches that all landed. Damn this felt good.

“Come on, keep at it.” He danced around me. “I’m still standing, show me what you’ve got.”

It hit me then that he might be letting me get my hits in. “You going easy on me?” I demanded, pinning him to the ropes.

“Never.” He pushed me back and knocked my head back with a solid hit to the chin.

“Better.” I hit him back, square in the jaw.

“Is that it?”
he taunted.

“You tell me, you’ve barely landed anything. Maybe
you’re the one out of practice?” I laughed and sidestepped a body shot.

He launched himself and pinned
me to the ropes while he rained blow after blow to my sides and back.

Goddamn this was what I needed, that little bit of pain and violence in the right arena with the right person. It kept me sane.

I shoved him back and hit him with an uppercut and a shot to the nose. He got me right back with a shot to the cheek.

Ian rang the bell
, and we went to our corners. I felt alive again.

“Holy shit. Are you both
okay?” Scarlet asked as she ran up.

“Better than
okay.” I spit out my mouth guard and grinned.

“What he said.”
Vin wiped at the blood coming from his nose.

I had a cut just by my eye that
had blood running down my cheek but I didn’t care. This was what had been missing the last few weeks.

“Come here, let me clean that up.” She held out a paper towel.