Unforgiven (36 page)

“Your hair looks beautiful, but if you complain about it again, I’m going to get your curling iron out and do it for you. I’ve never in my life used one, and I can pretty much guarantee you’ll regret it if I do.” She gave him a small smile, laughing even through her tears at that. She nodded. He nodded.

The rest of the day was very similar to their morning. She was stoic, and he watched. He watched and watched and watched. The funeral was small, and as far as funerals went, perfect. She cried, sobbing silently as they lowered her mother’s casket into the ground, and he brushed his own tears away at nothing more than the pain of seeing her hurting so much. He stood beside her, letting Michelle support her with an arm around her waist as he waited for her to need him. Michelle walked away to greet someone she knew, and Bailey turned toward him, gripping the side of his waist harshly and desperately. She didn’t touch him other than that, and it seemed all she was capable of doing to let him know it was okay to touch her.

He pulled her into his arms, and she let him hold her. Her hand found his lower back under his suit jacket, and he stroked the back of her neck. His parents were there, and his mother smiled through her tears at them. His father squeezed her hand, and after they both hugged her and patted him on the shoulder they were gone.

Walking away from the gravesite was the hardest part for her. She kept looking back. She couldn’t seem to stop looking, and it took them nearly ten minutes to reach his car. She was crying quietly by the time he got her into the car, and she was sitting in a silent stupor by the time they pulled up in front of his home. She sat on the deck for hours that afternoon, and it was dark when she finally came inside. He was trying to give her space, but it wasn’t what he wanted. She sat on the couch next to him, and she laid her head in his lap.

“You’re going to get through this.” He stroked gently over her forehead as she looked up to him. She nodded slightly, but she remained quiet. He’d not heard her voice for hours, and it left the silence in the house unbearable.

She fell asleep eventually, and he carried her upstairs to bed. There was nothing to do but fall asleep when she was like this.

The next five days were the same. She woke. She slept. She ate. He’d try to talk to her, but he didn’t get much response—one or two words at most and then silence. She snuggled up close to him every night, and it was about as much emotion as he saw. He worked when he was scheduled, and Michelle came over every day to see her, bring her lunch when he wasn’t there, and stay for hours sometimes. She’d sit on the back deck with Bailey and just wait for her to show some sign of life. He’d arrive home from work and join them.

The first night she showed any improvement came on day six after her mother’s funeral. Michelle was over, and they were grilling salmon on the back deck that night. As they sat at the patio table having dinner, they were reminiscing about growing up together in Savoy. Jess came up, and Michelle started talking about the time Jess punched one of the football players for telling Bailey he wanted to “hit that.” He was referring to Bailey’s ass, and he was referring to fucking it. But apparently the phrase “hit that” wasn’t one Jess knew, and she assumed the player was being an asshole. The player was being an asshole, just not the kind of asshole Jess thought he was being. It earned her a one-week suspension at school, and the suspension earned her a one-month grounding at home.

Darren was in college at that point, and he could still remember talking to her on the phone as she railed on and on about the unfairness of life. He’d tried not to laugh at her, but it was hard. He’d instantly called Bailey after he’d hung up with Jess, and he’d ended up staying on the phone with her nearly all night. He used to get hard just talking to her, and there was no limit to what he was willing to do to his body if he happened to be alone while he was talking to her. Some of his best masturbatory orgasms were while he was on the phone with her. She simply didn’t realize it.

Bailey looked up and smiled, laughed quietly as they remembered Jess and just what a spitfire she could be. Both he and Michelle gaped at her sudden smile and laughter, and then they stowed their shock quickly, not wanting to scare her sudden bout of contentment away. Michelle left shortly after that, but her step was lighter, her smile easier as she hugged Bailey good night.

Over the course of the next five days, she made steady improvements. At first it was just a random smile about something, but soon her voice came back, and she started talking again—really talking. He was relieved. Michelle was too, and after dinner one night, after Michelle had left for the evening, he pulled Bailey down to sit between his legs on one of the loungers.

“Kind of nice to see you smile.”

She hummed as she contemplated that. “Why haven’t you touched me?”

Her question took him a bit by surprise. He swallowed, his body already responding. “I didn’t know you wanted me to. You’ve been a bit difficult to read.” He kissed the back of her neck.

“Will you touch me?” Her voice was hesitant and quiet.

“What does it mean to you if I do?” He didn’t need to be told he sounded like a chick when he said that, but he needed to know where things stood with them, and he didn’t like that this was so up in the air.

“Does it have to mean anything? If memory serves, you were the king of meaningless sex.” She didn’t intend to hurt his feelings, but those words cut to the bone.

He stood, walking away as her eyes followed him. He went to bed early, still fully clothed, and fell asleep to bad dreams. She hadn’t followed him, and he was avoiding her because he didn’t want to argue with her.

“Please touch me.” Her voice whispered against his ear, and her hands were in his pants, already touching and stroking him. He was still dressed, but she was naked, and he could feel the warmth of her pussy against his cloth-covered thigh. Her hips moved, and she was pushing herself so greedily against him.

If he hadn’t been hard when she started, he was by the time he woke to her breathy and frustrated voice in his ear. “Bailey.” He mumbled her name as he woke up, and then her lips met his. Her tongue pushed past his lips, and he groaned. He’d needed her touch from the moment he saw her again in the hospital—hell, since the moment she left Savoy—but he wasn’t at all sure this was a good idea under the circumstances. She’d been virtually catatonic for days, and now she was trying to ravish him in the middle of the night after offending him with the truth earlier in the evening.

“Please. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to be rude.”

Her hand was stroking his rigid arousal, and she was being rough, desperate. “Stop for a second.” He waited for her to slow the stroke of her hand, and when she was panting beside him, he pulled her hand from him and slid it down between her legs. She parted her thighs, and he guided her fingers between the lips of her sex, letting the moisture coat them both, and when he pushed her own finger in with his, she cried out. His hand was on top of hers, and his finger was buried deep inside her next to her own. He stroked the top of her middle finger with his as he plunged through her silky wet cum.

“This isn’t meaningless. Say it.”

She groaned before she could respond. “This isn’t meaningless.”

“Never with us.” He let his lips brush against her temple. He didn’t expect her to repeat that, but she did. Her voice was breathy and aroused, and he pushed another finger inside her pussy. She was quivering around their fingers, and he pushed slowly as the breadth distended and stretched her.

She started whimpering, her hips writhing as he plunged their fingers in and out. Her stomach and chest rose and fell quickly as she panted and her body readied. And when she finally came, she bit into his shoulder. She lay panting, and he stared down at her, finally seeing a small glimpse of her.

When she reached for the buttons of his shirt, he watched her slowly undo one after the other. She pushed the shirt off his shoulders, and before it had even fallen to the bed, she was working on the button and zipper of his pants. She climbed up, pulling his pants and underwear down his legs as he stretched out, and then she straddled him. He could feel the soaking wet moisture of her sex coating his cock as she moved into position, and he rested back with his hands behind his head to watch.

She rocked her hips, sliding the cleft of her pussy along his length, and he groaned at the heat. When she reached the head, she leaned over, planting one hand above his shoulder and using the other to guide his dick to her entry. She slid back down slowly. He could feel that heat enveloping his cock as she pushed deeper and deeper. Her nipples brushing across his chest were just added torment, and when he was fully embedded in her, she pushed down even farther and tightened around him. He cursed, and he hissed, and she watched his reaction. He let her move up and down his length a few times, becoming entranced by her rhythm and her slow, gentle pace, but then he sat up, bringing his face right up to hers. She started to wrap her legs around him, but he stopped her.

“Keep your knees on the bed.” She searched his eyes for a second, but she did. “Lean back, all the way to the bed. Arch your back.” She looked incredible as she arched her back and came to rest with her shoulders and head on the bed between his calves. It stretched out her torso, and he ran his hands along her flat, smooth belly. “Grab my ankles, and use them to push back to me.”

He gripped the sides of her waist, pulling her pelvis tight over his engorged cock. He tightened his buttocks, pushing himself deep, and he used her hips to fuck him. When he leaned over her to pull her nipple into his mouth, she cried out, but her hips started working on their own as he sucked, nipped, and licked the hard, pink peak. He moved to the other side, and by the time he was done there, she was gasping and panting, wriggling against his body. He sat up straight so he could look down on her body, and he turned his attention to her sex. It was the most perfect view of her parted lips and his buried dick. There was a slight swell to her belly where his dick was seated, and he ran his hand over it, pushing down slightly and feeling it on the head of his penis.

When he massaged his way down to her clit, she let out a strangled cry, and her sheath tightened around him. He used one thumb to pull the skin above her clit back, exposing the swollen little nub all the more, and when he licked the pad of his other thumb, she watched. Her hands were tightening on his ankles, and when he touched her clit, her nails dug into him painfully. She started pushing back to him, and he started clenching and releasing his buttocks in rapid succession as he watched his dick sink farther and then pull back. His cock was glistening with her wetness, and as he rubbed gently across her clit, her sheath clenched and trembled around him. As their speed quickened, his finger swirled around her nub, and he used his free hand to push down gently on the swell of her stomach.

Her face looked nearly panicked in her need to explode, and when she did, she screeched and released his ankles, twisting her hands in the sheets. Even stretched back, he could see her taut stomach muscles contracting under her slim waist, and just as her release started to subside, he gripped both her hips, jerking them down hard on his groin as he clenched his butt and drove deep into her. He held the depth as he came, and he crumpled over on top of her, resting his cheek on her chest.

He listened to her heartbeat as it gradually slowed, and when she could move again, she stretched her legs out from their cramped, bent position. She lay stretched out, panting, and he was still bent at the waist over her body as he regained his own breath. He peered up to her face, resting his chin between her breasts, and she tucked her chin down as she looked back at him. He stretched his hand up, running his fingers down her neck and caressing gently across her skin. She sighed, and the sound was so replete he almost sighed himself at just the contentment. When he’d caught his breath enough to sit upright again, he spent many long minutes caressing over the skin of her chest and then farther down to her stomach. He was still inside her, but he was relaxed, and when he caressed over her belly, the swell was gone.

He didn’t want to leave her body, but he finally pulled away. He stood and stretched, and she watched him as she stretched too. She had to be sore, or at the very least stiff. It was a hell of a way to fuck, and he was exhausted. He crawled in next to her, pulling her back to his chest, and rested his hand across her throat, feeling her swallow occasionally. He drifted away.

“Bailey, we need to talk about your plans. Your PO in Memphis is getting antsy, though I suspect he’s always that way. I’ve smoothed things over for the time being, but he expects to know soon if you’re staying in Savoy or moving back to Memphis.”

“How soon does he need to know?” She’d been lying with her head at the foot of Darren’s bed, watching him as he stood naked at the bathroom sink shaving, but when the cordless phone on his nightstand rang and caller ID said it was her old PO, Harold, she had to give up the view—very reluctantly. Now she was lying with her head in the appropriate place, and she was glad. This wasn’t really a conversation she wanted to have with Darren in the room, but she knew if she left, he’d notice, not to mention be offended. It didn’t mean she was going to advertise their conversation, either.