By the time I stood in the parking lot with my cell, I was trembling so hard I barely could punch in the numbers.
It rang once, twice, three times.
Every instinct in me screamed for me to hang up. The guy was already busy tonight. I was just another Sunday for him. The note meant nothing. Maybe I was his backup. Maybe it wasn’t even -
“Hello?”
Music blasted through the background, but even in the cell’s tinny speaker, his voice seeped into me like dark chocolate.
“Yo?” he said again.
“Hi, uh, yes.”
The speaker hissed with the intake of breath. “Cadbury.”
“Sean…” Even at this distance I felt inadequate, like a human talking to a tornado. What would this man want with me?
“You done for the night?”
“I am. I thought I’d finally use that note.”
“Does this call mean that you weren’t troubled about the other night’s festivities?”
“I’m ok with them. I’m…good, even. I had a good day.”
“You’ve got no idea how relieved I am to hear that, baby.”
The last word crawled down my body firing up every nerve available to feel with. I could barely speak. “Thanks.”
“Thanks? Thanks for what?”
“It was new. I think I liked the experience.”
“Is that right?” The music went muffled, and his voice came in a whisper. “If that’s the case, then I’d love to get that thanks in person.”
Of course that’s where this led, where it had been heading ever since I dialed. But his words still hit me like the force of a truck.
“What do you say?” he asked, his voice a seduction in my ear. “Shall I come pick you up?”
I could handle another bout with him, and that was all I was agreeing to. The loud part of me that usually cared about the future of things had gone quiet.
I started to nod, then realized and said, “Yes.”
He chuckled and the music came back on. “Well, alright then. You stay right where you are.”
I paced the glass front of the restaurant after he hung up, trying to convince myself to just leave. I could, rationally speaking, but deep down, I’d never been so sure of needing something in my life. Already I felt a space in my body for him.
It hadn’t been ten minutes before one of the sets of headlights whipping by on the street ahead, slowed instead and pulled into our roundabout and next to me. I couldn’t see through the tinted windows, but the passenger door nudged open.
I climbed in. Sean sat reclined in his seat, hand on the wheel like the car was driving itself and he was just directing it. His tan skin glistened in the blur of street lights, and his grin dazzled in them.
He swooped an arm around me and tugged me in for a kiss.
Neither of us had said a word before he pulled back onto the road. My mind returned to me.
“Where are we headed?” I asked.
“To my place.”
“Oh.” Down the long boulevard, I could see down the banks at the lower class suburbs mangy with light. They weren’t unsafe for me or anything, but I didn’t feel comfortable making my way back alone if I had to either.
Right as I was about to voice my thoughts, he pulled off into Lafayette Park, then turned into the lot of a fenced off complex. I gaze up at the lofts - not towering, but tall for Detroit.
“You live here?”
“Surprised?” His voice was littered with a smile.
“Nope.” I wasn’t going to admit that, but it did make me revise my opinion. How good a fighter was this guy?
He parked the car and escorted me by the elbow in to the elevator. The silence persisted as we stood waiting, and his muscles tensed tighter around me. I could feel the strength of him barely concealed by the sleeves of my uniform top. It coiled tighter around me, passing his fire to me.
Finally, the doors dinged open. Sean hit the fourth button then turned on me, pressing me into a corner. His mouth crushed down on mine and trapped my head between his strength and the unyielding wall. It probed me tenderly, then insistently and then his hand cupped my chin and his tongue mingled with mine.
The elevator rose slowly. I felt I was floating up into the clouds, lifted by this madman at my lips. His other hand started working at my chest. I moaned into his mouth at the swell of sensation tearing down from his touch and it echoed in the confines of the room. By the time the doors dinged open, my clothes were already unbuttoned and his hands were inching down my bra.
He half-led/half-dragged me back to his place. In the moonlight, I got glimpses of cream walls, minimalist but elegant furniture and modern art pieces perched atop them. Then Sean shut the apartment door and unleashed on me.
His hands yanked down my pants and scattered my bra to the hardwood floor. I started getting his shirt off and he finished, mouth on me in between pulling the cloth over his head.
His muscles rippled in the pale night light as he staggered me back towards his room. When we finally arrived, we were both bare and I fell backwards onto his sheets. I had finally descended onto his cloud. He landed over me, a giant white beast, his grin spreading like a wolf.
“You look so fucking good,” he growled.
“You look fierce,” I murmured.
“Glad you see what you’re about to get.”
His mouth sank down over a breast. I cried out at the ceiling as he slathered it with attention. I could feel his hunger pulling me open, just like he had the night past. Now I could spread my legs as wide as the longing for him I felt between them.
He probed me there and came back up with glistening fingers.
“You’ve been aching for this,” he said.
“Ever since I woke up the next morning,” I sighed. “Take me. Take me how you want.”
The shimmer of his eyes narrowed as he finally understood how mad I was for his body. He shifted himself over me and entered smooth and deep and full. The sound that erupted from me was one I’d never heard myself make.
The sound came over and over, and I came with it several times that night. He had me on my knees and my back and my side and my stomach, and even overhead. I felt him buried deep in me as I thrust on and off him, heard the wild sounds of our union and the groans from my man.
Finally, he came over me one last time; a hot, tight finish with his hands trying to fasten my body to his. When he released me, the sheets were a tangle of our sweat and more. We lay loosely in each other.
All the energy he’d put in me that day was gone, spent and returned back to him. He looked just as exhausted as me though. His eyes were already shut, and all of his fight was gone. I had a notion to leave, and knew I should, but his arm lay tight around my shoulders and there was something soothing about the way his breathing was off pace.
He had held nothing back from me. He was the kind of man who would risk everything and anything. That gave me a moment of terror. I could only imagine how he fought.
But then my mind started to fade, and I thought it wasn’t such a bad way to live your life. Whatever else he was, he lived honestly.
At least lying here with him, I could start to feel a little bit the same.
CHAPTER EIGHT
Sean
I opened my eyes and saw Gabi heaving peacefully next to me.
I blinked a couple times and pinched my thigh and she was still there.
Goddamn.
I tipped onto my side to watch her sleep. Her smooth dark form was bare and spread on my sheets, soft as them but a stark contrast of color. She’d tugged the blanket up to her waist. I had the urge to lift it up and peek at the treasures I had tasted, but she looked too peaceful to disturb.
Many girls had been through here. Many had been lying where she was, but none had left me so mesmerized - hell, so consumed. I should be out at the gym by now. I wasn’t typically all that delicate in getting my hookups up and stumbling out the door. Her chest swelled and fell and I couldn’t do anything more than watch.
Hell, I had to pee, and I didn’t even want to nudge her by accident to do that.
She sighed deeply and turned my way. I looked at the delicate features of her face, and tried to picture Marcia’s face on there. That’s what this was about right? The satisfaction of finally doing well enough to bed an upper crust girl? Well, upper crust for a poor guy from Downriver like me.
Only I couldn’t even remember Marcia when I saw Gabi. I just saw her. There was a feeling from my chest to my stomach that I couldn’t quite comprehend: part lust, part ease and part fear. It was one thing to have her witness my life, but it seemed like I was actually considering let her linger in it. How long would it take before she saw how thin these fancy walls were?
Pop and Sarah were still there. That rickety house was still there. The only thing holding me in this room were my two fists. For the first time, I worried there might not be enough there for me to keep what I had.
In MMA, people only came to see you when you were on your way up. If I hit a level that I couldn’t beat…well, it would squash me back down and I’d lose everything else with it.
I really needed to hit the gym.
Gabi’s eyes fluttered to life as if she’d read my mind. Her brow wrinkled and she looked at the room past me.
“Morning, baby,” I said. “You know where you are?”
“I do,” she croaked, then cleared her throat. “It just looks different in the day.”
“Wasn’t planning on staying this long?” I asked.
“I didn’t but that’s fine.” She looked on either side of her. “Can you find me my phone?”
Her purse was by me. I picked out her phone and handed it to her. She took a glance at the screen and her eyes nearly popped out of her head.
“It’s 10:15?!”
“Yeah, kind of a late morning. You don’t got work right?”
“Oh, crap,” she just said, tapping on her screen. “My dad’s going to be livid.”
“Your dad? I thought you were a college girl.”
“I’m staying home for the summer. Gotta keep the good girl act up.”
She finished typing whatever, then sank back into the pillow with a sigh. Chalk up another difference between us - my dad had stopped paying attention to my goings and comings long ago, except when he needed a ride to the hospital. Hers kept tabs on her?
Something about the thought of me holding someone’s little girl lit a fire inside me. I crept atop Gabi.
“You’re
not
a good girl though,” I whispered. “You did a lot of things last night that good girls don’t do.”
Her eyes drank me in and started to sink under my spell, but then they snapped open. She shoved at my chest.
“No,” she said. “I’ve gotta be there in fifteen.”
“Why’s that?”
“I made up an excuse that I was out with Jada. She’ll drop me off in her car, and I’ll pick mine up later.”
I chuckled. This felt like middle school shenanigans. “What does she drive?”
“Dark black SUV.”
If that wasn’t fate talking then I didn’t know what was. “Well, I’ve got one of those,” I said. “I can drop you off.”
I landed a kiss on her lips.
“No,” she said. “I need to-“
I sank hard onto her, cutting her off with a longer kiss. Her lips moved rough against mine, but she pressed me back.
“Sean,” she said, but it was more surrender than protest. Her eyes were dim with lust.
I wrapped an arm around her head and settled back onto her mouth, finishing the kill. Her body tensed as if with rigor mortis, then softened against me. Her lips started to move on mine. Any fear about where this all was headed evaporated from my head. We were both here now.
I pressed into her mouth and savored her taste. Even in the morning, her breath came only slightly bitter. After I licked that away, there was only sweetness. She couldn’t move with me weighing on her, and I took my time nibbling her full lips. She let out a low moan that had me instantly hard at my center.
I kissed my way down her chin and indulged in her dark, velvety neck. Her soft sounds rumbled through me, and she ran her hands uselessly through my short buzz of hair. All of her was already bare to me, free to taste and consume as I desired.
When I had my fill of her sounds, I went up her breast and started sucking at the center. She cried out, but I gathered more of her and brought it inside my mouth.
Such simple pleasure - but somehow even this part of her was more succulent than anything I’d had before. I took turns on each breast, then continued down towards her heat, her wetness.
She keened as I enveloped it. I was in no mood to flirt around. Her tasted rushed into me, and I lapped furiously, bring about more and more of it. Her hand scratched against fabric and her legs writhed about me. I laid them still with one press of my arm and continued eating her dark center.
Under my focused attention, she barely lasted two minutes. Her voice shimmered and cracked and I was rewarded with a rush of liquid satisfaction. I went back to her gasping face and smothered it with a kiss, taking her fully in my arms. She was mine. Whether she or I could understand it, we had sway over each other.