Survival (Twisted Book 1) (22 page)

“What did you buy?”

He smiled. He was proud of himself.

“A patchwork blanket and…” he pulled something cream out from under the blanket. “A bunny comforter. I thought since we’re eating like rabbits, it fits.”

“I love you.”

“You just want me for my shopping skills,” he winked and threw his arm around me. “Love you, too.”

I took the bunny off him and caressed the little square of blanket attached to it.

My phone rang and I pulled it from my bag, sighing when I saw the name on the screen. Thomas sighed, too, and took the trolley while I answered the call.

“Hi, Nina.”

***

We waited with baited breath as the little white stick
laid on the back of the bathroom sink. Thomas held my hand and we stared. And stared.

We sagged in disappointment when only one line appeared.

“Next month,” I smiled weakly.

“Next month.”

Thomas wrapped his arms around me and nuzzled into my neck.

***

I was running late. I was sitting in Thomas’ office finishing off some things for Nina. I tried to get it done before he got out of the shower, but when I hear
d the remains of water drip down the pipe just outside the window, I knew I was caught. I wasn’t supposed to be working. I’d had a chest infection for a couple of weeks and I was drained. Under Thomas’ orders, when out of the office, I stepped out of the office; which meant he was not going to be happy that I was sitting in his chair and being sneaky.

I jumped when I felt him enter the room. The back of the chair moved when he held onto it and leaned down to kiss my bare shoulder. I had been getting ready to join him in the shower when Nina emailed me, so I had run downstairs naked.

“What are you doing?” He breathed, knowing full well what I was doing. He could see the screen without his glasses on.

“I just have to finish this.” I coughed and he rubbed my back before moving round and sitting on the edge of the desk.

“I asked you to stop.”

I rolled my head and sat back in the chair to look at him.

“I’m done, it’s done. She’s my boss, I can’t say no.”

“Yes, you can,” he kissed my forehead, stood up and held out his hand. “Shift over, it’s shower time. I put some eucalyptus oil in the shower. It’ll clear your chest.”

“Thanks, doctor.”

I rose heavily from the chair and went to shower. I could tell by the tension in Thomas’ body that he was mad, though he hid it well.

Something sweet, tender, romantic and real…That was what we had. And nothing, nothing, could compare to that.

February, 2011.

All I could see was the outline of Thomas’ body when he placed my legs over his thighs and my back arched as he pulled me onto his lap. Cupping my face, his thumb traced my bottom lip before he replaced it with his mouth and sealed it over mine. I wrapped my arms around his neck and his fingertips tickled a trail down my back and to my hips.

He lifted me onto him, lowering my body onto his and g
ently easing into me, forcing gentle laments of pleasure to escape from us. My grip tightened, our tongues stroked and danced, sealing our connection. I felt whole. Thomas kept his hands on my hips, controlling my rhythm as I moved on top of him and sighed in tender bliss.

Our movements were slow, allowing our hands to explore as we conducted the sensual dance these nights created. Life had run away with us, but we would always have our chemistry, the hunger for each other that allowed us to shut the world out and consume each other.

Thomas lifted his hips as I rocked into him. I leaned back with my hands on the mattress behind me. We could see everything; every time he slid in and we lost ourselves in each other; every expression and gasp as the pleasure took control of all other sensations.

I shivered as Thomas rolled his hips, the intense power of his thrusts easing me ever nearer towards ecstasy.

No words were spoken; we simply watched each other and listened to every sigh, every moan, every ragged breath as we took each other.

He laid me back, locking my ankles at the bottom of his back, linked his fingers with mine and raised our hands above my head. Long, slow strokes had me pulsing around him, drawing him into the depths of my soul. My core tightened and I succumbed. I let my release crash over me, freeing me from my own mind. I tensed and tightened, encouraging him to follow me. He let go with a guttural groan and spilled into me, letting us escape to a world where only we existed.

Exhausted, Thomas collapsed next to me and pulled me into him. I didn’t bother setting the alarm.

I closed my eyes and fell asleep in the arms of the man I loved.

He was kind of freaky. He was kind of an animal…I was unaware, but I was slowly coaxing the animal out of its cage.

February 18
th
, 2011.

“Skye, can't you just leave it?”

Thomas ran his hands through his hair and groaned in exasperation. We’d just returned home from one of his work functions. I knew he was tired; the beer was wearing off, his stomach was probably growling with the need to be fed and, judging by the equally hungry growl rumbling low in his chest, so was his stronger, more demanding appetite.

I on the other hand, was antsy and I was frantically trying to ease it.

Thomas had held out his hands in the taxi on the way home, but I didn’t want to play. I refused the gift, accepting that I’d pay for it later, one way or another, and left him to pay for the taxi while I went inside. And now I was battling with the cushions. It’s what I did when I was restless. I couldn’t control my emotions but I had control over the way the house looked.

“You know I can't.”

I frantically arranged the cushions…and then rearranged them again. I couldn’t get them to look right.

“Leave them.”

“No.”

I pulled them from the sofa and began placing them in a new arrangement.

“Are you trying to piss me off?”

“Piss you off?”

“Work me up, rile me. Whatever.”

“What?” I stood up and saw him in the doorway with his feet shoulder width apart and his arms folded over his broad chest. “No.”

Maybe.
God, I loved that stance. It rendered me speechless, unintelligent…frazzled. Seeing him like that made my stomach flip and heat like a burning flame ready to explode into a flash tore through me.

“Tell me again like you mean it.”

I stood my ground. I didn’t want to play games…I didn’t
think
I wanted to play games. I picked up a cushion and launched it at him. It bounced off his chest and sighed in defeat as it hit the floor with a huff. Yeah, the cushion knew where we were heading, too.

“I don’t want to have sex with you.”

He strode purposefully towards me. He knew. My denial held about as much conviction as a stripper refusing a raise.

I gasped as he gripped my hip and reared me back to the wall, forcing my breath to escape in a gust. The pictures fell from the sideboard as I gripped it for support. Thomas’ hips pinned me to the wall. I was trapped when he grabbed my hands and held them against the wall by my sides.

“I don’t believe you,” he growled. “I know your game.”

“You do?” I matched the aggression in his voice with
a ferocity of my own.

I had been suffering with it all night; the palpitating ache, the searing erotic rage. I knew it and he knew it.

“Yes,” he sucked my bottom lip, leaving it swollen and tingling when he pulled back and his eyes bore into mine. “You don’t want to be caught. You want to be taken. You want me to fuck you so hard I send the tension into next week.”

I whimpered.

“Admit it,” he breathed as his teeth pulled at my ear. “Do you want me to fuck you senseless?”

“Yes.”

I released a shaky groan when his hand slipped between us, pulled up my dress and a gentle stroke betrayed my efforts to conceal my arousal. I was soaked.

“See? You were going to deny it. You were going to go to bed aching for my dick but refusing to take what’s yours.”

“Yes,” I crashed my head back.

“Why?” He pulled my underwear aside, and wasted no time diving through my drenched folds, filling me with two fingers while his thumb found my clit.

“I want you to take it,” I hummed, rocking my hips into his hand.

Through the blood that roared in my ear and the quivering that quickly built in my core, I heard him growl; an unrestrained sign of primal, carnal delight. He snapped my underwear away and I watched his eyes darken as he tugged open his trousers. The button popped off, the zip tore and his rigid length replaced his thumb, the crown coaxing the nub to swell and pulse.

He shoved me up the wall, lifted me from the floor and I cried out as he pulled my legs tight around his waist, allowing himself to slam into me in one powerful move and he did fuck the tension into next week. Relentlessly.

Was I crazy? Was I that crazy girlfriend? I’d never felt more like a batshit crazy spinster…Was I a batshit crazy spinster?

March 19
th
, 2011.

Thomas had a ‘work thing’ on Saturday night. He usually said that when he planned to spend the night with Chaz and Joel. It almost always involved sport so, technically, he could get away with calling it a work thing. Beth and I planned to go out for dinner and few drinks.

Things were okay with her but, honestly, I was distracted. Having her around made me crave a family more than I ever thought possible.  I’d slowly gone from nothing to having everything I ever wanted. Now all I wanted was to be a mother; to hold a bundle of innocence in my arms and know that Thomas and I would raise it together and love it forever. But it just wasn’t happening.

And now Thomas was going away, I’d be home alone for the night and I would miss him.

“You’ll remember what I said?”

Thomas dragged his weekend bag down the stairs and dropped it in front of the door.

“Yes. I’m the obsessive one, remember?”

He laughed and kissed the tip of my nose, “Humour me…What did I say?”

“Don’t walk Buster in the dark, make sure all the doors are locked by sunset and switch off the downstairs sockets before I go to bed.”

“That’s my girl.”

He kissed me between the eyebrows. I closed my eyes.

“I don’t want you to go.”

“I don’t want to go, but
it’s work. It’s just one night.”

I could count the number of nights we’d been apart since I moved in on one hand. My Ikea furnished shoebox was no match for the four
bedroom, three bath castle Thomas lived in. Okay, it wasn’t a castle, but it had its own grounds and no nosey neighbours overlooking it. He’d been there three years when we met and he spent every evening and weekend renovating it until it was perfect. As far as I was concerned, it was our castle. We were living our fairy tale, only one of us was flying the coop for the night.

The last thing we needed was to be spending the night apart.
In separate towns.

“Can’t you stay? Isn’t that one of the perks of being the boss?”

“Yes,” he rolled his eyes, but couldn’t hide the smile that played on his lips. “But it comes with the job, too. If I spend my days sitting behind a desk barking orders, I’ll lose all respect and become detached.”

I sighed. I knew he was right. You couldn’t control what you didn’t invest yourself in. I knew he had to
go, I just didn’t want him to.

“I know.”

“I’ll drive home first thing in the morning. We’ll turn our phones off and do something. Just the two of us.”

Perfect. We had spent so much time around people lately; colleagues at functions, Fran and Martin’s new fortnightly dinners, time with our friends and dates with Beth and Jack. We barely had the time to enjoy each other. Our ivory tower had an open invitation.

The realisation of my dependency on him was a huge reality check. I had to let him go without making a fuss.

“Don’t worry,” he rubbed the top of my arms and pulled me into him. “I want to stay as much as you want me to. I like that you need me.”

“You do?”

He
nodded, the stubble on his chin tickling my forehead; he was still squeezing me and I was sure he smelled my hair.

“Yeah, it’s an ego thing,” he was trying to play it cool. “And I need you too.”

“Hurry home, okay?”

“I’m already back.”

He pulled my hair away from my face and gathered it at the back of my head. His lips brushed mine before he kissed me; tender yet firm. It was a kiss that both calmed and excited.

We walked to his car and he climbed in, shut the door and opened the window.