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“So, what do you think?”
I shook my head, trying to concentrate on what he was showing me. He pointed to the bed, and my lips lifted into the biggest grin. “It’s a ship.” My eyes widened, and I stepped away from Asher, letting his hand whisper across mine until we were no longer touching. When he’d said downstairs that he had a pirate bed, I didn’t know what I imagined, but it wasn’t this. There was a literal ship in the middle of the room and a huge mattress inside it. “Holy shit.” I paused at the edge and moved my fingers across the smooth wood. There were three steps which led onto the bed.
“Cool, right?” I turned to face Asher who was also grinning. “Me and Belle used to use it as our pirate ship when we were kids.” I raised a brow, and he must have known what I was thinking because he said, “Fine, we used it as adults too.”
“When was the last time you did that?” I placed my hand on my hip and tilted my head to the side, waiting for him to answer, but when he looked to the side and focused on the wall, a laugh escaped my throat. The kind of laugh which spoke of freedom and happiness. Asher did that. Asher made me happy, and he had no idea, not until I blurted out, “You make me happy.”
He whipped his head around to face me, his brown eyes darkening at my words. “Say that again.”
“You make me happy,” I repeated, leaning my back on the side of the ship.
He sauntered toward me, slow and intent, an
d my heart sped up. No one had made me feel the way he did, not in that moment, and not in any moment since.
The voices downstairs became louder, but still I didn’t look away from the gap in the curtains. The sun shone high in the sky, so I was guessing it was the middle of the day. I wasn’t sure what day, but I knew every moment which dragged by was another moment Asher was in county jail and I was here, in his childhood bed, his comforter wrapped tightly around me. I was safe here, in this room. Asher surrounded every inch of the place, which was why I didn’t want to leave.
It was dangerous out there. Scary and dreadful. But inside these four walls, nothing could touch me. Nothing could hurt me.
Not physically anyway.
Memories threatened to haunt me, but I tried my hardest to push them all back and only think about the good things. To only stay in my bubble and let happiness consume me.
His hand slipped around my waist and he pulled me against him. “Fuck,” he whispered and bent down, so his face was level with mine. “You turn me upside down, Elodie.” I placed my hand on his chest and felt his heart racing. “I’ve never felt like this before.” It was a fact—a confession.
“Neither have I,” I told him because it was the truth. We’d both been skirting around our feelings because it hadn’t been the right time. But now…now it was our time. Our time to be with each other. Our time to show each other how we felt. Which was why I lifted up onto my tiptoes and pressed my lips against his. I knew we couldn’t go too far, not with his family downstairs, but his tongue swiping over my lips demanded more from me, and I was willing to give it to him. I’d give him every piece of me knowing he’d handle me with care.
“Asher,” I groaned, letting my head drop back and relishing in his lips as they fluttered over the soft skin on my neck.
“Yeah, sweetheart?” he murmured in my ear, and I shivered from his warm breath.
“I need…” I wasn’t sure what I needed, but his fingers flipping open the button on my jeans and undoing my zip was enough for me to realize exactly what it was I wanted. I wanted him. All of him. But most importantly, he wanted me too.
His hand slipped down the front of my jeans and my eyes fluttered closed as his finger connected with my clit. The bundle of nerves pulsed with each of his flicks, and I knew I wouldn’t last—couldn’t last—not when he was touching me. Not when he was playing my body like a seasoned musician.
Footsteps echoed up the stairs, and my pulse raced at the sound. Logically I knew it wasn’t anyone who had come to hurt me, but that didn’t mean I could control my body’s reaction. My anxiety was at an all-time high, and I had no idea how to make it go away.
I moved my hand to my chest, trying to calm my beating heart, and winced from the move. My body ached in places I had no idea it could, and the bruising marring my skin was dark and deadly looking. But I couldn’t think about that right then. I couldn’t remember the way it disrupted my pale tone and drew a map of the violence.
“That’s it, sweetheart,” he ground out, his voice low and gruff, and it was all I needed to let myself go. To let myself feel every ounce of the pleasure he’d given me. I clutched on to his shoulders as he slipped his hand free and wrapped his arms around me, and then my back was hitting the mattress and my jeans were being shucked off me and thrown across the room.
I chuckled as he struggled to get one of my tennis shoes off. “Fuck it, they can stay on.” I glanced down at him and my bare legs complete with shoes on my feet, and even though the sight was comical, I didn’t laugh because he was yanking down his jeans and moving on top of me. “I can’t get e-fuckin'-nough of you.”
“Good.” I gripped on to his shoulders and sighed as the head of his cock met my entrance. “Show me how much you want me,” I whispered, and his eyes darkened a second before he plunged inside me, pushing all the way to the hilt, and showing me exactly what he felt.
Knocking rang out and I gasped. It had only happened once since I curled up in Asher’s bed, and it had been Lola trying to get me to eat something. But I hadn’t been able to stomach it. I hadn’t been able to face her after what she’d witnessed in the hospital room. She’d seen me at my worst, and now I was afraid what she would think—how she would treat me.
“Elodie?” a soft voice asked from the other side of the door, and my muscles locked. That wasn’t Lola, it was— “It’s Belle.” I stayed perfectly still, too scared if I made only the smallest of noises that she’d know I was awake and come inside.
The door handle creaked, and I snapped my eyes closed. Lola hadn’t walked inside, not without me answering her. But Belle’s footsteps got closer and closer until I could feel her looming over me. I squeezed my eyes shut as tight as I could and counted in my head. Each number felt louder and faster than the last, and I made it all the way to twenty-two until she said, “I know you’re not asleep.” She paused, waiting for me to answer her, but I couldn’t. I couldn’t face it. Not right then.
“You need to eat, Elodie.” A couple of soft bangs rang out and then the sound of metal cutlery pinged. “I brought you over some soup and fresh bread—okay, so I didn’t actually bake the bread because we all know I can’t bake. But I went to the store and bought it fresh, so I’m calling it a win.” She chuckled and the bed dipped beside me. What the hell was she doing? “I know you feel like you’re alone.” She let out a sigh. “I remember a time I felt like that too.”
I slowly opened my eyes but didn’t turn to face her. I was listening, and I had a feeling she knew it.
“You’ve probably seen my scar. It’s not exactly hard to miss.” Her body moved, and I wondered if she was touching her neck. I’d seen her touching it and wasn’t even sure she was aware she was doing it. “I was twenty-one when I fell in love for the first time.” She chuckled. “Real love. The kind of love that consumes you entirely and refuses to let go.”
I knew that feeling. Knew the way something—someone—consumed every inch of you. I hadn’t known what it was, not at first. But I was sure of it now, surer than anything else in the entire world. It may have felt fast, but I couldn’t deny how deep it was.
