Chapter Forty-Eight
Josh
There was no way sleep would take him tonight. Even after making love to Carina and keeping up with his beautiful girl in the bedroom, he wasn’t tired. His mind raced with the dangers that surrounded her. Thankfully, she wasn’t suffering from the same affliction, or at least it wasn’t manifesting into sleepless nights. When he had left her, she had been wrapped up in his sheets sound asleep wearing only his t-shirt.
Josh sat on the oversized chair and rested his feet on the ottoman. Even in the dark he could make out the glint of the gun. He brushed the barrel with his fingertips and imagined the sound it would generate and the filthy piece of shit at the other end of it. It had taken an act of God and some pleading from Chase and Erin not to do what he wanted to do to Ross. They had talked him down when he had first learned what Ross had done to Carina and convinced him not to go after Ross and butcher the bastard. He had reluctantly agreed, but only after he realized that his actions could take Carina away from him, maybe forever. It wasn’t the threat of prison time that had persuaded him to not take matters into his own hands, but the fear that he would never be able to touch her again, feel her body against his as she slept.
Still, he could imagine what it would be like to put that asshole out of his misery. But his fantasy was interrupted by creaking floorboards and he focused on the petite figure walking toward him. “Can’t sleep?” he asked.
“Why are you sitting here in the dark?” Carina stood in front of him and stared at the gun. Her lower lip began to tremble.
Josh placed the gun on the table next to him. “Come here,” he said, holding out his hand.
He pulled her onto his lap, but her eyes remained fixed on the gun. “Just one of those precautions, baby,” he said. He gently steered her attention from the gun with two fingers to her chin and forced her to look at him instead.
“Because of me, you’re sitting in the dark with a revolver, keeping watch.” Her eyes welled with tears. “Because of me…”
He reached for her hands and placed them on his bare chest. “Because of you…my heart beats again. You’ve brought me back, Carina.”
Straddling him, she leaned in and kissed his lips. His heart beat faster beneath her fingers as the kiss deepened. She broke away long enough to remove her shirt and resumed kissing him. As her tongue mingled with his, he felt her take his hand and place it between her breasts. “And this…this belongs to you, beats only for you,” she said, between breaths.
With her hair unbound and her eyes wild, she hovered just above his cock. He lifted his ass off the cushion and yanked his lounge pants down, exposing his rock hard shaft. She groaned into his mouth and slid down his length.
“Josh!” Her hips swiveled, sending vibrations along his cock and throughout the rest of his body. His thrusts became urgent, making each one of her moans and pleas louder than the last. Riding his cock with her back arched and her breasts bouncing, she looked absolutely beautiful. He took a nipple and sucked deeply. Her hips came crashing down and he struggled to fight back his release.
“Ah…Carina!” he groaned. Her silky, wet, pussy was clenching him, urging him to spill inside her. Her body thrashed and trembled as he slid in and out of her, as she allowed him to take what would forever be his.
***
Carina
Carina didn’t know when, but at some point in the night Josh had carried her to bed. She had the best sleep in weeks and was in the middle of a full body stretch when she heard someone rattling around in the kitchen. She threw on one of Josh’s t-shirts and followed the noise.
“Hungry?”
Josh was standing over the stove stirring something with a slotted spoon and looking gorgeous. He was fresh from sleep, wearing only his lounge pants, his hair all messed up. Yeah, she was hungry, but not for what Josh was cooking.
“Keep looking at me like that, Carina, and see what happens.”
“Is that a threat, Dr. Graham?” Carina took a few steps closer to him. “Or a promise?”
Josh swallowed…hard and set the spoon down on the counter. He turned and faced her. Her eyes immediately drifted to the tent in his pants. He was aroused and getting harder by the second. “If I didn’t have an exam this morning, I would have you bent over this counter right now. And while I was slamming into you, you would be promising me something.”
The visual he conjured in her mind caused her breathing to hitch and her face suddenly felt warm. “What would I promise you?”
He erased the space between them and gathered her into his arms. “Everything,” he said. He traced a finger along her lower lip as he gazed into her eyes.
Didn’t he know that he held her heart in his hands? That he was everything to her? Well, if he didn’t, she was going to prove it to him tonight. “I better get in the shower. I don’t want to be late for class.” He cupped her cheek and then planted a quick kiss on her lips, one that left her wanting. “I used Lady Jane’s Eggs Benedict recipe. I hope you like it.” How the hell did he expect her to eat right now when she was so turned on? Josh gave her one of his sexy smiles, as if he knew she was struggling, and then disappeared into the bathroom.
It took a few minutes for her to catch her breath. When her heart finally settled down, she went to the stove and eyed the hollandaise sauce that was simmering in the pot. It looked incredible. Her appetite came back in an instant. She reached for a plate and piled on the eggs and ham. She was drizzling the sauce over it all when she heard Josh’s phone chime on the counter next to her. Instinctively, she looked down and almost dropped her plate on the floor.
Amanda.
Carina knew it was an invasion of his privacy. That she shouldn’t tap on the message that just came through. That she shouldn’t scroll through his messages. The dozens of messages Amanda had sent him over the past month, but she did.
“I want you to fuck me.”
“I need your cock in my mouth.”
“I want you to spank me, fuck my pussy, and then come on my face.”
“I want…”
“I want…”
Carina stopped reading. And breathing. And sank to the floor. She didn’t know how long she had been sitting there on the kitchen floor with Josh’s phone in her lap. Visions of Josh doing all those things to Amanda were still going through her head when she felt two hands lift her off the ground. “Carina, what’s wrong?” Numb, she let him take her to the couch and cradle her. “You’re scaring me. What is it, baby?”
The concern in his voice, the worry in his eyes, made her own well up. “Your ex…texted you this morning,” she said, handing him his phone. Josh tossed his phone on the couch next to him without even looking at Amanda’s message and hugged her tighter. “She still wants you,” she said, against his chest.
“I don’t want her, Carina. It’s over. It’s been over.”
“She doesn’t believe that, Josh. I read them…the texts she sent you. I’m sorry. I know I shouldn’t have gone through your phone, but…”
He took her face in his hands and said, “I haven’t been with another woman since we met. I haven’t thought of another woman since I saw you at that Phillies game. You’re it for me, Carina.”
She knew what she looked like right now. Insecure. Jealous. Scared. She had no right to doubt him. While she’d swiped through his messages, she had noticed that he had only responded to two of her messages. The first text was to tell her that they were over. In the second text, he had asked her to meet him for coffee, which was the day he had told Amanda to stop contacting him.
“I’m sorry, Josh. For being jealous, for being…”
He tucked her into his chest. “I’m sorry that you saw those messages. That they reminded you of the man I used to be.” He sighed into her hair. “I’ll go to Verizon after class today and change my number. That should put an end to things.”
Her heart melted and she looked up at him. “The thought of you not being mine. That you may miss the life you had before me…scares the shit out of me.”
“What I was doing before you wasn’t living. It was me going through the motions. Existing. I was lost until I found you.” Her bottom lip was quivering when he leaned in and kissed her. His lips were soft but demanding and she wrapped her arms around his neck. He groaned into her mouth as he kissed her thoroughly. Suddenly he stopped and stared at her.
“I’m so in love with you, Carina.”