Two
Porter
I held her a while longer in the humidity of the bathroom, but eventually she began shivering.
How, when I was sweating, I wasn’t sure, but standing here in a towel wasn’t going to do her much good. Her catching a cold wouldn’t help matters, either.
“Let’s get you in some clothes, beautiful,” I murmured into her hair. I pressed a kiss there after, letting my lips linger against her wet hair and breathing her in. God, I loved her.
She pushed back and reluctantly, I let her. She held the towel to her chest with one hand, her eyes still locked on my chest.
Why wouldn’t she look at me? Why wouldn’t she give me her eyes? I needed her eyes…
As if she heard my thoughts, she lifted her chin and my heart cracked in two, at the brokenness there. I reached out and ran my hand down her temple. “Talk to me, Ash.”
When she bit her lip, I brought my thumb to it, prying it from her teeth gently. “It wasn’t your fault, Asher, beautiful.”
The police called the house after they received a 911 call. After all was said and done, they still didn’t have answers.
James, Asher’s former foster father, never regained consciousness after he was shot. Avery didn’t have much to say about the ordeal; she just knew that he’d been Asher’s foster father.
And Asher?
Asher just shut down.
Myke and Ryan had a falling out, but Ryan had been able to give some insight to the ordeal. His father was being charged for raping his stepdaughter. Ryan had come to Beloit, looking for Asher. Thanks to goddamn social media and fucking bunnies who posted pictures, he had come across Asher’s picture on a forum. Ryan said he came to try and convince Asher to testify.
But testify to what?
Against James’s character?
Ryan wouldn’t say, just saying that Asher had something to offer the testimony.
So, Ryan came, looking for Asher. Found Myke. I was pissed that he’d used Myke to get to Asher, but the two of them could deal with the fall out.
Ryan brought James to us. He swore it wasn’t his intention; his father wasn’t supposed to leave Tennessee.
The most the cops could come up with, the last they spoke to the family, was that James wanted to silence Asher, from whatever she could bring to the testimony.
I could feel my blood starting to boil, to race, at the realization that Asher once lived with that man. I knew her last home wasn’t great, but this event, this moment in time…
If I could clear the internet of anything with Asher’s face, if I could erase any mention of her name, I would do it in a heartbeat.
My name brought her past to her.
My family’s celebrity brought her nightmare back to her.
The ghosts were back in her eyes and I wasn’t entirely sure I could find a way to ward them away again.
She was so closed off…
“Love me,” she whispered into the room, her eyes locked on mine.
“Always,” I promised, reaching out to cup her face with my hands.
She shook her head and I could see her pulse pounding in her neck. Her arm dropped from the towel and the white cotton fell to the floor. “Erase it.” Her body shook and her eyes pooled with tears, but she kept her eyes firmly on mine.
“Asher…”
She didn’t need sex right now. No, she needed to be held and loved, to know that I wasn’t going anywhere. I’d be here as long as she needed me. If that meant taking the season off, fuck it, I would.
I wasn’t leaving her.
Nothing could tear me away from her.
Her hands were on my jeans, her fingers working at my button. Her eyes still hadn’t left mine, but the pools were getting deeper.
“Shit, Ash,” I said, moving a hand to cover hers, stilling her fingers.
She didn’t blink, but her eyes were too full.
Heavy tears fell down her cheeks.
I placed a hand on her cheek and, closing my eyes, leaned into her and kissed away her tears. “Asher.”
“Please, Porter.”
Asher
I led him to the bed. I could feel his eyes on my back, but I kept moving. This was my last time to take something I wanted with my entire being.
I was going to take it.
I pulled back the covers and crawled into the middle. Porter stood beside the bed, the war raging in his head clear on his face.
“I need you,” I brokenly whispered. And I did. More than anything.
I didn’t think he was going to do it. The longer he stood there, staring at my naked body, the more I was convinced he wasn’t going to give me what I needed.
God, I just needed him one more time.
One last time to feel the body of someone who swore he loved me.
Before he realized he couldn’t ever love someone like me.
He isn’t going to do it. He isn’t going to give me what I needed.
With a hitch in my breath, I gave him a sad smile and shook my head. “Okay.” I dropped my eyes from his, unable to look at him any longer. He was so fucking noble.
I reached for the covers and lay down on my side, my back to him and the covers to my chin. I wouldn’t cry.
I couldn’t cry.
I folded in on myself and could feel the bed dip behind me. Of course, he would decide to hold me.
But it wasn’t what I needed.
I pinched my lips together, fighting the need to cry.
I felt as his big body curled around me from behind and then his hand was under my cheek, pressing my face to the side and up toward him. I tried not to look at him, but his green eyes called to mine.
The green orbs stared at me before he lowered his mouth to mine.
The kiss was gentle.
Soft.
Loving.
It made me want to cry.
With slow precision, his lips moved over mine, his lips sucking and his tongue brushing, but every time I opened to pull his tongue into my mouth, he pulled back with a gentle suck on my lower lip.
He wasn’t pressing deeper.
I rolled to my back, reaching for him, my hands on his face, holding him to me. I swept my tongue over the seam of his lips and finally, finally, he opened his mouth and welcomed me.
I needed him above me. I needed to feel him surrounding me.
I slipped my hands over his cheeks, to the back of his head, moving further to wind my arms around his neck, trying to pull him to me, but still he held off, holding himself to my side.
Rolling into him, I pushed at the covers with one arm so I could wrap my leg over his hip. I nuzzled closer to him. I needed to feel him.
“Asher,” he mumbled into my mouth.
“Love me, Porter,” I demanded, angling my hips into his jean-clad ones. I could feel him through the denim. He was hard.
He pulled his face from mine. “You’re not ready.” His voice was stern, but his eyes…they held a world of concern in them.
He didn’t even know what I did, and he didn’t want me. The world crumbled around me and I swallowed past the disappointment. My last memory of hands on me, would be hands that disgusted me. I was forever tainted. “Then leave,” I managed to spit out, my voice shaking as I unwound myself from him.
His hand caught my leg, bringing it back to his hip and holding me to him.
“I am not leaving you.”
“I don’t want you.”
“Asher.”
“Leave me alone.” I pushed against him, trying to roll away, but his hold only tightened.
“Just let me hold you, Asher. I just want to hold you.”
“And I just want you to erase his fucking hands from me!” I slapped at his chest, trying again to push away from him.
Porter stilled. His hand growing lax on my thigh.
The silence was thick, the tension in the room suffocating.
“So, he did touch you.” Porter’s words were quiet but laced with anger and hurt.
“Just leave me alone.” My fingers tightened into his shirt though.
“Did. He. Touch. You.” His eyes were unwavering on mine, his pupils dilating and constricting as if he was trying to control his emotions.
My own eyes filled with tears again and I could no longer see him. “Yes. Is that what you want to hear? Yes, Porter. Yes. I touched him.”
“Fuck, Asher.”
I pushed away from him now, successfully, and rolled away, giving him my back. I moved from the bed and toward the dresser, needing to find something to cover myself with. I pulled out a shirt and hastily dragged it over my head, removing my wet hair from the collar.
I pulled open another drawer, digging for bike shorts, but my hands stilled when I felt Porter’s body behind me, pressing into me hard.
Possessively.
His hands were on my bare hips, having pushed up the shirt enough to make purchase with skin.
His lips were on my neck.
“Let me erase his hands. God, Asher, let me…”