Chapter 18

I don’t have to check the prices when I shop. I make my own money and spend it how I want to.

-Me at the dollar store.

Evander

I went to her house three days after her sister had passed away. The funeral that I told myself I didn’t need to go to, yet went anyway. Though I hadn’t seen her there.

Why she hadn’t been there was killing me.

What would keep her from that?

Needless to say, I needed to go check on her.

I had to figure out what was going on.

I didn’t know what I was expecting.

One, I was expecting her house to be locked up tight. It wasn’t.

Two, I was expecting her to be somewhere outside, tending to her animals. It was a routine of hers, one she was very meticulous about. She wasn’t.

Three, I was expecting to find her raving mad and pissed off at the world. That was the furthest thing from what she actually was.

I found her in the bathroom.

Under water.

With a snorkel attached to her mouth so she could breathe.

It was surreal.

When men say that they love their wives and girlfriends despite their quirks, I don’t think that Kennedy ever got the memo.

Love was weird.

I hadn’t felt it before…not like this.

I’d loved my sister. I’d loved my dog. I’d adored my mother.

What I hadn’t thought was that I would love Kennedy.

But despite the weirdness and the quirky traits, I did. I loved her. I loved the way she loved her niece and nephews. I loved the way she doted on her chickens like they were actual human beings rather than animals. I loved that she always blurted out random stuff that wasn’t relevant to the conversation. I just loved her.

But I couldn’t tell her that.

Just like I couldn’t allow her to be more to me than what she was—a one night, one time, never going to do it again—stand.

Kennedy didn’t know what I went through on a daily basis.

She didn’t know the degree to which I was disliked in this small town.

She also didn’t know that I had revenge in my soul, and the only way it was going to go away was when that corrupt asshole of a police chief got booted out of his office on his ass.

She only saw the good in me. The things that she wanted to see.

Because had she seen it all, she would know that she was in love with a man that had a very high likelihood of getting hurt.

I was nothing but bad news. I wasn’t expecting my life to change anytime soon.

My brother, who was supposed to be my friend—my own goddamned brother—didn’t even watch out for me.

I had a way of getting rid of the people that were supposed to mean the most to me.

But as I sat there and watched her through the water, all of my worries seemed to just…disappear.

It sounded cliché, like I was just making excuses.

But when it came to this woman, all of my carefully laid plans were shot to hell.

I reached my hand down into the bathtub, wincing when the hotter than hot water hit my hand, and kept going until I reached her foot.

Circling my hand around her ankle, I pulled her down the length of the tub until her legs were hanging over the side.

She came willingly, and it was then that I saw her eyes on me through her mask.

She was watching me watch her.

“What are you doing in there?”

She blinked, then shrugged.

I offered her my hand, and she took it.

The moment she was on the ledge of the tub, dripping wet, she said, “My head hurts.”

“So you decided to submerge yourself underwater in hopes that it would stop?”

She looked away.

“Maybe.”

A grin kicked up the corner of my mouth, and she turned around to glare at me.

“What?” I questioned, my eyes sliding down her still wet body. “You have steam coming off your body.”

She tried to cover herself up better, but her arm could only cover so much of her boobs.

The other hand was at the apex of her thighs, covering up the thatch of hair that wasn’t covered by the way she crossed her legs.

“What are you doing here?” she asked, hoping to take my attention away from my perusal of her body.

I ran a finger down the line of her jaw, and then up again to circle a strand of wet hair and tuck it behind her ear.

“Doing things that I shouldn’t.”

She bit her lip.

“Like checking on you to make sure you’re okay.”

Making sure that her roof was in good repair—which it was.

She looked down.

“Are you okay?”

When she didn’t lift her head up, I did it for her by using one fingertip just underneath her chin.

“Look at me.”

When she finally lifted her chin, I saw the tears that were forming in her eyes, and once again, my belly clenched.

It almost seemed like that was its usual state of feeling lately.

Every time I thought about the woman, it’d clench up tight.

“Why weren’t you at the funeral?”

The first tear fell.

“He told me it hadn’t been decided when it would be held.”

Her breath hiccupped.

“And everyone looks at me like I’m some sort of a traitor now, since I didn’t go.”

I cupped her face with my hand and swept away the tear before it could make its track all the way down her face.

“That has nothing to do with your sister and everything to do with you hanging out with me in public,” I told her honestly. “If you’d take time to listen to what they have to say, you’d hear.”

She started to laugh.

In my face.

“I’ll give you that,” she agreed, wiping away another tear that spilled over. “But it wasn’t all of it. Mostly, they’re saying we’re good fits since we both have brother/sister problems.”

I snorted.

“My brother has always been standoffish when it came to me,” I told her. “He had a mom and dad who loved him. I had a mom, and a dad that loved another freakin’ kid. We all knew who my dad was, and we all knew who his choice was. To this day, there is still something between me and my brother, and it will always be there.”

“That sounds…awful,” she admitted. “How can people be so cruel? I thought you were supposed to love your kids?

“My dad met my mom, slept with her, while he was also ‘courting’ another woman,” I explained, stepping back and pulling her wet body with me.

When she came, I lifted her up and placed her down on the counter, then went for the towel that was at her side.

With slow, methodical movements, I started to dry her off, starting with her toes and finishing with her hair.

“Apparently, the minute he won the other woman, he stopped seeing my mom. Only, he left a little something behind—that being me.”

“I’m sorry, Evander.”

I shrugged. “Doesn’t bother me much anymore. Hurt like a motherfucker to see them when I was a kid, though.”

“I’m sure,” she said, then sighed. “I’m wallowing in self-pity.”

He grinned.

“I’m here to take you out.”

Her hand found my chest, and then smoothed down the length of my side until she came to my belt.

“I’d rather you just take my mind off of my worries.”

I leaned in and pressed my mouth to her forehead.

“You don’t want that.”

I was hanging on by a thread.

If I distracted myself with how hurt and broken she was, then I could control my baser instincts.

But when she started talking like that, I found myself unable to keep focused on what I’d come here to do—and that was to help her.

I couldn’t help her by fucking her.

At least, I didn’t think I could.

Kennedy, obviously, had other ideas.

This I found out moments later when she hooked one hand in the belt of my jeans and yanked me forward.

The move put my cock up against the length of her now exposed sex.

The towel that I’d spread out over her body was now shoved to the side, and the only thing covering her up was the length of wet hair that was curling around her nipples—which were now playing peek-a-boo.

“I said, take my mind off of it,” she repeated. Slowly this time.

Fuck!

Out of everything, though, it was the intensity of her eyes that had me leaning backwards and unbuckling my belt.

“This isn’t a good idea,” I told her bluntly.

She shook her head. “Don’t you know?”

“Know what?” I asked, pausing in my effort to loosen my belt.

“I don’t care what everyone else thinks. I only care what you think.”

Then she slammed her mouth down onto mine, making me temporarily forget what I was trying to do.

When she broke the kiss, her eyes were liquid pools of need.

“I care what everyone else thinks,” I told her. “I don’t want you hurt.”

She reached for the hem of my damp shirt and lifted it up and off my shoulders.

The move left the shirt inside out in her hands, and she shook it out, then started to shift so that it was underneath of her.

“What’s that for?”

She grinned.

“You’ve fucked me once, Evander,” she said, shifting her hips so the shirt lay flat beneath her. “I know that you might start off all nice and slow, but you finish hard.”

My dick hardened even further.

“And I don’t want the skin of my ass getting countertop burns when I don’t shift with your movements.”

The shirt was a good idea.

Especially when I reached for both of her ankles and pulled her ass clear to the edge.

“Very good idea,” I agreed.

Her smile was wicked.

“You’re wearing too many clothes,” she pointed out, lifting one eyebrow.

I winked.

“Am I?” I asked, circling one of her legs around my hips and pressing lightly for her to hold it there.

She did, and watched me as I brought my free hand up and trailed the pad of my thumb gently down the lips of her exposed sex.

She shivered, eyes on me.

I didn’t know where to watch.

Her eyes? Her hard nipples? The way her chest was moving up and down with her increased breathing? The way that her sex seemed to shine with the wetness that was leaking out of her?

Fuck, but it was a lot to take in, and I wanted to see it all. Taste it all!

I lifted one of her ankles up and pressed a kiss to the inside of it before dropping it onto my shoulder.

With my free hand, I finished undoing my belt and then my jeans.

The moment that the confines were loosened, I pushed them both down my legs, and watched her eyes as she found my cock.

It was hard—so fucking hard that it hurt.

The head was a thick, ruddy red that looked angry, and the veins that were pulsing with blood were prominent and full.

She licked her lips.

“You going to stick that in me?”

I leaned forward slightly and let the head of my dick play along her slickened folds, up and down, coating first the head, and then my entire length, in her wetness.

When I glanced up, it was to find her head thrown back, wet strands of hair sticking to her skin.

Each time I let my tip slide against her clit, she would tense. Her nipples were hard as glass, and she was jerking, causing her voluptuous globes to jerk and jump with each of her movements.

Not paying any attention to erring on the side of caution, but instead only thinking about what it would do to me to feel her sweet heat enveloping me again, I slid my cock to her entrance and stilled.

My eyes closed of their own accord, and this time it was my head falling back as I slowly sank inside of her.

Only intending to give her an inch, I couldn’t physically stop myself from giving her more when I felt her surround me—more and more and more until I was inside of her as far as her body would allow me. For now.

My eyes were clenched tight, and I was having a hard time drawing oxygen into my lungs.

Then I felt her nails dig into my thighs as she cried out, “Please!”

I probably would’ve managed to hold still—to give her the time she needed to adjust—if she hadn’t started convulsing around me.

Seemed she didn’t need the time, because just the act of pushing myself inside of her, and giving her my length, was enough to make her come.

Her pussy started to ripple, and I couldn’t stop myself from pulling out, and slamming back inside.

I did this only twice before I realized, once again, that I really should be wearing a condom.

Really, I should be.

I knew that I was clean. I was about a hundred and two percent certain that she was clean, but that didn’t mean that she was on birth control.

In this day and age, I was endangering her with my inability to control myself.

But I was blaming it on my dry spell. I was blaming it on Kennedy’s virgin pussy that just begged for me to do bad things to it.

And if I was being completely honest, the idea of Kennedy swelling with my child would give me the perfect excuse to stay. I could be with her and not feel guilt every time I turned the goddamn corner.

I’d then be with her for the sake of our child, not because I was selfish and wanted her there with me.

But I was fooling myself.

Fooling her.

And she wasn’t stupid.

So before I could come in her, I pulled out and jacked myself off over her stomach, gasping when the first spurt of come decorated right below her breasts.

The second spurt went only an inch or so lower, pooling in the depth of her belly button.

The third and final spurt hit the trimmed curve of her lower lips, mingling with her desire and mine, making an attractive concoction that I couldn’t quite help swirling my finger in, and bringing it up to her mouth.

The sexiest things I’d ever seen someone do were the things she’d done with me.

Come. Watch me. Change in front of me. Wash her fucking hair.

But watching her lick my finger clean of my release and hers was enough to top the list of my all-time sexiest things list.

“Fuck me,” I growled, eyes dilating and hands clenching.

My cock was still throbbing with my release, and Kennedy’s chest looked flushed with desire.

And I probably would’ve dropped down and given her my mouth, but my phone rang.

“Shit.”

She moved to stand, and I backed up, giving her room.

Then she went for the towel, picked it up, and wiped herself clean while I reached for my phone.

“Hello?”