Donovan

I’m basically running from her room like a goddamn bitch and I know it, but Jesus fuck me Christ, my dick is so hard I’m actually afraid it’s going to break the zipper in my jeans. This whole friends thing is a rocky fucking road and there’s one big fucking reason for that. The problem is that I want— scratch that, I desperately need—not to lust after Eden Avery, and that isn’t working out because my cock and my brain aren’t on the same page at all. That beautiful, tiny, tornado of a woman somehow puts me on my goddamn ass every fucking time I see her. I’m bigger, taller, stronger, faster (and let’s not forget fuckin’ older) than she is, yet I’m the dumb motherfucker who is constantly coming from the defense position.

Unlocking my door, I swing it open and then slam it shut behind me. Crossing the room, I toss the box with my calzone onto the counter before I continue to my bedroom. I’m so over-amped that my fucking fingers barely cooperate as I tear my clothes off, leaving them in a pile on the floor. In the bathroom I turn the shower on and jump in, gritting my teeth as the ice cold water pelts my skin.

Eden shocked the hell out of me when she announced that she wants me to run with her. Fucking run with her, instead of running from her like I need to. And let’s be real here—she should be doing whatever needs to be done to avoid my dumb ass. I know I’m a standoffish asshole—it’s purposeful so it’s not as if I could be oblivious to it—but she lets it roll off her like it’s nothing more than a personality quirk.

Being in her room and sitting across that tiny table from her had me on edge, but I was keeping myself in check until the moment she looked at me like she was thinking something filthy. My already half-hard cock started to fully rise—and then she bit her puffy, perfect bottom lip. I damn near went over the table to taste that sweet, sexy mouth. I have no fuckin’ idea what is wrong with me or why it’s so goddamn hard to resist her but goddamn, it really fucking is.

For nearly eight fucking years I’ve been a dead man walking. Every day I get up and do the bare minimum to imitate life. I can count on one hand the number of people who I care about and I have absolutely no intention of adding another person. Hell, the people I do care about only get the bare minimum from me because I have absolutely fucking nothing to give. Keeping other people at arm’s length—fuck, well past that—is easy for me. So easy that it’s more than just my default—it’s become second nature. Except when it comes to Eden Avery.

She’s single-handedly putting cracks in walls I need in place in order to survive. Each time she looks up at me with those innocent doe-like blue eyes my brain goddamn melts. Maybe—fucking maybe—I could deal if it was just the never-ending need I have to be inside of her, but it’s so much more than that. I’m celibate and damn good at it because the idea of being touched makes me ill. Until now. Until her. I want to fuck, mark, protect, and claim her as mine. Each one of those desires is alien to me but, it’s the need to claim that has me up pacing every night. I don’t do need, and I sure as hell won’t ever be able to do anything about my desires.

I grimace as I glance down at my still semi-hard cock. Stubborn fucker wants her bad enough to stay hard in spite of the deluge of icy cold water beating down on me. Setting my forehead against the shower wall, I turn the situation over in my mind. It was easier to keep her at arm’s length in the beginning. Things started to change the night I went to get my mail and saw how distraught she was. When she explained that she was upset because of her dad, a little sliver of I don’t even fucking know what thawed inside me. The next thing I knew I was announcing that I’d find him. Ever since then I’ve been far, far nicer to her than I should be because it feels like being an asshole to her is equivalent to kicking an angel. After that night at the front desk I knew she didn’t deserve to have some jaded asshole treat her like an annoyance, which has really fucked me up.

Suddenly the fog in my head clears and a lightbulb goes on. That’s it. I haven’t been able to shut her out because I know she’s in a rough spot. All I need to do is double down and find her father. Once that’s taken care of I can go back to not caring. And maybe, just maybe, things will work out so well with her dad that she’ll leave and go back where she came from.

Ignoring the rolling wave of discomfort that thought evokes, I grab my bar of soap and start lathering up. Operation find Eden’s dickhead father is getting kicked into high gear. I’ve been looking for him, but not in a desperate way because part of me has been afraid that shit will go from bad to worse for her if I find him and he doesn’t want to see her. Now I realize that I just need to go hard. If he doesn’t want to see her when I find him, I’ll make him change his mind—no matter what it takes. She deserves a father that cares about and protects her—and I’ll do whatever it takes to make damn sure that happens.