Chapter Nine
Watching the reunion between Nate and his mother was like watching really bad reality television—awkward to the extreme. Hannah Archer looked far older than she had the last time Ellie had seen her, which was at least five years earlier, before she’d left town with her husband—the stepfather who had caused Nate so much pain.
Apparently she was back. And no one had thought to tell Nate.
Ellie watched as a myriad of emotions passed over Nate’s face in silence. Shock, pain, rage… and then nothing. Just an icy cold veneer that froze his expression in impassive lines, so vacant that it sent a shiver down her spine.
The silence stretched out until Ellie wanted to do something, anything—break into song, strip naked, whatever—just to break it.
“Um. Eleanor, would you like another vodka cranberry?” Hannah awkwardly gestured to Ellie’s near-empty glass.
Nate said nothing.
Ellie nodded, probably with more enthusiasm than was strictly necessary. “That would be great. Thanks.” At least if Hannah went to get her another drink, it would give Nate a chance to recover.
With a lingering look at her son, Hannah nodded, then headed back to the bar. Nate sat frozen for a long moment before pushing away from the table.
“I need some air.” He didn’t look at Ellie as he moved, just shoved away from the group, his long stride eating up the distance to the front door.
Ellie watched him go, her heart in her throat.
She remembered every single time that Nate had come to the Marshall house with bruises and cuts, distress hanging over him like a dark cloud. His pain had in turn hurt her¸ but he’d hidden so deeply behind his veneer of badass that she hadn’t been able to reach him to help.
Now she ached to run after him. To soothe his hurt.
But… they were involved now. Kind of. And in the early stages.
Would he appreciate her poking her nose into his business? Questioning him about something that was clearly tender?
She hesitated for a long moment, torn. Finally she let her gut lead her and hurried away from the table herself. They’d known each other for a very long time, and she’d be damned if she’d watch someone she cared about in pain while she sat back and did nothing.
She didn’t have to look very far. Nate was seated on the edge of the sidewalk just outside the bar, his arms looped loosely over his knees. His expression was still blank, but he didn’t tell her to go away when she seated herself on the pavement beside him, so she decided to take that as a win.
Going with her gut yet again, she sat with him in silence, leaning against him lightly so that their shoulders just brushed. She squeaked with surprise when he wrapped his arm around her and pulled her in closer, squeezing tightly like he could draw on her strength.
“Do you know if she’s still with him?” Nate’s voice was tight, as though it had been stretched over a thousand razor blades. Ellie’s own heart bled at the raw emotion that she heard in it.
“I don’t.” She shook her head to emphasize the point. “I didn’t even know that she’d moved back to town.”
Nate digested this in silence before surprising Ellie yet again by pulling her into his lap, right then and there. She stiffened for a moment—anyone who walked by would have the news of their embrace all over town by morning.
But Nate needed her. And that was more important that worrying about what her family would think of whatever this was between them.
“You know what always hurt the most? It wasn’t the beatings, wasn’t the harsh words, wasn’t the pain.” Nate brushed a hand absently through the long tail of Ellie’s hair, and she wasn’t sure he even knew he was doing it.
“It was the fact that she wouldn’t leave him. She wouldn’t leave the man who hurt her child. And I had no control over that, no way to make her love me more.” Ellie half-turned in his arms to find Nate smirking at her darkly. “I bet you’re going to have a field day with that tidbit, huh?”
It took her a moment to understand he was referring to his taste for control in the bedroom. Her heart ached at the same time that her spine stiffened.
“I hope you’re not telling me that you believe your taste for kinky sex has anything to do with you being screwed up by your parents.” Her tone was sharp, and Nate looked up in surprise.
“Well, where else would it have come from?” He arched an eyebrow at her, darkly amused. “I couldn’t control my mother. Now I want to control every woman I’m with. Makes sense to me.”
Ellie shook her head, noting the way his eyes darkened when she disagreed with him. “Or maybe you just like what you like and want what you want and it has nothing to do with any underlying issues with your parents.”
Nate snorted, looking down at a crack in the concrete. “Well, that would be tidy.”
“Nate.” Ellie turned the rest of the way, shifting so that she was kneeling between his spread knees. She looked up at him with wide eyes, noting the fine lines around his eyes that his angst had brought out. She’d never noticed them before—but then, maybe he’d never let her see them before.
“We’re all shaped by our parents.” She wet her lips, wishing for a glass of water. “But I really hope that you don’t think you’re… wrong… because of it.”
Nate stared into her eyes for a long moment, and Ellie’s heart contracted under the intensity of the gaze. In that moment she forgot that he was a player, forgot that there were people waiting for them inside the bar, forgot everything but her, Nate, and the air they were breathing.
“No matter where I got it from, control is something I need.” Nate dipped his head and, without warning, bit into the curve of Ellie’s neck. She gasped, the touch completely unexpected, then tugged away to look at Nate questioningly.
“I’m feeling very out of control right now.” He spoke quietly, his eyes again fixed on hers. He didn’t ask, didn’t demand, didn’t order, but Ellie understood without words what he needed.
“Let me help.” She placed her hands on his knees, then slid them up his thighs. He hissed at the touch, his stare darkening.
“Be sure, Ellie.” He deliberately looked down her body, then back up. “I’m not in the mood to be gentle.”
The words made her shiver, but it was with anticipation, not fear. Nate would never hurt her, of that she was certain.
“I don’t need you to be gentle.” Using her grip on his thighs for leverage, she slowly stood, then extended a hand back to him.
“Let me help. Control me. I want you to.”
* * *
Control me. I want you to.
A shiver worked through Nate as Ellie’s words hit home. He’d heard something similar from the lips of countless women before, but never with such raw honesty riding beneath.
Never with the same reasoning behind it. Ellie was offering herself to him—all of herself—to ease his pain. She cared enough to give herself to him.
That, more than anything, was what made his pulse stutter. And in that moment he needed her far too badly to do anything but accept.
He took her offered hand, and he knew that doing so meant he accepted everything she was giving.
Using their linked fingers as a tether, he tugged her tightly against his chest. She stumbled a bit on her low heels, and he savoured her small gasp when her soft breasts pressed into her chest.
Wanting to hear the noise again, he tangled his fingers in the golden length of her ponytail and tugged. Sucking in a mouthful of air, Ellie lifted her gaze. He still half expected to see fear or trepidation in her eyes, the things that he’d imagined for so long to be what she’d truly feel.
Instead he found heat, blue fire that ignited an answering flame in his very soul. Thinking that she’d never accept what he wanted, who he was, had still not been enough to quench his desire for her. The years they’d known each other before, they were kids. The years since, when he thought of her, he’d convinced himself she’d run screaming. But now, with the discovery that she harboured the same dark cravings he did?
It was enough to bring him to his knees.
“This is what’s going to happen.” He released her hair, sliding his hand down to cup the back of her neck. “You’re going to go to the ladies’ washroom. You’re going to go into the largest stall and close the door behind you. Then you’re going to pull these tight little jeans that are taunting me down around your ankles. Panties, too. You’re going to face the wall and put your palms flat against it. And then you’re going to wait for me. Understand?”
Ellie nodded, wide-eyed, then stiffened and changed to a shake of no. “I—I can’t. I’m sorry.”
“What do you mean, you can’t?” There it was again, that knee-jerk reaction that had him wondering if he’d pushed her too far, but she was quick to continue.
“No! It’s not that I don’t want to.” Her face flamed crimson, and she looked down at her feet. “It’s, ahh…”
“Tell me.”
“I’m not wearing any underwear,” Ellie whispered loudly, her fingers clenching on the front of his shirt. “So I can do everything else, but I can’t do that.”
Just when Nate had reached a point in his life where he thought he couldn’t be surprised anymore, this woman set him back on his heels. Her confession, voiced in that whisper that was both ashamed and defiant, was almost enough to make him break his rigid control.
For a long, wild moment he thought about just opening the front of his jeans and hauling her astride him right then and there, never mind who might see. He wanted—no, he needed—to sink into the completion that only Ellie was able to give him.
He clung to his last shred of common sense and stepped back, putting a slender but vital sliver of space between them.
“Go into the bathroom. Do as I said. And then wait.” With a light touch to her shoulder, he pushed her away.
She didn’t even hesitate, though he noted that the pulse beating against the paper-thin skin at the line of her jaw throbbed. And though her eyes were wide, there was a definite extra sway to her hips as she walked away.
She wanted this—wanted him. She was offering him the keys to heaven, and he’d be a damned fool not to take them.
He watched two minutes pass by on his Philippe Patek watch before he followed Ellie back through the front doors of the bar. Ignoring the crowd, he wound his way to the small hallway to the left of the bar, where the washrooms had been located the last time he’d been there.
He saw his mother standing behind the bar, a bottle of beer in one hand, and a ruby colored highball in the other. She opened her mouth as if to speak to him, but he let his gaze just slide right off of her as if he didn’t see her or, worse, as if she meant nothing to him anymore. And she didn’t—that moment outside in which he’d spilled his soul to Ellie had been brought about by the sheer surprise of seeing Hannah Archer when he hadn’t expected to.
Now? He was focused on Ellie. He needed her. Craved her with every fiber of his being.
Pushing through the door of the ladies’ washroom, he found a woman he didn’t know applying lipstick in the mirror.
“Um, hi?” She cocked her head at him, meeting his gaze in the mirror before recapping the lipstick. He smiled at her but made no move to retreat, just rocking back on his heels with his hands in his pockets.
“Okay then.” With a strained smile, the woman shoved her makeup back in her purse and pushed past Nate to leave the small washroom. He distinctly heard the words hot but weird as she went, and he couldn’t help a small snort of laughter.
Oh, if she only knew.
Only one stall door was closed. The idea that they could be walked in on and discovered would heighten Ellie’s arousal, but he found that he didn’t actually like the idea of sharing their intimacy with anyone.
That, too, was a first for him.
“It’s me.” He knocked on the closed stall door, short and sharp. He heard the metallic cling of the flimsy lock, then slid into the small sliver of space when the door opened, insinuating himself into the cubicle and locking it behind him.
Ellie was there, just as he’d told her to be. She’d worked her jeans down to her ankles, and was facing the wall. Her hands were splayed on the white tile, the tips bloodless, as though she was holding on for her life.
The sweet curves of her ass were bared to his view, and he growled deep with satisfaction.
But first…
Drawing back his hand, he swatted her across one of those pale cheeks. Her shocked cry echoed throughout the small room, and he smiled darkly to himself.
“That’s for not wearing panties.” Sliding his fingers into the heat between her legs, he slid one deep inside, savoring the way her wetness clenched around him. “The next time I discover that you’re trying to tempt me like that, I’ll haul you across the nearest flat surface. Keep that in mind.”
“Y-y-yes.” Ellie’s thighs clenched around his hand, trying to hold him in place, but he laughed and withdrew his touch anyway. She moaned with disappointment.
“You’re going to have to be quieter than that, or you’ll have the entire bar coming in to see what’s going on.” Nate slid his damp fingers up through the crevice that divided the two globes of her ass, and Ellie sucked in a shaky moan. “I don’t care, myself, but I suspect that you’ll be a little upset if the entire wedding party comes in to find me buried inside of you while you scream out my name.”
“Jesus, Nate!” Ellie arched her back as he took his free hand and worked her T-shirt up and over her breasts. Another tug and her bra was riding low, offering her plump breasts up to his touch like plums on a platter. He tweaked each nipple, rolling until they tightened into hard peaks. “We can’t—oh—oh God—we can’t do this here. Anyone could come in!”
“Are you saying red?” He slid his hands down the soft planes of her stomach, then once again buried it between her legs. His thumb found her clit, and she cried out as he began to circle the small bud hard and fast.
“No. No, of course not—I—” She sagged back against him, her knees giving out as he worked her clit, reading the signs in her body that told him she was fast approaching climax. “I just—I can’t—”
She was almost there, her chest heaving, her skin sheened with sweat. Just before she could fly over the edge, he pulled away, savoring her startled cry.
“What? Why?” Sweet Ellie actually banged her fists against the wall with frustration, and he did his best to cover up a laugh. “That’s so mean. Why would you do that?”
The desperation in her voice woke something dark deep inside of him, and again he had to bury the need to simply push himself inside of her and take what he needed. He held on to his control, but only just.
“When you tell me no, you’ll find that you don’t like the consequences.” Deliberately, he dipped his head and sank his teeth into the nape of her neck. He bit hard enough to turn her skin red, deeply satisfied to see his mark on her body.
He expected her to apologize, to stammer, to blush prettily. Instead she stiffened, then pushed back against him, rubbing that delectable ass over the rigid erection that pressed against the front of his pants.
“You’re going to have to do more than that to control me.” She continued to rub, rocking back into him with movements designed to drive him insane. “I’m stronger than that.”
“What are you saying, Ellie?” Roughly he grabbed her ponytail, tugging so that she was forced to turn to the side. She pressed her cheek to the cool tiles of the wall, and she laughed breathlessly when he got right in her face, forcing her to look at him.
“I’m saying, make me.” Her eyes sparked, and she pushed back against him, and he understood. She hadn’t really been protesting him having her here—she’d been playing a game. She wanted him—wanted him to take her as far as they could go.
“When you’re screaming loud enough that the whole bar hears you, just remember that you asked for it.” With another nip to her shoulder, Nate reached for the fastenings of his jeans. He undid the zipper, the sound harsh and metallic in the otherwise silent room. Their combined breaths echoed as well, a prelude as he shoved his pants and boxers down his hips and tore open the condom that he carried in his wallet.
Quickly sheathing himself, he positioned himself at her entrance, feeling her slippery heat even through the layer of latex. Grabbing his cock at the base, he rubbed himself up and down that crevice that divided her ass again, noting that she rocked back into him when he reached the pucker that lay hidden between.
No doubt about it, Ellie Marshall was his kind of girl—dirty to the core.
Her heels raised her up a bit, but she was still so small compared to him. Grabbing her hips, he adjusted her position so that she was bent over more deeply, her naked pussy an offering to his need.
Bending his knees, he positioned himself at her entrance, then drove in hard and fast and without warning.
“Nate!” Ellie arched back to meet him, then hissed when he encountered resistance inside of her. As he’d discovered the night before, she was tight and he was large, and with her legs anchored together by her jeans the fit was even more snug.
But she was going to take him all. He needed it, and she needed it too.
“Hold on tight, baby.” Ellie’s fingers scrabbled against the tiles as he continued his advance. He felt her flesh pulsing around his rigid length, squeezing, rippling, and his eyes rolled back in his head at the delicious sensations.
It wasn’t enough. It would never be enough.
Growling, he grabbed her hips again and hoisted her higher, bending her over further. The angle opened her wider, and he worked his way home, seating himself to the hilt inside that decadent heat.
His groan rent the air; hers followed. They stayed still for a moment, absorbing the sensations of filling and being filled. Before long, the dark, relentless need started to again claw at his insides, demanding that he ride this woman and make her his.
He pulled out nearly all the way, gasping for air as if he’d been submerged in the sea. One more deep breath, and then he was plunging back in, searching for something he’d never before realized that he needed.
Inside her, fully seated inside of her, his demons flew away. So he stayed there again for a long moment, letting his mind empty and then fill up again with everything that was Ellie.
Beneath him, Ellie was giving as much as she got, not content to be passive in this encounter, though she’d been the one to tell him to take control. With the lightning quick rolls of her hips, the way she reached for him, the breathy little pants that escaped those naughty lips of hers, she urged him higher and higher, demanded that he take more.
He had no choice but to do as she commanded.
Placing one hand flat on her spine, he tangled the other in her hair again, her messy ponytail falling free, the wheat colored strands lying in silken ropes on the creamy expanse of her bare back. Using his grip as an anchor, he quickened his pace, still seating himself with every thrust, but his movements coming faster and faster and again and again, until there wasn’t enough air left in the cubicle for either of them to breathe.
Remembering her earlier reaction to the touch, he slid the hand on her back down through the cleft of her behind. Her groan was barely audible, an animal sound, and it spurred him on as he found her tight pucker and stroked his index finger over the ring of muscle.
He hadn’t expected her to protest, and she didn’t, instead pushing against him, as eager for more sensation as he was. Using her own slickness to aid him, he worked the tip of his finger inside, and the way her body shook as he worked the digit in and out of her entrance set him on fire.
“That’s it, Blondie. Take me.” He continued to slam his cock inside of her tight channel, faster and faster, savouring the sounds their flesh made as they joined. And at the same time he worked at her tight rosette, his other hand tugging lightly at her hair as he guided them both toward release.
“Nate.” Ellie released the wall, reaching behind herself to grab at his hips and pull him closer. “I need—I need to—”
“I know, baby. Just hang on.” He intended to release her hair, to again work at her clit until she came for him with those pretty cries, but he never got a chance. Her pussy tightened around him, clenching and releasing as she pressed her cheek to the wall and bit her lip to hold back a scream.
He ground out a curse when her rippling flesh tore his own last shreds of control from his grasp. The grip of her pussy on his erection, the heat of being inside of her had the pleasure gathering in his toes, his scalp, the base of his spine before shooting through his cock in an explosion that made his vision go white.
He lost track of time and place. Still inside of her, Nate wrapped his arms around Ellie and held her tightly to him, her back to his chest. The heat and sweat from their lovemaking sealed them together, and as he rested his cheek on the top of her head he thought that he’d never felt anything more right.
It was Ellie who finally turned, squiggling in his arms until she faced him. Those perceptive eyes of hers searched his face before she pressed a quick kiss to his lips, then began to straighten her clothing.
“I’ll head back out first, okay?” Damn it, but when she looked at him like that, she could see right inside of him. And if she could in that moment, he’d be getting his heart stomped on, because she’d see how much she’d come to mean to him, and how much he didn’t want her to dismiss him as what she thought he was—a playboy.
He nodded, not sure what else to say. And as she went, the noise increasing momentarily as she opened the door, he knew that he would do whatever it took to change her opinion of him… and to keep her for good.