Chapter 7
“Shawna.”
She woke up with a jump and a yelp.
The blanket she had pulled over herself slid to the floor. Sometime in the night, the loose pants had stopped being so comfortable, and she had pulled them off. She had meant to wake up well before Elijah did, so she hadn’t thought that it would matter in the least.
With another yelp, she grabbed the blanket and pulled it over herself.
“You’re awake. I didn’t think you’d be awake so early. You should have an aspirin.”
She was babbling, thought Shawna, agonized. She really should stop babbling.
“Did you put me to bed, then?”
Shawna nodded, thankful that she’d managed to stop talking.
“Didn’t undress me. But… Ah, you took my belt off. Well, I guess I should thank you for that. Come here, Shawna, so that I can thank you.”
There was something different about him.
There was…
Oh, she should’ve said no – should’ve gotten her pants on and left.
But what she should’ve done, and what she ended up doing, were two vastly different things.
“Elijah…”
“I won’t bite. Unless you want me to.”
He sat up, and she caught sight of that rumpled shirt still open wide at the neck, and her throat seemed to go dry. The blanket fell from her fingers, though she barely even noticed it.
He was beautiful. He was so beautiful that it made her throat ache.
Shawna wasn’t completely aware that she was up, and walking towards him, wearing only her shirt that just skimmed her thighs.
She stopped beside him, by the bed, and looked at him, her eyes wide.
“Kiss me, Shawna. Isn’t that what you’re supposed to do in a fairytale? You looked like a princess, sleeping there in that chair – a princess out of time. Kiss me, and let’s see if we can turn me into something more.”
His fingertips brushed over her hand, and the soft, delicate touch was enough to send a jolt through her.
She shouldn’t.
But she wanted to, so much.
She wanted to.
So Shawna threw caution to the wind, because for once, just for once, she wanted to follow her heart, no matter where it might lead her.
He saw the moment of capitulation, and she saw triumph in his eyes, fierce and wild, as his fingers tightened on her hand and pulled her, tugging her to tumble beside him.
In a move so swift and graceful it reminded her of a predator in the jungle, he moved over her, pinning her down onto the bed. Shawna gasped as she felt his body, lean and tough, over hers, making her feel so soft and so vulnerable.
She raised her eyes to his, and saw in them what she felt – the confusion, the need that had been ruthlessly suppressed so far. She was shocked by it, enough to be stunned when those lips parted and covered hers, so possessively that she lost her breath, and then she lost herself.
Shawna wasn’t even aware of the moment when her arms moved around him, her legs moving to wrap herself around him, her heart beating so hard and so fast that it felt like it might leap right out of her.
His lips were potent.
They made everything in her tremble, turn hot and threaten to melt, as they explored the shape of hers, touching and tasting. His tongue flicked out to tease her lips, tease the line where they met, until she parted them to moan her pleasure and it darted in, finding hers, tempting her to touch her tongue to his, stroke it along his sensually, intimately, until he teased her tongue into his mouth and sucked on it, making her gasp in shocked pleasure.
Her body was pulsing with heat as he touched her, and she saw that the buttons of her shirt were undone. She had unhooked her bra sometime during the night, and her breasts, full and tipped with dark, now taut, large nipples, were exposed to his gaze.
Shawna wasn’t a shy person.
And she didn’t feel shy now.
His eyes on her, moving over her torso, taking in every curve and every dip of her form, was as physical as being touched.
“You’re gorgeous, Shawna. You’re so beautiful.”
His whispered praise as he kissed her again made her tremble, and this time, she was aware of her desire as she wrapped herself around him, pressing her breasts against his chest, and she wanted to feel his heated skin against her. She wanted to feel him.
She wanted nothing between them.
Frantic, nearly frenzied, her fingers ran down his torso, undoing the rest of his buttons as he kissed her neck, open-mouthed, tongue stroking her sensitive skin. When she finally spread his shirt open and pressed the palms of her hands against his chest, she felt his muscles clench and ripple under her touch.
It made her feel powerful.
“Yes, touch me. I want you to touch me,” he whispered in her ear, and his tongue traced the folds of her ear, making her tremble and moan again as he licked his way down her neck.
Emboldened, she slid her hands up his chest to find his small nipples and stroked them, brushing her fingertips over them, until she felt them harden against her palm. She brushed her nails against them and arched her back as he nipped at her ear in response.
“So beautiful, so responsive, Shawna. I want to feel how much you want me. Tell me you need me.”
Could she have denied him the truth?
“I need you. I want you to touch me, too. Elijah…”
His name was a plea, and he listened, moving down her body in a slow, seductive wave that made her tremble with desire. He kissed her shoulders, dipping his tongue into the hollows of her collarbones, before moving down to her chest, kissing the soft, dark mounds of her breasts, so softly, but she felt every touch in every part of her body.
He breathed on her nipple and smiled as he licked it, gently, just once, making her tremble again.
“Elijah…”
She breathed his name like a prayer, and he answered, his lips latching on to her nipple and sucking it into his mouth, his tongue sliding wetly across the tip of it, and her back bowed, arching off the bed, as she wrapped her arms around his head and pulled him closer, longer, oh, she wanted so much more…
“Your skin is so soft,” he whispered against her breast, before switching his attention to the other one and lavishing it with the same care that made her whimper and moan against him.
Her hands roamed over his back, feeling his muscles moving, his skin getting hotter, getting bedewed, and she could feel the strain he was under, holding back, going slow. And she wanted more.
She didn’t want him to hold back.
She wanted him to show her how much he wanted her.
“I want you. I want you inside me. I want to feel you so deep inside me.”
She felt him tense and shudder as she said the words, and he growled as he moved up her to kiss her, ravenously, as if he would devour her.
“You push me…”
“I want to. Show me how much you want me.”
She wrapped her legs around him again, and felt him, hard and so big against her. She gasped as he moved, brushing against her so intimately, and the heat spread until she could hardly stand it. She wanted him, beyond reason.
“Shawna…”
She opened her eyes when cool air hit her, and the distance between them almost hurt. But she saw him shedding the rest of his clothes, and she smiled.
“Oh yes,” she whispered as he moved over her again, and this time, he kissed his way down her torso, his mouth wandering over her breasts, nipping and licking, before dipping down, kissing her belly and making her quiver, his tongue sliding over her navel before he reached her hips and made her shiver.
He nipped at her hip bones, and she gasped again, as he got closer and closer.
He slowly, deliberately, drew her panties down her legs, and kissed the soft skin of her thighs, licking and nibbling at her legs until she felt like she was melting with need for him. He got closer, and closer, and she spread her legs for him, opening herself to him, letting him see how much she needed him.
He breathed on her, making her tremble.
He made her wait, each tiny fraction of a moment making her want him even more, before he licked her, slowly and softly, and she was so close that she nearly climaxed for him right then.
But when he buried his face between her legs, licking her wet folds, finding that hard button that needed his lips and his tongue so desperately, she was lost. He made her wait – taking her to the edge as he used his tongue and his lips on her, before pulling back and keeping her there, over and over again, until she was begging him, sobbing with the desperate need for release.
“Elijah, please, please…”
When his fingers slid inside her, moving inside her, her hands twisted in the sheets and she let her head fall back, her mouth open, her pleasure uninhibited, and everything inside her seemed to twist, clench and hold for an impossibly long moment before she cried his name, her body shuddering and trembling as he made her rise, crest and fall.
Elijah moved over her as her body still trembled from the pleasure he had just given her.
“Look at me, Shawna. I want you to look at me.”
Could she have done anything less?
She looked at him, nearly drowned in those gray eyes, like the stormy skies, dangerous and unpredictable, and she felt him enter her, stretch her and fill her.
Shawna wrapped her legs around him, willing him to lose himself in her as she had lost herself in him, as she was again losing herself in him.
“Elijah,” she whispered, and she felt it all tense again as he moved in her, so deep, driving so deep into her that she moved with him, her hips following the rhythm he had set, keeping up effortlessly as she sought that pleasure again.
She found it, with Elijah deep inside her, and she welcomed it, letting herself shatter around him. She held on to him as she clenched and tightened around him, and she felt the moment he let go and joined her.
“Shawna!” he gasped as he held on to her, so tight, and she wanted to soothe him, tell him that it was all right, tell him that he could take her, take whatever pleasure she could give him. Take whatever comfort she could give him, because she had never before seen anybody in such need of comfort.
They held each other, for long, sweet moments, as their panting became more like breathing, and their bodies seemed to cool down a little.
Shawna smiled at him, still feeling him inside her.
“Elijah.”
She said his name in that moment of intimacy, expecting to feel that connection.
But when he looked at her, his eyes seemed empty.
He rolled off her, and the coolness she felt wasn’t just from the air.
Something was wrong.
“Elijah?”
“I need to shower.”
Shawna told herself she was being silly, but she couldn’t help it. She had never felt more hurt in her life – never.
He’d said it as if he needed to wash her off himself, as if she had contaminated him in some way.
Suddenly, she was very aware of her nakedness and needed to cover it.
Her fingers were trembling, she noticed, almost detachedly, as she found her clothes and put them on carefully.
By the time she was done, Elijah was back out, and dressed in a shirt and loose sweatpants.
It was the most casual she had ever seen him dressed.
But he looked more formal than she had ever seen him before. He looked at her like she was an employee, not the woman he’d just made love to so passionately, so ardently.
“So…”
Shawna trailed off, wondering what she could possibly say. All the intimacy had drained out of the morning.
“Thank you for helping me last night, Shawna. You didn’t have to, but thank you.”
Shawna could only nod.
“It was no problem. I… Ryan is here. Will Elizabeth be here today, or should I help him get ready for school?”
Elijah looked startled.
“Ryan is with his grandparents.”
Shawna shook her head.
“He was here. That’s why I came looking for you last night – I had to make him something to eat and get him ready for bed. I wasn’t sure what was going on.”
Elijah’s face tightened.
“I’m sorry you had to do that.”
Shawna shook her head.
“No, I didn’t mind. It’s fine. It’s just a bit irresponsible not to have anybody to take care of him. You were in no fit state to do it.”
He looked like a stranger now.
“I am quite aware of that, Shawna. There must’ve been a misunderstanding. Thank you for helping.”
Shawna hesitated. But she had to ask. How could she not?
“Elijah, what’s wrong? What was wrong last night? Why did you send the staff off? Why were you…”
But his face was like thunder now. She couldn’t finish asking him all she needed to know, because he so obviously didn’t want to tell her.
“I think you’re forgetting yourself a little, Shawna. Thank you for everything, but my personal life remains personal. I have no desire to talk about it. Now, I’m sure you need to get going. I’ll have the car brought around.”
That was dismissal, and it hurt as much as a punch to the face.
Shawna was mortified.
“I can get a cab.”
But she checked the time, and saw that she would need to take him up on his offer, as if her humiliation needed to be compounded.
Shawna turned around a walked away, and by the time she was at the door, she heard the car.
She felt like she was escaping, and barely, as she got in it and was driven home.
The last thing she needed was to get emotional about it.
She was pretty sure she remembered Elijah opening the drawer of his bedside table and getting a condom out, for which she was grateful. The last thing she needed was to have to ask him to get tested.
Her face burned with the humiliation of what had happened.
He hadn’t even acknowledged what they had shared – the night they had spent together. Had it meant nothing?
Maybe it had.
Maybe this should be a lesson to her.
She was thankful that Layla had already left by the time she got home, and she barely had time to get ready and get to work. To her annoyed gratitude, the car was waiting to take her to work, too.
Getting through the day was harder than Shawna could’ve imagined. But she managed it, even if her stubborn pride was all she had to keep her going.
The next day was just as difficult.
By the third day – but of course, Elijah hadn’t called, and why would he? – Layla decided to talk about it. Shawna and Layla had one of their rare fights, and for the rest of the week, the sisters didn’t speak to each other.
Seeing Ryan in class every day, and seeing how much he was improving, was a joy, but a bittersweet one. He looked forward to his Sunday class so much, but now Shawna dreaded it.
There was absolutely no question of going back to that delightful routine, of course. She had been put in her place, and very firmly, too.
She had crossed many lines – lines she had never meant to cross, lines she should’ve known better than to cross. And she was paying for it.
So she would take her lumps.
But she wouldn’t put herself in that situation again.
The next Sunday, Layla and she had called a truce by the time she was ready to go to work.
Might as well make her point firmly, figured Shawna, and she didn’t wait for the car to pick her up. Affordable or not, she took a cab to the house that looked like that forbidding fortress again. She no longer saw the warmth that she’d begun to feel there.
It had been an illusion, just like the softness she had seen in Elijah.
She avoided everybody – did they all know about what had happened? – and focused on her lesson with Ryan.
That was a joy, as it always was. Ryan was coming along so well that she was genuinely beginning to wonder when he would outgrow her. Ryan would be quite the composer if he didn’t get bored, too. It didn’t seem like he would. He was as in love with the violin as she had been at his age, and he was a lot better.
He had music in his head and in his fingers.
But that was a conversation that she would have to have with Elijah.
The realization that she had been letting Ryan down, too, was hard to swallow. She’d been so engrossed in her own personal gratification, the tenuous relationship she’d thought she was building with Elijah, that she had avoided talking to him about Ryan, which was her job.
She hadn’t been doing her job.
She would do it now, she vowed, no matter what. Now that all her illusions about her place in Elijah’s world had been shattered, she could pick up the pieces and go back to living in reality.
She was the music teacher, who was from the kind of world that a man like Elijah Rogers would never understand.
She had thought that in that room, in that little alcove, they were just two people exploring each other, finding out new things about each other, leaving the world outside and simply spending time with each other.
Enjoying each other’s company, enjoying each other, perhaps even…
But Shawna refused to think about that.
There was no perhaps even.
Elijah had got what he’d wanted, and if he thought he was going to get it again, he was wrong.
It was up to her to let him know exactly where she stood.
So when the lesson was over and Mr. Smith turned up, Shawna was ready.
“Please let Mr. Rogers know that I am not available to have dinner with him tonight. I must be going.”
He looked shocked, but he nodded, and walked her out.
This time, Shawna didn’t look up when she was being driven away. This time, she didn’t feel his eyes on her, either.
Even knowing it was futile, Shawna kept an eye on her phone. But there was nothing – no message, no call, no nothing.
No apology.
No concern.
Absolutely nothing.
It hurt, so much more than it should have.
She had let herself care, let herself believe that she was finding the man beneath the façade. What a fool she’d been!
At least she could find comfort in the knowledge that she had been right that first time. She had been right; Elijah Rogers was exactly as cold and unfeeling as she’d thought him that time.
But he’d been so wonderful, so sensitive, so caring…
Until afterwards.
He’d been the dream man, until afterwards.
Shawna was so preoccupied with her own life, and her own problems, that for once, she didn’t pay attention to Layla.
Layla was quieter than usual, and had stopped the baking and the cooking.
But Shawna hardly noticed, because she wasn’t interested in food, anyway. Eating seemed like such a chore.
The only thing that gave her joy anymore was music, so she poured everything she had into it, every second she could spare.
She dreaded Sunday again, but this time, she needn’t have worried. This time, she wasn’t asked to stay for dinner.
That evening, Shawna composed a progress report for Ryan and emailed it, as Elijah had demanded so many weeks ago.
She made it comprehensive, and added the recommendation that Elijah might perhaps like to listen to the progress made himself.
But there was no reply other than curt acknowledgment.
It hurt, far more than it should have, but Shawna told herself that she would deal with it.
By the time she was ready for bed – not that sleep came easily to her anymore – she was exhausted, and was irritated when she saw Layla at the door.
“Layla, can this wait till morning?”
Layla shook her head.
“I need to talk to you, Shawna. I… I don’t know what to do.”
Looking at her sister, Shawna felt her world slowly shift, and settle again.
She’d let go of her priorities.
Family – that had always been what mattered.
Family.
Layla.