Pieces of Summer (A stand-alone novel)(51)

“What f*cking happened?” he asks again, quieter, almost deadly calm.

Swallowing against the knot in my throat, I stare him in the eyes.

“You have your dark past. I have mine. Can’t we just let it go?”

He grinds his teeth, but he slowly releases my hands. Immediately, I grab my shirt, but before I can pull it on, he jerks it out of my hands and tosses it aside again. Without saying another word, he bends presses his lips to my stomach, and I stiffen against his touch.

“Don’t,” I whisper harshly, hating being touched there with his lips. He shouldn’t have to kiss that.

“Tell me what happened and I won’t,” he tells me, dragging his lips from one set of scars to another, continuing to kiss the disgusting marks and angry red lines that never faded.

“Chase,” I plead.

He ignores me, still kissing each and every jagged or precise line, every white scar or red mark… Every. Single. One.

More tears fall, and he works my panties down, slowly kissing his way down my legs. “You’re going to tell me, Mika. Then I’m going to f*ck up whoever did this to you.”

“Trust me,” I whisper as he starts to come back up, leaving my panties at my knees as he kisses my hip bone, “they f*cked themselves up worse than you ever could.”

“I doubt it,” he murmurs, once again tracing some of those disgusting marks.

When I try to push him away, he doesn’t budge. Instead, he lowers his head again, this time kissing down my middle instead of to my thigh. When his lips brush my clit, it pulses and throbs, and I moan.

“I’m going to make you forget it’s even there,” he says before latching on.

I try to spread my legs wider, but my panties at my knees keep me restrained, causing the intensity of his mouth to be so much stronger as he works me over, owning me as primal sounds rumble from his chest.

My hands go to his hair, holding him there as his body stays just off mine in a push-up position. It doesn’t feel like enough but it feels like too much at the same time.

My back arches, pushing into him, pushing me closer to his mouth as he continues to drive my mind into a frenzy. Everything on me gets too tight, almost leaving me on the verge of breaking, or so it seems. Then suddenly, it explodes, and ecstasy washes over me as my body trembles—actually trembles.

Chase doesn’t stop until I’m begging him to because it’s all too sensitive… almost painful. Finally, he tears his mouth away from me and lazily kisses his way back up, slowly dragging his lips across my skin.

When his lips find mine again, I can barely kiss him because I’m out of breath… as though I just ran a marathon or something. He grins against my lips, when I have to break the kiss to drag air into my starving lungs.

“Tell me that doesn’t bring back good memories,” he says as he pulls back, brushing a piece of hair from my face.

I run my hands along his shoulders as thunder rumbles across the sky, and my eyes lock with his as a slow smile starts to spread.

“Either my memories are rusty, or you’ve gotten a hell of a lot better at that.”

He smirks before reaching between us, and I pull one leg up as he pulls my panties off it, freeing my legs so he can settle in between them.

“When you tell me what happened, I’ll show you some other areas I’ve improved in.”

My smile dies immediately, and he studies my eyes as my lips tense. In only my bra, I feel exposed now instead of intimate. He’s the first guy to see me in this context. In the past, when I was still trying to be intimate with people, I kept my shirt on. With Chase, I forgot I’m not the pretty sixteen-year-old girl whose life was once better than most.

“Let it go, Chase,” I whisper, hoping he stays on top of me instead of revealing the scars again.

“If you want me, Mika, you are going to have to let it go,” he says, brushing his lips over mine. “I’m not getting inside you until I know who did that to you and what happened. And trust me, you want me inside you.”

Heat licks at my insides as I squirm beneath him, and my legs slide up and wrap around his waist.

“Again, my memory may be rusty, but I recall you being a little less patient than that,” I murmur while tilting my hips and pressing myself against his bare torso.

A groan passes through his lips, but he just narrows his eyes at me.

“I was a horny teenager back then. I’ve grown up a little, and I can promise you I’ll impress you with more than just my patience. Why won’t you tell me?”

Thunder booms as though it’s an omen of things to pass, and I blow out a breath while wrapping my arms around his neck.

“If you’re not going to wow me with your alleged skills, then let’s order pizza before the power goes out. I hate eating in the dark.”

He doesn’t look happy about that, but he pulls me to my feet. Immediately, I turn away and shimmy my shirt back on before pulling my panties back into place. He leaves his shirt off, and he watches me hurry through the process of covering up. I look around for my shorts, but remember he took them off in another room.

He orders pizza, and by some miracle, the power stays on in spite of the storm. He keeps looking at me questioningly, and I keep tugging at my shirt reflexively. When he opens the fridge, he frowns while looking in.

“Why do you have a gallon of water, a pint of half-and-half, and two jugs of orange juice, but nothing else?” he muses, possibly trying to make light conversation.