Risk (Gentry Boys #2)(47)

I washed out the gumbo container and then decided the entire kitchen could use a good scrubbing. From there I moved on to the living room and then the bathroom. Two hours later the place was immaculate. But all that activity didn’t force Creed Gentry out of my thoughts.

With a sigh I sought out my phone. Saylor would still be at work and there wasn’t really anyone else I could call to discuss my infatuation, which in truth was beginning to overpower me. On a whim I called my sister Carrie. Her voicemail answered with the same bubbly voice I used to hear everyday. I didn’t leave a message. There was no way to reach Mia up there on some off-the-grid farm in the Pacific Northwest. And after my last awkward conversation with Aggie, I wasn’t willing to risk the forlorn feeling that had bothered me for days afterward.

I stared at my phone, wondering how things would go if I dialed anyway, if I blurted out everything I should have told her four years ago. I put the phone down. It would be selfish at this point. I would only be sharing the burden of my own pain because I couldn’t carry it by myself anymore.

I didn’t call her. I tossed the phone on the coffee table. If I had lived alone with it all this time then I could keep on going just like that. It was my cross to bear.

Dolly jumped on the couch next to me as I curled my legs underneath my body and picked up a shabby pillow. I toyed with the remote and then put it down, not feeling much interested in television. I used to love to read. When I was a teenager I would blow through about eight romance novels a week. I couldn’t wait for the day when the things happening in those pages would happen to me. I was still waiting. I’d finally learned not to mistake sex for love but I hadn’t seen what love looked like for myself. I was afraid I’d always be on the outside looking in.

The knock on the door was loud. Sometimes drunks would roll out of a party and get lost, banging on doors until someone answered. Cautiously I peered through the peephole. Creed stood on the other side of it, his head down.

My heart rate immediately doubled. I glanced down quickly at my messy clothing. I wasn’t even wearing a bra and although Creed never seemed troubled by the sight of my breasts, I knew the loose ponytail, nylon shorts and grubby t-shirt were rather tacky.

“Didn’t expect to see you again tonight,” I said easing the door back slowly.

He pushed it open the rest of the way and grabbed me.

“Wait,” I gasped, struggling to close the door as his hands went down my shorts, “Creed, hold on.”

“Why?” he growled, slamming the door shut and then pulling his shirt off.

I circled away from him, even though I was already shaken up from the brief touch of his hands. I wanted him like I always wanted him. Still, it annoyed me that he just came barging in here to silently demand sex.

“You don’t call,” I said angrily, my thighs squeezing together to suppress the fresh ache. “You don’t even say, ‘Hello’. You just show up here at eleven pm like I’m some fast piece of action you can ride.”

He stared down at me, breathing heavily. I wanted to feel the solid heat of his tanned chest. I wanted him to take me anyway. Instead he pulled his phone out of his back pocket. I’d left my own phone on the coffee table and it buzzed loudly.

I put my hands on my hips and glared at him. “What the hell are you doing?”

He just stared at me silently with his phone to his ear as mine continued to ring.

I picked my phone up.

“Hello, Truly,” he said into the phone, his eyes boring into me from six feet away.

“Hi Creedence,” I answered, meeting his gaze.

“Can I come over to f*ck you until you scream and then fall asleep on your tits?”

Creed you know I’m so full of shit and that you don’t really have to ask.

“Yes-“ I started to say and that was enough for him. Creed threw his phone down and was on me, pulling my shirt up and fastening his mouth to my breasts. I was in ecstasy immediately, pushing his head against me harder as he ripped my shirt over my head. I felt myself falling but he caught me and we clumsily wound up on our knees. His hands were inside of me, and then his tongue went there too. Creed Gentry got me stripped naked and on my back as he loomed over me like a golden mythological god.

“Creed,” I whispered, reaching for him, wanting badly to feel what he was keeping just out of my reach. He held my hips in his hands, his wild blue eyes scouring every inch of me before he reached between my legs.

“No,” I whimpered as he brought me higher with the steady rhythm of his fingers. “You, I want you!”

“Hush, baby. I just want to watch you come first.”

I didn’t keep him waiting long. He’d already learned everything there was to know about my body and the shattering pleasure found me quickly. Afterwards he got on top, covering me completely with his hard flesh. I was still ripe, completely ready to have him inside me. I was about to begin pulling off his pants whether he wanted me to or not when he let out a sad sigh and moved his cheek to my shoulder.

The back of his neck was hot as I ran my fingers over it, then into his hair. His arms snaked underneath my body to pull me more tightly against him. I knew something was wrong and I was about to ask him to tell me about it. But that wasn’t the way Creedence worked. He would tell his stories in his own time, in his own way.

“It’s too bright in here,” he muttered suddenly and then gathered me into his arms. He carried me into my room and set me down on the bed.