Risk (Gentry Boys #2)(55)

“The beast is being domesticated,” Cord joked and then laughed when I glared at him.

I took their razzing for a while longer, making believe it pissed me off when it really didn’t. As the three of us sat there cussing and joking it was easy enough to pretend that we were just living in the same carefree way we had since exiting Emblem. I could almost fool myself into thinking things were normal and there wasn’t a dark death cloud hanging over our heads.

Almost.





CHAPTER TWENTY ONE


Truly



Every night we’d wear each other out and I’d fall asleep in his arms. Then I’d wake up in the same place. Creed liked to hear me talk. Before I drifted off I would give him lively snippets of my childhood, mostly leaving out the rotten parts and especially anything about why I walked away from my mother and sisters one horrible night. Sometimes, when I asked, he would haltingly tell me stories too. His were short and dark, full of hurt and neglect. The only lights in his early life were his brothers.

Creed’s clumsy words to me in the middle of Cluck This were the only ones he’d outright spoken regarding how he felt about me. It was enough though, for now. When Creed Gentry looked you in the eye and told you that you mattered to him you knew it was entirely true.

“How come you never travelled more?” I asked him, one week after the night he told me he didn’t want anyone else but me. He was lying on my chest, his weight constricting my breathing a bit, but I didn’t mind. I loved being underneath him. “I mean, you always want to hear about all the states I’ve been to and it seems like you’ve a mind to see them yourself.”

Creed propped himself up on one elbow. “I’d like to do that,” he said thoughtfully. “Someday. I’d like to see a lot of things, places where there’s not just brown dust and heat.” He leaned over and brushed his lips across my cheek as his voice dropped to a whisper. “And I’m takin’ you with me, baby.”

I shivered from the effect of his words. Creed had that kind of power over me. He didn’t make empty promises. On the rare occasions when he revealed what was going on inside his head he could take my breath away.

“Creedence, will you sing for me?”

“Later,” he answered firmly, opening my legs.

No matter how many times I had him inside of me I still gasped from the initial shock of it. He was so big, so powerful, and yet he always held back until he’d made me cry out from sheer ecstasy.

“Creed,” I whimpered, already getting close as he pumped, first slowly and then with increasing speed. My hands clutched his broad back and my knees hugged his ribs. He kissed me and I greedily sucked his tongue while my body shattered with primal bliss. When he came he thrust so hard and deep I was sure there wasn’t room enough to keep him inside.

“No,” I complained when he tried to pull out.

“What?” he panted. “You’re not done?”

“No.” I wrapped my legs around his waist.

“Aw baby, it’s gonna be a few minutes until I get some more to give you.”

I kissed his shoulder. “I don’t care. I just want to be as close to you as possible.”

He didn’t answer. He just settled on top of me as best he could without crushing me completely. It didn’t take long for him to be ready again. It never did.

I offered to make him breakfast but he didn’t want any. He was going to the gym. He said he worked out better on an empty stomach.

As I stood there by the front door, wrapped in his arms, I wanted to ask him about the fight. I knew it weighed on him. I knew it was the reason he spent hours in the gym every day. But every time I’d brought it up over the past week I’d been met with silence. Saylor said she didn’t know anything but she looked so miserable when she said it I didn’t know if I believed her.

“See you tonight?” I asked instead, holding him, inhaling him.

He massaged the back of my neck. “You will,” he answered.

We kissed and then he was gone. I stood there in the living room, feeling the unique sorrow of a woman bidding her lover farewell, even if just for a little while. Dolly slept soundly in a ball on the couch. Stephanie was, as always, behind a closed door.

I paused outside her room for a moment and thought about the morning she’d burst into the apartment in tears. She hadn’t really been herself since then. She went to class, she came home, she went to her room. I hadn’t heard her yelling at anyone on the phone lately. Somehow that worried me more. If I ever saw a girl who needed to let go of herself a little it was Stephanie Bransky.

Even after I showered and changed it was still very early in the morning. I decided to go for a walk. When I was a child it had been a simple pleasure of mine. It didn’t matter if we were living on the beach or in the backwoods. Sometimes my sisters walked along with me but most often I walked alone.

There was a canal within a quarter of a mile and I headed over there. The canal was relatively full due to the recent summer monsoons. I glimpsed several exotic river birds by the banks. Heaven only knew how far they had flown to get here and where they had come from. They must have been on their way somewhere else when they saw water from the air and decided to take a closer look. They wouldn’t know that it didn’t really belong in this parched place.

I encountered sporadic joggers who nodded at me before moving on. As I stretched in the warm sun there were parts of my body that ached a little but it was a good feeling. There was no shame at all. It made such a difference, being in the arms of a man who cared for you.