A Woman Gone Mad (10 page)

After a month everything I told Allen that Saturday afternoon turns into a big fat lie.

I’ve fallen head over heels in love with Leo and his words of happy ever after. It’s like he can’t breathe unless I’m with him.

On the weekends I can’t come up with a solid lie so that I can go out with him, he keeps me on the phone, refusing to go out with April and Josh. Hell, he refuses to go out at all. He just stays at home with me on the phone.

Then first thing on Monday morning, as soon as Mrs. Stewart leaves for work, Leo is running into the house to get to me. As soon as he sees me, his face lights up and he has me whisked up into his arms, raining kisses on my face, hair, and shoulders. I fall more into him every damn time.

“Missed you, Lil. Fuck, I missed you, baby,” he groans into my neck then playfully nips. “You missed me too, didn’t you?”

“Nah, not really. I mean, I did at one point because I couldn’t reach the cereal in the pantry but… Oh wooo ahhhh!” He grabs me under my arms and tosses me in the air like a freaking toddler before he catches me with one arm under my knees and the other behind my back. “Leo! Shit, you scared the hell out of me!”

“Next time you say you missed me then.” He leans in to kiss me until I’m dizzy. “Now whatcha wanna do today, baby?”

I give him the answer I know he wants through a coy smile. “Hang out with you.”

Allen walks through the kitchen and sees us, stopping dead in his tracks.

Leo looks over his shoulder at him and says, “What’s up, kid?”

“None of your damn business,” he mutters, turning to leave. Then he glances back at me over his shoulder. “Lil, summer’s almost up.” Then he’s gone and I’m left in Leo’s arms, staring at the door he walked through.

“Hey, what’s up with your kid brother, Lil?” His strong arms squeeze me tight, and he buries his face against my neck.

“Oh, it’s nothing. He’s ready for school to start, I guess.” The butterflies stir in my lower belly when his warm lips brush against my neck.

He pulls his face from my neck. “Ooookay, well, I got some movies for us. You wanna go crawl up in my bed with me and watch them?” The devious smile on his face melts away any refusal that might have been there.

I gather my wits and reel in my emotions. “Yeah, sure. Let me get Jules some breakfast made and make sure she’s good. Then I’ll meet you over there, baby.” I lean up and kiss his perfect mouth before hopping down and starting to make my way around the kitchen. “Jules, you want eggs and toast, babe?” I yell through the house.

I hear her voice come from the living room. “Yes, ma’am. Thank you, Lil.”

When I look up at Leo on my way to the fridge, I catch him watching me. “What?” I giggle as I make my way back to the countertop with the eggs and butter in my hand. “You want some eggs and toast too, baby?” I lift my eyebrow and give him the sassy smirk I know drives him insane.

“No, I just like watching you in here, with her.” He nods towards the living room, walking over to me. Coming up behind me and wrapping his arms around my waist, he settles his chin on my shoulder and whispers in my ear, “You’re gonna be in my kitchen, Lil, with my kids, bein’ my wife and makin’ our family eggs and toast in the mornin’, baby.”

Wait… Wha…??

“Is that so?” I glance up at him and feel whatever reserve I had disappear with the look of propriety I see in his eyes.

“Damn right that’s so. Mark my words, baby. You
are
mine, Lillian Shaw.”

Shudders, butterflies, and jumping jacks slide up and down every one of my nerve endings as Leo spins me around and pins me against the counter. Digging his erection into my lower abdomen, he bites my lower lips and pulls it into his mouth with a growl. “Say it, Lillian, I wanna hear you say. Right. Now.”

Letting my hands skate under his t-shirt and over his back muscles, I drag my nails across his skin until I am at his shoulders, where I sink them in and pull myself up against his body. My tongue slides down my lower lip still between his teeth, and I lick at his teeth to tease him into letting it go for a kiss. He does as my lips and tongue tease him to do, only I pull back and look up at him from underneath my eyelashes. With a shy grin spreading across my face, I tell him, “Leo, I’ll be yours. I’ll always be yours, baby.”

He swoops down, his hands immediately going into my hair. Grabbing fistfuls, he kisses me breathless. Then as quickly as it starts, it’s over and he has me spun back around facing the eggs and mixing bowl.

SMACK!

After a hard-as-hell, bruising smack on my ass, he’s sauntering out of the kitchen when he throws over his shoulder, “Feed the kid, Lil. Then get your sexy little ass over to my house and in my bed. I got plans for you.” And then he’s gone.

I can’t remember when I fell in love with Leo. I know a piece of me did the first night we were together. I know every time I saw him flying up to me like a man dying of thirst and I was all he needed to quench it that a piece of me became his. And after we would make love and he would lie there for hours, running his fingers through my hair and just staring at me like I was both the beautiful holder of all life’s answers and the world’s largest unsolvable puzzle, I would lose pieces to him then too.

Every kiss, every caveman declaration of ‘Mine’ he growled or groaned into my ear. While I thought he was only taking my body, Leo was actually slowly possessing my soul. It wasn’t like it had been with Michael—hard, fast, and so overwhelming at times it made my head spin.

Leo was smart, I know that now. However, at the time, I truly thought my heart was safe. I realize now, though, that Leo was setting up my fall slowly and methodically, with stealth and divine grace, so that when I did fall—and it was never a question of if, but when—I would fall and never be able to get back up again.

His takeover strategy mimics those of history’s greatest yet most demented minds. The strategies that almost took over the world in wars, only Leo wasn’t after the world—just a young woman’s heart. A heart that belonged to both a girl and a new woman. He was devising a plan to successfully invade and occupy my heart. And he succeeded.

Another odd thing that happens with Leo is that Lilly leaves when he is around. She doesn’t like to talk about him. We still chat but it isn’t ever about him, and it isn’t ever when he is around. I’ll wish later that I would have asked why, but all my attention is focused on Leo, so I never get the chance to ask her. Ladies and gentlemen, I fucking fell. I fucking fell and these were the most beautiful moments of my entire life—even up to right now, the end. It was and will always be the most precious moment in all of the moments that make up this pitiful and seemingly wasted life.

Summer is ending. I am starting school the next Monday and this is weighing very heavy on my mind, but I try to hide it. I’m scared to death that, when this summer ends, Leo and I also will.

Leo takes me to dinner at a beautiful little Italian restaurant called A’more on the lake. After we’re done eating, he drives us down to a secluded area on the lake that his grandparents own and use to dock their boats in the winter.

When we pull up, I immediately know where we are, and giddiness ignites inside me as I watch him walk around the hood of his Camaro to open my door and help me out of the low seat. Trying to keep my skirt down, my knees together, while in heels and getting out of a car was
very
new to me.

“Up you go, baby girl,” I barely hear him say while I’m getting out of the car.

“Thank you, baby.” I’m smiling up at him, excited, nervous, happy, and a tiny bit sad because our summer is ending.

“I’d do anything for you, Lil. Everything for you. You know that right?” he asks as we make our way to a small strip of sand and beach on the lake.

“I know, Leo.” And I do know, but what about after tonight? What about when school starts?

As we walk towards the beach, the faint beginnings of fall are in the air. This deepens my sadness, but I hold on to what else I can hear and focus on that—the cicadas and frogs making their southern summer melody that always reminds me of home and will now forever remind me of Leo’s and my summer.

Once we round the bend and come up over the hill, I see that Leo has laid out a blanket on the sand, and scattered all around the blanket are little tea light candles. In the middle of the blanket are pillows—maybe five. Off to the side, I spot a picnic basket. Then I see the lightning bugs. They’re everywhere around the lake and old low-hanging oak and cypress tree branches suspended over the beach and our little spot.

I gasp and stop. I can’t move. My eyes instantly fill with tears and my feet become lead.

“Lil? Baby, why are you cryin’? I didn’t want you to cry, baby. I want tonight to be special. Shit, did I fuck up? What’d I fuck up, baby? tell me and I swear to Christ I’ll fix it.”

I can’t speak. I’m still rooted there with my hand over my mouth, attempting to hold in a sob that is trying like hell to rip out of my throat, hot tears now streaming down my face.

“Lil? Baby?” His voice is full of fear. “FUCK! MOTHERFUCK!” He stomps off towards the blanket and starts picking up pillows.

“Wait!” My voice breaks as I cry out to him to make him stop. “Wait, Leo, please,” I cry, stumbling towards him.

He looks up, confusion consuming his face, and drops the pillows.

Half-falling and tripping over the uneven ground in my heels, I try to run to him and almost tumble to the ground. I kick off my heels, hike up my skirt so it’s around my waist, and haul ass to him.

As soon as I reach him, I jump up, wrapping my arms around his neck and my legs around his waist. I immediately inhale him and whisper against his chest, “It’s perfect, baby. It’s perfect, it’s perfect, it’s perfect.” I rake my nails into his long, silky hair, fisting it. I pull his mouth to mine and devour him.

I kiss him like my life, like my being, like the placement of my soul in heaven or hell depends on it. With his hands cradling my face, he uses his thumbs to sweep away my tears and he pulls back to look into my eyes.

I see his eyes get misty as he sucks in a deep breath before he asks me with his watery eyes still pinned onto mine, “I didn’t fuck up?” His voice makes him sound like a lost, scared boy. I have never heard Leo sound unconfident.

I brush his hair behind his ears and kiss his closed eyes. He’s taking deep breaths, trying to gather control of the tears that I can still taste on my lips.

“No, baby, you didn’t fuck up. You just knocked my world off its axis. Stole my breath, my heart. But no, you didn’t fuck up. I love you, Leo. With all my heart. Always will, baby.”

“Then why—” I cut him off mid-sentence, kissing him with a fervor, a need that I would only feel with Leo for all of my life.

I peel my shirt over the top of my head as he lays me down on our pallet. As soon as I’m snuggled up in the mountain of pillows, I pull his shirt off too, nipping and biting. Then I’m licking my nips and bites, kissing them better.

“Leo,” I moan as his nails rake over my nipples while he drags my bra cups down under my heavy breasts. Once my breasts are pushed up and bare, I shove them into his hard chest, rubbing my lower half against his erection. His hands go around and grab my ass, and he pushes himself harder into me.

“You want me, Lil?” His mouth is against my ear. Then I feel his tongue lick the shell of it before biting down on my earlobe.

“Fuck yes. Please, baby…” I whine as one hand comes around to my front and yanks my skirt up higher around my waist then delves into my panties. Becoming the master of buttons again, he circles once, twice, and after the third circle, he eases a long finger inside of me.

A moan escapes my throat when he pushes another finger into me and starts moving them in and out. My eyes roll back in my head and I start to feel the now familiar heat coiling inside me and around his fingers. I know this is the beginning of waves of heaven in the form of an orgasm.

“Fuck, Lil, you’re so wet, baby. This is mine, isn’t it? Your body only does this for me.” He growls as his fingers start working faster, pushing in deeper. My hips are bucking against his hand, and I feel it coming, building higher and higher. “Who does this body belong to Lil?” he rasps against my mouth.

“Mmmmmm,” is all I can get out. I’m right there. “Please don’t stop, Leo.” Then I gasp sharply when his fingers are quickly removed from inside me and blink my eyes open to catch him licking me off his fingers. His dark blue eyes almost look black from desire.

He shucks his pants off immediately after tearing my skirt and panties down my legs and off my body, tossing them over his shoulder. He grabs my hands that are running down towards his erection and yanks them up pinning them above my head. He looms over me, staring down into my eyes. His voice is dark husky, and it makes the ache stronger. “Whose, Lil? Who does this body, your heart, your soul… Who do they belong to?”

“You. Yours, Leo. Shit, just plea—” He slams inside me, his mouth devouring, consuming mine. He thrusts hard, over and over, harder and harder, deeper and deeper, moving his mouth from mine to over my still pushed-up, on-display nipples. He circles one with the tip of his tongue then bites down and immediately sucks it into his mouth, laving the sting away.