All Broke Down (Rusk University #2) (23 page)

I lace my fingers with his because it seems like the right thing to do in my head, and he holds our entwined hands up in the air for a few long seconds, like he’s never held someone’s hand before. When I lay my head back down against his chest, he lets our hands drop into his lap and stay there.

I feel something warm and soft graze my forehead, and electricity skips up my spine. With his arm around my shoulders, my head on his chest, and my hand in his it feels like all roads lead to Silas. And all the restless energy floating through me keeps connecting to him and coming back twice as strong, like we’re this closed circuit, and the longer we stay linked, the more powerful the pull between us becomes.

There’s a frenzy to it, a need that reminds me of sex, of those moments when I’m chasing something and it feels just a breath beyond my grasp. It builds in me, fills me up, until I feel like I might burst.

Even so, as time passes, my head feels heavier and heavier, and it blankets the need, buries it. Even though I’m resting against Silas, there’s this tickle at the very top of my neck that makes me feel like a string is there holding everything together, and it’s about to snap. I shift and shift, suddenly exhausted, but unable to get comfortable.

After a few minutes, Silas grips my thighs and moves me so that he can lean against the armrest, his legs stretched out. It leaves more of my legs draped over his lap, and when I settle back down, I’m no longer laying just my head against his chest, but my whole upper body. The arm he’d had across my shoulders drops to curl around my waist. I fall asleep there, breathing in time with the lazy strokes of his fingers down my side.

My final thoughts are that I think the pot is wearing off, but the lightness it gave me, that bubbly giddiness in my belly, appears to be sticking around. Unless it isn’t the pot that’s making me giddy after all.

M
Y HAIR TICKLES
my face as someone pushes it off my back and over my shoulder. My face is too warm, pressed against something even warmer. Breath skates over the back of my neck seconds before a kiss is placed there, chasing away some of the heaviness in my head.

I open my eyes, but the living room is dark, the television is off, and the crowd of people that had been here during my last memory is nowhere to be seen. Silas, though, is still underneath me, and I’ve shifted so that I’m practically on top of him. My head has migrated down to his stomach, my legs stretched out onto a now-empty couch, and I’ve got my arms wrapped around his middle.

I push myself up a few inches, unable to open my eyes all the way against the gravity of sleep.

“Sorry,” Silas says. “I should have woken you up when everyone left, but I . . .” He trails off, but instead of finishing his first sentence says, “How do you feel?”

“Tired.” My voice is deeper than usual, husky almost.

“Yeah, that happens.”

I remember then, why exactly I’m so sleepy. I wait for some kind of feeling to unfurl in me—anger, shame, regret. It doesn’t come, so I brace for panic, for fear, but there’s none of that, either.

Instead, I remember Silas’s face as he made me tell him exactly how many slices of ham to put on my sandwich, like he was going to be a complete failure if he put too much or too little.

“Did they win?” I ask, reaching up a hand to rub at my eyes.

“Who?”

“I don’t know. Whichever team you wanted to win.”

He laughs. “They did. In fact, they had an incredible last inning that you slept right through.” I wipe my hand across my cheeks, checking for drool, and thankfully coming up empty.

“Oh, that’s good. Sorry I missed it.”

I should sit up, now that I’m awake and everything, but all I really want to do is lay my head back down against him.

“So, exactly how mad are you?” he asks.

“About missing the last inning?”

He sits up then, giving me no choice but to do the same.

“About the pot. I swear to God, I never would have let that happen if I were down here, and I promise Carter won’t get within two feet of you ever again. That should never have happened, not in my house, not around my friends, and if . . . if you don’t want to come back here again, I get that. I just—”

“It’s okay,” I tell him.

“No, baby, it’s not.”

Baby.
I have a vague recollection of him calling me that earlier, something he’s only said on a handful of other occasions, all of which involved a certain level of intimacy or teasing. It had felt generic then, like something he probably said to every girl he touched or kissed or flirted with, but it feels different now. Feels like that endearment belongs to me.

He drags a hand through his hair roughly, pausing to clench a handful in his fists. He drops his hand and lowers his chin, his eyes piercing through the floor, and says, “I’m sorry. Incredibly sorry.”

I close the distance between us and kiss him. It’s quick, but that earlier frenzy, that build of feeling that I had assumed was the drugs, comes roaring back to life. It’s nothing more than just a brush of lips, but it feels big.
Huge.
Like I’ve just calmly walked off a cliff without even glancing down to see how far down it is to the bottom.

“What was that for?”

“I thought that was our thing. I apologize, you kiss me. It’s only fair if it works both ways.”

At first I think he’s going to blow me off. He’s got that air about him that he wants to beat something up, and doing it to himself is his only option. But then one corner of his mouth lifts for a scant second.

“Well, I do like to be fair.”

I take that almost-smile and raise him a full-out grin. “And I like to say I’m sorry.”

He tilts his head to the side and looks at me, his eyes focused. For the first time in a long time, I feel that edge of danger around him again. But it’s a different kind of danger now, and it’s even more potent.

“You’re sure, Dylan? Tonight was . . . a big deal. I don’t want you to pretend like it doesn’t bother you if it does. Don’t do that for me. Don’t ever be what you’re not for me. I’d rather you tell me how you feel up front.”

I’ve made up my mind. It might be a mistake, and I have no clue where it’s going, but maybe it’s time I made a few more of those.

“
I’m sorry.
Was I not clear enough? Because if I was vague, I apologize. What I should have said is that I’m not sorry it happened. I’m sorry I did it unknowingly, and I’m sorry you spent the night stressing over how I would react, but you took care of me. And I’m not sorry for that. Not even a little bit sorry. But if you need to hear it
one more time,
I promise I’m not—”

His mouth slams into mine, and we go from zero to
oh my God
in seconds. He pushes me back on the couch and his big body settles over me. His lips are hard and demanding, and his fingers curl around my neck like he’s scared I’m going to disappear. His tongue strokes every corner of my mouth, and I can’t keep up, so I just bury my hands in his hair and hold on for the ride.

His weight is exquisite on top of me, like he’s pinned me to this moment and neither my body nor my mind will wander while he’s got control. He tugs at my shirt where it’s tucked in until it comes loose, and he can slip his hands underneath to grip my waist. Our legs are tangled together, and one of his thighs rests between mine, pushing down on the perfect spot. I can feel him hard against my hip and I shift, rubbing against him. He pulls back to breathe but doesn’t leave my mouth. I open my eyes, and he’s staring down at me, his breath mingling with mine.

“I can’t fucking—” He shakes his head and starts again, “I can’t describe what you do to me. I don’t have the words or even know them. There are so many things I want to do, so many places on your body I want to touch and taste, and I’m breaking apart just trying to focus on one.”

I trail a hand down from his hair to curve around his neck, mimicking the way he holds me. “We’ve got time.”

“Do we?”

I don’t know how much time he’s asking for or how much he’s willing to give, and I don’t want to have that conversation, not right now. I want to be able to enjoy this without asking questions.

“I don’t have anywhere to be.”

He lifts himself off me and stands next to the couch. When he offers his hand, I take it, and he leads me up the stairs to his room. He closes the door once he has me inside, and a trickle of nerves bubbles up in my chest.

I need something,
anything
to say. “I didn’t expect your room to be clean.”

He shrugs and reaches up to tuck my hair behind my ears.

“I’ve not had much in my life that is just mine. Makes you determined to take care of what you have while you have it.”

“You take care of me . . . have from the night we met.”

His hand pauses in combing through my hair, gripping tight. “Are you saying you’re mine?”

I swallow. The intensity rolling off him is both intoxicating and overwhelming.

“I guess that depends.”

“On?”

“On what exactly that means.”

He cups my breast, lifting it in his hands, and squeezing just enough to make something give way in my belly.

“It means I get to touch you like this.”

“You’ve already touched me like that.”

His hand leaves my breast to smooth down my stomach and dip between my legs. He draws a finger along the seam of my shorts, pushing that hard edge against me. “It means only I can touch you here. Only I touch you, period.”

I bite down on my lip and concentrate on how to say the things I need to say when I want him to keep touching me so badly.

“No one else is going to touch me there.” His wandering fingers push a little harder, and I go a bit light-headed. I fight through the sensation to say what I need to. “But I can’t be yours, Silas. I’ve spent too many years trying to please other people. I need to be my own for a little while.” I don’t know why, but most of my life has felt . . . conditional, like my parents and Henry and everyone else accepted me because I filled these holes in their lives. And I made sure I filled them perfectly because that was how I belonged, how I guaranteed my spot, by never failing to live up to their expectations. As long as I was perfect, they would have no need to cut me loose.

Except Henry did. And for the life of me, I can’t think of anything I did wrong, and maybe that’s why this all started. Because try as I might,
perfect
doesn’t guarantee me anything. I can’t control whether other people will want me or love me or even like me. I can only control how I feel about myself. And that’s something I’m still discovering day by day.

And if I’m honest, I’m a little afraid I’m doing the same thing all over again with Silas. That I’m being what he needs me to be instead of who I am. And I have to be certain. I have to
know
for sure that what I do is what
I
want.

He says, “How about I just borrow you for the night, then? I promise to give you back. Eventually.”

I laugh, and he kisses me in a way that is far from funny. His hands curve around my bottom and he pulls me up against his erection, and I know how very serious he is.

“You need to tell me now, baby. Because all I can think about is being inside you.”

“No one else touches you, either?” I ask. “While we’re doing whatever this is, I mean.”

“If you’re touching me, I won’t want anyone else.” That’s not quite a straight answer, but he continues: “Right about now, I’ll agree to anything, give you whatever you ask.”

I’d expected him to play it cool, to be the confident, cocky guy that he’s always been. His honesty, the desperation in voice . . . it does something to me. I run a finger lightly over the front of his jeans, following the seam in the same way he did to me. He hisses out a breath, and the hands on my backside clench.

So far, our encounters have mostly consisted of him touching me, driving me insane. Now all I want to do is turn the tables. I sink to my knees, dragging my fingers down his thighs as I go. His jaw clenches tight, and when I undo the button on his jeans, he looks up at the ceiling, muttering a few curse words under his breath. His jeans are stretched tight over the hard length of him, and I’m careful as I lower the zipper. I do it so slowly that I can hear every metal tine unhook. When I finish, Silas is breathing heavy, his fists clenched at his side.

“Baby, I need you to go a little faster or I’m gonna die before we ever get there.”

I tug his jeans down, but I’ve forgotten about his shoes, and it takes him several seconds to kick them off with his jeans around his ankles. It’s a touch awkward, enough to make me nervous that I’m going to do this wrong, that after all of this, all the buildup, I won’t live up to the other girls he’s been with. I’m not naive enough to think that there haven’t been many. And I don’t know how to deal with that. Henry and I were each other’s firsts, so there was never any imbalance there.

I take a slow breath and reach up to touch him through the last barrier of material. The tip of his erection has pushed past the waistband of his boxer briefs, and I trace a finger over the exposed flesh. His eyes are darker than I’ve ever seen them above me. I lean forward and run my lips along the muscled V of his hips. I hover next to his waistband, gathering my courage, and when I exhale, his whole body tenses. I tuck my fingers under the fabric and exhale again, looking up at him as I do. He groans and twitches within the confines of his shorts.

“I take it back. You do whatever the fuck you want, however slow you want. I’ll die and be happy about it.”

I straighten my shoulders, feeling a little more confident, and I pull down that last piece of clothing.

That time in the kitchen, I’d touched him, wrapped my hand around him, so I knew he was thick, but I hadn’t been contemplating putting my mouth on him then.

I lick my lips and his hands shoot forward, but at the last second, he stops before touching me, and curls his arms up toward his chest, restraining himself.

“You pictured this?” I ask.

“God, more times than you probably want to know.”

Weirdly, I think I
do
want to know.