Be My December (35 page)

I awoke to an empty bed, an empty apartment, and an even emptier heart. My mind had to have been playing tricks with me; was he really in bed with me last night? Had he really said those words to me? My heart was heavy, and my confidence shattered. I felt like I was being pushed back to the girl who had first arrived. Ky didn’t want me; did I have too much baggage for him? I deserved this, I wanted this, I needed this.

I had practically begged him to take me last night.

It confused me.

It frightened me.

It set me on fire.

I shook the thoughts from my head and threw back the covers. I had a meeting to attend at Anderson Publications and then I would be spending some time getting reacquainted with a deliciously sexy girl called Victoria. 

Stumbling out into the vast living room, I was less than comforted by the silence that lingered in the air. The room was shadowed by the darkness of the clouds hanging in the sky that penetrated through the windows. Stormy weather to suit a stormy mood it seemed. I searched the room for my purse and found the red leather sitting on the kitchen island. My eyes latched onto the empty coffee mug beside the coffeemaker that was filled with freshly brewed coffee. A note leaned against the white porcelain of the mug that was meant for me.  

I poured myself a fresh mug and fiddled with the note, flipping it over in my hands before I finally found the courage to read his words.

Had a couple of things I need to get sorted. Will be back later today. Ky.

I took the note back to my room and sat on the edge of the bed. The feeling of being dismissed hit me, but then something shocking swept through me—determination, courage, and confidence. If he didn’t want me then I needed to move on. That was the plan. I had to stick with it.

••••

My arms ached from the bags containing the expensive yet deliciously gorgeous lingerie I had purchased, and I was buzzing from the numerous coffees I had consumed during my epic shopping marathon. I hadn’t spoken to Ky while I was at Anderson Publications and I had fled the building before he could get to me, maybe that’s why I had spent a fortune shopping. I felt so much better though. There was nothing like buying a skimpy pair of panties that no one will ever see to brighten up your mood. As I stepped up to Ky’s door, I fumbled around in my purse for the key but was startled when the door flew open and an anxious Ky stood there, taking up the entire door frame. 

“Where the hell have you been?” His voice was laced with panic as his eyes darted over my face in concern.

“I’ve been shopping in the city.” I stood in the hall. “What’s wrong?”

He shook his head and stepped away from the door. “You just can’t disappear like that.”

“I didn’t disappear, I just went shopping. Why are you so worried anyway?”

I moved into the living room and placed my bags next to the couch then turned back toward him. His eyes burned back at me, they were so dark tonight.

“I… just… please tell me where you go in the future.” His reaction confused me. “I don’t like the thought of anything happening to you and with him out there it scares me okay.”

Jeremy
.

He turned his back on me and walked through the apartment toward the dining room table where his laptop sat. What the hell was going on? I jumped at a loud crack of thunder and suddenly the lights flickered out and darkness fell throughout the apartment.

“Shit!” Ky hissed, and I froze. “Stay where you are until I find the candles.”

“I’m going to pack up my things and go stay with Ashlyn,” I announced into the dark space. “I think it would be best.”

I stood in the middle of the apartment robbed of my ability to see. I didn’t know whether it was the darkness, the silence, or the jabs of lightning that lit up the room that made the intensity soar.

My shriek filled the room as Ky’s arms weaved around my waist and pulled me against his chest. I was fully alert to the closeness of his body, and I inhaled violently as his warm breath skimmed the skin near my ear. 

“I don’t want you to leave.” His mouth was so close to my ear and a shiver of want fled down my back.

“After last night—” I whispered causing my head to involuntarily fall to the side, and I was rewarded with the lightest of kisses.

“Last night you begged me to take you Eden. Do you know what that felt like, hearing you ask me to give you everything. I don’t want to hurt you Eden, I couldn’t live with myself if I did. I’ve been thinking about it all day and then when I got home and you weren’t here… I freaked out.”

I was trembling against his body, not in fear but of expectation. His words were flooding my ears and the realization of what he was saying was so confusing. Did he want me or didn’t he?

“I needed to distract myself so I went shopping.”

“What did you buy?” he growled against my neck, his fingers kneading my hips.

“Lingerie.” 

His body ripped away from mine so quickly and the sensation of loss was gravely intense. Darkness still swamped the apartment and for a moment I thought he had slipped out of the door to leave me on my own. My ears pricked to life when I heard movement to my left but still I couldn’t see him. Finally through the flicker of candlelight dancing on the mantel I made out his features. He moved through the living room and disappeared into the bedrooms, igniting candle after candle until the apartment danced in shadows.

Ky headed to the couch the minute his eyes locked onto the dark pink bags on the floor. My breathing halted as he lifted them and walked back toward me like a man on a mission.

“I want you to try something on,” he suggested in a devastatingly seductive tone as he placed the bag on the floor between us. His dimple popped in his cheek as he smirked and lowered his eyes back to the bag. “You bought it, you try it on.”

When his eyes met mine, we stared at each other for what seemed like eternity. I didn’t even know if I was breathing. My heart thundered in my chest and my stomach swarmed with excitable butterflies at the thought of standing before this man in my lingerie. I nodded and dropped my hand to the bag on the floor and picked it up. His hand came to mine, encasing it with hesitation and stopped me.

“Only do this if you are really sure because if I see you in lingerie, there is no way I will be able to control myself. Say no to me Eden because I won’t be able to stop once I start.”

My actions spoke louder than any verbal response I could have given him. I pulled the bag close to my chest and sauntered down the hall that was illuminated by the candlelight escaping through the doors of his bedroom and the guestroom.

I was really going to do this. I stepped into the guest room and placed the bag on the bed. I had begged him last night for this and now he had practically told me that he would have me tonight.

I gently pulled out everything from within the bag and my eyes fell to my favorite purchase of the day; a dusty pink panty and bra set with a matching silk gown that sat mid-thigh.

Excitement quivered within me as I stepped into the skimpy panties and clasped the bra around my body, the soft tone of the pink complementing the olive of my skin. Pulling the gown over my shoulders, I sighed as the lace and silk caressed my body and swam around my mid-thigh. I stepped in front of the mirror and my gaze roamed over my body illuminated by the candles that Ky had lit. I felt like a goddess ready to present to her god. I swallowed breath after breath and silently chanted to myself
‘you can do this Eden’
.

With my head held high and my eyes fixed squarely on the candlelight flickering on the walls of the hall, I moved through like a silent assassin. I stepped out into the living room and through the room lit only by candles I found Ky standing by the window, looking out over the ocean in complete thought.

“Fuck!” he hissed as his eyes roamed wildly over my body in the reflection of the glass. “Please for the love of God turn around and say no.”

My stomach fluttered with a swarm of butterflies. “I don’t want to say no. I want to say yes Ky. Let me say yes.”

Within a flash of movement, his arm was around my waist and his hand wrapped around the back of my neck as his mouth pressed furiously against mine. Pulling my bottom lip between his teeth, I whimpered as pain and pleasure took over my body.  My heart thundered in my chest with want.  His tongue swept through my mouth, tangling passionately with mine in a fire that had been smoldering for weeks. I gripped hold of his shirt, pulling his body as close to mine as I could, frantic to feel the ridges of his chest against the curves of mine. We stumbled through the apartment, using the candlelight as a guide. His hands gripped firmly on my ass then lifted me from my feet and my legs firmly locked around his waist. The feeling of his growing erection rubbing against my heat caused me to break the kiss and my head fell to his shoulder as pleasure I craved roared to life within me. My body took over when my mind decided to cease to exist. I started slowly moving my hips, grinding myself against him, begging for release.

My body screamed at me. I craved the feeling of the perfect ache between my thighs; I wanted to lose my breath with a man above me, below me, and behind me; I wanted the feeling of being owned in the way a princess would be owned by her prince, and  I wanted Ky Crawford to be that man. I
needed
Ky to be that man. The fear of my past haunted me, it consumed me, it penetrated so deeply in my soul that I had only allowed five people to know the true extent of what happened to me—my parents, the lovely police office, my lawyer, and Tori but here I was considering the most intimate of things with a man.

“Please Ky,” I groaned into his shoulder and lightly nipped his skin with my teeth.

My body dropped to the comfort of his bed, and his body hovered over mine. His eyes grew dark with lust as he took in my flushed cheeks and swollen lips. “I want to taste you Eden, I want to get drunk in your scent, but more than anything, I need to be inside you.”

My eager hands ran under his shirt, connecting with his heated skin. He stayed silent as I undressed him, and his eyes never left mine. Once his shirt was discarded, he slowly and torturously pushed open my gown and unclasped my bra. With precision hands, he slid the gown and bra off my shoulders until I was left bare in front of him.

“You are beyond perfection Eden and for every minute I have you I am going to cherish you like you are my very last breath.”

His mouth fell to my nipple, and I gasped as fire rose within me. His tongue swirled and cherished my hardened peak while his hand ran along my thigh and pushed open my legs. The sensation of his mouth devouring mine and hand sweeping over my body caused my breathing to stop.

“You’re so wet baby,” he moaned against my flesh as his hand slipped into the front of my panties and his finger began teasing me so devastatingly gentle. My hips lifted from the bed, pressing harder against his hand craving for more and then with the tiniest scrape of his teeth against my nipple he took me to all new heights.

“Ky please,” I begged through heated words. He pulled his mouth away and the most deliciously seductive smirk pulled on his lips.

His hands made quick work of my panties, sliding them down my thighs and throwing them to the floor. I was completely on display to his prying eyes and as they took in all of me, I had never felt more vulnerable yet completely at ease.

The moment he reached for his pants and then his wallet, I found my voice.

“Stop.”

Once the word left my mouth he froze above me and his face twisted in agony as he looked back at me.

“I’m so sorry Eden, I shouldn’t have done this,” he apologized with words pained with devastation and started pulling away from me and lifting his body from mine.

What the hell was he doing?

I grabbed his arm and stopped his escape. I swallowed hard, desperate to draw in some confidence. “If we are going to do this, I want to experience everything with you Ky. I want to undress you, I want to worship you, and I don’t want anything separating us.”

“What?” he breathed out as he ran his finger along my jaw and over my lips. His eyes were vibrant and latched fiercely on mine. “Are you saying what I think you’re saying?”

My hand wrapped around the back of his head, my fingertips running through the edges of his hair. “Please, let me feel you. I need to feel you inside me. All of you.”

Suddenly his face went serious. “Are you on birth control? I’m clean, completely, but we have to be safe.”

“I am, never miss a day.” 

That’s all the reassurance he needed.

Ky’s lips crashed to mine with wild abandon and took away my deepest insecurities with a lash of his tongue. Kissing him was like having kryptonite pushed into veins.  Pulling me in and ceasing my ability to escape. With one kiss he could completely own me; mind, body and soul. I felt myself falling into his body and his arms encased me tightly before I crashed.  His lips left from my mouth before kissing my jaw and neck with softness that felt like the caress of cotton left wetness along my jawbone and neck as he moved toward my ear. His heated breath on my earlobe caused a deep sigh to escape me.

“Are you sure because once we start I won’t be able to stop.”

“I don’t want you to stop.”

My hands trembled as they ran over his warm skin, over his shoulders and down the muscles of his back. My breathing hitched in a mixture of nerves, lust, and anticipation as my fingernails ran the length of his back. His lips peppered along my collarbones, nibbling my sensitive flesh occasionally, and I loved every minute of it. He pulled his mouth away and pushed back to gaze at me. Everything that I wanted to witness on his face looked back at me.

Protectiveness, compassion, lust, and want.

“You are so beautiful,” he whispered.

His teeth nibbled my bottom lip, and the moment I opened my lips to gain a desperate breath, his tongue slipped in claiming ownership. His body moved over mine as my hands fumbled between us. I popped open the button of his jeans and slid down the zipper. Ky lifted his hips, allowing me to slide his jeans and boxer briefs down his thighs.