Crash Into Me (26 page)

Still
reeling from shock, Anita remained silent.

“What
did he do to you?” Sonny asked.

Anita
looked out the window, across the flat expanse of land in the distance. In the
eerie predawn light, the harsh surface of sand glowed gray-white, as ethereal
as moondust. “Nothing that hasn’t been done before. Or since.”

“Was
he the worst?”

“Yes,”
she said without hesitation.

“Why?”

Anita
stood and washed her cup in the sink, drying it carefully before she set it
aside. “You never understood. The men in my life have not been perfect, this I
know. But they were not deliberately cruel.”

Rage
licked through Sonny’s body, quick and hot, like a burst of flames. “Everett
Moore wasn’t cruel?”

Anita
regarded her with sad eyes. “No. He was sick.”

Sonny
laughed, but the sound held no humor.

“Your
father was cruel,” she said.

A
hard, cold ball settled in the pit of her stomach. “Oh?”

“Some
men have wicked tempers,” she continued. “Arlen did not. He would hit when he
was in a good mood. He would just strike out, lightning fast, while he was
watching a ball game, in midsentence. He would do terrible, unmentionable
things, then light a cigarette and tell me to move out of his way, because I
was blocking the TV.”

Sonny
believed every word of it. And felt herself go dead inside.

Anita
covered her mouth with one hand, remembering. “One day I came home from work
early. I found Rigo curled up in the closet.” She choked back a sob. “Arlen had
beaten and tortured him. He was only six years old.”

Sonny’s
heart went out to her brother. He’d never told her. “What did you do?”

“I
threatened to press charges if he didn’t leave.” Her expression was troubled,
her mind far away. “After he was gone, I vowed to never mention him again.”

Sonny
couldn’t help but stare. A new idea occurred to her, one more painful than her
memories of Everett. “Is that why you hated me? Because of what my father did?”

Her
mother’s face wilted with sorrow. “I never hated you,
mija.
I always
loved you. I love you still.”

Sonny
found those words impossible to refute. Yet how could she believe them when
confronted with so much evidence to the contrary? Too many times, Anita had
chosen a man over her own daughter. Too many times, she’d looked the other way.

Sonny
rearranged her face to hide her emotions, something she’d become very good at.
“What name was he going by then? Arlen what?”

“Diels,”
her mother said softly. “Arlen Diels.”

James opened the door for her, his hair
sticking up all over the place, a fleece blanket around his thin shoulders. He rubbed
his eyes in a measured lack of concern to see her, returned to his comfy spot
on the couch, and proceeded to snooze.

Sonny
tiptoed upstairs to Ben’s room. Finding the door unlocked, she entered quietly,
determined not to wake him up. She was feeling too raw for sexual intimacy
anyway, too emotional to look him in the eye.

But
she needed something only he could give her.

After
visiting her mother, she’d turned off her cell phone and disengaged the GPS.
Grant couldn’t call her and he couldn’t track her. When he caught up with her,
she’d be reprimanded, at the very least. Until then, she was going to treasure
every stolen moment.

Ben
slept like the dead, obviously. He was sprawled out on his back, one arm flung
across the bed, the other lying on top of his chest. The comforter hung off the
side of the bed. One leg, dark and hairy against the white sheets, was
completely exposed.

She
unbuttoned her jeans and let them fall to the floor, then hesitated at the hem
of her T-shirt. Would he expect something from her if she came to his bed
naked? Mired in self-doubt, she stood there, legs shaking, until fatigue
overcame her. Pulling the T-shirt over her head, she crawled across his bed,
succumbing to it. And to the overwhelming desire to explore his body, while he
was asleep and vulnerable.

Very
carefully, she pushed aside the comforter.

Beneath
the dark blue cotton of his boxer shorts, his penis lay soft and thick, clearly
outlined, impressive even in repose. He stirred, kicked the comforter off the
bed completely, and rolled over onto his stomach.

The
man looked as good from the back as he did from the front. His shoulders seemed
to span more than half the width of the bed, his deltoids were well defined,
and his butt was the stuff female masturbatory fantasies were made of.

She
knew that paddling and swimming kept his upper body tight and right. Obviously,
maintaining balance on a surfboard also required well-developed lower body
muscles, all working together in perfect harmony.

Sonny
imagined some of those muscles working, with him on top of her.

Unable
to resist, she pushed down his shorts and eyeballed his sculpted buttocks like
a voyeur. Below the waist, his skin was a shade lighter than his sun-browned
back, and that paleness endeared her even as it added an illicit thrill.
Sliding her palm over that masculine curve, she snuggled against him and fell
asleep.

When
she awoke several hours later, she was still lying on her side, her face
pressed against his smooth back.

His
body was tense. He was awake.

Moving
her hand over his hip and down the front of his shorts, she discovered that he
was not only awake but fully aroused. He must have been having some very sexy
dreams, because so was she. The points of her breasts tingled, and between her
legs she was already warm and moist, pulsing with sensation.

Even
in sleep they turned each other on.

Instead
of letting her explore, he took her hand and placed it over his flat stomach,
covering it with his, stroking her fingers. Making a sound of longing, she
placed a soft, openmouthed kiss between his shoulder blades, and he turned to
face her.

Feeling
vulnerable, Sonny ran a hand through her disheveled hair. She wished she could
smooth over her emotions the same way, rearrange her face to show confidence
and allure.

His eyes
were hot on her skin, her breasts, her belly. From the set of his mouth and the
hunger in his expression, she knew that he’d been awake and wanting her for a
while.

Too
nervous to speak, she hooked her thumbs in her panties and pushed them off.
Lying back against the pillows, she offered herself to him in a gesture that
needed no interpretation.

He
reached into the nightstand and came up with a single condom. Suddenly as
awkward as she, he stared at the foil-wrapped package as if it were a totally
foreign object he had no idea what to do with.

Sitting
up, she took the wrapper from him, pressing her lips to the throbbing pulse
point at the base of his throat. He closed his eyes, struggling with some inner
demons, and she saw that he was shaking.

His
uneasiness calmed her as nothing else could have. She stepped into the role of
nurturer, soothing him as well as herself.

She
motioned for him to take off his boxer shorts, which he did. Then she held out
her arms, a silent invitation for him to come over her, and he did that, too.
Neither of them saying a word, she rolled the condom down him in a slow caress,
taking her time.

When
he couldn’t stand it any longer, he trapped her wandering hands. Put them over
her head. Pinned them to the mattress.

She
wouldn’t have allowed another man to restrain her, but with Ben, she felt
excited, not overpowered. She wanted him on top of her. Inside her.

Moaning,
she wrapped her legs around his waist, squirming beneath him, all but begging
for him to come into her. He was right there, so close she could feel the blunt
head of his erection throbbing at her body’s opening.

She
lifted her hips, wanting to feel more.

With
a strangled groan, he laced his fingers through hers and he pushed forward,
filling her with one perfect thrust.

She
gasped.

Nothing
had prepared her for that moment. Not the intimate scene in the Jacuzzi. Not
the sweet rasp of his tongue the night before.

It
was too much. He was too big, too thick, too heavy, too masculine. The
sensation was too intense, too emotional. She was on the verge of tears, and
orgasm, and he hadn’t even touched the right spot.

Very
deliberately, he released her hands.

Sobbing,
she threw her arms around his neck and pressed her face to his throat, longing
for the sweet torment to end, hoping it would go on forever.

Using
the position to his advantage, he slid his hands underneath her, curling his
fingers around her collarbone. With his body covering hers, he pulled back and
thrust forward, burying himself to the hilt, again. And again.

She
could feel every inch of him, stretching her, sliding into her, creating an
impossibly arousing friction. She couldn’t stop herself from coming any more
than she could keep from crying out loud.

He
covered his mouth with hers, swallowing the sound. When she quieted, he raised
his head to look at her, his eyes so full of wonder that she burst into tears.

Undeterred
by her emotionalism, he just kept moving inside her, slow and easy, in no hurry
to finish even though she already had. He watched her face, gauging her
reactions, and soon she forgot her tears because he drove himself deep and hard
and at just the right angle, hitting just the right spot.

She
came again, almost immediately.

This
time it was too much for him. Shuddering, he buried his head in the crook of
her neck and let her skin muffle his cry as she convulsed around him.

Then
it was over, much too soon, and he was heavy, sweaty, and spent.

Refusing
to let herself bask in the warmth of his embrace, she pushed at his chest. “Get
off me. You must weigh a thousand pounds.”

He
lifted his head from her neck and smiled that sexy, crooked half smile of his.
His eyes were still sleepy, his cheekbones flushed, and his hair was all messed
up, damp at the edges. He’d never looked better.

And
she could no longer deny what she’d known all along. She was in love with him.
“Feeling smug, are you?”

That
wiped the grin off his face. “Well, yes. I mean, I can do a lot better,
actually. But you did come twice.”

She
rolled her eyes. “You’re proud of that? I can do that in the shower.”

Taking
the hint, finally, that she needed some space, he heaved himself off her. His
ego, among other things, much too large to be daunted by her insults, he
whistled a snappy tune all the way to the bathroom while she curled up in a miserable
ball, feeling sorry for herself.

So
I’m in love with him, she told herself. So what?

He’ll
never love you back, an annoying little voice returned.

Groaning,
she buried her face under a pillow, trying to stifle it. In the bathroom, she
heard him turn on the shower faucet, still whistling.

He’ll
never love you back, once he knows…

Furious
with herself, and with him, for being so goddamned cheerful, she got up,
stormed into the bathroom, and wrenched open the shower door. She was going to
put a stop to all this love bullshit right now. Nip it in the bud. Smother it
in its infancy.

He
was rinsing soap off himself, smiling lazily. “Need me again so soon?”

“My
brother killed my stepfather for raping me.”

He
regarded her thoughtfully, as if what she’d just said was average postcoital
conversation. “Why don’t you come in here and tell me about it?”

Her
body humming with determination, she stepped into the shower. “I was sixteen,”
she said, wetting her hair and lathering it furiously. “Rigo was twenty-two. He
wanted to be a famous soccer player. It was his life.” She leaned her head
back, rinsing.

He
handed her the conditioner.

“My
mom was always working odd jobs. And shacking up with strange men.” She closed
her eyes, rinsed the conditioner from her hair. “Everett, my stepfather, wasn’t
the first one who…took a liking to me.” She barely noticed when he handed her
some masculine-smelling shower gel, was unaware that she scrubbed a little too
vigorously.

“I
think you’re clean,” he said, taking the soap out of her hands.

She
stared down at the drain, waiting for the water to run clear. “Some of them
liked Rigo, too,” she murmured.

He
shut off the faucet, wrapping a towel around his waist and another around her.

“We
both grew up pretty fast. He looked out for me. I looked up to him.” She
stepped out of the shower stall. “If not for Rigo, what Everett did would have
happened a lot sooner. But he couldn’t be there to protect me every minute.”