Dissonance (29 page)

Instead, I bobbed my head over the length I’d taken. I watched him with each pass, learning where he liked more attention, how fast he wanted me to go.

The sight of him taking his pleasure from my mouth coupled with the incredible feeling of is strong, pulsing length against my lips made me feel powerful. His slightly salty, slightly sweet, slightly musky taste was one I knew I’d never tire of. Somewhere in my constant motions, I no longer thought of going down on him as just a way to please him. I pushed on, harder, faster, milking him for not only his pleasure, but for my own as well.

I could feel him growing thicker, longer, so stiff I could hardly believe it was possible. Moments later his low groans were broken by him gasping out, “I’m going to come, baby. You need to stop.”

Stop? I didn’t want to stop. I wanted him to come just like that. I wanted to take all he had to give me.

“Baby, it’s time to stop,” he said more desperately.

I shook my head slightly around him. A roar so arousing I thought I might just combust echoed through the room just before his flesh began to pulse. He seemed to come forever, forcing me to swallow several times and relax my gag reflex to keep up. I couldn’t breathe and my jaw was beginning to ache, but the sound of Logan lost in absolute bliss kept me going. I had done that to him.

When the pulsing finally ebbed, he pulled himself from my mouth and hauled my body against his.

“That was incredible,” he puffed against my neck. “Just… absolutely…
ugh.
Thank you, baby.”

Where that came from, I have no idea. Charlotte had rocked my world. Even as the awe-inspiring pleasure receded from my body, I still remained adrift in the high she’d given me.

I was starting to think she might kill me.

Lying with her in the afterglow, it was all I could do not to beg for a repeat performance. There was no getting enough of her. I wasn’t even sure I could come that hard again so soon, but I sure wanted to try.

My mind was so clouded by replaying every moment that I was acting like a pig. It wasn’t until Charlotte shifted her pelvis restlessly beside me that I shot back down to Earth, remembering her needs. Her eyes held barely contained desire. She needed me to get her off. I can honestly say there has never been a job I was more excited to fulfill.

“Do you need relief, angel?” I wanted her to say it. Char needed encouragement to vocalize her desire.

She bit down on that bottom lip that could bring me to my knees. It was still swollen from the indescribable treatment she’d gifted me. That sweet blush spread across her face and she nodded. Oh no, a nod wasn’t going to do it. She had found the words to tell me she’d wanted to please me; I wanted her to do the same for herself.

“You have to say it.”

My fingers tickled down her back before returning upward, towing the hem of my t-shirt that she wore with them. I teased along the edge of her panties, trying to coax her past her insecurities.

“Please,” she moaned. That pleading voice nearly had me giving in.

“Please, what?”

“Logan,” she groaned in frustration. “Please, touch me. Please.”

Close. So close.

“I am touching you,” I taunted.

“Please,” she repeated, sounding more desperate than I’d heard her. “Lower, Logan.”

I dropped my hand to her upper thigh, but didn’t stray high enough to give her any relief.

“Here, baby?”

“Ugh!” Her frustration only had me growing hard.

“Tell me,” I demanded again.

Suddenly her hand was wrapping around my wrist, pulling it up the short distance to where the wetness could be felt through her panties.

“Here,” she moaned. “Touch me here. Make me come.”

Hell, yes. That, I could do.

While Charlotte showered, I cleaned up the dishes from breakfast. With the high of our orgasms fading from me, I was fraught with tension again over the things Charlotte had said the night before. I wanted to understand what she was always hiding, where that fear in her eyes came from. I wanted her to let me in. No, I needed her to. Love is like that. It may have still been a shock to my system, but I knew I was in love with her all the same. That love demanded that I have all of Charlotte, including her past. Like some primal instinct, I was driven to possess every part of her.

The sound of glass shattering stopped me in my tracks.

“Char?” I called.
She probably just knocked something over,
I told myself, but it didn’t slow my racing pulse.

When I got nothing back, I started towards her room.

“Baby, you okay in there?”

Still nothing.

Pushing the door open felt ominous somehow. Like that scene in a low budget horror movie where the audience knows there an ax-wielding murder on the other side, but the fool on screen slowly enters anyway.

What I found was no Hollywood horror scene, though. In fact, there was nothing horrific in my sights at all. Just Charlotte’s room exactly as it had been since the day she finished unpacking. Everything was where it belonged. What was out of place, though, was the unusually strong scent of Charlotte’s perfume in the air.

I turned to look into the attached bathroom. The first thing I saw through the open door was the shattered glass and the small puddle of liquid on the floor, the fractured remains of her perfume bottle. That explained the sound and the smell. What it didn’t explain was Charlotte’s silence or the way she stayed completely still a few feet away. It certainly didn’t explain the unadulterated fear I could see in her eyes as I moved closer. I’d seen that look once before, right before she rushed away to hide in Eli’s bathroom.

“Charlotte, are you okay?” I hedged gently.

She showed no indication that she’d heard me at all. That sent my nerves skyrocketing.

Cupping her cheeks in my hands, I forced her gaze up to mine. It was as if she wasn’t even looking at me. There was terror in her eyes, but not even the slightest glimmer of recognition. I realized in that moment that this was worse than it had been before, so much worse.

“Charlotte, look at me,” I commanded. “I’m right here, honey. Everything is okay.”

Nothing but dead eyes met me in response. I felt sick to my stomach. Desperation took over. I shook her, gently at first and then more forcefully, hoping for any response at all. Her stoicism ratcheted up my fear until I could only think of one option. Moving behind her, I turned the shower back on before hauling her taut body into my arms, taking her under the relentless spray.

The spark of life was almost immediate.

“Logan?” she sputtered, the panic just barely receding from her eyes.

“It’s okay, angel. I have you. You’re safe.”

Her clothes were quickly soaked through as the demons continued to battle beneath the surface. I wanted to kiss her, to fill her with the same serenity she gifted me with every touch, but I was afraid. If she was still too deep in her nightmares and my kiss became a part of that, it would shatter me. I couldn’t handle if she pulled away from me in fear. No, there was too much as stake to risk kissing her, but I had to find a way to comfort her. I settled for running my fingers through her increasingly wet hair, lightly massaging her scalp they way she liked me to while she was falling asleep.

“Focus on me, Charlotte. Focus on my voice, my touch.”

Her eyes zeroed in on mine at last. My voice was getting through. It gave me an idea. Maybe it was foolish, but it was a straw to cling to and I’d take it. Keeping my eyes on hers, I softly sang “Make You Feel My Love.” The song had brought her to me once; maybe it could work its magic again.

And it did.

Just a few lines and I had her back.

Those brown eyes I adored lost their frightened fog and stared clearly at mine again.

“Logan,” she began weakly. “I…”

That renewed clarity broke my resolve. I had to kiss her. I could not go another moment without that connection. I needed it more than my next breath.

When my lips collided with hers and I felt her return my kiss, the vice that had gripped my heart since I’d heard the shattering glass finally loosened its hold. Wherever she had gone, my girl was back.

It took a while for the last of the panic to subside. Her muscles finally unwound against me. When she seemed at ease, I dared to ask the question that hung in the air, despite my doubts that it would be answered.

“What happened?”

As expected, she just shook her head against my chest. Would that part of our relationship ever change? Charlotte never opened up to anyone, but I held on to what could very well have been a foolish hope that I could change that. What if I was wrong? What if she never let me in? How long could I stand by loving someone that fought to keep me at arm’s length?

I tried another tactic. “What do you want, Charlotte? What can I do?”

“I need to run,” she replied in a still-shaken voice.

“Will you let me come with you?” I don’t think I could let her out of my sight right then.

“If you want to.”

Those answers hurt the most. Could she not see how much she meant to me?

“I always want to be with you.”

Running was my way to decompress. It gave me unhindered time to think. It allowed me a way to release every emotion that had gotten out of hand. It handed me back my sense of control. Running with Logan, however, drove me to distraction. He’d come in a plain t-shirt, but had stripped it off when we left the car. Now he was just a mess of sweaty, tattooed muscles in a pair of low-slung basketball shorts. I tried to keep myself a pace in front of him, but the urge to glance back at that view was too great. I’d nearly face planted onto the trail at least half a dozen times.

Logan wanted me to talk. I knew it. Despite the fact that he hadn’t pushed me, despite allowing me to indulge distraction when I was upset, I knew he wanted me to tell him everything. Well, he thought he did at least. He didn’t know better. He didn’t understand that we were better off with him not knowing. It was best if no one knew but me. He didn’t deserve to endure that story. There was no way things could remain the same if he knew how I’d gotten that scar.

What if the knowledge was too much for him, and really, how could it not be? What if he learned the truth and realized how unworthy I was? I wasn’t naïve. I knew we were not forever. It didn’t matter what I may have wanted. He would move on eventually. Why dig up skeletons for something impermanent? Plus, there was the fear that he might stand by me out of pity if he knew. There was no way I could let him do that. He deserved to be happy.