Rough Around the Edges (43 page)

“Right.” He’d agree to just about anything in order to get out of there quickly, before the pain became debilitating. Turning, he shifted his focus to Ally. “You mind putting the rest of your food in here and finishing it when we get home?”

“Sure.” She scraped the remainder of her meal into the box, her gaze lingering just above his face as she transferred the rest of his food into the container, too.

“I’ll call you and let you know where.” Patrick was already glancing toward the door.

“Talk to you then.” Ryan grabbed the box and stood.

When Ally rose to stand beside him, he placed a hand on the small of her back and guided her out of the restaurant. They took a cab home.

When they got off the elevator and walked through the door of their new place for the second time, Ally rushed to his suitcase. “Where’s your medication?”

“The front pocket – the one with the zipper.”

She raised a bottle of rattling pills and handed it to him.

He dumped a few into his hand, picked two and swallowed them.

“Do you want a glass of water?”

“No. I’m fine.” He replaced the cap and set the bottle on top of his suitcase. “There’s something else I’d like, though.”

“What?”

He went to the kitchen and she followed, standing close beside him as he put the to-go box full of Italian food down beside the sink. “I was thinking we could pick up where we left off. It could be good preventative medicine.” It wasn’t a joke – just looking at her and being alone with her tempted him to smile despite the pain.

She didn’t say anything, just stripped off her clothing, efficient if not graceful with one arm in a sling. Bandages or not, it was one of the hottest things he’d ever watched.

He undressed too, and when they embraced, the hot press of her body against his instantly took the edge off his pain, or at least insulated his thoughts and senses against it. Her heart beat against his chest, the rhythm faint but steady, and each beat dispelled some of the anger he’d brought home from the meeting with his family.

He ran a hand down the graceful curves of her body, from her shoulder all the way to her ass, cupping one cheek and drawing her close. His cock pressed into her belly until he lifted her onto the counter, just like he had earlier that afternoon.

She’d looked good up there naked from the waist down. Completely nude on top of the faux-granite surface, she looked amazing. Pale sunlight filtered through the kitchen window, illuminating her from behind and highlighting her trademark halo.

Her breasts were level with his chest and her nipples looked as hard as the surface she was sitting on.  “Guess I need to figure out where the thermostat is in here,” he said, touching one and teasing it with his fingertips.

“Later,” she said. “Not now.”

The urgency in her voice hit him hard, resonating somewhere deep inside his chest. “Later,” he agreed. “The only thing I want right now is to be inside you.”

He nearly was. His hips were level with the counter, level with her pussy. Her folds were exposed to him; he stood between her spread thighs, cock reaching for her. He took half a step forward, resisting a shiver that raced down his spine when the head of his dick brushed her clit. “One second. I put a couple condoms in my wallet before we left for the airport.”

It wouldn’t be long before they could stop using them altogether, when she was done with her antibiotics. He hadn’t forgotten that, not for a second.

His fingers weren’t too difficult to move anymore, despite the fact that he still wore his cast. His wrist had started itching more than hurting, the curse of a healing bone, and his fingers were much more mobile than they’d been at first. It didn’t take him long to put on a condom, rolling it to the base of his shaft and gripping himself there, guiding himself inside her.

She rocked her hips in a subtle motion that facilitated his entrance. Sliding into the heat and tightness of her body, he sighed.

She did the same and tipped back her head, eyes closed. It was amazing how her every movement affected the degree of pressure her body exerted, the feel of her walls wrapped around his dick. For a few seconds he didn’t even move, just stood there and let himself be overwhelmed by the feeling of being inside her, a perfect fit, like a lock and key.

She was outwardly still too, but not on the inside. Her channel seized up around him, eased a little and then tightened again. Feeling that while watching her thighs tremble on either side of his hips was like a drug. It sped through his system, washing away his awareness of pain and making him feel stronger, more focused, more alive.

When he thrust into her, her breath hitched, a sound that made his heart surge ahead, beating faster.

Wrapping her good arm around him, she gripped one of his ass cheeks, letting her nails dig in. Her hold kept her hips tighter against his and allowed him to push deeper into her. The sheer pleasure of feeling her flesh yield to his prompted him to press a hand between her thighs and massage her clit, eager to make sure she came before he did.

It worked. She arched her back, shuddered and gasped, her pussy rippling with a series of contractions that forced all the air from his lungs, leaving him mute as he continued to fuck her, lost in the intensity.

She gasped things, things he couldn’t understand but relished the sound of anyway.

When her orgasm ended he slowed, remembering to be gentle. “Are you okay?” Her hair was like silk against his fingers when he cupped the back of her skull, looking into her eyes.

“Yes.” She was still gripping his ass – hard. It felt good.

“Good. I want to keep going.” With his fingers threaded through thick locks of her hair, he guided her mouth to his and kissed her deeply. “I want to keep going for a while – I want to stay inside you until it hurts not to come.”

She didn’t say anything, just rocked her hips, her gaze hazy and locked with his.

He kept going, ignoring the digital clock glaring from nearby. It didn’t matter how long they took – there was nothing else he had to do and nothing else he’d rather do. He’d paid his dues to his family for the day; he was free to lose himself in her and forget about it all until tomorrow. Burying himself deeper and deeper inside her body was the most absolute freedom he knew.

He eventually slipped into a climax that would’ve dropped him to his knees if the urge to keep thrusting inside her hadn’t been stronger than gravity, stronger than anything. “I love you, Ally,” he said when he finally withdrew, legs shaking from the exertion. “I’m so glad you came with me. To here, New York, I mean.”

“I love you too, and so am I.”

“I promise you won’t regret it. You’ll be happy here.” He’d do anything to make sure that was true.

* * * * *

She didn’t look happy as she sat alone in the dark, curled up on one end of the leather couch. Lonely, definitely. Sad, probably. Definitely not happy.

“Hey.” His bare feet were silent on the carpeted floor, so he gave her a warning that he was approaching, not wanting to scare her.

She jumped like she’d received an electric shock. Thanks to the faint haze of artificial light bleeding through the panoramic window, he could see the tenseness in her muscles, her shoulders rigid beneath the thin t-shirt she’d put on for bed.

He’d gone to sleep hours before, retreating to the bedroom after sex in an effort to sleep through his lingering migraine. It had worked, but it hurt to look at her and wonder how long she’d spent awake and alone in the living room, inside her own head.

“Hey.” She turned to face him, the new leather squeaking faintly beneath her. “How do you feel?”

“Pretty good.” He crossed the room and sank down beside her. “What are you thinking about?”

He could guess, but it would be better if she said it.

“Manny.”

“Mmm.” No surprise there. And he couldn’t blame her for dwelling on the past – not when the tragedy of her brother’s death was so fresh, and especially not when he’d spent an entire year doing the same thing. Hell, he still did it. It was just that now, with a future to look forward to, he was trying not to.

Still, it wasn’t her fault. He’d get her to see that, even if it took a while, which it probably would. “I hope you’re not still beating yourself up over what happened to him. You’re not to blame for the way he chose to live his life or the way it ended.”

“I know that. Consciously, I know that. But subconsciously, it’s a different story. Sometimes I feel guilty, even when I know I shouldn’t.”

There was a difference between knowing something was true and feeling that something was true. A hell of a difference. He knew that.

He rubbed her back, fingertips drifting across the little bumps of her vertebrae.

“You know what I mean, don’t you?” she asked, staring out the window at the endless midnight traffic. The city never slept; there was always something to be distracted by. 

“You said something to me not long ago about feeling guilty over how your time in the military ended and the fact that you couldn’t go back. But it ended because of an explosion. You didn’t have any control over that. It just happened to you, and you couldn’t have stopped it. It’s not your fault that you were hurt, or that you weren’t hurt as badly as some of the others.” Her voice faltered on the last note, and she didn’t look away from the window.  “And you know that it doesn’t make any sense to feel guilty, right?”

She knew about Gibson’s death. Feltz had shown her pictures of him, had explained that he’d been killed in the explosion that had ultimately fucked Ryan out of his career in the Marine Corps. He’d wondered, at the time, if she’d ask him about it later.

He continued to rub her back, trying to banish the tension in her muscles. It didn’t really work, but he kept it up anyway. “Yeah. I guess I know what you mean.”

He knew he’d keep dreaming, would keep waking up to the agony of reality, realizing he couldn’t go back. At night, his brain would keep trying to change things, keep trying to create a version of the past that was somehow acceptable, or a future that would undo what had happened a year ago. But when he was awake, during his days with Ally, he’d try his best to look ahead instead of back.

“Tell you what, though,” he said, “I’ll give this fresh start my best try if you will. It might not be easy, but things worth doing usually aren’t. Maybe in time the things that happened in other places – Baltimore, Afghanistan, wherever – won’t be something we think about every day.”

“Deal.” A little of the tension finally left her muscles as she leaned back against his chest.

“You ready to come to bed?” He swept a stray lock of hair off her cheek. “Or is this your subtle way of telling me that you want to break in the living room like we broke in the kitchen?”

She smiled, relaxing a little more against him. “That’s up to you. If we don’t do it tonight, I’m sure we’ll get around to it tomorrow.”

He slid a hand around her body, cupping one of her breasts. Her t-shirt was so thin that her nipple sprang up hard against his palm.  “Who knows, maybe we’ll even make it to the bed at some point.”

She turned into him and he pulled her down onto the leather, his arms tight around her body.

Chapter 25

The restaurant where Ryan had agreed to meet his father was a casual place, supposedly. Still, Patrick wore a suit, as always. In his jeans and the hoodie he’d forced to stretch over his cast, Ryan looked out of place. He felt out of place too, but he probably always would in his father’s presence.

Father and son – they might as well have been strangers. And yet, Ryan owed him for helping him out, for providing the money and connections necessary to allow him a fresh start at life – a life where he could protect Ally. As he mumbled his way past the hostess, striding toward a corner table, he tried not to think about the things his father owed him.