Tyler (27 page)

But Erin nods. “Definitely a keeper,” she whispers and nothing else matters.

***

Monday afternoon finds me at Damage Control, at my usual spot behind the desk, welcoming customers, making appointments and wondering if the weekend really happened.

It must have, because I receive a message from Erin with a photo of Jax she took on Sunday at her parents’ house. He’s holding his red toy truck, lips pursed, eyes bright.

There’s a weight on my chest, but it feels good. I can’t stop smiling.
Jax.
He’ll be staying with his grandparents for now, as he’s used to, but we’ll have him over for the weekend again.

We should get an apartment together. We should—

Zane passes by and claps me on the shoulder, followed by Rafe. They stop in front of the desk and Zane gives me a once-over.

I scowl at him. “What?”

“You have a scar on your stomach,” he says without preamble.

What the fuck?
I put down my phone, cold slicing through me. “Yeah, so?”

“But you didn’t cover it up with ink.”

I resist the urge to press a hand to my stomach, over the scar under discussion. “After I had my chest tattooed, I realize the ink wouldn’t really cover it completely. So I left it as it is.”

“It’s a good place,” Rafe says. “You’re right.”

“I have one that will fit just right.” Zane nods. “I’ll do it.”

I frown. “What are you two talking about?”

“I vote yes,” a familiar voice says, and Asher appears behind Zane. I didn’t even hear the door chimes.

Dylan is with him. “Fine by me,” he says and shoves purple-tipped bangs out of his face.

Slowly and deliberately I get up and fold my arms over my chest. I won’t say I look down at them from my six foot two—they’re all big guys. I swear Asher must still be growing because he’s almost my height, and the others are easily six foot tall, all of them. But I feel better standing, staring them in the face, than sitting down while they’re obviously discussing me.

“Care to explain?” I finally grind out when they mimic my stance, folding their arms and lifting their chins.

“We think you need a new tattoo,” Zane says.

“I don’t want more ink. Told you.”

“Didn’t say you wanted. Said you
needed
one, fucker.”

I narrow my eyes and clench my jaw. What the hell is he talking about? “I said no.”

“It’s a symbol,” Asher says quietly. He shrugs his jacket off, then pulls off his sweater and shirt.
The hell?

I blink. He has a big black dragon inked on his chest and shoulder. He didn’t have this four years ago, when I left.

Then again, back then I had no ink either, and look at me now.

“Symbol for what?”

“Survival,” Zane says. “We each have a dragon inked on us, to remind us of it.”

“What doesn’t kill me makes me stronger and all that bullshit?” I drawl, a bit confused and annoyed by it.

“What doesn’t kill me can kiss my ass,” Rafe mutters, and I stifle a snort.

“It’s a brotherhood, motherfucker.” Zane advances on me and pushes me a step back. “We are brothers. Pain has made us so. We stand by each other. Pull each other up when we fall. We are the family we never had. Are you in?”

My gaze passes from Asher to Rafe to Dylan and back to Zane. “Are you serious?”

“Damn right I am. You need that ink. Because you’re family.”

I let my hands drop to my sides. I’m familiar with the sting of the tattoo gun. I’m familiar with pain in many forms. That doesn’t frighten me. But this is more than that. It’s not about covering my scar. It’s about showing everyone who I am and where I belong.

Asher nods at me, and I tip my head.

“Okay,” I whisper. “I’m in.”

“Fucking awesome,” Zane mutters, his face splitting in a grin. “Five’s a good number. We’ll be the five musketeers, or something.”

“The musketeers were three, plus D’Artagnan, four,” Rafe says.

“And who gives a fuck?” Zane shrugs. “Welcome to the brotherhood, Tyler.”

The others gather around, clapping me on the back, and it strikes me that I’ve gone from having no one in the world, no one to care if I was found dead on the street one day, to having such a damn big family.

I ruffle Asher’s hair like I used to do when he was a kid, and he knocks my hand away.

“Take him in,” he says, and suddenly I’m airborne, lifted off the ground on three pairs of strong arms.

“Fuck.” I struggle as I’m carried toward the booths.

“Stop fighting it,” Asher says, following us as I’m carried into an empty booth and deposited on a chair. “You’re one of us.”

“I’m not fighting it.”

“Are you sure?” Zane lifts a dark brow.

“Yeah.” I pull my shirt off, exposing my scars and my ink. I’ve got nothing to hide anymore.

“This ink will be badass,” Zane announces, grabbing the tattoo gun and baring his teeth. “All for one, and one for all, fuckers.”

***

It’s late when I ring Erin’s bell, and I hope I’m not waking her up. She said I should just come over when I’m done with work, but the tattoo took time, and it’s now closer to midnight.

The lock clicks off, and she opens the door, dressed in my favorite tiny shorts and see-through white blouse. She smiles.

My blood beats faster as I step inside, running hot under my skin. It feels like weeks since I’ve been with her, and with Jax here, we barely even kissed.

Now it’s just us and as her subtle candy scent reaches my senses, I can’t think of anything else but kissing her, tasting her, taking her.

She steps back and I follow her, shrugging off my jacket and pulling off my sweater. I catch up in two strides and press her against the wall, my hands landing on either side of her face, framing it. My mouth crashes on hers, and my tongue plunges deep as I mold my hard body to her softer one. My inked stomach stings, but I ignore it. Her nipples tighten, biting into my chest, and she gasps in my mouth.

I grin against her lips and lick at her mouth as my hands glide down her shoulders, over her breasts. Her nipples are diamond-hard by the time I lift her blouse and take one in my mouth.

She arches into me, her hands tangling in my hair, and I lick and lightly bite the other one, feeling myself harden more and more. My dick’s pressing so persistently on the inside of my fly it’s gonna have the pattern of the zipper embedded in it forever.

“Tyler…” She tugs my head back and I release her breast, breathless. “I want you.”

“What do you want?” I whisper.

“You.” No hesitation.

“How do you want me?”

She winks. “In every way.”

I laugh and pick her up in my arms. She throws her arms around my neck and hangs on for the ride, her head resting on my shoulder. I kiss her as I carry her to her bedroom, and she nips at my lips hungrily.

My control is fraying fast. I lay her down on her mattress, on top of her blue comforter, and peel off her shorts and panties, so fast I rip them. I kneel between her legs and grab the hem of her blouse.

She’s panting, her lips parted, her eyes dark with desire.

“I have something for you,” I say.

Her gaze dips to the tent in my pants. “I’d say you have.”

I laugh.

The small box with her gift is burning a hole in my back pocket, but my control is slipping away.
Later.
I tug on her blouse, and she lifts her arms, helping me bare her.

She lies back down and gazes at me under her lashes. Her curves are hypnotic, the swell of her breasts, the dark areolas, her narrow waist and the dip of her navel, the flare of her hips.

The fine white lines on her stomach now make sense, and I discover finer ones on the sides of her breasts. Stretch marks.

She’s the prettiest girl on Earth.

“What?” she murmurs.

“You’re just…” I shake my head. “Incredible. Beautiful. More than I deserve.”

She reaches for me, gets a good hold on the back of my neck and pulls me down, so she can kiss me. “You deserve me. You deserve this.” Her hand trails down my chest, over the bandage of the tattoo, and cups my aching cock.

“Ugh,” I say coherently and thrust into her hand, my ears filled with a buzzing sound. “Fuck.”

“And I deserve you,” she goes on, kneading my dick, and I’m about to come in my pants if she doesn’t stop. “Because I’m happy with you.”

Hell.
I grab her hand and force it on the mattress by her head, then bend over her and silence her with a kiss. Her hands fumble with my shirt, and I rip it over my head impatiently.

“Tyler?” She touches the bandage on my chest. “What’s this?”

I look down at it, then shrug. “A dragon.”

Her eyes widen. “Can I see?”

I peel off the tape, then tear the bandage off and hiss. On the gauze, the shape of the dragon is imprinted in my blood, and the smell of it makes my stomach roil.

As if reading my thoughts, Erin sits up, takes the gauze from my hand and throws it into a can by her bedside. Then she runs her hands along my ribs, making me shiver. “It’s an impressive design.”

It’s quite cool, now that I finally take a good look at it. It covers my scar and curls around my navel.

“Survival,” she whispers the word—the same word Zane spoke.

This is getting too damn solemn for me. I survived, and Erin says she deserves me—all of me—so I’m gonna give her what she deserves.

I grab her wrists and lift them to place a kiss on each palm. Then I reach down to unbuckle my belt, and she beats me to it, deftly pulling it off and opening my fly. Her small hands send bolts of electricity through my dick, tightening my balls. I lean back, propped on my hands, and watch as she unzips my jeans carefully, obviously aware my cock is molded to them from the inside.

My eyes half-close in relief when she pushes my jeans down, then my briefs, freeing my erection. It slams against my stomach, and I hiss at the sting of pain/pleasure.

I grab my dick, press hard, and struggle to keep myself from coming so soon. I breathe in and out, grit my teeth, and I think I’m gonna stave off the explosion—when I feel wet heat closing around the head of my cock, and I groan helplessly, my hips jerking.

“Erin…” She’s mouthing my dick like it’s the best thing she’s ever tasted, licking and sucking. At this rate, I won’t last not even ten seconds.

So no matter how much I’d love to come in her hot, sweet mouth, I put a hand on her shoulder and nudge her off me.

A hurt expression crosses her face, but I don’t give her time to say anything. I kick off my jeans and briefs all the way and wrap myself around her. I suck on her mouth as I guide the tip of my cock inside her wet folds, pushing slowly and steadily.

Fucking hell.
I moan in her mouth. So tight, so hot,
Christ
. She cries out in my mouth when I thrust up and enter her completely, and I pant, my vision darkening for a second.

I’ve never been so hard in my life. My whole body strains as I rock inside her. I lower my head and suckle her nipples, feeling her clamping down around me. Her breathing is coming in gasps, and her arms are around my back, her short nails clawing at me. It feels so damn good.

I kiss my way up her neck, and she presses open-mouthed kisses on my lips, panting harshly. She’s so wet, her inner walls rippling, massaging my cock, until I can’t take it anymore. Gasping, I lay her back down, and I arch over her, rocking into her heat, faster and faster. Her pelvis lifts, and she starts to shake, clenching around my cock so hard I see stars.

“Tyler!” she calls out my name, and I feel her come.

My breath locks in my lungs, and my spine bows as my orgasm detonates inside my balls. My cock swells and jerks. Pleasure drives though me in a hot surge that keeps rising, carrying me higher and higher. I think I cry out, but can’t be sure because my pulse booms in my ears as I come and come again. She pulses around me, and my cum overflows, spilling out of her and drenching the comforter.

The sight of that makes me groan and thrust inside her one more time, clenching my teeth against the unbearable pleasure.

I fall on her, my muscles turning to rubber, and barely manage to roll by her side on the bed before I crush her. She immediately turns and presses her satiny curves close and even after coming so hard, I swear my dick gives a little twitch of appreciation.

“That was nice,” she says.

“Just nice?” I can’t move if my life depends on it, but I force my hand to lift. I caress her face.

“Okay, it was great.”

A slow grin tugs at the corners of my mouth. “Just great?”

“Tyler Grayson…”

Damn, the way she says my chosen name could raise the dead. My dick twitches again. “Yeah?”

“It was fucking awesome.”

I snort and kiss her quickly on the mouth. “Yeah, it was. Will you be with me, Erin?”

“Yes,” she whispers. “Always. You are everything to me.”

A lump is lodged in my throat. “Wait here.”

I sit up, swing my legs off the bed and locate my jeans, thrown haphazardly across a chair. I can’t even remember doing that. I lift them and dig into my back pocket. Pulling out the little box, worn from the years spent among my things, I walk back to the bed and sit on the edge.

“What is it?” Erin kneels on the mattress.

I turn the box in my hands and roll my shoulders. “It’s for you. I bought it for you before I left, before we fought and…” I wet my dry lips. “I hoped to give it to you some day.”

She takes it with trembling fingers and opens it. Her eyes widen, and she draws out the pendant I had made for her. A silver star with her initial carved on it. It dangles from its fine chain when she lifts it.

“Here,” I say gruffly and gesture for her to turn. She obeys, and I pass the chain around her neck and fasten it.

I pull back. The star lies on her collarbone, shiny like her eyes. “You’ve always been my girl, you know? I never stopped loving you.”

She throws herself at me, hugging me fiercely, then as if that’s not enough, she wraps her legs around me, too.

“God, I love you,” she whispers on my neck and kisses my skin. “So much.”

I hold her, rock her and breathe in her scent. I thread my fingers through her silken hair. “Lucky for me, huh?”