Wrecking Ball (13 page)

Liam nodded with a slight smirk.
What in the hell is wrong with him?
He was totally acting like a dick.

“
I’m Liam. I gave Soph a ride home.” Liam smirked. “Sophia and I…we were kind of first loves, if you know what I mean. So you’re the fiancée? Brad is it?” Anger lashed like wild waves inside of me. Liam knew his name and mentioning we were each other’s
first loves
wasn’t necessary. He was mad because I rejected him and now he was trying to create problems between Brandon and me. Liam stepped on the bottom stair and extended a hand to Brandon to shake with an all too obvious twinkle in his eyes suggesting he wanted to piss Brandon off, and that was the straw that broke the camel’s back. Brandon drew back and cold cocked him right in the eye. Liam fell off the bottom stair and hit our concrete sidewalk in one hard thud. In a flash, Brandon was down the steps standing over Liam, when he bent down and grabbed his shirt pulling him up slightly to meet his face. “My name is Brandon Dalton. Sophia is my fiancée. I’d make sure to remember that if I were you. You ever come near her again, I’ll break your fucking legs.” With that he let go of Liam’s shirt and stepped away, his chest rising and falling dramatically as he tried to calm down.

I was frozen. My hand didn’t just hold the railing to support me with a bum
leg, it now gripped the hard wood like a life line keeping me from being dragged under in the massive undertow that was Brandon.

I watched Brandon as he watched Liam half crawl/half walk to his car and drive away. When his gaze met mine, I could see the doubt play
ing out in his eyes. He was wondering if
I
kissed Liam. “Brandon, I—”

“Shut the fuck up,” he bit out and I recoi
led.

Okay.

H
e’s mad.

I get it, but no one tells me to
‘shut the fuck up.’

“Excuse me—”

“Sophia!” he yelled.

“Fuck you!” I yelled back and turned, attempting to quickly hobble to my front door so I could slam it in his face.

“Oh, don’t worry,” he growled. “You will.” And just as my hand reached the door knob, he hoisted me over his shoulder and carried me down the steps of our porch.

“Put me down!” I shouted as I kicked my feet and hit his back.

He carried me an entire block, screaming through my neighborhood like a mad woman before he set me down near his car on the passenger side. He opened the door and ordered, “Get in.”

I glared at him. My day had officially gone off the freaking tracks and here was my fiancée acting like a Neanderthal. “And if I don’t
?” I gave him my fakest saccharine smile.

“Then I’ll be forced to fuck you right here on the hood of my car, in front of your entire neighborhood
,” he warned. His brown eyes bore down on me, like tongues of fire licking my skin and even as pissed as I felt, I had to squeeze my legs together as the familiar ache that Brandon always caused pulsed. Something about him angry and demanding turned me on. His mouth curved slightly, daring me to argue. There was no doubt in my mind that he’d make good on his promise and take me on the hood of his shitty Ford Focus that was due to break down any day.

I swallowed the dry lump in my throat and tried to stop my body from trembling. If he knew I was turned on, he’d only torture me more. “Maybe if you ask nicely.”

“Sophia…” He said my name in a deep and gravelly voice. “Would you please get in my car, so I can take you to my hotel and fuck you?”

A little whimper escaped my mouth
. Jesus, woman, don’t show him he’s got you.
Fight, tell him to go to hell
. But, I didn’t do either of those things. I slipped in to the seat and he closed the door. My day may have been awful, but maybe getting fucked senseless would right my world.

***

My parents always welcomed Brandon to stay at their house, but it was made very clear by my father that we would not share a room under his roof unless we were married, so Brandon always got a hotel room when he came into town. My parents weren’t idiots; they knew Brandon and I were intimate so they understood why he got a hotel room, even though they never mentioned it.

We didn’t speak all the way to the hotel. The longest ten minute drive of my life. My body was pent up with so much anxiety. What will
he do to me? What will he say? When we finally entered his room, he shut the door and immediately walked into the bathroom leaving me alone. My knee still hurt, but I wasn’t limping anymore. I plopped down on the edge of the bed and waited.

When Brandon emerged, he stood in the doorway, staring at me. There was a long moment of silence and I couldn’t take it anymore. He had to know I didn’t kiss
Liam. “Liam kissed me.”

“Be quiet
,” he ordered me.

“I just don’t want you
to think—”

“Sophia
,” he warned. I clamped my mouth shut, anger building inside of me again. “Stand up,” he ordered me as he leaned against the door frame of the bathroom and crossed his arms. The muscles in his biceps flexed and my mouth went dry. With shaky legs, I stood up and turned to face him.

“Undress.”

His gaze met mine and heat immediately blanketed my skin as my body begged for his touch. Slowly, I unbuttoned my blouse an
d let it fall to the floor and then I unzipped my black pencil skirt and let it pool around my feet. My bra and panties were gone in seconds and I stared at Brandon, waiting and wanting.

“Lay on the bed.” I crawled on the bed, my gaze never leaving his as I spread out. “Fuck
, you are so beautiful. My cock is so hard right now.”

“Is it? I can’t quite tell when you’re way over there.” I batted my lashes at him.

Brandon sucked in his bottom lip and I nearly lost my mind. His dark hair sat loose and disheveled
on his head. It looked like he hadn’t shaven in a day or two and his face had that sexy scruffy look to it. His clothes were simple, jeans and a tight black T-shirt that hid none of his exquisite muscles underneath. He straightened himself and slowly began to unbutton his pants as he walked towards me.

“Touch yourself.”

My hands immediately flew to my breasts and my back arched from the pleasure it brought me. My body was keyed up, needing his mouth on me, his cock inside of me.

“Does
that feel good?” he asked as he slipped his shirt off.

“Yes,” I breathed.

“Finger yourself, Sophia. Show me what you do when I’m not here to fuck you.”

My eyes never left his as I let one hand drift down my stomach until it centered between my legs. “I’m so we
t,” I moaned as I rubbed my clit in circular motions.

“Wet for me or for Liam?”
he questioned his tone rich with spite.

My gaze snapped from his as anger replaced want inside of me. “I’m not doing this with you.” I rolled over to slide off of the bed on the opposite side from where he stood, but he grabbed me by my hips and pulled me back, slamming me down on the bed.

“Do you know what it does to me to think about that fucking twat’s lips on yours?”

“He. Kissed. M
e,” I growled through clenched teeth.

“And you let him?” It didn’t sound like a question when he said it, but I decided to treat it like one anyway.

“No. I pushed him off me.”

“When he kissed you, did you think about how it f
elt when he used to fuck you all those years ago?”

“Fuck yo
u, Brandon.” I jerked up, but he slammed me back down and pinned my wrists above my head. He kissed my neck and my shoulders, trailing down to my breasts where he sucked and nibbled. My body torqued in to his, begging for his touch. Wanting him and being angry with him at the same time was torture. He was jealous and being a dick, but I needed him. I needed him touching me everywhere.

“Do you want him?” Brandon continued to torture me
, biting my nipple and I arched my hips, needing to feel him between my legs.

“
No,” I breathed.

“Tell
me, Sophia. Did you want to fuck him?”

“No!” I yelled, raising my head so that my face was only an inch from his. “I don’t want to fuck him, I want to fuck you, but you’re
being an asshole!”

In a flash I went from being pinned down on my back to standing and being bent over the desk beside the window.
“Then let me give you what you want,” he growled. The wood of the desk was cold against my burning skin and my body clenched at the sudden intrusion of Brandon inside of me.

“Oh God,” I moaned, the sensation of him filling me
somehow releasing all of the built up angst I’d carried around all day. I needed Brandon in so many ways, but at that moment, I just needed him to fuck me numb, make me forget, punish my body the way only he could.

“Fu
ck, you’re so wet,” Brandon mumbled as his hands gripped my hips and he began thrusting hard into me. “Who do you belong to, Sophia?”

“You,” I cried as I stood on the edge, ready to fall head first into what was sure to be a mind blowing orgasm.

“Mine. You hear me. You. Are. Mine.” Brandon bit out each word and his grip tightened on my hips. “Say it.”

“I’m yours.” And then my orgasm ripped through me and I moaned over and over, “Yours. Yours.” As I lingered
in the fog of an epic orgasm, Brandon’s thrusts became shorter and harder until he moaned my name and I felt the familiar pulsing as he came.

My body was wrecked and my legs felt like they might collapse beneath me. Suddenly, from out of
nowhere, sobs tumbled out of my mouth and I started crying.

“Oh
shit, Sophia. Did I hurt you?” Brandon quickly pulled out and yanked me up from where I had been trying to melt into the desk in post coital bliss.

“No. It’s just been a really horrible day.”

He scooped me up and carried me into the bathroom, sitting me on the sink while he started the shower. Once the water was warm enough, he picked me up and sat me in the tub under the stream. Wrapping his arms around me, he pulled me to his chest as I continued crying. “I’m sorry I got crazy, Soph. I’ve been going fucking crazy being away from you and when I talked to you earlier today you sounded like something was really wrong and I got scared maybe you were drifting away from me. So I got in my car and drove here right away and then that fucktard was dropping you off and you’d been drinking and he said he kissed you…I lost it. I’m sorry.”

I wrapped my arms around him and pressed my forehead to his chest. “I’m sorry I made you worry. The truth is, I kind of quit my job today because my boss was being a dick and I
didn’t know how to tell you.”

“Why? I wouldn’t have judged you.”

“Because I stayed here for that job when I could’ve gone back with you and it just seemed so shitty that I would just quit it. I’m miserable without you.”

“Then come back with me. You don’t have the job now. You can move in with me and find another job in Alabama. I need you
, Soph. I swear, I feel like I’m missing a limb without you near me.”

“Me
, too,” I cried and he stroked my back gently. “I didn’t kiss him, Brandon. I swear.”

“I know
, baby. I’m an asshole. I don’t know why I did that to you. Will you forgive me?”

I gazed up at him and smirked. “Only if you promise to do it again.”

He bit his lower lip. “Happily.”

Sophia

Early the next morning, Brandon and I returned to my parent
’s house after a night of non-stop love making to pack my things. We would be heading back to Alabama as soon as we could, eager to officially start our lives together. We even set a wedding date.

Tia was at the kitchen table, doing math homework, her least favorite subject which she was always flunkin
g, most likely because she waited until thirty minutes before school to do her homework.

“Where’ve you been?” She gave me a curious smile.

“Out.” I rolled my eyes. “Where are Mom and Dad?”

“They went to bed early
and slept in. Door’s shut.” She pretended to gag. My parent’s bedroom door being shut could only mean one thing. They were having sex.

“Gros
s,” I muttered, even though in a weird way I liked knowing my parents were still crazy about each other that way.

“I see Brandon found you.” She beamed a friendly smile at Brandon.

I pulled out a chair and sat next to Tia. “Tia—”

“I know. You’re leaving with him.” She mumbled and let her gaze fall back to her math book. Tia was years younger than me, sometimes it seemed like she lived on a different planet our lives were so different, but she was always my number one confidant. We were close, always had
been and I knew even though me moving to Alabama was inevitable, she’d still be upset.

“How’d you know?”

“Brandon has that shit-eating grin,” she grunted and pretended to jot something down on her paper.

“That’s because we had sex all nigh
t, too,” I added and her gaze shot to mine. She was always asking me about sex and what it was like and I always tried to steer away from the topic, afraid I’d encourage her. So me mentioning anything about sex first was sure to get her going.

“He bang
your brains out?” she asked eagerly and Brandon nearly choked on his laughter.

“Tia!” I groaned.

“Well, did he?” She was relentless.

“Yes, he did.” I shook my head not quite believing I was telling her about it.

She leaned back in her seat and grinned like an idiot. “I
cannot
wait to have sex.”

“Tia—”

“I know, Phi. Make sure it’s with the right person and don’t rush.” She said in a monotone and rolled her eyes.

“Help me pack?” I patted her hand and we both got up and headed to my room.

When we were on the interstate heading back to Alabama, Brandon took my hand and kissed it. “I’m going to make you happy, Soph. Give you everything. I promise”

“I just need you.”

Brandon was telling the trut
h, too. I moved back to Alabama with him and we married the following year. We were so happy and he did everything he could to keep his promise. When he finished his masters, he took a job as an assistant professor at Alabama while he worked on his PhD.

I worked
as a manager for a local collections agency. Not my dream job, but it was easy and I got to be with Brandon. Even though we were busy, we were still crazy about each other, and when I thought I couldn’t get any happier we found out I was pregnant. Still, we loved passionately and after I gave birth to our second child we found an amazing house. Brandon’s schedule had become so busy as he began working on tenure we decided I should stay home to take care of the girls. Things didn’t seem like they could get any more perfect.

Looking back, that’s where everything started going wrong.
As the years went on, a distance grew between us. I told myself, that’s common in marriage, but I refused to let it fully take root.

“Come to be
d, Brandon.” I stood in the doorway of his study wearing his favorite nightie one night after I’d put the girls down. He’d been so busy with work, I’d tried to stay out of his way so he could focus, but it was obvious he was wearing thin, needing some way to relieve the stress and tension, so I went to him, to distract him, at least for a little while.

When he looked up at me from his computer, his brows rose and he leaned back in his chair. “What did you have in min
d, Mrs. Dalton?” He arched a playful brow. His hair was a mess from running his hand through it repeatedly, his tie loose, and the top buttons of his shirt were undone. The man could still make my legs tremble just looking at him.

I sashayed towards him until I stood between his legs where he sat behind his desk. “Did you know that there was a Swiss study that concluded men who get blow jobs while working are more likely to succeed in the work place?” I teased as I
pulled up the silk of my nightie and fell to my knees in front of him.

“Is that so?”
he smirked. “Those damn Swiss are fucking brilliant.” He nodded enthusiastically.

“Yes, well I want to help my husband succeed.”
I began unbuckling his belt when his hands grabbed my wrists. Pulling me up, he stood with me and kissed me passionately, his hands groping my ass as he did. But after a moment he pulled away and smiled softly at me.

“Baby, you go on up. I’ll be up shortly. I’m almost done and then I can come up and take my time with you.” He nibbled my neck before pulling away from me again. Disappointment fisted my stomach. It was the first time he’d ever rejected me, but I told myself he was busy and promised he’d be up soon.

But Brandon never came to bed that night. When I woke at six in the morning the next day, I found him passed out on the couch in his office. Maybe I shouldn’t have let that hurt me so much. He was tired. But it stung and I somehow held on to that hurt. Of course, little did I realize, that was just the beginning. There are countless examples of me trying to initiate and him putting me off or not responding, so after a while, I stopped trying. I let Brandon come to me and when he did, we made love. But what was once spontaneous and unbridled became more routine. Sex was good with him, always, but not like it had been. That raw hunger he once had for me was gone and instead, there was comfort. He knew I would always be there, and I would be.

To preoccupy myself, I devoted my life to our girls and raising them, making sure Brandon had whatever he needed so he could focus on his work.
When he was given tenure, although his schedule calmed down, he was still busy. We did spend more time together as a family, and we were happy for the most part. Life was comfortable and I took pride in what we built together.

But I was wrong. Nothing was okay; far from it. It
all started with a phone call two months ago. A phone call—the wrecking ball that crushed through my life as if it was nothing but a condemned building with weak walls and a caved in roof.

“He
y, babe. What are you up to?” Brandon asked from the other end of the line.

“Cooking dinner. Your
favorite—pork loin,” I answered as I stirred the pot of sauce simmering on the stove.

“Damn that sounds good
,” he groaned. “Unfortunately, I’m working with a couple of grad students on their dissertations and I’m going to be late. Will you save me a plate?”

“That’s three nights this week
, Brandon,” I complained.

“I know. I’m really sorry, but I promise I’ll be home every night the rest of the week.”
I could hear the remorse in his voice.

“Okay. I’ll put a plate in the microwave for yo
u,” I sighed, disappointed.

“Thank yo
u, Soph. I love you.”

“I love you
, too.”

When we hung up, I stared at the pot I was stirring
, feeling guilty I made him feel bad. He was working hard, for us, and I needed to remember that.

“Was that Daddy?” Chloe asked from the doorway into the kitchen.

“Yeah. Daddy is sorry, but he’s going to miss dinner with us tonight.” I smiled at her as I turned the burner off. “Looks like it’s just us girls.”

“You should take dinner to Daddy
,” Chloe grinned.

“Yeah, and give him a big kiss
,” Ferrah added.

I chuckled softly. “You think so, huh?”

“Yeah, on the mouth.” Ferrah giggled.

“Won’t he give me cooties?” I laughed.

“Yeah, but it’s Daddy. You already have his cooties,” Chloe insisted.

The girls had a great idea and I knew Brandon would appreciate the gesture.
So when I finished dinner, I made a plate, called our neighbor Arlene and asked her to come sit with the girls so I could take it to him.

The science building parking lot was vacant for the most part, but the building was still lit and the doors were unlocked. I took the stairwell as Brandon’s office was on the second floor and it wouldn’t be too much of a workout.

The desks and cubicles outside his office were all empty, everyone having gone home for the evening, but I could see through the murky glass of his office door that his light was on. The door was open slightly and figuring he was alone, I didn’t knock, but walked right in. That’s when my world tilted. Brandon stood with his hands on the waist of a young woman he was kissing, her arms wrapped around his neck. Brandon’s hands moved to the woman’s arms and pulled her back, staring into her eyes. In the brief moment I watched them, I could see the feud going on inside of him, but apparently any doubt he had about whether or not to kiss the woman wasn’t enough for him to fully disengage himself from her. The woman:  obviously a grad student, was pretty and young, and the dreamy gaze she peered back at him with told me he was something she wanted very badly.

My face went numb as I tortured myself watching them
, waiting to see what he would do. Neither of them noticed me until they heard the plate in my hand hit the floor, food scattering everywhere. Brandon’s head whipped towards me and his eyes widened.

“Shit. Soph—”

I backed out the doorway, shaking my head frantically. This couldn’t be happening. As I turned, my stomach knotted. Brandon was cheating on me
. I just witnessed my husband, the father of my children, cheating on me
. I moved towards the stairwell when Brandon’s hands grabbed me and spun me around.

“Pleas
e, Soph! It’s not what you think,” he pleaded, a frantic desperation in his voice.

Anger bubbled up inside of me and I tore his hands off me. “Don’t you fucking touch me!” I hissed as I backed away from him. “How could yo
u, Brandon?” My hand covered my mouth to muffle the sobs I wanted to let lose.

“I swear. It’s not what you
think,” he pleaded again, reaching for me, but I backed away.

“I have to go.”
I backed away from him and rushed through the door of the stairwell. My heart pounded in my chest as I exploded in sobs. Running to my car, I fumbled with my keys, my body shaking. When I got inside, I drove two miles towards the house and pulled over on the side of the road realizing I had to calm down before I went home. How could I be so stupid? All of these late nights weren’t about his work. He was running around on me.

My head thumped against
the steering wheel as I cried, long and hard, my heart bleeding out. When I finally calmed down, I wiped under my eyes and drove home. By the time I got to the house, Arlene had put the girls to bed and even though my puffy eyes and red nose made it obvious I’d been crying, she didn’t ask. She simply slipped out of the house and left me to sort out my issues.

I crawled up to our bedroom, stripped down and climbed in the shower letting the scalding hot water run over me. I stayed under the water crying until it got cold
and my fingers were pruney. When I stepped out and wrapped a towel around me, planning to fling myself in bed, Brandon sat on the edge of our bed, head hung and hands clasped in his lap as if he were praying. I had no idea how long he’d been waiting, but I knew he had to have heard me weeping in the shower.

Anger replaced my devastation, briefly.
With a deep breath, I steadied my voice and said, “You need to go. I can’t even stand the sight of you right now.”

“Sophia.” He sighed my name as if he was trying to control his own emotion. “Baby, I know what you saw looked—”

“Like you were cheating on your wife,” I interrupted, disdain rich in my tone.

“I swear it’s not what you think. She kissed me and I stopped it.” His gaze moved to meet mine and his eyes were glossy as if he were on the verge of crying.

He did pull away from her, that I saw, but he
did
kiss her. I witnessed it with my own eyes. There was a long moment before he pulled away from her and even after he pulled away, he held on as if he were debating whether he wanted to kiss her again or not.

“Brandon.” I shook my head, exhausted. “You were kissing her. Maybe you pulled away at some point, but you
were
kissing her.”

“She came on to me. I swear nothing else happened and I stopped her. I swear.”