Page 55 of Rough Hard Fierce (Chicago Underground 1-3)
He jerked against the tangled sheets and mumbled, “No…leave her…”
I’d done this. I shook his shoulder firmly to wake him.
“Colin. It’s all right. Wake up. Everyone is fine.”
He blinked up at me blearily. “Allie?”
“Yeah, it’s me. You were dreaming.”
“Won’t let him hurt you again.”
“I know. I know. Shhh.”
Then he crushed me to him with both arms and slipped right back to sleep. I wasn’t sure he had woken at all, even though he spoke to me. My arms were trapped by my sides, and my neck was tilted awkwardly, but I held myself still. This was the way he’d put me. I needed to be able to do this small thing for him, have my body be the way he wanted it. I just closed my eyes and tried to will comfort from my body into his.
When I woke up again, it was still dark in the night that would never end. Colin thrust between my legs. He was inside me and over me and everywhere. It wasn’t fear or discomfort I felt, but relief. Gratitude that he was letting me do this for him. But he was muttering, “I’m sorry. Sorry.” I roused myself enough to mumble, “It’s okay,” and spread my legs wider, and he quieted. I understood why he was apologizing, though, because he didn’t even seem to have control of his own body. It was like his hips were thrusting of their own accord, and the rest of his body just had to go along with it. Each thrust was deep and strong, and with an unsteady but deliberate rhythm. It felt like being claimed, like being marked, protected, and I could hardly describe how that felt different from regular sex, except that I knew it when I felt it.
The irony is that I felt more owned, more controlled, than I ever had during the rough sex I’d craved with other men. He was telling me that I was his—that he couldn’t stop it and neither could I, so it was damned convenient that neither one of us wanted to. I don’t know how long he went on this way, but I could have taken him forever. My body was already relaxed and pliant from sleep, and I made no effort to change that.
When he came, he groaned my name and then shuddered over me, clutching me to him. I didn’t try to push into him, or away, just yielded completely to whatever shape he gave me.
Chapter Four
The light of the morning teased me, shadows dancing from behind my closed eyelids. Still feeling the lethargy from the night, I opened my eyes to…orange.
Orange fur.
“Goddamn it.” I bolted up from the bed, away from the orange hairball curled up on the pillow next to me. I was still gaping at the cat when Colin walked in and stroked my ass. Only then did I realize I was completely naked in the middle of the bedroom while Colin had dressed.
He fitted his body to mine, my back to his front, and nuzzled his face into my hair.
I pointed at the intruder. “The cat. It’s yours?”
Colin didn’t even look up before he murmured into the side of my neck. “Figured it was yours.”
“So, wait. Did you let it in?”
He nodded.
I pulled away from Colin, and he groaned in protest. “Sorry,” I said. “But this cat is leaving.”
I wrapped the sheet around me and picked up the cat, who’d now gone deadweight. His heft proclaimed that this was no starving kitty. “Absolutely, positively no cats allowed,” I said as I carried him down the stairs. Then I set him down outside the door and shut it with a satisfying click.
My confessions weighed on me, but the important thing was that Colin was still here. He still wanted me, and that was enough. I’d make it enough. I’d make us a family if it fucking killed me.
Chapter Five
I peeked under the blanket draped over the stroller. A cherub with chubby cheeks and tawny curls slept peacefully, in direct contrast to the little devil who’d shattered my eardrums in the house earlier. Bailey had begun insisting, quite loudly, that she was finished with naps. Droopy eyelids at the dinner table and cranky bath times proved otherwise, though. The battles were epic until I found a secret weapon: the cracked, slanted sidewalks of Colin’s neighborhood. A few minutes in her stroller, and Bailey was out like…well, like a baby.
I didn’t mind the walks. I enjoyed them. Would have done them before, had I not been likely to pass a streetwalker and two drug dealers on a trip around the block. It was like a bad “three guys walked into a bar” joke, but with needles.
Here, there were houses instead of boarded-up storefronts and trees instead of broken streetlamps. I even passed the occasional jogger, a pastime that I’d never understand, or another mom pushing her kid. They’d wave, and I’d wave back. So neighborly.
But I missed my neighbor of almost two years. Shelly hadn’t come around since the revelation about Philip, when she’d said his last name unbidden, and I feared I knew exactly what that meant. Her client, the rich one, the one who liked to hurt her, the one she lived with, was Philip. I already disliked Philip for how he treated Colin—shitty—and how he treated me—like I was invisible. But if I we
re right, I’d despise him for what he did to Shelly.
I didn’t really understand it. She was beautiful, and she’d had long-term clients. With me and Bailey out of the woods financially, at least for now, she didn’t need a whole lot of money. So why would she live with him? Did he have something on her? Because he sure as hell held something over me. Oh, just my entire future. All because Colin trusted him, and so I had to by default. No biggie.
