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“Brain aneurysm,” he added with a melancholy smile. “Just happened one day, out of nowhere. She was there, and then she wasn’t.”
I struggled to swallow past the tacks lining my esophagus at the mere concept of that. Even though I told myself I wasn’t close with my mother, even though I had asserted my independence from her as soon as I could growing up, I couldn’t deny how much I relied on her presence, her support, even as I told myself I didn’t need it. My mother was the north star for all of us, unyielding. I couldn’t imagine how adrift I might feel without her.
“How old were you?” I asked another question that I shouldn’t. I certainly didn’t need to be learning about Elliot’s history, his trauma. He was meant to be anything but a fuck, not a complex person whose past was defined by loss.
“Thirteen,” he wrenched his gaze from the photo to me.
“Fuck,” I muttered.
“Yeah,” he nodded. “Broke my dad for a while. Broke us all.” He cracked his knuckles. “Went searching for the wrong women in the wrong places without her watchful gaze to steer us right.” His hinting at a troubled past with a woman made me infinitely curious and vengeful toward the unknown, stupid fucking woman. “But she was the best mother we could’ve asked for, and we found a way to carry on.” Elliot pulled up his cap then dragged a hand through his tousled curls. “She would’ve been disappointed in us all if we let her death make us unhappy or separated us.”
My heart panged at the easy way in which he revealed this, and the incredibly enlightened and healthy view of loss and grief.
Though I was lucky enough to never have experienced such a loss, I had the inkling I would’ve let it make me harder and more embittered to the world, if such a thing were possible. I’d be like Jasper, completely, with no redeeming qualities, no softness left.
The thought made me shudder.
Elliot mistook the gesture for being cold and stepped forward, rubbing his hands along my bare arms. The calluses rubbed along my skin in a way that was not at all unpleasant, along with the casual, caretaking touch.
My next shiver was caused by something else entirely. His hands grazed up my shoulders to encircle my neck, his eyes bouncing between mine before focusing on my mouth.
Though I didn’t think I could go from talking about dead mothers to being turned-on in a matter of seconds, my skin waselectrified, and my pussy pulsated from just his hungry gaze on my mouth.
Need coursed through me like a drug, and suddenly, I was desperate for his mouth on mine, his body on mine, his cock slamming into me, erasing everything else but us.
My tongue ran along my lips at the mere thought of it. His eyes trailed the movement, throat bobbing as he swallowed. The pressure at my neck tightened as he pulled me closer, mouths inches apart.
I felt the furious desire burning between us, his ravenous yearning glaring in his eyes. Hooded eyes that had a maddening edge that seemed completely out of character with the easygoing man I was coming to know.
But he didn’t act. He just hovered there, the time and space surrounding us buzzing with sexual energy.
“I’m a bad idea,” I whispered to him.
With his eyes fixated on my mouth, my lips tingled as if he’d touched me there.
“I’m bad for you,” I insisted, even as my body leaned closer toward him, our lips almost brushing. Basically, I was doing nothing in line with my noble intentions of warning him off of me.
“I refuse to believe that you, Calliope Derrick, are anything but made for me,” he rumbled.
And before I could argue with that terrifying statement, he kissed me.
Not just a kiss.
It was a claiming. Lips, tongues, teeth. We were fighting, both of us. I was fighting against the maddening desire to submit to him, trying to take charge of the interaction, the power dynamic between us.
He wasn’t fighting so much as melting all of my attacks into nothingness.
His hands settled at the hem of my skirt, hiking it up before those callused hands found the skin of my thighs, brushing along the garters I’d worn for precisely this reason.
Elliot let out a low hiss as his fingers traveled along the lace then skirted up to my sensitive inner thighs, never reaching the soaking apex that was practically crying out for his attention.
Instead, his hands crept to my bare ass, palming it roughly, protectively before lifting me up.
My legs wrapped around his waist, a mewl of pleasure leaving me as my panties brushed against his hard cock, trying to escape the fabric of his jeans.
Our mouths stayed connected as he carried me, expertly navigating the tables even with his mouth plastered to mine. An impressive feat since we didn’t even bump into a chair.
Then again, we could’ve crashed through a wall, and I doubt I would’ve noticed since my mind and my body were wrapped up in Elliot so completely.