Page 23 of Absolutely Pucked (Punk as Puck #3)

CHAPTER

FOURTEEN

KILLIAN

I had no idea what to expect when Ford invited me to have dinner in his bed. I was tempted to say no because my life was hard enough, and this was torture. But I couldn’t. I wanted him too much. I couldn’t have him the way I was craving, so I was going to take anything on offer.

Filling both bowls, I tucked a couple of water bottles under my arm, then made my way into his room. I hadn’t been in there since the morning I used his shower. It was his sacred space, and I was already imposing enough being in his house.

My first paycheck told me I wasn’t going to make nearly enough to get my own place in Turenne, but it would probably be enough for one of those weekly motels on the edge of town if I needed to leave.

And that was on my agenda because being there was disrupting his life enough as it was.

I would be selfish and indulgent for this little while, and then I’d see myself out and let him get back to normal.

Ford had set up a little nest when I walked in, and it was far too easy to nestle in next to him, our shoulders touching as we dug into the food. I was transported back to my younger years when things were different.

Harder in some ways, easier in others.

Those were the moments where Tucker and I were still best friends behind closed doors without jackasses at school judging us for being close.

Our friend groups were never the same. Tucker had always been drawn to the people who liked to rebel.

The ones who were always getting suspended and picking fights and getting high in the woods just outside of the school property line.

My friends were studious nerds and the occasional outcast. The people who stood in total opposition to the man my brother was becoming.

Back then, I could feel myself losing him. Our parents put more pressure on me to perform up to their standards, and showed more open disdain for every choice Tucker was making.

The cracks were obvious, and they were deep, but I ignored them until it was too late.

And now I was here with him, closer than he’d been in almost a decade, and yet the furthest I’d felt from him our entire lives.

Ford and I ate in total silence. His body was so warm, his breathing even, his throat emitting tiny little happy noises with every bite he took.

My ego puffed a little—what I had left of it, anyway. He scraped the last bite out of his bowl, then handed it to me, and I swung my legs off the bed so I could take them to the kitchen, but he caught my arm.

“Stay.”

I hadn’t planned on leaving just yet. Well, I’d thought about it, but I wasn’t ready to stop being selfish. “Just going to put these in the sink.”

He cleared his throat and held on tighter. “Okay, but…stay. You can take them to the sink later.” It was almost like he was afraid that if I left the room, I wouldn’t come back.

And hell, maybe that was true. Maybe halfway to the kitchen, I’d lose my nerve and hide in the guest room once more.

My hands began to shake as I set the bowls on the nightstand and turned back toward him.

The blanket was pooled around his waist, and his eyes were heavy-lidded as he looked at me.

He seemed tired—a little haggard with his hair barely hanging on to the bun at the nape of his neck and dark circles under his eyes.

“Would you like a massage?”

Ford’s eyes went wide. “Seriously?”

“I’m good at them.” I was. Delia had trained me very well in the art of getting out all the knots in her shoulders. “I can also brush your hair.”

Ford let out a tiny groan, then waved a weak hand toward his dresser. “I have a comb over there. And in the first drawer is oils. Don’t judge me for whatever else you find. And don’t snoop if you don’t want to know about me.”

My brows lifted. I wanted to know everything, but I wasn’t ready to take more than the inch he was offering me. Dislodging my arm from his grasp, I walked over and grabbed the comb from the corner by the mirror, then opened the top drawer.

There were several boxes that were very obvious sex toys and three bottles of what looked like oil. Two of them were lube, and the third was a cinnamon-scented body oil. I couldn’t help but wonder who he’d used these with, and jealousy rose hot and thick toward the base of my throat.

I had no right. At all. So I choked it down and composed myself before making my way back over.

“How do you want me?”

Every single way you want to give yourself to me , I thought. “I’ll get behind you, if that’s okay.”

He hummed his assent, then scooted forward, making space so I could press against the wall and fit him between my legs. We’d been that intimate before. Just the once, but I hadn’t stopped being able to feel it in my dreams.

He was just as warm now, his skin soft as I helped him take his shirt off. He groaned when I ran exploratory hands down his back and leaned into me as I found a couple of hard knots and several bruises.

“Hockey,” he murmured.

“This one is in the shape of a puck.” I pressed my thumb over a very round spot. Then just above it, a slash. “This one?”

“A stick. Pads only do so much. You should see what I look like after someone crashes their sled into me.”

“I don’t know how you do it,” I said, setting the oil down, then pulling the hair tie from his hair. It fell in loose, coarse waves over his shoulders, and I got a whiff of his shampoo. “I’m such a baby when it comes to pain.”

“I love it.” He groaned when I began to comb out his tangles, leaning back just slightly so his ass was pressed right against my dick.

There was no way I was going to be able to hide the fact that I was getting hard, but I think he knew what he was going to do to me.

“Pain kept me grounded after my accident.”

His hair quickly untangled, so I tied it back up, then poured a dollop of oil on my palm and rubbed them together. The scent was rich but not overwhelming, and I began hard, sweeping motions over his back.

As I swept my hands down lower, near his hip, I saw scars. Big, jagged scars with dots where stitches had been. Clearly, the accident that had taken his leg had been worse than just that. I wondered if he was afraid of horses now.

“Did your parents get rid of the horse after it trampled you?”

He grunted and groaned as he arched into my hands. “Huh? Oh, no.” He snorted, and the sound was very bitter. “No. When I came back to the house, I never went near the stable again. But I’m pretty sure they built that horse a little mansion to say thanks for nearly killing me.”

I froze. “Um…why would they do that?”

“Sorry,” Ford said. “Fuck, sorry. I don’t mean to trauma dump.”

I quickly started rubbing his back again, urging him to sit more firmly against me. And he did. “I don’t mind. You’ve seen the sorry shit-show my life has become. If you want to talk about it?— ”

“It’s not something I normally tell people.

It’s…I don’t know. Humiliating, I guess.

And I forgot you didn’t already know the whole story.

” I went silent as he took a deep breath.

“My dad wasn’t my bio-dad, but I didn’t know that until I was eleven.

Something always felt off, and the more they brushed off my questions, the more I got angry and started acting out.

He started getting violent and calling it discipline.

He gave me a couple of shiners to take to school. Then he started playing pranks on me.”

“Pranks?” I echoed.

“Started putting hot sauce in my food to the point it was inedible and laughing at me when I choked. He put glass cleaner in my contact solution once. Fucked up my cornea pretty bad for a while.”

“What the fuck?” I whispered, horrified. My parents had been awful. Textbook narcissists who turned Tucker into the scapegoat and me into the golden boy who never quite measured up. But nothing like that.

Ford snorted. “Yeah. He didn’t fess up to that one, but when I got back home from the ER and smelled it, it was totally Windex.

I started getting more and more suspicious because he wasn’t like that with my sisters, you know?

One day, I refused to put on something nice when we were going out, and he blew up at me about it.

I was done taking his shit, so I mouthed off, and my mom just…

lost it. She told me that he wasn’t my real dad.

That I was lucky he even gave me the time of day since I wasn’t biologically his.

That I should be grateful for any attention he gave me. ”

“Holy shit,” I breathed out. My parents had been monsters, but that was unthinkable .

“Anyway, things got worse after that. He no longer had to pretend, so his pranks and discipline got worse. Then the horse incident happened.”

I wasn’t sure I wanted to know what that meant. “The incident ?”

He hesitated for a long, long beat. So long I thought maybe he was going to stay silent the rest of the night.

I moved my hands down around his ribs, careful of his bruises, then slowly snaked them around toward his abs.

They jumped under my hands, but when I tried to pull away, he grabbed my wrists and held them there.

“My dad scared the horse on purpose, and it trampled me. Shattered my leg into pieces. He laughed until he realized there was bone sticking out of my skin,” Ford said, his voice tense.

“He took a really long time to call an ambulance. I thought I was going to die. He resented me for being someone else’s child, and I think he kind of wanted me to die.

My mom eventually came over to see what was going on, and she called 9-1-1, and they sent some EMTs to get me to the hospital. ”

“He tried to kill you,” I growled, pulling him tight against me. “He should be in fucking jail.”

His head fell back against my shoulder, and my hand slipped down lower. He sucked in a breath, but he didn’t stop me. I wasn’t brave enough to touch him the way I wanted to, but that thread of hesitation was slowly starting to snap.