Page 28 of Brash for It (Hellions Ride On #11)

Thirteen

Pretty Boy

The first thing that hits me when I walk through the door is silence.

Not the kind of silence that’s natural. This is different.

This house hasn’t been quiet since the day Kristen stepped into it.

She fills space without even trying. Her shoes by the door.

Her humming in the kitchen. The sound of her blow dryer in the morning.

The way she leaves the bathroom light on low, swearing it helps her sleep.

Now? None of it.

Three days on the road with my brothers, a run that was all grease and adrenaline and too many hours hunched over handlebars — it’s the kind of ride that sticks in your bones. Usually I come home ready to crash, let the bed take me, let the walls remind me I’ve got a place that’s mine.

But tonight, the bed’s too still. The air too empty.

Kristen isn’t here.

I drop my bag by the door, keys in the dish. The house smells like lemon cleaner and faint coffee, like she tried to leave it nice for me. There’s a folded blanket on the couch, a mug in the sink. Signs of her everywhere. Just not her.

A part of me bristles at that. The part that doesn’t like needing anyone. The part that doesn’t want to admit I counted on her being here, counted on the sound of her voice when I walked in.

I grunt, shaking it off. Can’t stand here like a stray left on the porch. I need to wash the road off me. Three days of sweat, smoke, exhaust. The kind of grime you can’t just wipe away with a rag.

In the bathroom, I strip down, toss my clothes in the hamper. The mirror shows a man with tired eyes, road dust in the lines of his face, hair matted from a helmet. Not my best look. I flip on the shower, steam billowing fast in the small space. Hot water, pounding. That’s what I need.

Stepping under it’s a damn relief. The heat soaks into muscles wound too tight, rinses away the ache in my shoulders, slides down my chest. I brace my hands on the tile and let the water hammer the back of my neck. For the first time in three days, I start to feel human again.

I close my eyes. And I see her.

Kristen, curled up in bed with my shirt swallowing her frame.

Kristen, laughing with a glass of wine on the porch.

Kristen, looking me dead in the eye while she told her ex to get the hell off our property.

Kristen, smiling and giving me a wave from behind the glass door of her work when I drop her off.

Even though, she has a license and does drive herself when I can’t, I find I like taking her to and from work.

It starts my day off right having her wrapped around me on my bike.

It hits harder than I want to admit. I missed her.

I tilt my head back, let the spray drown the thought before it can turn into something too big. I’m not a man built for missing. Not supposed to be, anyway.

The bathroom door creaks open.

I snap my eyes open, turn my head.

And there she is.

Kristen. Hair loose, face soft, clothes half-shed in her hands.

She doesn’t say a word, just steps inside like she belongs here.

Like the three days I was gone were nothing but a pause.

She lets her dress slide off her shoulders, slow, deliberate, until it pools at her feet, panties already slipped off.

Then she opens the shower door and steps in with me, steam curling around her like the water’s been waiting for her too.

Her skin brushes mine, warm against the heat. She tips her head up, water streaming over her face, and then she looks at me through the spray.

“I missed you,” she says, voice low, raw.

My throat tightens. My hands clench on the tile.

“Kristen.” It comes out like a warning, gravel in my chest. “I don’t have the self-control. If you don’t want all of me,” My jaw flexes. “Get out now.”

Her eyes flash, steady. Instead of backing away, she presses closer. Chest to chest. Her arms slide around my waist, water cascading over both of us.

“I’m not going anywhere.”

The heat that surges through me has nothing to do with the water. Her words hit me harder than any punch I’ve ever taken. I’m not going anywhere.

Challenge laid out.

The steam blurs the edges of everything, but she’s sharp and clear in front of me—eyes locked on mine, lips parted, water slicking down her hair, her skin. She doesn’t flinch, doesn’t hesitate. She just presses closer, and the last of my restraint buckles.

I’ve spent months telling myself I’d wait.

That she deserved time, space, healing. That I could take the edge off with cold showers and long rides.

But there’s only so much a man can push down before it claws back up.

I haven’t gone this long without a woman under me since I had sex for the first time at fifteen.

And right now, with her pressed against me, her breath hot on my chest, her nails skimming my ribs like she’s daring me to finally take what we both know has been building—there’s nothing left inside me to keep the need at bay.

I catch her face in my hands, tilt her chin up. “You sure?” I rasp, because I need the words even if I already feel the answer in her body.

“Yes,” she whispers. “I’m sure.”

That’s it. The last barrier gone.

I kiss her hard. Weeks of hunger, of holding back, pour into it.

She answers with the same kind of desperation, lips parting, tongue sliding against mine, her hands fisting in my hair like she’s been starving too.

The water pelts down, hot and relentless, but I barely feel it compared to the heat radiating off her.

I press her back against the slick tile, my hands roaming down her sides, memorizing every curve, every shiver. She gasps into my mouth, arches into me, and that sound alone is enough to brand itself into my bones.

The kiss turns frantic, wet, teeth clashing, her legs trembling against mine. She clings to me like she’s afraid I’ll vanish if she doesn’t, but she doesn’t need to worry. I’m not going anywhere either.

Her fingers dig into my shoulders, sliding down my chest, mapping me like she’s claiming every inch. I groan, low and rough, the sound reverberating off the tile.

“Kristen,” My voice cracks. “You don’t know what you’re starting.” I feel like there is a beast inside me coming alive. The dragon spirit in me is fire burning for her that is about to be unleashed.

She pulls back just enough to meet my eyes, water streaming down her cheeks like tears that are anything but. “Yes, I do.” Her smile is small, fierce. “You warned me. I want you, Kellum. I want this.”

Something in me snaps clean in two.

I lift her, her legs wrapping around my waist instinctively, her body molding to mine like it was built for it. She gasps, clutches at me, and the sound of it is pure fire. My mouth finds her neck, biting, soothing with my tongue, while she tilts her head back, offering more.

“Mark me,” she pants as I can’t help but devour the flesh at the bend of her neck into her shoulder.

The shower becomes its own world—steam thick, water pounding, every surface slick and hot. I move against her, with her, like we’ve been waiting lifetimes for this. Every kiss, every touch, every desperate press of her body to mine lays claims ways words never will.

She moans my name, breathless, and the sound undoes me. I’ve heard my name a thousand ways—growled, barked, cursed—but never like this. Never like it was an answered prayer.

I can’t get close enough. I push, pull, taste, devour.

She clings, answers, gives, takes. We find every angle the small space allows, bodies colliding with a kind of raw grace that only comes when there’s no fear left, only want.

The water beats down, mixing with the sweat, the salt, the heat of us.

At one point she grips the back of my neck, pulls my forehead to hers, eyes blazing. “Don’t hold back,” she pants. “Not with me.”

And I don’t.

I let go. I let her see the man under the control, under the restraint, under the years of telling myself I couldn’t trust this with anyone. I give her all of it, every ounce of hunger, every drop of need, every jagged edge of me that usually stays caged.

The shower echoes with our gasps, our groans, the slap of water against skin, the scrape of her nails down my back.

The sounds of our bodies moving as her pussy clinches tightly around the thick length of my cock as if her own damn body can’t get enough of me.

The world outside doesn’t exist. There’s only her, me, and the storm we’re making.

When it finally breaks—when her body goes tight around me, when she cries out my name with her head thrown back against the tile—it feels like something bigger than sex. It feels like a fuse lit, a vow sealed, a truth spoken without words.

I follow her over the edge, burying my face in her shoulder, groaning like the sound’s been ripped out of me. Every nerve fires, every muscle shakes, the release crashing through me like the first real breath after drowning.

We cling to each other under the spray, her body wrapped around me as I carry her weight effortless, water still pouring, but it might as well be silence for all I notice.

My chest heaves against hers, her fingers still tangled in my hair.

She’s trembling, not with fear, but with the same aftershock rattling through me.

I feel it through my balls as my cock throbs inside her going soft.

I press my lips to her temple, lingering there, breathing her in. For once, I don’t try to put words to it. There aren’t any good enough.

All I know is this: I warned her. She stayed. She chose. And now there’s no going back.