Page 10

The house I pull in front of looks like it hasn’t been lived in for a long long time. There’s weed almost the height of my Raven in the lawn around the house and the lights are off.

“Are you sure we’re at the right address?” I ask her, looking around. It’s all very quiet.

“Yep.” she throws her bags on her shoulders but since I am a gentleman, I take them from her. Did she stuff rocks in them? “Thanks.” she says with a forced faint smile.

“They weigh nothing for me.” I flex lifting the bags up and down which brings out a real chuckle out of her.

“Not just for that. For coming to my rescue, James. Thank you for picking me up on such a short notice. I’m sure you had other plans with your night. I won’t hold you back late." She quickly makes her way to the door past me. How do I tell her that no plan is better than spending time with her?

She opens the door and holds it for me. “You can come in if you want.” I am hit by a whiff of dust and old wood. All furniture is covered under white cloth. It is clearly evident that nobody lives here. How am I supposed to leave her alone here?

“You can put the bags there.” she points to the cloth covered couch. I put the bags down and she pulls a water bottle out of her bags and gives it to me.

“Thanks.” I drink some water while taking a good look around. The house isn’t the cleanest, but the floor looks like they were wiped recently. “Can I ask you something?” I choose my words carefully.

“Why is my sister not here with me?” She reads my mind. I wasn’t going to frame it like that but I was going to ask her just that.

“You don’t have to answer it if you don’t want to.” I don’t want her to cry again. I can’t see her cry again.

“Just know before I tell you anything that my sister is not a bad person. She’s just a little naive and she would rather suffer herself than let the other person know that he’s hurting her.” He? Okay…

“I won’t think like that. I promise.” Or at least I’ll try not to.

“My sister wanted me to stay here so that she and her boyfriend could do their work or something like that. I didn’t wait to listen to the entire explanation.” Her eyes well with tears but she looks away and wipes them too quickly. It hurts me that she doesn’t trust me enough to let them flow. Does she think that I will judge her for crying in front of me?

“So, why are you here then? You could’ve booked a hotel or something.”

“This is my family’s home.” She gets up from her seat and looks around. Assessing every nook and corner. I can see a bittersweet expression on her face. “Or at least it used to be.” She sighs and faces me.

I get up and walk to the fireplace which is very dusty but I see some dusty frames on top and really want to see her childhood photos. It’s not a shabby place. It’s pretty big and has a rustic taste. Not something old and rusty, but rather antique. I pick up the frame and clear the dust off the photo. It’s probably her mother holding her two daughters on the lawn outside. I can immediately spot the small mole under her eye and it is enough to tell me that it is my Raven. She was adorable! Still is.

“I thought you were an international student.” I put the photo down and walked towards her. She’s eyeing the kitchen carefully. Reliving her memories.

“We moved back to India when I was in fourth grade. My grandmother fell sick. She passed away a couple years after that. I was glad that at least I got to know her before that. But then, dad said it felt like home and decided to stay there.” She turns around to look at me.

“He bought this house when I was born.” She looks at the ceilings. “He always said that I was his lucky charm. We weren’t always rich. My mom and dad struggled in the beginning. A lot. And now, here we are. I have a really big family back at home. We live in the biggest house with at least fifteen people. It’s awesome having my cousins by my side.” She genuinely smiles. It is evident that she misses her home.

“Can I tell you something?” she asks shyly.

I just want to turn her around and hug her from behind. Wrap my arms around her stomach and pull her into me, inhaling her scent as she tells me all her childhood stories. Snap out of it Marcus!

“Anything.”

“I never once called any place that I lived in, home. Except for my actual home in India. That is the only home I have. Even this…” she points around the house. “Just feels like a house. Not home. Maybe because my home is my family.” her eyes tear up. I just want to pull her in for a hug and take all her pain away.

She looks at the watch on her hand and then looks at me. “It’s late. I don’t want to hold you back late.”

“Are you sure?” I ask her one last time.

“What?”

“That you don’t want to come with me to the hotel?”

She gives me a sad smile. “I’m sure. I know it looks very shabby. But it’s just for a night.” Just then we hear a noise from upstairs.

I immediately push her behind my back and take a few steps back. She’s obviously scared right now. And I wouldn’t blame her.

“That can’t be your sister by any chance right?” I whisper to her and she nods. Clutching onto my shirt from the back. I pick up the lamp from the table and slowly head upstairs. The wood floor creaks as I take every step. The only sound there is the sound of her panicking breath, the dancing bell anklets, my shallow breath and the creaking wood.

“Stay behind me, alright?” I whisper under my breath enough for her to hear it. We finally make it upstairs and we hear a lamp fall to the ground from one of the rooms. I make my way towards it and slowly push open the creaking door, all ready to attack whoever is there.

We hear a squeaking sound and a mouse jumps out of the corner and towards her. Riya is jumping around until she is in my arms. Eyes closed shut, arms wrapped around my neck. It takes me down the road of ideas of what I would do to her right now. The mouse runs off, but she’s still frozen in my arms.

She flutters her eyes open and pierces my soul with her pretty brown eyes. Yep, I’m hard. She wiggles a little and I put her down gently.

“Sorry, I must be heavy.” she tucks the few locks of her hair behind her ear.

“You really know how to bruise a man’s ego, don’t you?” I chuckle and she doesn’t understand why I’m laughing.

“I can lift you in one hand sweetheart. You weigh nothing.” Actually…I did lift her with one arm that night. All the way up to my bedroom . I don’t say that. I remember that feeling when she had wrapped her arms around my neck similarly, but so childishly. Something changes in her eyes. Lust? Nah! I must be imagining it.

“I’m sure you can, musclehead.” she smirks at me.

“Musclehead? Really?”

“Sweetheart? Really?” Spitfire. She’s back to being sassy. Thank god!

A yawn releases from my mouth and I see that she is tired too. “So…”

“So…” she folds her arms behind her back and looks at me with those big doe eyes. I know I am tired and sleepy but man do I want to fuck her right now.

“Where are we sleeping?” Her brow immediately arches up as I say that.

“We are not sleeping here. I am! It’s late, you should get back. Thank you, James. For this… But I won’t hold you–”

I corner her in the room from which the mouse just ran outside. “Either you let me crash here or else I am halling your ass over my shoulder and putting you in one of the rooms in the hotel.”

“You wouldn’t dare.” She challenges me.

“You think I can’t throw you over my shoulder? Are you challenging me, Raven? Want me to prove it to you?” I take one more step towards her until she is trapped between the wall next to the door in the dark room. There’s no light in here, but I can tell that her eyes are piercing mine with lust right now.

“You won’t dare.” That’s all it takes for me to find her thighs and lift her with one hand and hall her over my shoulders. I am so tempted to smack her juicy ass right now. But I am using all my strength to keep my free hand in my pocket.

“Put me down. James…Put me down!” She's moving around. I make my way down the stairs. She weighs nothing. Literally. “James. I’m telling you…Put me down now!” She chuckles and hits my back with weak punches. “Fine.” she stops hitting as I approach the couch. “You win. You are strong. I get it. Now please, put me down. Please…” Fuck. I can’t say no to her. So I put her down gently. She adjusts her hair and sweatshirt which slightly exposed her stomach when I put her down.

She scrunches her nose and narrows her eyes at me. So adorable! “You’re an asshole.” She hits my biceps.

“You like it.” I say and she rolls her eyes at me and finally chuckles after meeting my eyes. I would carry her for the rest of eternity if that meant she would chuckle like this. “Say Raven…What are you doing tomorrow?” I ask her with the cute expression that George taught me. He said that women will drop their panties and fall on their knees to suck you off if you ever use that look. Not that that’s my motto here. Not that I would mind it either. But right now, that is not the goal. Not right now.

“I’m not sure. But I know for a fact that I am not going to see my sister if that’s what you wanted to know.” Not why I asked the question. But it breaks my heart to know that her sister hurt her that badly.

I press my lips together in a thin line. “I was wondering if you wanted to go shopping with me and the boys. We were going to this gala. I told you about it right? Do you want to tag along?”

Her eyes widened as if I just asked her to accompany me on a one way trip to Mars. “I… I mean when you put it like that, it feels like you are just asking me out of pity.” she forces a laugh.

I cough out loud. “What? No! I would love for you to be there. Both shopping and the gala. You know I’d ask you before, too. But you declined my offer. Nonetheless, I would really be happy if you came with us. God knows the boys need some help with their fashion.”

“Just the boys?” her eyes narrow. Challenging me. “You sure you don’t need my help either?” she licks her lips and that makes my dick twitch.

“You think my fashion sense is bad, Raven?” I tickle her and she falls on the couch pulling the white cloth. It wraps around her. I wrap it further, immobilising her and tickle her for a good five minutes.

She gasps for breath between her laughs. “Okay. Stop. You have an amazing fashion sense. Stop tickling. Please.”

I hold her down. “Say you’ll go with me tomorrow.”

She repeats while laughing.

“Shopping and the gala. Both.”

“Alright, I will.”

◆◆◆

We are in the fifth store and I have never been so exhausted. I hate shopping and I hate shopping with George and Sid even more. These motherfuckers always have something to comment about every single thing that everyone tries on. And to add to that, my sweet Raven is brutal with her comments.

She made George shut up, for which she was heavily applauded by all of us. “I don’t understand why I couldn’t go with my idea of painting a shirt as an option.” Only George can think of something like that or even pull something like that off.

“Why can’t I wear my hoodie?” I complain.

“Because you can’t.” My Raven looks so upset with all the boys, including me. We gave her hell. But she struck back stronger. At least that distracted her from everything else. I have never been thankful for having such annoying friends.

“Isn’t it a black tie event, Dan?” Daniel is looking out the window. All zoned out. I know he didn’t want to go to his abusive shit of a father’s event. But his father threatened him to come to the event. I couldn’t let my brother walk into the lion’s den alone, so I agreed to go with him to distract him from the lion in the den.

“Daniel?” Riya shouts from the passenger seat.

She scares not just Dan but the rest of us too. He jerks his head up to face her.

“Where is your mind at? You barely got anything for the event which I should mention is being hosted by your father.” She emphasises.

He just groans and goes back to staring out the window. Riya doesn’t follow up. She can clearly sense that he is upset about it. She doesn’t need to be told word by word to know that Daniel and his father don’t get along well.

“When are you going to show us your dress?” George leans ahead between me and Riya. I am driving, so I can’t punch him. Shit .

“It’s a surprise.” she squeaks. She didn’t even show me what she bought. And I can’t stop imagining how beautiful she would look in anything she wears. More so without the clothes, but that is a view I’d like to keep private only for myself.

“If you steal my idea of body painting a dress. I wouldn’t mind it.” Sid smacks George’s head.

“Asshat.” Sid mumbles.

“Thanks Siddharth.” Riya rolls her eyes.

◆◆◆

“How long is it going to take you, your highness?” George shouts from the living room of the suite.

All the boys are suited up and ready to head out. Except for my Raven. She made sure everyone else got ready and then went to get ready herself. She tied all our bows. It’s been more than half an hour since then.

It didn’t surprise me how nobody among us knew or didn’t care about wearing bows. But when Riya snapped at us saying that if she’s going, we better dress up because she didn’t want to feel overdressed. Everybody shut up and stood still as she tied our bows.

A scream echoes from inside. “If you ask me that one more time George, I am going to stick my heel so far up your ass that even the ER team will have to cut it open to remove it.” Damn. She’s scary. Even George backs off. So she is SCARY. That’s crazy hot! I giggle to myself like an idiot.

About twenty more minutes later she walks out of the bathroom in a navy blue sparkly dress which goes beyond her high heels. It has a slit high up her thigh which exposes her sexy leg and the dress dips in the front. Enough to see her perky tits sitting perfectly. Her hair black falling on her shoulder with perfect curls.

A small necklace with a single stone and beautiful dangling sparkly earrings. She spins around and I see the back of the dress and I immediately want to drag her into the bathroom and bend her over and fuck her brains out.

She twirls around to give us the entire show and I notice that the fabric is cut out enough to expose the dimples on her back and it hugs her in the perfect places, putting her ass on display for everyone!

“Wow!” Daniel says subconsciously and then looks at me when he realises what he said. I wouldn’t blame him though. She looks spectacular.

“You guys look good too.” Her eyes finally land on me and does she spot the drool on my mouth?

The boys are frozen. Standing and gawking at her. Like me.

She clears her throat. “Aren’t we getting late now?”

I quickly turn around and adjust myself. Maybe I should have sized up two sizes in my pants. “Right. Dan…you’re driving.” I throw the keys at Dan. I can’t drive because I’m painfully hard right now. These pants are barely holding me in. But my poor cock is fighting for its life right now.

We sit in the car and Riya sits besides me.

Fuck a life sentence. This is the worst type of punishment. I am literally fighting with Hades to keep my hands to myself and not claim her right now.

She smells good too. I want to make her come on my fingers.

She adjusts in her seat and her bare thigh rubs against mine. She folds her leg over to expose more of her leg. Fuck… She’s going to kill me.

“You alright there James?” she whispers in my ear and I can feel her rusky breath on my ear and it makes my balls ache. I need to fuck her right now. I want to taste that delicious red lipstick of hers.

She’s teasing me.

So I take off my jacket and fold my sleeves up to my forearms. I’ve heard it so many times that it turns on girls and the way she presses her thighs together tells me all I need to know.

I bring my mouth to her ear and whisper, “Two can play the game, Raven. ”