Page 45 of Ly to Me (Devils of Alliston Springs #1)

Lyra

The Secret

M y eyes fought against the burning rays of the midday sun as Carver carried me back inside the house. He set me down in the hallway bathroom on shaky legs, then took one look at the buckle of my knees before he lifted me back into his arms.

The countertop looked hard and daunting as he stepped up to it, and I let out a soft whimper at the thought of my ass trying to settle on it.

“Don’t worry, I got you,” he assured me, then gave me a slight smile.

“I need you to reach between us and unbutton my jeans.” I scowled, and before I could open my mouth, he added, “We’re taking a bath. ”

I pursed my lips, but the thought of warm water soothing my muscles and sore bottom made me reach into the small space Carver created between us so I could do as he said.

He kicked his clothes and stepped into the small tub, maneuvering the lever with his knee, refusing to put me down.

It was something I might have appreciated more had he not been the reason for the way my body had become weak, just like my heart.

“How’re you gonna fit in this tub with me?”

He chuckled and glanced around his feet. “I dunno. Never tried this, but I’m sure I can make it work.”

“You’re, what, six-two and a wall of solid muscle? I can take a bath on my own.”

“Six-three, but who's counting?” He smirked, then started lowering us down, shifting his bridal-style hold on me as he fit his body in the tub while bending his legs.

He gently moved me to fit between those spread legs, and the groan I let out at the immediate relief was obscene.

“Feel better?” he asked.

“Much,” I murmured, cupping my hands in the water as it inched higher.

His hands fell over my arms, brushing them with gentle strokes until he met my shoulders, and when he did, I let out a sharp hiss.

“Holy hell. Don’t stop doin’ that.” I rolled my neck, settling into his touch.

His cock hardened against me as he rubbed my sore muscles. “Ignore that.”

I giggled, then covered it weakly by clearing my throat. Sometimes it felt like we were kids again—not a care in the world. And then I’d remember how I’d never be that girl again.

“Lean back on me, and clear your mind of whatever it is you keep thinking about that makes you tense up so bad.”

“The way you fucked my ass is what’s makin’ me so tense,” I bit out.

“You loved it.”

“Did not.”

“Your ass is squirming against my cock.”

Heat rose to my cheeks. “No, it’s not.”

His chest rumbled with laughter as he shifted my hair from my back and laid it over one of my shoulders, then went back to massaging.

“It’s just…the water feels good. That’s all,” I reasoned.

“Sure.”

I didn’t have to look over my shoulder to know he was grinning like a fool. I gathered more water in my hands and tossed it at him.

His fingers stopped moving. “Lyra,” he growled low.

So, I did it again, only this time, I couldn’t stop the laughter breaking free from my lungs. He wrapped his arms around me, locking my back to his chest and my arms at my sides. Suddenly, all I could smell was the heady mix of us .

“You like being a bad girl, don’t you?”

“It’s what I know,” I said breathlessly.

“Hook those pretty legs over mine. Show me how bad you can be.”

His legs were bent, pressing against the sides of the tub, and if I listened, I’d be spread eagle. Put right up for slaughter. The pulsing of his cock against me forced another whimper free.

“This can go several ways, and what I have in mind—well, I think you’ll like if we go with the first option.”

“Fine.” I gave in and started lifting my legs, settling the backs of my knees on his thighs.

He slipped his hold from over my arms to under them, letting his fingers glide up my ribs until they met the underside of my breasts. I moaned as he cupped the swell of them, squeezing firmly. Possessively.

“Remember when I told you to touch yourself and to tell me how wet you were?” His question vibrated through his chest onto my back.

“Yes.” I pressed back into his hold right as firm hands inched up to my nipples.

“Touch yourself.” He rolled my hardened nipples between his fingers. “Touch yourself and tell me how much you loved taking my cock. Tell me how wet it makes your tight little cunt just thinking about me sliding inside you.”

I moaned and dipped my hand beneath the water, not necessarily needing to touch myself to know how much I wanted him. He groaned as my fingers reached my slit and I tossed my head back on his shoulder.

“Tell me, Ly.”

“Drenched,” I replied as my hand slid lower, knowing the slick on my fingertips was not from the water.

He let out a pleased growl. “Fuck your fingers. Nice and slow.”

I pushed two fingers inside, and every nerve ending, from my head to my toes, tingled. He nipped my earlobe, muttering a curse as I did it again, just as he demanded—nice and slow. His cock twitched against my spine as he flicked and teased my nipples, making my core burn.

“Deeper,” he commanded.

I pushed in more forcefully, trying to reach as deep as I knew he could, but there was no hope. I frowned, which he, of course, noticed.

“I can fuck you in this tub. I can make you come so hard, you won’t be able to think straight. I can do that, and so much more, all night long.”

“ Please, ” I begged, dragging my fingers back out to circle my clit, my core aching to have him fuck me.

He instantly snatched my wrist, and I watched with too much haze in my vision as he brought my fingers to his lips and sucked them into his mouth.

He groaned deeply as he slid his tongue over the two that had been inside me, then pulled them free and guided those fingers back down to my entrance, right past my clit.

“Please, Car.”

He separated those same fingers from the rest and pushed them back into my pussy. My ass wriggled against the bottom of the tub, desperately wishing my thighs could close to keep his hand where I needed.

“You know what I need,” he said. “Give it to me, and I’ll gladly give you what you want.” He ghosted a kiss over my neck. “Any way you want me, as many times as you want me.”

All of my hope faded, unlike my gnawing desire to have him in all the ways his words made me picture having him.

“ Goddamn you ,” I forced through a moan as he teased all my senses. My fingers kept a steady rhythm with his guidance, while his other hand promised to torture my nipples in the most excruciating way—pulling, rolling, pinching, slapping, caressing.

“I meant every word I said in the barn. Even the fact that I Iove you.”

“Don’t keep saying that.” The breathing along my neck picked up as the rest of him stilled. I could feel his heartbeat skipping, like it was breaking beneath me. I forced myself to continue. “You can’t mean it. Not really. Not when you don’t know everything there is to know.”

“Tell me and I’ll prove you wrong.”

I shook my head. When I made a slight move to get my legs off his, he used the leverage of the wall and pressed my leg into it, then pulled his other knee back just enough to make it harder for me to get free.

“We’re not done here,” he gritted out. “I’m going to give you one last chance in this room, Ly. Please, don’t make this harder than it has to be. Whatever it is, I’ll always love you.”

Tears pricked my eyes, and even as I tried to think of the words he needed, the confession he wanted from me, I just…couldn’t get them out. “I can’t,” I repeated like a broken record.

“You can, but you won’t.” His voice turned gritty as he pressed on my fingers, wordlessly telling me to continue.

“I can do the same. Bring you right to where you need to be, but not give it to you.” He swept over my clit, and I bucked in his arms. “The only difference is—I know what I want. She’s in my arms right now.

” He snatched my wrists and pinned them to his legs.

“It’s your turn to figure out if what you’re keeping inside is worth holding onto any longer.

Because I know nothing is worth losing you all over again. ”

TEN YEARS AGO

I ran.

I ran so hard my lungs burned and the tears I was crying flew off my cheeks and splashed onto the pavement.

I ran until I was at his front door, pacing back and forth.

My fingernails clawed into my scalp, triggering a light to flash on from the side of the house. My breathing hadn’t regulated yet from running over a mile in the middle of the night to my home—not a where , but a who.

Shivers wracked through my limbs as I paced, and paced, and paced. My vision glued to my feet, bare and broken, just like their owner.

Wood creaked, and I kept pacing and pacing, unable to stop until a familiar warmth surrounded me.

“I’m here, sweetheart.” My home. “Whatever it is, I’m here.” Tears flooded down from my lids to his exposed chest. “I’m right here. You’re alright. Let’s get you inside.”

Ten minutes later, I was stepping out from his bathroom, my fingers shaky as I combed through my hair.

Carver patted the side of his bed, and though I tried hard not to register the look on his face, I knew what it was. Not pity, or anger, or grief, or worry.

It was much worse than that, because it rolled them all together into one.

“C’mere.”

My hands fell to my sides, toying with the edges of his hoodie he’d slipped over my shaking body. When I curled in beside him and pressed my cheek on his chest, he planted a single kiss to the top of my head, then settled his chin there.

My body tensed as I glanced at the clock on the wall.

An hour ago, I was cowering in my room. An hour ago, I was covering my ears from the words of a drunken man who was trying to beat down my door.

All the while Carver was in his perfect home, peaceful and at ease in his perfectly maintained bedroom, knowing his perfect parents were down the hall.

“I shouldn’t be here. I’m so sorry, I—” I tried to get up, but he held me firmly to him.

“You’re always welcome here.”

I nodded against him and counted slowly in my head until my breathing settled back down.

“Thank you,” I murmured.

“Do you wanna talk about anything?” His question lingered, and when I went silent for too long, he suggested, “How about we talk about…your birthday?”

I curled in on him more.

“Okay,” he amended. “What about…your collection? Were you able to catch—”

“Talk about you…please.” I tapped my fingers along his abdomen, hoping he wouldn’t keep pressing me for anything more.

Carver went right into back-to-back stories, mostly about Jared and him hunting or playing around, or both, and then some vacations he’d taken with his parents, what they did as a happy family.

He talked until my eyes grew heavy and the darkness I felt inside ate into my vision, swallowing them whole.

I woke up a few hours later with Carver’s arm draped around me and the steady rhythm of his heartbeat under my ear. I shifted the smallest bit, and his arm tightened.

“Where you goin’?” His tone was low, almost like he wasn’t fully awake. I waited a few seconds and tried to move again, but this time he rolled, putting himself above me.

His smile forced one of my own. “I said, ‘where you goin,’ not ‘get goin’.”

His mouth brushed over my parted lips, and what started off sweet quickly turned into me tearing his sweatpants from his hips and him tearing the hoodie from my body. We didn’t stop until there was nothing between us, and when he eyed his nightstand where he kept a stash of condoms, I gave a nod.

Our passion burned deep as he held me close, kissing my neck, telling me how beautiful I was. I held him tight, wishing every morning could start just like this, with just us and nothing else. No one else.

But that wasn’t reality.

When he finished, he shifted lower, startling me in ways I wasn't expecting. Good ways. Really good ways. His smug smile as he laid on his back beside me was something I wanted framed, but the mental image would have to do.

“Been wanting to try that for so fucking long.”

I giggled as he pulled me back to him, resting me in the crook of his arm, and then his fingers dipped beneath my chin, pulling my gaze to his. “I’m not complainin’, but will you tell me why you ran here barefoot at midnight?”

I flipped onto my stomach and folded my arms on his chest, resting my head there as I stared back at him. “What are we doin’ after graduation?”

He reached for my hair and tucked it behind my ear. “What do you want to do after graduation, Ly?”

“I want to be with you,” I replied instantly.

He grinned. “I want to be with you, too.” He lowered his voice, like he was about to tell me a secret as he said, “But I thought that’s what we were already doin’ here.”

“ Here , you’d be right.”

A flash of confusion passed his face. “And what is that supposed to mean?”

“I don’t want to stay in Alliston, Car. I want to go to another town, somewhere far from here.

Somewhere that isn’t—” I stopped before saying too much, then corrected myself.

“Somewhere me and you can, I dunno, rent a place, start livin’?

I have money saved up and I’m supposed to go buy this car soon that I’ve been eyein’, and that will leave me with enough rent for a month or two for a place you and I can fit into easily.

I mean, probably a studio, nothin’ fancy.

You can still enlist from there, and I’ll get a job doin’…

I don’t know, but I’ll find something quick, I promise.

” I forced myself to take a breath, realizing I’d just blurted all of my thoughts without giving him a second to process.

But he was grinning.

“That”—he cupped my cheek—“sounds like a dream. One I’m on board for.”