That night, for the first time in longer than I could remember, I dreamed, and it wasn’t the kind of dream you told your parents about around the breakfast table. In it, I was lying in bed, and a heavy weight was pinning me down. My body was alive with sensation. Burning-hot skin pressed against mine. Strong hands imprisoned my wrists above my head. Warm, soft lips moved up my neck.
I should have been scared, but I wasn’t.
“Don’t get on my bad side, Bug,” a deep voice whispered in my ear.
One of his hands gripped my throat, holding me in place. I couldn’t move, couldn’t speak. I couldn’t do anything but feel his hands on me, breaking all the rules without a care in the world.
“Or do – more fun for me.”
It could only be one person. Only one person had ever spoken to me like that. Cayden West.
I woke suddenly, my body hot and wet and wanting. I stared at the moonlit wall opposite my bed, waiting for my heart to calm. My whole body felt heated, like I’d been standing too close to a furnace or had a low-grade fever. I pushed my hair back from my sticky forehead and took a deep, shuddering breath. I slipped out of bed and grabbed my journal and pen from my desk. Describing the dream made it more real. Cayden West. The new boy who’d knocked me on my ass, hauled me around a party, and threatened me all in a forty-eight-hour period. And I – Lily Williams, touch-starved good girl – had just had a sex dream about him.
Once I emptied my sleep-dazed thoughts onto a blank page, I reached for my water and gulped it down. Maybe that would return some sanity to my feverish mind. What was wrong with me?
He doesn’t play by the rules, he wouldn’t care about your father’s threats. He would take what he wanted and never even give you a choice.
I shivered, the thoughts curling through the edges of my mind like wisps of smoke, too unformed to grab on to. Regardless, just the memory of the dream had my body responding. It was official. I was playing a dangerous game, building up an endless supply of raging teenage hormones without any kind of outlet. One day, it might just boil over and I’d become the girl who went insane from unsatisfied lust.
Returning to bed, I slid under the covers. The sweat that had slicked my body while I dreamed, was cold now, and I shivered. My body felt twitchy and awake from the dream. I ran my hand down myself, over my breasts. My nipples were hard, straining against my T-shirt. Shame and embarrassment coated me as I let my hand drift lower, under the elastic of my shorts. I was all hot and wet down there, and even my thighs were sticky. I slid my hand under my panties to check. Yup. It’s bad. My own meager explorations had been the only action I’d ever had downstairs, and those experiences had been sorely lacking. It felt good when I touched myself, and I knew enough about human biology to understand the components, but I’d never managed to make myself come. I’d read up about it and approached it in the most scientific way I could, and yet I was still orgasm-free.
There had to be a variable I wasn’t factoring in. Given that dream tonight and my body’s reaction to it, it seemed clear what that variable was. I was missing another person. Namely, one who would pin me down and take what he wanted from me. Just that thought sent a fresh, slick wave of want through me. I slid my virgin fingers around my clit, rubbing in a circle. It felt good, better than usual. I let the dream fill my mind again, imagining the heavy feeling of Cayden’s body against mine, picturing the way his hand held my neck. I had no choice. I wasn’t breaking my parents’ rules and I wasn’t letting them down. It wasn’t my fault. I moved my fingers faster on my wet pussy, and for once, I felt myself rising. Maybe the elusive O could finally be mine.
Outside, a car door slammed, jolting me up in my bed, my impending orgasm slipping from reach.
Who the hell is out at this time of night?
We didn’t live close enough to anyone else for it to be a neighbor. I slipped out of bed and peeked around the curtain. It was raining heavily. I couldn’t make out too much. My bedroom was on the ground floor, beside the spare room. My parents’ room was upstairs.
My father had been out? I checked my glow-in-the-dark clock. Three a.m.
Curiosity pulled me from the safety of my room. I drifted down the hall, wrapping my huge fluffy robe around me and perching my glasses on my nose.
The lights blazed in the kitchen. My father stood in the middle, his raincoat wet and his hair shining. My mother stood in front of him in a robe and slippers. They argued quietly. The front door stood open, and a cold wind blew through the room and down the hall, winding around my legs. A shadow lurked just outside the door, leaning against the wall, just out of the rain. A person, shrouded in darkness. I somehow knew his eyes were on me, despite not being able to make out a damn thing but his vague outline. Just like that day in the parking lot, when that dark hood had hidden glittering sea-blue eyes from me, I knew exactly who was standing in the rain outside my house at three a.m.
I couldn’t make out everything they were saying, but my mother gestured wildly toward the shadow outside, and my father made those hand gestures he always used to try and quiet her. After a few minutes like that, my mom turned on her heel, angrily storming through the house.
“Mom, what’s going on?” I called.
“Ask your father!”
Her snapped reply made me even more curious about what was going on. Something out of the ordinary was happening.
I approached the kitchen. My dad shrugged off his coat and wiped his feet on the mat, then turned to hold the door open for our unexpected guest.
“Come on in, Cayden, make yourself at home,” my dad said. Coach Eric was always polite and warm. Everyone loved him. The town good guy.
Cayden didn’t have a jacket on. His thin, holey hoodie was soaked through on the shoulders, and his sneakers squeaked with water. He carried a black trash bag in one hand. His hood was up, his face shadowed. That dark oval turned toward me as I stood in the doorway, feeling like a kid in my oversized robe.
“Lily, Cayden is going to be staying with us for a while,” Dad said and threw me a distracted smile, his gaze straying along the hall in the direction my mother had gone. “Honey, can you get Cayden a towel? It’s really coming down out there. Then take him to the spare room, and show him how to use the shower and all that. I have to talk to your mother before she goes back to sleep. Cade, see you at breakfast, seven o’clock sharp.”
Instructions given, Eric clapped Cayden on his soaking-wet shoulder and left the room. Being the high school coach, my father was used to being obeyed.
Cayden West was staying with us?
I was rigid with tension as I watched my father walk down the hall, leaving me alone with the boy who’d done nothing but threaten me since we’d first met.
“The towel, Bug.” Cayden’s deep voice jerked me from my horror.
“Fine, but it’s just because I don’t want you dripping on the floor,” I sniffed. I didn’t know why I bothered trying to come off as unaffected by him. His eyes told me he didn’t buy my cool girl act. His presence bothered me. I couldn’t hide it. The dream beat at my temples, and my face filled with an unpleasant itchy heat.
Not expecting an answer, I turned and headed for the linen cupboard. It was at the end of the laundry room, past the kitchen. Opening the door, I reached up and grabbed a couple of towels from the warm, lavender-scented space.
I spun around and immediately froze.
Cayden stood right behind me. He’d followed me, and damn closely, at that.
“You didn’t have to come, I’d have brought them to you,” I said, fighting the urge to fidget. God, this was so awkward. “Here,” I blurted and pushed the towels into his chest, escaping around the side of his body.
He had that gift of sucking the air out of the room with his presence. Reaching a far safer distance, I turned and leaned around the counter, watching our new guest. He looked at the towels for a long moment.
“You probably have to take off your hoodie to get dry. If you want, I can put it in the dryer right now,” I told him.
He was still for a long moment, and then he tossed the towels on the counter and reached for the bottom of his hoodie. When he yanked it up, his T-shirt came with it.
I didn’t consider myself a creep, not usually, but right now, nothing could stop me from staring at Cayden’s body. Okay, sometimes it was fun to go and watch hockey practice on the pretense of waiting for my dad, but usually, I wasn’t going just to stare at beautiful bodies.
Cayden’s T-shirt slid up his torso, revealing golden skin and the taut, tightly packed muscles on his abdomen. His long arms bulged with well-defined strength as he dropped them back down to his sides.
But my lust quickly morphed into concern when I noticed mottled purple marks on his torso. Fresh bruises. I gasped, my hand unconsciously moving toward them.
“Don’t.” His voice was like a whip. He grabbed my hand where it grazed his chest, yanking it into the air between us, gripping it tightly. “Don’t touch me.”
I swallowed hard, the serious look in his eyes freezing me to the spot. I couldn’t remember what I was supposed to be doing. Cayden had my hand up near his face, my fingers clutched in his. His blue eyes stared down at me, warning me away and drawing me in all at once.
No. I’m not going to be the girl who’s drawn to the broken boy. Nope. I’ve read that story, and it’s not going to happen.
“You’re the one touching me,” I muttered when he continued to hold my hand in a punishing grip.
The hard line of his mouth softened a fraction, and his chest suddenly expanded like he’d been holding his breath. I realized that I had, too, at the same moment, and gulped down some much-needed oxygen.
Cayden squeezed my fingers and made to let go, just as his nostrils flared. My hand was only inches from his face, and in a move that would forever haunt me, he brought my hand to his nose and inhaled.
Heat flooded my cheeks. Holy crap. I rarely bothered touching myself much, seeing as it never went anywhere. This was just my luck. The one night I’d ventured down there, and the very guy I’d dreamed about appeared and sniffed my goddamn fingers.
He couldn’t really smell anything, though, right? You’re being paranoid. Relax.
“W-what are you doing?” I stammered out. I was pretty sure my face couldn’t get any hotter at this point. A curse of being a natural redhead.
Cayden made a noise deep in his throat that was kind of like a growl. Goosebumps rose on my arms.
“The question, Bug, is what have you been doing?” he mocked quietly.
I snatched my hand from his and stepped back. “I haven’t been doing anything. I was sleeping. It’s three in the morning, in case you hadn’t realized.”
I was doing a great job of coming across like a prim schoolmarm. Cayden watched me with glittering eyes. His T-shirt had fallen back into place, hiding his obvious beating. I didn’t care. If he wanted to hide his injuries and be a martyr creeping around at night, I couldn’t have cared less – so long as it didn’t involve my family.
“Whatever you say. The dryer?” he prompted, somehow embarrassing me even further; he’d flustered me so much, I’d forgotten why we were standing there in the first place.
“Right, the dryer,” I muttered and reached out to snatch the hoodie from his hands. I stuffed his threadbare jacket into the dryer and turned it on. I needed to get the hell away from this guy before I embarrassed myself even more.
“I’ll show you to the spare room,” I said, trying to find something to do with my hands. I grabbed the remaining towel on the counter and started through the room. The house was quiet, but I knew my mom and dad had to be arguing somewhere inside. Clearly, my mom wasn’t happy about a student staying the night. Good. I knew I couldn’t take more than a night under the same roof as Cayden West without losing my mind.
“Here you go,” I said, entering the spare room and hitting the light switch. Warm light flooded the room. “It’s not much.”
“Yes, it is,” Cayden said, so quietly that I wasn’t sure I’d heard him right. He’d grabbed the trash bag as we’d passed the hall and now set it on the desk. Was it his clothes? Why would he have his clothes in a trash bag?
I felt his eyes on my face and realized that he had to know what I was thinking.
“Okay, so there’s a shower down the hall, get dried off and um, change, if you want.”
“Don’t worry about it, Bug. I’m sure I can make myself at home just fine.”
Cayden’s words sent annoyance sparking back over me.
I rolled my eyes at him, and he narrowed his in return.
“Whatever. I’m going to bed.”
“Yes, go. I’m sorry I interrupted your – sleeping – earlier.” He gave me a mocking smile and rested a long, thick arm above my head, leaning on the doorframe and making me feel tiny. “If you want some help getting a more satisfying sleep, let me know.”
His words sent my blood rushing back to my face, and a hot, squirmy feeling coiled in my belly.
“I don’t need your help, and I’d never let you touch me,” I started, flustered all over again. No one ever hit on me. It just didn’t happen.
Cayden chuckled, the bastard. “Bug, I don’t do charity. I simply meant I’d point you in the direction of a book or something from the library you can consult. Don’t get worked up.”
I scowled at him. “You’re such an asshole, you know that?”
“I’m well aware, and our earlier conversation remains true – don’t piss me off or you’ll regret it.”
I matched his violently nonchalant tone. “I don’t think I will, seeing as you clearly need to be on my father’s good side. In fact, you better not piss me off, or you’ll be the one regretting it.”
He glared down at me, tension thickening the air around us. A muscle worked in the strong column of his jaw. It was criminal how good the guy looked when he was threatening me. Totally unfair, really.
Then he grinned, and ice skated down my spine, chasing away the heat that had been there.
“Lillian… you don’t want to go toe to toe with me. You’re too smart for that. You don’t want to threaten me, Freckles, or go to battle against me. You really don’t. You won’t like the consequences.”
Freckles?
Somehow, in a reserve of strength I didn’t know I had, I summoned a smirk. “Oh really? With that kind of hype, I just know you’ll never live up to it. You don’t scare me, Cayden. Get that through your thick skull.”
He stared at me a moment longer, his blue eyes assessing. His head tilted slightly to the side. “We’ll see, I guess.”
He lifted his arm, no longer barring me from leaving. I backed away, never moving my eyes from his. He followed me out into the hall, leaning against his doorframe. He watched me open my door, and a smirk played around his lips.
“Is that your room? I guess we’re neighbors.”
His smirk only widened as my pulse quickened. It was cold and predatory, more of a threat than any words could be.
“Remember that and be a good girl.”
