Bad For You (Rocktown Ink Book 4) Page 15

  I gripped her lush ass and held her to me, heart racing so damn fast. “It will always be just you and me, Lila, I promise you that. And when we’re together, I want you to feel powerful and sexy and alive. Sex is about making each other feel good. You tell me what you want from me, and I’ll give it to you, always. Nothing is wrong. Not between us. Nothing.”

  Her cheeks darkened and she rubbed her lips across mine. “I love it when you hold me tight, when you dig your fingers in so I still feel them there even when they’ve moved to another part of my body.”

  I squeezed her ass, making her gasp and my cock throbbed. “What else?”

  “I love the way you kiss me, like you can’t get enough of me. No one’s ever kissed me like you do.”

  “Because I can’t get enough,” I rasped. “What else?”

  “I love it when you lose control, when I have you deep in my mouth and you can’t stop yourself from thrusting deeper. You treat me like I am just any other girl.”

  My heart was racing and my cock was close to punching through my jeans. I wanted this girl so much that my voice shook when I could finally form words. “You’re wrong. I will never treat you like any other girl, Lila, because I’ve never felt about any other girl the way I feel about you, not even close.” I cupped her face, holding her close, our lips almost brushing. “And you don’t have to worry about me suddenly holding back from you, Bambi, because that’s impossible. I have no control around you. None. When I’m inside you I lose my damn mind, and I can’t hold back. That’s an impossibility. And just being in the same room as you…Lila, you make me so hard, so primed to fuck, I can’t think straight.”

  “Jesse,” she whispered, her hips shifting restlessly against mine, her panted breaths hot and sweet against my lips. “I need that. Please, give it to me.”

  “You want me inside you, Bambi?”

  “Yes.”

  My mouth was on hers a moment later in a dirty, hot kiss that was deep and wet and definitely out of control. I gripped the bottom of her shirt and tugged it off, tossing it aside. I had her bra undone two seconds later. I pulled away from the hottest kiss of my life so I could look at her gorgeous tits.

  Her nipples tightened under my gaze, and I took their fullness into my hands and squeezed, loving Lila’s little gasp.

  The tight buds were hard against my palms as I played with them, pressing them together, scooting down on the couch while tugging her higher so I could get my mouth on them.

  “Hey, girls,” I muttered and slid my thumbs over her hard, little nips, watching goose bumps lift all over her creamy skin. “I know you missed me, but tonight we’re gonna get reacquainted.”

  Lila laughed huskily. “Are you talking to my boobs?”

  I glanced up at her. “Shhh, they like it.” My gaze went back to her sexy tits and I pinched and teased the right one. Lila moaned. Christ, she was hot. “The other side’s getting jealous, think I should kiss it better?”

  “Yes,” Lila said, her movements growing agitated, her breath shaking out of her. “Definitely kiss it.”

  With a groan, I tugged her forward and sucked her into my mouth. Fuck me. How was it that everything was so much better with Lila?

  I stood and strode through the living room, into her bedroom, with her wrapped around me.

  “I missed you,” she whispered. “So much.”

  Getting back to her had been the only thing I’d cared about, and I planned to fuck her until she forgot everyone who hurt her, until she couldn’t think, only feel.

  Until she could only see me.

  Chapter Eighteen

  Lila

  “How are things going with you and Riff?”

  I glanced at Eves as I dismounted from Asher, one of the horses she’d been working with, and grinned. After our talk, when I’d told Jesse about Jarod and my parents, things between us were better than ever. I could honestly say the last week had been the best of my life.

  “I’ll assume that cheesy grin means things are going good?” Eves smiled as well, but there was concern in my best friend’s eyes.

  “You have nothing to worry about. In fact, things are kind of amazing.”

  Eves undid her saddle and I did the same. “I’m so glad, Ly. I’m also pretty happy he pulled his head out of his butt. I don’t ever want to see you hurt like that again.”

  I slid the saddle off Asher, and Eves and I carried them into the barn to put away. “He was trying to protect me.”

  “I can see that.” She smirked and nudged me with her elbow. “Now that you’re with a big, bad biker, we’ll have to go shopping. You’ll need appropriate biker-babe attire.”

  I laughed. “I’m not sure I make a good biker babe, though I do love riding with him.” I more than loved it. Unfortunately, we wouldn’t be riding again for a while, not until after winter.

  “Yeah, I love it, too,” Eves said wistfully. “Bring on summer.”

  After brushing down the horses, we headed up to the main house. Eves loved working on Cassy and Cal’s ranch and had lived here for a while before she and Dane finally got together.

  Cassy was excited to see us, she’d been stuck at home struggling with morning sickness, though really it was all-day sickness. She was more than happy for our company. We chatted for a couple of hours, and I helped Eves chop veggies since she was making a family dinner for her and Dane, Cassy and Cal and their little boy, Jack.

  “Why don’t you stay for dinner?” Eves asked as she poured the marinade she’d just made over chicken thighs.

  “Maybe another time. I’m meeting Jesse at Rocktown Ink, then we’re getting takeout.”

  Eves gave me a knowing smile, and we both burst out laughing.

  Cassy walked in scowling. “Hey, no laughing without me. What am I missing?”

  Eves filled her in, embellishing the details of the night Jesse and I had planned until we were laughing so hard I had tears rolling down my face.

  Half an hour later, I was in my car, heading back up Cassy’s long, winding driveway toward the main road.

  My parents’ ranch was right beside Cal and Cassy’s, which was how I’d met Eves. My belly gripped tight. I hadn’t been home in months. I missed my horse, Molly, so bad it hurt. I hadn’t seen her or Mavis the family cat—or my parents in all that time, either.

  And weirdly, I wasn’t at all surprised when I spotted a familiar blue Ford pickup parked at the top of the driveway. My mother sat behind the wheel, waiting for me. I’d expected it, hadn’t I? People talked out here. Someone would have seen me drive through town and reported back to her.

  My heart kicked behind my ribs. I wanted to keep on driving. I wanted to pretend I hadn’t seen her and speed all the way home to Jesse. But I couldn’t do that. She was still my mother. If we could find a way to work through this, I had to try.

  I parked behind the truck, bracing for what would come next, and climbed out.

  She was walking toward me, face twisted in anger before I’d even shut my door.

  “Hi, Mom.”

  “Don’t you dare ‘hi mom’ me. I spoke to Jarod, he told me everything,” she said, vibrating with rage.

  My heart hurt looking at the disdain in her eyes. “And what exactly did Jarod tell you?”

  “That you’re spending time with a biker. A thug. That he saw you kissing on the street like a common whore.”

  I jerked back like she’d struck me. Another shot to the heart. Though, why was I surprised? It wasn’t the first time she’d called me that.

  Why was I letting her do this? I couldn’t let this go on anymore. In the past, I would have shrunk under her rage, I would have apologized and made excuses. No more. I had nothing to apologize for.

  Pain and anger fired through me so fiercely my hands shook. I curled my fingers into fists to hide it from her. “The information your spy gathered is correct. Yes, my boyfriend, Jesse, is a biker. He’s also a tattoo artist, an extremely talented one. He’s one of the best men I’ve ever known, and he care
s a great deal about me. We care about each other.”

  “He’s using you, you stupid girl.”

  “No, he’s not.”

  “He only wants one thing from you, and I bet you’ve given it to him, haven’t you?” The abhorrence on her face made me feel about two feet tall.

  I didn’t answer.

  Her face darkened. “You’re just like your sister.”

  The vehement way she said it made me flinch.

  “I tried, I really tried, but you defied me at every turn, wanted to be like her…a damned slut.”

  “Her name is Kate.”

  “We don’t speak her name, and if you carry on as you are, we won’t speak yours, either.”

  Anger crashed down on me, and I locked gazes with her, something I rarely did. “When Jarod was telling tales on me, did he happen to mention that he tried to force me to sleep with him?”

  She froze. “You’re lying. He would never do that.”

  I crossed my arms, needing a barrier between us before I grabbed her shoulders and shook the hell out of her. “Do you think we only held hands when we were dating?”

  She flushed and opened her mouth to fire more poison at me, but I talked right over her.

  “Let me guess, that’s my fault as well?” I laughed humorlessly. “Your wonderful Jarod took my virginity, then blamed me for tempting him.”

  “He would never do that, not unless you…”

  “Stop,” I yelled.

  Her eyes widened, shocked into silence for the first time in her life.

  I took a step toward her. “Don’t you dare put that on me. Don’t you dare. There were two of us there. And if I’m like Kate, I’m thankful. She’s an awesome mom, a loving wife, and a supportive sister. She loves her daughter unconditionally, unlike you. The fact that you care more about what other people think than your own children, that you would rather believe Jarod than me, says more about you than me or Kate.” I held her gaze even as my heart split wide open. “If you can’t see that, we’re both better off without you.”

  It was her turn to flinch, but there was no backing down, it was there in the hard lines of her face.

  I was done. So done. There was nothing else to say. She wasn’t going to listen anyway. I turned my back on her and walked to my car.

  “You’re not welcome at the ranch,” she said. “Don’t contact me or your father until you can show us you’ve changed.”

  I turned back to her. “I have changed, for the better. And you won’t be seeing or hearing from me again.”

  Then I climbed in my car and drove away.

  I didn’t remember driving the thirty minutes home. One minute I was getting back in my car, the next I was outside Rocktown Ink.

  I pushed the door open and walked into the shop.

  The little bell above the door jingled.

  No one was behind the main desk and music played through the speakers around the room—not as loud as usual—but all I could hear were my mother’s hateful words.

  Jesse walked out of the room where he created his beautiful tattoos and smiled when he saw me. “Perfect timing. Just cleaned up after my last client.” He swaggered toward me, like he always did. It was sexy and confident and made me want to kiss him. I always wanted to kiss him.

  He pulled me into his arms and gave me what I wanted, what I needed. He kissed me like only Jesse could, like some medieval warrior back from war.

  I clutched him to me, kissing him back almost desperately. He hauled me up into his arms and set me on the counter, filling the space between my spread thighs, and gave it back to me just as urgently.

  He kissed me until I was dizzy, then he lifted his head and grinned. “Hey, beautiful.” Then his chin jerked back, eyes widening. “What happened? Why the fuck are you crying?” He growled like a feral animal. “Did that fucker Jarod hurt you? I’m going to kill him.” His gaze sliced to the door, like he was about to take off, like he was already committing murder in his head.

  I cupped his jaw and made him look at me. “No, it wasn’t Jarod, not entirely.”

  “Lila…”

  “My mother,” I whispered, the pain choking me. “She was there when I left Cassy’s. Waiting for me. Jarod told her about you and me, that he saw us kissing. She called me a slut and a whore. Told me I’d disgraced the family, and I…I didn’t hold back. I told her about Jarod, all of it, what he tried to do. She blamed me, of course, and she cut me out of her life, like I’m a bit of rot. Like she did Kate.” I broke down then, tears running free.

  Jesse held me tightly.

  “I know it hurts, Lila, but you’re better off without her poison in your life. I know that better than you think.” He pulled back so I could see his face. “You still have me. You have your friends. You have Kate. And we’re not going anywhere, ever,” he said with so much feeling behind his words, he shook.

  “Thank you.”

  He wiped the tears from my eyes. “Don’t need to thank me. Having you in my life is the best thing that’s ever happened to me. If she can’t see how amazing you are, that’s her loss.”

  “You really mean that?” I said, gripping him tighter, fighting more tears.

  “Yeah, I fucking mean it.”

  We stared at each other for several long moments, and I gave him a shaky smile. The look in his eyes was intense, so intense my heart raced and I was close to blurting out how much I loved him.

  “I’ve always wanted a tattoo; did you know that?” I said to break the tension.

  His mouth kicked up on one side. “Yeah? What would you get?”

  “Kate and I have always talked about each getting a bird…well, a black-throated blue warbler in flight to be precise. We rescued one once, but it stayed for a long time after we released it, let us feed it. After it finally left, when things started getting tough at home, we started a secret group, just me and Kate…the Blue Warblers.”

  Jesse chuckled.

  I laughed as well. “Hey, we were little.”

  “I think it’s cute,” he said, eyes warm and sexy.

  “We used to pretend we were birds, that we could fly away, too.”

  His gaze grew intense again.

  “Anyway, we thought it would be a cool sister tattoo, something that has meaning to just us—togetherness, freedom. Is that silly?”

  “Nope.” He tucked my hair behind my ear. “Let’s do it.”

  “What?”

  “Let’s ink you up, Bambi. We can do Kate’s next week if she’s still game.”

  “You’re serious?”

  “Why not? What’s stopping you?” he said, that sexy grin front and center, daring me to do it.

  “Okay.”

  His grin widened, heart-stoppingly gorgeous, then he lifted me off the counter and carried me to the room he used and set me on a table.

  He rested his hands on my thighs. “Where do you want it?”

  That sounded kind of dirty and my lady parts perked up. But instead of jumping him, I held out my arm and touched the inside of my forearm. “Here.”

  He took my arm, leaned in, and kissed the sensitive skin there. “Perfect.”

  I sat nervous as he got things ready. “Is it going to hurt?”

  “Yeah, it can hurt, but nothing you can’t handle. Have you seen me? I’m a fucking baby, if it was that bad, you think I’d look like this?”

  I giggled, giddy and excited and nervous all at once. He was just trying to make me feel better. Jesse was not a baby, he was a badass, and if he thought I could handle it, then I believed I could as well.

  Twenty minutes later I was looking down at my forearm, at the little blue, black, and white bird Jesse had tattooed on my skin, wings extended, taking flight.

  It was awesome. “I love it, so much.”

  “Glad to hear it. It looks cool,” Jesse said as he smeared some kind of ointment over it, then covered it with gauze. “You can take that off in a few hours.”

  “I can’t wait to show Eves.” I gave Jesse I wide-e
yed look. “Trix is gonna be pissed, though. She’s been trying to get her hands on my ‘virgin skin’ for ages.”

  “Too bad, it’s mine,” he said gruffly and kissed me.

  “Thank you,” I said against his lips. “You always make me feel better.”

  “That’s my job, Bambi.”

  The way he said that made me shiver, in a good way. A really good way.

  “And I always make you horny as well, yes?” he said, a goofy, hopeful expression on his face.

  And then he had me laughing again. “I’m a horny mess ninety-nine percent of my day,” I said between giggles.

  He made a tutting sound. “Only ninety-nine? Looks like I need to up my game.”

  His big hands squeezed my thighs and I sucked in a sharp breath. “Your game is just fine.”

  “You ever been fingered in a tattoo parlor before, Lila?” he asked casually.

  My breath caught in my throat. “Can’t say that I have, Jesse.” I would have squeezed my thighs together if he hadn’t been standing between them.

  “Well, that’s a crying shame.” He snapped open the button of my jeans. “I think we should remedy that, don’t you?”

  I nodded. How did he do this to me? Make me crave him in an instant, so badly I hurt.

  He undid my zipper and I gripped his biceps as his hand slid down the front of my underwear.

  I gasped and Jesse hissed.

  “Love how wet you always are for me,” he said roughly.

  He toyed with my clit and I moaned helplessly, my fingers biting into his muscles harder.

  “Right, change of plans. Have you ever been fucked from behind over a table in a tattoo parlor, Lila?”

  I shook my head, half laughing, half panting while trying to angle my hips for more of his touch at the same time. He removed his hand and lifted me before I realized what was happening, then he spun me so I was facing away from him and bent me over the padded massage-style table I’d just been sitting on. My jeans and panties were tugged down next and Jesse moved up behind me.