Fix It Up: Torus Intercession Book Three, page 21
“No,” I assured him. “I’ll go back to Chicago, and if you want to call me when you get back to Santa Barbara, maybe we can––”
“No,” he told me. “You can either call your boss and quit Torus now, or tell him that I want you with me in Kentucky and he can bill me, but I think that seems a little like I’m paying him for your time while you sleep in my bed, and that seems a little hinky.”
“I’m sorry, what’d you just say?”
“I think it’s better to tell him you need to go on vacation until you figure out what you want to do.”
“I’m a fixer, for crissakes!” I told him. “I go where––”
“You’re only going where I am, and I don’t see what kind of fixer you can be when I’ll be tagging along, and I thought you wanted me to record my album. How am I supposed to do that if I’m gallivanting all over with you?”
“Gallivanting?”
He turned to look at my mother. “Am I not using that word right?”
“Oh no, darling, you’re using it correctly.”
He turned back to me. “Yeah, gallivanting,” he reiterated.
I threw up my hands.
“Your son is a bit of a pain in the ass,” he told her.
She snorted. “Oh, darling, I know.”
“You’re supposed to be on my side!” I accused her.
“Sweet boy, I’m always on your side.”
“You’re going to like the guys,” he told me, grinning. “And they’re going to be crazy about you.”
“Oh? And why is that?”
“Because I’ve scared them and let them down and put them through hell more times than I can count. They won’t believe it when they get a look at you.”
“What are you––”
“The fact that they agreed to do this with me, make the pilgrimage, keep backing me up instead of looking for new gigs, and basically trusting me to do right by them and not fuck up—again—is insane. They shouldn’t, you know? The bridge should be burned, but they still believe, and I’m very blessed.”
“Listen, honey, I––”
“Also,” he said, grinning at me. “For the record, if you really want me to take you seriously, even for a second, that you don’t want to be with me, then maybe you should try and purge the word honey from the list of endearments you use when you’re talking to me.”
Fuck.
Putting down my fork, I leaned forward and put my head in my hands.
My mother chuckling did nothing for my mood.
I called Jared after dinner and told him what was happening with Nick. For his part, he was pleased to hear about the trip to Kentucky.
“It sounds like it should be very healing for him.”
“I hope so,” I said solemnly.
“Well, just keep me in the loop and let me know when you’ll be back.”
“I’ll be back,” I assured him irritably.
“Okay,” he told me and left it alone.
Walking into my bedroom, I found Nick passed out on the side of the bed closest to the bathroom, farthest from the door, which was where I would have wanted him if I were going to let him stay. As it was, he needed to get up and go back to his room.
Climbing on the bed, I went to shake him, to get him moving, but I couldn’t help myself. The man looked really good lying there with all his gorgeous tan skin and relaxed muscles. His hair was short on the sides and in back, the top longer and sweeping across his forehead. I brushed his hair back and then traced a thumb over his beautiful, thick eyebrows.
“You’re touching me,” he mumbled, not opening his eyes.
I felt like I’d been caught shoplifting or something, and quickly moved my hand away.
He rumbled his displeasure. “You think if you don’t touch me, don’t initiate anything, don’t let your guard down that this will go away.”
“I do,” I assured him.
“And now you’re going to do what, go sleep in my old bed?”
“I’m thinking about it,” I admitted.
“I have a counterproposal.”
“Hit me,” I said, leaning close, sliding my hand down his back, savoring the definition and the satin feel of his skin.
“Admiring your handiwork?”
“What?” I asked, distracted as he eased closer to me.
“You made me strong, nobody else.”
“Marisol and Felix made you––”
“I only listened to them because it was what you wanted.”
“You’re giving me way too much credit for all your time and effort,” I said, leaning over to kiss his brow.
The purr of contentment was not to be missed.
“Shit,” I grumbled, leaning back, ready to roll away.
His hand on my face stopped me.
“Until we get back to Santa Barbara, I need you to pretend that you’re mine.”
I tried to laugh, or do anything at all, but my mouth was suddenly dry and there was a lump in my throat.
“Just,” he sighed, easing me down beside him, sliding his hand into my damp hair. “Be all in. Belong to me until we get home.”
“And when I go, you’ll stick with everything? You’ll drink only in moderation, stay drug-free, eat right, exercise, do everything you’re doing now?”
“I promise,” he said, and the hopeful smile I got as he stared at me made my heart hurt. “Is it a deal?”
I sighed deeply. “Okay.”
“Good,” he said, rolling to his side. “Now, kiss me like you want me.”
“Listen to me,” I said firmly, lying down, facing him. “This, us, physically—only a monk could say no to you.”
Slow, lazy grin.
“Maybe,” I amended, because the man was temptation incarnate.
“You want me bad.”
“Yeah, I do, so what? I don’t care if you know that,” I griped at him. “Every part of you is gorgeous, and of course I want you. I just don’t think it’s right for you to settle when you have the whole damn world at your feet.”
His gaze didn’t leave me.
“Do you understand?” I pressed him, slipping my hand around his neck and holding tight so he had to meet my gaze. “You’ve had some horrible shit happen to you, and now you’re in a brand-new place, and you’re clean and healthy and ready to start this amazing new chapter in your life,” I said, my eyes filling for whatever stupid reason as all my hopes for him swelled in my chest. “And I want the best, the very best man, or woman, or person you decide on, and I don’t want to be in the way when you cross paths with that particular human being. It would fuckin’ kill me to know that I kept you from your happily ever after.”
He nodded. “And it would break your heart if you fell madly in love with me and then I tossed you aside.”
I shrugged and nodded.
“I get that,” he agreed, scooting closer, slipping his hand over the curve of my hip. “I do, and the fact that you care about my happiness that much says everything about the kind of man you are. But really, Loc, if you think about it, a man who wants only the very best for me, isn’t that the exact person I need?”
“You’re not listening to me,” I said gruffly. “I’m you’re fixer, and as such, I––”
“I want the kissing now,” he said, cutting me off, taking my mouth, kissing me again, taking his time, exploring, rubbing his tongue lazily over mine, chewing on my bottom lip, and finally lifting up, which was when I realized I was flat on my back. “Did I hurt you in the garden?”
I shoved him off me and rolled to my side, not wanting him to see the blush I knew was there because I could feel the heat on my face. “No, you didn’t hurt me. Why the hell would you think you hurt me?”
“It was hard,” he said, spooning behind me, my ass pressed to his groin. “And I got lost a bit in the middle because having control of you, and knowing how powerful and strong you are, and just being inside of you I—it was a rush.”
“Well, you didn’t hurt me,” I husked, shivering when his hand slid down to the knot in the towel. “I would never let you hurt me.”
“That’s what I was counting on,” he said, his breath warm in my ear. “I’ve had other people in my bed, and I wanted to be…rough, but I was always afraid of hurting them. I didn’t want to do that; I didn’t want to make that mistake with you.”
“Of course,” I agreed, lifting up off the bed so he could pull away the towel that he’d loosened, swallowing hard, trying to calm my racing pulse.
“I’ve tied people up,” he said, and I heard the pop of a cap and knew he’d pulled lube from somewhere, perhaps under his pillow. “I grew up on a horse farm. I can tie a knot, right?”
“Sure,” I agreed, catching my breath as one lubed finger slid between my cheeks, and curled forward. Already my cock was hardening just imagining him back inside me.
“Guys who are bigger than me either don’t like to bottom, or they’re self-conscious about it, so they don’t.”
He added a second finger, and I pushed back against him and then slid off, back and forth, enjoying the slow, massaging breach.
“Don’t move,” he whispered, biting my shoulder gently as he pressed in deep, making undulating circles, scissoring his fingers at the same time. “Do you like to top?”
“Sometimes,” I said softly, my breath hitching as he pushed in as deep as he could, and I shivered in response. “Most guys expect it.”
“Because you’re all strength and power and muscle,” he said, his fingers quickly replaced by the wide head of his cock sliding between my cheeks, nudging my hole before his hand slipped around my thigh, gripping tight as he pushed into my body.
I arched my back, lifting my ass to take more of him, changing the angle to allow for a smoother entry as my muscles relaxed and stretched around him.
“If you want to hold me down,” he murmured, slipping his left hand around my cheek to turn my head toward him. “If you want to be inside me,” he said, easing back and then sinking into me, all the way, fully seated, his thighs plastered to mine. “I am all for that. I’m dying to feel you in me. It will be my pleasure,” he husked, his voice a guttural croak.
I squirmed on his cock, sliding forward and back until he took over the rhythm, and I moaned with the feeling of fullness.
“But Loc,” he choked out, “having you like this, in my hands, is heaven.”
“Nick,” I whispered before he kissed me.
He swallowed my moans, my pleas, ravaging my mouth as he shoved into my ass, the withdrawal and plunge a seamless glide before he pulled out, pushed me to my back, and scrambled to sit up. Shoving a pillow under my hips, he lifted my legs to his shoulders.
I moved my arm to cover my eyes, but he took hold of both my wrists and, curling over me, held them above my head as he thrust to my core.
His name came out in a roar.
“Look at me,” he ordered roughly, and his gaze, with those blown pupils, was locked on mine. “I want you to see me, see that you belong to me, and know what you’d be giving up if you walk away from me.”
“You––fuck,” I gasped as he thrust again, deeper, harder, his rhythm never faltering as he smiled down at me. “We agreed that––”
“And I’ll honor my word,” he said, his hands squeezing my wrists so tight, pressing them down into the mattress. “But that doesn’t mean I’m not going to do everything in my power to make you fall head over heels in love with me, because goddammit, Loc, you’re fuckin’ mine!”
My stomach clenched at his words, because fiercely spoken promises were my favorite. When you couldn’t even think beyond what you wanted—what was better than that?
“Grab your cock,” he demanded, releasing my numb wrists. “Do it now.”
But I grabbed hold of the rails on the headboard instead, and held on tight as he pistoned inside of me. “I don’t…need to.”
“You can come like this? With just me––”
“Yes!” I cried, arching up off the bed, needing to brace myself so he could give me the pounding I wanted.
Letting my legs slide from his shoulders and fall to his bent elbows, he caught me under my knees, bent me in half, my thighs splayed open, and drove down into me, savagely, relentlessly, pegging my gland as I chanted his name.
“Never letting you go,” he growled out as his hands closed on my biceps, and he gave me all that I needed.
I spurted over his abdomen as I came, all my muscles contracting at once, lost in the euphoria of an annihilating, consuming orgasm.
“Loc!” he shouted, frozen above me, unable to move as my clenching channel tightened around him like a fist. I took a breath and loosened enough for him to slide in the last bit, fully seated once more.
It took a few moments for me to get my breathing evened out, and to look around and remember where I was. For his part, he didn’t move, just stayed there, frozen, filling me up until I felt hot cum leaking from my hole.
My legs slid from his arms as he dropped down onto me, face buried in the pillow beside mine, lying between my thighs. I made sure to wrap him in my arms and stroke his back.
Finally, he stopped shaking, and even though I was lying in cum, sticky and wet, I didn’t care. He needed me. Taking care of your lover after the orgasm was as important as the act itself.
“We both need another shower,” he muttered. “And we should strip the bed.”
“In a minute,” I said gruffly, massaging the back of his head.
“I hope we didn’t wake up your mother.”
“You’re worried about that now?” I asked gently, playfully. “It’s a little late for regrets now, don’t you think?”
Low, filthy chuckle from him. “I can’t help it if you’re loud, baby.”
I let that slide because that was him, not me who was yelling, at least in my recollection. “Well, lucky for you, Sherri Barnes can sleep through a tornado, so I doubt she heard anything.”
“Which is good but not a pressing concern. You had all my focus.” Lifting to meet my gaze, he stared down into my eyes. “For the record, I’m telling you again. I will never let you go; do you understand? Never.”
But never was a very long time.
Thirteen
The Blue Grass Airport in Lexington was small. The plane parked on the tarmac, we got off, walked into the terminal and out the front doors, accompanied by the Netflix crew we’d met in Phoenix, headed up by the producer, Gabriella Nuñez. There was an all-black tour bus with tinted windows waiting for us at the curb.
I followed Nick onto the bus, and he was immediately grabbed by Jericho Horne, the band’s driver.
“Oh, man, you didn’t have to come,” Nick said, grinning at the older gray-haired man with the leather cowboy hat with gorgeous feathers in the band. “We’re just driving back and forth from here to my aunt’s place.”
He shook his head. “Whenever you’re all together, I’m driving. Period,” he told Nick, smiling wide. “Damn, Nicky, lookit you,” he said, sighing, smiling at the guy I was determined not to fall in love with.
In the airport in Phoenix he’d held my hand, refusing to let go even when we were swarmed with paparazzi taking a million pictures. Apparently, the ring on my finger was already trending on Twitter.
“Thank you for coming,” Nick said, opening his arms for another hug.
When he eased back, still smiling, he stepped sideways so the man who was built like a brick wall could see me. He was all thick muscles, barrel chested, with a buzz cut and a full beard.
“Rico, this is my partner, Locryn Barnes. Loc, this is Jericho Horne, who has been with us since we started.”
He thrust his hand out for me, and when I took it, he grasped my shoulder tight even as he pumped my arm. “It’s truly a pleasure,” he told me. “I’ve never seen him look so good, and that must be owed to you.”
“Nick worked very hard,” I assured him, taking a breath.
“No doubt,” Jericho agreed. “But he worked very hard before, and the time before that, and before that, but I don’t recall ever seein’ new muscle and clear eyes.”
I checked to see what Nick thought about the familiarity Jericho was giving me, but his smile was real, and his gaze on the older man was warm. Returning my focus to Jericho, he let my hand go and gave me a final clap on the shoulder.
“Since you’re in the fixin’ business there, Loc,” he said, shortening my name immediately, “maybe you could focus some of your attention on Flint.”
I turned to Nick, and he grimaced.
“And please, call me Rico.”
“Yessir,” I agreed.
“Come on,” Nick prodded me before he laced his fingers with mine and tugged me gently forward down the aisle between the wide leather seats.
“You should see our real bus,” he told me, turning to grin over his shoulder. “It is a tricked-out double-decker piece of art that Rico is super protective of.”
“Oh yeah?”
He nodded. “We took it out to Miami, Oklahoma, so the elders in Rico’s tribe could bless it. After that, God help us if we tried to bring drugs or alcohol even near the door. That was just not going to happen.”
I nodded. “So you let Rico make a rule like that?”
He turned to look at me over his shoulder. “He took us out there to receive the blessing because he feels like me and the guys are his to watch over, so yeah. We trashed a whole hell of a lot of hotel rooms, but not our bus. Never our bus.”
“Okay,” I said softly as we stopped in front of three guys lounging in three different seats. I had googled Nick’s band, of course, and knew who I was looking at, and was interested to see what kind of reception I would get.
“Loc, these are the guys,” Nick said, tipping his head at the three men, and then introduced them, pointing to each. “That’s Merce Scott, he’s on bass; Silas Alden, guitar; and Flint Burroughs, drums. Guys, this is my partner, Locryn Barnes.”
Silas stood, and I wasn’t sure what I saw on his face, but his hands were fisted at his sides, and his feet were braced apart as he took a breath before turning to his right and waving toward the back. A woman got up and came forward hesitantly, taking small steps, biting her bottom lip, brows furrowed as she moved.
