Total pages in book: 77
Estimated words: 72990 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 365(@200wpm)___ 292(@250wpm)___ 243(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 72990 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 365(@200wpm)___ 292(@250wpm)___ 243(@300wpm)
I’m as hungry as a horse, but I don’t want to inconvenience her. “I’ll have a beer if you have one?”
“Sure.” She pads into the kitchen and takes a bottle of Bud from the fridge.
“You want to take a shower?”
I nod, reaching out for the beer which she’s opened using her dad’s old bottle opener.
“You can use the bathroom between mine and Travis’s room.”
The last time I was there, we were exiting after bursting into Gabriella’s room. If Travis hadn’t asked us to rescue his porn collection, none of this would be happening right now. Funny, the things that can be put into motion with an innocent request for help.
“Okay.” I take a long swig of beer, grateful for the cool relief and the spread of it in my stomach.
“I’ll take you up.”
I follow Gabriella up the stairs, my eyes never leaving her peachy ass as it wiggles with every step. Damn, she’s filled out nicely. Curvy in all the right places. Long slender legs that I’m going to relish getting between.
As we get to the top, Travis’s door looms. Forgive me, I say internally, not wanting to think about what he’d think of me if he knew what I was about to do. The back of my neck feels hot, and I turn away, trying to brush off the guilt.
Gabriella’s room smells of flowery perfume and is perfectly tidy except for a spread of books and papers on her desk. Before I can take in my surroundings, she opens her closet and pulls out a large white towel. “You can use any products there,” she says.
“I won’t be long.”
“It’s fine,” she says, shrugging. “I’ll tidy up.”
There doesn’t seem much out of place, but whatever. If Gabriella likes her room Stepford-Wife clean, that’s her business.
I make my way into the shared bathroom, looking around at the familiar space, finding it smaller than I remember. I’ve lost count of the number of times I’ve messed around in this bathroom. Mostly, after getting dirty in the yard, and before Darleen fed us with something delicious. Sometimes, we’d splash each other with water, and make a mess that poor Darleen must have cleaned up. For sleepovers, we’d clean our teeth, all four of us in a row. Sometimes five if Gabriella wanted to join in and Travis didn’t tell her to get lost.
Those were fun times.
I undress and step into the shower, letting the warm water wash away the stresses of the day, and find a bottle of something that smells fruity and scrub myself clean. I think about Gabriella in this shower, naked, her wet hair trailing over her body, her long legs stretching to places I’ve only been lucky enough to get a glimpse of. My cock thickens under my palm, the piercing at the top sliding between my fingers. Is she going to like it or worry about it? It can go either way.
Well, until it does its job. Then she’s going to love it.
I don’t linger under the water, knowing I have something way more important waiting for me on the other side of the door. There’s no point in getting dressed either. I just wrap the towel around my waist and saunter out, knowing the ink I’ve covered my body with since we were kids is going to make an impact.
It does. Gabriella’s lips part and she stands slowly. “Shit, Blake.” When she’s close enough to touch me, she lets her fingers trail the black lines of the tattoos I’ve designed; across my chest, over my shoulder, down my arm and up my neck.
“They’re beautiful,” she whispers, her pretty eyes flicking to meet mine. “It must have hurt.”
“Nothing worth having comes without pain,” I tell her. She bites her bottom lip, thinking through my words.
“There are many different types of pain.”
She’s right. There are. But all of them need to be processed or they scar over, leaving trauma behind.
“I promise I’ll only inflict the good kind.” I grin, touching her face, the softness of her skin making me sigh. I’ve touched her cheek like this once before, when we camped out in our backyard and Gabriella fell asleep next to me. We were young, but I remember the rush of protective feelings I had for her. I remember the way her beauty made my heart ache.
“I’ll hold you to that,” she says. Seconds tick past, the air lingering between us feeling thick and paralyzing. I want to kiss her so badly but to do it, I feel like I need to climb a mountain. This is little Gabriella, the girl who always wanted me to play with her Barbies, the girl who’d tag along to play war games, even though I could tell she hated them. She just wanted to be a part of the fun, a part of our group.