SWNOVELS Weak Side : Chapter 38
She was devastating.
I was stuck in the entryway with an entire party occurring around me as I watched her descend down the stairs after her best friend. The only thing I could see was her toned leg slipping out from behind her dress and those icy eyes set on me like I was the only guy in the room.
The universe was aligned when she entered the world, and I would be a damn fool if I ever let her out of my grasp. I’d already proven to myself that I’d fallen for her, but I still felt like I needed to prove it to her. The only thing stopping me was a recent truth that was spitting fire in the back of my head every time I thought of her.
After learning what Tom had told me, I could hardly look Claire in the face without spilling every last detail, but I knew that a few hours after getting a concussion wasn’t the best time, so instead, I held onto the truth and avoided her.
And now, here I was, holding my hand out to her in the middle of a fucking sorority party, wanting to do nothing but live in the moment and see her smile instead of watch her world get flipped on its side by a man who had the power to grant me my future but potentially break all of the trust Claire and I had formed together.
Either way I looked at it, I had been put in a shitty position—tell Claire what I’d learned or wait until Tom showed up and we’d tell her together. I had no idea what to do, but all I wanted to do right now was pull her in close and press my lips to hers.
Her soft hand fell to mine, and still, it felt like it was just the two of us in the room. There was chatter around us, and everyone was staring, but the only thing I focused on was her.
“Hey,” she whispered, taking a step closer to me.
I tugged her in closer and wrapped my hand around her waist. “Hey,” I breathed down into her space. Damn, she was like a fucking drug. “I miss you.”
Her mouth opened slightly from the truth spilling from mine. “You do?”
I nodded, moving my hand from her waist and cupping the side of her face. “Can I kiss you?”
“Since when do you ask?” She grinned, but I didn’t have it in me to smile. Instead, I bounced my eyes back and forth between hers and dipped down, pressing a soft kiss against her mouth. Since the beginning, our touches and kisses had been to fool other people and were fueled by none other than desire and lust. But this moment was different.
This was intimate, and she felt it. She pulled back and paused for a split second before grabbing onto my hand and dragging me toward the stairs.
“Where are we going?” I asked.
“Upstairs.”
We were all but running by the end, and I almost stopped so I could pick her up because I knew that her ankle was still bruised from her fall. I lifted the covers this morning while she was sleeping and cursed at the blue bruise before I ran to the rink to continue the extra conditioning ordered by Coach.
“Bryant, slow it down,” I said, out of breath. Not from physical exertion, though, more so because that was just what she did to me.
Her devilish grin peered over her shoulder, and if I wasn’t already a goner, I would be by the look in her eye. The door slammed behind me, and although the only light throughout the random bedroom was from the moon shining a glow through the window, I could see every last inch of her.
I leaned against the door as she stood in front of me. Time seemed to slow as silence settled around us, and I hesitantly reached my hands out in front of me. My fingers slipped underneath the black disguise, and I pulled it up and over her head, dropping it to the floor beside us. My heart did a triple-take, and a swallow got lodged in my throat.
Claire did the same to me, slipping her delicate fingers underneath the mask and reaching up on her tiptoes to pull the rest of it over my head. She dropped it right beside hers, and I pulled her in close, gripping her tightly because I was afraid that, sooner or later, she’d slip right through my fingers.
“What are you doing?” I pressed, half afraid to know the answer.
Her light and airy tone calmed me almost instantly. “Showing you how I really feel about you.”
My heart came to life at the sight of her timid smile. It could have been the end of the world, and I would have been perfectly content, standing here with her body in my hands.
Claire took a step back from me, and silence came between us, but that was what was special about the two of us. We didn’t need words. All it took was one look.
Her hand moved to her shoulder, and the thin strap that held the dress up slipped down her arm, and I gulped, watching her undress. “Claire,” I croaked. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. “Wait.”
“No.” A deep breath left her. “I know we need to talk, Theo. But let’s just live in the now. We can talk after.”
I clenched my teeth and fell for her pretty words because I’d rather die than deprive her of what she wanted.
My hands fell to the pockets of my suit pants, and I tipped my chin, watching her accept my silence for what it was. The tiniest smile caught my eye, but I quickly moved to her hand as she reached over and delicately shoved the other strap of her dress off her shoulder, showing off the top of her bare chest.
Temptation is a bitch.
“Spin,” I demanded, pushing myself off the door and eyeing the zipper on the back of her dress. The sound fueled my desire like gasoline on a fire. I let my finger trail down her spine as I unzipped the dress, letting it fall to her hips. I took a step back, and rested against the door again, placing my hands back in my pockets. Fuck.
She spun back around, pushing her hair over her shoulder and giving me a full view of her naked chest. My mouth watered, and although I wanted to stand there and watch her undress, I had to do something with my hands or I was going to lose all control. So, just as she was tugging the dress past her hips, I shrugged off my suit jacket and kept my eyes trained to hers as I slowly began unbuttoning my white shirt.
Claire stood in front of me with nothing on but a pair of panties, and I fought the urge to pounce on her. Instead, I shoved my white shirt off my shoulders and let it fall to the ground behind me before moving my hands to my belt. Claire’s nipples tightened at the clanking sound, and before I knew it, she had shoved my hands away and finished the job, pushing my pants down and then my boxers.
She gasped when she saw that I was already hard, and I threw my head back when her hand gripped me tightly. It felt good. It felt better than most, and that was simply because it was her.
I palmed her waist and picked her up, carrying her over to the bed. Instead of throwing her on it and ravishing her body like I wanted, I slowly sat down with her straddling me and peered up at her sweet face as her brown locks surrounded us like a veil.
I wanted to say I love you, but I didn’t because it didn’t feel right after knowing what I knew and hiding it from her. So instead, I would show her.
“You’re perfect,” I whispered, peeling her panties down her legs as she lifted up. We were skin on skin. Bare. Just the way I wanted it.
“So are you.” Claire sat back down on my lap, and my blood ran hot. Her mouth fell to mine, and the kiss was soft and slow with meaning behind it that I couldn’t put into words.
Neither one of us said anything else.
Our mouths moved against each other like it was the most natural thing in the world. My tongue dipped inside, and hers did too. I kissed the side of her neck as she hovered over me, and when she sunk down, I swore I touched heaven.
We were in a slow frenzy. Havoc was occurring on the inside, but we weren’t chaotic or rushed. There was no uncertainty or confusion. We both knew that we were in the right place, tangled in one another while putting a pause on everything else.
“Theo,” Claire buried her head into the crook of my sweaty neck, and my hand fell to her lower back before I spun her around and laid her down flat. I pushed farther inside of her, my movements slow and steady as I stared down at the euphoric glaze in her eyes. They fluttered closed, and I looked down, watching how perfectly we fit together.
I pulled out of her, slick with her wetness, before plunging back into her and catching her gasps with my mouth. “God,” I whispered, moving quicker as I felt her winding up against me. She met me halfway. “The feeling you give me is addicting.” The second I hit her sweet spot, she threw her head back and set my world on its side as she came all over my dick.
God. Damn.
I pulled out a moment later and came on her stomach, capturing the hottest visual of my life and saving it for the end of time. I could be ninety years old and still get hard picturing her fully fucked with red cheeks and my come all over her stomach.
“Are you thinking what I’m thinking?” I asked after cleaning her up and catching our breath. I began to slip the dress back over the curves of her body, wanting nothing more than to palm her ass again.
Claire peered up at me with her gentle smile. The party was in full swing. It wasn’t loud or frenzied like the parties at the football house, but I would rather be anywhere than where we were now. “It depends. What are you thinking?”
I burned with hope, and it was the strangest feeling not being as confident with Claire as I had been when we first met. There was an inkling that I was going to lose her at some point, and I wasn’t sure I’d survive the loss. Maybe it was because the entire premise of our relationship was fake. Regardless, the fear of letting her slip right through my fingers was damn near paralyzing.
“I’m thinking your concussion is giving you a headache.” I winked. “And I must take you back to the dorms immediately.”
An instant smile split across her face, and I latched onto her bright teeth and swollen lips. I cocked an eyebrow, silently asking if she agreed.
Claire nodded slowly. “The dorm with you sounds like a way better place to be.”
Damn straight, baby.
As we crept down the stairs, I kept my eye on the door and nowhere else. I didn’t want to see Aasher or Ford and their suggestive faces. I didn’t want Taytum rushing over to pull Claire away. All I wanted was to take my girl back to the dorms and be with her for the rest of the night.
I’d been avoiding her, and I wasn’t lying when I said I missed her.
And I knew we needed to talk. We really needed to talk, especially after what just happened upstairs because that, my friends, wasn’t just a fuck.
“And where are you two going?” Taytum slipped right in front of the door as my hand reached out to open it. Damnit.
“Um…” Claire nibbled on her lip, and I quickly swiped my thumb over it. The plopping noise went straight to my dick despite that it was just inside of her.
“Claire has a headache,” I said, lying straight through my teeth. Taytum half-rolled her eyes, but I saw the hint of a smile.
“Oh, I’m sure she does,” she joked, pulling Claire in for a swift hug. I didn’t let go of her hand, though, because I was beginning to see that I was selfish when it came to her. I squinted when I watched Taytum whisper something into Claire’s ear, causing her to nod sharply.
“Ready?” I asked, tipping my chin in a lazy goodbye to the rest of the hockey players. I skimmed the party for a quick moment, and I stopped with one foot out the door as I landed on someone who was leaning against the far wall with a red cup in their hand.
There was a girl draped against his side like some cheap, drunken date, but his sight was on me, and then it moved down to my hand in Claire’s.
“Theo?” Claire looked up at me and then over to where I was unmistakably glaring. Her hand tightened in mine, but to my surprise, she pulled me out the door and put her back to Chad.
I poked her with a question that I wasn’t sure I wanted the answer to but needed to hear directly from the source. “We’re no longer making him jealous?” I asked, opening the door to my car and ushering her inside. There was a slight worry embedded in between her eyebrows, but her eyes were as stern and true as ever when she shook her head.
“No, and it was never about that to begin with.” Her door shut, and I knew that when we got back to our room, we were going to have to talk.