pretty pretty
His hand slips between my legs, the warmth of his palm heating my flesh to the bone. His knuckles are bleeding. Red smearing as my skirt settles over his wrist, hiding the reaching fingers and staining the pink fabric ever so slightly.
He’s kneeling before me, cheeks flushed. There is frosty rage in his eyes. A vulgarity simmering beneath the ice.
When his other hand presses on my stomach, I let myself fall backward onto his bed. I can feel his breath on my legs, a tapping on my knees that has them spreading further. I don’t know if either of us are particularly aroused. But the longer the game goes, the more pliable I find myself to his every touch.
He’s stiff. His shoulders are a tense line.
Freshly shaven. Pink lips forming a gentle frown as he sucks in a long breath and drops closer to me. Guiding my legs, large hands slipping under my thighs and sliding up and up.
My shirt is discarded already. Hanging precariously off the back of his desk chair. He’s fully dressed. His jeans straining against the muscle of his legs as he kneels. The sleeves of his shirt rolled to sharp points at his elbows.
“You didn’t start it, did you?” Asking the question that’s been lingering between us. Propping myself up, elbows sinking into the mattress. The dark blue landscape of his room is cool and professional. No more personality to it than a hotel room.
Eli doesn’t meet my eyes. His raging vision locked between my legs.
He flicks my skirt up. Cold air has the instinct to slam my legs together rising. I don’t. Letting them hang lazily, feet now resting on his shoulders.
Kicking him lightly, toes stabbing into the muscle of his shoulder and neck, “Eli?”
“I didn’t start anything.” Gruff. His voice is smooth and low. But anger is harshing the edges.
“He’s the only one that really likes you, you know?” Pushing. His jaw is clenched, making the blossoming bruise that much more obvious.
He rocks back, “Your family needs to understand that my patience only goes so far.”
One hard hit to his jaw. That’s it. Barely touched. My brother looked rough, violated. The pictures on my phone were sent alongside long paragraphs from my mother. Edwin is only two years younger than me, but we have our mother’s genes for delicate features and small statures. We both have to crane our necks to look Eli in the eyes. Never a fair fight.
“He’s just a kid,” Sighing it out as I lay myself flat. The comforter crinkles under my weight. Sinking in.
“He’s twenty two, El.” Almost a snarl, “He’s grown and he should know better.”
I can picture my mother’s tsking in my ear, “Violent men, Elodie. You’re gambling with a lot getting involved with violent men.”
He’s fuming now. Scarlet cheeked with red tipped ears. But his hands are back on my legs, his breath back to hitting my skin on each exhale.
“Edwin feels like a kid to me,” Rolling my eyes, knowing he can’t see it, “He’s young and dumb. Don’t let him get under your skin.”
Troubled.
The guaranteed word for the youngest son, the baby boy. Always something to say. Always ready for a fight.
Nails drag, scratching over the surface of my hips. He hums in the back of his throat, noncommittal. Going quiet, feeling that familiar coiling in my gut.
“I missed you today, I was thinking about you all morning.” He throws out my concerns, but knows exactly what I like to hear. Steering my attention back to his broad shoulders and practiced fingers, “Did you miss me?”
I’m so lonely without him.
“You know I did.”
My skirt is pulled off, socks tossed aside.
There is a familiar ache of wanting, needing. Unwavering and imprecise. I want hands on me. A grip so tight fingerprints are left behind. I need the world to know that someone wants me.
“Tell me I’m pretty,” Sighing out the plea as he hooks his fingers in the band of my panties and pulls them up and off.
“You’re beautiful.” A kiss to my knee, inner thigh. Muscles flexing. Resisting the urge to grab fistfuls of his hair and bury his face against me. Ankles wanting to lock around him, trap him.
The sex means little to nothing for me. Orgasms are something I reach for until exhaustion hits and I admit defeat. Never quite there. Even alone. But his attention, him wanting me, is more than enough. I can feel myself getting wetter, hotter with anticipation.
Our conversation dulling in my mind. No sobbing mother or bleeding brother. Just me and a boy who thinks I’m pretty enough to touch.
“I said pretty.” The correction has an upward tilt as his head dips and his tongue sweeps with steady pressure.
“You’re so pretty, Elodie.” Muffled, on his knees and ready to worship, “You’re so pretty.”
I let myself fade into him. Slinking into the furthest corner of my mind to watch the way he sinks his teeth into me and feasts. Dazed. There is something about beautiful men that makes my chest ache. A need to own them, to give myself over to them.
He takes his time. A lover. Waiting until I fake my way through a first orgasm before he climbs up my body. His effort feels nice, knowing he wants me to always have more than him. Moving up to kiss me and let me taste myself on him.
Tongue parting my lips. Wrapping my arms around his shoulders, hands sliding over his neck and through his hair. Pulling his weight down. He flattens himself against me as my legs fall wide to accommodate the width of him.
The heat of him is addicting.
He lets my hands wander. No resistance when I slip them along the edge of his shirt and tug sharply, my silent request. His muscles stretch and flex tight as he lifts himself enough for me to clumsily pull it off.
His discipline leaves me breathless no matter how many times I see him striped down. Rigid in his routines. He’s the type of man who knows the only way to keep birthrights is through proven effort. Life can be brutal.
Teeth grazing over his neck, sucking the skin to leave behind my claim on such a sacred spot. He’s not mine in the ways that matter, but I can sink my nails into him and pretend with ease.
A soft moan tumbling past his lips. Slipping my hand down his chest, reaching for the button of his jeans.
He stills, tilting his head. There’s a faint echo of someone pounding on his front door. Heavy hands landing solidly. It’s not enough to distract me from my prize.
Coaxing him back into me. Hands roaming over the hot flesh of his back.
He dips his head, lips skimming over my own, “I should get that.”
“Ignore them,” They’ll leave. It’s that simple.
When he pecks me like it’s a goodbye, I stretch forward. Chasing after him. Hands cupping the back of his neck.
He laughs. The rage is a soft flame in the back of his eyes, no longer the forefront emotion, “I’m sure it’ll just take a minute. We’ll be back at it soon.”
I feel like I’m curling into nothing, balling up into something that can be discarded without care. Crawling to burrow my face in his pillows. The cotton doesn’t cool me, but the scent of him stills the expanding pit in my stomach.
“Just hurry,” Voice muffled. The demand has him snickering to himself. His shirt slides back on.
He leaves the door open and takes the stairs at a rapid pace. He has a single speed; efficient.
Grabbing my phone off the nightstand, I scroll through the notifications of messages from my family. The last one from my mother was twenty minutes ago, a demand for an apology. Or as close as someone like her can get to asking for exactly what she wants: Perhaps Elijah will see the value in an apology once he’s calmed down.
Another from Edwin himself, He still pissed?
Sighing, tossing the phone further down the bed. I can hear Eli’s voice carrying. Laughter that’s growing closer.
A burst of panic has me slipping under the bedding when I realize he’s getting closer and someone is with him. Feminine and sultry. A voice I’d recognize anywhere.
“Stop following me,” Snapping playfully, the undertone is harsh enough that the sound shifts into only one pair of feet coming down the hall.
He leans into view. Alone, neck craning to check on me. Blue eyes bordering on embarrassed as he scratches his chin, “Did you remember Jordan’s party is tonight?”
“Of course she remembers! You’re the idiot who can’t keep dates straight,” His sister’s voice matches his, the joke of it only extending so far.
Scrambling to my feet as his body blocks the doorway. She sounds far enough down the hall that there isn’t an immediate risk of being caught. Hiking the skirt into position as I pick a side, “Yeah, it’s his twenty fifth today.”
Eli rolls his eyes. Arms crossed. He looks over his shoulder toward Serena, “She’s just finishing getting ready. Go hang out downstairs, we’ll be there in like five minutes.”
She does something that makes his expression sour, but I hear her weight head back toward the front of the house.
“I promised to be the designated driver apparently,” He stares as I spritz some of his cologne in a circle around myself, “Doesn’t sound like me.”
I can still smell my own arousal, the headiness of sex acting like a second skin. He steps forward and jerks his chin for me to come closer. Spraying it onto him as well. As mortifying as it is, at least we’ll smell the same.
“I can’t believe we forgot about that.” Staring at my reflection in the oversized mirror by his desk. Passable.
“I don’t know why she thinks her boyfriend is high on my radar. They’ve been together for like what, a month?”
Shrugging. I like Jordan, “He’s better than the last one. Do you think the skirt’s too short?”
Outrageously conscious of my thighs. It was fine when the only person who would see it was him.
“Just grab one of my jackets, it’ll be fine.” He moves around his room, filling his pockets with necessities and popping a piece of gum into his mouth.
I can feel my insides curdling. Getting more and more wound up at the thought of people. Hiding my tight shirt under one of his knit pullovers that I pray appears more cool girl chic than trashy. They judge me enough as it is, his friends all made up of those who outrank me in every sense.
He tosses his arm over my shoulder, whispering in my ear, “This is gonna suck.”
I couldn’t agree more.
