Heading back upstairs, I stand on the first step just in front of him. “All I want from you right now is just to paint you. You told me you’d help me, and I want you to keep your word.” I need more time.
He glowers and I can see how badly he wants to say his two favorite words. “You’re not allowed to tell me to fuck off,” I say, quietly, further inciting his annoyance. He pins me with narrowed eyes for a long time. And I actually feel the prickly tingle of nervousness across my skin.
“You’re a goddamn brat,” he grouses before moving past me and trudges down the stairs. I follow behind him at a more sedate pace, and the widening smile on my face is something I can’t help.
***
In the art room a little while later, he sits on the dais in the middle of the room, which is where Mr. Kauffman typically puts the subject matter of that particular class. I’m on my knees between his parted legs wrapping the white gauze around his scraped, raw knuckles. So far he hasn’t protested much to me doing this. Letting me lead him to the sink and remaining relatively quiet while I washed the blood from his hands. Then I’d fetched the first aid kit Mr. Kauffman kept in the pottery area and returned with the necessary supplies. Hissing and flinching only the slightest bit when I cleaned his wounds with rubbing alcohol, he allowed me to rub some ointment on each hand before wrapping them up in gauze.
I finish wrapping the last knuckle. “You shouldn’t be doing this.” That’s the first thing he’s said to me since the stairwell. His voice sounds hoarse, gruff like he’s been screaming.
I lick my lips and shrug one shoulder. I can still feel his lips on mine. “It’s not a big deal,” I reply, putting the supplies away before coming to my feet. “If you give me a minute, I’ll set up and we can get started.”
Moving around with intent, I unfold my tripod, prepare a canvas, and set it up on the easel. Going in and out of my designated cubby to gather my brushes, I head over to the communal island countertop where all the paints are kept. I grab what I need, mostly the acrylic paints, and return to my canvas. He has his phone in front of him, the overgrown fringe of his dark hair falling sexily across his vision. I want to go over there and brush it back. But I don’t. I do nothing except take a seat on the stool behind me while I silently watch him text. Is it a girl? Or is it work? Those two questions go round and round in my head like a carousel in an abandoned theme park. I can feel myself begin to obsess so I’m grateful when a spark of inspiration blazes through me compelling me to outline, to sketch, to do what comes too naturally to me.
He gets up a little bit later and swaggers my way, and I have to blink a few times to snap myself out of my spell of inspiration.
“I gotta go.” When he’s close enough, he reaches out to grab a lock of my hair. Like before, he plays with it like it’s something intriguing enough to keep his attention. “I should go,” he says, a little more firmly, and I’m not sure if he’s trying to convince him or me. Looking up, I find startlingly-clear and emotional eyes stare right through me. And then he lowers his head down, his hand now cradling the curve of my cheek. “Tell me to go.” There’s a strain in his voice now; choked desperation. “Damn it, Aylee, tell me to leave you alone.”
I shake my head. “I’m sorry,” I whisper. “But I don’t want you to leave me alone.”
Like the weight of his emotions is too much, he rests his forehead against mine and closes his eyes. “I’m no damn good for you,” he murmurs, and sighs deeply. “There’s nothing here for you but pain. You get close to me and I’m going to end up hurting you.”
Taking what I feel may be my last chance, I cautiously touch his face, and when he doesn’t recoil, I allow my fingers to trace his cheek and then his jaw. I pull away an inch. “Do your worst, Maddox.” I know my voice comes out small, but I say it with conviction. He knows I mean it. I’m not sorry. And I’m not taking it back.
“Stupid girl,” he growls. And thenhe consumes me. Drinks from me. Slants his beautiful mouth over mine, prying the seam of my lips apart with his tongue, and ruins me for anyone else. “Stupid fucking naïve girl,” he chastises between harsh breaths, between passionate, demanding kisses that blaze through my core and sear me open. “Why the fuck can’t you be like the rest of them? Why can’t you be another damn body? Why doyouhave to matter?”
I close my eyes for a brief moment, taking in what he’s just asked me, before I stare back at him. “Because I see you. I see you, Maddox, more clearly than I’ve ever seen anything or anyone in my entire life. And I know it scares you because you can see me, too.”
Feeling like a huge weight has been lifted off my shoulders, I initiate the kiss this time. It’s nowhere near his level of skill, but I lick at his lips and shyly graze his tongue with mine. His responsive groan emboldens me to do more. But he doesn’t give me control for long, and too soon I’m gasping inside his mouth when he effortlessly lifts me from the stool. The clattering noise of my materials falling to the ground becomes lost in the fog of heady desire. With my arms around his neck and my legs encircling his waist, he holds me to him by my butt, his large hands gripping both cheeks through the layer of my jeans. There’s no break in the kiss as he carries me to the countertop and sets me down with effortless ease. Off in the distance of my muddled mind, I hear tubes and cans of paint roll and tumble off the counter. They’re of no importance.
He leaves my mouth swollen, threading his fingers through my hair as he tilts my head back to trail open-mouth kisses across my jaw and down the side of my neck. They’re hungry kisses, kisses that feel like he’s going to devour me whole. I moan when he sucks hard on the fragile skin of my neck. That shot of pain mingled with the sweet pleasure of his lips and tongue soothing the ache away makes me crave more. He moves down, brushing my cardigan from my shoulders, and it falls down my arms and pools around my waist and wrists.
Through the layers of my bra and camisole, he cups my breasts and with dazed fascination I watch him lower his dark head to bite the thin materials over the nipple of my left breast. Even with the barrier of clothes, I feel the clamp of his teeth, and a whimper tumbles from my open mouth as the sweetest heat licks between my thighs, making me squirm. He finds my mouth again, tangles his hands in my hair to move my head just how he wants it as he plunges his tongue deeper into me.
“Tell me to stop,” he orders thickly, his forehead pressing against mine as he pants. “Tell me to stop, Aylee, because I swear if you don’t, I’m going to pull down your jeans, spread you out on this table, and slide my dick inside your warm pussy.” Who knew words this obscene could be so arousing? Or is it only when they come from this boy’s beautiful mouth? A spectacular explosion of goose bumps spill across my skin as I raise my fingers to his mouth.
Tenderly, he puckers his lips to kiss my fingertips before interlacing them with his. “There won’t be any stopping then.” He continues. “I’m going to fuck you, Aylee. I’m going to fuck you slowly and I’m going to fuck you hard. I’m going to make you scream so loud that whoever is left in this building is going to come running and see how good you can take my dick.” The last bit he whispers against the fragile skin where my neck and ear meet, sending shivers rippling through my body. Heat dances in my belly and trickles down the valley of my thighs to flood my core. I’m pulsating, breathless, and I want moreofhim, morefromhim. Whatever he’s doing now, this dark spell of ardor he’s cast is exactly where I need to be.
Do I want him to stop? No. I do not. But I can’t let him do all these things to me on this table, in the middle of the art room, despite how badly I ache for it. It will eventually make it to Tim’s ears, and he will be out for blood. Both mine and Maddox’s. Me, I’m not highly worried about. But I can’t bear the thought of my actions inadvertently hurting Maddox.
With a sigh, I give into impulse and run my hand through his thick mane. “You say you’re bad for me but you’re always looking out for me.”
He snorts. “Side effect of stupidity, I guess.”
I smile and bring his head close to gently kiss the corner of his mouth. “Thank you.”
“For?”
“Every time you’ve been there. Now…”
He sighs heavily. “I can’t promise you anything, Aylee.”
“Good, because I’m not expecting anything. Let’s not define what this is. We’ll just let it take its course.”
He slowly showers me with a different set of kisses from his abundant arsenal of sexual mastery. I live for how he parts my lips, live for the decisive way he dips his tongue inside my mouth and strokes it so softly against mine. He kisses me like I’m the best thing he’s ever had in his mouth and wants nothing more than to savor my taste.
Chapter 19
