I run my fingers up his arm and squeeze his wrist, “Small price to pay, I guess.”
“Figured I’d go easy on you,” he smirks.
“Easy?” I scoff.
“Yeah,” Bowen shrugs, “thought I’d be a gentleman and leave your ass for another time.”
“You wish,” I chortle, brushing a lock of hair out of his eye with my fingertip.
“You laugh,” he kisses me softly, “but just like that tight little pussy of yours is mine and that pretty little mouth of yours is mine, that sweet little ass of yours is also mine. And soon, you’ll be begging me to fuck that, too. And when you do…” Bowen leans into the nape of my neck, biting it with a groan.
“That’ll be the day,” I snicker.
“Mark my words, darling,” Bowen radiates with arrogance as he reaches down between us, but then his face drops, “Oh, shit.”
“What?” I raise my head, my eyes darting up and down.
Bowen looks up at me, his mouth ajar, “I lost it.”
“Lost what?” I pop up onto my elbows in a jolt of panic, “Inside me?”
Bowen blinks and stares at me in silence for a few moments, “No,” his face explodes into a Cheshire Cat grin, “I got it,” he raises his closed fist and waggles his eyebrows.
I collapse back onto the sheets with relief, purging my lungs of air. Laughing to himself, Bowen crawls over me to the edge of the bed and stretches halfway off to ditch the condom in the trash can. And when he does, I do a double-take, struck by a tattoo that stretches from one shoulder to the other. It's a fox, drawn with thick, sharp, black lines. Its head curls over Bowen’s left shoulder blade, looking backward and baring its teeth, while its tail swirls over his right shoulder like a jagged black tidal wave.
How did I not see this massive tattoo across his back?
Because he hasn’t turned his back to you since coming in this room.
“Whoa,” I reach over and run my fingertips across his traps, following the black waves over his muscles, “I didn’t even see this.”
I lift my fingers when I come to a scar on his left shoulder blade. It’s hidden under the black ink and easy to miss at a distance, but the skin is raised and looks like the track of a shooting star. I leave it be, in case it’s sensitive, but I can’t imagine getting a tattoo over a scar that big. Bowen retracts back to the edge of the bed and looks over his shoulder, letting me admire his ink.
“Why a fox?” I ask.
He crawls back over me and settles between my legs again, “Ever heard the saying, don’t let the fox guard the hen house, even if the fox is really good looking?”
I give a half shrug, “Sounds familiar.”
“Foxes are cunning and sly, but so are humans,” he explains, “some are smart, attractive, and good at deceiving people. You have to recognize which ones are the foxes and always stay five steps ahead them.”
I arch my brow and nod, “I take it you’ve met some foxes, and not just the pretty kind.”
Bowen trails a lock of his hair back and forth across my forehead and smiles, “It only takes one, and you never make that mistake again.”
I gaze at my reflection in his dark brown eyes. They’re vibrant, but have a distant look when he stops speaking. But silence with him isn’t awkward or off-putting. Instead, it’s like looking through a pitch-black doorway, and knowing that beyond the doorway was something incredibly exciting, like being drawn to the void.
This is what he was talking about—this is exactly what it feels like to be with him. And now I want to go wherever he’s going.
I finally break the silence, “Are you staying or heading back?”
“Do you want me to stay?”
“Yeah,” I stretch my neck from side to side, “if you want to.”
A shadow falls behind Bowen’s eyes and he looks down at me with the same darkness he had when he flipped the swing bar shut on the door. “Then say it,” he says slowly, “tell me what you want from me, and mean it.”
I don’t know why it’s so hard to say what I need to say, especially now. For some reason, it’s easier to make demands of him while he’s fucking the life out of me rather than just telling him that I want him to stay the night. But the imminent threat of him leaving finally drags me out of the idiotic conflict in my head.
I reach up and stroke the side of his face, “I want you to stay here and sleep with me.”
Bowen’s eyes soften again and he lifts my leg, wrapping it around his waist, “Now that you’ve invited me in,” he drawls, sending a shiver over my shoulders and neck, “I’m never leaving.”
Thank God.
CHAPTER NINE
Brett
Present
Judy glances up from her laptop, “How long have you and your boyfriend been together?”
Some people might be put off by that—their therapist typing away as they spill their guts—but it kind of makes me feel more important. It makes me feel like what I’m saying is worth writing down, even if she is going to use it to analyze my mental illnesses, which I’m sure haven’t all been identified yet…
That’s a loaded question. She sees my jaw tighten and my cheek muscles twitch as I try to keep a straight face.
But she lets it ride and continues, “What first drew you to him? What are your favorite qualities you see in him?”
