Paying Her Dues

“Mike,” she says, on a whisper, tracing the edge of the countertop with her fingertip and that jolt I felt earlier when she used my first name is back with a vengeance.

“Yeah.”

She lifts her eyes again. They’re shimmering, but not with sadness. “Is there… something going on?”

I keep my gaze right on her. “I don’t know what you mean.”

She swallows, and I watch her pulse flutter in her throat. “Here. With us.”

Holy fuck.

The thing is, it’s impossible to ignore. And now I know she’s feeling it too. Fucking chemistry. 101. Pure and primal.

And I can’t ignore it. But I can definitely deny it. “You should sleep,” I tell her, keeping my voice between a warning and something warmer and kinder. And doing my best to keep the lust out of my voice while talking down my hard-on.

Her eyes trace my face and she takes a step closer. Inches between us now, no more. “That doesn’t answer my question. Is there something going on here?”

She taps my chest with her index finger then points to her heart.

I don’t say a fucking word. I don’t move a muscle. Because I know that if I do, if I let myself move at all, the next thing that happens is my mouth on hers, and me kissing her breathless and bending her over the back of the sofa and feeding her the ten inches of meat she’s brought to life .

Her tits rise and fall as she watches me. Time slows down, dream-like.My cock throbs in my pants. My balls tighten and feel heavy.

I have a flash fantasy of scooping her up on the granite countertop, right here, right now, and sliding my fingers inside her tender little wet hole, before I…

No, fuck no. You fucking animal. Your job is to protect her. Even if it means protecting her from yourself.

Sam’s footsteps coming fast down the stairs snap me back to reality. “I’m going to bed, Jess,” I tell her, and then turn and force myself, fucking force myself, to walk away. Without another glance back at her beautiful body. Her beautiful face. Her beautiful self.

“Mike,” she calls after me. “Please, wait…”

“Night,” I growl, and head down the hall.

From around the corner, I hear Sam come back into the kitchen. His Vans squeak on the floor.

Somehow, even from around the corner, I can feel the tone change between them. “Real talk, girl,” Sam says. “Are you….are you okay? After earlier? I did not want to talk about it in front of my dad, because, girl, you know he can be nutty when it comes to some stuff. That’s protective streak of his…”

Now hold the fuck up. I freeze in my tracks. I don’t like the sound of that one bit. If someone hurt her, if someone offended her, I’m gonna fucking…

Jess lets out a heavy sigh. “Yeah. I guess.”

“Spill it,” Sam says. “I want to know every-fucking-thing.”

She sighs again. It sounds sad and defeated. All my protective instincts kick in hard like the rest of me. Possession, passion, protection. All of it.

I listen, pressing myself against the wall as she goes on, “I mean, I know that trying out for the first violin puts a great big grubby target on my back. But If I don’t give Dr. Markham what he wants, if I don’t…I guess put out for him…whatever that means.”

Oh hell no.

“…then he’s going to cut me from the orchestra, Sam, and then what am I doing to…he said it’s his word against mine if I say anything.”

She’s still talking, but I’m not hearing anything but the sound of bones breaking and a death rattle from that fucking conductor.

I always hated him. I can read people and his asshole needle has always been in the red with me even though he thinks he hides it well.

He’s threatens her and that means he’s threatening me. And I’ve got the red haze so fucking bad it’s making me want to sink my hand right through the goddamned drywall.