Sweet Ache

He looks at me, eyebrows knitted in curiosity. “What is it?”

“A box of Good and Plenty,” I deadpan, trying to fight the smirk but failing miserably, thinking of the suggestive nature of the candy’s title.

He throws his head back and laughs heartily, the sound reverberating deep within me. “Oh I’ll give you good and plenty, all right,” he says crossing the short distance to me before grabbing me and placing another kiss on my lips. “I believe I just did.” He steps back, smug smile on his lips, and just shakes his head before he walks away.

I sag against the cabinet, a replay of the explosive and incredible sex we just had running through my mind over and over already.

Because it was that good.

Incredible really. I swear my heart skips a beat at even the thought, and I try to tell myself it has to be the newness of him, plus our inherent physicality together, that makes our sex so goddamn incredible. I rationalize that there is no way I could have feelings for him beyond the earthmoving sex we’ve had that makes it just seem that much more.

It’s a futile attempt. I know I’m lying to myself. I’ve had good sex before—nothing like this, but still good—and I know my insides didn’t twist and flutter from it like they are right now.

I’m falling for Hawkin, the epitome of everything I told myself I’d never fall for.

Shit.

Chapter 19

HAWKIN

I scrub my hand over my jaw as I contemplate how to answer the question one of the students has asked me, and I realize I can still smell the scent of Quin’s pussy on my fingers. Fuck me.

Talk about a way to lighten the somber memory of today’s anniversary.

And ease the anxiety over the judge sitting in the very top row of the auditorium, watching my every move to make sure that I’m fulfilling my obligation.

I force myself to concentrate on not screwing up, not on how little Miss Q just screwed me senseless in the alcove over to my right, but fuck if it’s not hard to do. Especially with her scent now seared in my psyche.

So I glance over to where she sits, head down, working on whatever she works on while I lecture, and I lose my train of thought. Well of course you did, dipshit. All you can think about is diving back beneath that skirt as soon as class is over. And God how I love her affinity for sexy-ass skirts.

I must be silent for too long because she glances up and meets my eyes before averting them quickly. But I catch the little smile that plays on her lips as she returns to pretending like she doesn’t care. Fuck if it’s not sexy and calls on me to have her again.

Yes, please. The sound of her voice saying that replays in my head as I refocus despite not being able to stop my own secretive smile at knowing what only she knows happened before class. I begin to give an answer, explain just how recreational drug use in Hollywood is the equivalent to putting a fat kid in a candy store and telling him to choose just one item, when a motion at the top of the steps catches my eye.

Why the hell is he here? And of course if I didn’t have Quin’s pussy numbing my mind the reason would be front and center.

Hunter slides into a seat in an aisle a third of the way down the banked rows. He has a baseball cap low over his eyes so one wouldn’t immediately make the connection that he was here, but I know my brother, recognize his clothes and his presence. Besides, I notice him only because everyone else is so busy looking at me.

Including the judge. How much more of a clusterfuck can this be?

As Hunter looks up and meets my gaze, the intense look on his face tells me why he’s here. My brother who uses everything else to help him forget—sex, booze, drugs, pushing my buttons—is here because today of all days, the anniversary of Dad’s suicide, he’s going to abuse the one thing he can without risking jail time. Me. Deep down I know somehow, some way, Hunter is here to try to hurt me for the fate he screwed himself out of but blames me for instead.

Jealousy is a mean, nasty bitch.

He flashes me a smarmy smirk, and I know I’m right. Fucking stellar. Is he here to try to rub my face in how he succeeded in making me bend when I shouldn’t have, take the blame for him, fulfill my promise to complete the seminar, to save his ass? My gut is uneasy with the possibilities and so I look away without giving him any reaction and continue on with my explanation to the class.

I don’t need this shit but I pull my head back from thoughts about Hunter because if I blow this lecture with the judge here then I’m the one fucking up, the one not fulfilling my promise to Dad to protect him.

The one who is weak.

And I know it’s fucked-up logic, deep down in my core I know it is, but it doesn’t make it any less powerful when history has already decided your fate today.

I trudge through the rest of the lecture, think I do pretty well considering the pressure coming at me from what feels like every angle, and roll my shoulders at the line of students waiting to speak to me after class. I’m not in the mood to be on in front of everyone, particularly not when I have the three people I don’t want interacting all within fingertip range: the one person deciding my fate, the one person I want in every sense of the word, and the one person I don’t want to deal with watching my every movement beneath his ball cap. My eyes keep flickering between them and the students in front of me.

Axe can tell I’m irritated and cuts the line off the same time that Quin starts packing up her bag. I make the rounds, catch sight of the judge as he pulls out his cell phone, and then look over to Hunt to find his grin wide, and eyes settling on Quinlan. When he looks back toward me, he gives me a subtle thumbs-up that causes dread to pour through me.