Page 36 of Keep Me

If I return to this life, I can’t do it on a Fox’s arm, and I can’t be on a Fox’s arm without returning. Once the threat has passed and the job is over, Roan and I will go our separate ways. It’s best that nothing ever starts.

I don’t like letting go of someone once I know what it’s like to have them.

Even though it’s only nine when Roan announces he’s going to take a shower, I decide I should try to fall asleep before he joins me. If I’m not awake when he comes to bed, maybe it will be like it never happened in the morning.

As soon as the glass walls of the bathroom begin to steam, Roan sheds his clothes, and I cover my face with a book. His presence isn’t any easier to ignore as his inked shoulders and back cut through the steam like mountains above fog at night. My body feels hot and itchy as unbidden visions of water rivulets running down his abs and between his taut shoulder blades conjure in my mind. I shut my book, turn off the lamp, and roll over, determined to fall asleep before I lose my mind and join him.

In an attempt to quiet my mind, I focus on the sound of the shower, imagining it’s a rain forest and I’m somewhere far away from this attic with claustrophobic levels of tension. I try to zero in on the sound of the water, but a gruff exhale breaks through. Once, I could have imagined. Twice, and I know it’s not in my head.

I slowly roll over, hoping Roan can’t make out the details of my position in the dark. With the lamp off, the shower light backlights him, and my breath catches in my throat. Everything is a foggy blur in the steam, but the motion is unmistakable. A rough groan sends chills down my spine while the silhouette of his hand pumps back and forth.

My mouth dries up. My skin burns. My stomach is twisted so tight I can’t breathe. I squeeze my eyes shut, intent to fight the urge to slide off my panties and glide my fingers through the wetness that has been present all day. My eyes slam open at the sound of a loud smack. On instinct, my gaze darts toward the noise and I see Roan’s big palm, fingers flexed and spread out on the glass wall.

An airy moan floats out of my mouth as I watch his head roll back and his palm press harder and flatter on the glass, as if for support. His throaty exhales grow louder, and I can’t fight the flame any longer.

I shimmy out of my panties under the covers and finally press my fingers against my aching clit. I stroke down and feel all the slickness and swollen flesh. Fuck, I don’t think I’ve ever been hornier.

Roan

I stand there letting the scalding water pelt my back while I catch my breath, hanging my head back. The euphoric post-release feeling never comes.2 Instead I pant with an even stronger, hotter need infecting my blood stream, even with my dick softening in my fist.

I’m agitated and exhausted. Exhausted but not sated. If today was an indication for how the rest of our time here is going to go, I’m certain I’m in Hell, or some fucked-up version of sexual purgatory at the very least. I slam the faucet off. Any calm from coming quickly dissipates the second I hear a familiar, breathy whine. My control is barely hanging on.

I turn off the bathroom lights and wait in the dark until my vision adjusts to the darkness. All sounds from the bed stop. I begin to make out Reggie, laying on her back, face perfectly still. Too still. While her face is a blank mask, her chest gives her away, rising and falling on noticeably deep breaths under the sheets.

I walk toward the bed, wondering what I will do if she insists on pretending she’s asleep. Do I climb in beside her and do the same? Or do I slide in behind her and whisper into the slope of her neck, wake up, I need to be inside of you?

The old, wooden floorboards creak with my approach, and I freeze each time to see if she stirs. The closer I get, the more my dick begins to twitch. I’m mentally preparing to fuck my fist one more time before falling asleep when I spot an out-of-place, black piece of fabric poking out from under the white comforter.

“You don’t have to pretend you’re asleep.”

“I am.” She purses her lips, but keeps her eyes closed, even when the only sound in the space between our breaths is a drop of water sliding down my naked skin and dropping onto the wood.

Drip.

Drop.

A steely chuckle leaves me. “Mentirosa.” I bend down to swipe her black panties out from under the blankets. Her eyes fly open then. I keep a straight face, soaking in the cocktail of emotion on her face as I sway the lacey fabric from a finger: shock, embarrassment, desire. I’m drunk on it and committed to riding it to oblivion.

“So you weren’t touching yourself while you watched me fuck my hand wishing it was your tight cunt?”

“No,” she gasps, having the audacity to sound offended. She sits up and tugs the sheets tighter to her chest.

“You didn’t get off knowing that you make me so fucking feral that I have to beat my fist just to be able to sleep?”

“That’s pathetic,” she scoffs, but there’s no hate in it.

I huff a dry laugh. “It would be if I were wrong. If you weren’t out here pretending to be asleep while you pleasured yourself thinking of me.”

Her pitch rises. “You are wro—”

I am only fueled further by how flustered she’s getting. “Prove it.”

“What?”

I drag my tongue over my molars and repeat myself slower, “Prove. It.”

Her brows flex together, then her eyes widen, affronted. “How am I supposed to—”

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