Page 49 of Pretty Broken Promises

“I want to, but I don’t know how,” I admit.

Sin looks over my shoulder to Ford. “She needs you to take control. I know she’s afraid, but you can’t let her fear guide what is between you.”

“Back off, Sin. This dominant shit might be what Raven needed, but you don’t know Tessa. She’s not like Raven,” Ford snaps.

“I know that,” Sin says with a sense of knowing that crawls over my skin and tears away at the shield I hide behind. He looks me dead in the eye, straight into me, and says, “She’s not like Raven, she’s like me.”

An alarm is blaring through my head, screeching a warning that he knows my last secret, but the look he gives me tells me that he will hold it. I take a few seconds to calm myself, and then ask him, “How do I let it go?”

“Do you trust him?” he asks and jerks his chin at Ford.

I’ve been kicking this same question over for myself since I agreed to give us another chance. There’s a part of me that is still apprehensive, and I’m not sure I completely trust that we’ll last. My silence pushes Ford over the edge.

His hand comes up to hold my throat, his fingers grip either side of my chin and he turns my face to his. “I want to hear your answer to this. Do you think I’d hurt you?”

I try to dip my head, but he won’t let me. “Answer me, Tess,” he insists.

“Not physically,” I murmur.

Raven manages to push through the fog of lust to give me advice. “It isn’t called a leap of faith because it’s easy. When I chose to give Sin another chance after that weekend, it was the easiest and hardest thing I’ve ever done.”

We’re talking as if the subjects of our discussion weren’t sitting right here with us. “I’m scared. Not of Ford, but of the things that creep into my mind. I don’t want those things anywhere near what we have. I wish it could be like it was before our parents came back from Vegas.”

Sin looks at me with understanding, and it finally sinks in. This is the real reason we’re here. Not some bullshit excuse of evening the score. “You guys thought I needed help didn't you?”

“Don't you?” Sin asks me. “I’ve been there, and I freaked the fuck out over and over to the point that I almost lost the love of my life. You’re suffering, and you can only speak about a fraction of the cause of it. You’re a bomb about to explode, and you don’t seem to be aware of it.”

“What is he talking about?” Ford asks me.

I want to shrink, become invisible, or do anything to turn the attention off of me. The best I can manage at the moment is to deflect. While I’m avoiding one problem, I can at least let them help me with another one. “How can I defuse? I want my life back, do you think you can help with that?”

“That’s the easy part,” he starts. “You just do what feels right, and if you start to panic we’re all here for you.”

Ford grabs my waist and twists me around. I swing my leg over him to straddle his. Out of the corner of my eye, I catch a glimpse of Sin kissing Raven as if just thinking about how he nearly lost her makes him need to remind himself she’s here with him now. I understand that kind of desperation. From the moment I opened up my heart to the possibility of Ford and me trying one more time, I often find myself needing to touch him just to prove it isn’t a dream.

I try and ground myself in the moment as his hands move up to hold my throat. I start to breathe faster, and not out of lust. Ford immediately drops his hand. “We don’t have to do this.”

Sin hovers over Raven, and looks over at us. “Don’t give up that easily. Tessa, take a deep breath and look him in the eyes. He is not them.”

He looks at Ford. “Lay her down on the bench. Remember it’s not about taking control, but making her feel safe enough to surrender it.”

I can tell Ford is bristling under the interference, but it’s making me feel safe. Not just because I have Raven and Sin, but because Ford will do whatever it takes to help me.

Slowly he lays me down on the bench and hovers over me. I follow Sin’s advice and I keep my eyes on Ford’s. His hands slide up my legs from my ankles to my thighs and guide them open.

I’m aware that at any moment the waitstaff could come back to check on us, even with the large tip Sin gave him.

The heavy breathing coming next to us is a good sign that Raven and Sin aren’t waiting to find out how much time we have back here either. The thrill of being sort of in public, not being alone, and the potential of being caught is enough to distract me from the other fears that are trying to bubble up from my damaged psyche.

Ford must see the moment my apprehension turns to arousal because he kisses me with a hunger I haven’t felt from him in ages. It’s clear he held back from me in Seattle. I don’t ever want him to censor himself with me again. I want this version of him. The raw, animalistic, needy Ford who kisses me like he’ll die if he doesn’t.

My hands go to his hair, and I fist my hands in the strands he keeps just long enough for me to do this, but this time he isn’t giving me an inch of control. He pulls my hands down and pins them above my head with one hand.

His other hand slips below my dress, and I’m not even embarrassed to know that he’s going to find me soaking wet. In fact, I’m proud that I’ve been able to exist in the moment and let go like this. His fingers stroke me, and I let my head roll back.

Ford’s mouth blazes a hot trail from my shoulder to the space below my ear. I shiver when he reaches that spot, like he knew I would. That’s the thing about being with the man who taught you how to make love, who is the only one you’ve ever made love with.

Sin and I fucked, and only once. Ford and I have done everything, and as a result, he knows every part of my body, and how to make me come better than I do.

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