Page 87 of Shared By the Mountain Men

“Come with me,” he demanded.

I tried to tell him that I would, but all that came out was a moan.

“Come while I fuck you,” he gritted out. “While I make that pussy mine.”

I screamed as the climax pulsed through my body, shattering waves of pleasure crashing on my shore with each thrust. My teeth found the skin of his shoulder and I bit down involuntarily, changing the pitch of his cries. Then Jack’s lips seared into mine as he moaned too, pressing his entire body against mine, crushing me into the bed while we shuddered and trembled and were remade anew.

39

Melissa

“Did I really do a bad job with the hatchet?” I asked.

We were laying on our backs next to each other, tangled sheets and tangled legs. Both of us still breathing like we’d hiked up a mountain at full speed. My mind was clear of concerns and worries, except for what he had said at the top of Snodgrass Mountain when we were taking a break.

“You did a fine job,” Jack said in a throaty voice. “I was just angry.”

“Yeah. You were really pissed off.”

“I was mad at myself, not you.”

“I don’t know,” I chuckled. “You seemed awfully mad at me.”

“I was mad at a lot of things.”

It was wild how much things had changed in the last hour. From screaming at each other to having some of the most passionate sex I’d ever experienced in my life. Was that healthy? I didn’t know. I also didn’t care.

It was clear that Jack had some demons he was fighting. Something from his past that had hurt him, and the wound was still tender. The bleeding may have stopped, but it still pained him every day.

That didn’t excuse all of his actions, but it might have explained them. And if I was being totally honest with myself, I was partially to blame for our friction. From the moment we’d met, he’d tried to help me, but I had pushed back against that help. I had wanted to be independent. I didn’t want to rely on anyone. Now that I had gotten to know Ash a little better, I saw those same trust issues in myself.

I rolled over and rested against Jack’s broad chest, lacing my fingers through his mane of chest hair. “Talk to me. Tell me what you were mad about.”

I wondered if he would open up to me at all now that we’d slept together. Was his moment of vulnerability just a fluke? A temporary intermission between his blunt, brusque demeanor?

“I was mad at myself,” he repeated. “I wasn’t allowing myself to be happy, holding back from getting too close. Not just with you, but with a lot of people recently. I’ve kept people at arm’s length. So when I saw Noah take you out to lunch, and Ash loan you his favorite bike, it was a reminder of what I could have been doing. Rather than see their actions as an example to follow, I projected my own insecurities onto them. They were pursuing happiness, and I wasn’t, and that tore me up inside.”

“It was partially my fault,” I began to say, but Jack immediately placed a finger to my lips.

“You can apologize another time,” he said. “Right now, I’m seeing things clearly, Melissa. I was wrong. I was afraid. And because of that fear, I acted like a total fucking asshole.”

I cupped my ear. “Hear that?”

“What?”

“That’s the sound of nobody disagreeing with you.”

He let out a growl, but it was playful. “I deserved that. I was projecting a lot of my own issues onto you, and that was shitty. I’m… I’m sorry, Melissa.”

It was obvious that apologies didn’t come easy to a man like Jack. I could see the way he had to rip the words out of his soul, like he was showing me a small and vulnerable part of himself. I leaned into him and squeezed him tight.

“I forgive you.”

He relaxed underneath me, fingers lacing into my hair. “Thank you.”

“You’re welcome. Now tell me something about yourself.”

“Like what?”

---