Page 29 of Advice from a Sunflower

He's touched a nerve and I can feel my face heating with anger as my words come spitting out. My friend, the mighty backbone has officially been put firmly back in place, erasing the jelly that was once there before.

"You have no idea what you're talking about."

"Oh, but don't I? You fell into the small town black hole and can't stand that I didn't fall down with you. That I managed to stay away when you were called right back. You found your new friends early on in high school and completely dropped me and our plans, just like everyone else. It was years before you decided I was worth your time, and you can't stand that despite you taking the most precious thing I could offer, I still didn't let you hold me back. How long did it take for you to marry Emma after that? For her to convince you to stay close for college?"

"What else was I supposed to do, Mouse? Follow you? Beg you to want me? No, fuck that. When you walked away from me after what we shared that night, you made your choice. You don't get to criticize how or why I made mine."

I scoff at that, throwing my hands in the air. "Yeah, apparently your choice was running right back to the life you supposedly hated and blaming everyone else when you weren't happy with the end result."

He lets out a loud growl, advancing toward me two steps before abruptly stopping himself. His fingers find his scalp and rustle up his usually perfect hair.

"You're infuriating," he rasps, the mask of indifference quickly falling away to reveal… what is it? Anger? Hurt? I can't tell anymore.

"Only because you know I'm right."

"You couldn't be any further from being right, Mouse."

"Don't call me that. I told you I don't answer to that name anymore," I insist, my brows furrowing together in frustration.

Wrong move.

His lips curl in a sinister grin at the crack in my voice. After successfully keeping my guard in place, I've just exposed a weak spot and given him a target.

"Why not,Mouse? Everyone always thought it was so cute calling you that. Quiet, meek little Mouse always scurrying around town in hopes no one would notice her."

He releases a menacing chuckle, and I can't help but feel like an actual mouse being played with by its predator before being devoured. The sick part is that it's actually turning me on.

I have the fleeting thought that I want to be devoured by him before swatting it away.

"I'm not playing your games," I choke out, my shoulders pushed back and my expression stoic. I'm determined to walk away from him with some semblance of pride. "Just leave me alone for the rest of my trip, and then you can forget I ever existed like you had before."

I begin to walk away but am yanked back when his long fingers wrap gently around my arm. "That's not going to happen," he growls into my ear, so close that his hot breath sends tingles down my spine. "I let you get away from me once before and everything imploded. If you think you're going to walk away from this unscathed again, you're dead wrong."

Before I can even take my next breath, his lips are on mine, aggressively reclaiming everything I walked away with all those years ago. My ego tells me to push him away. Who does he think he is talking to me like that and then mauling me like I'm his to own?

But my heart wants him to keep going. To see how far he's willing to take it. We're transported back in time, eighteen again and unscathed by the outside world, yet still older, wiser, and a ton more experienced. It makes the kiss that much harder to pull away from.

Whatever happened to the man before me has hardened him beyond belief, but his mouth is betraying his abrasive attitude. He's still the delicate boy I handed myself over to all those years ago.

As I struggle with the internal battle of brain versus heart, Eli's hands begin caressing their way up my hips, his fingers slowly slipping under my shirt to meet the soft flesh of my stomach. He's walking me backwards toward the couch and my brain turns to mush.

Ego? Pride? What are those things? They officially leave the building when he breaks the kiss to nip at my chin and earlobes, each bite leaving a little sting in its wake that feels both enticing and punishing.

I let out a soft whimper when he makes a move South, expertly pulling my shirt and bra out of the way to place his mouth on my left nipple. Brad never bothered with foreplay, unless it was for him. I never argued it, but I'm remembering exactly how important it is as Eli pays equal attention to both of my nipples and his hand begins moving over the button on my jeans.

He makes quick work of unclasping them and yanking them down my legs, exposing the boring pink cotton panties I picked up at Walmart when I first landed. He quietly takes in the view before him with a blank expression before returning to my bare, lonely breasts.

My cheeks redden once again, only this time in embarrassment as I realize I'm nearly completely naked before him in the middle of my sisters living room wearing my Walmart underwear while he remains fully clothed. I try to remedy that issue by tugging at his shirt, but he swats my hands away, slowly shaking his head.

"No," is all he says, abandoning the girls to hook his fingers on my plain panties. For the first time, he stops to meet my eyes, silently asking for permission.

I'm not sure why this is where he draws the line after brazenly taking every step before without so much as a glance in my direction, but I swallow back the thick emotion in my throat and nod a little too eagerly. If he's capable of turning my brain into mush with a few simple elementary nips and kisses, I'm terrified and excited to see what he'll do to me next.

Another sinister smirk pulls at his lips as he begins tugging my panties down but before I can begin to overanalyze it, he dives his head down and gives my center a long, slow lick. I can't even stop the moan that escapes me as my hips buck further forward into his mouth. I can still feel the smile on his face as he takes my embarrassing display as encouragement and continues pleasuring me with his tongue, expertly moving and caressing in ways I'm ashamed to say I've never experienced before.

The noises that fall from my mouth are strictly primal and somewhere deep in my euphoric haze I wonder if Marnie is still awake and if she can hear me. Hell, I begin to wonder if the entire block can hear me once he begins introducing his fingers. One by one, he slowly inserts each one, curling them upward once he's in all the way until I can't take any more. My head begins thrumming with anticipation as my body builds up to the strongest orgasm I've ever been blessed with. I can feel him trying to hold my hips down and keep up as my body starts convulsing, and we ride the wave together until the last of them work their way through me.

Once I'm finished, Eli slowly pulls away. When he stands up to examine me with that same damn self-assured smirk, reality hits hard.

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