Page 39 of Laila Manning
“Never mind. Just go.” I turned my back on him and busied myself with the supplies discarded on the coffee table.
“No.” He argued. “Stop.”
“Please just go. This is all embarrassing enough without the awkward ending.” I was such an idiot to think he was actually interested in me.
He was repulsed by my body.
Just like I knew he would be.
Exactly how he should be.
“Laila.” He barked as I left the living room and took the supplies to the bathroom. “Just talk to me. Don’t shut down.”
“I can’t.” I felt my walls crumbling and panic building and knew I needed to end this conversation before it got any worse. “Please just go.”
“Do you think I don’t want you?” He followed me and stood in the doorway, blocking my path out. “Laila, talk to me.”
“I can’t.” I cried, closing my eyes, and hanging my head in defeat at the sink. “Please, Zeke. Just go.”
“No.” He stepped behind me and pressed his body against mine, pinning me to the sink with his hips. “Does this feel like I don’t fucking want you, Dove?” He ground his hips again, rubbing his erection against my ass, and I groaned, hating how the night turned. “Feel how hard you made me and then look me in the eye and tell me you still think that.”
“Zeke.” I shook my head.
“What are you feeling right now? Tell me.”
“I don’t know how.” I stared at him in the mirror and hated the tears that sparkled in my eyes.
“Try.” He wrapped his hands around my waist and stood patiently behind me. “For me.”
My desire to please him, to give him this, caused a sigh of frustration to slip from my lips. “I feel—” I closed my eyes, “Dirty.”
Zeke tensed behind me, and the tears slid over my cheeks again for the second time tonight. “Because of what I did?”
“No!” I cried, opening my eyes and staring at him in the mirror. “Because you didn’t want me to do it back.”
“Laila.” He deflated behind me and closed his eyes like the information pained him. “You’re not dirty. I didn’t stop this because I don’t want you.” He forced me to face him, and he wrapped one hand around the side of my neck, using his thumb under my jaw to keep my head tipped back so I was looking at him. “I stopped because I want to give you so much pleasure, you’re cross-eyed with it before I take even a second of pleasure from your body.” He kissed me, and instead of fighting him on it like I should have, I melted into it. “You’ve spent too much time seeing to other people’s pleasure, Dove. It’s time you were worshiped the way you deserve to be.”
“I don’t want you to make up for other people’s sins.” I cried, shaking my head.
“I’m not.” He pressed his forehead against mine and held me firmly. “But I will heal your wounds, Laila. Because that’s what someone does when they care about you. They better you and help you.”
“I just want to be normal.” I cried, hating that everything he was saying was the right thing. Because I didn’t want there to be any right or wrong things to say anymore. I just wanted to be normal.
“You’re not normal. And neither am I.” He kissed my lips, slowly coaxing me to kiss him back like I had before. But instead of the carnal need behind the kiss like earlier, there was something deeper and more heartfelt in it. “I don’t want your normal, Dove. I want your wounds, your insecurities, and your hesitations. It’s in these that I prove to you how much I want you. It’s in moments just like this one that we growtogether. Tighter and stronger than a normal couple that is shallow and only surface deep.”
“I don’t know—,” I hesitated.
“Well, I do.”
I smirked and took a deep breath, trying to relax and unwind, the whole night had been a whirlwind of emotions from the moment I walked up the driveway. “If you say so.”
Zeke left shortly after our moment in my apartment, going back to work for Ryker. Before he left, he kissed me and told me he wouldn’t stay away for so long again this time. I didn’t know if he meant it, and a part of me believed he only said that so I wouldn’t feel used after what happened between us.
But I wasn’t sure.
I did know, however, that I didn’t feel used.
Quite the opposite, actually.
