“You’re so pretty like this,” he said, gazing down into my eyes. “Letting yourself go. Letting me handle you.”
“I trust you,” I blurted out, and that felt like a bigger admission than if I had admitted I loved him. Which, I didn’t. Obviously.
But trust somehow seemed bigger.
Harlan’s eyes softened. “Good. Daddy’s got you.”
I liked it, but my slight embarrassment about it made my cheeks fire-hot. He picked up on it.
“Don’t get in your head about it,” he said. “Focus on my hands.”
The hand holding the showerhead started to circle my clit, a move that made me buck my hips. I stopped stroking his cock, getting lost in what he was doing to me.
“There you go,” he coaxed me. He watched my face for a few moments, and I let him see me: desperate, wanting, unfolding for him. “I trust you too, Emma.”
I beamed up at him, and I almost became a puddle on the shower floor when he smiled right back, biting his bottom lip like he couldn’t get over me.
Our kisses were slow, languid. His hand left my throat to play with my breast and my hips sought the water stream.
“Is that good? Is that what you need?” he asked, but I could tell he was starting to mess with me.
“It’s not enough,” I whined. “Please don’t fuck with me right now.”
“What do you need?”
I clutched the back of his neck for leverage, practically humping the showerhead between us.
“Tell me. Do you need me, princess?”
“I need you, Daddy,” I rushed out before I could doubt myself.
“Yeah?” he asked, false concern scrunching his brow. He was mocking me.
“I fucking hate you,” I spat, on the verge of ecstasy and agony and frustrated tears.
Harlan’s eyes lit up and his smirk sent me somewhere between heaven and hell. “If you hate me so much, you better fucking scream for me.”
My nails dug into his neck as I gnashed my teeth and held my breath. Harlan pinned me to the wall at my neck again and I wanted to be able to scream his name, or Daddy, or something, anything to let him know I’d never been this high before, that I’d never felt so seen and safe, that this feeling transcended love and hate and sex and trust.
But all I could do was scream.
He encouraged me with little chants of “let go” and “so gorgeous.”
I pinched my legs shut as I came and Harlan let the showerhead drop, spraying water at our shins now. I slumped into him and he held me tight to his body. A flood of feel-good chemicals coursed through me as I shook against him, and all my foggy mind could think was that love was taking root. Love was letting someone see you at your wildest, trusting them to hold the deepest, most raw parts of yourself with care.
And the scariest part of all was, he did.
TWENTY-FIVE
HARLAN
MARCH
Off my stick.Off my blocker. Dumping it behind me so they could try to sneak around the other side, like I didn’t anticipate that. Somebody must have pissed in Colorado’s Wheaties. It felt like they were shooting constantly. Where were my guys? Twenty-three shots on goal in the first period was not a small number.
Behind me, commotion broke out and I peered around just in time to catch Leroy slamming his stick down on one of Colorado’s forward’s arms.
Great. Two minutes for slashing. Meaning good old Daddy Royce was back in the hot seat.