Where It All Began (Phoenix Falls Series)

I scratch my hand at the back of my neck, biting at my lip-ring.

“You want me to get in the tub?” I ask, brow rising in amusement.

She settles herself onto the submerged bench on the side farthest from me, wiggling her ass until she’s nice and comfortable.

The corner of my mouth quirks into a smirk. Temptress. But she continues feigning interest, propping her feet up onto the seated ledge and avoiding my eyes as she waits me out.

I can’t help myself. I walk around the tub until I’m stood by her feet and I look through the ripples at her glittery toe nails.

Possessed by animal instinct I dip both of my hands into the water and I wrap my hands around her ankles, rubbing my thumbs into her until she uncrosses her legs for me.

Jesus, she’s soft. I gently lift her ankles out of the water, her warm wet skin slippery in my palms.

Now that I’ve got a feel for how fucking light she is all I want to do is get her underneath me, and see how high her legs can go.

I place her feet back into the water and take one last glance at the cabin to her back. No chances that Tate and his fiancé are going to be unoccupied right now so it should be private out here for just the two of us. I say a quick prayer for Kaleb to not make any surprise appearances and then I reach my arm to the back of my neck and rip my shirt over my head.

Kitty’s eyes slowly trail down my torso, and my chest heaves under her gaze. I toss my shirt onto the ground and then kick off my boots and socks as my hands make work of unsheathing my belt. When I’m down to nothing but my jeans I give her a few last seconds to change her mind, although my fingers are itching to tug down my zipper and get in there with her.

She looks up at me through her long, dark lashes, and the soft light from the cabin reflects against her eyes.

“You want me to get in?” I ask her again, my voice no longer light with amusement. It’s low and gruff and it makes a shiver ripple through her chest.

“Yeah,” she says quietly, eyes dropping down to where my fingers are paused. I flick the button open and her breathing hitches. Then I yank down my zipper because I’m done giving her a show. We can have a re-do some other time because right now – when I’m finally going to be able to kiss her for the first time in two fucking years – is not the time.

I kick off my jeans so that I’m wearing nothing but my underwear and I grip my fists into the ledge of the tub, quickly heaving myself over the border and instantly being met with hot steaming bubbles. It seeps straight through the cotton of my boxers and lashes at the muscle that’s growing heavy behind them.

I wade the few steps from my side to the centre, the hot spray splattering up my abdomen as I shift my weight in the water. Kitty’s eyes haven’t left my body, roaming over each muscle like she’s cataloguing them for a textbook. I’m taking that as a good sign. When I’m finally right in front of her she swings her legs down from the bench and lowers her body up to her chin.

I bend forward so that I can get my hands under her knees and then I lift them slowly until they’re knocking at my ribcage. She chews nervously on her lip and takes a glance over her shoulder, thoughts of her guests and – much worse – her brother obviously nagging in her brain as well as my own.

When she turns back to me again, looking much more relaxed after realising that we are in fact totally alone, another thought resurfaces in my mind.

“The cameras,” I say gruffly, wanting this conversation to be wrapped up before it’s even begun. I have much better plans for the rest of our night. “The other week, you mentioned that you have cameras-”

She waves her hand as if that’s old news and her toes scrape up the backs of my thighs. Holy fuck. I lean a little further towards her, wanting my cock pressed nice and hard against her pussy.

Her breathing shakes and my eyes drop down to her tits. They’re obscured in the water and I need to see them. I almost growl, the need to take them in my mouth overwhelming.

“I took them down from the barn just before you started working on it,” she breathes out, her knees trembling underneath my fingers.

I exhale a sigh of relief. “Okay, that’s good-”

Then I stop short.

Hang on. The barn?

“When you say the barn,” I begin, my mind racing at a million miles per hour.

Shit, shit, shit.

“You mean the outside of the barn, right? To watch for, er, animals or something.” Probably should’ve kept those up then, all things considered. “Or burglars and thieves, right?”

“Yeah.” She says it like I’m stupid. Fucking accurate.

Then, dropping like a tonne of bricks in my stomach, she adds, “And the inside too, of course.”

Of course. Of fucking course.

Of course I jacked off in the one section of this ranch that was wired up with cameras.

My hands are gripping her knees way too tightly and her eyebrows are raising as she senses the shift in my mood.

“But you took ’em down before I got here.” I ask it like a statement to try and prevent the inevitable “no” that I’m about to get.

“No,” she says. Obviously. “I took them down a few days ago so that you wouldn’t have to paint around the wires.”

I lower her legs into the water and tug my hands through my hair, the water that was just dripping down her thighs now running down my face.

Fucking shitting motherfucking hell. I really am an idiot.

She shifts on her bench, raising her body up from the water so that it pools around her waist. Her beautiful tiny waist that I should’ve had my hands on five fucking minutes ago.

“Why does it matter? What’s wrong?” She looks around us as if she’s searching for an answer. Her eyes light up when she thinks that she’s found one. “Is it a band thing, like you need an NDA, or I’m not allowed to have you on film or something?”

God, she’s cute. No, I don’t think that I’m so important that I require an NDA. I’m grateful that the band can tour and earn a fuck-tonne but I don’t give a shit about someone taking my picture.

I care more about the fact that there is now a video of me beating one out for her parents to see and, better yet, I’ve got my fist clenched around their daughter’s used tank top whilst I do it.

“Please tell me the footage doesn’t live-stream to your dad’s cell or something,” I ask. Beg is probably a better word for it.

She gives me a nervous laugh. “No… why?”

I let out a relieved sigh. “Can we delete the footage?”

Now she looks really freaked out. In fact, worse than that, she looks angry.

“Delete the footage? What the hell did you do in there, Madden?”

I hold my hands up, trying to prevent the escalation of her rage. “Nothing bad, I promise, it’s just… when I first got here, and I was in there checking things out I…”

There is no way that I can tell her what I did in there.

“Please just trust me,” I plead with her. “Can you delete the tapes from the past week for me?”

She stands up, the water sloshing down over her body and landing with a slap around her hips. I keep my eyes locked in with hers even though I’m dying to finally take a look at her breasts.

Don’t look down whilst you’re having a serious conversation with her, do NOT look down whilst you’re having a serious conversation with her.

“I have to check those tapes to ensure that we don’t have anyone staking out on our land, Madden. Protecting our ranch and keeping it safe is ninety-fucking-percent of this job.”

I couldn’t hate myself any more right now. All that I want is to keep her protected and safe. I’ve learned from what my dad and I went through and I refuse to repeat that catastrophe.

“Kitty, baby-”

She shoves me backwards and a grunt leaves my chest. At least she’s fighting me. Fighting means feeling.

“Don’t ‘baby’ me,” she says, her tone lifting in defiance. “Either tell me what you did or-”

“Fine.” We’re not sinking this ship just because I’m a moron, but there’s also no way that I can look her in her eyes and tell her what I did at the same time. “Watch the tape – it’s the one from the day after I came.” I almost choke on my own choice of words. “Came here,” I rectify. “It’s the one from the day after I came here, to this ranch, with your brother.”

She’s looking at me like I’m insane. She’s right. I am.

“In the morning I went in there and…” I trail off because I’ve already fucked this up and I don’t want to keep her out here any longer than she needs to be. “Please just watch the tape and then delete it. I don’t want your parents to see it.”

I don’t want your parents to know what a dirty fucking dog their future son-in-law is.

“My parents?” She’s truly astounded now. “What does this have to do with my parents?”

Oh God. “Nothing, definitely nothing to do with your parents, Kitty, honestly, please.”

I shove my fist into my mouth. Anything to shut myself up.

“Please. And I’m sorry, okay? For… for everything.”

I turn around and leave before I can make things any worse.