Stepdaddy Savage (13 page)

I chuckle sadly. It was the truth. Shifting my weight from one foot to the other, I ask, “So what made you finally let go?”

“You,” he responds quietly, squatting down and rearranging the flowers on Kathleen’s grave. Without asking him I know for a fact that he’s the one who put them there. And maybe even every week, or every month. It makes me love him even more.

Fuck,
love him
.

I love this man.

The realization hits me hard, like a punch to the gut, and I gasp for air.

“I knew when you entered my club that it was a sign. A sign that you’re mine. A sign that you always were. When those idiots hit on you and you raised your eyes to the second floor and saw me, it was fate. Corny as shit but it was. Because you were looking for something else, someone to save you from those assholes. You found what you were looking for.” He smiles, but not happily, at the grave. When he stands up, I notice that he’s holding one of the pink flowers in his hand. He hands it to me.

“This will never happen to you.”

“I know,” I whisper. We stand in front of one another for a long minute before he says:

“What do you wanna do?”

I lift my eyes, and know that even though I don’t say it, he sees it, “I want to make you happy.”

“I meant right now,” he smirks.

I nod, and repeat myself.

“Make you happy. That’s what I wanna do. Now. Tomorrow. Anytime.”

A
week passes by. I still think about the graveyard incident, but Graham and I don’t talk about it anymore. I go to school every day and it’s weird not having Shawn around. He got out of the hospital three days ago, but said he still hasn’t fully recovered from the minor car accident he was involved in. Just to make sure the story is legit, Graham smashed Shawn’s Jaguar into a tree on the outskirts of Princeton. Since Shawn was drunk and coked up when he tried to get into my pants, and traces of both alcohol and cocaine were found in his blood stream, this made total sense to the hospital staff and his parents.I’m not sad for him. I just hope Graham is right and Shawn will never try doing this to another girl ever again.

Jade is still pestering me about my relationship with Graham, so I finally decided to make it “official” by inviting some of my friends over for dinner with him. I figured it’d make everyone see that we’re just a regular couple and maybe make them ditch the whole “Dahl is screwing her daddy” running gag they’ve been taunting me with. I invited Jade, Britney and Sarah, another friend from school. Graham invited Carter, a guy named Ross and his younger brother, a guy I’ve never met before, Cole Savage. Graham was always careful to keep his real family separate from Mom and I. We saw t Cole is twenty-five and they’re only half-brothers from their dad’s side, but I am still eager to impress him.

For the past week, we’ve spent every single evening together. We have dinner, discuss our day and fuck like our lives depends on it until the early hours of the morning.

It makes me feel like a grown up. Like a woman. Like someone who is loved. I know my mom will be back soon, but I opt for denial at this stage as per usual. No harm in trying to forget about it. I mean, it’s going to happen anyway.

I’m in the kitchen now, making my special roast, the one Nana taught me how to make, and fry some bacon for my egg and bacon salad. I stand in front of the stove, flipping the juicy pieces that sizzle in my pan, when I feel his hard body grinding against mine. He is enveloping me from behind, planting a kiss on my shoulder and snaking his arm next to my waist to steal a piece of bacon. Graham throws it in his mouth and chews on the crispy piece of meat, deliberately doing so while his mouth is on my ear.

“So fucking tasty, but it’s not the only thing I wanna eat right now.”

“Then you’ll have to starve.” I cock an eyebrow, smirking as I fish some of the bacon out of the greasy pan and throw it into a bowl. “Because I need to fix dinner for eight, and I’m not even halfway done.”

His cock pokes at my ass cheeks and damn if I don’t want to turn off the stove, order some Thai food and tell my guests to deal with it.

“Oh, she’s sassy.” He sucks on my earlobe, palming one of my tits and circling his thumb around my nipple through my shirt.

“Does that annoy you?”

“Not really. Every time you say something mouthy, I just picture your lips around my cock. That’d silence you in a second.”

I turn around, opening my legs wider and hoping he’d take the hint, grab me by my ass and carry me upstairs, even though my inner thighs are still recovering from our session last night, when the doorbell chimes and Jade walks in swiftly like she owns the place. Graham offers me a look that says that he is unimpressed, reaches behind me, takes another piece of bacon and gets out of my personal space.

“Hi, Mr. Savage!” Jade waves the bottle of cheap wine she brought in her hand. Jesus. We’re not even trying to disguise the fact that we’re drinking underage.

“Hello, Jade. Call me Graham. Mr. Savage was her step-dad.” He cocks his head in my direction, and I giggle. Jade licks her lips and eyes his ass as he walks out of the kitchen and up the stairs. I smack my best friend, snatching the bottle of wine from her hand.

“Stop sizing up my man.”

“He really is stupidly gorgeous, you do know that,” she replies like it’s a bad thing, scrunching her face.

“Yes, it’s a problem. When his face is between my legs while he eats me like I’m his least meal, I sometimes yank him up by the hair just to get a kick out of having this gorgeous man serving me like I’m his queen.”

“I hate you. I’ll never have a sex life as satisfying as yours.” She punches my arm lightly.

“I have a feeling that’s not true.” I laugh.

A knock on the door sends our heads flying, and I give Jade the task of chopping the bacon and eggs while I answer the door. Britney and Sarah hug me and they brought a cake for dessert. Five minutes later, Graham climbs down the stairs and join us, having changed from his usual attire of an expensive suit to a pair of dark denim pants, white V-neck shirt and he’s barefoot.

The house is full of people, laughter and banter, and the kitchen is hot with food, and it’s the first time this place feels like a home. I think Graham feels it too, now that I watch him laugh at something Jade said, the wrinkles near his eyes showing that he is genuinely happy.

When the doorbell rings again, he goes to greet his friends, and when they all walk into the dining room, all four of us girls nearly drop our glasses of wines along with our jaws.

Shitting hell, Cole Savage.

If I thought Graham is a hottie, then Cole is a whole different ball game. He is so gorgeous it should be illegal. A cross between Jason Momoa and Brock O’Hurn. I want to cry just from looking at him. Tall as a tree, wide as a fucking building and with a light brown manbun and green eyes. He’s got sexy stubble and a playful smirk. Jesus, this man.

Jade clutches my thigh under the table. “Wherever he’s sitting, I’m sitting next to him.”

“But what about Carter?” I protest on a whisper.

“Fuck Carter. I mean that literally, unless, of course, Cole is game and then Carter can go fuck himself.” Wow. That’s a lot of fucks in one sentence.

“Okay, but what about me?” Jade sat next to me the minute we set the table.

“Honey, I love you, but as of two second ago, you’re no longer my best friend in this room. He is.”

I can’t help but laugh when Graham introduces everyone to each other. He does so with the formality of a European man and I love how he can be both playful and serious. He takes the seat Jade sat in just a second ago and we all dig into the food I’ve made. Looking around me at all these people, I have to admit that I am happy. Genuinely, surprisingly happy. I can get used to that. A part of me is sad that I’ve never experienced it before. I mean, even during Christmas, Graham would have someone set up a tree in our drawing room and we all bought each other presents and opened them on Christmas morning, but that was it. No dinner. No down time together. No nothing.

“So, Cole, tell me what you do.” Jade smiles widely, and hell, she’s pretty. I can’t blame Cole for looking at her like he’s having her for dessert. Only problem is, Carter is sharing the sentiment, which makes them both hungry for the same dish.

“I do whatever you want me to do,” he responds smoothly, winking at her, but not in a creepy way. Jade almost dies right here, while Britney and Sarah giggle. Carter takes a swig of his beer, and the room is so full of hormones, I’m starting to feel mine taking control of my body. I reach under the table and stroke my boyfriend’s inner thigh and even though Graham’s face remains indifferent, he reaches down and stops me, grabbing my wrist in his firm hand. I wince, and when he guides my hand to my own thigh, my eyes widen. I am wearing a skirt, and because of the central heating I didn’t bother with wearing any leggings either.

Shit, I think my plan is about to blow up in my face.

“Tell her more about what you do,” Graham instructs Cole dryly, all while guiding my palm between my thighs still holding onto my wrists. He takes two of my fingers and slips them into my pussy, tugging the left side of my underwear to make room for them. Cole continues talking as Graham forces me to masturbate in the middle of dinner. I flush. I am horny. I am out of my fucking element.

I start panting frantically, feeling my fingers against the wetness of my sex, thrusting into myself all while Graham guides me. I glance at him, panic and lust in my eyes, and see that he is still laughing with Cole about something he’d said and I didn’t hear, his free hand clutching onto his beer bottle.

I’m getting closer and feel my cheeks become rosier and my pants heavier. Oh no. I am going to orgasm in the middle of the dining room at the table. Shit, Graham. Shit, shit, shit.

“And what do you do, Carter?” Jade continues her interrogation of our guests. Jesus, this girl. Carter answers her enthusiastically, but I can’t hear a thing because I’m quivering like a madwoman, on the brink of one of the most intense orgasms I’ve ever had.

“That’s it, baby,” I hear Graham whispering. “Take it all in.”

And when he says that, he takes my hand, making me shove my fingers into my pussy up to the knuckles and feel how I’m clenching hard against them. I let out a scream, an actual scream, I kid you not, and all eyes move to me quickly.

Oh no.

Oh no.

“What happened?” Sarah asks, standing up. I’d scared her.

“I think I saw a mouse!” I blurt out the first, stupidest thing that goes through my head.

“I think I saw him too,” Cole says with a smile, standing up. “It went out the door. Hey, Jade, wanna come help me look for it?”

Another two weeks tick by, and I’m in love and happy, and it scares the shit out of me. I’m not used to it and fear begins to trickle into my gut. For the first time in my life, I allow myself to feel. I don’t want to lose this. My mom is coming back today and she’s not going to like what she’s going to see.

“I can’t believe we changed the locks,” I mutter, fingering the curtain of what is now
our
bedroom, looking out and trying to spot her car peeking from the main road.

“She needs to know we mean business,” Graham says simply, putting his shoes at the edge of the bed. He is getting ready for work.

“I’m scared.”

“I told you, Dolly, I’m not leaving you here to take the heat. We’re doing this together.”

I graduated from high school, alone. I didn’t want Graham to come to my graduation ceremony because I thought it’d be too weird after people had spotted us at the coffee shop, and he respected that. Graham and I have been looking for college courses for me in New York, but I was distracted by this moment, and now it’s finally happening.

“She’s here.” I hear myself saying all of a sudden when I see her red Mustang slicing through the landscape of our gorgeous neighborhood. “She’s coming.”

I run to the gate and open it for her, her remote won’t work anymore after we changed our whole security system, and mom parks in her spot next to Graham’s car.

She gets out of her car, without Julio, at least she had the decency to drop him off at home before she came here, and doesn’t even bother to take off her shades.