Where the Streets have no Name (10 page)

Dreaming?

“
Are…” He licked his lips “…are you serious?”

“I am.”
Amelia reached for her black-rimmed glasses.

His hand closed over hers and he shook his head. “Leave the
glasses on, love.”

Her eyes widened.
“They aren’t too nerdy?”

“They’re bloody sexy is what they are, just like the lass wearing them.”

A beautiful pink hue stained her smooth cheeks. “I may be many things, Daniel, but I’m not sexy.”

“Bloody Christ, you are. D’you not see how you
affect me?” His eyes flicked down to her hands wrapped around the thick crown of his erection. God but it was the single sexiest thing he’d ever seen.

Thick, dark lashes dropped, hiding her eyes from view. “I thought…”

She didn’t continue.

“You thought what, Amelia?”

She stroked the length of him, firm and steady. His breath caught. Legs shook.

“I don’t know…maybe…maybe because I’m here and no one else is–”

“Don’t.” He grabbed her hands, working them up to the head and down to the base. “Don’t be an idiot,” Daniel ground out, his teeth clamped shut.

A quirk of her brow and Amelia grinned, moving her tongue along the edge of her bottom lip. “If there’s one thing I do know for sure, Daniel, it’s that I’m not an idiot. I may be insecure, but I’m not an idiot.”

In a flash of frantic need, he jerked her up his body, crushing his mouth to hers. He’d kiss the insecurity from her if he could. If that’s what it took. He’d do it, and he’d damned well succeed.

“You’re distracting me, Daniel.” Her mouth slid down his jaw, lighting his blood.

“Ah,” was all he said. What else did a man in this position say?

She moved in a slow, sensual
, teasing dance, licking his bare chest, dragging her teeth over a nipple. Every touch shot straight to his groin. His thighs burned with impending release.

Nothing on this earth prepared Daniel for the feel of her tongue on his cock. Amelia watched him from her spot, knee
ling between his parted thighs. A thick curtain of her glossy hair drifted over one shoulder. Tentative at first, she licked the underside, sucking him deep into the heat of her mouth.

Tension coursed in his veins
. Hot. Electric.

And the little vixen moaned
.

During the last fifteen years, Daniel endured much, but this was the sweetest kind of torture. The need to thrust his hips up, to force more of his cock into her mouth, it was
unbearable. He wanted to hold on, to prolong the feeling. She sucked him deeper, harder, working one hand hard at the base, and the other cupping him.

He couldn’t hold on much longer
, any more than he could if he was a goddamned super hero. “Amelia…” he said, voice shaking, hands fisting the sheets at his sides. “I…Jaysus. Can’t…”

She sucked harder, ignoring his words.
Stroked his length in tight, frantic squeezes. Daniel tried to hold back and failed. He had to warn her…

“Shite!” he shouted, pulsing
his release down her throat.

He tried to pull away but she kept her lips wrapped around him, swallowing him down.

Daniel couldn’t breathe. He shut his eyes, stroking her hair, emptying the last of his seed into her mouth. When he grew softer, she released him, planting a kiss on the softening crown of his cock and then his thigh. He looked at her then. Her expression yanked at his heartstrings.

The blasted woman just gave him his first ever blow job. And now, she sat there smiling like the cat that got the cream
, licking her lips. He didn’t know how, but he wanted to make her feel like she made him feel. Daniel reached for her but she jumped off the bed, shaking her head at him.

“It’s okay
. I-I…” Amelia swallowed. Shook her head again. “I wanted to do that for you but that’s it. Nothing else.”

Her words slapped him in the face then stabbed into his chest. Darkness ebbed around him
, closing in. Why was she being so elusive?

“Oh, no, Daniel, I…don’t be upset
. I just, I don’t know if I can…”

The lass stumped him. One minute she was open and honest and the next, completely shut off.
“Why?” he asked.

She shook her head, eyes shut, pain etched in her expression.
“I…”

His heart broke for her. Daniel didn’t know what she meant. A number of scenarios flashed in his head but he didn’t want to believe any of them. She had to tell him. He needed to make her talk before he did something stupid like rob a bank and fly to wherever she came from to smash some heads against brick walls.

“Amelia, love, I’m honestly curious. If you don’t want to talk about it, then that’s fine, but I need to know more.”

“Need?”

Did he say need?

He meant want.

Or did he mean need?

“Aye,
” he said, coming to a conclusion. “Need.”

She swallowed
, coming back to sit next to him. Pain filled her eyes with tears – tears she held back.

“High school…
for me, anyways, was awful. A smart girl with glasses and braces, taller than average and too gangly? I was a target. The popular girls…they…” Her chest shuddered “…they were horrible. But it was what they didn’t do that made my life hell.”

Daniel’s heart constricted. He held his tongue, waiting. This story belonged to her. Guessing, filling in the blanks,
that wasn’t his place. He held her hand, hoping the action explained what he couldn’t say in words.
I’m here.

“Someone…maybe even them…told a bunch of guys I’d be backstage in the auditorium during this
school dance. I wasn’t there to dance, I was there as a favour to the principal, helping with music and lights. Said he’d rather pay me, someone he could trust, than someone who’d take a huge chunk of money and do a crap job.”

Amelia sucked in a deep breath.

Anger had him clenching his jaw; Daniel saw red. The idea that any man, let alone a bloody goddamned group of them, attacked her…

He’d certainly have a reason to be back in prison if he ever got his hands on the
feckin’ bastards.

“Oh, no, I…” Amelia squeezed his hand, pulling him back from the blink of evil. “They didn’t…I mean, it wasn’t…r…” She shook her head. “I can’t say the word. No, they just…they beat me up. Bad.”

“That’s just as inexcusable! The bloody feckers.” His hands fisted. Knuckles cracked.

“Don’t be upset, Daniel, please. I’m fine now. I’m just… It usually takes a lot for me to trust someone, that’s all. I’m always terrified the same thing will happen again. I never did anything to them. They just hated me for no reason
– no reason I’m aware of.”

“Feckin’ goddamned twat
-waffles,” he seethed.

The blood in his veins
turned to a raging fire. He’d hunt down every last one of them and lash them to the rocks of a cliff to drown if he could.

“Daniel?”

Softness in her voice drew him to her. Concern knotted her brow. A little pink tongue darted out over her lower lip. God, but he cared. Was it too much, too soon?

“Amelia?” He gripped her hand tight in his.

She smiled a sweet little smile up at him before snuggling into his arms. “Thank you.”

Thank you.

Thank you?

She just…

Daniel swallowed again, his tongue dry and sticking to the roof of his mouth. No use pretending he was worthy of her, but he’d be damned if he’d let her think she was anything less than what she was; beautiful, kind, passionate, smart, funny, and everything he wanted. Ever.

“Don’t you be thankin’ me for nothing at all,” he whispered. “It’s me should be thankin’ you.” His hands moved over her hair from the top of her head to the roots, straight down her spine. She felt so right in his arms. As if God himself created her to be held by him.

“I should be thankin’ you,” he repeated, kissing her forehead.

Amelia sighed, a sleepy sound. He meant to say more, but after spending hours tossing and turning, and then… Daniel was exhausted.

He shut his eyes and held her close. Pretending, for a moment, he could keep her in his life forever.

Waves crashed at the jagged, rocky cliffs below. Violence in nature; the purest form. The air smelled sweet. Just like Amelia.

Jaysus, but she twisted him up in
bits. Feckin’ bits. He wanted to hold her, to protect her from everything and everyone bad. He wanted to wrap her up and keep her safe in his arms for as long as she allowed.

It wasn’t fair. But nothing about life was fair. Good people suffered for the horrid deeds of bad people, and those rogues went through life with a silver spoon shoved up their arses. In the short time he spent with her, Daniel saw Amelia as a kind-hearted, caring individual who put the needs of others before her own.

She’d be waking soon. He wanted to be there when her eyes opened. Wanted to be the first thing she saw, and then kiss the sadness from her eyes. Daniel turned away from the cliffs, making his way back inside the small inn. Quiet as he could manage, he slipped through the halls until he reached his bedroom door. Knowing she was on the other side, curled up in his bed – even if it was just his bed for the duration of their stay – gave him a sense of belonging.

He wanted to belong to her. He wanted her to belong to him. Wanted too damned much he wasn’t worthy of.

Back in his room with the door closed behind him, Daniel quietly toed off his shoes. The jeans came next, followed by his shirt. Wearing just a pair of boxers, he slipped beneath the covers, just in time for Amelia to roll over and enter his arms. The feel of her was torture.

Her scent teased his senses
. Heat from her body awakened his nerve endings and set his entire being alight with need. And all he wanted to do was kiss her. Everywhere. All day long.

Warmth surrounded her in the first moments of wakefulness.
Amelia sighed, curling her knees closer to her chest, enjoying the comfort. Last night she couldn’t sleep until…

Until she came into Daniel’s room.

Where she begged him to let her…

Oh my gosh, I didn’t…

She did.

And she loved every minute of it. Touching him, making him feel, taking his
mind from the faraway places it often vanished to. She made him see her. She made him want her. He did, she knew. He proved it. She wasn’t damaged, not to him. To Daniel, she must have been at least a little special.

The wonder of anonymity. Amelia sighed
. If he knew how her mind worked he might not be so quick to want her.

Daniel’s arms wrapped around her, holding her like she was the most precious thing
in the world. His lips touched the top of her head once. Twice. “That you awake then?”

“Mmhm.” Amelia slid closer
, winding her arms around the granite hard muscles of his shoulders.

“Good.”
Daniel held her face in the palms of his hands. Eyes searching.

For what?

She didn’t know.

Did he regret letting her do what she did last night?

Amelia hoped not. The feel of him in her hands gave her a sense of control she long thought she lacked. The scent of him drove her insane with wanting. The taste of him lingered, reminding her of the way his hands burrowed through the roots of her hair, softly, like he cared.

She met his gaze again, trying to figure him out. A small fleck of a scar under his right eye, barely noticeable from a foot away, stood out this close, with his breath bathing her lips.

“Let me taste you, Amelia,” he said, his voice low; almost like a growl. “I’m dying to taste you.”

Taste me?
What does he mean–

Gentle and warm, his lips
brushed against hers. Tempting. Teasing. Driving her wild.

“Let me,” he begged again, gliding his lips over her collarbone. His hands moved from her jaw, down her arms…down…lower still, massaging her ribs and sliding back up to the undersides of her breasts.
“Need to taste you.”

Amelia was powerless to deny him. Her body hummed with unexplored desires.
Electric jolts shot over her skin everywhere he kissed. Then his tongue…oh lord his tongue. Hot, wet, sucking her nipples through her shirt. A burning river of desire flooded down between her legs. She cried out, bucking her hips.

Coherence slipped away. Too many emotions to name surrounded her, filled her. But the sensations…the feel of his hands on her body, the way
his every touch and caress stoked the fires within her, it stunned Amelia into a state of bliss she’d never known.

“Daniel!”

“Ah, love,” he murmured, sliding lower. “Tell me I can; tell me you want me to taste you.”

Each pass of his lips over her skin sent tingles racing to her core.
Too caught up in the moment to worry about modesty, Amelia watched his descent down her stomach. “Please, oh god, please!”

Chuckling, Daniel hooked his thumbs
in the waistband of her shorts, slowly pulling them down her thighs, over her knees, past her toes, and dropped them on the floor. The bottom half of her was now completely bared to Daniel. His sapphire eyes darkened to cobalt. He licked his lips, staring at her with unrestrained hunger in the taut lines of his face.

Daniel knelt on the edge of the bed, taking one of her feet in his hands. He massaged her from the tip of her toes to her knee in long, languorous, and firm strokes. Each time he moved upwards, his hands neared her heat. She ached for him.
Mercifully, he didn’t leave her wanting for long.

The first swipe of his tongue turned Amelia into a frantic,
trembling mess. Strong arms held her in place on the mattress while he worked away at her core, licking, nibbling, sucking. Stubble from his jaw scratched the insides of her thighs, adding to the sensations. He pulled her clit into his mouth, rolling his tongue, flicking back and forth over the sensitive bud. The feel of him open-mouth kissing her most sensitive parts was nothing like she expected.

“Ah, Amelia, love,” he murmured. “You taste so good.” His tongue moved up through the very heart of her heat, long and languorous.
“So sweet.”

He stoked the flames low in her belly, drawing them out to her thighs and down to her toes. She shook with the need for some unknown release. Something was building,
something too profound to understand. She’d touched herself, rubbing this same area, but nothing compared to Daniel’s intimate kiss or his finger exploring her passage. The thick digit burned a little, stretching her.

Then he stroked some magic place inside her,
curling his finger there. Tremors of liquid heat slipped through her, like scorching hot waves crashing down, blinding her, tearing her apart in the sweetest torture. Amelia died in a flash of bright, blistering white; her body rocking against his mouth. In the next breath she was reborn. And he didn’t give her a chance to catch her breath.

Amelia cried out his name again and again, thrashing on top of the bed sheets. That same
wildfire sparked up and she gave in to the pleasure, letting it consume her.

When her body slumped down on the mattress,
Daniel chuckled, planting a chain of hot, wet kisses from her thigh to her chin. Then he claimed her mouth with stunning ferocity, covering her body with his. He thrust against her, rigid and throbbing. The only thing standing between his cock and her core was a thin layer of boxer-briefs.

Amelia wanted him. She wanted to feel him inside her, stretching her, filling her.
And the thought terrified her more than she’d admit.

Sighing at her lips, Daniel
shifted to the side, resting next to Amelia. “You’re so beautiful, love.”

She tried to reply in the negative but nothing worked. His tongue and hands turned her into a useless, limp mess.

“You said you wanted to do tourist-y things today.” Daniel stood, the stiff length of his most male part straining under the stretched out fabric of his boxer briefs. “So let’s get showered, have breakfast, and head into Dublin then, aye?”

How was she supposed to think? Amelia wanted him. Why hadn’t she pulled him into her when he was there? So close…brushing at the centre of her need.
And he wanted her too. She saw that clear as the sun shining through the window.

What the hell was she thinking?

She had to call her best friend. Gabby would talk her down from this crazy, needy ledge.

“You go shower first,” Amelia said. “I don’t need to wash my hair today, so I’ll take less time than you.”

“Okay.” He kissed her, like he was learning the taste and feel of her, imprinting her inside his mind and soul. Then Daniel headed for the bathroom.

Grabbing the edge of the sheet and pulling it over her exposed thighs, s
he watched the play of muscles on his back, the flex and strain, until he shut the door. She waited for the sound of water. Then Amelia dove for her cell phone.

A perpetual night owl, Gabby would be awake and, no doubt online, too.
She monitored the games from time to time, making sure anyone who broke the rules got kicked off, and their IP addresses were blocked forever. Amelia didn’t put up with bullies in the real world anymore and she wasn’t going to allow it in the fun worlds she created either.

Playing it safe, Amelia checked the RP forum Gabby frequented and sure enough, her pseudonym made a post less than five minutes ago. Amelia brought her phone to her ear and waited while it rang.

“Well if it isn’t little Alex Q.”

“Gabby,” Amelia sighed.
“I’m glad I caught you.”

“Uh-oh, sounds serious. What’s up? Do you need me to catch a flight out there? Damn, I knew this was too hard–”

“No, Gabby, I’m handling things…surprisingly well. Look, I don’t have a lot of time, but I need your help.”

“Ohh, sounds ominous.”

“It is,” Amelia sighed. “I kind of…met…a guy.”

Gabby shrieked.

Amelia yanked the phone from her ear until the screaming finished.

“Holy shit! You did it, didn’t you? You finally had some hot dirty sex, didn’t you?”

“What?” She gasped. “No!”

“Aww, why not?”

She eyed the door nervously, then said, “Um, well, we might have done other things…”

“No. Freaking. Way. Tell me everything!”

Quick as she could, Amelia told Gabby everything about Daniel, leaving out the prison part. All she needed now was for Gabby to blab to Amelia’s parents. “So now I’m trying to think of a reason why I shouldn’t…you know…go for it. I figured you’d be my best hope. The one to talk me down from…doing that…with a guy I’ve only known for a few days.”

“No way, lady. I’m saying go for it. And you already know it isn’t going to hurt, not like if…you know…everything was still intact.”

Amelia met Gabby at an animal shelter fund raising event shortly after she finished school – which was also shortly after she faced the group of boys. One of them kicked her between the legs so hard she saw stars. It was the single most painful experience of her life.

After that,
Mom sent her to see a gynecologist, just to make sure there wasn’t any damage. The examination took care of the proof of her virginity though.

“How do you know it won’t hurt?”