A Heart's War (The Broken Men Chronicles Book 5) (11 page)

Kayla’s words played over and over in my head.

Could I forgive myself?

Well wasn’t that the crux of it all!

Sitting at the table as I pondered this, I realized I was no longer alone when soft hands ran over my back to pause onto my shoulders with a light squeeze.  Morgan didn’t need to speak for me to know it was her.

“You shouldn’t be here.  Not after the way I spoke to you.”

“You can’t get rid of me that easily, Theo.”

“So it seems.  You should be running in the other direction.  You’ve had more than enough to deal with for a lifetime.”

“I’m a big girl.”

“I think I get it.”  I grabbed her hand and held it, pushing my chair back and pulling her so she sat on my lap.  She studied my face, grasping each side with her hands in a tender manner before leaning in and pressing her forehead against mine.  “I just don’t know if I can do it,” I whispered against her lips.

“We’ll take it one day at a time.  Now that you know that there’s no forgiveness to be given but your own, we can work on that.  Just don’t push those who care about you away when you’re more deserving than any of us to be happy again.”

“I want to be happy.”  My lips grazed hers.

“Then I promise I’ll try to make that happen, baby.”  And she sealed her vow with a light press of her mouth to mine.

“You make it easier.” I pulled her in tight against me, causing her to wrap her arms around my shoulders as I clamped my mouth to hers, a hand of mine finding the back of her head, holding her in place as I set to devouring her mouth in an intense kiss that showed her how much she affected me.

The place was quiet, the rain pinged at the windowpanes, loaning to the feel that we were the only ones in the world.  I had Morgan cradled against me, her head on my shoulder with the knit throw covering our nakedness on the couch.  It was a little piece of heaven.

Morgan’s hand ran up my chest, her fingers playing over the tattoo that lay between my pecks, climbing over my collarbones.  She sighed.

“That sounded loaded,” I remarked.

“Not at all.”  She lifted her head and kissed my chin.  “I was just thinking about how it’s been one hell of a day.  I know I should go home, but-”

“Don’t go.” It sounded like a plea even to my ears.  “I mean, you can stay, I want you here.”

“With the way you left, Kayla going after you, and then Savi leaving so I ended up chasing her here, I never had time to lock the house up.  I have to go and-”

I kissed her before she could finish.  “It’s okay.”

“Come with me.”  Her eyes displayed guarded hope that I would and my mouth ran dry, unsure of what my next move should be.  “I promise I won’t hit you with another two-by-four.  I’m really sorry about that, by the way.”

I laughed easily as I pressed my lips to her forehead.  “Are you sure?”  My eyes studied her face for any note of doubt to her invitation.  “I might never leave.”

She kissed the left side of my chest.  “Would that be so bad?”

“I thought you said you weren’t looking for forever?” I said, bemused.

“It’s not.”  Her eyes sparkled and she smirked.  “It’s right now.”  She climbed over me, straddling my hips, her hands on either side of my head and leaned forward.  “No one knows where we’ll be tomorrow, a year, or twenty from now, Theo.”

My hands roamed over her thighs, up to her sides, my thumbs rubbing just below her ample breasts.  “Yeah, but we’ve got a small problem, Morg.”  She recoiled at that, sat up and stared down at me.  When she made to get off of me, I grabbed her hips and pulled her back down, grinding my pelvis into hers.  Her eyes glazed over.  I lifted my hand up and tucked a few loose strands of her hair behind her ear.  “Oh yes, a little problem.”

“And what’s that?”  Morgan’s hands were braced on my stomach.

I grabbed her wrists, pulled her down towards me and with a swift twist of my hips, I managed to flip us so she lay on her back under me, and I nuzzled at her ear before whispering the next. “What if I end up wanting forever?”

Finding a soft warm body pressed against mine the next morning, and every morning for a week afterward, was new for me.  Morgan’s tight ass pressed into my crotch certainly did things for my libido, and as each day passed, I became increasingly aware of how happy a simple thing as having someone to wake up to made me.

Much to my regret, I left Morgan’s sleep-warmed form, headed for the bathroom to take care of business, then made my way to the kitchen, hitting the percolator’s
on
button on my way to the fridge.

Once fed, I headed out to check on things and greet the crew of guys that would be showing up to finish the outside component of Morgan’s upstairs addition today.  It wasn’t until I’d entered the old barn I’d been storing some tools and equipment in that I knew something was up.

What the fuck?

My temper was still at its edge as I neared Morgan’s drive with more provisions from the hardware store, to replace the damaged items I’d found in her barn this morning.  I’d spoken with my workers only to get nowhere.  No one knew anything, and no one tipped my radar as guilty either.

The hairs on the back of my neck stood on end as I checked my rear view mirror.  Something didn’t feel right when I spotted an older red Ford pickup truck, which had been behind me since my hitting the outskirts of town.

As I turned to pull up Morgan’s driveway, the tanker in question – which had slowed down – sped up and drove past the turnoff and kept going before I could get a license plate number or attempt at recognizing the driver.

I shook away the sensation that something was off and exited my truck, reaching for the couple of bags that lay on the seat beside me, and headed for the tailgate to get the rest.  Collecting the gallons of paint, I headed for the front door.

“Morg,” I called out. “I’m back!”

With the music cranked up, I knew exactly where she was.  With how high the decibels to her music was, it was a wonder that this woman wasn’t anywhere near deaf.  Hearing her voice above the country tune she had on made me smile.  She may have nothing on Brantley Gilbert, but she sure as hell knew how to
kick it in the sticks
as the song coined with the same name said it.

When I opened the room door, all thoughts of continuing with the day’s project or the suspicious tail I had acquired on my way home vanished.

With her hips swinging, hair tucked in some loose messy bun, her skin coated with a light sheen of sweat, a roller in her hand and paint spatter all over her arms, Morgan had never looked any better.

And then she did this little shimmy manoeuvre with her hips that set my blood on fire.  I wanted her, and I wanted her like yesterday.

Fuck it!

Setting everything on the floor, I couldn’t help myself.  I snuck up on her, grabbed her hips and pulled her abruptly to bump her rear to my front.

“Holy shit!”  The roller went flying as she spun around, then sucker punched me in the shoulder.  “You ass, you scared me half to death!”

I grinned down at her, then kissed her forehead.  “I’m sorry, but this little sprite had me mesmerized, and I couldn’t very well let her go on with her hypnotizing dance now could I?”  I kissed her now smiling lips as my arms squeezed her to me.  “Now what was that last move you did?”

“Hmm…” she murmured against my lips as I broke away from hers.  “You mean this one?”

She turned in my arms and proceeded to rub up against my front like a cat in heat.  Yeah, that was the one.  I groaned.

With the desk only a few feet away, I nudged Morgan’s hips forward until her balance was thrown and she had to lean forward onto the sturdy piece of wooden furniture to maintain her footing.

“Theo!”

“Don’t move,” I instructed her, my hands running up the side of her thighs to cup her ass.  “Seeing this ass in these shorts all day has been driving me crazy.”  She moaned when my thumb rubbed against the seam of the jean material that ran over the crease between her legs.  The heat radiating from her along with her distinctive scent of arousal had me salivating.

“W-what are you doing?” Morgan asked when my hands reached around her to undo the button of her shorts.  “We have people floating around the house, you can’t-”

“Baby, the only work they’re doing is outside today.”  I rubbed my crotch against her delectable bottom.  “If they need anything, they know to knock or ring the doorbell.”

“But-”

“Shh.”  I nipped her earlobe. Her body quivered against mine and with a few quick flicks of my wrist, Morgan’s shorts were on their way down along with her underwear.  “I want to thank you for the show.  In fact…” I reached to unzip and take myself out of my jeans, rubbing the tip of my cock in the slickened crease between her legs with one hand while I kept her pressed against me with the other.  “I feel hard pressed to be thankful in a very thorough manner.”

As if knowing what I wanted her to do next, Morgan spread her legs to allow me more room to move between her thighs.

Lining myself up with her heat, I slowly entered her, hissing “Yes.”  She whimpered as I invaded her depths, melting into me.  “So sweet, so hot, so slick.”  I licked my lips.  “I love how wet you get for me.”

“Just for you,” Morgan purred as I began to pull out.

“For me,” I said and thrust forward.

“Yes!  You!”

Her declaration did something to me.

“Brace yourself, baby, you’re in for one hell of a ride,” I announced right before I pulled back and slammed in as far as I could go.

Morgan cried out as her hands braced on the edge of the desk and I set the rhythm.

There wasn’t anything soft about the way I brought us pleasure.  It wasn’t sex. It was hot.  It was sweaty.  It was pure carnal rapture – animalistic fucking at its finest.

Hard.  Rough.  Loud.

The minute Morgan’s climax took her, I felt her insides clench down on me like a vice and I was a goner.  “That’s it, baby.  Take it all,” I said, spilling myself inside her depths, bringing forth a long keening cry from her as her pussy clenched me even harder as a second wave of orgasmic bliss rose on the tails of her first.

We collapsed to the desk where I was careful not to crush Morgan.  Our breathing stabilized, and when I could think straight enough, I pulled out of her and flipped her so she could face me.  The look of pure satisfaction on the woman’s face was something to boast about.

“Sweetheart?” I asked through the smirk that had overtaken my face.

“That was…” She raised her head and gave me a hard kiss before collapsing onto the desk, her chest rising and dropping rapidly.  “Just, wow!”

The reality of her size sunk in.  “I wasn’t too rough?”

She shook her head, a grin spreading across her face.  “Baby, I might be small, but I’m not made out of glass.”  Her hand came up and cupped my cheek.  I turned my head and kissed her palm without losing contact with her eyes.  “I loved it, but I have a question.”

“What’s that?”

“Where the hell did that come from, and when can we do it again?”

Nearly two weeks had gone by, and I wish I could say that the odd break-and-enter episode in Morgan’s barn had been a one-time occurrence, but it wasn’t the case.  After yesterday’s setback, however, I knew that someone was trying to send us a message.

Finding thousands of dollars’ worth of my equipment not only damaged, but some of it ruined beyond repair, was more than enough for me to bring in the police.

They came.

They investigated.

They left with nothing more than a report for their files and a half-empty reassurance that they were investigating things and that it was most likely teenagers.  Much to my annoyance, but feeling the need to spare Morgan any more grief and financial worry, I had my men help move the tools, equipment, and the shipments of building materials onto my property, locking them away in my garage, and only bringing them along when we needed them.

Two days later, I got up early to start on Morgan’s kitchen flooring.

As I walked to her garage – and not her barn – to fetch the tile we’d just locked up there the night before to make today’s task a bit easier on us, I knew something was wrong when I found the padlock clean cut and lying on the ground with the door ajar.

Sonofabitch!

Pushing the door open further to peek inside, I took in the mess I knew awaited me.

In heaps of rubble lay most of Morgan’s new Italian slate tile.  Cans of paint, varnish, caulking – whatever liquid that could be found – were splattered from wall to wall, floor to ceiling.  In the middle of the messy deluge was Damon’s classic ’69 Charger that – according to what Morgan had told me a few weeks back – he’d finished restoring right before his last deployment.

I took one last gander at the piles of what could mostly be considered garbage, and resigned myself to a day of dealing with the calls to my insurance and the cops for the second time in as many days, as I headed back to the house.

“What’s wrong?” Morgan asked as I walked into the kitchen, my face clearly displaying my anger.  She was barefoot, dressed in nothing but a loose fitting t-shirt that hung off her shoulder, holding a cup of steaming coffee out to me.  I took it from her at the same time she said, “It happened again, didn’t it?”

I nodded.  “It’s worse.”

“What about-?”

Before I could shake my head or say anything else, Morgan rushed out of the house and toward the garage. Setting my coffee mug down, I rushed after her.  I caught up with her just as she stormed through the garage door.

I knew what she was looking for.

With a pained cry, she dropped to her knees as the sight of her brother’s hard work showed its ruined state.

“Baby.”  I tried to get her to stand, but she was limp, covering her face with her hands as she sobbed.  I crouched down and wrapped my arms around her.  “Morgan.”  I turned her face into my chest and cradled her head against me.

“It’s all I had left.”  She sniffled.  “This junker he loved so much, and this house.  Except now, it’s really junk.”

“It’s fixable, baby,” I attempted to console her.  “I’ll take care of it.”  Keeping an arm wrapped around her back, I reached under her knees to pick her up.  Her bloodied knees made me wince.  Morgan’s body shook with sobs as she wrapped her arms around my neck and held onto me.  “Let’s get you cleaned up and then I’ll call the police.”

After the last incident, Paxton had asked me why I hadn’t contacted my old friend Shane.  Well, I guess I was going to now.  This wasn’t a sporadic innocent act of bored delinquency.  This was someone after my livelihood, and they were choosing to pick their fight with me on my woman’s turf.  The lingering question was why was this happening.