Uncommon Passion (27 page)

Katy started in on the argument midstream. They’d had it so many times she didn’t need a reason, or

even a word from Ben. “We’ve all moved on, Ben. All of us. Mom, Dad, Sam, me, Alan, the girls. Even

Chris. We’ve all moved on.”

“That’s great, Katy,” Ben said insincerely.

“You’re the one stuck in the past.”

Ben looked at Sam and saw what no one else saw, the pain hidden behind his brother’s eyes. The lines

around his mouth. The wariness. He wasn’t stuck in the past. In this he was Sam’s mirror, bearing witness

to the destruction of a soul, and if that was too hard for the rest of his family, too fucking bad.

“You two don’t need me for this,” Sam said. He crawled past Ben’s outstretched legs and lowered

himself through the hole in the floor to the ladder. His soft, loving
hey, buddy
drifted up through the

opening, along with Jonathan’s less guarded reply. Attachment issues or no, the kid loved Sam wholly and

completely. The thought of what might happen if things didn’t go well made Ben’s throat tighten.

“Dad’s sorry,” Katy said into the silence. “He’s sorry, and he regrets what happened.”

Regrets what happened?
He’d driven Sam out of the house with threats of a reeducation camp for gay

kids. He’d removed the carburetor from Ben’s truck so he couldn’t search for his brother, his own lost soul.

And when he’d started to cry, his father said,
Don’t you start. Don’t you fucking start. Be a man, for

Christ’s sake.

Ben kept his gaze locked on Katy’s face. “What exactly does he regret, Katy?” he said emotionlessly.

“Because the list of things he did to this family is too long for
sorry
to cover it.”

“You’re the one who’s ruined family dinner and holidays for a decade. Not Dad.” She shook her head.

“You’re just like him. Stubborn as hell, hard as hell.”

“How do you think justice happens, Katy? You think it comes from being soft and easy? You have no

fucking clue what happened to Sam, what he went through on the streets,” Ben snapped. “I do. I see it

every goddamn day. Sam’s got to live with that for the rest of his life. Dad does
not
get to set that down and

walk away with an apology.”

He was halfway through the hole in the tree house floor when Katy put her hand on his arm. “You’re

hurting all of us, Ben, but the person you hurt most is yourself.”

“Sam never pulls that pop psychology bullshit on me, and he’s a therapist, not a loan officer. You don’t

get to, either.”

Eventually, as the day dragged into later afternoon he made his way through the mellow crowd and

down the block. Inside his truck he turned on the AC and picked up his phone. Four twenty-seven. Not that

he was checking the time or anything. He scrolled through his missed texts and calls.

None from Rachel.

Well, fuck. A laugh huffed from his chest. He didn’t need to teach that girl any-damn-thing.

He picked up a pizza on the way back to his apartment. Dinner consisted of opening the box on the

coffee table and eating in front of the Sunday night game.

The knock on his door surprised him. The last time someone knocked on his door on a Sunday night

he’d ended up in a ménage. But the knock wasn’t military firm. It wasn’t tentative, either, and lightning

didn’t strike twice in the same place.

He opened the door to Rachel Hill, dressed in jeans and a white eyelet shirt that tied under her breasts,

her hair in a French braid as thick as his wrist. From his taller vantage point he saw bits of dried leaf

clinging to the strands. Emotion simmered in her whiskey eyes, too complicated for him to figure out.

Anger, mostly. He recognized that, no problem. Concern that grew as she studied his face, which confused

him. Today was what everyone did, a lazy Sunday brunch with family. No cause for concern.

The anger won. “An hour ago I lost my temper with someone, for the first time ever. It felt really good

so I thought I’d come here and try it again. Where were you?”

“Sam’s.”

His answer made her blink hard and look away. “Oh,” she said. “That’s nice. Did you have a good

time?”

He shrugged. “It’s just a family thing,” he said and left it at that.

“Why didn’t you tell me you had other plans?”

“Because I didn’t.”

She worked through the implications, then settled on the right one. “That is not all right, Ben,” she said.

Her voice was clear and even, not hushed to prevent his neighbors from hearing. “If I did something wrong

last Sunday, if you don’t want me to come around anymore, then tell me and I’ll find something else to do.

But be honest with me. Don’t make me guess.”

“You didn’t do anything wrong,” he said. “Guys just stop calling. You won’t know why. It’s what you

need.”

At that she turned on her heel and took two steps toward the stairwell. The sight of a white envelope

tucked into the back pocket of her jeans forced her name from his throat. “Rachel. Wait.”

She stopped. Turned back to face him. “I’m done with people telling me what I need, Ben,” she said

firmly, as if that could cover the tremor in her voice.

“Okay. I get it. I do,” he said and stepped back to open the door wide. “Please.”

For a long moment she didn’t move toward the stairwell, or toward him. But then she crossed the short

distance, and turned sideways to slip past him, into his apartment. He shut the door, then picked up the

remote and turned off the TV.

“It’s so complicated,” she said as she rubbed her forehead.

“What is?” he asked cautiously.

“Everything.”

The look she gave him wrenched something out of alignment inside him. Indomitable Rachel, with tears

in her eyes. Then she eased down on the arm of the chair next to the TV and pulled the envelope from her

back pocket. “My dad returned my letter. Again. I don’t know why it still hurts. I’ve sent him letters, one a

week since I left, and he’s returned all of them. Unopened.”

Ben folded his arms across his chest and sat on the arm of the sofa nearest her. “And?”

“I applied to vet tech school. They have rolling admissions so I should hear soon, but the waiting is

killing me.”

“And?”

“Jess is mad at me because she thinks I’m after Rob, but I’m not. I’m not. I just like him. He’s a friend.”

“He’d be more than a friend if you wanted,” Ben said.

“I know that,” she said impatiently. “I was never stupid. I’m not even naïve anymore. He wants me. I

want you. I don’t know what you want. You’re not my lover. You’re not my friend. You’re . . . It’s a

mess.”

He crossed to crouch down in front of her but refrained from touching her. “Do you want me to be

your friend?”

She reached out with her index finger and touched his lower lip, gaze fixed on skin-against-skin as she

pressed gently. The sweet taste of honey bloomed unbidden in his mind, fading again when her finger

traced down his chin to the hollow of his throat, then over his collarbone to tug aside his collar. The snap

below her finger gave way, the sound of metal popping loud in the silence.

She slid off the chair’s leather arm and slid down on her ass with her knees to her chest, between his

spread legs. Gaze still fixed on his, her finger followed the upper contour of his pectoral, tugging open

another snap in the process, then more directly moved down his sternum.

Click.

Click.

Click.

“Is that an option?” she asked.

Were they talking? He’d forgotten, because Rachel’s finger brought his skin to life. All the nerves went

on high alert in its wake, sensation coursing south to pool in his cock. The expectant look in her eyes

triggered his memory. Was being friends an option?

Click.

His shirt gaped open. He watched her eyes flick between his face and his torso, and didn’t answer the

question.

Disappointment flared briefly in her eyes. He saw the moment, the exact moment, she settled for the

sheer sexual heat simmering between them. She fisted her hands in his shirt and pulled his mouth down to

hers. The kiss was hot, electric, an angry, sliding battle of tongue and teeth. He teased her, holding back his

own emotional turmoil to heighten hers.
Get angry. Take it out on me. Make me feel something other than

this festering knot of anger and abandonment.

She got to her knees and reached for his belt, making quick work of buckle, buttons, and jeans while he

tugged her jeans and panties off. He sat back on his heels, pulling his wallet from his front pocket both to

ease the strain of his jeans pulling across his thighs and to get a condom. She plucked it from his fingers

and rolled it on, a brittle edginess in her movements. He rarely worried about putting himself in a woman’s

hands, but Rachel was strong, and pissed. She rode the edge, though, handling him just roughly enough to

make him insane.

He swallowed hard and wrapped one arm around her waist as she straddled his thighs, centered herself

over his cock, then wound her arms around his neck. Her lips brushed his, and this time she was the tease,

her tongue flicking at his lips, her breath heating nerve endings already sensitized to her kiss as she worked

herself down his cock.

Then she rode him with none of the connection she’d created when she tied him to his dinette chair. It

was hot and fast and completely focused on her own release. Based on the hitches in her breathing she took

a perverse pleasure in leaning just of reach when he tipped forward to kiss her. Really kiss her. Swiveling

and grinding on his cock, the end of her thick braid rhythmically brushing his forearm, slick little noises

drifting under their erratic breathing, she closed her eyes and took exactly what she wanted from him, while

giving him nothing. When she came she buried her face in his shirt while the contractions gripped the

length of his shaft, but he was nowhere near coming himself.

This he understood. Taking and getting used in return. It was simple, uncomplicated, and unemotional.

Who he was.

When her muscles slackened she shifted backward, clearly intending to push herself up and off. His

arm tightened at her waist. “Where are you going?”

“I’m done,” she said evenly.

“I’m not.”

“Perhaps I don’t feel very accommodating after being stood up this morning.”

The words were both dead serious and testing. He felt one corner of his mouth lift as he looked at her,

because he knew damned good and well the difference between
no
and
talk me into it
. “Perhaps I’ll change

your mind,” he said, mimicking her precise cadence.

Keeping one arm tight around her waist he rose to his feet. His jeans sagged low on his hips but not low

enough to hamper his progress to the wall between the kitchen and the bedroom. Her legs rose to clasp his

waist, but that slight surrender didn’t stop him from thudding her into the wall and driving in, hard, right

through her breathless gasp. Her eyes widened as she studied his face. The concern was back in her eyes, he

noted through the need raging inside him. Not concern that he’d hurt her or use her. Concern for him.

He’d heard the phrase
fuck her blind
, which was why he powered his hips and his mouth, ravaging

hers, as he pounded her into the wall so she would stop looking into his soul. It was hard, fast, ruthless.

Apparently the raw power worked for her because within moments her eyes closed and her head tipped

back, exposing her throat. Her hands scraped the back of his skull, holding his mouth to hers. The air in her

lungs, huffing out over his lips and jaw, was as erotic as her body tightening around his hips. Weight

braced on one forearm, the other under Rachel’s ass, he pounded his anger and frustration into her.

She took it greedily, urging him on, demanding more, until a strangled cry wrenched free of her throat.

Her pussy convulsed around his cock, hot and slick and so fucking tight that he went over himself. With

one final, deep thrust he nailed her to the wall with hips and chest, his face pressed against her cheek, and

poured everything into her.

This time she gasped for air like she was strangling. His fault. He straightened enough for her to breathe

more easily, and felt sweat trickle down his back and along his jawline.

“Better?” he asked.

“Yes,” she said, but the word lacked complete conviction.

He stepped back and set her down, disengaging their bodies in the same move. She took a couple of

tentative steps back to the living room, and by the time he’d ditched the condom she’d stepped into her

jeans and panties. He pulled his jeans back up and buckled his belt, but didn’t bother with his shirt.

“You’ve got leaves in your hair,” he said.

“Rob and I went on a picnic down by the river,” she replied.

It took only a split second to imagine the scenario that involved fallen dry leaves making contact with

Rachel’s hair. Jealousy roared through his chest and down his limbs to his fingers and toes. As if she felt