Unforgivable Read online

  With a groan, Mick scrubbed at his face, running his fingers through his hair until it stood up like he’d been in a tornado. Resting his elbows on his knees, he pressed his face into his palms for a minute or so, thinking maybe the floor would tilt beneath his feet. But nope, he couldn’t even blame his wakefulness on drinking too much. Shit.

  Stretching, he figured it was better to get up than try to keep sleeping when it was obvious there wasn’t going to be any rest for him tonight. Sunday morning was going to dawn whether he wanted it to or not. He might as well accept the fact he’d be up to greet it.

  First, a shower. Cold, to keep himself from sinking into erotic reminiscences of the afternoon and Alice in his bed. It didn’t help much. Sure, the frigid water goose-pebbled his skin, but all he had to do was flash back to the feeling of her underneath him, and his cock started twitching. He stroked a hand along it and bent his head into the spray with a groan. Another stroke. A shudder. Not even the fact that his teeth had begun to chatter could stop his cock from getting hard when he thought about Alice.

  Mick stroked a little faster, feeling his balls tighten. He pressed his forehead to the wall of the shower, letting the water hit his back in stinging spray—the pain, fuck yeah, he could admit that it made this all a teasing torture. A little faster. A quick palm of the head, then all the way down. He gripped the shaft and fucked into his palm.

  Imagining her.

  They hadn’t fucked for real in the past two days, but that didn’t stop him from remembering how it had been in the past. He groaned again, his hand no good replacement for Alice. Her slick heat. The way her body tightened around him when she came. There’d been times when they’d spent hours in bed, when he’d moved inside her, mesmerized by the look in her eyes when she finally tipped over the edge. When he’d been buried balls-deep inside her as her orgasms rippled over her, and he’d felt every single spasm on his cock as he stayed still. His fingers couldn’t replace the squeeze of her on him now, but damn, he was trying.

  Faster. This wasn’t going to be easy. Cold water, the fact he’d already come once in the past twenty-four hours and he was no longer a teenager . . . the fact his hand was his own and not hers . . . but closer, he was getting closer. He bent his knees a little, one hand on the shower wall, the other still working on his cock. He closed his eyes.

  “Fuck me,” he imagined Alice saying. Pleasure speared him. “Make me come,” he heard her whisper, and everything inside him tensed. Over the edge, hard, his climax short and sharp and somewhat unsatisfying. A little fraught with guilt. He spattered the shower wall and gasped, shuddering. Blinking. His cock softened faster than usual as the cold water became impossible to ignore and he actually bit his tongue with the chattering. It hurt, too.

  Rinsing himself and the shower of any evidence he’d just spent himself like a horny kid, Mick turned off the water and got out to towel off. A glimpse of himself in the mirror didn’t make him feel any better. He looked puffy eyed and scruffy, his hair a mess. He sneered. Glowered. Ah, shit, there was no helping it, he looked like 4:00 a.m.

  Wearing a pair of jeans and a button-down shirt he didn’t bother to button, bare feet, hair still wet, face still bristly, Mick went upstairs to see if he could round up some coffee. Someone, God bless them, had made a pot that was still warm, and he filled a mug. Added sugar. Took a minute to smell the glory that was coffee. Then went out to the deck to watch the sun rise.

  Alice, bundled in a fleece blanket, was in one of the lounge chairs, only her face peeking out.

  “Hey,” she said softly, not like she was surprised to see him at all. Almost as though she’d been waiting for him.

  Mick set his mug onto the railing and leaned against it. “Haven’t you been to bed yet?”

  She shook her head. “Dayna made coffee about an hour ago, and I was dumb and drank some.”

  “Ah.” He turned to look out over the yard and the sky above the tree line at the bottom of it. “Sun’ll be up soon.”

  “That’s what I’m waiting for.” With a yawn, Alice stretched under the blanket. “If I make it.”

  “Want some more coffee? You might as well. It’s going to be daylight soon.”

  “You don’t have to—”

  But he was already going inside to pour her a mug, adding the sugar and cream the way she liked it. Or she had liked it, back then. Uncertain, Mick brought out the mug and handed it to her.

  She sipped. “Perfect.”

  “Oh, good.”

  “You still know,” she said quietly.

  Mick didn’t answer. He faced the impending sunrise and drank his own coffee, thinking that action would make it easier to pretend as though he was trying to avoid talking to her on purpose. He’d never been able to fool her, though. Behind him, he heard the shift of her on the chair and the soft swish of the blanket as it fell away. He tensed, closing his eyes, waiting for her touch.

  It didn’t come.

  The hint of her breath on the back of his neck teased him for a second, but Alice didn’t touch him with anything else. She put her mug on the railing next to him and leaned on it. She shivered a little in the chilly morning air. The sky was starting to brighten enough that he could easily make out the curves and lines of her face even without the light from the kitchen.

  “Why do I feel like you’d still know everything about me, Mick?”

  He cleared his throat. “I wouldn’t. How could I?”

  “You know how to make my coffee. You know how to make me come,” Alice whispered. Her arm brushed his sleeve. He didn’t move.

  He forced the words. “I never knew everything about you, Alice. Nobody ever knows everything about anyone.”

  “You knew enough. More than anyone else ever did before you, or has since.” She went quiet.

  Both of them watched the sky getting paler. She sipped her coffee. Mick had lost the taste for his.

  “I’ve missed you,” Alice said.

  He’d missed her, too. For years, Mick had thought about Alice, wondering what she was doing. Who she was seeing. He’d seen her face on random women and in his dreams, always wishful thinking and never her, save that one lucky time a few years ago when he’d spotted her dancing with her friends. He’d been stupid, maybe, not to say something to her that night. He’d be stupid not to say something now.

  But though his mouth worked, his tongue trying without success to push the words free of his lips and teeth, the only thing that came out of Mick’s throat was a soft, hissing sigh.

  “Well, I guess that’s my answer,” Alice said, and went inside the house.

  He almost went after her, but as with so many other mistakes Mick had made, he waited too long. By the time he was able to get himself moving, Alice had gone inside her bedroom. Knocking would wake everyone up, if she deigned to answer. He almost did that, too, raising a hand to let his knuckles rest against the wood. Then his forehead. Straining for the sound of her inside, all he heard was the sound of his own breathing and the pound of his heart in his ears. His stomach, gone sour, sent a surge of bile into his throat.

  “Alice,” Mick whispered, knowing there was no way she could hear him.

  There was no light beneath the door, nothing to indicate she was awake, though he had to imagine she hadn’t simply tossed herself into bed and slept. What if, he thought suddenly, she wasn’t in there at all, but in his room? She’d done that more than once. Left him upstairs only to be waiting for him in his bed, usually naked. It was too much to hope for, but Mick let himself hope for it.

  Disappointment slapped him in the face when he found only the tangle of his sheets, his own drool-spotted pillow. He had missed her, that wasn’t the problem. Admitting it, saying it aloud, that had been too hard. Why? Because he was stupid. There was no other real explanation, other than faced with the reality of seeing her, all he could think about was how much he didn’t want to lose the fantasy. But faced with his empty bed, the empty room . . . empty fucking life, Mick thought as he sank onto