Serene (Shattered Book 3) Page 15

  “What exactly are you offering?”

  “Me…” I responded without hesitation. “Here. Now.”

  “Are you sure about this?”

  God, in moments like this I hated my blindness more than ever. I wish I could have at least one look at him, even if it lasted for a half a second.

  “Isn’t it obvious?” I asked with a smile.

  He chuckled and rose to his feet, now caressing my chin with his fingers, when his other hand kept touching me in the most sensual way.

  “Remember – you asked for it, Ivy Ryan. Because this ride you will never forget.”

  ***

  Stanley

  Fire crawled up my spine. I was seconds away from giving in to this blissful moment of pure excitement, but I couldn’t act like a selfish bastard, no matter how much I wanted to be one now. Ivy deserved so much more than this, and I fully intended to give it to her.

  I gently lowered her on the sheet, enjoying the view of her glorious body spread on my bed. Lord, if only she knew how many times I pictured her just like this – all ready and wanting and dripping for me. The smell of her juices filled the space around us, and I couldn’t wait to lose myself in it, in her.

  I tried hard to not come from the mere view opening in front of my eyes. She was just too amazing in her vulnerable need that couldn’t wait to be satisfied. I wasn’t the first man in her life, but right now, I felt like I was. I wanted to worship every inch of her, to show just how much she meant to me, no matter how alluring the thought of taking her right away was.

  Her eyelids were closed and I wondered if behind them there was the image of me – the way she imagined I looked like at the moment.

  Her senses were the only thing that she could rely on, and I wanted her to feel the whole range of things that had been filling me starting the day we first met. Was I capable of showing her how much I loved her? I never made confessions like that in a bed, or at all for that matter.

  I’ll try my best, I said to myself. No, scratch that – I’ll try better than my best.

  She put her hands on my shoulders, her palms slid up and down my back. We kissed again, with her fingers running through my hair, and my need to become one with her hit the roof. I broke the kiss and stood up.

  Quickly, I got rid of my clothes and then got back to bed and covered her body with mine.

  Her skin burned mine. Her swollen lips and flushed cheeks gave away her desire that was the reflection of my own.

  I pressed my hips against hers, feeling her wetness all over the head of my hardened cock. She groaned at the touch.

  “This is not enough,” she breathed into my lips.

  I smiled and covered her mouth with mine, before I whispered, “Neither is it enough for me.”

  I didn’t rush with my next move. Instead, I wanted to tease her just a little longer. Hell, I enjoyed the torture like never before, no matter how painful it was.

  My lips wandered down her neck, collarbone, and all the way to her waiting nipples that I hadn’t touched yet. The moment I sucked one of them into my mouth, her moans of pleasure and anticipation broke the silence of the room, making the empty walls shudder with barely audible echoes.

  Giving her other nipple a deep kiss, I pushed one finger inside her sensitive entrance, welcoming the way her back arched in response.

  God, this was too much. Too much to stand and too much to hold back.

  My gaze slipped up and down her smooth skin, where tiny drops of sweat started to form. She looked like a miracle, too beautiful to be real, but at the same time - too real to ignore it.

  Grabbing her wrists, I pinned them above her head, giving her another loving kiss.

  But the kisses were no longer enough.

  Without warning, I let my hardness push its way inside her dripping heaven.

  We moaned in unison, both welcoming the long-expected connection and dying to get so much more than this. I paused for a moment, not sure if I had the right to proceed with my moves.

  “I’m on the pill,” she said, as if reading my mind.

  “Good.”

  My breathing became rapid, thoughts disarrayed.

  How could I live without her for so long? How could I not know about her existence?

  When I turned my head to look at her, her eyelids flew open, as if she knew how much I wanted to catch the look of her eyes. If I didn’t know, I would have never believed she was blind. There was so much adoration in her gaze. And trust, and warmth, and something that I still couldn’t believe existed.

  Love…

  Again, I felt like telling her just how much I loved her, and again, I knew the time to say the very words hadn’t come yet.

  Right then and there, no words were needed. Even if what we felt for each other was the same, the words could wait until later.

  The rhyme of my moves slowed down and she immediately frowned, as if disappointed.

  That made me smile.

  “I don’t want to hurt you,” I said into her ear, then kissed her earlobe and sucked it in between my lips.

  “You are not hurting me. But if you stop, I swear, I will hurt you.”

  I laughed under my breath. “Noted.”

  I pushed harder, enjoying the way she welcomed my moves. Her muscles began to tighten around me, making my own desire to come even harder to suppress.

  “Faster,” she whispered in response to my thrusts.

  “I always knew you wanted me to the core,” I teased her.

  She grinned and said, “Years of abstention didn’t do me any good.”

  “Does this mean you are going to exhaust me every night, starting tonight?”

  “Do you mind?”

  “Not at all.”

  Just a few more thrusts, and I felt ecstasy splash all over me. It filled my every vein, as if blood was no longer needed to keep me running.

  I let go of Ivy’s wrists and she wrapped her arms around me, letting her orgasm take her away. I swear I never saw anything more beautiful than what I could see in her now. I pulled out of her, feeling a little high.

  She smiled with her eyes still closed, and my heart melted.

  She was happy, I could feel it. And I couldn’t be happier, knowing that I was the very reason for what made her smile.

  “Does this mean I will see you more often in my bed now?”

  She laughed and rolled onto her stomach, wrapping both arms around one of my pillows. I lay next to her, with my eyes travelling down her curves.

  “It doesn’t mean anything, Dr. Burke. I like my bed. It’s big and comfy. There’s no reason to change it for yours.”

  “This is exactly why I asked you to help me find a bed for my new apartment. I need a big and comfy one too.” I bent down and added in a whisper, “So you could spend a lot of time in it.”

  She sighed and moved a little so she could touch my face. “You really believe in this, don’t you?”

  “By this you mean us?”

  “Yes – us.”

  I turned my head and pressed my lips to the back of her palm. “I do. Always did.”

  She stayed quiet for a long minute, no less. Then she moved closer and put her head on my chest saying, “So when shall we go shopping? I’m a big expert in comfy beds, by the way.”

  “Oh, yeah? I knew I asked the right person to help me,” I said, wrapping both arms around her. “Do you think I should also buy a helmet before I go to work on Monday?”

  She giggled. “If you think it will save you from my sister’s anger, you are wrong. You will need something stronger than a helmet.”

  “I’m sure she won’t be that angry at me. After all, I saved her sister from a lifetime of ‘abstentional’ misery.”

  “How very noble of you.”

  “I know, right?”

  She punched my chest, offended.

  “Ouch, it hurts!”

  “Actually, Emery said that you are a good option to start with.”

  “To start with?” I chuckled. “W
hat the hell does that mean?”

  “It means she doesn’t mind I practice my seductive skills on you.”

  “Were those the exact words she said about us?”

  “Yep.”

  “Then I think I can go without a helmet. She likes me, I never doubted it. Even when she looked like she wanted to splash a cup of steaming coffee right into my face.”

  “You think all the women around you are in love with you?”

  “Isn’t it true?”

  She sighed again before saying, “Lucky me – now I have you all for myself.”

  “I don’t mind being yours and yours only.”

  “Good news – I can’t see any of your patients. Otherwise, I might be too jealous to let you work as a plastic surgeon. Blindness definitely has its advantages.”

  Speaking of which… A few days ago, I sent Ivy’s medical history to the doctor I thought might be able to help me find a solution for her problem. I was expecting him to call me back one of these days, and I hoped he had good news to share with me.

  Meanwhile, I needed to do a few more things before moving out of my apartment.

  “Will you help me sign the boxes?” I asked Ivy. “I think I forgot to do it when packing them.”

  “Then how on earth shall I sign them without knowing what’s inside?”

  “I’m afraid we will need to open them and check it out.”

  Ivy sat up and shook her head. “My sister was right after all – you are hopeless, Dr. Burke.”

  “I thought I just proved you different.”

  “Bed and surgery room don’t count. There you are God.”

  ***

  Ivy

  “Does this dreamy smile on your face have a name?” Emery asked, sitting on the floor of my living room. She and I were packing presents for Jesse’s birthday and since he always knew where she hid them, she thought it would be better to leave them at my place.

  “I have no idea what you are talking about,” I said as innocent as ever.

  “You are glowing, sissy. And I’m 100% sure I know there’s a reason behind your glow.”

  “If you think you know everything about me, then why ask questions?”

  “I just want to make sure my guesses are correct.”

  “Guesses about what?”

  “You and my boss.”

  “All I can say is that your idea about adding me to the list of his everyday appointments was great.”

  “So I thought… By the way, have you dreamed about your amber-eyed guy again?”

  “No. Why?”

  “Just curious. I still can’t believe you were able to draw a portrait of a man you never saw in real life.”

  I shrugged. “Talent and imagination don’t die in a car crash. Besides, I always loved drawing portraits.”

  “Right.”

  “Am I missing something about this whole ‘mysterious’ conversation?” I knew Emery too well to believe that her curiosity was just curiosity.

  “On the contrary – looks like I am the one who’s missing something very important.”

  I put aside a present I was holding in my hands and said, “Just spill it, sis. What’s bothering you?”

  “It’s just…”

  She didn’t have a chance to finish the sentence, because next second, my doorbell rang, and I went to open the door.

  “Are you waiting for someone?” She shouted after me.

  I shook my head. “Not tonight.” I was sure it wasn’t Stanley, because we talked just a few hours ago and he said he needed to study some papers for an early morning operation.

  But the moment I opened the door, my heart dropped to my feet…

  The scent I would have recognized anywhere.

  The scent I used to smell all over my sheets at nights.

  The scent that topped the list of things I tried so hard to scratch out of my memories for months.

  It belonged to the man whose betrayal almost killed me, turned me into nothing and then made me fight for every step I took.

  “Kean?”

  “Hello, Ivy…”

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  “What the fuck are you doing here?” Emery’s voice broke the icy silence between Kean and me.

  “I… Need to talk to Ivy.”

  His voice sounded different from what I remembered. Despite that, it hadn’t lost its ability to affect me. Only now, it awoke a whole new range of emotions inside me. I used to flutter from his every word, no matter what he was saying. My eyes would follow every small movement of his lips, making my thoughts concentrate on one thing only – kissing him senseless.

  “Don’t you think it’s a bit too late for talks?” It looked like Emery wasn’t going to give up easily. I didn’t blame me. She, of all people, knew how much Kean’s disappearance shattered me. As well as she knew how much effort and time it took me to ‘rebuild’ myself from zero.

  She was saying something about how much of a son of a bitch Kean was and so on and so force.

  Unlike her, I couldn’t make myself say a word. So I just let her lead in this ‘conversation’.

  I imagined talking to Kean many times. I imagined killing him with my bare hands, smacking his face, calling him every name in the book, sending him to hell, and doing many other things that in my opinion would make me feel like revenge was finally complete. But when I heard my name rolling off his tongue, it caught me off guard. And the most surprising thing was that I didn’t feel like killing him anymore.

  “Please…” Kean said.

  Mentally I thanked God I couldn’t see him. Something was telling me it wouldn’t help me play it cool. Either because I was scared to feel his handsomeness making my knees shake again, or because I didn’t want to see the compassion that I was sure would fill his gaze. Almost everyone I met for the first time, or after a long break, felt sorry for me. It made me so angry, I wanted nothing more than to send them to the hellish of hells and watch them burn in fucking flames.

  Emery’s poisoned laughter made me shudder. “Please? Seriously? After everything you have done to my sister?”

  “Give us some privacy,” I said, surprised I still remembered how to talk.

  “This is a bad idea, Ivy.”

  “Emery, please. I’ll be fine, I promise.”

  She thought for a moment, obviously debating between showing Kean the door and letting us talk. “I’ll be in the kitchen if anything.”

  “Okay.” I waited for her to leave and said to Kean, “Come in. Unless your visit is going to last even less than the last time you came to see me.”

  Sorry, not sorry, I mentally said. I couldn’t help myself.

  Wordlessly, he stepped into my apartment and I closed the door behind him. I walked to the living room and he followed me. I intentionally sat on a chair, in case he decided to sit down next to me if I took a couch. Keeping some distance between us was for the best.

  “What brought you here tonight?” My voice sounded firm, and I mentally thanked heavens for giving me the strength to not show just how much my ex-fiancé’s presence bothered me, in all the negative meanings of the word.

  “You look great,” he said, ignoring my question. Or maybe he was trying to win some more time to think about his next words. “It’s been a long time…”

  “Not so long,” I retorted, despite how endless first months without him felt. I cried myself to sleep almost every night, not sure if that was because I felt pity for myself, or because he was no longer there to hug me and tell me everything would be okay.

  “How are you feeling?”

  I almost cracked at his question.

  “How do you think I’m feeling?”

  “Listen, Ivy… I came here to apologize. I know it’s a bit too late for apologies, but trust me, I’ve been feeling terrible because of leaving you two years ago.” Sincerity filled his every word. For a moment, I was taken aback by how truthful they sounded.

  “Why?” I asked quietly. “Why did you leave? Because your fiancé was no
t perfect anymore?”

  “No… I left because I was not perfect for her anymore. You needed to stay strong to heal. The doctor said no one knew how long your blindness would last, and I got scared… Scared I wouldn’t be strong enough to help you through it.”

  Emery would most likely say he was just a coward, she said it many times.

  But something in Kean’s voice made me look at what he did from a different point of view.

  “You are right,” I spoke. “I needed to be strong. And maybe if you stayed…out of pity…I would never become the person I am now. Because thanks to the strength of the people surrounding me back then, I am who I am today. This is what I’m thanking you for with all my heart. You made your choice, and I accepted it. No matter how much it hurt at the very beginning.”

  “It’s not all, Ivy. There was something else that I felt like I would never forgive myself for… The accident. It was my fault. I should have paid attention to the road. Instead, I turned your life into hell. For two years, I’ve been living with the guilt so strong; sometimes I felt like I was lacking of air. The accident changed me. But the aftermath ruined me. I’d been falling asleep and waking up with the thought of ending my life, because I couldn’t look at myself in the mirror, knowing that my eyes were still healthy and could see the world around me, when yours couldn’t. I blamed myself for ruining your life, for taking away the vision that helped you create so many wonderful things. I…couldn’t stand the idea of watching my guilt staring back at me every day, for the rest of my life. This was the real reason for my leaving. I was sure you would start hating me, sooner or later. Even if we found a way to live together and make new plans for the future. They would never be as those we made for after the wedding. So I thought it would be better if you hated me for leaving you than for ruining everything that you loved so much. I’m not trying to justify my escape. I know it’s unforgivable. But I want you to know that it had nothing to do with you or your inability to see. I knew I did something pretty awful, and the more I listened to my conscience, the harder it was to make myself stay. Guilt filled me from within, it seized me, overwhelmed me. It made me feel like I was the worst person in the world. And you deserved so much better than that. You didn’t deserve a hellish life with the man who couldn’t get over his inner demons and just make you happy, the best he could. I’m sorry, Ivy… So sorry.”