Feral Read online

  “Gross, spare me the mental image,” I answer, while silently applauding my successful topic change, even if it came with a side dish of yuck.

  We get to the Den. I have a momentary sinking feeling as reality comes to a head. Is everything going to just go back to the way it was before?

  Dean is already there. He looks up at me when we walk in, a little wild-eyed, like he didn’t sleep at all. Deric is rambling on about his trip with Dex’s group, totally oblivious to the fact the air has turned thick and electrified.

  “You listening?” Deric asks Dean. “You hungover too? I didn’t even see you drink. God, you’re all a bunch of pussies.”

  I can feel myself starting to blush, so I go to the bathroom hoping to gain a little control over my pulse and composure. In about three minutes Deric’s going to put it all together.

  I scramble in my purse for a mascara, something, anything, but all I find is Chapstick.

  Damn it.

  Well, at least my hair has mostly dried. I take a few slow breaths, calm my nerves and go back out. Deric’s playing R. Kelly’s Bump N’ Grind, going on about how Kia/Kayla/Kara wanted to do it in the backseat of his car to ’90s R&B.

  I just rode in that car.

  Ewww!

  The disgust is fleeting, though, as I come back out and the super-sexual overtones of the song and Dean’s hungry expression flood my system. It’s all making me every bit as uncomfortable and aroused as I was when I hurried off.

  “Anyway, Ava, how’s the site coming?” Deric asks.

  I try to train my focus on just my brother. “Uh, good. Yeah, it’s coming good. I mean, I’m not a web designer, obviously, so you know, keep your expectations ground level.”

  “I haven’t looked at it since you’ve been working on it. Pull it up for us,” Deric urges.

  I sit down to the used HP I talked them into picking up off Craigslist and pull up the site. The page loads and I start showing them the different sections. I’ve written up short blurbs on each of the guys, complete with some pictures I dug up at home of them as teens, as well as current ones of them on the job. Deric is sitting backwards in an extra chair looking over my right shoulder. Dean is on my left leaning in. His hip is brushing against my shoulder. If I turned towards him my face would be even with his crotch…

  Yummy.

  I give my head a little shake.

  Focus!

  It’s a lost cause. Every part of me is aching and sensitive. I can’t blame the hard cider last night, because I know damn well I’d jump his bones in a heartbeat if I got the chance.

  I can feel his hot breath on my neck. His hand is on the back of my chair and his thumb is making little swirls on the skin exposed by the back cut-out of my tank top. I close my eyes for just a minute, soaking it in.

  “Well, it looks good, sis, nice work,” Deric says, popping up. “I’d love to stick around here, but I need to run up to the Ranger Station in Beaver Creek and pick up my permit for the climb. I don’t trust Brody not to fuck it up if he has the chance. You want to come with Dean? There’s a cute new female addition to the Rangers…”

  Dean clears his throat. I smile to myself with the satisfaction I’m not the only one who’s distracted. “Thanks, but I’ve got to rebuild my front shock before it bottoms out on me and I eat it good.”

  Dean’s fingers are at the nape of my neck now, hidden in my mass of air-dried crazy-waves and reaching up to caress my scalp.

  “Suit yourself!” Deric says, grabbing a folder off the desk and heading to the door. “See you losers in a bit.”

  I want to retort, but I don’t trust my voice not to come out as a croak. The door closes and there is only silence and Dean’s hand at my neck. The sound of Deric’s car crunching over the gravel and down the road fades.

  Dean drops his hand from me and walks to the front door, looking out to confirm what we already know. We’re totally alone again.

  He turns around and I stand up. Our eyes meet and it’s like the last nine hours didn’t happen.

  We meet in the middle of the room, our bodies and mouths crashing into each other.

  My hands slide under the hem of his shirt, spreading across the hard planes of his chest, the defined cut of his abs, the wide stretch of his back and shoulders. I want to touch him everywhere. I want to feel him with every part of me.

  He’s kissing my neck and I’m yanking at his clothes. Desperation sweeps me up in its arms and I can’t get him stripped down fast enough.

  My hand finds his cock. It’s hard and throbbing… for me. For little vanilla Ava who follows the rules, pays her taxes, drives the speed limit, sleeps with the covers all the way to her neck and tucked under her toes… just in case.

  But I don’t feel like that Ava. Right now, I feel drunk on the sensation of having him hard for me and I want to do every dirty thing I’ve ever thought about but been too afraid to try.

  My hand is full of him. He groans and pulls back when I start stroking him.

  “What’s wrong?” I ask, in too much of frenzy to stop touching him.

  He places his callused hands on my shoulders and drags in a breath. “Nothing… everything.”

  “That clears it up then,” I quip.

  He flashes me an exasperated look. “You drive me fucking insane sometimes.”

  “Good.” I smile.

  “What makes you think it’s a good thing?”

  “This,” I say, reaching down to grip his erection again.

  “Wait...” He hisses and the sound fills me with confidence. I’m no virginal rosebud, but I’ve never felt this powerful with a man before. “Just… we need to figure this out.”

  I laugh. “I never thought I’d be the one explaining this to you, but don’t worry, it’s actually pretty simple. This,” I say teasingly, stroking him, “it goes u—”

  He crushes my lips, sweeping into my mouth with an urgent tongue and cutting my sex-ed lesson short.

  When I’m sufficiently buzzed on his kisses and I have to grip his shoulders to steady myself, he breaks away, pressing his forehead to mine. “Trust me, I know what to do with that.”

  “Kay,” I say, light-headed.

  “I just… I want this. I do, I really fucking do. Way more than I should, and that’s the problem.”

  “Alright” I say, getting nervous.

  “It’s just, if Deric found out… He’s my best friend and even if we weren’t running this business together, he and Dex are about the closest things I’ve got to family these days,” he pauses, raking his hands through his silky black hair, looking deliciously disheveled. “He expects me to look out for you, to protect you—not take advantage of you.”

  I can see the vulnerability there beneath his words. I get it, I do. They’re like brothers… but he is not my brother, and damn it, I don’t really think I need to take Deric’s feelings into account when it comes to who I date or sleep with… Hell, why does he even need to know?

  “I don’t want to come between you either,” I say, reaching up on my toes to kiss the stubble on his jaw. “So let’s just keep this between us… our sexy little secret. We’re both adults and you’re not taking advantage of me anymore than I’m taking advantage of you. There’s no reason we can’t have fun. It’s not like my brother, Mr. Casual Sex, is one to judge. Besides, Deric’s not my keeper. He doesn’t need to know everything, or everyone, I do,” I say, pulling my top over my head.

  Dean looks at me, wild-eyed. “So, there are others?”

  I smile. “Why? Are you jealous?”

  He growls and lifts me, taking my mouth in another mind-warping kiss.

  Guess that answers that.

  We fall onto the couch. He looks me over with a hungry sort of reverence, and then his mouth is on me. He’s kissing me everywhere, scorching my skin.

  Everywhere he touches me, everywhere his lips land, it feels like he’s peeling something away, bits of the shell I used to live in. I don’t know this person underneath, but she’s taking c
harge now with or without my permission.

  “I used to fantasize about this,” I whisper, surprising myself with the confession.

  Dean smiles and pulls back. “What?”

  I blush. “I’d imagine I was the girl you’d bring out here to play cheesy ’90s make-out jams for and drink wine coolers with.”

  “So you’re not as innocent as you seem,” he says, nipping at my collarbone.

  “Not at all..” I smile wickedly, grinding against him eager, urgent.

  Dean grips my thighs and slides back, pulling my shorts off at the same time. I didn’t have time to look for cute panties… not that I quite expected this to happen. They’re just plain black cotton boy shorts to match my black sports bra, but he’s looking at me like I’m wearing a twelve-hundred-dollar La Perla set.

  I’m a little paralyzed and a lot turned on as Dean peels them off gently and tosses them aside. I watch, mesmerized, as all those glorious shocks of jet black hair dip down to my thighs. He trails kisses along the inside of my thighs. Every inch closer he gets to my center, my senses clench.

  I’ve never done this. Boyfriends past may have wanted to, but it felt too private, too vulnerable… but right now, with Dean, it feels right. I want to explore, I want to be adventurous with him.

  I sigh, surrendering to his mouth as he uses his tongue to caress, to part and penetrate me. He’s stroking me towards some peak of sensation that feels unfamiliar. My thighs are tensing, everything in me is tightening, even my fingers in his hair.

  When he murmurs my name, the vibrations of his deep voice shuddering through me, it overtakes me, my consciousness slipping somewhere uncharted.

  I hear myself in the distance—a cry, hoarse and ragged. But before I can settle back into the present, he’s inside me. Some fragment of my mind registered him pulling back, removing his pants, ripping open a wrapper and settling back between my legs, but the detail-focused part of my brain has taken a back seat.

  All I know now is the glorious fullness that’s surging into me. I can’t help but be transfixed by the sight of our bodies coming together. The hard, tanned lines of him over me. All those taut muscles, straining, carrying me back up that rise with every thrust.

  I look up at him and his eyes are on my face. Their green depths are clouded, so full of intensity, and it’s for me…

  My hands are on his shoulders, bracing as I rise to meet his thrusts, until I feel my muscles going weak, sensation ravaging me. Everything contracts as I cry out again, lightning ripping through me. It’s an incoherent sound, a gasp, a prayer… and he’s joining me.

  Sweaty and wrecked, we collapse together.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  DEAN

  “You missed a hot little piece yesterday,” Deric says, getting out of the car.

  I’m in the shed, checking over my bikes after a morning ride with a group of amateur photographers looking to catch the sunrise over the mountain.

  Ava rode in with Deric again today. I make a concerted effort not to watch her as she walks into the Den.

  “Your gain, I guess,” I respond.

  “Damn right. She seemed into me, got her number for you, but since you’re so set on leading the life of a celibate freak, I might hit her up this weekend,” he says, leaning against my workbench.

  “Elbow deep in it these days, huh?” I ask, trying not to dwell on the fact that while he was getting me a phone number, I was inside his sister.

  You’re so fucking dead.

  “Man, if I knew I’d score this kind of pussy just by telling chicks I own my own business, I’d have started a fucking lemonade stand years ago,” Deric laughs.

  “Yeah, well, chicks are easy when you’re successful,” I say, feeling a touch bitter.

  “Guess you’d know more about that than me, I wasn’t exactly living the high rollin’ life like you before this.”

  “You’re not missing much.”

  “Is that why you’re so hard up? Some chick burn you?” he asks.

  “She didn’t burn me, just reminded me that nothing good lasts forever,” I say, sounding darker than I mean to.

  It really wasn’t that it was her. Stacie seemed like a good girlfriend, and there was a time I thought I was in love with her, thought we were happy, that there might be a ‘future.’ But once I fucked up and had my accident, lost my competitive ranking and big paychecks, she soon cleared up my misconceptions. She never loved me and I’m not sure what it was exactly I felt for her. I’ve never had a normal life. I’ve always been on the fringe, so I guess it makes sense I don’t even know what love is. When she dropped my ass for another pro rider, it wasn’t her I missed, just the feeling of things going right for me.

  Whatever she was, she taught me a valuable lesson: Don’t get too attached to shit, because it can all fall apart in an instant. You’d think I’d have already known that after losing Dad in the Gulf, getting ripped out of my high school and away from my friends midway through my junior year, not to mention being slowly pushed out of my own family by Terry, but apparently it took one fair-weather girlfriend to drive the point home.

  “Yeah, okay, I’m not touching that depressing shit. I don’t need your gloom attaching to my junk, cock-blocking us both,” he says, going inside and making a scene of shielding his crotch.

  He’s probably right. I’m not exactly a beacon of optimism. Still, all the darkness that’s been clouding me feels less stifling at the moment. I haven’t really thought about Stacie in a while.

  First with the business, and now with Ava. It’s almost, almost like things are going right again.

  Deric is in and out of the Den over the next few days, but I’ve got a lull, which means there’s plenty of opportunities to steal time with Ava. I know it’s wrong, us sneaking around like this, but even though I feel guilty, I can’t for the life of me stop.

  One taste sure as hell didn’t do it. I thought it was hard trying to avoid a perma-erection before we had sex, but now I know what it’s like, how next level addicting her body is, I’m more worried about components breaking from excessive use.

  Sex aside, I like having her around. She’s curious, she’s smart, and Ava doesn’t take shit. Having a brother like Deric I’m sure has a way of thickening your skin. I never expected to, but I love how feisty she can be.

  When I was raking in money riding in the pro circuit, I got used to a certain flavor of flattering, fawning groupie. No judgment on those ladies, but I’m finding I like being challenged a lot more than effusive adulation. The weird and somewhat alarming thing is, the more I let her into my world, the more I want her to hang around for a while. It’s a dangerous desire, one I know I can’t have. Other people maybe, but my life hasn’t been a festival of happy endings.

  “I thought you said you knew what you were doing,” Ava teases, as I take my time trying to mount the center pull brake on a bike.

  “I do know what I’m doing,” I toss back, “but some things take finesse.”

  “Hmm… an excuse by any other name,” she jokes. “Lucky you’ve got a little extra time now.”

  We’re in the shed. She came out here to tell me my next tour was running behind, but she stayed to hassle me, apparently. It might come at the expense of my vanity, but if it means having her hanging around more, I’ll take all the needling she can dish out.

  I raise a brow, giving her a pointed look and finish tightening the bolts in place, the wheel centered perfectly in the fork.

  “You were saying,” I murmur, pinning her quickly against the wall.

  “I was saying, you’ve got some extra time… What are you gonna do with it?”

  Her hand is at the button of my pants, already freeing my hard-on.

  “I think you mean who am I going to do and, baby, I think you already know the answer to that,” I say, biting at the smooth line of her neck.

  She makes hushed panting noises as I hurriedly yank her leggings and panties down and nudge between her legs, sinking into her soft heat.
>
  God, I love the sounds she makes and I’m increasingly grateful we’re out here in the middle of nowhere. There’s no way we could get away with this in a city office. Out here I can make her scream as much as I want.

  My phone rings, interrupting us. I glance over. It’s Dex’s ringtone.

  “Don’t answer it,” Ava moans, and I can’t quite manage to drag myself away from her.

  It’s quick and it’s hot, and even after I come I still want more. ‘Celibate freak?’ Not quite.

  We scramble to dress, knowing clients could still show up soon. I watch her slide her leggings back up, regretting I can’t pull them back down and taste her. I take out my phone and she runs back to the Den. Hell, even if I can’t have my hands or my mouth on her, I just want her back here with me.

  I shake my head. This is just supposed to be a little fun. Don’t go getting attached.

  Except I know I’m past that point. That dead, cold feeling creeps up and my stomach churns at the thought of this coming to an end, but I need to brace for it, because it will.

  It always does.

  “Hey,” Dex answers.

  “Things okay in LA?” I ask him.

  “Not really. I’m gonna be out another week.”

  “You got it,” I say quickly.

  “She’s going off life support and I need to stick around for the funeral. There are some odds and ends I need to deal with,” he says, sounding way calmer than I expected, almost robotic.

  “Man, I’m sorry, Dex…” I start

  “Don’t be. It is what it is,” he says coolly. “Tell me what’s going on back there? Ava sent me a link to the website and the business email she set up.”

  I can tell he’s shutting down, but who the hell am I to tell him how to process this stuff?

  “Things are going really great here. Don’t worry about any of it. We’ve got it covered,” I assure him, filling him on the details of the tours Deric and I have taken over for him.

  “You sound more chipper than usual,” he comments. “You finally bust a nut and break that sexless streak?” The comment is playful enough, but there’s an edge to his voice I don’t like.