Chapter 6
The rays of moonlight glinted across the window pane. It was still night out and that explained pitch darkness within. Lucy could hardly breathe. She woke to find Jace sprawled over her meshing her into the mattress. She shifted to shove him off, but he only snuggled in closer.
"Jace!" Lucy whispered.
"Yes," he replied, sounding incredibly alert.
"You're awake?" She asked him in surprise.
"Yes," he replied tightly, and just like that the sexual tension that was never far resurfaced so that Lucy shivered and trembled in reaction.
"Don't," he groaned out loud.
"I can't help it. This was a bad idea," Lucy whispered, her hands crawling up and over his back feeling him up even as she was clutching him closer.
"I know, but I saw no other way," he murmured softly, into her ear sending thrills coursing down her spine.
"You should have just left things as they were," she got out some lucid thoughts amidst her lust filled ones. Communicating was difficult. But her freely roving hands saw no such problems. "We are better off as just friends."
"Bed friends?" Lucy missed the questioning quirk to his brow in the darkness, but she couldn't miss the mockery to his tone. The resounding smack that echoed across the room was the ringing of the palm of her hand off the back of his head.
"Ouch!"
"Serves you right, buster!"
"Serves me, right? I am not the one with my hands all over your naked breast." Jace breathed down at her roughly.
"Are you saying you have breasts?" Lucy couldn't help asking pertly. "Besides I am not the one with nothing on."
"You're wearing nothing but your underwear." Jace had to remind her.
"And whose fault is that?" Lucy hissed out at him.
"Mine," he moaned tightly. "All freaking mine."
Lucy couldn't help but flick her taunt body against his strained muscles. The friction was amazing robbing speech momentarily from them both. They breathed out in harsh pants before Lucy pleaded again. "You have to release me." She didn't know how much longer she could hold her own against him. They shouldn't be in bed together, not the way they clearly felt for each other. The Neals were gone, they room was unoccupied. There was absolutely no reason for Jace to share this bed with her. Not anymore. Her back arched again helplessly to rub her breast against his chest.
Their groans were audible, mutual and heartfelt but then Lucy had had enough.
"Why couldn't you have just let things be, Jake?" She asked hoarsely.
"You're nineteen and about to head on out to college. I am not about to watch from the sides as some other guy sweeps in on my turf."
"I am not a patch of grass! And I have watched on plenty of times as you happily made out with other girls. Shouldn't I have my chance to play the field too?" Lucy asked reasonably.
"No."
"Jace!"
"If you hadn't been that young back then I would never have agreed to just leave things be. You had a valid excuse back then but... not... anymore," Jace muttered angrily, as he desperately avoided her searching lips again. They rolled and tumbled on the narrow berth. A double bed was no place for a full grown six-foot-tall athletic male and his hot hot half naked body to escape a hungry girl's reaching hands. How the tables turn?
"I had an excuse? Oh, don't kid yourself. The excuse had been all yours. You were the one who couldn't wait to leap into bed with the next girl who so much as smirked at you. You forget Jace Neil, that I not only know you, but I really know you."
Lucy reached out knowing fingers and ran them down his ticklish side. A bout of nervous laughter left him breathless but not winded.
"You don't know shit! You just think you know everything. Let me remind you Lucy Ara Little. You are not the brains in your family. Don't fire up those neurons and glial cells and let Cat do the thinking for you."
"You! Oh! Oh! You... oh."
Jace's knowing fingers slipped low down her torso beneath her panty line to flit across the hot lips in her nether region.
"Oh, by Cat you meant pussy."
"No, I did mean Cat but when it comes to your thoughts on me, I'd be happy to have you think with just your pussy."
"You wish!"
"Oh, I do! I most certainly do."
Their hands travelled unhindered roving where they would and exploring where they must, in utter abandon. There was no denying this rising passion for either of them. This had been long in coming, ever since she turned sixteen. Lucy's first and only kiss had been on her sixteenth birthday and with this man. Jace Neil, the best friend she had been lusting after, ever since.
Lucy could recall that day well. Her cheeks had been still tingling in awareness from the brush of his lips against them earlier that day. Her birthday present, he'd said. A kiss from him. A real kiss. Not stolen. Not shy. But bold and blatant. At that moment it had been everything. The merest brush of his soft lips against her skin and it had ignited an awareness she had been refusing to acknowledge before. Her best friend was hot.
But rather than invoke sentimental longings in her heart, his kiss had only wrought discontent. Lucy's temper, always ready to rise at the slightest provocation by Jace's mischief, had instantly risen. She saw red at Jace's attempt to muddy what they had between them. It was with this discontent that she'd reluctantly made ready for her sweet sixteenth birthday party. It was with this discontent that she had made her way down to the poolside later, where the guests already arrived had started to mingle. In her anger, she had been curt in accepting her birthday greetings, her angry eyes searching for the culprit who had tried to ruin the only sweet sixteenth she would ever have.
She'd found him easily enough. Her best friend, Jace Neil. Lounging in the pool with his friends. Friends Lucy didn't like and usually avoided when she could. That they were there, invited to her birthday party only had her fuming all the more. But her angry stare was snagged by Jace. His usual icy blues had smouldered with such heat as they held gaze. Lucy had found herself suffused with unwarranted heat. She was rooted where she stood, simply staring stupidly back at him. Without releasing his invisible hold on her, Jace broke away from their visual exchange to haul himself out of the water. He padded over to the low-lying diving board and stood poised at the end of it. His clear blue gaze searched and found her. Tawny gold sparks flew from the clash but Jace only lifted his brow challengingly before he moved to execute a smooth dive.
It was from that sleek dive into the water that spun her whole world turning it on its axis. Lucy begun to me view Jace differently. The same Jace, that she had grown up with and played countless tricks on, with her fateful sidekick, the twins, was the very Jace she suddenly couldn't tear her eyes away from.
He had been laughing at his own antics when his head emerged from the water flipping the wet strands up and away from his face so that his gaze sought and found her own mesmerised stare. The lust she had suddenly felt then had been acute. It had been immediately clear to Lucy that this was something more. Something entirely unexpected. Something to be wary of. Fear gripped her and sent her reeling as Lucy spun away to dash off into his room where her things were stored. That had been her mistake. She hadn't realised he'd come after her, that the first place he would look would be in his own room. But he did, and he found her. Lucy was sitting on the edge of his bed still shaking from reaction, trying desperately to calm her racing heart. She needed to think clearly. To make sense of what she was feeling for Jace. But the loud thudding of her heart blocked out everything else, even Jace's untimely arrival.
"Lucy?" He'd call out her name from the doorway.
She shouldn't have turned to look but she did. And then he was coming in and shutting the door behind him, locking it. Meeting his gaze, Lucy saw the same deep lust that she was feeling reflected in the heated depths of his baby blues. Lucy blinked and then he was there before her. Crowding in on her personal space, stifling her breathing altogether.
Soaking wet from the pool and dripping a puddle on the floor as Jace knelt before her. It was only a moment, but it had seemed an eternity, in which they gaze met and held. Then without a word, they were each leaning forward involuntarily. Their unblinking gaze drawing them in on each other until their lips meshed in what was their first real kiss. His sweet lips were soft as they pressed onto her own. Their breaths mingled on a pant then caught before with a helpless stifle, Lucy found her lips clung back with an unexpected tenacity. Jace tore his apart for a desperate breath before they resumed his expert assault. Her lips parted on his insistence and they his tongue was slipping in to flick languidly against hers in a duel as old as time. Her first kiss had been everything she'd hoped it would be and more. So much more. Lucy knew this was a kiss to would haunt her for life. A kiss that would spoil her for all others. The panic in her grew unbidden but then her world was tilting, and his sleek wet body was pressing down onto hers. Lucy's limbs acted of their own violation wrapping about him urgently as she hung on for dear life.
It was the most thrilling moment of her life. Her first kiss was beautiful. Jace was tender and gentle, but rough and urgent at the same time. Straining on his forearms he did his out most to hold back, to not simply take her lips as he would. But after the third and fourth languid kisses his control broke.
"Sorry." Jace had muttered against Lucy's lips before he took them again, this time roughly, to part and then plunder their depths. Again and again. In a ruthless advance that Lucy could only helplessly return. A strange weakness pervaded her limbs as Lucy found herself invariably melting in his arms. She could only moan out loud and beg for more with her body rubbing listlessly against his.
Thy laid there on his bed writhing against each other until a loud hammering rang on his door in a rude awakening.
"Hey Jace? Are you in there, man? Who's the chick? Want to share?"
The loud jeers and laughter of his rich spoilt friends rang out from the other side of the door jerking Lucy back to her senses. She panicked and shoving him off she tumbled out of the bed to set her swimsuit to rights before making for his widow. It was two-stories up, but it wouldn't have been their first time she'd clambered in or out his window. It was however, the first time he'd thought to stop her.
"Are you crazy? You could kill yourself!" Jace had reached out belatedly to grip at her arm. Startled Lucy had looked back up from her perch over his window sill. His concerned gaze burned down at her. It had been surreal. Jace Neil concerned over his tomboy girl-friend. A friend who was not a girlfriend but merely a friend who was a girl.
She had known instantly then, and she did now, that they could never be anything more. With a feral grin, Lucy had pushed off the ledge, leaping for the tree that would break her fall beneath and tearing herself away from his grip. It had been her great escape, one that had wisely shielded her from what would be a great many heartbreaks as Jace turned his attentions from one fleeting blossom to the next.
Only to find herself back where she started - three years later and trapped in his arms.
But thinking of that disruption to her first kiss served like a dash of cold water on her heated libido making Lucy realise afresh they were not meant to be.
The heat of his body washed over her in waves, silently working against her will, eroding away reasons to keep their distance and to go on as before. His very presence was a drug in itself and Lucy was a confirmed addict. For, why else would she keep throwing herself onto his path. Why else would she keep submitting herself to his presence?
Lucy knew she could not have him. But she couldn't seem to keep away either. This was unnatural what they had between them. Even she knew that. Knew it and couldn't fight it.
It had been an effort, every time, since that first kiss to restrain herself from throwing him down and having her wicked ways with him. But she had managed for three years straight to do just that. So why now? Why break her only rule, now?
The seaside winds picked up, rattling the shutters outside and sending in a cool breeze of the summer night. The smell of the sea was inviting but it did nothing to dispel the scent of Jace that was tantalizing her nostrils. Jace groaned against Lucy, pulling her closer, holding her tighter in his embrace until their chest rose and fell as one. Sharing each breath, each gasp for air that their passions for each other strived to deprive them of.
Jace nuzzled into her neck, raining gentle kisses across her collar bone before settling into a spot and suckling hard. Lucy bit down on her lower lip, working hard to keep from crying out for the pleasure pain was intense flinging her back into her memories of her sixteenth birthday.
Her sixteenth birthday had been more than just a coming of age for her. She had been forced to look at herself differently. Look at Jace differently. Look at them both with eyes wide open.
"We need to talk." Jace had said seriously, after that kiss, cornering her.
Lucy had kept away from Jace for the rest of that day moving out of her way to avoid him dodging any room or paths where she could hear his voice or that of his friends. It was well into the night when she made it back to his room to grab her pj's. The mansion was packed to the brim, so the twins and Lucy had sleeping bags strewn about Jace's room. She was glad the twins were already asleep in theirs, so Lucy had the comfort and security of knowing they were on hand to save her from herself- should the need arise. And it did.
Thinking to hide in her sleeping bag pretending at sleep, Lucy had rushed to the bathroom to change and had emerged to find Jace sprawled on his bed waiting for her. She gasped and moved back to shut herself in. Willing to spend the night in the tub if it meant escaping Jace.
"Don't!" He whispered then moved off the bed towards her. Crowding her in as he pushed his way into the bathroom with her to shut the door behind him. Lucy watched him turn the lock.
"We need to talk," he said again, this time softly. His tone oddly imploring. It was not a tone Lucy was familiar with, not coming from him... and certainly not directed at her.
She moved back to listen. "Go ahead," Lucy had said, warily.
"I've felt like this way about you for a sometime now. And it's been driving me crazy." His half laugh sounded oddly sinister as he tried his best to muffle the sounds. Both of them were wary of the twins sleeping in his room. Lucy shifted a hesitant glance at the door before turning back to face Jace. She didn't understand what he was telling her. Lucy was already panicked freaked out by her own unexpected feelings, she didn't want to have to contemplate his too not when they had apparently been brewing for quite some time.
Jace ran an agitated hand through his golden locks. His smile was oddly shy and a little rueful and he continued. "I've been feeling like a bloody pervert. I'm nineteen now and you've only turned sixteen."
Jace licked his suddenly parched lips before continuing earnestly. "I know you're still too young and I want you to know I will be here for you when you are ready for more. I will not kiss you again till you are. " His smile had been hesitant, a grimace of pain and not at all reassuring, as he intended. Jace stared at Lucy a moment, his smile flickering before fading away altogether.
"I won't kiss you again," he said again softly, his eyes serious as he lifted a trembling hand to run his fingers caressingly down her left cheek.
Lucy felt her eyes well up in unshed tears now on recalling that conversation. She hadn't understood it then. Not really. And had even gone so far as to not think about it at all. She had known that he was right. She had been unwilling to change what they had. True friendship, even one rocked by countless disagreements, teasing and taunting, was hard to find. She had been unwilling to risk it. Jace had been her only friend for too long, she couldn't have handled losing him. But that hadn't stopped the blinding pain from exploding in her chest each and every time she'd seen him smile at another girl, talk to them... date them. Her heart had splintered then, each and every time. It was a painstaking process re-joining the fragments but knowing Jace had been worth it.
They had not spoken a word in reference to that first kiss again. Jace had reverted to his usual self but the sizzle between them had not faded away as Lucy had hoped. It had only intensified over time.
With their easily combustible nature, it had only been inevitable, that they would one day find themselves back in each other arms.
Lucy writhed against his hold. Her cry of distress breaking off with renewed determination. She couldn't believe he had stooped to marking her with a hickey. As if that was going to change anything. If it did change things it certainly wouldn't be in his favour. Lucy turned her head wrapping his longish sun-streaked strands around her fingers as she wrenched his head off her neck. Her gaze was pointed and sharp as she took in the moist cherry redness to his sensuous lips and couldn't help licking her own in rapid response, but she wasn't about to be lured into that pitfall. Not this time.
Firming her resolve, Lucy met his passion darkened blue gaze and said, "We cannot do this. I am too different from you. We move in different worlds."
Lucy finally said what had been haunting her all these years. Their difference was irrefutable. They had the years of arguments behind them to prove just that.
"You think I don't know that? It's been haunting me for years. Not the way you think." Jace was swift to clarify. "I know you hate my circle of friends. That you would never fit in but that's just it. I don't want you to fit in. I want you to stand out. A beacon of what is pure and untainted," Jace demanded vehemently," It was why I kept my distance all these years. But I can't.... I cannot keep away any longer."
I will not.
The last was left unspoken between them but it remained understood.
Lucy sighed knowing they had reached a stalemate at this point, one they will not be able to overcome this night.
"Just give us a chance. That's all I ask," Jace said whilst looking at her so earnestly that she caved in. Looking into his soft caring eyes Lucy could only nod hesitatingly in agreement.
"But there are rules," she stated quickly, "I would like us to keep quiet about this at least until I'm certain this is what I want."
"Agreed!" Jace exclaimed excitedly. Lucy only smiled uncertainly at his enthusiasm before he engulfed her in a bear hug then rolled over to settle her on his chest. Burying his face in her hair he whispered softly, "You know I'm right in this. It's time we acknowledge what we have. Kiss me."
And Lucy obligingly did. A peckish kiss on his cheek. Turnabout was fair play. Willing to try did not mean an easy acquiescence. Her grin then was cheeky as he met the consternation on his cute face.