CandleMoth Vol 2: Possibly Never: A Holy City Romance Read online

  “Oh-!”

  I went to my knees, stunned.

  “You’ve been so bad, Lily. I’m going to fuck your mouth til your brain swims.” His hands knotted into my hair, pulling my scalp savagely tight. “Do I have your attention?”

  My nerves sizzled electric.

  “Say it,” he said.

  “Yes.”

  “You really think you can lock me out, Lily?” His voice was dangerously low. He bent my face to his cock again so that my ass went up in the air. “Say it.”

  “No.” I moaned, I felt the sound vibrate along his skin like electricity from a high tension wire.

  “Say you’ll never do it again,” he said.

  “Ry,” I said, around his cock, “please-”

  I wriggled, trying to get his fingers in me, but Ry only moved his touch away from where I wanted it, needed it. My legs were unsteady. I was close to letting go, to losing all control.

  “No. You’re mine,” Ry said. “Not til I say.”

  I wanted to babble like an idiot.

  My mouth fell in a circle up and down his cock. The brutal shape of it, as sense-memories of that cock driving inside me went spinning through my flesh:

  As above, so below…

  Oh jesus I want you.

  “I’m yours,” I panted. “Everything me, yours.” My lips and chin were wet, sloppy.

  Watching him, I took Ry deeper, running the weight of his cock back along my tongue and then against my uptilting throat.

  Wanting you inside me, all over me at once.

  My spine still curving up like a dog’s, and I was so wet for him my thighs were slick.

  It was humiliating, the sheer animal need Ry could weave up in me.

  Scary, too. To feel this bared, this hungry for his touch. To need someone this way- I could hate myself for it.

  Ry smacked my ass hard, making sure it would hurt.

  Then again. Harder this time. Overlapping the second blow with his first, moving the sting slightly. I bucked into it, trying to make him sting where I needed it.

  Ry laughed. “How do you like no, you bad girl?”

  No- delirious, almost limp on my knees, I could only shape the word.

  “No, you can’t have it yet,” he said.

  But No went like a current went through him and Ry staggered back, not wanting to release yet. He hit my towel rack, which was held in place with spit and tacks, basically, and the thing went clanging to the floor as another peal of thunder unrolled outside.

  He picked me up by the waist, manhandling me up against the shower wall, pinning me just above the slippery floor of the tub so that I was unstable, utterly exposed as he held my legs apart, staring between them. I flushed, embarrassed and aroused.

  But he wouldn’t let me touch him. My pajama bottoms were soaked, the silk rough and thick, and they clung to me, outlining every detail, rubbing tortuously. I panted, desperately unstable against the slick wall.

  My hands slid; I grabbed at the muscled curve of his ass, his athletic legs, trying to bring him closer. “Please-”

  Every movement rubbed.

  Ry let one of my feet slide to the floor. “This one is mine,” he said, still trapping the other in his hands.

  He stepped back, running his teeth along my calf. My foot still trapped in his hands as he skated his teeth and tongue down the sensitive arch of my foot, luxuriating back, his hips forward, showing me just how much he was enjoying himself, and the stubble on his cheeks sent shivers up my bones.

  “You like this, baby?” He kept forcing me off balance. Forcing me to rely on him, to float in the cradle of his touch. His free hand came sliding down my thigh to rest over my womb. His thumb teased my cleft.

  “I, oh, I need,” I said, stuttering with want. My legs were strong. I tried to curl him towards me, to force him where I wanted.

  “Yes?”

  But he was so much stronger, horribly out of reach, still torturing me. Ry stayed where he wanted to be.

  He slid his mouth down my toes one by one, dragging his teeth against the sensitive skin, laughing as I moaned and writhed. His hand nearly spanning the dish of my hips.

  My hair dragged along the slick wall as my spine went liquid, unstable. I felt hit over the head with the pleasure of his touch.

  “Oh, oh oh,”

  -and so glad I’d shaved-!

  Finally he came into my arms, slippery and hot. Our tongues blurred hard, his cock heavy in my hands. The taste of water in his mouth like kissing in the rain-

  Ry slid his face between my breasts, his hands hunting down my sides and finding my ass again. Squeezing and dividing me like bread, something he could eat, and then he knelt, licking my ribs on his way down to his knees.

  “I love seeing you like this,” I said.

  “On my knees?”

  His mouth at the softness of my inner thigh, spreading my legs, sucking and licking the tender curve, velveted with water and sweat and wanting.

  “I love you on your knees,” I said.

  “You’re the one on her knees,” he said, grinning. The warm spray of the shower, the room dense with steam. Ry’s hair dripping, glossy bright, was thick with water.

  I was screaming, on my toes with need of him and Ry stood again, lifting me, up, over his head, crazily almost over the top of the shower, feasting at me, his arms and shoulders so beautifully molded; there was nothing I could do but surrender, blood beating, pinned and spread above him.

  With a hot liquid rush my center dissolved.

  “Oh, so beautiful.” Letting me slide down, tasting the length of my body. “So beautiful, Lily.”

  I was boneless, sheer ecstasy, against his lovely chest.

  He plunged in me while I still throbbed. I dug my fingers into his shoulders; he was too much, he was just right, I wanted more. Never enough, our open mouths. Salt & copper, the warm water streaming down our backs.

  Ry shook his hair back from his face and ran his hand through it. Raking it back so that the curls clung to his neck, dark with water. His eyebrows curved together, gorgeously intense, and the heat of his expression sent a thrill stabbing through me.

  “Oh jesus oh god-”

  A train clicking up to high speed.

  We fucked deep, my legs wrapped around his hips, our bodies slamming together and my shoulders traveling up and down the slippery wall, both of us screaming and arched with rapture.

  “Baby I’m here, I’m here-”

  Ry let go too, his cock jacking hard so that we shattered down- into a pool of water.

  My crummy shower was clogged. Still headless with glee, it took us a moment to register how grimy the water was, that it was rising up grey to our knees.

  We started laughing, trying to splash ourselves upright. But my thighs were too buzzed to stand and Ry wasn’t any better. We leaned into each other, laughing, as he reached back to turn off the water so the bath wouldn’t overflow. Crowding me against the plastic wall to keep me warm while he knocked aside the curtain to reach for a towel from the wall.

  “Ah, shit!” he said.

  Because we’d knocked the towel rack down. I covered my mouth, giggling until I spasmed into hiccups.

  Ry bent, his side abdominals cording like rope, and whisked the towel up from the floor.

  “I can’t leave you in this place much longer. Everything’s falling down!” he said, enveloping us both with it. I looked down at my towel rack, lying there sadly on the floor.

  “I almost don’t want to fix it.” My throat was bruised with everything I hadn’t said. I pushed my face into his, hiding myself. “You’re making it so everything here makes me think of you.”

  Ry leaned back, the sides of his mouth flickering, wondering why he bothered with such a nut, probably.

  Without the noise of the shower, sounds outside came rushing in, as if a shell had lifted.

  The man in the hallway- he was still out there banging.

  “Oh, man. My neighbors are going to flip out. I’m
surprised nobody’s called the cops.”

  “I’ll deal with him,” Ry said.

  “No! It’s just a- reporter. I’ve got it. He shouldn’t see you here.” I whipped off with the towel, leaving Ry there in the pool of standing water.

  In the shadow cast by the overhead light, I could almost imagine the water, grey with soap, was enough to hold him. But it was my lie that trapped him.

  Ry’s shoulders sagged. He knew he couldn’t follow, not if it was a reporter in the hall.

  I paused. “I’ll be right back.” Wondering what it meant, that I was becoming a person who could lie so well.

  “Okay.” He didn’t look at me.

  Survivors are dangerous. There’s no trust, no faith. For us, free fall is the natural state. We’re ready for it, expecting it, when no one else even dreams its coming. That moment the false bottom of your cage gets pulled out, and you fall into catchless space.

  Survivors always find a way to land on our feet.

  “Ms. Inoue!” the man said.

  “I’m coming!” I said.

  His banging paused. I threw open the door, making my face furious. I was shower water puddling at my feet, some innocuous little Asian girl all wrapped up in a ridiculous beach towel. But I had my shoulders thrown back like a boxer. My chin held high.

  And ol’ Double Wide took me in with a grudging respect.

  “Leave now or I will call the police. You’ve no right to harass me.”

  I grabbed the folder from his hands. It was thick with what I knew to be crisp, dense bills, and I slammed it into his chest, noting with satisfaction the imprint of my wet hand against the fabric of his shirt.

  He dropped the package, shuffling after it like a crab. Christ, how much money-?

  “Tell Mr. Calhoun to shove that up his ass. I don’t want his dirty money. I want him to leave me alone. Please.” I closed the door.

  Still down on his knees, this time Double Wide didn’t bother with any loafer tricks.

  I stamped back to Ry, the fresh silence behind me telling me everything I needed to know...

  as the realization of what I’d just done sank through me.

  All those people whose well-being I’d jeopardized, just to be with Ry one more time.

  Not to mention Ry’s own inheritance.

  Yup, we’d flushed that too.

  Because even if Double Wide hadn’t actually seen Ry in my apartment, he’d surely heard Ry’s voice. Now all he had to do was report back to Mr. Calhoun that Ry and I were together again, and the Foundation would have its carpet ripped out before sunrise.

  Because Mr. Calhoun was willing to destroy people’s lives for poll ratings.

  And because I couldn’t say no.

  Almost without realizing it, I’d picked up my phone, was turning it back on. I was going to call Calhoun and scream in his ear the way his junkyard dog had banged into my evening. Since everything was ruined anyway- but as the lights came alive in my phone, the first message that scrolled up was the last I expected to see.

  It was from Casper Graham.

  “BLACKCATS is in new orleans this yr,” he said. “Let me make it up to you, Lily. two nites onstage. it’ll be fun, let’s make this right.”

  I’d always wanted to go to BlackCats. Beren had even talked about buying tickets together this year.

  And Casper… !

  I felt a flurry of joy just seeing his name on my phone. Even if he was a dick, there was something irresistible about him.

  I loved being around Casper.

  I just had to be careful to not trust him. Ever.

  Although I had a six digit savings account thanks to Casper’s giving me a role in his hit music video, he’d never asked if it was okay to use the footage we’d shot together. It’s hard to stay mad at a check, though. Especially when you’re scraping together dimes to buy groceries.

  I rubbed my phone, thinking. I’d never needed much to survive. I could easily donate ninety percent of those earnings.

  And I could make more. Casper would know a way. He was plugged in, he had industry friends, high level connections, all of that stuff.

  Until that moment, it hadn’t occurred to me I could keep the foundation afloat on my own. Just because Ry’s father pulled his funding didn’t mean the whole thing had to falter.

  The only thing coming to a stop, I realized with a smile, would be Calhoun’s campaign. If voters ever realized the man was star-crossing his son and threatening to desert-island kids who’d already been through hell-

  I stood there grinning, dripping shower water all over the floor. My fingers hovered over my phone. YES.

  “k,” I wrote.

  “I’ll set it up,” Casper responded, instantly. A stream of smiley faces pooling after that.

  Ry and I could be together if his father didn’t have any threats to wave over our heads. (Well, he could still pull Ry’s inheritance, but I’d think about that tomorrow.)

  But. If by some chance I couldn’t scrape enough cash together- how much did it cost to run a foster center, anyway?- and Mr. Calhoun got wind that Ry and I were still hooking up…

  I still couldn’t tell Ry my plan.

  Not yet. Not until I was sure it would work.

  Because Ry would follow me to BlackCats. He’d follow me anywhere, and sooner or later, there would be photographers. Then Mr. Calhoun would have no choice but to pull funding. I didn’t want to force the man’s hand until I knew I could win.

  Ry was shirtless, sitting on my bed in his jeans. His belly was flat and creased dark above the soft, wash faded denim.

  “Hey tiger,” he said, smiling. He turned one muscled shoulder to show me the marks I’d sliced into his back with my nails.

  Vivid as red pen.

  “Christ, I’m sorry,” I said.

  Ry’s pararescue tattoo flashed as he straightened, propping himself back on the bed. I wanted to wander my hands along the landscape of his shoulders and neck, easing the tension I’d brought there.

  “It’s okay,” he said.

  He started to say something else, too, but caught himself. Watching me cross the bedroom as if I were a mirage. As if he didn’t quite believe I’d make it all the way into his arms.

  It ached to make him suffer. To not explain why, suddenly, we couldn’t see one another any more.

  Equally, there was a part of me that didn’t want to explain, that didn’t want to admit to myself that what I was about to do - again- was wrong.

  I was in Ry’s arms again, I was between his legs. I put my hands to his head so my towel slipped to the floor and kissed his hair. We held each other tightly.

  Skin to skin.

  You are home, I thought, kissing his hair.

  “I ordered us dinner,” he said.

  I shifted in protest. The last thing I wanted to do was eat. Stress tied my stomach into knots.

  “No, you’re going to eat. Whatever’s going on with you, I’m taking care of you. The last thing I’ll allow is you starving yourself because you’re stressed.” Ry held me close. “Someone has to take care of you. And you’re going to let me. Okay, okay. No more talking, I promise.” He grinned. “Just fucking. I’m going to fuck you until you forget your name.”

  I looked down, trying to smile.

  I had to leave tonight for us to have a chance in the future. The longer I stayed, the harder it would be to leave.

  My plan was a clock in my mind. I was a minute hand, climbing the release of hours.

  This is what survivors know.

  You never explain, never apologize.

  Sometimes you have to travel alone. And explanations only slow you down. Sometimes the best way to keep your beloved close is to leave them behind.

  Just for a while. You hope.

  Who could understand this better than the daughter of a whore? My own mom left me behind during a raid.

  But there was something else in my mind, an image I wasn’t quite letting myself see.

  Casper Graham. His lo
ng brown hair tugged into a bun on top of his head, his forearms sculpted from playing guitar to packed amphitheaters around the world. He was super cute.

  And super selfish. You couldn’t trust him with ice cream in a snowstorm, much less your girl.

  And Ry hated Casper.

  Dear friend,

  Thank you so much for reading this series- there’s more coming soon!

  Meanwhile, I’d love to know your thoughts- what you liked, what could be better, all that stuff. If you’re enjoying the Lily and Ry’s story, please leave an Amazon review!

  Candlemoth: A Holy City Romance, Volume 3 is nearly finished, and will be available early August 2016. To stay tuned, follow my Amazon Author page to be notified when it comes up for Pre-Release...

  Meantime, here’s a little taste-

  How to Spend It

  Candlemoth Volume 3: A Holy City Romance

  by Pauline West

  Candlemoth Volume 3: How to Spend It, A Holy City Romance © 2016 Pauline West Any credits.

  Copyright © 2016 by Pauline West

  All rights reserved. Manufactured in the United States of America.

  Cover Image by Vanessa Mendozzi

  This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used

  in any manner whatsoever without express written permission of the publisher

  except for the use of brief quotations in a review. Contact author/publisher first at

  [email protected]

  “You won’t tell me where you’re going?” Ry said.

  “I told you, I can’t.”

  “Right.” It was the first time Ry had ever spoken sharply to me.

  His voice cut like an edge.

  Sometimes it seems to me that our emotions are the rooms we live in, and the shape of this feeling, of this sorrowful heart-shaped box I’d brought myself to stand in, suddenly the walls seemed so far away I realized I could get lost here, inside this terrible feeling.

  I might never find the door free.

  I was feeling too much.

  I slid from him in tears.

  “Christ, look at you. You clearly don’t want to do this. Whatever it is that you’re doing. Lily, this isn’t normal. I don’t understand why you’re packing-”