Compelled

Nicholas

Nicholas

I can’t believe this s**t.

I slip on my shoes and hunt around for my belt. I have never been so pissed in my life. Not even when my fiancé left me the night before our wedding. Not even when Terrence Donaldson tripped me in front of a table full of cheerleaders in high school. Never.

I’ve been waiting for Kenna to come back for over two hours. I managed to convince myself for about half that time that she’d only stepped out on an errand and would be right back. As the minutes continued to tick by, my irritation rose in equal degrees. I went back through every room in the house twice. I found a locked door that had a weird thumbprint scanner near the doorknob. I think it leads to the loft space that’s visible from the the living room below. I knocked and banged on it, but all I heard was the sound of my pounding echoing back at me. She was definitely not here.

I sit on the couch, with my hands steepled in front me, a deep frown making my face ache. Last night had been— unexpected. I’d had every intention of apologizing to her and then leaving. But when I saw her puffy eyes and sad, resigned face, I pushed my way inside.

We hung out for a while, and I realized that I had misjudged her. Aside from her exotic beauty, she was funny, eclectic and extremely bright. My begrudging attraction for her grew as the night went on and when she asked me to stay with her until she fell back asleep, I felt an unwelcome pull in my chest. I hadn’t meant to fall asleep too, but when I woke up she was having what I thought was a nightmare. Wrong. She was having a hot ass s*x dream and was moaning my name in the dark.

What was I supposed to do?

I had been fighting my lust for this woman from the moment I saw her. It didn’t matter that I thought she was a gold-digging tramp out to scam my family, I wanted her anyway. It took about a whole nano-second for me to decide to jump on the opportunity to get inside of her. My d**k stirs in my pants as I remember the smell of her, the smoothness of her skin, the tightness of her p***y. I shift on the couch, crossing one leg over the other.

She was the hottest f**k I’d had in a long time, maybe ever. She came with her whole body, holding back nothing. I felt like thumping my chest, Neanderthal style after her first orgasm. She was ridiculously bashful after, which I found oddly adorable. I woke her up a few hours later and f****d her again this time from behind. There were marks on my leg from where she dug her nails into my thigh as she came over and over. Christ, she was perfection. I had every intention of waking her up with my tongue on her c**t, but instead, I woke up to cold sheets and an empty bed.

My anger is at war with my d**k, both pulsing to the beat of my heart.

I am not the man who waits around for anyone, let alone a woman. They wait for me, beg for me. I can admit that my ego is pricked a little bit. It’s not every day that you give a chick multiple orgasms and then she high-tails it out of the bed. A whisper of a comparison floats through my head. I clench my teeth and shake it off. MacKenna is nothing like Diana. They couldn’t be more dissimilar if they tried. Kenna actually has emotions- she’s a scrambled up mess of love, humor, and sass. You can tell what she is feeling at any given moment. I would love to play poker with her, she’d get her clocked cleaned. Preferably strip poker.

Diana was cold, an unsolvable problem, an equation with no solution. I never knew where I stood with her. At first, I found it challenging and fresh; it was a novelty to be kept off balance, to be chasing. After a while, it became less of a novelty and more of emotional quicksand. Her acceptance of my proposal felt more like the end of a one-sided war than a celebration of love, like a cold blanket being thrown over a weak fire. Diana ran because she was exposed. MacKenna has clearly run for some other reason. I glance at my watch and decide that I’ll give her fifteen more minutes before I leave. I text my driver to be out front in exactly fourteen minutes.

I tap my fingers on my pant leg and watch those fifteen minutes slowly ebb away. My anger is spiking back up. I stomp toward the door, grabbing my jacket from the small chair in the foyer. I spy the spare key she told me about the night before, hanging on a tack that is shaped like a Spiderman head. I refuse to be moved by her hot nerd charms and grab the knob, flinging the heavy door open. I stop short when I almost smack into Kenna’s bedraggled little self standing with her keys in her hand, eyes big and round in her arresting face.

“Sorry? That’s all you leave me is a ‘sorry’?” The words shoot out of my mouth. Dammit. I meant to give off frigid and aloof. Instead, I sound like some emo f*****g teenager. This woman seriously messes with my head.

Her eyes get bigger, and a shaky smile crosses her full pink lips. “I guess saying sorry again right now isn’t gonna cut it, huh?” She pushes past me, and I see my driver about to get out of the car, the wipers furiously flinging snow away. I hold up one finger telling him to wait and close the door behind her.

I stalk to the living room, where she is gingerly pulling off her soaking wet coat. Her thick black hair is a soggy mess, and she has on mismatched rain boots. She has on slim lounge pants, and an old stretched out grey sweatshirt with faded lettering on it. I can see by the hardness of her n*****s that she isn’t wearing a bra. I frown at her violent shaking and grab a thick blanket from the couch, wrapping it around her. Pushing her down gently, I pull off her boots and rub her cold little feet between my hands. She silently watches me, a look of gratitude and something related to panic on her face. She left in a hurry and judging by her expression; I’m one hundred percent sure that I’m the cause of it. I dial back my anger and decide to try another tactic.

“Business meeting?” I ask her wryly. Her amber eyes narrow and she suddenly starts laughing. Shaking her head, she tilts it to the side. Her face is pale from the cold, her lips slightly chapped, but she is still the most beautiful girl I’ve ever seen. A bit of shame colors her cheeks and she grabs one my hands, which is still wrapped around her ankle. “I’m sorry,” she whispers.

I nod stiffly and stand up. “I’ll make you some tea. Don’t move.” I point at the floor in a commanding gesture. She rolls her eyes in her head and salutes me. Smart ass.

Her kitchen is a more modern, homey version of the sleek room Felice once had. I turn on the electric kettle and search the cabinets for a mug. She has an impressive collection from all over the world. I grab one shaped like hairy feet and see that has the words “The Shire Cafe” written on the side. My lips twitch, and I mildly chuckle. I don’t know what kind of tea she likes, but she has about ten different mint versions. I pluck out a random one and also snatch the bear-shaped honey bottle stored next to the mugs. I walk gingerly into the living room balancing everything in my hands. She is still balled up under the blanket, but at least her shivering has subsided. I place everything in front of her and wait while she pours an ungodly amount of honey into the hot water and dunks the teabag repeatedly. Her movements are slow and deliberate, and she is refusing to meet my eyes. I find my mouth struggling not to grin and decide to put her out of her misery.

“So?” I ask her leaning back into the cushions. She pauses in her dunking and peeks up at me. I raise my eyebrow and wait. She sighs deeply and takes a cautious sip of her tea.

“So.” She answers back. She sighs again and then scratches her scalp nervously.

“So last night…” She stops and winces.

“What about it?” My grin breaks through. Her discomfort is delicious. A scowl crosses her face, and she crosses her arms. She shrugs, and her sweatshirt slides off of her shoulder. Her freckles are jumping off of her face, and her juicy bottom lip is pouting slightly. I want to tackle her.

“You know what. You were there. We…had The Sex.” Her arms tighten, and her left leg is jiggling nervously. The s*x? I fold my lips behind my teeth. God, she is adorable. I can see that she is monstrously uncomfortable and that my laughing at her would be a huge mistake.

“The s*x? Yup, we definitely had—that. Was it not good?” I know for a damn fact that it was good. The best. I’ll let her little ass get away with a lot, but not lying about how hard I made her come. I’m not adverse to giving her a demonstration to remind her.

“You know it was, ok? It just should’ve never happened to begin with.” She abruptly stands up an starts pacing. Her lounge pants are still damp and are molding to her incredible ass. Each step is a hypnotic sway of her hips. I can feel my d**k hardening. “I mean we can’t take it back, right? We did it, it was great, but now we have to forget it and move on.”

Record scratch. What? I dial back into what she is saying, sure that I misheard her.

“What do you mean forget it and move on?” I stand up, and she takes a step backward. She’s so tightly wound, I’m shocked that she’s not a pretzel.

“Look, I have too much to lose here, you don’t. Your family may forgive you for a lot of things, but I don’t know if this is something they will get over. Felice is still scarred from all of that s**t that happened in the past. How many friends of hers did you screw right under her nose? How many were still her friend after? None. That’s how many. None. And not to be an asshole and bring up painful s**t, but no one in your family is over your …engagement. Did you know that half of these rich bitches are still snickering behind their hands at Grey? Some of them aren’t even nice to her anymore. They are happy you’re home, and that’s gone a long way to making up for it, but the last few years have been crappy for them.” Her fists are clenched at her sides, and a suspicious gleam of tears is in her eyes. My stomach twists over her recount of my family’s painful recent past. I distantly knew that I was leaving a firestorm behind me, but all I could concentrate on was getting away.

“We both know that this isn’t going anywhere, right? Is the family’s happiness worth a few romps in the sack? No, it isn’t. It’s better if we chalk this up to a few too many beers and leave it at that. I refuse to hurt Felice like all of those other girls she was friends with. I’m gonna be the one that sticks.” She’s shaking her head frantically, and the tears have started falling. “This isn’t me, ok? I don’t sleep with random guys, and I don’t sleep with guys when I know it will hurt someone I love.”

I rub the back of my neck and huff. She’s right. I always knew that the girls who Felice brought home were angling for a place in my bed. I never once gave thought to how it made her feel, and even though I was insistent on hating MacKenna, I could see the deep love they had for each other. More than once I heard Felice refer to her as “her sister,” and I knew that Grey and Charles adored her. Though my d**k is howling in protest, I nod gravely. I don’t want to hurt them anymore, and carrying on with a girl they consider family is bound to cause significant strife. I thought back to what my uncle had said about needing people. Kenna is panicked about losing her family; my family.

She stops her pacing and wipes furiously at her tears. She looks me square in the face. “Can we be friends? Like real friends. Not the friends-with-benefits type,” she quantifies quickly. “We don’t have to hang out and do stuff together, but we can be nice to each other, at least. I don’t want to fight with you anymore.” She sticks her hand out for me to shake. I stare at it a moment and then slowly reach out and engulf her small hand with mine. She’s still a little cold, and there’s a tremble in her fingers. My heart clenches a bit at her honest emotion.

“Friends.” I shake it briefly and then bend over to grab my jacket. Her hand drops back down to her side, and I stride out of the house without looking back. My driver jumps out of the car and quickly opens the door. I slide onto the warmed leather, and he pulls away. I should be feeling relief, but instead, a steady ache tries to crawl up my chest. I push it down determinedly and watch the snow-covered city speed by.