Chapter 8

“You’ve seen this before.” Cody blinked and then turned to see Sid watching her. “You were...somewhere else just then,” he pointed out. “If you want me to go....”

“No, sorry just...you wouldn’t even believe what a stupid day it’s been,” she explained, wishing she could tell him everything that had actually happened. He had one of those faces, open and honest with eyes that said whatever you told him wouldn’t go any further than right here. She opened her mouth to tell him and then thought better of it, and shook her head. “How’s the head?” she asked, purposefully changing the subject. 

“It doesn’t hurt when I’m with you.” It had been one of those questions, sort of like ‘hi how are you’ that you ask to be polite, because it’s what you do and she’d fully expected the usual response of ‘fine’. She’d definitely hadn’t expected that and as she turned to see a bright pink tinge creep up his thick neck and into his cheeks, she realized that he hadn’t expected to say it either. 

‘Now what do I do?’ she asked herself as they stared down the length of the couch at one another. It had been bad enough, the few times their fingers had brushed when they’d simultaneously reached  into the bowl of popcorn she’d set between them, but this was not inadvertent, maybe unintended, but the expression in his eyes said he meant it, every word. 

Part of her brain told her to ignore it. The same part of her brain that had wanted to ignore his big, expensive SUV in the driveway and pretend not to be home, until Becks had given the game away. She didn’t want to drag him into the hell that her life had turned into. Flirting was one thing, but actually getting involved with someone would mean coming clean about who she, who they were and what they were actually doing in Pittsburgh and the chances that he wouldn’t run screaming out the door once he knew....

On the other hand, the other part of her brain was screaming ‘Oh for fuck’s sake, he’s gorgeous, jump him!’ It had been a while and she was inclined to listen to her libido. Especially with him sitting there in a t-shirt that was screaming for mercy at the width of his shoulders and was sitting so flat against his chest she could count every ridge in his six-pack. Not to mention the way he was filling out those jeans. The seams of the dark denim were stretched to the limit over his massive thighs and if she looked one more time at his package....

“I’m friends with this spring board diver, or I was...,” she began, flexing her fingers which had begun to tingle at the thought of running through his thick, dark hair. “She hit her head, kind of got clipped by the board when she didn’t clear it,” she explained, remembering clearly the sound of Lisa’s head when it had contacted her skull. She’d felt sick to her stomach when she’d heard it and worse when she watched her friend’s body fall like a rag dog into the pool. “She had a concussion. It was pretty bad, stitches too, but she liked it when I gave her a head massage. I could...I mean if you wanted I could...,” she flexed her fingers again and then patted her lap. 

‘What are you doing?’ the part of her brain that knew where this could lead asked in a huffy sounding voice, while the other part of her brain was already turning down the lights and putting on music that, in her brain, sounded a lot like ‘bwa chi chi waa waa’. 

Was it her imagination, or did he move the bowl of popcorn and toss himself down on the couch, his head in her lap, in about half a second? He crossed his ankles and threaded his fingers together in the middle of his massive chest and closed his eyes. Sidney Crosby was completely and entirely at her mercy. 

Cody’s hands shook as she reached in to dig her fingers into the thick, dark hair on the top of his head. It was soft and silky, like he’d just recently washed and conditioned it. Not a lot of guys took the time to do that. They all would if they knew how it felt to a woman’s touch. Having been a swimmer her entire life, she was careful to only use the best products, even though most of the time she wore a swim cap. All that chlorine had done horrible things to her hair. It took a lot of good, deep conditioning to make it as soft as his hair was now. 

He let out a little grunt, and his full, soft, pink lips turned up at the corners as she pressed her fingers down into his scalp. Glancing up at the TV, she was glad that they were missing this part, the part with the rain and, well, what came next. She didn’t need any prompting to want him to press her against a wall and ravage her. Looking down at his meaty fingers she was already imagining what it would feel like to have him run his fingers over her skin. 

“Do you miss it?” she asked and the twitch at the corner of his mouth told her he knew what she was asking about. 

“All the time, everyday,” he admitted with a sigh. 

“Could you go back now?” she asked, not because he didn’t flinch or wince at anywhere she touched, but for more purely selfish reasons than that. 

“Maybe,” he frowned, his eyes still shut. “I know there are guys who’ve played worse off than I am now but...there’s still times when I can’t even be in a room with the lights on, you know?” Now he did look up at her and Cody caught her breath, like a soundless gasp as she looked down into those gold and bronze eyes. She nodded, not only because there was no way to actually form words with him looking directly at her, but because she was afraid if she actually did speak what would come out of her mouth would be something like ‘are your lips really as soft as hubba bubba?’ “I don’t want to go back until I can play...well, like I know I can. I don’t want to half ass it. Until then...well the guys will just have to keep doing what they can,” he sighed and then his eyes fell shut again and only then could she take another breath. 

“It must be hard to watch,” she offered, her gaze tracing the scar bisecting his chin, the one above the corner of his lip and lastly, the way his long eyelashes curved as they fell softly onto his cheek. 

“Yeah, I pretty much hate it,” he grinned suddenly, his full lips pulling back over white teeth and Cody felt her heart stop suddenly. Damn the man didn’t even have to do anything to be sexy. A totally sincere and unguarded toothy grin and she was reduced to a pile of wet clay, literally putty in his hands. “You know though,” he opened those glittering orbs of his again and reached back with one hand to brush her arm with his fingers, stilling them on his temples, “with your swimming, I mean, and your niece.” 

‘Can he see my heart beating?’, she wondered, ‘and does it look like it does in the cartoons where it’s all heart shaped and sticking out of my chest?’ He didn’t wait for her answer, which was probably a good thing as Cody was fairly certain it would have come out sounding something like 

‘befubpshhlitchshoogaagaagoogoo’. He merely used his superior strength to pull her down to him, his other hand slipping into her hair as their lips touched. 

It was awkward and in no way satisfying as a first kiss, but it didn’t matter. It got past all of the should I’s and can we’s and all of the other questions that had been plaguing him since he’d made the decision to come here tonight. It was 'yes' to so many questions and it silenced the rest of the doubts in his brain as he got to his knees and held her face in his hands and pressed his mouth against hers’ and felt her hand slide up his back until she was holding onto his shoulders, her nails digging in as he urged her lips open and reached for her tongue with his own. 

His body, that had felt like it had been put in stasis for weeks, suddenly felt alive, every nerve ending and every receptor shooting off like fireworks all at once. For a moment he thought it would happen, the headache, the blinding shooting lights behind his eyes would come back as the blood coursed through his veins like a dam had been released somewhere in his body, but it didn’t. As he eased her back on the couch and gently manoeuvred his body over hers’, all he felt was her lips and the soft press of her breasts against his chest and his overwhelming need pressed against her stomach. 

Damn, he was like a twelve year old with a Playboy. He was practically humping her leg as he slid his hand up under her t-shirt, cupping her breast in his hand. She moaned into his mouth and pressed her hips up against him. This was going too fast but there was no way he was turning back now. The thought of this, of being with her, had been one of the only things that had gotten him through these past few weeks. 

He slid his hand beneath the satin cup of her bra and rolled her nipple between his thumb and forefinger and she gasped, tipping her head back and arching her neck invitingly. He kissed every pale centimetre, feeling her pulse jumping under his tongue as he sucked at her fragrant skin until she cried out his name. 

He liked the sound of it. He liked the way she said it. Not as much as he liked the way that her niece did, Sid thought with a smile as he rolled her t-shirt up to bare her breasts to his eyes, his tongue and his teeth. He made a long, slow sweep of his tongue around the pink, uneven skin of her areola. Her fingers dug into his hair and he wished, for the first time in a long time, that he had more of it, that he hadn’t been keeping it short. Running his tongue over the hard yet yielding pebble of her nibble, he felt her entire body press up against his and heard her release a low pitched whimper of submission. 

He moved his mouth to her other breast and repeated the successful formula and was again rewarded with a sound that he felt through his entire body, his cock throbbing painfully against the restraints of his jeans as he pressed it against her hip. He could ignore it. He’d had years of training in ignoring his own physical needs. 

“Little eyes.” Barely pausing, Sid tugged at her nipple between his teeth. “Hey, little eyes, watching.” She tugged at his hair, as much of it as she could get in her hands, forcing him to relinquish the prize in his mouth long enough to look over the arm of the couch. 

“Oh...damn,” he hissed, meeting the anxious gaze of a little blue eyed girls with pig tails the colour of corn silk wearing a pale blue onesie with pink feet, worrying at the thumb in her mouth and holding tight to a bright blue teddy bear. “Uh hey squirt,” he called out, pushing himself up and off of Katie in one smooth motion so that she could slip further down the couch and make herself respectable. After all, he only had to hide himself below the waist. “Can’t sleep?” the little girl shook her head. “Nightmare?” She nodded, her big blue eyes reminding him of those pale little statues Nathalie had around the house. “Want me to read you another story?” Another nod and then the wet popping sound of her thumb being removed from her mouth as she held her head out towards him. 

As if he hadn’t already been playing the maracas on her ovaries, watching him sitting on the edge of that little bed, reading the 'Berenstain Bears and the Bad Dream' was like having an entire mariachi band do the meringue on her fallopian tubes. That he’d already volunteered to do it once had made her want to hug him until he turned blue. Doing it twice without being asked? Well if she hadn’t already thought about taking him to bed and doing things to him that would make his mother blush....

“Better?” he asked and Becks nodded, her eyes already fluttering closed as she yawned and snuggled into her pillow. As Cody watched, he tugged her covers up and planted a soft kiss on the little girl’s forehead and, of course, one for the bear too. 

Before he had a chance to turn around, Cody snuck down the hall, leaving her t-shirt behind like a crumb to follow. Shrugging off her bra, she hooked that on her bedroom door and then pulled it shut as she hopped on first one leg and then the other as she kicked her jeans into the corner of the room. 

Grabbing a box of matches, she quickly lit the dollar store candles she’d stuck into the empty bottles of equally cheap wine that had been her only company on the long winter nights she’d spent watching old movies or re-reading Maggie Shayne romance novels. Just as the door opened, she slipped beneath the down comforter and did her best to look as doe eyed and alluring as she imagined those heroines did when their buff and burly heroes came to their rescue. 

He stood in the doorway for a moment, her t-shirt and bra in his hand, looking like he wasn’t sure if he wanted to cross the threshold, like he’d suddenly gone back to being the shy boy she’d met weeks ago. She was about to say something cheesy like ‘I promise not to bite, unless you ask me to’ when he stepped into the room and quietly closed the door behind him and then leaned back against it. 

“You don’t have to do this,” he began, looking at her mostly through his long, dark lashes. “I mean, with little ears down the hall....” 

“When she’s out, she’s out like a light,” Cody offered him an encouraging smile, touched by his thoughtfulness and what appeared to be a case of honest to goodness performance anxiety. Not that there was a chance of there being any chance of being disappointed with him. Not from what she’d already felt and experienced. 

“I uh...I just have to go get something out of my jacket,” he mumbled, turning red as he draped her t-shirt and bra over a chair by the door. 

“If you mean these,” she called after him before he had a chance to open the door again. “I found them in the bag with the ice cream.” 

He had already been turning pink but now his entire face was suffused with heat and colour as she held up the box of condoms he’d bought at the Seven Eleven. Unlike Max, he didn’t announce the fact that he was planning on getting lucky every time he bought condoms. In fact he’d had some in the car but when he’d checked the expiry date he’d ended up tossing them. 

“No pressure, right?” she said, raising her eyebrows at him.

“I didn’t mean to presume. I mean I hoped, obviously...but ummm,” he looked over at her and her entire face lit up as she grinned at him.

“Get over here,” she giggled and then promptly disappeared under the covers. 

Sid tugged his t-shirt off and threw it behind him as he reached for the top button on his jeans. He hesitated, trying to decide if he should leave his underwear on, wondering if she had and glancing around the room to see a pair of white cotton panties bunched up with her jeans. Digging his thumbs into the waist band of his jeans and boxer briefs, he pushed them both down and stepped out of them and then sat on the edge of the bed to roll off his socks. 

He felt the soft press of her body against his back. It felt soft and warm at the same time. Her mouth felt hot and wet on the back of his neck. He closed his eyes and leaned back into her, sighing as her fingers dragged slowly up his chest, making him shiver. 

Shit, she’d barely touched him and he was aching and hard. How many times had he lain awake thinking of what this was going to be like? Had she? Had she thought it would be like this or the way so many of the girls that he’d been with, all flowers and candles and silk sheets? 

He knew none of the other guys worried, or cared much for that matter, if the women they had sex with got off but he’d never been that cavalier about it. It wasn’t his competitive streak or even that he was worried that he’d end up with the kind of reputation some of the other guys probably had amongst the women that showed up at places like Diesel or Lava. He was too choosy, too worried about stage five clingers for that. It was exactly because he was more selective than the other guys, because he only went this far with women that he liked, because he wasn’t into the one night stands that he wanted this to be more than a roll in the hay. 

“Are you sure?” he asked, reaching up to press his hand over hers’ where it rested on his shoulder. ‘And what if she says no now genius?’ he asked himself as he felt her lips pause at the nape of his neck and then withdraw.

“Give me your hand,” she whispered in his ear as he felt the mattress move beneath him. He let her take his hand, let her lead it slowly down and back until he felt the smooth skin of her thigh and then...oh Christ then, the hot, wet heat of her. 

She gasped as his fingers slid into the smooth slick core of the valley between her legs and her other arm came around his chest like a vice. Like if she didn’t hold onto him she’d fall. He pressed his own hand against the one that was pressed flat against the centre of his chest and wondered if she could feel his heart beating for her. “Oh god,” she gasped and pressed her forehead to the back of his head as he slid his middle finger over that magic button, the pearl in her treasure chest.

“Lay down,” he whispered against her cheeks as he leaned back, wanting her mouth. Her pupils were dilated as she looked down at him, her hair loose and falling around his face like a chocolate waterfall. He let go of her hand and she slid it up to cradle his chin as she pressed her lips over his. Like the first kiss, it was awkward and not exactly what he wanted but his cocked throbbed appreciatively anyway. 

And then she was gone, her body peeling away from his. He heard the rustle of the sheets as she lay down as he finished tugging his socks off and then he joined her, aligning his body with hers, on his side so he could look down at her, so he could watch. 

She brought her knees up as he slid his hand down over her breasts, taking a moment to cup each of her perfectly shaped tits, to run his thumb over the plump pink nipples just to make her shudder. Then he slid his hand down over her stomach, over her smooth shaven mound and down between her thighs and watched her eyes fall closed and her sweet lips drop open as he slid his fingers up and inside of her. 

Mother of God she was wet! Her juices oozed over his hand and his fingers came out dripping with them. Her entire body went similarly liquid as he scooped that juice up and pressed it over her clit, wetting her entire slit until it was pink and gleaming. He looked down at her pussy and watched his fingers disappear inside of her as she raised her hips up off of the bed and pressed her pussy down against his hand. 

She whimpered as he took one of the hard little pink nubs into his mouth and sucked at it, swirling his tongue around it while he fucked her with his fingers, pressing them up inside her, searching for that elusive spot that would bring her, would make her come undone. Even as his cock ached painfully, reminding him that it wanted in on the action, he knew he wouldn’t give in to his own needs until he’d brought her at least once. 

He had no idea, Cody was certain as his thick fingers pressed their way up inside of her, how easy it would be to make her come completely apart. She reached for his mouth with her own, partly to stifle her own cries and partly to do something other than lie there twitching and gasping like a fish out of water. His tongue tasted slightly salty, slightly buttery like the popcorn they’d been sharing. 

His tongue was forceful, like his fingers, like his hand and she gave in, letting him lead, melting beneath him and finally giving up as his mouth moved back to her neck, to her breasts, leaving her clenching her teeth in an effort not to cry out as the first wave hit her. What came out of her mouth was nonsense, sounds and words strung together and forced out through her teeth as her body bucked and shuddered and finally stilled. 

When she opened her eyes, he was looking down at her, watching her, with a gleam in his eyes and a bemused smile on his lips. For a moment she thought he was done, that he would slide into her and take his own pleasure now that she’d had hers’, but instead, he started again, his fingers moving in slow, deliberately soft circles around her clit that, in no time at all, had her biting down hard on her bottom lip with her back arched off of the bed as he brought her again. 

The third time, she clung to him, her nails digging into his back as he used his long, thick fingers on that spot deep up inside of her that made her cum and cum again until she begged him to stop and he lowered her back down. She was limp, and out of breath and then the tears came. 

He held her tight then, her face buried against his neck as she hiccupped and sobbed through the last orgasm and only as it began to subside, and just as she got some control over her breathing he slid up inside of her, making her breath catch in her throat. 

God All Mighty he was big. Not just big, but long and thick and with him holding her like this, it almost felt like there wasn’t enough room. She could feel him pressing up against her pelvic bone and by his sharp intake of breath, she thought so could he. For a long, agonizingly sweet moment they held still, joined to the hilt and unmoving, wrapped in each other’s arms. Then he moved. 

It was a push up, his biceps, pecs, delts all strained as he moved over her and then reached back and pulled her knees back gently but firmly towards her shoulders. His next thrust was deep and they both groaned in unison at the satisfying sensation. 

“Fuuuuck,” he hissed into her ear and then withdrew quickly, leaving her once again gasping for breath as he reached over her to grab the box of condoms. He dug his meaty fingers into the cardboard and ripped the box wide open, shaking its’ contents out onto her stomach. She grabbed the line of square foil packs and ripped the first one open with her teeth and reached for him, slapping his hand away when he tried to stop her. 

She rolled the latex down over his thick erection, noticing how she couldn’t close her hand around the girth of him and then looked back up at him to find him watching her from eyes that had gone dark with hunger and need. With one hand still around his dick, leading him back inside of her and the other pulling his lips down over hers’, Cody laid back on the bed. She gasped into his mouth as he stretched her to near painful limits and then, as she wrapped her legs around his, they began to move in unison. 

“Holy...holy fucking shit,” he breathed as their gazes locked. It had never been like this. She’d been with guys, mostly guys from the swim team, but it had never been like this. There had been a lot of grunting and it had always been over before she’d ever felt anything like she’d already had with him. There had never been the tidal wave of hormones, pheromones, endorphins and serotonin that now had her feeling laid wide open. 

He saw her. As he moved over her, his gaze holding hers like he was daring her to look away, she knew without a shadow of a doubt that he saw her, the real her and not the one she put on, not the always happy and smiling Katie, but the Cody she’d been trying to hide...and she hated herself. That’s when the tears started again and not the kind that had erupted before when she’d barely been in control of her bodily functions. These were tears of pure shame and she hid them against his neck, holding on for dear life.

“Do you want me to stop?” he breathed, his body stilling atop of hers’. 

“No,” she whispered back, sniffing, her eyes squeezed shut. “Hell no,” she told him, trying her best to sound like the happy go lucky Katie he wanted her to be. “Harder,” she added, internally cringing at the thought but needing to be punished for bringing him into this mess that was her life without telling him the rules. 

“You sure?” he whispered, pulling back and cradling her face, his bronze gold eyes searching her face. She lied. With all of her being she lied. She smiled up at him and nodded and then offered her mouth and pushed herself against him, begging his body to do what she wanted.

There was something wrong. He knew it even as he kissed her and pressed himself harder inside of her but then again he was too far gone. He wanted to stop, could have, maybe, except that he was already so close and she was so god damn tight and wet. 

Then there was the fact that she was meeting him thrust for thrust and every single sound she made, every squeak, every whimper, every stifled cry turned him on so fucking much that he couldn’t stop. Not once he started, and then the haze came down and he stopped thinking about anything except how fucking good it felt. 

Then she fell apart. One minute her heels were digging into his ass like she was a rodeo cowboy and he was a bucking bronc and then the next minute she was holding onto him for dear life and balling like a baby as her entire body clamped down around his and pulled him over the edge, sucking him dry as he pressed his mouth over hers’ to stifle his cry of pure, unadulterated pleasure. 

“I’m sorry. Shit, did I hurt you?” He’d done it before. Gone a little too far, pushed a little too hard. Even with all the foreplay some girls couldn’t take his size. He knew it, but he’d forgotten himself. It had been so good. 

“No, not you not...,” she buried her face in his neck and he held her against him, pulling the quilt up around their shoulders. “It’s just been such a messed up fucking day. I just...it was...it was so good and I...,” he felt more than heard her sigh before she looked up at him. “I wasn’t expecting this...I’m sorry.” 

“Sorry we did this or...?” He was searching her face, worried she was going to ask him to leave when all he wanted was to stay, right here, holding her like this. 

“No...this, this was good,” she smiled up at him and then put her cheek on his chest. “This feels safe. I like this,” she whispered and curled up against him.

“Can I stay?” he asked and found the words tickled his tongue, like drinking champagne. He’d never done it before, never stayed the night, but he wanted to now. He felt like she needed him here, that they both needed him here. 

“Please?” she replied, looking up at him with eyes made silvery in the moonlight by her tears. Nodding, he wrapped her in his arms and held her close and closed his eyes.