“Yeah. The tattoos hide the scars, too. There were many. I wouldn’t wear his injuries on my body, so I covered them. Owned them. Prison tattoos while I was inside. Better ones when I was out. But yes. With each tattoo. With each piercing, for a moment I can feel. On my terms. Not on someone else’s.”
Ryan’s voice trailed off, but his arms never slackened. We stood there listening, watching the morning creep over the top of us.
“I like it out here, Grey. When I got out and the nightmares wouldn’t leave me alone, I’d ride up here in the night. It’s like she keeps those thoughts away, at least while I’m here, under her watch.”
I shivered then. Half from cold, half from what he’d just handed me.
“Let’s get you home, Grey,” Reap’s voice brushed the top of my head. “You’re freezing.”
Chapter Twenty Six
Sophie shivered against me all the way home. Morning had arrived now from the east, flooding the north east coastline with a cold spring glow.
I felt every one of them. The small tremors through her body, her arms tightening and loosening around me like she was fighting it. My grip shifted on the throttle, the Rocket answering without question as I pushed it on, cutting through the quiet roads before the day had chance to wake properly.
It felt familiar. Her on the back of that little 125. Knees tucked in, arms wrapped tight, laughing one minute, swearing at me the next when I took a corner too fast. Racing the dark. Always racing the fucking dark. Trying to get her home before her dad clocked the time, before the lights flicked on and everything came crashing down around us.
Different bike. Different boy. Same girl. Almost.
My jaw tightened slightly as I shifted up again, the engine settling into that deep pull beneath us. This time it wasn’t her dad, we were racing. And still, with her there, pressed into my back, holding on like she always had, just for a second everything felt right.
My road of terraced cottages came into view, the streetlight already switched off, like we weren’t important enough to have light past midnight. Some windows glowed. Neighbours getting ready for work or school, or just to survive another day. Some were still cloaked in fabric. Sleeping or denial, not ready to take on the world.
The little house was as cold inside as it was out, and I flicked switches on the boiler that stood like a sentry next to the back door as I guided Sophie through.
“Sorry. It’ll warm up soon.”
Sophie pulled her arms round herself, but it didn’t do much. The cold had got in deep now, settling under her skin. Her lips had lost their colour, a faint tremor running through her shoulders that she couldn’t hide. Even her fingers looked stiff, curled tight like she was trying to hold on to warmth that wasn’t there.
“Shit, Soph. You look utterly frozen.”
“I am,” she answered faintly.
“Let’s get you in the shower. That’ll warm you up quicker, Grey.”
I tugged a hand, pulling her through the kitchen into the back of the little house. The bathroom was cramped with two of us, but the shower filled the room quickly with steam. I stripped off my top quickly, the cold not getting to me in the same way it had done her. Hundreds and hundreds of miles on a motorbike did that to you.
She shivered underneath me as I peeled the hoodie over her head, pulling off the over-sized t-shirt of mine she’d hurriedly pulled on a few hours before. Her nipples were rock hard underneath, tits already perky and full, creating that first arc of perfect shape of her body. I brushed my fingertips over her skin, feeling a different shiver under my touch.
The steam was already clinging to her hair. The tendrils of rich brown curling under the humidity forming in the bathroom and framing her perfect face. There wasn’t much that could distract me from a pair of tits as good as these, but that face. The locks of curly hair framed her heart-shaped features, softening the keenness of her eyes. I lifted my hands and pushed the hair away, studying every tiny line as I brushed at the strands stuck there. Barely a wrinkle. Barely a smile line at the corners of those beautiful grey eyes. And that hurt me. Because every time since I saw her in that hospital, and every time I looked into those eyes since, I could never see happiness in there. Only control. Like she was constantly guarded.
“Ry?” she asked as I stared at her.
“Let’s get you warmed up,” I said quickly, letting go of her face.
I kicked off my jeans, feeling Sophie’s eyes on me before I even looked up again.
“Off.” I pointed at the jeans covering her legs.
For a moment she looked at me, as if she was thinking of something else, but then she peeled the denim down her legs, pushing over well-covered thighs, slim enough I could see the shape of her legs, but big enough to grab hold of when I wanted to. I stopped the urge to lick my lips and sink to my knees right then as another shiver cascaded over her body.
Turning her, I pointed her to the shower, stepping into it behind her and positioning us both under the hot stream of water. It fell heavy on her hair, drowning the curls that had formed in the steam, water dripping over her back and over that perfect round arse. I reached for the shower gel on the stand in the corner, massaging it into my hands.
“Turn round, darlin’,” I instructed, my voice thick in the steam.
She turned without complaint, her eyes dropping down my body like it was the first time she’d seen me and then settling onto my cock.
“I’m up here, Soph.” I wanted to see her as I felt those fucking beautiful tits.
