Revive Me, Part One: The Act (New Haven, #2)

by J.L. Seegars

To the survivors who hid their wounds and built something beautiful out of the destruction

It’s the best thing that’s ever happened to me, and, though I have no way of knowing this for sure, my biggest mistake.

She bites her lip, hiding a small smile I want more of. “Private tutoring isn’t a part of your teaching assistant duties, Christopher.” “How would you know? You haven’t seen the fine print in my TA contract.”

“Everyone on my dad’s side of the family, specifically the men, have gone into medicine. There are generations of Dr. Johnsons that have come before me, including my dad and my big brother, and if my dad has his way, there will be many more after me. Medicine is in our blood, coded into our DNA just like the perfect amber shade of your eyes is written into yours.”

“I think desires can be born out of any circumstance, good, bad, or ugly, and still be valid representations of the things we want for ourselves. The source of the desire doesn’t matter so much as what we do with the dream it sparks in us.”

And most of all, though I’m loathe to admit it, about Mallory, her lies, and the truths I want her to only give to me.

She’s an exquisite, perfect thing. With all her secrets and half-truths and anxious habits that make me want to make all her problems go away.

“People always think they want the truth until you give it to them. Once you do that, they never look at you the same. It’s all sad eyes, pitiful glances, and empty words that don’t help. But you already know that, don’t you, Chris? That’s why no one here knows about your mom. That’s why you hide the demons that keep you up at night behind a big smile and bury the rest of it inside whatever girl finds her way into your bed.”

Like a true animal. The words echo around my brain, and I’m momentarily shocked by how close they are to the ones I’d use to describe the way I like to fuck.

“No, Mal, I was dead sober when I told you.”

She turns to me quickly, her eyes pleading with me, asking me for things I won’t hesitate to give her, things I think I might have been born to give her.

“These are for you.” Taking his hand from behind his back, he presents me with a small vase with water in the bottom and a bouquet of white and yellow flowers sprouting from the top. The sweet, floral notes hit me, and I instantly recognize them. Eyes stretched in surprise, I meet his soft, serious gaze and he nods, answering my silent question. “Jasmine.” “My favorite. How did you know?” “You always smell like it.” He licks his lips, like talking about my scent makes his mouth water, and I blush because the thought makes the ball of desire low in the pit of my belly start to unfurl. “Like jasmine and citrus.”

I’m trapped in his gaze, drowning in soft and serious ochre eyes and trying to appear unaffected. “Sure.” “You look beautiful tonight.” My throat is dry, so the chuckle I force out is raspy. “Just tonight?” “No.” His eyes glow. “Not just tonight.”

“Chris.” She reaches across the table, her elegant fingers grasping my hand. I turn my palm over, resting my knuckles against the cold linoleum table while the feel of Mallory’s skin against mine makes irreparable changes to the structure of my DNA. It’s like she’s writing herself into my very being. “I’m so sorry.”

“The pleasure is all mine, princess.”

“Like your ex being on campus regularly. We don’t know if he knows where you stay. There might come a time when you need somewhere to feel safe and you won’t be able to go to your brother or Nic or Sloane without having to tell them things you don’t want them to know. This can be that place.”

“Mallory, as long as we’re doing this,” he gestures between the two of us, “I can promise you that you won’t see or hear about me being with anyone else. All of my time, attention, and affection is yours.”

That I didn’t realize what we could have had, what we could have been, sooner.

I move the photos from my camera roll and into an album that’s currently untitled but holds all of the solo pictures I took of Mallory on Sunday. The ones that are just for me.

The brave, daring parts that whisper quiet questions under the chorus of victory. Questions about Chris and me and this arrangement that I think could be more if we let it. I’d be willing to try for him, and maybe, just maybe, I can convince him to try for me.

“Go suck on a dick and die, Trent.”

“No.” He frowns. “You, princess. Your happiness. Your safety. Your well-being. I take it all very seriously.”

including the one I love.

Should I just sit here and stare at him, obsessing over the way he licks his lips after every few bites, treating me to flashes of his tongue that make me want to kiss him just so I can have the chance to suck on it?

“Why do you want to take me to Disney?” His voice is silk and butter as he answers me. “I’ve heard it’s the happiest place on Earth, and I thought you could use a little happy right now.”

“It’s more than nice, Mallory. Your smile is the thing I want most in the world. I spend every waking moment trying to find new ways to get you to give it to me. I wish for it on every shooting star and repeating number on a clock.”

“I’ll probably spend the rest of my life wishing for it to always be mine.”

“Not fake, princess. Real. Everything I feel for you, everything I want with you is real.”

“Is that something you could want?”

“Yes,” I whisper fiercely, nodding to emphasize my answer. “It’s all I want, Chris.”

“I’ve always wanted you, Chris. I’ve never been more sure about anything, about anyone, in my entire life.”

“Would you like more, princess? Can I taste you?”

“I know, baby. I can smell how turned on you are.” To emphasize his point he runs his nose over my sex, flared nostrils taking in all of my scent as they move over my engorged folds. “You smell even better here, Mallory. There’s no jasmine or citrus, just you.”

“You need a formal request to be my girlfriend even after I’ve had my face buried in your pussy?”

“Mallory Kent, will you please do me the honor of being my girlfriend? For real this time?”

“I just need you to stay there, okay? Touch yourself for me. Show me how you play with that pretty little pussy when no one’s around.”

“Chris, I’m going to sleep. I’m not about to be figuring out how I feel about anything besides leaving this mattress behind.” She leans back and pushes her lips out, using the power of a pout I can’t resist. “Stay, please. Hold me. Kiss me. Rub my back until I fall asleep. I promise I’m still going to want us in the morning, nothing is going to change my mind about that, especially not time away from you.”

“Are you done running, princess?” “No.” A low, tortured growl spills from his lips.“Do you want me to keep chasing you?” I bite my lip. “Yes, and I want you to catch me.”

“You’re not just my girlfriend, Mallory. You’re my mission. My purpose. The only thing in my life I can’t afford to fail at, so forgive me if I don’t give a fuck about what another man in my position would do because I can guarantee you there isn’t a man in this world who….”

“Loves you.” He swallows. “There isn’t a man in this world who loves you like I do.”

He nods. A solemn, severe gaze burning through me. “I love you, Mallory.”

“I love you too.”

“I love it, and I love you.”

That even when I feel like I have no one, I have her.

Chris knows exactly what I’m about to do, so he lifts his legs and bends his knees. The subtle change in his position pushes my legs up, bringing my knees closer to my chest and tilting my hips upwards so I can reach my opening more easily. He grunts in my ear, both of our eyes on the mirror as my middle finger disappears inside my pussy.

“Chris, please don’t stop.” “I’m not going to stop, baby.” I watch his expression in the mirror, the torrent of pleasure etched into his features emphasizing his words. “Not until you’ve ruined this bed like you’ve ruined me.”

“What do you want, princess?” I lean in and drop a kiss on his lips, every word of my answer a brush of skin that paints my desire on the canvas of his mouth. “I want you to fuck me like you know I won’t break. I want it hard and rough and perfect. I want to be sore when I wake up in the morning, and then I want you to spread my legs and fuck me again. I want your teeth in my skin and your hands in my hair. I want us—our desires, our moods, our needs—to be the only thing determining how we do this. Not my past. Not your fears about hurting me or your thoughts about what I deserve. Because what I deserve is a partner who trusts me to decide what I want and how I want it.”

“Next time I’m going to make you do that in a cup, so I can make sure I drink every drop.”

“Don’t tell me that, Mallory. I’m barely holding it together as it is.” When he opens his eyes, he looks even more feral, and I smile, thoroughly turned on by the sight of him.

I gasp, and he blesses me with a devious grin I feel right in my trembling core. “We agreed that I’d give you what we both want. In order for me to do that and make it good for you, I need some self-control, baby. If only to keep me from blowing my load the second I get inside you.”