A gentleman would have.
We already knew—I wasn’t one.
Just looking at her eased the tension inside me right away.
“Logan, talk to me,” she whispered.
I took a step back until I hit the sink. “Elle, I’ll be fine. I just need a few minutes.”
I’d just found my father out in the parking lot with some guy from the neighborhood and a bottle of Jack Daniel’s in his hand. He was about to shove the neck in his mouth when I saw him. As soon as he saw me he started shaking so much, he dropped the bottle.
“Don’t, Pop,” I’d said. “Don’t do this. Killian wanted you to be whole. That’s why he did what he did. Don’t make it all for naught.”
“Sean,” my uncle Hunter’s voice boomed. “That’s not what Dad would want.”
I jerked my head around.
Uncle Hunter, my father’s older brother, had moved to New York to get away from the shadow of the Irish Mob. He approached my old man. “Let me take you home for an hour,” he said, and then he looked at me. “I need to have a talk with him and then I’ll bring him back at five for the final viewing hours. Will you stay here until I get back?”
Irish tradition mandated that the body of the deceased not be left alone until burial. It was just one of many traditions that didn’t make much sense. Still, I stayed at the funeral home.
My old man hadn’t taken a drink, but I knew he was close to losing his months of sobriety. The thought cut me like a knife. He had been on his way to living a life free of addiction. I was going to be the one to cut the ties that bound him to Patrick as soon as I figured the whole cluster-fuck situation out. Killian didn’t have to go and do what he’d done. And besides, my old man wasn’t the one who should feel the blame for what Killian had chosen to do, I should. I was the one who started this whole fucked-up thing.
I was the fuck-up.
“Logan,” Elle said, pulling me back. “I know you’ll be fine but I want to be here for you. To help.”
Feeling every sound she made in my cock, I stepped closer to claim her mouth. I knew this was not the place to be doing it, but I needed a hit of something to take the edge off and she was it.
Still, I should have fought my animalistic need. I just couldn’t. My willpower felt as drained as my life.
Our open mouths came together almost savagely and my tongue thrust into her mouth the instant we made contact. This kiss was short, hard, and anything but elegant.
Five seconds or more passed and then she unzipped my pants and started to slide down my body, taking my pants with her.
Again, I should have stopped her. “Elle,” I groaned, trying to protest.
She ignored me and didn’t stop until her face met my cock. By then it was too late to stop her, because I wanted nothing more than to feel her warm mouth on my throbbing dick.
My pants were at my ankles. “Oh, fuck.”
She was licking me like a lollipop from the tip of my cock, which was soaked in pre-cum, all the way to my balls, and then she took me in her mouth as much as she could.
My hands went to her hair, and even though it was pulled back neatly, I still had to hold on to her.
Sounds left my mouth that I tried to hush but couldn’t.
Her hands were jerking me off fast, her lips gliding up and down at the same time.
I thought about pulling her up, lifting her dress, and plunging deep inside her, but I couldn’t move.
Teeth slid, lips sucked, tongue licked, and I let myself go in the pleasure of it all. Let all the shit around me fade away.
When my toes clenched inside my shoes, I had held on to sanity for as long as I could. My thumb was in her mouth and I lifted her chin. “If you want to stop, now is the time.”
She knew what I meant. I was going to come in her mouth if she didn’t stop and if she didn’t want that, she had to stop now.
She didn’t.
My thrusts were frantic. This was it. What I needed. It felt so incredible, and everything that was fucked up around me was gone. “That’s it. Don’t stop. Oh fuck, don’t stop.”
There was no stopping. Her hands were on my ass now, her back arched, and her mouth working magic on me.
My hands were on her head and I felt my orgasm as the sensations began at my feet and traveled up my body. Coming while standing up takes an orgasm to a whole other level. “Fuck!” I shouted.
Her eyes looked up at me and whatever she saw in my own caused her to take me even farther into her mouth. My cock plunged inside her mouth over and over as my body spasmed until I had nothing left. Until all the grief and remorse was drained from me.
This was what I needed in order to face tonight.
And she knew it.
And later tonight she would do the same—she’d spread her legs wide for me and let me fuck her until I was exhausted. Until sleep took me.
And in the morning, I’d lick her to orgasm and then plunge inside her, and I hoped that would give me the strength I needed to make it through the funeral.
It just had to.
DAY 22
ELLE
Wise men say women can be thoroughly fucked.
Well, I now know guys can be too.
I’d made sure Logan had been. It was the only way I could make him feel any better. To help ease his pain and suffering. And I think it worked . . . for a little while anyway.
This day, though, had been extremely long for him. First the church, then the cemetery, and now the reception. Everything had taken its toll on him. I could see it on his face even from across the room.
We were at Molly’s. The place had been closed to the general public. Frank, who owned the pub that had been turned into a club by his daughter, Molly, was Killian’s next-door neighbor for years, and he mourned Killian’s death along with everyone else. Perhaps as a way of showing his condolences to the family or perhaps because he just wanted to help, he had not only volunteered to host the after-funeral affair, but also to cook for the almost one hundred people who had shown up to say goodbye to Killian.
Faces I’d never seen had come and gone, all within a five-hour time span. I worked in the morning and met Logan here after the funeral. I needed to stay away from the public eye in case someone who knew Michael saw me. There was no way I could explain being at Killian’s funeral that would make any sense.
Obviously, I hadn’t gone through with my plan, and I had yet to confess anything to either Michael or Logan. I had gotten sidetracked by the death of Killian. And the more time that passed, the more scared I became to talk to either man. Both outcomes were just so uncertain.
Finally, the funeral reception was coming to an end, and all that remained were Logan’s friends from New York City.
Logan’s mother and maternal grandfather did not come and Logan said it was for the best. In fact, he had asked them not to. I guess he knew they didn’t care for Killian and didn’t want to have to deal with them today of all days.
Since Logan, his father, and uncle had arrived in a limo, Logan’s uncle had taken the Rover that I used to drive to Molly’s and brought Sean home a couple of hours ago. Being around all these people drinking wasn’t a great idea for Sean, but I guess at Irish funerals booze couldn’t be avoided.
“How long have you known Logan?” Phoebe St. Claire, one of Logan’s best friends from New York City, asked from across the table.
Both our feet killing us, we had retired to a dim booth in the corner. The sound of her voice caused my gaze to shift from Logan over to her. “Three weeks.”
Phoebe took a bite of her Irish soda bread. “That’s all? The way he talked about you I would have thought it was much longer.”
My hands on my coffee mug, my smile couldn’t be contained. “He talked about me to you?”
“Well, not to me but to Jamie, who in turn mentioned it to me.”
I glanced back over to where Logan sat at the bar with the group of people I had learned were a very close-knit circle of best friends. There was James Ashton and his new wife, Lindsay; Phoebe’s husband, Jeremy McQueen; Emmy Lane; Lily Monroe; and Danny Capshaw. They all had come this morning to be beside Logan and help him through this tragedy in his life.