Her Reluctant Husband by Erica Marselas (summer beach reads txt) 📗

table and steps in front of me. His hand runs down my cheek, a devilish smirk dancing on his lips, saying more than words ever could. It’s full of promises of a next time, and I hate that my body shivers in a delightful response, though I’m pissed. “Till next time then.” He kisses my cheek and marches out of the kitchen, leaving me more confused than ever.

8ALEX

I’ve been staring at the same document for hours, not typing a thing because I can’t stop thinking about what happened in the kitchen earlier with June. Her fucking little moans are still echoing in my ears which makes it impossible to concentrate.

I have no idea what came over me, but seeing her standing in front of me in the tiniest pair of underwear, her practically bare ass shaking around as she rooted around in the fridge, my dick led the charge. He didn’t give a fuck about my feelings. He wanted her. And I hate to admit once I got a whiff of her arousal, it all but consumed me. I was thrown off my axis and my mind went haywire. I fucking called her Ju-Ju to her face.

The thing is I didn’t care at that moment. She weaved her damn power over me, hypnotizing me to the past and I was desperate to know if her pussy would still feel like silk around my cock. It did.

The one thing I can’t comprehend is her nervousness and her fear. I understood her hesitancy in the beginning, but then she just drifted away at one point. Like she was moaning, soaking my cock and I swore she was about to come, but then she went stiff in my arms and I swear she was going to take off my dick with her pussy death grip. She was holding me so tight she even left nail marks in my shoulders. I don’t know where her mind went, but she was scared when I looked at her. I’m not sure if it was because of me or something else, but she had to know no matter how fucked up my feelings are for her I would never hurt her or mistreat her.

"Nooo!" 

June's scream pierces through the air like it does every night. I glance at the time and it’s only midnight.

She’s three hours ahead of schedule.

I close my laptop lid and before I can process what I’m doing I’m striding out of my bedroom and heading for June’s. Out in the hall, I make out her whimpers, I push open the door and step into the pitch-black room. I hear the sheets rustling as June fights off her nightmare.

"Alex, pleassse. Noo," she yells.

Hearing my name leave her lips in the middle of her nightmare unsettles me.

“June?” I whisper as I make my way through the dark room to her. Following her cries, I find the edge of her bed and flick on her lamp in hopes it will rouse her. It doesn’t.

“Alex, why?” she whimpers and pulls her knees to her chest, tears spilling from her eyes. She’s drenched in sweat and the pain etched in her face is haunting.

What the ever-living fuck is the girl dreaming about?

That it’s obvious I’m the star of?

“Please, I'm sorry. Please, stop.”

I shake her shoulder, needing to wake her from whatever hell she is in. "June, wake up. June." Nothing. “Come on, June, wake up.”

Then the deepest wail I’ve ever heard leaves her lips. “No, no, don’t go.”

She’s crying now, deep from in her chest. I’m not even sure if she’s awake yet. Without thinking, I grab her and pull her to me to cradle her in my arms. I didn’t think her cries would affect me, but this does. Deep. I’ve heard her cries other nights, but these are painful, soul wrenching cries, and no matter how I feel about her or about what she did, I don’t want this for her. No amount of hate I have for her wants me to see her this way.

The thought is a confusing one and not something I’m ready to process.

"Shh, it's okay," I tell her and brush her hair back. Her heart is beating erratically. "Breathe, Ju-Ju. It’ll be okay." I place a kiss on her forehead, and June’s eyes fly open. It seems Sleeping Beauty only needed a kiss to be awakened.

"What the fuck?" She screeches as her eyes flit around the room fearfully till she finally focuses on me. "Alex?"

"Yeah. I’m here."

She scurries out my lap, and onto the mattress, her eyes large and afraid. She grabs her blanket and pulls it up to her chin. “Why are you in my room?”

"You were having a bad dream."

"So? What else is new? You never come in here."

“I was worried and then I heard you calling my name, so I thought you needed me.”

"No. Definitely not.” She shakes her head. “Actually, could you go?"

“June,” I sigh and cup her face wiping away the tears from her cheeks. “What the hell are you dreaming about?”

Her mouth opens and it hangs open as if she’s trying to come up with the words, but nothing comes out. Moments later, she closes her eyes tight, and a few more tears roll down her cheek. “Nothing you would understand,” she mutters and turns away from me.

“Listen, I’m trying here.”

“I don’t need you to try to play dreamcatcher.”

“Dreamcatcher,” I chuckle, but inside I’m stewing. I’m trying to show her I give a shit, and this is what she does?

Fine, if this is how she wants to play, I can go back to being a cold ass. “No, no sweetheart. The last thing I want to do is get tangled in your dreams.”

“Glad we can agree to that.” She scoots off the bed, throwing the blanket