Madeline Sheehan - Unattainable

Ellie’s hips suddenly jerked in an attempt to dislodge him and his eyes flew open and his body spurred into action. Gripping her thigh, he brought her back, fully sheathing himself once again. Then he slapped his hand down over her mouth, pulled his hips back, and again seated himself. His body shuddered through the adrenaline rush inside of him.

“You get it now?” he asked quietly.

Trying to breathe but unable to, she nodded wildly against his hand. Her hands flew to his wrist and she began pulling and clawing, trying to remove his hand.

The second he released her mouth, she didn’t even bother taking the time to refresh her lungs. Her arms shot forward, gripping handfuls of his shirt, and her feet hooked around his calves as she tried to shove her way out from beneath him.

She wasn’t going anywhere.

Grabbing a handful of her thick black curls, he yanked her head to one side. “Fight harder,” he growled, increasing his hip thrusts. She stopped fighting and started sucking in air, her tense body trembling.

“FIGHT ME!” he roared.

She did.

She fought him hard and ended up getting a couple good clips in, some skin-breaking bites. She fought him with everything she had until, finally, nearing the end, she was crying, not out of pain but out of frustration, and he decided that was good enough.

It was a heady feeling, power. Exhilarating. Power over the same sex who’d stripped his power away from him when he was only a boy. He needed it as much as he needed to breathe, and he’d been stupid to think he’d ever be able to have a sexual encounter with a woman any other way. He’d been stupid for thinking he’d be able to manage it. Even with Ellie.

And when he was done with her, after he’d left her body and fell onto his back beside her, he turned his head and watched her. Naked, still lying on her back, unmoving except for the heavy rise and fall of her quivering breasts, Ellie stared up at the ceiling.

“Ellie?” he whispered, fear rising in his gut. She was going to leave him now. She was going to run from him. No woman, especially not a smart and beautiful one, was going to willingly deal with him.

But instead she surprised him for the hundredth time. When she turned her head in his direction, he winced, seeing the tears in her eyes.

“Hold me,” she said hoarsely, her tone pleading. “And let me hold you.”

His eyes widened.

“Please, Michael,” she continued. “I can do…what you want, but you have to give me something in return.”

When he said nothing, his mind a frantic mess, Ellie was suddenly curling her body around his, laying her head on his chest and cupping the side of his face with her hand.

He went rigid. Refusing to touch her, he locked his jaw and tried to breathe.

This was Ellie. It was Ellie. His beautiful, sweet, loving Ellie, who had the very best laugh in the entire world.

Slowly, very, very slowly, he lifted one arm and almost gingerly laid it over her bare back.

His eyes closed. Fuck-ing-hell. Her skin was so damn soft. Without even realizing it, his fingertips dug gently into the extra weight at her side, and before he knew what was happening, he had both arms around her and was holding her tightly.

“I’m sorry,” he choked out, squeezing her tighter.

Her head tilted and her big blue eyes caught his gaze. “Never be sorry for who you are,” she whispered. “That man saved my life. Twice.

“And,” she continued, “I’m falling in love with him.”

Dirty’s throat closed up. This wasn’t happening to him, not really, because it couldn’t be. Not after a lifetime of misery, not after everything he’d done. No fucking way, he didn’t deserve this, not even a little.

But he wasn’t going to give it up either.

No. Fucking. Way.

He would lie, cheat, steal, and kill to keep this. To keep her.

“Mom,” I said nervously, glancing over at her. “I still don’t think this is a good idea.”

Keeping her eyes on the road, she shook her head. “Baby, it was Eva who called. She was crying so hard I could barely understand her. She needs me.”

“I know,” I whispered. “But I don’t think I should be there.”

She shook her head again. Reaching out, she placed her hand on my thigh and squeezed lightly. “She needs us all.”

I closed my eyes and tried to fight back my rising nausea. How could I face them all after what had happened? And during the wake of tragedy? No one would want me around. No one in that club needed me for anything. I didn’t belong there; I wasn’t family and would serve as little comfort to any one of them. Instead, I would be in everyone’s way.

I had barely slept in the last two days, ever since the phone call from Eva. I was awash with a mixture of emotions—nervousness, anticipation, fear, and grief. I wanted to be there for the club, but at the same time I didn’t know what my reception would be. And the last thing I wanted to do was intrude on them, especially now in the midst of their grief.

“Not me,” I mumbled. “I don’t belong here…I never did.”

I jerked forward as my mother slammed on the brakes of our rental car and pulled it over on the side of the road. I stared at her, somewhat bewildered, as she whipped off her seatbelt, then promptly turned in her seat, facing me.

“I know what you think of me, Tegen,” she said matter-of-factly. “I know you think I’m a club whore.”

My eyes went wide. “No!” I protested but my mother quickly put her fingers against my mouth.

“Shh,” she whispered. “It’s well past time you knew the whole story. Maybe if you’d known all along…” She trailed off and shook her head.

“I didn’t love your father,” she continued. “I tried to, but he wasn’t just physically absent from us, he was emotionally gone as well. When I met Jase… Well, Jase started out as a distraction, something that made me feel like a woman that was actually wanted.

“We were both married, both unhappy with our marriages. I knew he wasn’t faithful to me but initially I didn’t care. I was happy with what he gave me but…eventually it wasn’t enough anymore and I demanded that if he refused to leave Chrissy, other than her, he be with only me. In return, he wanted me to leave your father. He wanted to take care of me and with every request, every demand for more, I fell more and more in love with him.

“Deep down, I knew he was never going to leave Chrissy, but that didn’t mean I never stopped wishing he would.”

I blew out a large breath of air. I already knew all of this; I’d figured it out on my own over the years, but hearing her say the words, trusting me with all of this, made me hate her a little less for some of the decisions she’d made. Decisions that hadn’t just affected her but me as well.

“Hawk was an accident,” she continued. “Jase had been on the road for nearly two months, I was drunk and sad, I barely remembered it. But he came to me again the next night and when I said no, he blackmailed me.”

My mouth fell open. He what? He fucking what?

“I will kill him,” I bit out. “I will fucking—”

“Tegen!” she snapped. “Watch your damn mouth! Let me finish talking!”

Breathing hard, I pressed my lips together. Maybe hearing this wasn’t going to be the best thing for me. Planning a homicidal rampage through the club was probably not the best idea.

“I won’t get into specifics,” she said. “But yes, he blackmailed me. He said if I didn’t agree to being with him again, he was going to tell Jase what happened.”

I closed my eyes to try to calm my quickly rising rage. How could she let these men walk all over her like this? For fucking years? Why? She was a smart woman, she was beautiful, she could have taken me and just left, we could have made a life somewhere else!

“Of course I was terrified of Jase finding out what had happened so I agreed…” She trailed off, her eyes going glassy, remembering, watching something only she could see.

“It was hard,” she whispered tearfully. “The first few times. Being with a man who wasn’t Jase, but…”

“But fucking what?” I gritted out.

“I fell in love with him,” she finished listlessly.

I gaped at her. “You fell in love with a man who blackmailed you into fucking him?”

Her eyes narrowed. “Do you always have to be so crude? You sound like the men around here!”

“I grew up here,” I shot back.

“Tegen, I don’t know how to explain this to you in a way you’re going to understand, but yes, I fell in love with him. He was different from Jase. He didn’t want to be with anyone but me. And the way he spoke to me, the way he was with me… He was willing to give up everything for me. The club, the boys, even Deuce. Nobody had ever loved me like that. Nobody had ever put me first. Especially not Jase.”

“Then why didn’t he?” I demanded. “If he loved you so much, and you loved him, why didn’t he just come clean, get tossed on his ass, and take us away from here?”

I watched as more tears formed in her eyes and spilled over.

“I never told him I loved him,” she choked out. “I was afraid of myself at that point, my betrayal to both of them, not knowing who to choose, not wanting to hurt either of them but at the same time, selfishly not wanting to give either of them up. It was all my fault, Tegen, getting shot and Chrissy going to jail, leaving those three girls without their mother. Jase is a wreck now, and Hawk…when he’s not with us, he lives alone. All the time, alone. And it’s all my fault.”

She broke down then, sobbing silently, tears flowing freely down her cheeks.

I grabbed her shaking hands and held them both inside my larger ones.

“Mommy,” I whispered, my own tears falling, my heart breaking for her. “You didn’t do anything wrong.”

She hadn’t. I knew that now. She’d been stuck in a loveless marriage, in an impossible situation, and had tried to follow her heart. Had she made some bad decisions? Yes. But my God, she had been so young, younger than I was now when this had all begun.

“Shit just…happens.”

My mother’s eyes met mine and surprisingly a small smile formed on her lips.

“Which brings me back to my original point,” she said gently. “Your shit, Tegen. ZZ and Cage. You’ve been doing well, considering, and I haven’t wanted to rock the boat, but you of all people can’t keep your feelings bottled up forever. Let’s start by why you never told me about ZZ.”

My eyes dropped to the console between us. “Because you didn’t remember him,” I muttered. “So, what was the point?”

“Tegen.” She drew out my name in a warning tone and I glanced up sheepishly. “Because I didn’t want you to know,” I admitted.

“That’s a problem,” she said softly. “Usually nine times out of ten when you don’t want your mother to know something, it’s something you shouldn’t be doing.”

My cheeks reddened. “I didn’t want you to be disappointed in me.”

“Oh God,” she said. “Tegen, no, I’m so proud of you, baby. For doing so well in school, for going to college, but most of all I’m so proud of you for getting out of here. The last thing I wanted for you was to end up like me.”

“There is nothing wrong with you,” I said, grabbing her hand and squeezing.

She squeezed back. “I’m alone, baby. The men I love are alone. I don’t want that for you; I don’t want you to make the same mistakes I did. Which brings us to the second man in your life.”

“Fuck me,” I whispered, squeezing my eyes shut. Cage. Damn him. I loved him so much. Too much. But for as much time as I’d put into daydreaming about Cage and me over the years, it had only taken a few short days and a tragedy for the reality of the situation to rear its ugly head. And the reality of Cage and me was so very different from the fantasy.

Not that it mattered anymore.

My mother smiled knowingly. “You love him, baby,” she said. “And that matters.”

“But it doesn’t,” I protested. “Deuce told me to stay away and…Cage never once tried to contact me.”

“That doesn’t prove anything. Have you tried to contact him?”

“You know I haven’t.”

“And yet you still love him.”

I shook my head. “I don’t understand what you’re trying to tell me.”

“Simply put,” she said softly. “You don’t want to spend the rest of your life not knowing.”

I closed my eyes, willing my quickly rising heart rate to slow.

“And, Tegen?”

I opened my eyes.

“You belong where you are loved.”