Bad For You - Sherilee Gray Page 0,56

into my lap. “You want this, Bambi? Us?”

Her pretty lashes fluttered. “Yes, of course I do.”

If I hadn’t been sitting, my knees would have given out with relief. She could do a lot better than me, and I kept expecting her to figure that out and dump my ass.

She curled into me, her head on my chest, and I rubbed her back. “Jarod comes from a strict, religious family. My family met his at a church in Spring Haven.”

The prick lived here in Spring Haven. Good to know. I kissed the top of her head, encouraging her to keep talking.

“He was controlling, jealous, but it was always my fault. He…he didn’t believe in sex before marriage. A lot of the youth at the church wore purity rings. We’d done…stuff, of course. But he’d always get angry afterwards. Blame me for tempting him. One night, it went too far. I asked him if he wanted to have sex. He pushed inside me before I was ready, no foreplay, and came instantly. It was painful, and humiliating, and he’d been so furious that he’d succumbed to temptation, that I’d made him sin, he lost his temper…”

“He hurt you?” I had to work to control my temper.

“He shoved me away,” she whispered. “I fell over, and he called me a lot of horrible names.”

I was going to end him. “What’s he doing in Rocktown?”

“My parents still go to the same church, are friends with his family. And since I’m not on speaking terms with my parents, he volunteered to come and check up on me.”

I bet he did. “He wanted to fuck you.”

“He hates himself for it, you can see it in his eyes. But he tells himself that I’m provoking him to make it okay.”

“He sounds like a twisted little fuck.”

She nodded. “It took me longer than it should have to see that. I was just trying to please my family. Date the right boy, from the right family, you know? It was a mistake.”

I rubbed her back. “What’s the deal with your folks, Lila?”

She lifted her head, her hands resting on my shoulders. “Kate was a little wild as a teen. She met Eric at high school and got pregnant. My parents kicked her out. That’s when we left Rocktown and moved to Spring Haven. They were…strict with me after that. They spied on me, shamed me, and threatened to kick me out as well to control me. It was…bad. Unbearable, for a lot of years. I’d been so alone, confused. I thought there must be something wrong with me.” Her gaze locked on mine. “When I met you, the way you made me feel, the things I wanted with you, they scared me, but excited me more. It’s been hard forcing the crap my parents put in my head out, learning who the real me is, and sometimes I still don’t know. I’m still learning.”

“Lila.” She was killing me. I tugged her closer.

Her thumb glided over my lower lip.

“When you kissed me that first time by the lake…God, I wanted you, Jesse, so badly. I wanted to be like you. You were so…free. But they were still in my head, my mother calling me horrible names if I did anything she didn’t like, my father warning me not to disgrace the family. The awful things they said when I finally got up the courage and left. Meeting Eves changed my life, and it was through her that I met you. Jesse, you showed me that I shouldn’t feel guilty for taking my life back.” She cupped the side of my face. “I was suffocating with them. I’m not the good girl they tried to force me to be. I never was.”

“Fuck, Bambi…”

“Yes, I was thrown off balance, seeing Jarod again. But I’m okay. I am. When I came to you at your club, what we did that night, it was a…a revelation. What we do together, it’s not wrong or shameful.” She smiled, lips trembling. “It’s…it’s beautiful. God, when I took you in my mouth, the look in your eyes when you stared down at me, I didn’t feel small. I felt sexy. Alive. And when I took you deeper…” She squirmed on my lap. “Your skin flushed and your pulse raced at the base of your throat, and your eyes, they were so full of need. I didn’t feel weak, I felt…powerful.” She licked her lips, her hands moving restlessly on my shoulders. “It was just you and me,