13. Kitty

13

KITTY

“ O utside! Now!”

My father bellowed across the bar, making me jump right out of my skin as I was roughly dragged outside by his security team. My struggles meant nothing against the arm gripping me tightly until Rook came along and wrenched the man free. I should have thanked him, but my attention was on my father as he strode across the parking lot toward his jeep.

“Dad!” I yelled, chasing after him. “Dad, you can’t run away from this! There are people inside, your people, who want you to listen to them because that is what the mayor is supposed to do! And instead, you’re so focused on?—”

“Enough!” Dad spun to face me, and his eyes were small and dark. “That’s enough, Kitty. Do you have any idea how humiliating it is to have one of your shareholders call you and tell you that your very own daughter is walking around the town inciting rebellion?”

I stumbled to a stop and scoffed. “Rebellion?”

“Yes! Because that is what you are doing. You’re out here forcing your own opinions onto other people, holding these little meetings as if those people are there for you and not the booze churning out of those taps.”

“It’s not like that!”

“Isn’t it?” Dad yelled. “How do you think I found out? Did you ever consider that maybe not everyone in town thinks like you do? That there are people who see the good in what I’m doing and they’re excited for the influx of income I’ll be bringing to this place? Did you ever stop and think about that?”

“Of course I did!” I snapped back, heat rising up my collar. “But then I was attacked in the store because the people whose lives you’ve destroyed have no other option. Because you are so fucking blinded by greed. You’re hurting people! I mean, look at the barn! Look at the flooding! The mudslides!”

“That’s because it rained, Kitty,” Dad growled. “It always rains, or did you forget that part? How do you expect me to police the weather?”

“It’s more complicated than that and you know it!” My heart was pounding, my palms were sweaty, and my knees were knocking together as adrenaline surged. I was so angry at him, angry at his inability to see beyond his own bubble. Angry that I had given a poster out to someone who clearly ran straight to my father. And angry that I was dragged out of the bar like he’d just discovered me drinking underage.

“Kitty.” My father took a deep breath. “You are so set on what you think is right that you haven’t considered the other side. My side.”

“Oh? Can you say you’ve done the same? When was the last time you walked the town? Popped into the stores of the people who put you in power? Spent time at the parks or the community center, huh? When?”

He hesitated, unable to find an answer. “The cost of progress,” Dad snapped. “And you!”

Suddenly, he surged past me, and when I turned, I saw him making a beeline for Rook who was standing nearby.

“Sir.”

“Don’t sir me,” Dead snapped. “What kind of fucking bullshit is this? You know damn well she doesn’t understand a thing about business and you let her get this far? Where was the sensibility? Why the fuck didn’t you stamp this out the moment you saw her on the wrong path?”

Rook seemed as unfazed as ever as my dad yelled in his face. It was hard to believe they were friends in that moment.

“You hired me to protect her, and that is what I am doing,” Rook replied calmly. “If you want me to police her thoughts…” He leaned forward a fraction. “That costs extra.”

“You son of a bitch,” Dad snarled. “Let me make myself perfectly clear. If this, or anything like this happens again, I will fire you so fast that you won’t even have time to pack your bags, understand? And you!”

He spun back to me.

“If I hear one more hint that you are doing anything other than supporting the path I am taking, I will send you so far away, you will be nothing more than an afterthought to these people.”

“Dad!”

“I mean it, Kitty. This stops now, you hear me?”

The anger stayed with me on the entire silent ride home. I caught Rook looking at me a few times, and I could tell he wanted to say something, but I was too furious to listen. I didn’t trust myself to open my mouth while I was seething.

How dare he?

How dare he act like I am the problem when he hasn’t set foot in town in weeks?

My anger was further fueled by the voice of doubt in my head that maybe he was right. After all, someone definitely called him and told him about the posters. I wasn’t as naive to think that every single person in town hated the idea of the highway expansion. Just like my father, there were sure to be some people who benefitted from this kind of change. But when the majority were being harmed, shut out, and struggled to survive?

It couldn’t be the right way.

And yet I was doubting my own thoughts now. Likely, a side effect of the adrenaline pumping through me with each rapid heartbeat, but it was there all the same. It didn’t help that being dragged out of a bar by your dad was embarrassing, no matter how old you were.

And then he threatened to fire Rook? His friend?

He really was losing a grip on things. Or he was so blinded by dollar signs that nothing else mattered.

I remained silent as the car pulled into the manor. I then stayed in the car as my father was greeted by my mother at the door, which sent a new burst of frustration through me. I wished she would stand up to him more.

No, I wished she would have my back more. I understood she was the way she was because she was a truly gentle soul, but she grew up in this town. She was watching her husband destroy it but didn’t mind because she still had her art and the ball.

Only when they left did I slide from the car and stomp into the manor, suddenly hating everything I laid my eyes on. I hated the black and white checkered tiles on the floor, the cream pillars and the obnoxious paintings hanging in the foyer. I hated the white stairs that gleamed too brightly as I stomped up to my room. I hated the red carpet that lined the hallway to my bedroom, and I hated the black curtains draped over the tall bay windows.

I hated it all.

I stormed into my room and slammed the door shut, only it didn’t make the satisfying loud slam I was hoping to hear. I turned and saw I had instead slammed the door on poor Rook.

“Rook!”

“Ow.”

“I’m sorry,” I snapped. “I’m just…” I searched for words to try and unravel the knots in my chest, but there were none. Nothing felt right in describing how I was feeling. There was only darkness.

“I know,” Rook said. He stepped closer and shut the door behind him. The way his eyes searched mine, I got the feeling that he was in the same boat. He wanted to say something but nothing was feeling right. Nothing was enough .

The air sparked between us, and when I breathed in, his warm coffee scent flooded my lungs and eased the first knot of tension in my chest.

Fuck it .

I didn’t have a plan. I just acted.

I threw myself forward, grabbed the lapels of his jacket, and dragged Rook down into a biting kiss. I was expecting him to push me away, to lecture me about how we couldn’t do this here and now. None of those things happened.

He cupped my face and kissed me deeply, then used that grip to spin us around and shove me up against the wall. Heat rushed through me, exploding through my abdomen and warming even my fingers and toes. His tongue shoved into my mouth, and suddenly, I understood.

I didn’t need to talk.

I needed to fuck.

Somehow, Rook knew this and was already on the same thought train as me. I pushed his jacket from his shoulders as we kissed messily, trading bites and tongue licks in between deep presses of our mouths. As he ripped my blouse open, sending buttons scattering into the four corners of my room, I repaid the favor. He groped my breasts, thrust his tongue deep into my mouth, and I tore his shirt wide open to gain access to his gorgeous, muscular chest.

I didn’t want to be treated gently. I had so much anger to work out, and I let Rook know this by how hard I bit his lower lip. He darted back with a gasp, looked me in the eye for a second, then he grabbed me by the back of the neck and pulled me away from the wall.

We spun together, kissing repeatedly until we were near the bed where he then threw me down with a firm shove. I landed on my stomach and bounced, then braced both my hands on the mattress to roll over.

Rook was on top of me before I could. When I tried to push up, he placed his hand back on the nape of my neck and shoved me back down. His other hand dragged up the back of my bare thigh, pushing my skirt up to my waist with his wrist.

“Fuck,” I gasped, and my own hot breath washed back over my face from where Rook kept my face down on the bed. Elastic snapped sharply against my skin as he pulled at my panties, drawing the fabric away from my skin until the pull was too far and then letting it snap back at my skin.

I jolted at the sting, yelping in the back of my throat. My heart was hammering, and I gripped the sheets with both hands as my core tightened in one firm pull.

I heard the soft sound of a zipper and the heat of Rook’s body was gone from over me, only to return a few seconds later with the delicious press of his gorgeous cock. Firm, aching hardness pressed right against my pussy, but rather than pushing inside where I wanted him, he stroked his crown through my pussy in lazy strokes.

“Rook!” I gasped, trying to lift my head. The moment I did, he shoved me back down onto the bed, and as I opened my mouth to insist once more, Rook entered me in one swift thrust.

The stretch of his cock to my core made every nerve inside me light up in excitement. Inch by perfect inch, he entered me until his hips were snug against the swell of my ass, then he draped himself over me and kissed the side of my neck.

“You were about to tell me what to do, weren’t you?” Rook murmured in my ear. His lips traveled along the shell of my ear to my hairline, where he deeply breathed me in.

“Maybe,” I whimpered, clamping my muscles down around him. “What if I did?”

“I won’t fuck you if you order me around,” he growled.

“Thought you liked it,” I gasped, rolling my head to the side.

Rook kissed along my hairline to my forehead, then swept down to claim my lips in a deep, open-mouthed kiss.

And then he started to fuck me. He didn’t stop kissing me, either.

His thrusts went from zero to a hundred, and he immediately set up a hard and fast pace that slapped our thighs together and shunted me up into the bed with each slam of his hips. I squealed and moaned, with each noise being swallowed by his own mouth as we kissed like he was keeping them secret. I tore at the bedsheets, adrift in the sudden onslaught of pleasure and unable to do anything but ride it out.

It was hot and sweaty. Clothes pulled awkwardly, my panties dug into my hip, and the bedsheets were too hot against my face. Breathing was tight with Rook’s weight on top of me, and he held me down in a way that raised my temperature to boiling.

It was perfect.

The sexy heat burned away the anger. The frantic fucking fed my adrenaline. And all the knots of nerves and anxiety in my gut faded away to be replaced by the tightening ripple of eager core muscles.

He fucked me relentlessly, never stopping and never losing pace. Holding back on my orgasm was impossible, and I didn’t even have the voice to warn him. Rook kept on fucking me like a man possessed, even as my pleasure swelled and peaked.

I cried out against his lips and came with a grunt. My entire body shuddered and trembled, and still, he kept fucking me hard and fast. Pulse after pulse of pleasure swept through me, and I quickly fell onto the other side of oversensitivity.

He fucked me wildly right up until he spilled his cum inside me and brought us to a breathless, twitching end.

Fuck.

It was amazing.

And it made one thing clear in my post-orgasm-addled mind.

No matter what was going to happen, I had Rook.

He was all I needed.