Tee- yeah, it is confusing huh? I'm so cruel!
Midnight- :)
Juli93- thank you!
Garmor- woop!
Fishing- she so does…
Chri5tin3- yay! Thank goodness for that :p
Pumpkinking- you sum up the chapters so well, I love it!
Bluebell- Did I see Zac on GN? DID I? Hell YES. It was epic.
Hopelessromaticgurl- glad you liked it :)
Brittany Katniss Gabriella- you have your update!
Fanficfan- here it is!
Brother to brother 6- I'm sorry I didn't know who was still around to translate, I never meant to cause any offense. I love you too, for being a fan :)
AddyD90- will do ;)
Fictionbooksaremy life- Thank you!
CHAPTER 7
Gabi did as Troy asked. She got into a routine of making his meals; tidying up and disappearing with precise timing and when he was later than expected home; she'd put his meal in the oven with a note of how to heat it up.
It lasted for two days, which to her was fairly surprising because they did share a house, after all. You'd have thought that after a while they might have crossed each other's paths, but it seemed like he was going out of his way to make sure that didn't happen and she couldn't blame him.
Troy was in the middle of all of this mess and she really couldn't blame him for being bewildered and confused and well…turned on. She had done that to him, she blamed. She had kissed him- twice- and instigated some very passionate results and she had led him on.
Gabriella Montez: Virgin. Prick tease.
Oh, why couldn't this be so much easier, she sighed? It was her own stupid fault for getting attacked in the first place and then none of this stupid mess would have happened. From now on, she was never walking anywhere after dark or accepting kind gestures of accommodation. Never.
Gabi leaned back from her frantic scrubbing of the bathroom tiles and considered her aching body might be something to do with her rather robust involvement with the cleaning regime she'd applied to the whole house.
She was still recovering, after all. She should know better.
Her eye was normal size now; if a little puffy and bruised underneath and her stitches were ready to be pulled which she had to pop out for later seeing as Troy had clearly given up on that little job. Her body bruises were fading and there were only two more days until Jake came back to save her sanity amongst other things. Like her innocence. Innocence she wished to lose to Troy with more urgency each day but kept reminding herself not to even think about.
Short term desire did not equal long term happiness, she quoted.
Now all she had to do was believe it. She rose with a sigh and stretched out her aching muscles, twisting to leave the bathroom and barreling into another body- that of her housemate and avoider.
"Oh, sorry, didn't realize you were in here…" His voice was scratchy like he'd just woken and she felt like a scullery maid in her damp, dirty outfit.
"Just cleaning," she supplied with a bow of her head.
"Is something hurting?"
Oh god, why did he have to notice that, she cried inside. Why? Was there no god? Was she not female? Had she not seen his abs and his pecs and those arms and did she not take pity on the already suffering Gabi; enough to make him not give a shit? Couldn't just something go right for her for on-
"Gabi?" Troy's voice and blockading presence reminded her she needed to speak.
"My shoulder aches a little…" She conceded quietly.
"You shouldn't be doing all this work," he chided softly and even his serious tone didn't harden his evidently caring words. She almost cried at the unfairness of it all.
"Well, I had to keep busy somehow…"
"Get changed. Meet me downstairs, I have something you can put on it." He instructed and she nodded, then flinched when she felt the backs of his fingertips brush her forehead. "I'll take your stitches out, too." He added and she quickly left to avoid any further conversation.
Damn, now she wouldn't be able to escape unless she wanted to look like she was fleeing which actually right now seemed like a more attractive option than going downstairs to collect some magic muscle rub and have stitches pulled by the sexy-almost-doctor Troy himself.
She was in deep trouble, she realized. Deep, irrevocable, unending amounts of poo. Jake was not going to forgive her for this, she realized. Nor Troy. Which saddened her the most because she really did like him. More than like him. Maybe-loved him, even.
But that wasn't an option. She'd have to stand strong, feign tiredness and retire as soon as was politely acceptable and then she'd only have two more days to get through before Jake came home. Easy stuff.
Right?
/
"Ok, hold still…" Troy leaned over her slightly where she sat on the sofa and he on his coffee table with scissors and tweezers focusing intently with his beautiful blue eyes to remove her stitches with the least amount of pain possible.
Gabi reprimanded herself for thinking his eyes were beautiful and let out a sigh.
"Losing patience?" He asked with his usual warmth. Affection she thought she might never hear from him again.
"No," she denied softly. "Sorry."
"You're nervous," he pulled back and his brows furrowed in bemusement.
"A little." She agreed.
"Well, no need to worry you're in safe hands…"
Safe, strong, gentle, sexy hands…Gabi this is getting you nowhere…
"I know," she forced her mind back onto the matter.
"Okay, they're a day over so this might pinch a little," he warned of the last couple of threads to come out.
"Are they grown into my eyebrow?" She wondered and he couldn't help his soft, wide smile break through.
"Not quite."
"Good. I don't want blue eyebrows for the rest of my life…"
"Okay, next," he stood and tidied away the remains of his work and came back over with a small pot. "Muscle rub…"
"Thank you," she went to reach for it, but Troy merely sat down beside her with the pot, reading the instructions.
"Muscle rub ointment for bruised, swollen or sore joints and muscles. Apply using a thin layer against the affected area using circular motions…"
"Right, I think I can manage that," Gabi nodded of his reading.
"Ok, twist around," Troy turned toward her and instructed.
"Troy…"
"It's muscle rub," he told her. "Not massage oil. And lest you forget, I am a doctor."
"You also told me to stay the hell away from you," she glittered back, annoyed at his little attempt at intimacy.
"Well," he pursed his lips and flicked down his lashes, cornering her with serious blue eyes when he lifted them back up. "You did and now I'm ok."
She gave him a look as of to say she didn't believe him but he wasn't going to budge.
"I'm not taking my top off," she stated and Troy gave her a condescending smile.
"Then how am I meant to rub the ointment on?"
"I don't want you to, I already told you," she repeated through clenched teeth.
"I see a hundred women a day," he boasted. "All parts of…" he added. "Your shoulder is not going to cause irrevocable damage to me, I swear."
"No, but your damn hands might to me," she muttered to herself and looked stricken as she twisted in the seat.
Thank god she had put on a bra, she mused of her outfit change into a wide-necked top that dropped over one shoulder becomingly. She lifted off the top with a wince and froze as a pain shot through her joint.
"It's okay, I've got it," she heard Troy's soft voice pierce the fog of pain and then she felt the soft material of her top against her chest, startling her; where she quickly looked down to find he had covered her front by draping the top against her bare skin.
"Thank you," she said and meant it of his gentlemanly gesture, then jumped with a squeak as his hand touched her skin.
"Oops, are they cold?" He rubbed his hands together with the ointment and lifted her bra straps gently down onto her arms before he began again, rubbing wide, gentle circles over both her shoulders; her neck a little down her back and then gradually closed in on the sore spot under her bruise.
"Ouch," she whimpered and shuddered as he found a particularly tender spot and she felt him breathe in; and his touch changed to a softer stroke.
"Your skin is healing well, but you'll have to take it easy on this joint," he told her.
"I didn't realize they'd done so much damage," she worried.
"It's just tender and stretched from the fighting and the fall," he supplied. "Just no more scrubbing, okay?"
She nodded, twisting her hair over her shoulder as he worked across her skin.
"How's work been?" She ventured.
Troy sighed and she felt his breath fan her neck; something that made her shiver uncontrollably- a reaction she silently berated herself for.
"Hard," he admitted.
"No cute girls to keep you entertained?" She threw out lightly.
"No-one like you," he admitted and she wasn't quite sure how to take those words. She decided that taking them as a simple, meaningless observation was best in the circumstances.
"Well I am one of a kind," she derided.
"You sure as hell are," his husked agreement had her twisting to face him, her arms clutching her top to her breasts protectively.
Her eyes appealed to his but he didn't seem in any hurry to answer her silent questions.
"I'm sorry I shouted at you the other night," he admitted with a blush. "I was fighting all kinds of feelings and I took it out on you…"
"No, you were right to put me in my place," she quickly assured with a vulnerable quiver.
"That's just the thing I can't wrap my head around," he puzzled, looking into her eyes.
"What do you mean?" She asked, her voice a raw strangle as she breathed in and out with slow deliberation, ignoring the intense gaze of his eyes and the swell and fall of his own chest.
Troy squinted. "Why does it seem to me that your place is in my arms?"
Gabi took three, hitched breaths at his words.
"You bastard," she accused softly, then lurched forward to kneel, wrapping her arms around his neck as he rocked back with the force of her attack, somewhat surprised by the attaching of her mouth to his.
Not that he didn't like it, he mused. He liked it a lot. It wasn't every day a full-grown woman decided to throw herself at him and he couldn't be happier at which particular woman it was; but oh god, her tongue dipped into his mouth and reminded him of another pleasure he should be enjoying right now, other than the lovely idea that she wanted to be in his arms as much as he wanted her there.
"Troy," she panted a breath in and then resumed kissing, relaxing into the long moments their mouths met and mated; something deeper and more special magically occurring while she groaned and straddled him the best she could.
His fingers danced delicately over her shoulder; silently acknowledging her injury before his fingertips ran down her spine and toward her backside. Once he'd cupped there and enjoyed her vocal responses; he tugged at the cloth between them that covered her breasts and he didn't have to work hard to drag the material away.
Gabi whimpered and struggled closer, but he ran his hand up her side with slow precision until his thumb brushed under her mound and then broached the hard peak atop it, covered by her bra.
"This is wrong," Troy ripped his mouth away and beseeched at the buck she made in his lap at his touch. "I can't do this…"
Gabi panted too and ran her hands through his hair as she considered her words.
"It's not wrong," she finally came up with.
"It is!" He argued. "Jake's my brother. I'm cheating with my brother's fiancée. You tell me how that's not wrong," he challenged on desire-dark eyes, fighting his conscience.
"It's not wrong," she said again, then took a deep breath. "Because I'm not in love with your brother."
There. It was out. The solid, unavoidable truth. But with it, came a lot of questions. The only question she had though, was if he was going to be bothered to ask them? Or would he let tonight be exactly what they both wanted it to be?
His conscience won out. It irked her and impressed her at the same time. He wanted her, she could see it as evidently as he felt it, but he loved his brother like he was a father and that she knew, would come out on top of anything the pair of them may be experiencing.
"Is that all you're going to say?" He wondered.
Troy flicked his eyes over her face which shone with the desire she was feeling. He knew there was something more to this, something important. Hadn't he felt it himself, this strangeness surrounding her and Jake? So if what she said was true it might offer him some answers, even if it didn't give him what he wanted- Gabi herself.
Gabi adjusted in his lap and swallowed. "No. I'll tell you everything. But later, I promise."
She lifted his hand to cover her heart so he could feel the steady rhythm of it beating- hard for him, just like his was for her, she knew.
"Okay," he agreed and her brows lifted with surprise but she merely climbed off the sofa and took his hand to lead him up to her room where she slipped off her jeans in full view, letting his eyes roam her nearly-naked body that he'd half bared with the removal of her top.
His face almost creased with the knowledge that she wouldn't be his, but he refused to let that thought delay him.
He stepped forward until he reached her, cupping her waist with strong, gentle hands and resuming his kissing with equal tenderness and fervour as before. Soon, she made a noise and wrapped her arms around his neck and then he found himself being stripped, bit by bit by her inquisitive hands.
"You have an amazing body," she sighed as her hands enjoyed him and then her lips followed suit. "And mind," she added afterwards, but by no means an after-thought. It just wasn't his mind that was arousing her right now, purely from her touching.
Troy wrapped her into him as his blood pounded around his body with vicious need and he felt the all-too familiar hardening of his body as her hands broached below his boxers to cup his backside, a sweet, sexy move he hadn't expected of her.
He gasped and pulled back; his hair stuck to hers as they drifted.
"Gabi…" he looked at her with eyes as dark as the night and hers were no lighter. Only touch mattered now, only swollen lips on skin and hands on flesh and Gabi dipped to rid him of his last barrier.
"Oh, lord," she panted at his aroused state- enlarged and even a little intimidating for a moment.
"Touch me," he graveled and moulded her hand around his hardness as he unhooked her bra and leaned down to suckle her tips; mutual pleasure abound as they both reaped the rewards of their foreplay, stood there in her room.
His kiss was strong as he bound his arms around her and hauled her up against his naked body, just the last barrier between them of her lacy underwear and it was as she was wrapped around him intimately; rubbing and aching for more that he whispered in her ear.
"I want to make love with you," he husked, thumbing her cheek and then devouring her throat with kisses.
She couldn't answer, only cry out in reply and she found them fallen on the bed and her small body covered by his.
"Troy," she scrambled to get up, dazed and foggy with desire, but remembering they needed birth control.
"Shh," the backs of his fingers soothed her lips. "I have something," he pressed the condom into her palm and kissed down her belly and over her thighs.
"Troy?" She called again, arching her head back and bucking on the bed as his tongue flicked deep inside her.
"Oh god, Gabi," she heard him groan out his own need and she wondered why he was wasting time; she wondered why he wasn't making love with her already before he ruined them both- in the best possible way.
"Troy, I can't…I can't…" she panted, fingering his hair and spreading her thighs unconsciously as his tongue flicked deeper, then over her nub.
"Fall for me, Gabi," he husked and flicked his tongue right there, right where it was sweet and overwhelming and insanely out of this world, like she was. Out of her mind, even at his oral ministrations.
"No," she tried to fight it, but the inevitable was to come. For her body had reached breaking point and the only option was to flow over; flow over the edge of the waterfall and drop among the waves that tossed her to and fro; just like the rippling of her body against her orgasm.
Kisses, she could feel kisses, soft and tender to her mouth. But why? Heaven had come and gone, why would someone be kissing her?
Troy.
Oh god, he was pressing into her, rubbing suggestively as she clutched his condom and tried to find air.
"I'm sorry," she panted quickly, coming around. "I'm-"
"Don't ever be sorry," his voice told her thickly. "Just tell me if you want this?"
She looked at him horrified for a moment. Of course she wanted this! She was risking everything for it, wasn't she? Did that not tell him exactly how much she wanted it? But she needed it, too. And only the movement of her hands to protect him would assure him of that, so she steadily got to work, unwrapping the sheath and lovingly protecting him before they embarked on their next journey together.
"I have never done this before," he tipped his forehead to hers.
"Me, either," she affirmed their previous confidences.
"I don't take this lightly and you need to know that." He kissed her some more, just softly.
"I know."
"I promise I won't hurt you okay?" He asked and she smiled lightly, still half-heady in a dream.
"Stop talking," she begged and curled her hand around his neck to bring him close for a kiss and somewhere along the line, she felt him enter her, with a gentle, careful thrust.
"Does it hurt?" He kissed her forehead, her cheeks, down her throat and then her mouth as he stilled within her, fighting his urge to buck his hips.
"You know that girl I told you you'd meet who was really special who you'd want so badly you wouldn't worry about being gentle?" She murmured, kissing him once, strongly. "I'm glad I'm not her. I love that you're gentle with me."
He didn't need any more reassurance because their bodies took over and Troy let his natural needs satisfy them both whilst keeping his promise to care for her the best way he knew how. It was slow, it was intense and it was probably the single most erotic thing in the world for them to just lay there and enjoy each other endlessly.
"I-" Troy panted as he felt lights cover his eyes and his control was on a knife-edge as his orgasm rose.
Gabi merely kissed his jaw and called his name, gently, tugging every emotion in his body as his climax hit and spilled into his protection at last. She was beneath him, sated and he couldn't move if there was a fire in this very room, he mused.
What was with that?
Soft fingers infiltrated his hair as he rested his forehead briefly against her shoulder and then he felt the soft cushioning body beneath him fidget.
"Is your shoulder okay?" He rolled onto his back and discarded his sheath with care, sliding his boxers on before he cuddled Gabi close and kissed her temple.
"Fuck my shoulder," she responded a little more candidly than he expected and it caused him to startle.
"That's a little weird," he teased right back, tightening his arms.
"My shoulder is fine," she replied formally, then propped up to look at him. "But how the hell did you learn to make love like that?"
He shrugged, brushing back her hair with tender fingers. "I know as little as you."
"Well," she sighed and let herself be wrapped into his arms again. "You're a natural."
"You, too," he smiled at her statement and she sighed contentedly out.
"Don't leave," she told him before she closed her eyes to sleep.
And he didn't think he could if he tried.