Lost (Captive Heart #1) Read online

  “Nice room.” I don’t know if I should start trying to score again or if I should wait.

  “Thank you.”

  Char steps toward me and I know it’s on; she wants to do this. But I do care about her. And I’m not such a jerk that I don’t want to make sure.

  “You’re sure you want to do this?”

  She places her palms on my chest. “Yes. I’m sure.”

  So I kiss her. I stroke my tongue against hers, twist our lips and mouths until we’re both panting. I’m so hard its almost painful, and with the way she’s writhing against me, I guess she’s ready.

  I pull off her shirt, and then my own. We keep kissing, the feel of my skin against hers making my body tense up with the need for release. I move to the bed, walking her backward and toeing out of my sneakers as I snake my hands from her waist to her boobs. God, she feels good.

  I lay her down, skating my hands back down her body before awkwardly trying to undo the button and zipper on her jeans. I get too amped up when I’m this close to getting inside a girl. I lose my cool.

  “I’ll do it,” Char whispers.

  Her hands move to her shorts, so I stand and hastily take my own off, with my boxers following. My dick stands at full-mast, hard and ready and so eager to push inside of her.

  And there is Char. Completely naked now, laid across her bed. She’s got her hands covering her tits, one leg thrown over the other to try and hide herself. Before I move to her, I grab the condom I always carry in my wallet. I’m a teenage boy, I’m hopeful but not stupid.

  “It’s okay. You don’t have to be shy.” I run my hand down her right arm and over her hand, peeling it away from her body. She moves the other and lays herself flat, giving me full access to her body.

  She’s so hot, one of the most beautiful girls I’ve ever been with. Char. I still almost can’t believe this is happening.

  It doesn’t take long for our kisses to turn frantic. I rip open the condom and roll it on, pinching the tip so my dick didn’t feel like it was suffocating. I haven’t really fingered her or anything, but she’s got to be horny like I am. Right?

  “You ready?” I stare down into her eyes, the lust and fear mixing.

  Char hesitates, nods, swallows.

  I guide myself into her entrance, the warmth and wetness already making my balls feel heavy. I cant my hips fractionally, and then a little bit more.

  “Ow! Wait!” Char pleads and I freeze up, immediately ceasing all movement with my cock only halfway in her.

  She lets out a little whine or a sob, her face twisting up in pain while she huffs out a breath.

  “Are you okay?” I feel like I have my finger on the trigger of a gun or something.

  She holds up a finger, signaling to give her a minute. I hold myself still and try not to move. Try not to even breathe.

  “Okay, you can move now.” Char nods, a tear leaking out that I blot with my finger.

  I give her a kiss, move my hips in a tiny thrust and then feel the gasp she lets loose on my lips.

  “Oh my …”

  I focus on Char’s eyes, the chocolate pools melting with each move I make. It feels good, she feels so good. Like a fist gripping my dick so hard that I know I’m going to burst in no time at all.

  She has to be close too, I think. She’s making sexy little moans and her mouth has formed a permanent O. And she’s grasping at my neck and shoulders, thrusting her hips off the bed to meet me every single time I push all the way into her.

  My spine and balls start to tingle, the sensations in the tip of my dick feeling so good I think I might pass out. And then I’m coming, shooting my load into the condom as I bury my face in Char’s hair.

  It takes me a minute or two to regain my breath and full consciousness.

  “Was that … okay?”

  I don’t pick my head up, but continue to breathe into her shoulder. My dick twitches, the tremors of my release still working through me.

  “That was … wow.” She sounds awestruck, and I smile to myself.

  “So did you … you know …?”

  A pause. “Yeah … yeah I did. Um did you?”

  “Yeah. It was amazing.”

  I push up onto my forearms and look down at her, unsure of what to do now. All of the other times I’ve had sex, it’s been at parties or in someone’s basement with their parents upstairs. I always had an out.

  “Uh … so … my parents will be wondering where I went. I should go.”

  “Yeah …” I can’t read the look in her eyes.

  I pull out and pull the condom off, wadding it in a tissue before sticking it in the pocket of my shorts and pulling all of my clothes back on. Char pulls hers on too, both of us going to different sides of the room and not really looking at each other and get dressed.

  When I’m done, I turn to her. “So … okay. I’ll talk to you soon.”

  I bend down and kiss her on the forehead before turning to leave.

  17

  Charlotte

  Eight Years Ago

  I think I’ve read the same sentence of Great Expectations sixteen times and I still have no idea what my eyes just processed.

  I set the book down with a sigh, unable to get into reading in the way I usually can. Usually, reading for me is like falling back to sleep on a Sunday morning. It feels so right and good, so familiar and even better than regular sleep. It’s warm and perfect, the whole world is cozy. It doesn’t even matter the book; assigned reading and pleasure reading are one in the same for me.

  But tonight I’m on edge. Just like I’ve been for a week.

  I can’t believe its only been seven days since I lost my virginity. Since I crossed the imaginary line in every female’s life, the leap that took you from being a naïve girl and into the world of womanhood.

  Seven days since I had sex with Tucker. It felt like a lifetime.

  I’ve replayed it so many times in my head that if my brain were a VHS tape, it would be spilling tape. The way our bodies moved together, the look in his eyes when he looked down at me. The way it felt to have him inside of me.

  Tucker. Inside of me. I used to daydream of that tousle-haired, brown-eyed boy laying his lips over mine and get butterflies. He’d been the star of all of my childhood and teenage fantasies. I never imagined he’d be the one to hold me for the first time as I experienced the most painful yet pleasurable sensations. Granted, I lied when I told him I’d had an orgasm. But no one did their first time, right? It was normal.

  And it wasn’t exactly fun. It hurt. A lot at first. But Tucker seemed so turned on by it, by me, that the pain faded quickly.

  My skin flushed and my heart revved into overdrive just thinking about his hands on me. And then I felt my cheeks suck in as the nausea came on.

  I hadn’t heard from him in seven days. He left that night, kissing my forehead silently as he looked into my eyes and said we would talk soon. And then … radio silence.

  I’d seen him in school twice, in passing or from a distance. He was always surrounded by people, I didn’t think Tucker had had a moment alone in his entire life. I’d tried to work up the nerve to go up to him, or to text him, and failed miserably. For the rest of the night after we’d had sex, I harbored this small light of hope in my chest. This was finally it, all of the wishes I’d saved up on birthday candles and lucky pennies and kissing the clock at 11:11 were going to come true. Tucker had finally noticed me, we were going to be something.

  And deep down, I still had that flicker, the tiny ember of expectation, but Tucker held the snuffer and he could stamp it out in a heartbeat.

  So I waited.

  I laid on my bed, a matching Gap pajama set keeping me warm, for what felt like hours. This was my typical Friday night, I’d never had a problem with reading until my eyes got heavy and then falling into a slumber only the weekends can bring. But tonight, it suddenly wasn’t enough.

  I’d hidden my phone under the bed in an effort to not check it incessantly, and so I didn�
��t notice it vibrate until ten minutes later when I allowed myself to calmly reach around on the hardwood and pull it up onto the comforter in front of me.

  Pushing the home button, the screen lit up. And there, I was greeted with one text. One name that flashed across my screen. Tucker.

  He’d finally texted me.

  I just sat there for a bit, my hands shaking as I saw his name go dark and then light up each time I refreshed the screen. I wanted to look so badly, but a part of me was preserving that tiny ember in my chest.

  By the time I picked up the phone and unlocked the screen, my whole body was shaking, as if I was in bone-chilling weather and couldn’t stop my body from shivering. This is what he did to me. And he wasn’t even physically here.

  Hi.

  I laughed outright, alone in my room, the sound echoing off the wall. I had gotten myself so worked up, and all he’d done was send a greeting. "Jeez, Char,” I muttered to myself.

  I should wait the requisite five minutes, let him wait, appear to be a cool girl. Like I wasn't trying too hard.

  But I couldn’t. My hands would not obey the teenage rule book.

  Hey, what’s up?

  A couple minutes later, my phone buzzed.

  Not much. At this party, kinda lame though.

  My stomach flipped. He was at a party. One he clearly hadn't invited me to. Wouldn’t you usually want the girl you were seeing to be at the party you were at? But he wasn’t having fun.

  Well, if it’s lame, I could stop by and make it better.

  Flirty. That was good. I could try and do flirty. He typed back seconds later.

  Nah, you wouldn’t want to come here anyway. I could come over there.

  My parents had taken to leaving me alone all weekend, doing some trip to this or dinner to that. Since I was leaving soon, my mom called this her time to “re-establish myself in the community and on several committees.”

  I didn’t mind, at least it got her off my back for a little while.

  I looked around my room, shooting off my bed and clearing what little mess there was before answering his text.

  Sure. You can come over.

  I was happy he was coming to spend time with me. But I also kind of wanted to go to that party.

  Ten minutes later the doorbell rang, and I was opening it to reveal Tucker.

  God he looked good. His curls had been chopped short sometime this week, nothing more but little waves close to his head now. His dark brown eyes shown bright, and his olive skin was even tanner than usual with all the running he must be doing outside since the weather had gotten warmer.

  “Hi.” I was breathless, my desperation probably reeked.

  “Hey there.”

  He walked in but didn’t make a move to kiss, or even hug, me. Hmm, okay.

  “Your parents home?”

  I followed him to where he stood at the base of the stairs. “Um, no. They’re out tonight.”

  “Cool. Do you want to go up to your room?”

  I pang of something—suspicion maybe—had me hedging for a minute, but this was Tucker. My crush. Wanting me to go upstairs with him. I’d be an idiot not to.

  “Sure.”

  My heart did a little flip when he reached for my hand to lead me up.

  18

  Charlotte

  “Three months. Three months you dragged me along like that. ‘I want to keep this for just us. It’s special this way.’ Yeah, what you really meant was that I was your dirty little fucking secret!”

  Tucker’s face pales, his mouth opening to start defending himself.

  “Don’t! You led me on for months, Tucker. And then you just left. Gone to college for pre-season without so much as a goodbye or a see ya later! You got inside my head and my heart, bent me to your every whim and then just left me without even having to dump me.”

  I point my finger into his chest, pushing him back so he’s not leaning against me into the wall anymore. I don’t want him anywhere near me.

  “Charlotte come on, I was a stupid kid. I was cocky and almighty, and I’m sorry.”

  “That was my first ever relationship. Did you know that? If you could even call what you did to me a relationship. I’d never even kissed another boy before you. And then to give you my virginity! God you probably laughed about how easy I was to your friends.”

  “No. I would never, no one even knew—”

  “Wow.” I shook my head, disbelief making tears spring to the corners of my eyes. “Of course they didn’t. You really are a bastard.”

  “What do you want me to say, Charlotte? Jeez, that was eight years ago!” He threw his arms up, the newly forming muscles flexing.

  “That you broke my heart! That you were a coward and a jerk and that you played me.”

  Tucker shakes his head, walking towards the door. “I’m not talking about this right now. Why do you even care anymore? Don’t you have your fancy fiancé?”

  Who had told him about Clark? “No. Not anymore.”

  “Oh, what happened? Love wasn’t everything you dreamed it would be?”

  I wanted to slap him. “You’re an asshole. Get out.”

  “Gladly, Char. Just don’t try to go anywhere. Not like you’ve tried in the past two weeks. Don’t you want to ask yourself why you are cooperating with, jeez, helping your kidnapper? Now that’s weird.”

  I picked up the closest thing I could grab, a flat pillow, and chucked it at the door as he slammed it shut. The effect wasn’t satisfying at all.

  A frustrated growl rips from my throat and I throw myself onto the mattress bed like a child throwing a temper tantrum.

  He knows he did me wrong. He has to. Who just leaves the person they’ve kissed, touched, laughed with into the early morning hours without so much as a word?

  My heart still feels jagged, like I’ve only used tape to line up the severe cracks instead of something more solid. When Tucker left, it did something to me. It broke something inside of me.

  And I was finding … it still wasn’t fixed.

  19

  Tucker

  Another week passes and there’s no sign of a search and rescue. No police or armed men coming for my head. I think every day about what I’ll do when they eventually catch me. What would happen?

  Seven days and not a peep from Charlotte either after she’d reamed me out. I deserve it too. For all of the fucked up shit I ever did to her. Back when we were kids, and now this. She’s right; I’m a fucking bastard.

  Detoxing is pretty much over, but the cravings are still a bitch. I wake in the middle of the night, my throat itchy and my skin stretched tight … so in need of a hit that it’s like a deadly thirst I can’t cure. I fight it with running and working out. If I can tire my body to the point of exhaustion, I can finally forget about the craving. So that is what I do.

  For the first time since I brought us here, I venture into the recreation building on this random afternoon. We’re almost into the last week of October and the weather is growing colder, not allowing me to sit down by the lake like I do most every night until it gets dark.

  And that’s where I find Char, curled up on one of the benches by the wall of bookcases filled with old paperbacks.

  I chuckle. “I should have known this is where you spent your time. Forgot about these old dust collectors.”

  I point to the piles of books which can’t have one among them younger than 2005.

  Char doesn’t even look up at me. Okay, I get it. But we can’t go on like this for the next couple of months. And I can’t carry this weight around on my conscience.

  “I’m going to play some ping-pong,” I tell her, walking to the rickety old table. “Care to join?”

  No answer.

  I fold up the other side of the table so that I can play against myself. Since clearly Char is not going to move and play nice. I don’t blame her.

  “It’s hard to get everything you want in life and then just have it ripped away from you in seconds.” I don’t realize
I’ve spoken those words out loud until Char’s head whips my way, the book she was holding folded and put on the tabletop.

  “Um … what? God,” A sardonic laugh pops out, “You are such a golden boy. Even now. You got what you wanted. You got the money from the bank, and you got me to leave with you. You have me staying here. You get everything you want, Tucker. You always have.”

  “Yeah, because this whole thing really went my way.” I point between myself and her.

  “You’re such an asshole. And a prick. And conceited. You have never thought about anyone but yourself for a day in your life.”

  Char shakes her head, her wavy mane floating on the air as she does. I can’t help noticing how small she looks, swallowed up in those sweats that don’t fit her at all. She looks adorable and sexy all at the same time. I just want to hold her in my arms.

  “You know what’s harder than having everything ripped away? Never getting anything you want in your entire life. Try that one on for size, Tucker.” She glares at me, her big eyes stony and filled with rage.

  “You were the easy piece of my life! And I don’t mean that in a mean way. But in the best fucking way possible. You were the calm in the middle of the shit storm that was my life. The one part of it where there was no pressure. I could just be … me. You didn’t care if I was a football star or a popular guy.”

  I look down at my hands, trying to convey all the twisted-up emotions clogging my throat. Ever since she yelled at me, bared her soul to me about us, its been at the forefront of my brain. I didn’t realize just how high and dry I’d left her. It had sucked leaving her, leaving what we had. But it was. It was easier for me.