Bad Wrong Things :  Bonus Scenes

Bonus Scene 2: Growth

Raven

 

 

For whatever reason the air wasn’t on at Clint’s house, or maybe it just couldn’t penetrate the cocoon of his warm, naked body wrapped around me like a monkey while he slept. 

 

I’d gotten into Mansfield late last night, weeks after our reconciliation, weeks after deciding we didn’t want to spend another second not loving each other. He’d been spending time with Joey, and other than dragging our fingers across each other's features on the screens of our phones, we hadn’t laid hands on each other in way too long. We more than made up for that last night. 

 

I carefully lifted my head from his chest, attempting to glance over his shoulder to the digital clock on the nightstand, but at my slight movement his hold grew more restrictive. 

 

“No,” he grumbled, the syllable rumbling up his chest. “You aren’t going anywhere.” He kissed my upturned face. 

 

“Thought you were sleeping.” 

 

“And miss a second of you being in my arms? No way. Besides, did you forget I’m an early bird? It has to be noon by now.” 

 

“Please no fucking bird and worm metaphors.”

 

His silent laughter vibrated through me. “It’s a phrase not a metaphor, sweetheart.” 

 

“Same shit.” I bit lightly at his chin. I sighed, getting comfortable again with my ear against his chest, listening to the drumming of his heart and relishing in the feel of his fingers crawling up and down my spine.

 

“You’re thinking,” Clint said.

 

“Yeah,” I confessed on a breath. 

 

“You do that a lot. I love that new side of you.” 

 

“New side…” I turned his words over in my head. 

 

Clint’s hand stilled when I went no further. “Did I say something wrong?” We were still adjusting to being together after having been apart for so long. Still learning the nuances of the people we were now. What made us tick, what still worked, and what was no longer acceptable in our respective new skin. 

 

“No.” I moved in his hold, and he reluctantly loosened his arms and legs, allowing me to roll to my back. “I don’t think I’ve been giving myself enough credit for how much I’ve changed.” 

 

“What do you mean?” He faced me on his side, head propped up on his palm so he could see me clearly. 

 

“As soon as I saw you again, fear and doubt took over. It was like I had been studying for a test that I never actually took. I had all the answers in my head. The tools needed to pass, but how could I be sure I was ready if I never had to put those tools to use?” 

 

“And then you came back for your mother’s funeral, and you were finally being tested.” 

“Fuck, was I ever. And I failed miserably. Or at least I thought I had, and it made me question everything I’d worked hard to overcome in the last eight years.” I went back to thinking while Clint contemplated my words. 

 

“Was coming back the hardest thing you’d ever had to do? Harder than leaving?” 

 

I rolled to my side, mirroring his position, smoothing a thumb over his scrunched brows. We hadn’t had time to talk about everything, but we needed to, because we were different people now and those differences were what was going to sustain us. “No. The hardest was a toss-up between leaving you and staying gone.” 

 

He nodded slowly as if he got it, but how could he? My hardest paled in comparison to his living without knowing if I lived in return, to not knowing where I was out in the world. As far as Clint knew I had no one outside of Mansfield. Nowhere to go, nowhere to seek refuge, nowhere to mend. I screwed my eyes shut, breathing through the rising ache in my chest as I envisioned our roles in reverse. 

 

“It’s over now,” he whispered, sliding a hand around the side of my neck, sweeping a thumb over my skin. I opened my eyes to find him patiently waiting for me to continue. 

 

“I had to leave. In my mind, there was no other way. But not coming back…” I shook my head. “I’d ride out to the Canadian border every week for months, ready to make my way back and fall at your feet.” 

 

“Why didn’t you?” Clint asked, just shy of begging for an answer. The lingering pain from our separation would always cut. “Why didn’t you come back to me?”

 

“Because I knew things would be the same because I was the same. I needed to be different. I needed to love myself enough so you wouldn’t have to love me enough for the both of us. The man that drove full speed to the border with tears clouding his vision only wanted one thing. For you to make me feel like something because I felt like nothing. Like no one.”

 

“God, Raven… You were never nothing.” 

 

“Without you I was as good as dead, Clint,” I said fiercely, watching his throat roll as he swallowed that pill. We hadn’t yet gotten to the nitty-gritty of our time apart, of how we became who we are now. We’d been spending our time loving each other, reconnecting with Joey, and coordinating his move next door. Looking forward, not back, because the future was far more appealing. But we needed this too.  

 

“But you didn’t die. You’re here now. You survived.” 

 

I huffed. “Barely.”

 

“Come here.” He sat up, tugging me into his lap, my ankles crossed at his lower back, my arms hung loosely around his neck. “My favorite position.” 

 

“Are you sure you want to hear all this now?” I asked. 

 

“Yes. I want to know everything. All the tiny molecules.” 

 

I blew out a breath, searching for a launching point. “I was living in my uncle’s basement apartment. If it could be called that—the fridge could be reached from the sofa. I was unemployed, barely eating or sleeping. I’d go days without moving other than to take a piss. Every day I’d talk myself out of coming back to you. I’d last a week before racing to get to you. I’d be right there, so close. All that separated us was a fucking border. Then I’d hear gunshots, and see blood. But it wasn’t the past haunting me. It was a glimpse into the future. A reminder of what I’d really be going back to. I’d then return to the basement and crawl into bed, hardly breathing. Wash, rinse, repeat.” 

 

“Then what?” Clint asked softly, combing my hair away from my forehead. 

 

“Then one night my uncle barged in and slammed a thick photo album onto the bed, nearly taking my fucking head off.” I scratched at the salt and pepper stubble coating Clint’s frown. 

 

“I’m not leaving until we’ve gone through every photo. Until you’ve heard every story about her. Until you know who and where you came from. Until you know who you are, Raven.”

 

“Hey,” Clint said, raising my chin. “Where’d you go?” 

 

“Just something my uncle had said.” Clint and I were naked, sweaty, and sticky from last night's fucking. We were a recipe with all the ingredients our past selves needed to tear into each other—or at the very least, for who we were to be hanging on by a lust-filled thread to get to the good part. The fact that our truths, however painful, and our hearts were now the very best part said a lot. 

 

“I remember you saying that learning about your mother’s past jump-started things for you.” 

 

“I thought I knew my mother. Thought I had her all figured out. For years I’d convinced myself I was doing my best to be nothing like her, but the opposite was true. My uncle provided perspective into who she was. Into the day she was taken, and the years she’d been missing before being rescued. We were both searching for something outside of ourselves to make the pain go away. To make us whole. To make us worthy, or to help us forget we were anything but.” My mother and I couldn’t mend things. I couldn’t fix her, and when I accepted that I’d finally understood Clint couldn’t fix me. And as much as I had believed I didn’t need to be fixed, it’s what I subconsciously wanted, it was what we all wanted. I’d also learned that fixed didn’t equate to being perfect, it just meant no longer being broken. “I was able to let go of the hurt she caused. Her mistakes were never about me, and I no longer took them personally.”  

 

“I may have been responsible for your beginning, but you’re in charge of your end.” Her last words to me the night I left Mansfield. The words I’d eventually come to live by. 

 

“I didn’t know where to start with the rest of my journey. My uncle swore by yoga and meditation, so I started attending classes at the studio he and my aunt owned. I gave up my vices. It started as a way of not wanting to be reminded of you, then I ended up not wanting anything in the way of me being enough for me. If I craved a cigarette, I dug deeper for the reason why. If I needed a drink, I soul searched instead. I wrote my feelings down, and worked shit out in my head instead of medicating myself with bad habits.” I tapped my temple for emphasis. “I started volunteering my time to the arts, trying to live a life of service—which reinvigorated my passion for inking, for my dreams. I matured. With time, I just matured.” I shrugged. “Now that I think about it, maybe the hardest thing I’ve ever had to do was face myself.” 

 

Clint kissed me, slow and steady, pulling back before things turned too hot, before our bodies began to burn down everything around us. “I’m enjoying this,” he explained. 

 

“I’ve never been more grateful for soft cocks in my life,” I said around a lopsided grin that he matched with a snort of laughter. I threaded my fingers through his hair. “Tell me how Brandon saved you.” 

 

 Clint had detailed the year he spent searching for me, and he’d mentioned Brandon visiting him in his dreams, saving him. I wanted a blow-by-blow of the details now. The stuff popcorn was invented for. Was it every night? All night? What had he said? What did he do? All of it. I wanted all of it. 

 

“At first he’d just sit and watch me with this disappointed look on his face. The dream always ended with me shouting for him to say something. Do something. Kick me, tell me he hated me, tell me I didn’t deserve a second chance at anything,” he gritted out. “Then one night he did do something. The little brat shoved me.” Clint’s eyes blew wide, he smiled so big his molars were on full display.

 

I joined in on his amusement, confused as shit but happy to be. “He shoved you? From what, like a fucking mountain top or something?”

 

“I can’t for the life of me remember that detail, but I woke up on the ground tangled in the sheets, suffocating and fighting my way out.” 

 

“And you found your way out?” 

 

“Yeah,” he said wistfully. “I at least saw the light at the end of the tunnel. He’d given me the shove I needed.” 

 

“Then what?” I repeated his question from a minute ago, knowing what came next but wanting to hear it anyway. He kissed my nose indulgently. 

 

“I did everything. Read every self-help book I could get my hands on. Allowed Bobby to drag me to church a few times. Threw myself into building the business. Learned how to ride a Harley just to be close to you in some way—it wasn’t pretty, by the way. Thank God for first aid kits,” he muttered. “And I allowed Brandon to be a part of my life again.” His gaze wandered over to the portrait of Brandon hanging on his wall. “My mother’s letter helped with that. And I matured, too. And I hoped—God, did I hope—that you and Joey would one day come back to me.” 

 

We hugged, rocking from side to side, as I pressed a kiss near his ear. 

 

“I need to know something,” he whispered. 

 

“Ask me anything, Clint.” 

 

“Would you have come back to me? If your mother hadn’t died?” 

 

It was the first sign of fear I’d seen in him since we’d reunited. As if the thought had not only just occurred to him, but it terrified the shit out of him, too. I braced my forehead against his, squeezing his nape. “I don’t know. Maybe. What if you’d moved on? What if we were so different that we no longer worked? What if we worked best apart?” I paused, but he read my last thought loud and fucking clear. 

 

“What if all it would’ve taken was one touch from me to prove that nothing had changed for the better? That we’d been playing a role for eight years, that we were still the same broken people only capable of breaking each other and everything around us.” 

 

“Yes,” I said, meeting those gray eyes that did me in every damn time. “Never having you again would’ve been an easier blade to choke on than finding out I’d left for nothing. That no good had come from it.” Learning he and Joey hadn’t reconciled during my absence didn’t help matters.  

 

He cupped my cheeks, speaking his next words with an intensity that shook my emotions. “I promised myself that if I ever got the chance to love you again, it’d be the right way. That I’d never let anything come between us again. Not even my demons. I wouldn’t squander a second opportunity. And if I promised it, I had to mean it. I couldn’t risk pretending, or thinking I’d laid the past to rest only to discover with one look at you that I hadn’t.” He dropped his hands to my shoulders, rubbing soothing circles over them. “You were so defensive when you came back. Scared the crap out of me. Here was my chance, and I couldn’t get through to you. You were right there, and I was going to lose you again.”  

 

“I was terrified you hadn’t changed. That I hadn’t changed after all because of the way I needed you as soon as I laid eyes on you in that church… And then you touched me, and it took everything to hold myself together while reveling in you taking me apart. Fuck was I scared. But you had changed, and so had I because I was just as whole after—where it mattered,” I brought his palm to my heart, “as I was before you put a hand on me that night. You hadn’t given something back to me that was lost. You hadn’t defined my love for myself in that bed. You added to it. You elevated it. And that’s what love is supposed to do, Clint. Your love no longer breaks or makes me. I make me. But you fucking make me better.” 

 

“Christ, I love you, Raven.” 

 

“Same. Fucking, same.” I wiped the damp corners of his eyes, the love pouring from them blinding me. “You know, I kinda liked that our roles had reversed, that it was your turn to believe enough for the both of us. For all the good those years without you did, I’d also lost pieces of myself I hadn’t admitted I wanted back.” 

 

“Like your love for riding?”

 

“Shit, definitely that,” I chuckled. “But other stuff too,” I said meaningfully, and his eyes twinkled with something filthy. “It felt good to sit back and let you be the one to work hard for us for a change.” 

 

“You had every right to be leery. I was the one that screwed up. It was my turn to prove to you that we could work. My turn to make a believer out of you. Rebuilding faith and trust was my job, Raven. Not yours.” 

 

“It’s both our jobs now, Clint.” A heavy silence descended on us, one full of thoughts, and maybe even a few regrets. “Fuck, that was heavy.” I sniffled. “How about a lighter topic?”

 

“Like what?” He smiled up at me, the epitome of warmth and patience. 

 

“Hell if I know. What's your favorite position?” I plucked from thin air, but not really. We were changed men, but I still found him hot as fuck, and after a meal like that, I needed a little dessert. I lowered one of his hands to my cock, needing his touch there, needing some balance from the overwhelming touch he had on my heart. I chuckled at his level of concentration. “There’s no wrong answer, Clint.” 

 

“Hold your horses,” he said, eyeing the ceiling, one side of his bottom lip tucked between his teeth.

 

“Before sundown,” I teased, but really, I loved that even this he took seriously. Nothing about us was unimportant to either of us.  

 

“Let’s see,” he mused, dragging out the suspense, and I dug my heels into his lower back. Fuck, would he always be this sexy? He’d taken me roughly last night. All night. But I wanted him again. I needed him again.  

 

“I love taking you from behind,” he said, interrupting my dirty thoughts. “The way your back arches when your chest meets the bed—or the floor. I love watching my cock plow in and out of you. Having you at my mercy, whimpering, makes me feel powerful. But…” He peered down at the wet stickiness falling over the fingers that stroked me, there was so much of it. “Jesus, Raven. Are you about to come, sweetheart?” He patted around the sheets, flipping over a pillow in search of the lube, his dick a thick pole pressing along the crease of my ass. 

 

 “We’ve got all the time in the world.” And if I came now, there’d always be later. He was my priority. This was my priority. “Keep talking.” 

 

He smiled, and it took everything in me not to violently kiss it off his face. “But,” he picked up where he’d left off, “I’d rather feel whole, and loved, and accepted. Empowered over powerful. So, I’m going to go with you in my lap, legs secured so tightly around me it’d take the jaws of life to pry you off. Your mouth parted, forming an O, your panting breaths washing over my mouth and chin, and your eyes clear and open, hearts floating from them. That’s my favorite position,” he smirked, “the position we’re in right now. Your turn.” 

 

“Same,” I whispered. “Fucking, same.” And I couldn’t say for sure if the sweat rolling down our bodies was the result of it being the ass-crack of summer, or from lust heating our veins like a fucking flame thrower. I nibbled along his chin until I found the perfect spot on his neck to stamp my claim.

 

“Wait a minute, sweetheart,” Clint said thickly, having to haul me back by my hair when his words didn’t get through to me. 

 

“What?” I asked huskily, petulantly. 

 

“Has anyone else been here? During our time apart?” he asked nervously, as if he needed but didn’t want to actually know the answer. His finger slid into my hole, the remnants of his cum making the voyage easier. 

 

“Fuck, yes,” I hissed. 

 

This was one area we hadn’t touched on at all, other than my mention of giving up men after leaving Mansfield, and not being in a relationship at the time of my return. We’d had enough to overcome, we didn’t need our jealousy getting the best of us as we were trying to navigate our new life together. But it was bound to be a topic of discussion, and what better time to ask if I’d taken another man’s cock while we were apart, even for one night, than right before I was about to get my brains fucked out of me. “Hold on,” he pressed a finger to my mouth, cutting off my answer. He scooped up the bottle of lube, reaching behind me to slick himself and my hole. “I need to be inside you for this.” 

 

“You, or your ego?” I said as he lowered me onto him, a moan shooting from my lips. 

“Both,” he panted as he bottomed out. “If you’re going to tell me about how someone else got to have you in any way, then I need the reminder that I’m the one you fall apart for while you’re doing it.” 

 

I was so full. Too full. And with my legs wrapped around his waist there wasn’t much I could do but accept the fucking he was giving as he lifted and lowered me continuously with a grip on my hips. 

 

“Tell me,” he demanded. 

 

“I tried…” I said with effort. Clint flipped us before I could explain further, slamming me to my back and clamping both legs over one of his shoulders, folding himself over me. The position sealed me like a tomb, causing his re-entry to feel like an invasion. “Shit, Clint.”  

 

“Who and when?” he snapped, breathing heavily. 

 

I pretended to be too out of breath to answer, revving up his impatience and his vigor. His movements turned violent, his thrusts perfectly aimed for that sweet spot inside me that never failed to activate my false pleas. “E-ease up, Clint. Fuck.” 

 

“That’s not what you want, is it, sweetheart?” He hauled his tongue over my slackened mouth, jerking away at every attempt I made to kiss him. My fingers dug angrily into his shoulders, my knees nearly grazing my ear. “You need your cock touched, don’t you?” 

 

“Yes,” I moaned as my precum trickled along my abs, tickling my flank as it dripped to the rug. 

 

“Then start talking.” 

 

I wanted to lie, even if it was just pretend. I wanted to say words that would prolong this, that would make his dick swell to impossible proportions. That would make fifteen minutes of hardcore fucking feel like days of getting my ass hammered by him. But I couldn’t. Not even as part of our game. Clint’s eyes softened, and he slowed, situating my legs around his hips and tugging me into his favorite position again. Our favorite position. He rolled into me, holding my waist to raise and lower me. I tangled a hand in the hair at his nape, pulling his head back to kiss the sweat from his top lip as I fist fucked my dick. “I told you once that the heart and the mouth are connected, and that I’d never give either to anyone but you. I meant it, Clint.” I paused to groan through a curse, because fuck, his cock was so big and so deep. “I’d gone on dates here and there, but they were never you. And I loved myself too much by that point to ever settle for anything less than you.” We came quietly then, gazing into each other’s eyes, spasming through our climaxes but too entranced with our mutual love to allow it to overtake the moment. Clint brought my hand to his mouth, licking each cum-soaked finger clean. My ass would be cleaned next. I shivered from the anticipation of having his face buried between my cheeks. 

 

“I wouldn't have blamed you if you had. I can’t say that I love you, and then begrudge your happiness. It would’ve been your right to move on.”

 

“But you’re happy I didn’t.” 

 

“Yes.” He buried face in the hollow of my neck but he had nothing to feel bad for. I didn’t lose a wink of sleep over being grateful he hadn’t moved on from me.  

 

I hugged him. “Your turn,” I said, and he stiffened. I pushed him to his back, his soft cock tumbling out of me. With my hands planted on either side of his head, I demanded, “Bobby’s sister-in-law?” 

 

“God no,” he said. 

 

“He or she?” 

 

“She,” he said, like it should’ve been obvious. As if it would’ve been a betrayal otherwise. But it didn’t work that way. Pleasure was pleasure, no matter who he’d gotten it from. It stung either way.  

 

“How was it?” I took his flaccid dick in hand, attempting to work some life into it. I suddenly had the urge to ride him hard. 

 

His eyes bulged as if I was out of my mind. He peered down his chest to my determined grip on him. “I’m an old man now—”

 

“Bullshit. You can still outlift me, and out run Joey. Now answer me.” 

 

His head flopped back, and my gaze narrowed at the amusement shaking the corners of his mouth. “I can’t concentrate and answer your question—”

 

“Try.” 

 

“Christ,” he spat when I scooted lower to lick a stripe up the underside of his dick. “Raven,” he said lovingly, a hand landing tenderly in my hair. I sat back on my haunches but didn’t release him. “I was just so damn lonely, sweetheart.” His words begged for understanding. “And all it did was make me feel lonelier because no one but you would ever do.” 

 

“Good answer, old man.” I lost the battle with my grin. He held an arm wide, and I tucked myself into his side, my leg tossed over him. 

 

“I’m surprised it took you this long to ask.”

 

“It hasn’t been that long,” I argued, pinching his side playfully. “And I try to avoid things that may trigger old habits.” The AC kicked on, pounding down on our sweaty skin, gooseflesh began to rise. We shuffled under the sheet, and I trailed my fingers over the fine hairs on Clint’s chest. 

 

“Anything you feel like you’re missing out on?” he asked. 

 

“Like what?” 

 

“I don’t know.” He shrugged. “Kids, maybe?”  

 

“Where’d that come from?” I gazed up at him. 

 

“I need to know you’re happy. Fulfilled.” His voice turned raspy with emotion. “Anything that makes you happy gets a yes from me.” 

 

“No. I’m selfish. I want to spend the rest of my life loving you and the life we already have. We’ll leave the dirty business of having kids to Joey.” 

 

“Happy to hear it.” Clint squeezed me in tighter, yawning, our noses grazing, lips teasingly close. “Do we have time for a nap?”

 

“I wish. I gotta meet Link in less than an hour. You can come hang with us,” I said hopefully. Link was just as much Clint’s friend as he was mine. They’d formed a bond while searching for me after I’d vanished. It was wild to see how my friendship with him no longer set Clint’s teeth on edge.

 

 “And I matured, too.” Yes, he had. 

 

“I plan on monopolizing your time starting tomorrow morning when Joey flies out to see David. So go have fun, and tell Link his truck will be ready tomorrow.” 

 

“Okay. What will you do while I’m out?” 

 

 “Joey and I will throw some burgers on the grill.”

 

“This is our life now, huh?” 

 

“Yeah,” he whispered. “Isn’t it amazing?” 

 

“The fucking best.” 

 

“I love you, sweetheart.” 

 

“Then shut up and kiss the shit out of me.” 

The End