Not That Kind Of Girl

Chapter 19: The Lyons' Pride

"Ah-hum!"
We all turned abruptly to a very dishevelled Josh, who stood with his arms crossed at the door.
"One of you better explain to me why the hell Miss Fitz from across the road just called me about some hooligans fighting on my lawn," he said with a yawn.
I looked at Tristan and hugged him again.
"It was all just some big misunderstanding," Aden called.
I turned to look at him, still disappointed with the way he'd handled it all.
"I don't really care whether or not that's true. I just want all of your asses in this house right now. It's too damn late for this crap!" Josh ordered.

The moments leading after the chaos was anti-climatic. I had a long shower to wash the night off of me and Tristan followed soon after I was out. Josh had all but demanded that Aden not drive and pointed him to the couch before slumping upstairs and closing his door. I found some pillows and blankets, wanting Aden to feel comfortable for the night.
My heart all but stopped when I reached the living room.
Aden was in the middle of taking his shirt off.
I watched the way his muscles flexed as he did so. His limbs stretching as his shirt finally came off and he threw it on the arm chair nearby.
He turned to me abruptly as though sensing that I was watching him.
"Like what you see?" He asked, leaving me reminiscent of a past conversation we'd had.
I gave him a half smile, still taken aback by the fight, and how he had forced Tristan to come out, instead of believing me.
He seemed to sense this sitting on the edge of the couch and tapping the spot beside him. I sat across from him instead, propping myself on the coffee table.
"I'm sorry," he said immediately.
I nodded thoughtfully, looking down at my fingers. "I think you owe him an apology," I muttered.
"I know," he said almost straight away, like he knew what I would say. "And I will apologise."
I nodded again.
"But I'm sorry you had to see that side of me. I got jealous," he admitted hesitantly.
I snapped my head up to look at him. "Yeah, no shit!" I smirked leaning into him a little.
He nodded. "Was it that obvious?" His tone was sarcastic, but he fained a sense of seriousness.
"Just a little," I said softly, leaning in a little more without thinking.
He slid his hands up my neck and cupped my cheeks. For a moment I couldn't think his palms hot against my skin.
He leaned into me almost closing the gap between us.
"I didn't know about Trsitan, I just thought he wanted you. That thought....did things to me," he explained slowly, swallowing hard. "It doesn't excuse my behaviour, but fuck it made me want to punch someething."
I looked down at my fingers. "Yet, you let me feel that when you slept with Caroline." I took a breath. "But, no matter my feelings for you, we.... werent together. Bur it still hurt. And some part of you would have known that."
He dropped his hands from my face and the lack of touch made me instantly shiver.
"My mum came home the night before it," he didnt seem to think, the words seemed to spill out of him.
I looked up at him but he was already looking at me. His eyes full of a sadness I'd never seen.
"She came to tell us that she's getting remarried in a few months to some guy, and they have two kids, Rachel," he stated flatly. "Twins."
"Aden," I whispered moving closer to hold his hand.
I wasn't sure how this had anything to do with Caroline but it didn't matter to me right now. The sadness that overcame him was too much to withstand.
Aden hadn't seen his mother since she'd walked out many years ago.
He squeezed my hand seeming to gather courage to say, "She's moving to England just after the wedding but wants us to meet her new family." There was a thick resonance of resement when he spoke of his mother and it made my chest ache.
He scoffed looking through me its seemed. "She had the nerve to tell me that she wants to start 'fresh," he spat, forcing the words out.
"What?" I breathed, feeling the severity of her actions. An anger seemed to creep up with the walls of my body and and exhaled slowly to calm it.
No mother should leave their children, not like this. In a way I knew how it felt, somewhat.
"Start fresh," he repeated, looking down at our hands and squeezing lightly. "How about making amends to the first family you abandoned?" He laughed, two notes that echoed his sadness through the living room. "But that was too much for her, apparently."
"She doesn't get to do that. You are all fine without her now!" I pressed, but caught myself getting angered by Alaine Lyons' departure. I took a breath to calm myself, Aden didn't need my biased opinion, he just needed me there. "But it's up to you if you want to meet your siblings. I'll even come with you," I said gently, hoping my offer provided some comfort.
He nodded but sighed seeming unsure.
"Hey," I whispered, but he didn't look my way, so I squeezed his hand lightly. "It's not a decision you have to make overnight okay?"
His eyes moved back up my body but settled behind me, and his thoughts seemed to visually shift, like he had remembered the reason he'd begun to tell me about his mother.
"The day I came over to pick you up and found Tristan here, I assumed you'd been sleeping together and my mind went blank, and all I saw was red. Caroline was just a distraction i chose to get away from that." His words were coming out faster and faster, almost too rapid for me to keep up. "All I wanted was to not feel for a moment." His eyes finally met mine but they weren't his own. He was overcome by something dark and pained. "I came to you because you make me feel something other than angry. Being with you calms me, because it's just the kind of person you've always been. You're like this overwhelming sense of clarity." His voice was straining. He cupped my face again and pressed his forehead to mine and closed his eyes. "We didn't even finish. The guilt of it all stopped me, and I told her we needed to stop mid-way," he clarified. His eyes begging me to believe him. "Because for a split second all I could feel was that i was doing wrong by you. Because you make me want to be better," he spoke softly now, almost as though the words were too painful to speak. "So I tried to do better, but the damage was done, and Caroline got to you before I could. Not that it would have changed or excused what I had done."
He sighed, seeming tormented.
"You're the only one that would have  understood, and I should have just  told you, because you've been here the whole time through it all. But something took over me when I thought that maybe I was too late and Tristan had won you....all of you."
He shook his head, closing his eyes tighter. "Deep down I figured he was perfect for you. Because you deserve nothing less than perfect. But I was mad at myself for pushing you in to his arms." Aden sighed roughly before pulling away to look at me again. "Oh so I thought."
There was a moment when I could see him think again.
"If I had just listened and treated you like you fucking deserve...then maybe it would have been you in my bed, or even just with me. The only one I actually wanted there. The only girl I care about," he whispered. I was unaware how close he had gotten again, but now his breath was fanning deliciously over my face. "I only want to fuck you, respectfully," the words fell from his lips sweetly. It should have sounded vulgar, but the way Aden said things ignited sparks in places I would be ashamed to talk about out loud.
A small smile played at his lips, because he knew exactly what he was doing to me. "I only want to be with you. To hold and kiss you. Not Caroline, or any of those other girls...you. Just you Snooks."
I sighed as he pressed his lips to mine softly and pulled away to look at me. "I'm so sorry," he said softly, although the sincerity was loud and clear.
He kissed me again, pulling away immediately once more.
The contact was enough to make my heart skip a beat, it wasn't enough to satisfy my need for him, and a heat quickly filled my body again. I moved quickly pushing him back against the sofa as I straddled him. My knees sinking into the cushions beside his hips.
He seemed taken by surprise, but Aden was good at this, and he knew it. His hands slipped down to my waist in rhythm with my hands cupping his face.
I kissed him, my tongue passing over his lips, demanding entrance. He allowed it, and the heat of out tongues meeting transcended through our body making my thighs quiver. I knew that if we didn't stop this would go all the way, and I wasn't oppose to it in the least. On the contrary I wanted it more than I had wanted anything in my life, and it didn't help that I could feel him get harder beneath me, the material of his pants tightening from the excitement. ,
I moaned both in pleasure and frustration, because my family couch wasn't the place us to have sex, and I was sure Tristan wouldn't appreciate the noise or the show if we went upstairs.
It was for the better, these decisions needed to be consented on a day where life hadn't been so chaotic.
I tugged at his bottom lip, sucking on it lightly as I pulled away. "If we keep going-"
"Josh and Tristan will have something to murder me for finally?" He laughed, letting his head fall back.
I laughed too, propping myself up to kiss his chin.
He moved his hand and rested it against the crook of my neck.
We settled there for a few moments listening to our staggered breaths until they were even again.
"I think I'm falling in love with you, Rachel Hart," he said softly against me.
I tensed, completely taken by surprised. I pulled back to look at him, sure that he had been joking, but his face was serious.
He smiled, glorious and beautiful.
"I am. You're everything to me," he whispered.