Have Mercy Read online

  “Thank you,” Royal says gruffly, startling me. I had been so focused on the task at hand and gawking at him that I didn’t notice he was awake and watching me.

  “Hey. Does it feel any better?” I ask him, taking a seat on the tiny edge of the bed he’s not occupying.

  “A little, yeah.”

  “Good. I can put another coat on in a few hours.”

  “What are we gonna do until then?” he asks.

  “Ah, I don’t know. I didn’t think you would want to move.”

  “I don’t,” he agrees.

  “Okay, so what is there for us to do?”

  “I want to kiss you,” he says, causing that same ache from yesterday to clench in my stomach.

  “A little hard to do that without you moving,” I tell him.

  “Not if you climb on top of me.”

  “I don’t know…” I start because it sounds too naughty.

  “Come on, Hannah. Distract me from the burning.”

  Oh, great. When he puts it like that, how can I not help him even if what he’s asking of me is so bad? I also feel guilty because it’s my fault Royal got sunburnt.

  When I stand up and look down at him on the bed, I ask him, “How can I do this without touching the burnt areas?”

  Royal pulls his legs together a little and pats the mattress on either side of him, barely lifting his palms. “Put your knees here and each of your palms next to my head.”

  “Okay,” I agree as I maneuver myself into position above him, being careful not to touch his arms, face or lower legs. When I’m on my hands and knees, Royal lifts his neck enough so that his lips brush over mine.

  “Aren’t your lips burning too?” I whisper.

  “Yes. Lick them and kiss them better,” he says with a small grin before our mouths meet again and again.

  Eventually, Royal’s head is back on the pillow as our tongues mingle together. This kiss is just as good if not better than last night’s, and I never want it to end.

  At some point in time, while we’re lost in our make out session, my hips lower and I freeze when I feel something long and stiff poking me in my belly.

  “That’s my dick,” Royal says against my lips.

  “Right, yeah,” I say as if I’ve felt a lot of them when I haven’t. In fact, I’ve never even seen one unless you count the illustrations in the health class book or the drawings on lockers and bathroom stalls at school.

  “Are you wet?” he asks me.

  “What do you mean?” My heart is racing, and my head is spinning so fast I’m dizzy. Although, now that he mentions it, there is a noticeable dampness in my panties that I haven’t ever felt before.

  “Your tight, little pussy gets dripping wet when you’re horny so that my dick will slide inside easier. It’s a good thing — the wetter the better, baby.”

  “Oh,” I say as my face blushes a shade of red similar to Royal’s sunburn.

  “So? Are you wet?” he asks with an arched eyebrow before he winces from the burn on his face probably caused by the movement.

  I nod, and then swallow down my embarrassment to answer. “Yes.”

  “Fuck, yes,” Royal groans. “One day soon I’m gonna reach down in your panties and see just how wet you are. If you’re nice and slick, I’ll slide a finger right on in…”

  “Royal,” I gasp at his dirty talk.

  He chuckles and licks his lips. “That’s nothing, baby. Just wait until I shove my tongue between your legs and lick up every single drop.”

  “You-you want to do that?”

  “God, yes, I do. You could sit on my face right now and ride my tongue if you want.”

  Wow. I think my ears burn right off the sides of my head after that sort of dirty talk.

  Bracing my palms on Royal’s unburnt chest, I push myself backward until I’m sitting on my knees, and right on his dick apparently before I bounce right back up, making him laugh.

  “That’s all a little too much for right now,” I tell him.

  “You gonna send me back to my room with a boner and sunburn, aren’t you?” he asks with a smirk.

  “I’ll rub more aloe on you tomorrow.”

  “Can we take the day off to rest? It’s what god wanted on Sundays, right?”

  “Right,” I agree. “I think you’ve earned a day off, as long as you’ll put in a good effort on Monday.”

  “As long as I’ll be rewarded for my efforts.”

  “You will be,” I promise him with a smile.

  Chapter Seven

  Royal

  Why am I even surprised on Monday morning when I see that my dipshit, suck up of a roommate is already at the shelter, sitting on the wall next to Hannah so close that his thigh is touching hers through their shorts.

  It’s nuts, because after spending the entire weekend with her, I forgot that no one else knows we’re together or fooling around, whatever you want to call it.

  And again, like whenever I’m around Hannah apparently, my body acts on autopilot, strutting right up to Garrett and grabbing the front of his camp t-shirt to pull him off the damn wall.

  “Royal!” Hannah exclaims while Garrett shouts, “Jeez! What’s your problem, man?”

  I ignore him, hopping right up on the bricks, taking his seat. Me and my roommate are gonna have words later, ones where I warn him to back the fuck off.

  “Why did you do that?” Hannah whispers to me softly when dozens of heads turn our way.

  “Because I could,” I tell her simply. “And because he’s like a roach that won’t die or give up.”

  “Still, you don’t have to be mean to him.”

  “Yeah, I do. How else will he learn?”

  Hannah sucks in a deep breath and lets it out, which I hope means she’s going to drop the shit for now. Thankfully, the next thing she says is, “Your sunburn looks better.”

  “Yeah. Finally.” Fuck, it’s embarrassing being a walking, talking lobster. Not that I’m the only one who got sunburned over the weekend, but still. It sucks and hurts. Not to mention it’s a total cock block.

  Yesterday and Saturday I talked Hannah into getting on top of me while we tongued each other until we were both dizzy from a lack of oxygen. If it hadn’t hurt so bad to move my arms, I would’ve had my hands all up in her shirt.

  Today is a brand-new day, though.

  Besides, Hannah needed time to come around to the idea of taking things further. I’m pretty sure she’s on board for more based on how many times she rubbed her pussy over the bulge behind my zipper yesterday. She’ll be ready for me to get her off on my fingers soon, and I can’t fucking wait.

  But one of the best things from this weekend running a close second to kissing was having Hannah take care of me. I swear she rubbed that aloe goop on me so much her palms turned a light shade of green. Not that I’m complaining. She also went down to the dining hall and brought me back lunch and dinner while I hid out in her room.

  Then, the rest of the weekend we talked about nothing and everything, because what the fuck else is there to do around here?

  It was the first time someone has taken care of me in a long damn time. My mother used to when I was little and sick or got hurt playing football, but she stopped when I was around six after my father told her she was just “babying” me. After that, she’s always sided with him on everything because she doesn’t have a backbone.

  So, thanks to Hannah’s kindness and how much fun I had just hanging out with her all weekend, sunburn aside, I’m actually ready to get to work as promised.

  Today, we’re at a new site – cleaning up old people’s apartments, also known as a horrifying, interactive episode of the show Hoarders about people who never throw anything away. It’s so fucking gross and disgusting, but I’m pulling my weight.

  I’m mopping the shit out of the kitchen floor we just found after taking out five loads of trash, so I don’t notice when our counselor, Claudia, comes up behind me until she speaks.

  “It’s so good to see
you putting in such a great effort today,” she says.

  “Uh-huh,” I mutter since I’m not doing it for her.

  “So, does that mean you’re finally feeling better?”

  “What?” I ask before I remember my excuse every day last week was feeling like I was going to throw up. “Oh, right. Yeah, I started feeling better over the weekend.”

  The weekend when I not only saw Hannah naked but touched her bare flesh and shoved my tongue down her throat so many times and so hard, I nearly fucked her with it. God, I can’t wait until we get back to the dorms tonight.

  “That’s so great to hear,” Claudia says as she comes and stands in front of me, halting my mopping and pissing me off because she’s now standing right smack dab on my clean floor. “Prayer works. I prayed for you to feel better, and it happened.”

  “Yeah, right,” I agree.

  “Aww,” she whines, pouting her lips. Reaching up to the hem of my shirtsleeve, she runs her fingers around the ring dividing my normal skin from my still red burn. “It looks like you got a little too much sun this weekend. Does it hurt when I touch it?”

  Fuck yes it does when you scrape your nails through it, bitch.

  “It’s not that bad,” I say because I don’t want to sound like a pussy.

  The next thing I know, Claudia is leaning forward, running her tongue over my ear lobe and whispering, “Now that you’re all better, maybe we could hang out tonight?”

  “Ah, yeah, maybe,” I stammer because she’s caught me so off-guard. My dick is on board with whatever the fuck is going on, but my head is still catching up. Then I remember the last few days and nights with Hannah. That shit is too good to not keep going back for more.

  “Can you sneak out around, say, eleven and meet me at our shelter?” Claudia asks. Lowering her voice to a whisper even though we’re alone, she says, “No one ever goes down there at night.”

  Jesus Christ. There’s no doubt about what she’s offering, and I may be the stupidest guy in the world for turning her down, but hell if I don’t do it anyway. Hannah’s so much more than some meaningless fling that probably won’t even be that good. There’s no way I would blow her off for that.

  “Oh, you know what? I forgot I have plans,” I inform Claudia.

  “Plans? What plans?” she asks, reeling back to look up at my face.

  “A, ah, a couple of guys in the dorm are getting together to play poker tonight,” I lie since I can’t tell her what I’ll be doing with Hannah.

  “You would rather stay in your room and play cards with the guys than screw my brains out?”

  “Um, what?” For a second, my brain short-circuits. My counselor, my hot, older, camp counselor didn’t really just say I could screw her brains out, did she?

  “You heard me,” she replies with an arch of one of her eyebrows. Sweeping her long blonde hair over her shoulder, she says, “And don’t worry, we can have fun and still be virgins afterward, if you know what I mean.”

  As if it wasn’t pretty damn obvious, she turns around and rubs her ass on my dick before walking away, giving me a coy grin over her shoulder.

  I have to press down on my shaft with the heel of my palm to try and hold it down because it’s definitely down with taking Claudia in the ass tonight.

  But that’s not what the rest of me wants.

  I really, really want to be with Hannah. And sure, after leaving Hannah’s room tonight, I could probably meet up with Claudia just to get off; and nobody would likely ever find out, including Hannah.

  Still, it’s a hard no.

  That’s not how I want my first time to go down, even if it doesn’t “technically” count. Claudia obviously has a lot of experience, and I don’t yet.

  I want all of my first times to be with Hannah. Her sexy body has been seared into my brain, and no other one will do.

  * * *

  Hannah

  “Hope to see you tonight, Royal,” Claudia, our counselor, says to him with a wave of her fingers when we climb out of the van back on campus.

  As soon as she walks off, I turn to Royal, who is checking out her ass, and ask, “What was that about? What did she mean about seeing you tonight?”

  “Nothing,” he says with a smirk as we start walking up the hill to the dorms. “She just wants me to come down here after lights out and fuck her.”

  “What?” I stop in my tracks and exclaim the word louder than I’ve probably ever spoken before, making him chuckle. “Are you joking? You have to be.”

  “I’m not joking,” he tells me with another bark of laughter when he stops to wait for me to catch up again. “I was just as shocked as you were when she licked my ear and threw herself at me in that dude’s kitchen today.”

  “She did that today? Earlier?”

  “Yeah, while we were at the site.”

  “Wow,” I mutter, because for one, she’s a counselor; two, she’s like two years older than Royal; and three, this is church camp, for Pete’s sake. Wait, Royal didn’t say whether or not he’s going to take her up on her offer. “Are you going to meet her?” I can’t help but ask.

  “What do you think?”

  “I don’t know. That’s why I asked you!” I huff.

  “You’re not jealous, are you?” Royal teases.

  “No,” I immediately respond even though I am. Claudia is really pretty and older, and I know Royal has to be physically attracted to her. Not to mention she’s apparently easy. I figure guys all love that.

  “Why do you think I jerked Garrett off the wall this morning?” he asks me, and it takes me a few seconds to remember what he’s talking about.

  “You were jealous of Garrett?” I say in understanding. “Really?”

  “That asshole has been trying to hump your leg since we got here!”

  “I think he’s, ah, had a crush on me for a few years,” I admit to him. “But you know I told him I just want to be friends.”

  “Oh, I know,” Royal grumbles. “But he either hasn’t got the message or doesn’t plan to give up. Either way I’m about to put a stop to that.”

  “Why? What are you going to do?”

  “Tell him to back the fuck up because you’re mine,” he says before cringing like he didn’t mean to say all of that.

  “So, does that mean you want us to be together, like boyfriend and girlfriend?” I ask.

  “No,” Royal says without even considering it for a second, which sucks. “If we go public, then it’ll be harder for me to keep sneaking into your room.”

  “Oh,” I say in understanding. “So you would want to, otherwise?”

  “Yeah, maybe.” His response is a non-answer, but I let it slide for now since he called me his.

  We both come to a stop in front of my building, which is closer than his.

  “I’ll grab a shower and then see you in a few?” he asks.

  “Sure,” I agree. “As long as you won’t leave to meet up with Claudia later.”

  “I don’t want her nasty ass. I want yours,” he says with a grin and a wink before he walks away.

  Chapter Eight

  Royal

  As soon as I get out of the shower and get dressed, it’s time to handle some business.

  Garrett’s on his way out, probably going to dinner before I grab his arm to swing him around and then ram my fist into the center of his gut.

  He doubles over before sinking down to his knees, face turning red with anger and pain.

  “What…what was…that for?”

  “Stay the fuck away from Hannah,” I warn him. “Don’t talk to her, don’t look at her, and you sure as shit better not touch her.”

  “Who the hell do you think you are?” he asks while still holding his midsection.

  “I’m the one who’s had her naked and on her knees every night,” I tell him, stretching the truth a little. She was on her knees Friday night, but only to pick up her towel, so it’s not a complete lie.

  His eyes widen in surprise before he says, “Liar. Hanna
h wouldn’t…”

  “Hannah wouldn’t what? Let you get to first base with her? That’s right, she hasn’t and never fucking will either.”

  “How do you know?” he asks, finally reaching for the foot of his bed to pull himself up off the floor.

  “Because if I find out you broke any of my three rules, I’ll fucking kill you.”

  “I’m not scared of you,” Garrett responds through gritted teeth. “Just wait until Hannah finds out the lies you’re spreading about her. She won’t ever touch you again either.”

  “Run your mouth, and you’re dead. You ever heard of social suicide? I can make you the most hated man at Mercy for the next two years if you screw with me or with Hannah.”

  “I could turn you in to my dad for hitting me or tell everyone about the church,” he threatens.

  “Again, you don’t want to fuck with me. I can and will make your life hell and you know it. You can come in your fist your junior and senior year, or I can hook you up with every slut on the cheerleading squad. Your decision, man.”

  When he doesn’t respond, only takes a seat on the bed with his head hanging, I assume he’s received my message loud and clear.

  * * *

  Hannah

  I know it’s wrong to break the rules and let Royal keep sneaking into my room every night, but it feels good to have a friend here for once.