by Kate Stewart
“You’re really going to play immune?” I rasp out, covering some of his upper half where he sits with one leg stretched out and one leg drawn up, his forearm resting on the fireplace his other on his knee.
“Now, that’s a game you are horrible at.” I can hear the amusement in his voice as I latch my lips to his neck and suck. “I can always tell when you’re turned on.”
“Oh, and you think you’ve mastered it?” I taunt.
“I know I have.”
“I’m calling your bluff,” I drape myself around him despite his rigid posture, sliding my fingers through his hair and raking my nails along his scalp before tugging lightly. He doesn’t give me any leeway as he remains hunched over the board while I try my hand at seducing my king. I don’t initiate often. I don’t have to because the man is just as much of an addict as I am.
“So,” I whisper, licking the shell of his ear. “If I were to pull your cock out of your pants, right now, and start sucking you the way you like it, right now, the way you want me to, right now, you wouldn’t react?”
“Non.”
I bite his earlobe, hard, and he doesn’t even grimace.
I pull away frowning. “You’re never going to let me win, are you?”
“Non.” He turns to me, dipping his eyes briefly as if I’m a stranger on a park bench before turning back to the board. I drop my jaw, insulted, but don’t make a sound. I don’t miss the slight upturn of his lips just before I slide my hand down his chest and palm his crotch.
Bingo.
He’s rock hard. Immune, my ass.
“Well played, Tobias, but unfortunately, you’ve got a very big tell.”
“That is unfortunate,” he grumbles “and an unfair advantage.”
In a flash, I’m pinned beneath him, a yelp escaping me as he leans in running his nose along mine before I look up at him through my lashes.
“But in the spirit of full disclosure, you should know that every time I look at you, Cecelia, I want your attention, your lips, your tongue, your body. You have infected me with your sickness, and now I’m an addict too.”
“I knew it!”
He tugs my sweater down suckiling my nipple, eliciting a moan from me. “And while I do appreciate your beautiful face and your pretty peach nipples, it’s this,” he presses his palm to my chest, “and the fact that you use it as your mouthpiece. That is what is most alluring to me. I’ve never met a woman so willing to brave her own destruction for just a little truth.”
Fully drawn into him, he gazes down at me as I stroke his jaw. “But I will never let you win. Not ever, not once, not out of mercy or due to a cease-fire. Not ever. And I don’t ever want you to let me win either.”
“Why?”
“Because if and when you stop fighting me, that’s when I’ll know I’ve lost.”
He kisses me and pulls away, his expression going grave. “And you will hate me again one day, maybe soon or maybe later in the future, but you will.”
I frown. “You’re so sure?”
“Yes, and only you will be able to tell me why.”
“Tobias—”
“Come with me,” he murmurs.
Staring at the chessboard from the foyer, I can clearly see the two of us and the way the rest of the night played out. A night I’ve replayed over and over in my head. Just after his confession, he’d stood and taken my hand and I silently followed him up the stairs and into my bedroom. That night, he’d taken me so fiercely, with so much intensity, I practically convulsed in ecstasy, my jaw shaking as I called out his name. It was the best sex of my life.
But it was both an apology and a preemptive strike. At least that’s the way I see it now. And the fact that I see one of the most beautiful nights of my life as one of manipulation only fuels my contempt for him. But it was one of the many apology attempts he made before the bomb dropped, and he destroyed three relationships.
When I left, or was forced to leave—after the initial shock wore off—I began to experience the blinding pain of losing him and all I thought we had. Even so, I told myself I was leaving him, and I was. He deserved it. What he did was unforgivable. But somewhere deep down, I had hoped he would come for me. My twenty-year-old heart probably would have forgiven him. And the kicker is…if he had come back to me, I would have fought him, more furiously than I ever had.
It’s funny in retrospect just how you figure things out. Especially when you fell for a criminally deceptive man.
And where would that twenty-year-old heart be now if he had come back, if it had forgiven him?
But it’s my twenty-six-year-old heart who never got an explanation, nor an apology and will never forgive him.
But like all things that happened, it didn’t play out the way I wanted it to or expected. He never came after me because he had again banished me.
My eyes drift to the dining room where I shared uncomfortable dinners with Roman. Tobias wasn’t the only man to break my heart in this house.
Why did you come back, Cecelia?
The more memories that surface, the more I’m beginning to realize just how asinine it was to forsake a life that was, for the most part, working for me.
Breaking it off with Collin was inevitable. But to re-live these memories, and purposefully?
It’s already too painful, and I only got here an hour ago.
Exhausted already from a day of confrontation, I head to the wet bar next to the kitchen, shooting up a silent prayer, and it’s answered when I find it well stocked.
I uncap one of the bottles and pull down a rocks glass. Tossing back the whiskey, I savor the taste remembering the first time I drank it at Eddie’s with Sean. That now seems like a lifetime ago.
But it wasn’t, it was here, in this place. And some part of me knows they are too. They probably never left. Another lie they told, to keep me at bay.
At some point, I’ll have to make my presence known if it isn’t already.
But not today.
I glance around the kitchen and past the set of windows that give a clear view of the pool and loungers.
Memories again threaten just as the liquor begins lacing my veins. The house may be freezing, but my blood is warming. For the first time in years, I need to allow myself to indulge in my recollections instead of fighting them. I have to let my mind continue to drift during my waking hours if I want to see this through. With another sip of whiskey, I climb the stairs to my old bedroom stopping short where Dominic’s body lay the last time I saw him.
“Yes.”
“Yes, what?”
“Yes, I’ve been in love.”
The sight of the new carpet devastates me as much as the sight of Dominic’s grave. He deserved so much more than a silent burial. Needing air, I walk across the room and open the French doors leading onto the balcony, remembering all too well that it was my escape route the morning I fled. Closing my eyes, I can picture Sean’s grief-stricken face as he lowered me to Tyler while shots rang out around us.
If I hadn’t been here, I would never believe any of it happened.
What the fuck were you thinking coming back, Cecelia?
The only conclusion I can draw is the same I did last night. I can’t out-live these memories. Moving on hasn’t happened in the six summers that have passed.
There’s no help for this, no psychiatrist who can shrink this away without the full truth. There’s no pill to prescribe to help me forget.
There’s no priest I believe in enough to confess our collective sins to. There’s only a God I have taken issue with, who I’m not sure has ever heard me, and might not consider me worth listening to.
It’s always been up to me to sink or swim. And I’ve been in the deep end for years without an inch of cement to grab onto while the kick slowly drained from me.
I chug more of the bottle as the grey sky greets me and I take in the view in the distance, the cell tower blinking at me as if to say, ‘welcome home.’
Hours later, I wake with a sli
ght hangover, my head thumping as I realize the rumble of my cell phone on my nightstand is what woke me. The silver lining is that I can’t remember a single dream I had in the last few hours. It’s when I see the name flashing on the screen that my celebration is cut short.
“Hey.”
“You were sleeping? You promised you would call when you got there.”
“I’m so sorry.”
“You should be.” Guilt nags at me when I hear the plea in his voice, “Cecelia, please come home.”
“Collin, I can’t. I’m sorry. But I can’t.” I lift from my bed, disoriented, and decide I’m far too sober for this conversation.
“Can’t or won’t?”
“Won’t. I won’t deceive either of us anymore.” Grabbing the bottle and my tumbler, I take the stairs two at a time, opting for a little hair of the dog over ice. I have no issue with rock bottom. I’m comfortable here. On the rocks might be the safest place for me for the moment, much safer than walking around lying recklessly to those I love.
But the reality I’ve thrust myself into is hell on Earth. It was so much easier to lie.
“Tell me why this is happening,” he urges me gently. “Just come home so I can try to understand. You just left.”
“I gave you an explanation.” I press my tumbler into the fridge door, adding some ice and pour a generous helping of whiskey. “Collin, I won’t ever come home.”
“I don’t believe you. This is some…mental break, some…episode.”
“You’re not wrong, but it’s not a case of cold feet. I wish it were.”
“You aren’t thinking clearly. What we had was real. No one is that good of an actress.”
“I wasn’t acting. I was…masking. I wanted it to work. A lot of the time, I believed it was.” I take a healthy sip of the whiskey and glance at the clock as it flips just past midnight, bringing an end to my first day in purgatory.
“So what if you were promiscuous when you were young. I’m no saint. I don’t give a damn if you slept with half that town.”
“Are you wondering if I was faithful?” I swallow, as a guilty tear sneaks out of me.
“You told me you were.”
“And you believe me?”
“Yes.”
“But you won’t for long. You’ll wonder if I was honest about that too, and then you’ll resent me for it.”
“I won’t. If you’d just come home—”
“Stop. This is beneath you, Collin. I do love you. I always will. I’m so grateful to have been loved by you.”
“So, you just decide it’s over and I’m supposed to accept it? Are you purposefully trying to destroy me?”
“I know how cruel this seems, but I want you to know the truth of what I’ve been battling for years. The guilt I constantly feel, knowing what I’m doing is wrong. Please trust me when I say next to Christy, you’re the closest person in the world to me. But you don’t know me fully, and if you want honesty, neither does she.”
“Jesus, Cecelia, I don’t understand,” his voice cracks and I feel it, the sharp stab of pain that I’m causing, again I fill up my tumbler. The reality of losing him is taking a toll.
“Collin, I’ve come to realize I’m broken that way. I lived too much. I experienced too much when I was too young. It was intense, and it made me…think differently, crave life differently. That’s the most I can explain it. I’m capable of monogamy. I’ve been faithful to you physically. It’s just…”
“You think I wouldn’t understand. You don’t want to tell me what you want because you don’t think I can give it to you?”
“I know you wouldn’t want to know this side of me. And I don’t want you to see it. That’s not who you fell for.”
“Stop telling me what I know about you!”
His anger is warranted, and so I let him have it. I put this train in motion and I need to see it through. He gives me a minute of silence before he speaks up.
“So, are you with them now?”
“No,” I hate that’s his conclusion. “Not at all. That’s not what this is. I’m not sure I’ll see him.”
“Him? Just one? I’m so confused.”
“I was upset last night, and maybe I explained myself horribly.” I wince, knowing no amount of whiskey will ever help this confession. “I told you when I was younger, I was in a polyamorous relationship for a few short months.”
“Yes.”
“But my feelings ran deep, Collin, really deep for both men, and after it ended, I fell in love with another, and he’s the one that I haven’t let go of. But full disclosure, I still have lingering feelings for them all.”
“Is this…” I can physically feel the gap splintering further between us, “is this what your dreams are about?”
“Yes.”
“Jesus, Cecelia.”
“It was one year, one year of my life, but it changed me. And I haven’t been able to fully move on since because of how that time with them altered me and how it ended. And that’s the reason I’ve never been able to give you what you need, what you fully deserve.”
“I’m no less guilty of having lingering affection, feelings for the women in my past. I’ve had moments, here and there. It’s all part of it.”
“It’s more than that, Collin. The unreasonable part of me still exists in a time I can’t erase or can never go back to. Because no matter how hard I try to forget it, it won’t let me.” I take another sip, and then another, terrified of admitting more of the truth. “I’ve been hiding things from you.”
“Like what?”
I grapple with the words and know the impact they’ll have.
“I deserve the truth,” he demands.
“You do.” I close my eyes and bring the glass to my lips, taking a long drink and bracing myself. “Sometimes, after we have sex, I fantasize about them while you’re in the shower.”
Over the line, I hear a pained breath leave him, and know I’ve just butchered his pride.
“Do you masturbate thinking about them after fucking me?!”
I confirm with my silence. It’s cruel, but necessary, though I’m not about to drill it into his head. I have to get through to him. I don’t want to draw this out. And I don’t want to give him hope where there is none.
“Bloody hell, Cecelia, you thought about them while we were in our bed!?”
Him. But I don’t correct him. I want his anger. I deserve it. Because my admission isn’t fabricated. It’s the absolute truth.
The more I reveal to him, put words to years of thinking it, the more I realize I’m doing the right thing. I was about to marry into my own lie.
“Collin, my sexual depravity aside, I can’t love you the way you deserve.”
“Whatever you think you lack, it’s in your head. You make me happy.”
“And at times you made me happy too, you know you did, but I can’t marry you. I’ve been lying in different degrees since we met. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry, Collin. I already miss you. I’m already regretting this, but this is the truth, and I’m so tired of fighting it.”
“I’m not a fucking prude, Cecelia. I’ll give you any fantasy you want.”
“It’s not just about sex, Collin. My heart was never in the right place, just…”
I palm my face, my lips shaking, my voice anguished as I ruin a relationship with a man who’s done nothing short of worship me. “I’m still in love with the memory of another man and have been since I was twenty. It’s clear now, I’ll never stop wanting him, and I’ve failed at every attempt to hate him. I had hoped so much to move on—and with you—I tried, I tried so hard, but I failed. I failed us both.”
“And you don’t know if you’ll see him? What future can you have with a memory?”
“One that’s not deceptive to you. One that doesn’t hurt you. I don’t care about my happiness anymore so much, but I refuse to ruin yours. I’ve been selfish enough in my thinking. Find a woman who would move heaven and earth to be good to you. Find her, and one
day, maybe you can forgive me. One day, maybe you’ll say you’ll try to forgive me.”
“You’ve ruined my life.”
“No, walking down that aisle and being emotionally unfaithful would have ruined your life.”
“You’re not giving me a chance to fight!”
“Because I’m certain, Collin, I’m certain. Please hear me. It’s over.”
As expected, he hangs up, and I hang my head, setting my tears free. My fate is sealed. There’s no back, and there’s no forward. I’ve been physically monogamous for years, just not emotionally faithful to the men I’ve dated. In one way or another, they all failed in silent comparison. I’m still strung out on the highs of my past because I never closed the door, fully let myself grieve, which left me in a constant state of limbo.
At this point, I would rather be alone than a liar.
I came back to declare war on my memories, to draw my lines, and I’m already disgusted with just how relieved I am by reclaiming, owning my dark side.
Maybe my scales are harder to see than Roman’s were, but we’ve got far more in common than I initially thought. I’m more than capable of being the villain.
Villain.
I guess it takes one to love and loathe one.
And I’ve become a convincing one at that.
And in Collin’s story, I will be.
Furious with the easy comparison, I scroll through my phone and press send. He answers on the second ring.
“You know, you’re about four years too late for a booty call.”
“Hey, Ryan, sorry, I know it’s late.”
“What’s going on? Neither you nor Collin have been answering my calls. And thanks to you both for not bothering to show up for work today, it was a shitshow. I had to push meetings.”
“I’m sorry, something came up. I’ll explain later.”
A brief silence.
“Should I be worried?”
“Ryan, I need your help.”
“Name it.”
“How soon can you get here?”
“Where is here?”
“I’m in Triple Falls.”
“You’re finally going to sell?”
“His business, his house. I want nothing more to do with him. It’s past time.”
