The Winter Games

by Sharp, Dr. Rebecca

  Because you are. I kept that to myself. I’d already confessed my love for this man once today, I didn’t need to staple my heart on my forehead.

  “She is a wise woman.”

  “I wish I hadn’t waited so long.”

  I tried desperately to blink back more tears but it was no use. “You are here now. That is what matters.”

  “I wish I had more time,” he laughed like he thought he sounded foolish. “I sat in there for an hour after she’d fallen asleep just talking to her. I don’t even know if she heard me. It wasn’t even anything important, but she wanted to know about my life. So, I told her.”

  “I’m sure her heart heard you, Emmett. That’s what happens when you speak from the heart—others hear it.” My thumb rubbed over his skin as my ear listened to that heart of his—the one that had survived so much. “And we all wish we had more time. That’s why we just have to make the most of what we have. And that’s what you did today.”

  “I don’t know how, and my brain refuses to believe it, but somehow, I feel like it was enough.”

  “It was, Emmett. It was.”

  I knew my confession of loving him still hung between us, but I was content to leave it floating there, up in space, for right now. He needed to resolve his past before we talked about our future and whatever was happening—had happened—between us.

  I began to drift off to sleep when I heard him speak quietly, this time, not about Miriam. “You are my sun, Ally—my light, my warmth. Thank you… for being here.”

  “You don’t ever have to thank me,” I yawned and snuggled closer to him, “and I’m only the sun because you’re what makes me burn.”

  WHAT THE FUCK TIME WAS it?

  I turned towards the window where a sliver of sunshine blinded me. Fuck. I forgot to set an alarm.

  Ally’s soft, lush form was draped over me—the same spot she’d been in last night—breathing softly against my chest. I wanted to wake her up with my dick pushing inside of her; that didn’t surprise me. But, I also just wanted to fucking lie here and hold her until she woke up on her own. I wanted to watch her sleep. I wanted to just hold her like this for as long as I could.

  That sappy shit shouldn’t have surprised me either since I loved her so much.

  But neither of what I wanted was an option right now. I needed food and to get to the hospital.

  “Sunshine,” I whispered into her hair, my hand tracing lazy circles on her back, “we have to get up.”

  She moaned against me. I loved her little unconscious moans. I loved her conscious ones, too.

  “Morning,” she rasped. Her eyes were so damn clear in the morning.

  “I have to go to the hospital.” I realized that she didn’t have to come if she didn’t want to.

  “Ok, I’ll be ready in ten.” My chest squeezed. There was no question for her. She was coming with me and Lord knew I needed her.

  Now, if only I could figure out how to let her know that.

  Grabbing some food from the Denver Biscuit Company, I booked it over to the hospital.

  I was too late.

  Today, when we walked through the doors to the waiting area, all I felt was death. And when Ruth turned at our arrival—she’d been in conversation with Miriam’s doctor—I knew why.

  Like I ran into a fucking wall, I stopped. Maybe if I didn’t get closer, I wouldn’t have to hear the truth. It didn’t matter.

  Ruth came up and wrapped her arms around my neck just before she burst into sobs. “She’s gone, Emmett. Mom is gone.”

  I thought I’d lost Miriam fifteen years ago when she sent me to Aspen. In this moment, I knew what losing her would have really felt like. I let go of Ally’s hand so I could return Ruth’s hug. We’d never been particularly close, but she was all I had left.

  After a minute, I pulled back; Ally stepped in to hug Ruth and offer her sympathies. I could hear that she was crying too. I walked over to the doctor who was still standing there.

  “I’m so sorry for your loss, Mr. Jameson.” The older black man held out his hand in solidarity.

  “How do you know me?” Not the right thing to say. Didn’t fucking care.

  “Your mother has talked of nothing but you for days.” I tried to swallow the lump in my throat. “I just wanted to let you know that she passed peacefully overnight and in her sleep.”

  I nodded. “Thank you.”

  “No, thank you.” My brow furrowed; why the fuck was he thanking me? He continued, “Miriam has been holding on, painfully, for weeks now. Her body was ready to let go, but her mind… and her heart… weren’t. I think she was waiting for you, son. And for whatever she needed to tell you.” He put his hand on my shoulder but I barely felt it. “I know this is a difficult time, but I want you to know that you brought her that peace.”

  I didn’t say anything. I didn’t even look at him. When I finally began to pay attention to what was in my vision, he was gone. I was standing and staring at nothing like a moron.

  Fuck, everything hurt. It hurt so fucking much.

  I needed to get out of here.

  “We’re leaving,” I growled, grabbing Ally’s arm and pulling her with me. I didn’t say anything to Ruth. I’m sure she expected nothing less from me.

  Filters of red and black flipped over my vision. I wasn’t angry. I was irate. I’d wasted so much fucking time and now she was gone. I was livid because it hurt so much. I missed all the time that we didn’t have. I’d never lost someone I loved before. I’d never lost someone who’d loved me before.

  I never wanted to do it again.

  My eyes narrowed on the girl sitting in the passenger seat, sitting quietly and waiting for me to just take more of whatever else she had to give.

  I was going to take it all. See if she still loved me then.

  The elevator dinged up to our room, each tone reminding me that I wasn’t in my right mind. Too many feelings—anger, pain, sadness, desire, love—all rolled into one clusterfuck inside of me.

  I slammed the door behind me and that’s when she turned, her eyes already spilling over with tears.

  “Emmett, I’m so s—“ My mouth was brutal. I didn’t want to hear her apologies, I wanted to taste them. My hand held her chin as I pushed her up against the wall; the other snaked up her shirt, ripping her bra down to claim her breast.

  Even though I pulled roughly on her nipple, she arched into me begging for more.

  Why? Why did they all just ask for more pain?

  I slammed my hips against her, letting her feel my cock before my fingers left her tit and headed farther south, digging beneath her waistline to her slippery sex. I slid right over her clit and pushed two fingers inside of that heat, curling them straight into her G-spot. She bucked against me.

  Good.

  I was losing my mind. I knew it because I saw everything in flashes. First, she was still against the wall as I tried to choke her with my tongue. The next I knew, her jeans were on the floor next to me and I had her bent over on the bed, face down in the mattress, ass and that pink-fucking-slit up in the air.

  For one slow fucking minute, I fought with myself. One second, fingering that sweet spot inside of her, letting her pleasure overwhelm her, the next, my hand came down hard on her sweet ass. Again, I teased her clit, watching as her desire dripped onto my hand; then, I was pinching that nub over and over as I bit into the soft flesh of her ass.

  I saw tears streaming down her face. Pleasure? Pain? I didn’t fucking know. I didn’t fucking care.

  I warned her I was the asshole in this fairytale.

  She kept saying my name. Begging me. I didn’t ask if it was to stop or to continue. I couldn’t.

  Then my pants were undone. I could practically see the blood pumping through my cock. I held her hips steady and impaled her. The sound she made there was no mistaking for pain. She was fucking soaked, but I was fucking huge. And angry.

  I couldn’t apologize. I wasn’t done taking yet.

  I needed her. I
needed her so fucking bad and I was angry for it. I pounded into her, her subsequent moans a balm on my careless heart that her discomfort was only momentary.

  She felt so hot, so tight. Her muscles clenched around my bare cock. Fuck. Ok, plan B—and I wasn’t thinking of that stupid fucking pill.

  I reached around her waist, fingers finding her clit again. “Come now.” I swirled my finger the way I knew would send her there.

  She screamed. Her orgasm rolled like music over my dick. My vision went black but I pulled out, painfully halting my orgasm.

  I flipped her over. Her hair a golden fucking halo around the angel I’d pulled down to Earth. I bent over her… those tits… I couldn’t fucking resist. So, I didn’t.

  Pulling one into my mouth, I put my hand on her again. She wasn’t done. She jerked underneath my touch, her last climax still echoing through her as I pushed her towards another one.

  My fingers took some of her juices, rubbing them on her sternum.

  I stood and pushed her breasts together. “Hold them.” As soon as her hands replaced mine, I slammed back into her; my erection singing Hallelujah as I rocked into her heat. Fingers on her clit, I waited until she came again, convulsing underneath me before I pulled out with a curse, ready to come.

  Kneeling on either side of her chest, I shoved my dick between her breasts, her own climax lubricating my slide. I stared down, watching myself slip between her mounds as my fingers pulled on her nipples.

  I came with a fucking vengeance.

  Like slow-fucking-motion, I watched warm, white jets of my desire spray up onto her chest and neck, covering her with a blanket of cum. She was probably so fucking disgusted, but to her credit, she didn’t act like it, moaning as I continued to rock my hips, milking every last bit out of me.

  Her eyes were barely open. I moved one hand, swirling my finger in the pool on her chest. “Mine,” I rasped as I wrote the word in the mess I’d made.

  I smirked down at her, daring her to defy me.

  She grabbed my hand as I went to move it back, pulling it right to her mouth and sucking my juice off of it. “Yours.”

  Fuck.

  My fist slammed into the wall as I stalked to grab her a towel from the bathroom.

  What the fuck had I just done?

  I purposely avoided the mirror in both the bath and bedroom. I didn’t want to see what the hell I’d turned into.

  “Here.” My disgusting ass almost tossed the towel at her, but I caught myself just before, letting her take it from my hand to clean the mess I’d made. “We should go. Before your brother finds out you are here. With me.” And that I just came all over your chest like a goddamn high schooler because I was too out of my fucking mind to remember a condom.

  She chewed on her lip and I wanted to fuck her again. So, I turned my back until I heard her go into the bathroom to wash herself. Yanking on my pants, I threw the rest of my shit into the duffel I’d packed and waited for Ally to finish up.

  It had been complete silence since he’d told me we were leaving—aside from the ‘dum dum dum’ of my phone as it died since I’d forgotten to charge it last night. Not that I didn’t have things to say, but none of the words were right. I remembered all the condolences that I got after Dylan. I felt guilty for hating them all. Those moments though, after someone you love dies, you hate the world—or at least I did. I hated everyone and everything in it for taking him. I hated the apologies because those people hadn’t lost him like I had, like his friends had, like his family had.

  My heart broke for Emmett losing his mom after he’d only just gotten her back. But I knew his heart was like mine—and more apologies would only make it worse.

  That left the angry… devastated… hot sex we’d just had in the room. I knew he was just adding that to the list of things to hate himself for. Maybe I should have been angry… maybe disgusted? Honestly, I loved every second of it.

  But how did I tell him that?

  ‘Hey, Emmett, by the way, I loved the way you fucked me right after your mom died and you went a little crazy. Is there any way you can just relive that pain so we can do it again?’

  Umm… no.

  I reached for some chapstick in my purse. We’d been in the car for twenty minutes—him stewing on his thoughts, me, frantically, trying to figure out how to change them—and not a word had been said; I needed to say something.

  I loved him and he was breaking right in front of my eyes. My fingers found the chapstick right next to Dylan’s ring in the pocket; I forgot I’d put it in there. My eyes squeezed shut. Maybe it was time for him to see that I was broken, too.

  “Dylan was on the football team with Tyler,” I began. “He was a great athlete, great student, great friend. He started a surf school; he loved teaching kids.”

  “Why the fuck are you telling me about how perfect your ex-boyfriend is right now, Ally?” His tone was painfully sharp. “I’m a fucking asshole. News-flash, sweetheart, that’s not fucking news to me.”

  My cheeks burned red. I gripped the Claddagh tightly, letting the metal dig into my flesh.

  “He died, Emmett,” I said harshly—that shut him up. “He died. That’s why we broke up. That’s why I still have photos of him. That’s why I’m even here.” Hot tears welled in the corners of my eyes so I kept talking, hoping that the words spilled out faster than the tears. “He started a surfing school that Tyler and I helped out with. A group of college kids came down for spring break. I was supposed to teach them but Dylan was concerned because they were all guys, so he decided to take the lesson.”

  “I went out shopping with my friends. Tyler said that the kids were drunk and when Dylan refused to take them out, one of them grabbed a board and dove in anyway. Of course, he was completely wiped out by the wave and pulled under. Dylan went in after him.” My throat was so thick I didn’t know how the words were coming out. “They said that he hit his head trying to push the kid up above the water. He made it to shore, but his brain was bleeding. He didn’t make it to the hospital.” The metal of the ring was actually hot between my fingers because I’d been rubbing it with such force.

  “Why didn’t you tell me?” he asked hoarsely.

  “Why don’t you tell anyone about Miriam?”

  “That’s fucking different,” he cursed, his body thrumming with anger and hurt.

  “How?” I demanded. “It hurts, Emmett. That’s why. Whatever your reasons or mine. It hurts and we tried to bury that hurt because it made us look weak and pitiable.”

  “It’s fucking different, Ally, because you don’t have a goddamn bad bone in your body. You want to know how it ended between Miriam and me? I kept trying to push her but she wasn’t breaking. So, I went out and did coke for the first time and I came home, knowing she would realize what I’d done the second she saw me; I made sure to tell her, too, just in case,” he ground out.

  “When I woke up the next morning, she told me that she loved me and she would do anything to help me and that meant that I had to pack my bags because she was sending me to school here. I wanted her to break—but not like this, not like she was a fucking martyr for me.”

  “So, I told her that she was a horrible fucking mother. I told her that she was never a mother to me and that my own cracked-out mom would have done a better job than she did.” He laughed cruelly. “Rose Jameson sent me away when I was no longer useful to her; she sacrificed me for her own sake. Miriam, on the other hand, sent me away even though it killed her because it was what was best for me; Miriam sacrificed herself and I threw it back in her face, telling her that I would never see or speak to her again.”

  “Emmett—“

  “Don’t. Just fucking don’t.” I could practically see the steam coming out of his ears that’s how badly he was trying to light himself on fire.

  “No! I won’t not say something. You were troubled; you were suffering; and you were an asshole. But what is the point of dwelling on that now? Did Miriam?” Silence. “Did she ask you why you said
or did those things? Was the first thing she wanted from you an apology? No. Because I think we all know that you meant none of those things. If you had, you wouldn’t have paid for her care for all of these years. You wouldn’t have talked to Ruth to hear updates on her. And you wouldn’t have that photo on your mantel.”

  “Ally…” His voice cracked.

  I turned in my seat to face him, seeing how red and streaked my face was in his sunglasses. “It’s ok to make mistakes. It’s ok to feel bad about them. It’s ok to want to make them right. But don’t sit here and think that you need to make them right to her. You sat in there with her for hours and all she wanted to know about was you and your life. She wasn’t looking for a confession or to see how your self-loathing has destroyed parts of you.” The air I dragged in went over speed bumps as it traveled down my throat.

  “I’m sorry that she is gone, Emmett. I’m sorry that you didn’t have more time with her. I only met her briefly, but I know for certain that this—what you are doing to yourself now—is the only thing that you’ve done that would hurt her.”

  I waited for a response. After a minute, I sat back in my seat because I wasn’t the one he needed to answer to.

  “The doctor said that she was holding on… for me.” I looked to him again. “He said she should have passed days ago, that her body was ready, but her mind wasn’t. She was holding on to see me. And after yesterday… he said she could finally pass in…”

  “Peace.” I finished for him, but barely, as I imagined what it had been like for him to hear that.

  My fingers fumbled and I dropped the ring into my lap. Fishing it out, I reached for my purse to put it away. Funny how a few months ago, I couldn’t bear to take it off, not knowing what to do with it, not willing to part with the last thing that tied me to Dylan. Now—well, the other night—I realized that it had never been about Dylan. It had been about reminding me that there was no such thing as a happy ending for me. Until the other night. Until Emmett.

  Now, it was a frustrating, overwhelming, infuriating, passionate, consuming, loving ending.