by Becky McGraw
“Yeah, I’m here…” she said in a wobbly voice.
“When did you record it?” he asked her then cleared his throat.
“About five hours ago…” she said then chuckled.
“No shit? Wow, that’s fast then…” he told her, then hesitated before he added in a raw voice, “I miss you so goddamned much, Jess…” and even though he pulled the phone away, she heard his soft sob, and knew he was crying now, before he said, “I miss my baby too.”
Tears poured out of Jess’s eyes unheeded, and she sobbed too, then told him, “I’m back in Dallas now, we just landed…you want to keep Angel for a few days? We’ve got some gigs lined up, so I’ll be busy…”
“Who’s we?” he asked in a voice barely above a whisper. “You and that Latino guy?”
“What Lat—oh you mean Carlos? How’d you know about him?”
“I saw you kissing him in front of the bar, Jess…and it ripped my fucking heart out.” If there was much more misery in his voice, Jess was afraid he was going to melt into a puddle of it.
“Wade, Carlos is Jazzie’s brother…he’s like my brother. You didn’t see what you thought you saw,” she told him.
She heard him suck in a breath, then he said, “I saw what I saw…but if you say he’s her brother, I believe you…we have a pinkie swear right?”
“Yeah, we have a pinkie swear, baby…how’s your back?”
“Hurts like hell, but my insides hurt more,” he said with a groan.
Panic flooded Jess and she asked in a frantic voice, “Oh god, did you hurt something else when you fell?”
“Yeah…when I fell in love with you…I’m so damned sorry for hurting you, Jessie,” he told her in a voice that vibrated with emotion.
“Wade, I can’t have this conversation with you right now…I’m not by myself. Let me call you back later, okay?” she asked with a glance at the driver and then Tamara who were watching her intently.
“Don’t trouble yourself, sugar…you’re probably too busy, now. I just wanted to tell you I heard our song, and I feel like I’m bleeding inside,” he said then hung up the phone.
“Don’t hang up dammit!” she yelled at the phone, then dialed him back. The phone rang and rang, but he didn’t pick it up, so she disconnected and threw it in the diaper bag in disgust.
After they dropped off Tamara at the corner by her apartment building, she tried Cole and Sabrina’s number again, and Sabrina answered. “Bri, this is Jess…can you get Wade on the phone, I need to talk to him.”
“He’s locked up in the weight room, and won’t come out…Jess, I’m worried about him,” Sabrina told her in a low serious tone. “He’s a mess…stays locked up in that weight room, when he’s not drinking himself into oblivion at night.”
Jess whimpered, then asked, “Think he’ll be there in about two hours?”
“He’ll be in there, til it’s drink himself under the bed time.”
“Don’t tell him, but Angel and I are gonna head that way as soon as I get home.” Jazzie and Jess had gotten a nice two-bedroom condo last week, and had just moved in, and the driver was just about there. Jess had also bought her a car…not a new one, but one decent enough to make it to Bowie and back. She’d take Angel and drop her off with Wade for a week or so…that would probably cheer him up, and Angel would like it too. She fretted sometimes, and Jess would swear it was because she missed her daddy.
“Oh, thank god…he’ll be here, and I’ll be even happier than him to see you,” Sabrina said with a rough chuckle.
Jess had plenty of time to worry and think while she drove to Bowie, and came to the conclusion that she and Wade needed to talk…mostly about Angel and how they could work out visitation, because she didn’t want to cut him out of their daughter’s life. Angel needed him to be in her life, if he got his act together that is…because she wasn’t about to trust her daughter to a man that found his peace at the bottom of a bottle.
When she pulled the car to a stop in front of the huge house out in the boondocks, Jess just sat there a minute, shoring up her defenses, so she could handle seeing Wade again, if that was even possible. The way her gut was churning right now, she’d probably toss her cookies all over his boots. Taking a deep breath, she let it out slowly, then grabbed the diaper bag and small suitcase she’d packed for Angel, then got out and opened the back door to get the baby out. Angel was sleeping, so Jess put her against her shoulder then kneed the door shut, and walked up the walkway to the house.
Before Jess could knock, Sabrina flung the door open and put her finger over her lips, and she walked inside, then Bri shut the door quietly behind her. “He’s in the bedroom now, with his good friend Jack. Let me have the baby, and you go talk to him,” she said then took Angel from her. Jess sat the diaper bag and suitcase down in the foyer, and followed Bri down the hall to a bedroom on the end, where she pointed at the door.
Jess nodded, then Sabrina walked back down the hallway with Angel. Her heart rate ramped up, as her hand hovered over the doorknob, then she opened one side of the double doors and walked inside the dark room, then shut it behind her. There was absolutely no light at all, but she heard the slosh of liquid in a bottle and then the clink of a the bottle against a glass, and she walked that way.
“What the fuck do you want, Bri? I’m trying to go to sleep,” he mumbled then she heard him swallow and sigh.
“It’s not Bri, Wade…” she said flatly and stepped closer to the bed. She heard the glass drop on the carpet and then the bottle being set on the night table.
“Oh, god, I must’ve drank too damned much, because I swear I’m fucking hearing things…or maybe I finally drank enough this time,” he said with a groan as he shifted in the bed.
“You’re not dreaming, sugar…I’m here,” Jess told him softly, then felt for the bed and sat down.
His hands patted around on the mattress, until he found her, then they moved up her legs across her breasts and finally to her face. He moved his fingers gently over her eyelids, and then down her cheeks, and he whimpered, “If this is a hallucination, I never want to wake up…”
“You’re not hallucinating, I’m here, Wade,” she told him then ran her hand up his chest to his cheek and it was wet, so she ran her thumb upward and wiped it away, then stroked his stubbled jaw.
He groaned, then grabbed her and pulled her to him in a fierce hug, and he sobbed into her hair. “Oh, god…”
“Shhh…don’t cry, darlin’,” she said in a choked voice against his shoulder. Jess couldn’t help it, love for him flowed through her like a raging river, and she was like a log floating on it, with no control.
“I love you so damned much, Jess…I’m so sorry for what I said…for hurting you,” he said and his arms tightened around her more.
Fighting to drag in a breath she told him, “You’re hurting me now, darlin’…I can’t breathe.”
His arms immediately loosened and he pulled her further up on his lap, and kissed her face until he found her lips, then he latched onto them and kissed her with a fierceness that spoke of the intensity of the emotions that were torturing him. Jess whimpered then slid her arms around his neck, and kissed him just as fiercely.
He tasted like bourbon soaked heaven, but heaven anyway, and she felt like a flower reaching for the sun, filling itself with bright rays of warm light. The cold dead places inside of her for the last few weeks renewed themselves, and tingles of pleasure moved along her nerve endings, as his hand slid up her legs to the edge of her jean skirt, then underneath, and she sucked in a sharp breath, wanting him to go higher, but knowing they needed to finish this talk first.
He pulled back and dragged in a breath then said, “Tell me you still love me, please tell me.”
“I do love you, Wade…haven’t ever stopped…you did hurt me, though, very badly,” she told him honestly.
“I truly am sorry, Jess…you mean the world to me, and I was out of my mind and totally fucking stupid for saying what I did to you,”
he told her in a tortured groan, then added fiercely, “I get what you were saying now…good or bad, if you love someone, you stick by them. I was trying to shove you away, because I thought some bad shit was gonna happen, and wanted to spare you…that wasn’t my decision to make, and I’m sorry.”
“You also made me feel like I wasn’t competent to make good decisions about my life, and that was the worst of it. You have no idea how hard I’ve struggled the last eight years to make it, Wade…to put up with the users in my life, and still succeed.”
“I do know, Jess…I see it…and I’m so damned proud of you, and in awe of your persistence. No matter what kind of bad crap comes down the pike, you manage to ride the wave to the next good thing that happens. Even when you got pregnant with Angel and I wasn’t there, you did the same thing.”
“I think you do get it…” she said softly, then relaxed against him laid her head on his shoulder.
His body trembled, then he hugged her again. “I do…and I promise I won’t do that to you again, sweetheart,” he told her with a kiss to her hair. “Stay with me, darlin’…please don’t leave me,” he pleaded.
“I can’t…I have to go back to Dallas. We have several pretty large gigs set up thanks to my new manager, and in two weeks we hit the road with Glory Shine as her opening act, that’ll last six months or so….”
Wade tensed up, but then let out a whoop that she was sure, Sabrina heard clear on the other side of the house, then he reached over and turned on the lamp on the bed table. His face was a ravaged mess, his eyes red-rimmed, but filled with so much love and pride, her heart twisted in her chest. “You’re there darlin’…you made it in spite of me and all the assholes before me…you did it.”
She smiled and said, “Nah, Jazzie and I did it…together we’re unstoppable.”
“She’s dynamite in a very small package, for sure,” he told her with a shaky grin.
His smile faded, then he said, “If you’re going on the road for six months, what does that mean for us? For Angel?”
“That’s what we need to talk about…calmly. We can figure this out, Wade.”
“As long as you’re with me, we can work anything out, sugar…I’ve been so damned miserable without you,” he told her then hugged her to him again, “We’re a good team, I’m just sorry it took me so damned long to realize that.”
“Better late than never…how long is your rehab?”
“The doc says that depends on my determination. I have the routine, all I need is a place to work out every day,” Wade told her then ran his hand over her shoulder and she shivered, as darts of electricity danced over her skin.
“Are you still gonna work at the Double B when you get back to a hundred percent?”
“I’m not sure I’ll be able to…they got the bone chip off my spinal cord, but the cage is still there, and if I fell off a horse again, it could be bad news. There’s a helluva lot of riding with that job. I just don’t know what else I can do…riding has been my life.”
“There’s a helluva lot you can do, sugar…you could probably get a job with the rodeo administration? Or give lessons to new cowboys wanting to learn bronc riding from the best?” she suggested with a soft smile, then offered, “Or how would you like to be a stage hand manager and daddy?”
“The daddy part is a given, but what does a stage hand manager do?”
She gave him a wry grin and said, “Manage the stage hands?”
He snorted then kissed her hair, “Smart ass…”
“You’d coordinate moving and setting up equipment for us at each venue, and make sure the guys putting the stuff up, know where we want everything, and that they do a good job of it, so nobody gets electrocuted, or hurt, especially at the outdoor venues.”
“So, I’d get to travel with the band? Do that and take care of Angel while you work?”
“Yep…the label is leasing us a big tour bus,” she said and put her arms around him to give him a squeeze, then said cheekily, “You could also be my bodyguard.”
“Now that’s a job I’d thoroughly enjoy…I would make that a priority, because I love your body and wouldn’t want to leave it unguarded for a minute,” he drawled sexily looking down at her with desire sparkling in his eyes.
“I love you, Wade…please help me make this work for all of us,” she told him sincerely.
“I’m gonna make it my new life’s mission, sugar, making you happy, because I don’t ever want to be without you again,” his said and his voice vibrated against her hair, sending tingles over her scalp and down her face and neck.
Jess hugged him again, then said, “Let’s go get Angel from Sabrina and hit the road…I’m kidnapping you back to Dallas with us…you game?”
“Does that scenario include you tying me up? And then me escaping and doing the same to you, so I can have my dastardly way with you?”
“It can include anything your imagination can conjure up,” she purred.
Wade growled then covered her mouth with his in a kiss that heated those tingles she’d been feeling to red hot waves of desire. She groaned, then panting, she pulled back from him to ask breathlessly, “How’s your back?”
“What back?” he asked, then kissed her again.
Twisting in his arms, Jess straddled him and pressed herself against his rock solid erection, which fit right where she needed it to be. With a moan, she deepened the kiss and moved her hips slowly against him, creating a rhythmic friction that started a desperate fire inside of her, that would take a whole lot more than the moisture pooling there to quench.
Wade moved his hands to her butt and pulled her tighter against him, then threw his head back against the headboard and rotated his hips with hers. His face was tense and flushed, and he groaned when she leaned toward him and licked her way up his neck to his ear, “I need you inside of me, Wade…I need you,” she told him desperately.
He reached between them and undid the button on his jeans, then slid the zipper down and shoved them down his hips and he sprang free. He grabbed her hips and pushed her skirt up, then grabbed the elastic of her panties and with a jerk, ripped them off of her, then sat her down on top of him. Jess wiggled her hips and took his head inside of her and moaned at the intense sensations that radiated up her body.
His whole body tensed and he sucked in a sharp breath, then held her still, and swallowed a couple of times, before he said, “Oh, god, I’m not even inside of you, and I’m about to come…you feel so damned good.”
Jess lowered herself and took him farther inside, then sighed when she was fully seated on him. His heat inside of her stretched her tightly and she felt so full, it was incredible. Catching short gasps of air, she looked into his eyes and told him in a broken whisper, “I’ve missed you so much…” then moved her hips to slide up his length, to set a slow sensual rhythm that was like floating on a lazy river on a summer afternoon, full of pleasure, but in no hurry to reach the end. She was just enjoying the ride and basking in the emotions pouring through her.
Leaning over him, she kissed his chest, then licked his collarbone, before putting open mouthed kisses along his neck. His arms tightened around her, and he huffed out a breath then said in a gruff whisper, “Slow, baby…yeah, so good, sugar,” then he moved his hand between them and found her heat and massaged her in slow sensual circles.
Jess sucked in a surprised breath, as an incredible orgasm snuck up on her. It took over every muscle in her body, and sweet pleasure sent her flying toward the release she needed so badly. With a whimper, she hit her peak, then her inner muscles clamped down on him. Wade shifted his hips under her to increase the rhythm, then dug his fingers into her hips, and tensed under her, then threw back his head and roared his release. She saw his pulse beating wildly in his neck, and his hands still held her firmly against him, even after the tremors in their bodies ceased.
