Always

by Lauren Dane

  He’d be with her on a beach in four days and have her all to himself.

  But he wanted her then. Wanted her to want it just as much. Even as her insistence in bringing up their relationship scared him on some level, he wanted her. They’d work it out, he’d see her more, travel up there more. Things would improve and she’d feel better after her exams were finished. He didn’t like her being upset.

  “What’s gotten you in such a bad mood?” Laura asked as he muttered to himself, looking through his proofs.

  “Nothing.”

  She snorted. “The only person with the power to make you feel like this is Cat. How is she anyway?”

  “Don’t know. She’s incommunicado.”

  “Ah. That’s the issue. What did you do to make her so mad she cut you off?”

  “Why do you assume she’s doing it to punish me? She’s taking her bar exam for the next few days and is offline and away from her phone until she’s done.”

  “Regardless, you’re in a snit. Which says to me that you should just admit you love her and be done with it.”

  He turned to her and sat. “And what of it, even it was true? She has a life in Seattle. I have a life here. Now that she’s done with school we can see each other more often. She can fly down and I can fly up. It’s a two and a half hour flight. We can even meet halfway. It’s not like we have to get married. But for now, she’s taking a three-day test and I’m going to see her this weekend so there’s no reason for me to declare my love or for you to poke at me until I snarl.”

  She raised a brow. “Fine, lie to yourself then. See if you can repeat it enough to make it true. But, Eamon, I’ve seen how she looks at you. She’s in love. She’s an ambitious woman and she’s going to come to a point where this week here and there thing isn’t going to be enough. Love isn’t always enough. Don’t lose her because you’re being stupid.”

  “Stop talking to Hannah and mind your own business. Cat and I are fine.” Not wanting to engage with her any further, Eamon stood and stormed out. Laura didn’t know what the fuck she was going on about and moreover, it wasn’t any of her damned concern.

  Chapter Ten

  Caitlin walked into the suite Eamon had reserved for them and let all the stress, the responsibility and the exhaustion simply fall away. He’d be there with her in another hour and then their vacation would start.

  Five days with him at her side, on the beach, in bed, in town. Five days when she wouldn’t have to share him with anyone. No family, no friends, nothing. Just Eamon and Caitlin. Add some margaritas and the warm breeze and it was as close to heaven as she’d been in years.

  She decided to shower off the trip and change before he arrived. They’d decided to fly separately because it was too much of a hassle to try and coordinate, not to mention more expensive. They’d only arrive about ninety minutes apart so it wasn’t that big a deal.

  And it gave her a little more time to decompress and ready herself.

  The bathroom was gargantuan, decorated with gorgeous hand-painted tiles in warm colors. Eamon was going to be in heaven. Caitlin smiled as she stepped into the huge, glassed-in shower stall and turned on all three shower heads. Her man loved water. Loved having sex in the shower or bath too. Not that she was complaining. At all.

  When she got out she was significantly more relaxed. Barefoot, she braided her hair back from her face as she walked to her suitcase to grab her bikini. While she thought of it, she called down and ordered a pitcher of margaritas. He’d be arriving very soon and the thought of it made her hands shake a bit.

  The bar exam had gone fine. She knew in her gut that she’d passed. She’d come home and slept for twelve hours, eaten and slept again until it was the next day. He’d sent her flowers to congratulate her and they’d traded voicemails because he was out on a job and she went off to dinner with Anh and some of the other AAGs she’d be working with. In fact, she’d start working full time once she got back from vacation. Of course her job was contingent on bar passage but that was normal.

  After liberal application of sunscreen and donning her big, but sexily mysterious hat, she headed out to the patio overlooking the ocean with the glasses and the pitcher. She sipped her drink and put her head back to soak in the sun.

  She’d done it.

  Gone to school, taken the bar and gotten her dream job. Working as an assistant attorney general didn’t pay as much as working at a big firm, but it was what she wanted to do with her degree. She loved her co-workers, she knew the job and it was actually real! No more studying nonstop. She’d have job stress, yes, but she could hit the ground running. She knew the law, knew the job, knew the judges and defense attorneys too.

  Caitlin was satisfied and not just a little proud of herself.

  Her only hesitation was Eamon and where they would go from here. He said they’d talk but she worried he’d put her off like he had before.

  Eamon was harried. Annoyed at the person in front of him on the flight who’d found it necessary to recline back into his lap. Who did that? In this day and age, you’d have to be a moron or an arsehole not to know any reclining at all would be severely uncomfortable for the person behind you.

  Then the resort shuttle had been packed and they’d asked him to wait for the next one. But damn it, Cat was waiting for him in their room and according to the text she’d left on his phone, in a bikini and drinking a margarita as she waited. So he’d said fuck it and got in a cab he’d thought at the time he was fortunate to share with others going to the resort, only the women had hit on him relentlessly the entire twenty minutes until he’d shoved money at the driver and run to get away from them.

  But the sight of her rising, her hat shading her face but her bikini not shading much else, had sent all that annoyance far away. She smiled as she removed the hat and then she was in his arms, laughing, turning her face up to receive his kisses.

  “There you are. I’ve got margaritas for us and a dinner reservation made for later. When I checked to be sure your flight arrived, I also ordered up some snacks. How about I scrub your back? Then we can eat.”

  “How about you get naked? I need to be inside you. Then we can have some drinks and eat some snacks? Or, I’ll have a snack of you first, and then we can have food.”

  She grinned as she untied her top and tossed it to the side. “Sounds like a fine plan.”

  Once her taste was on his lips again, he felt much better.

  Through his camera lens, Eamon watched her move, the gentle sway of her body, her skirt fluttering around her bare legs. Her hair was held back from her face in a high pony tail and the woman she spoke rapid-fire Spanish with at the stall was the perfect counterpoint to Caitlin’s pale beauty.

  The woman laughed and nodded. Cat put some money on the counter and took the wrapped bundle, calling her “thank you” out as she turned back to Eamon.

  “Should of known you’d be snapping pictures. Come on, I just got some fresh pan dulce. I think we can grab some coffee at that little café right back there.”

  There was so much in her, a quiet ferocity for experience, for knowledge and understanding—it called to him, uncoiled something within his soul and dug in deep. He wrapped an arm around her waist, drawing all her vitality and beauty close as they got settled and ordered coffees.

  She unwrapped the sweet breads and broke one in half, handing it his way.

  “Perfect.” And he meant far more than the bread and coffee.

  “She said they’d only come from the oven an hour before.” Cat ate and sipped her coffee; he wanted her so badly his skin itched with it.

  “You look especially lovely just at this moment.” He snapped a few photos of her. She’d apparently gotten used to it and tried her best to ignore him. It amused him.

  “So. You said we’d talk in Mexico. Here we are, relaxing with some lovely pan dulce and café con leche. I’ve realized a lot of things over the last few months since school ended. Eamon, I want to be with you.”

  He soft
ened at what a tenacious little bird she could be. What man wouldn’t be flattered a woman like her wanted him? But she had him, didn’t she know that?

  “We are together, Caitlin. I told you, I haven’t seen anyone else in over a year. Since my first trip to Seattle when we re-connected. You have me, love.” He slid his thumb over the flesh of her hand just below her thumb, liking the way her lips opened on a soft sigh of pleasure.

  “Nonetheless, Eamon. I think our definitions of being together differ. I want a relationship. I want us to be together all the time.”

  “I live in Los Angeles. You live in Seattle. How do you propose we get around that?”

  “Clearly this will take some creative problem solving on our parts and some hard choices too. We need to look at our situations and see what needs to be done. I know it’ll take some sacrifices but I think we’re worth it, don’t you?”

  “We can talk about it more after the summer. Once you have your graduation ceremony we can re-evaluate if necessary. Come on.” He stood and avoided the hurt in her eyes. “We’re supposed to get massages, remember?”

  She stood but didn’t take the hand he held out. “You can’t avoid the topic forever. I won’t wait that long,” she said quietly as she walked past.

  Two evenings later, they’d had a lovely late dinner and came back to their room. On their deck, they danced under the stars, his lips on her hair, her body lithe against his. Always, when he was with her, a deep sense of satiation and warmth lived within him. He found himself drawing on it when they weren’t together, pulling the memory around himself when he needed the boost to make it through the day.

  Words poised on the tip of his tongue but he didn’t let them go. Words about when he’d come back to Seattle or see her again in LA. Of course he’d see her graduate in June but June was four months away.

  “I keep meaning to tell you how wonderful it was that you won the grant. Congratulations,” she said lazily, her lips against the bare skin of his throat.

  He’d received a grant to work on a program teaching photography to kids at youth centers based in Seattle, Los Angeles, Phoenix, Chicago, Dallas, Boston and Cincinnati along with seventeen others. All people he’d met when he’d stopped over in New York the year before.

  “I bet your father would have been over the moon.”

  He squeezed her a bit tighter. His da would have been very excited and proud. Mainly that Eamon was doing something to help other people but also that it had been a project Eamon himself was excited over.

  She got him. She understood him in ways no one ever had.

  Their last day was tomorrow and then he’d head back to LA and she to Seattle and her job. The last three days had been so very good. He wasn’t sure he’d feel that good again until the next time he had her with him. And that wasn’t something he really knew what to make of.

  “You feel good. I’m going to miss this after Wednesday.” He heard it in her voice, knew the topic would come up again and panic swelled. Why did she want things to change? They were perfect as it was.

  “We’ll see each other again soon. You don’t live that far from me, you know.”

  “Far enough that this seems a luxury. I don’t want time with you to be a luxury. A treat, yes, but not a rarity.”

  “How about a swim? The moon is full and I haven’t seen you wet at night. Well, outside the bedroom anyway.”

  She laughed but it was laced with sadness as she held her hand out toward him. “You know, you’re working so hard to avoid talking about the future. You’re probably twisted into a pretzel by now.”

  “I’m not avoiding talking about the future. I wanted to go for a swim under the moon with my beautiful girlfriend. Is that so wrong?”

  She rolled her eyes but they quickly changed into swimsuits and headed down the manicured path to the beach.

  Cat was a strong swimmer, confident even at night. He was content to float and watch her move, effortless, graceful, sexy.

  The water was warm and the waterfall decorating the edge of the pool they were in sent relaxing white noise into the evening air. She was beautiful in an otherworldly way, the moon sliding over her wet, pale skin.

  “Enough swimming. I need to be in you.”

  His mouth cruised leisurely down her throat. He paused to flick his tongue against her thundering pulse, sucking just a bit before his teeth caught that sensitive skin around the tendon there.

  Caitlin couldn’t stop the gasp, laden with pleasure and pleas, from escaping her mouth and his chuckle in response sent shivers through her system. He’d made love to her when they’d come back in from the swim, after they’d showered. It had been hard and fast, nearly frenzied on his part. But this time, this time he’d awoken her sometime after two in the morning with slow, lazy kisses, touring her body just how he wanted and she’d opened herself to it.

  She shifted, arching into his body, his touch, wanting more. The dark softness of his hair tickled her chin as he sent his kisses down her neck to her chest. Once his tongue danced around her nipple she was lost. Ha! She’d been lost since she heard his voice at that nightclub over a year before. Now she simply fell further, past any place where she felt safe and straight into the kind of love, a depth of need for him she knew she couldn’t be silent about anymore.

  The weight of his body, heavy, warm, familiar and achingly absent until that moment, anchored her with delicious friction. His hands were everywhere at once, caressing, kneading, pressing thighs open and then delving, fingertips swirling around her clit, making her even more wet, making her even more desperate for his cock.

  “Please,” she gasped out.

  He paused for just a moment, his lips leaving a brand against her hip bone, before replacing those questing fingers with his mouth.

  Helplessly, she writhed, her hips churning against him, her fingertips scrabbling through the blankets to hold on as orgasm shot through her so hard she felt bruised by it.

  His entry into her body was deliciously slow and when she opened her eyes, he was staring at her with such intensity it was nearly magnetic. She wanted to plaster herself to him, skin to skin, heart to heart.

  He didn’t speak but he didn’t need to. She saw it in his eyes, saw that this thing between them was so much more than either of them had bargained for. Desire, longing, a sense of home all tinged with a bit of fear at how fast it had become so very much.

  This was nearly too much and yet, not quite enough all at once.

  He broke his gaze and dipped his head to taste her mouth again. The kiss tasted of her as his tongue invaded in time with his thrusts.

  On it went, Eamon making love to her slowly, kissing her like she was the best-tasting thing in the world. Neither of them made a sound other than a soft gasp or moan.

  And when he came at last, as his lashes fell and he looked at her through them, she knew without a doubt. She was in love with Eamon and things could not go on the way they had.

  “I love you.”

  It hadn’t hurt to say it. She didn’t feel afraid or even worried he’d say it back. It was true no matter what he felt and she’d lived long enough being afraid of what people might think of her feelings. No more being put off. No more fear about what he’d do or say. It couldn’t continue this way.

  His breathing changed, quickened, and he sat up. She turned on the lamp and sat as well. His normally open features had blanked and her heart dropped. Still she soldiered on because she’d let him put her off enough.

  “I can’t do this anymore, Eamon.”

  “What? You just told me you loved me. You have to give me a moment to process.” He took her hand, kissing the palm and she allowed herself a moment, eyes closed, to love the gesture, to receive it as his way of responding even if he didn’t acknowledge it verbally.

  “Process what? This has been between us for over a year. We speak nearly daily. I’ve shared my hopes and dreams with you. It’s not just sex between us. It’s not just friendship. We’re not dating. It’s more
than that for me. I love you,” she repeated. “I want to be in a relationship with you.”

  “This is a relationship. Of sorts. Whatever it is, it’s good. Why do you want to change it?”

  She nodded, trying very hard to stay calm and rational when she wanted to demand he pony up and make a damned decision. “Of sorts is a good way to put it, I suppose. I thought I could keep on rather than let go. I was scared to push so I let you put me off over and over. But in truth, I need more than just a few days here and there. I want to see you more than three times a year.”

  “I’m not ready for this discussion. For this step, Caitlin. I feel very deeply for you. There’s no other woman in my life. There hasn’t been since December before last. But I have a condo and a business in Los Angeles and you have a job in Seattle. What do you propose we do about that?”

  “Not ready? You can’t claim you didn’t know this was coming. I’ve brought it up multiple times. As for what I propose to do about our different situations? Nothing if you’re not ready to think about it. Which you clearly aren’t. I can’t be the source of panic in your life. I don’t want to be a responsibility or a burden and I don’t want to be a decision you make rather than a choice.”

  “What the feck does that mean? Decision is the same as choice.”

  It settled into her with horrible and yet certain reality. She had to take a stand here, no matter the outcome. Once she’d finally said the words there was no going back.

  “No it isn’t. I want you to choose to make your life work to be with me. I’m asking you to make a move to Seattle work. I’m asking you to be the one who makes the sacrifice and moves. That’s choice. A decision is what you do when you have to take care of an ailing parent. It’s borne from responsibility and duty. I want to be a choice. I want you to want to be with me and to make it happen.”

  “But you want me to do all the work. Because some arsehole fucked you over, you won’t move for anyone now.”