I had one of those once, and I know what it feels like to lose it.
“Makes sense, but now Kinsley is around you guys more, so . . .” Delia replies with a smile.
“So maybe I’ll come around more.”
“Good. To answer your original question, the job thing is great, thank you for asking. The extra money doesn’t hurt either.”
“Did you get a nice raise?” I ask.
“A really nice one. It’s going to allow me to do some much needed improvements on my house. Gray was nice enough to get me in touch with someone who does renovations, and I’m going to have the floors redone first. After that, I think I can tackle the kitchen.”
“Yeah?”
She nods. “My cabin is great, but it needs a little love. You’ll see it when we get there.”
Yeah, and then I’ll dream of her and me on that floor, doing all kinds of things.
I clear my throat. “I can’t wait. You know I can help too?”
“Help renovate?” Delia asks with a hint of surprise.
I swear I just thought about how I avoided town because of her and now here I am, opening my big fucking mouth and volunteering to be around her more. “If you want.”
“Don’t you know that poor girls never turn away free labor?” Delia says with a grin.
“I didn’t say I was free.”
She laughs. “Like your sister-in-law would ever let you charge me.”
“Yeah, yeah.” That’s not the only reason I wouldn’t take her money. “Where to now?”
She tells me to make my next right and then directs me past the corner store.
It’s a nice place, small, and looks as if it had the outside stained recently, but the flower beds are overgrown and one of her gutters is hanging on by a thread. No matter what it looks like on the outside or the inside, it’s better than the RV I’m living in. I’m sure she at least has running water and electricity not provided by a generator.
“Like I said,” her voice is higher than before, “it needs work.”
“Everything worth a damn needs work.”
“Even you?” she asks and then her eyes widen. “Shit. Sorry. I didn’t mean that.”
I let out a chuckle, not wanting to make her feel bad. “You’re not wrong. I probably need more work than anyone.”
Her face falls slightly. “I’m going to overstep here, but if I don’t say this, I never will. You have people who love you and will do anything to help you, but you have to accept their offer to help.”
“I’m not good at accepting help,” I admit.
“No one is good at it, but we learn that humbling ourselves is needed at times. Try it, Josh. And while you’re at it, maybe work on not pushing people away. Love isn’t a punishment. It’s amazing and wonderful. It heals and allows us to move forward.”
“I don’t push love away. I love my family and my friends.”
“Right. I know you do.”
“That’s not what you’re talking about, is it?” I ask, but she bites her lip and looks away.
“I shouldn’t have said anything.”
“What do you want, Delia?”
Her lips part, and I can see the struggle warring within her. “It doesn’t matter. I’ve never had a chance to get what I want.”
“We don’t get what we want in life.”
She shakes her head and laughs. “No, we don’t. But at least I’ve had the courage to want more.” Delia exits the car without looking back, and I sit here, feeling like she punched me in the gut.
All these years, I don’t know that she’s ever been that bold. Sure, she says things, but it’s always been more subtle. This was not. Before I know it, I’m rushing after her. I have more courage than she can ever comprehend. Does she think it’s easy to want something and deny yourself?
I take her wrist, and she gasps, turning toward me. “What do you mean?”
“Mean?”
I look down in her coffee-colored eyes, searching for the answers. “Yes, what courage don’t I have?”
“Kiss me.”
I blink, my eyes instantly moving to her lips. “What?”
“You heard me, Josh. Kiss me. That’s what I want. It’s what I’ve always wanted. I have the courage to ask for it, do you have the balls to do it?”
Our breaths grow just a little deeper. I move my hand up her arm as the other snakes around her back, pulling her to me.
Warning bells go off in the back of my head, but I am too pissed, too challenged, to stop myself.
“You want me to kiss you?” I ask, needing to be sure I’m not dreaming.
“Is that what you want?”
Fuck yes, it is. I want to kiss her and do a hell of a lot more. The thing I don’t want is to hurt her or lie to her. I care too much about her to make her think there’s any chance of there being an us. All this can be is lust. I don’t have a heart to give her. “Yes, but you have to understand.”
The breath falls from her lips. “Understand what?”
“That this . . . this kiss, it doesn’t change anything. I can’t give you more.”
A soft laugh flows around us. “I never asked for more.”
I take a step forward, pushing her back against the door, and then I do what I’ve wanted to since I stepped foot back in Willow Creek Valley. Hell, since the last time I held her almost fifteen years ago.
I kiss her.
Chapter 3
Delia
He’s everything I remember but tried to forget.
Josh’s hands tangle in my hair, pushing my head to the side as his tongue slides against mine. He kisses me hard and then soft, playing with me like he’s done my whole damn life.
I don’t care that this will be all I’ll ever have. I relish in it because now I’ll know what it’s like to be in his arms when there’s no delusions between us.
I’m not a little girl, clinging to whatever desperate dreams I have about what our life could be. I already know—there is no life for us.
All there is, is this.
It’s lust, lacing its way through us, binding us as our mouths stay fused together. I push down all my desires for more and take what he’s giving.
My hands move up his back, gripping his strong shoulders, pulling him closer. The cool wood against my back is opposite of the heat on my chest. I moan softly as he kisses me harder.
Yes, God, yes.
He tastes like vanilla and mint mixed with sin.
Once, a lifetime ago, Joshua Parkerson kissed me, and he ruined me for years. Seems he’s determined to do it again.
He moves his hand to the door and opens it, causing me to fall back, but he catches me quickly.
We stare at each other, my hands on his chest, my breathing sounding as though I’ve run a marathon. And I have. I’ve been running this same race for years, and now I see a finish line.
I know I’m over him.
I know that this is all it’ll ever be, and . . . I don’t care. I want this. I want whatever the hell this can be—once. I will finally know what it’s like to be with him and then I’ll be able to walk away.
He releases me and runs his hands through his hair. This is my only goddamn chance, and I can’t let him talk himself out of this.
“Josh, please,” I say, and that’s all it takes.
He walks toward me in two purposeful strides, and then his hands are on my face, holding me before our lips fuse again.
I tear at his shirt, pulling it up and over his head. I don’t even get a second to look at him because our mouths can’t stay apart long enough.
Josh’s fingers pull at the fabric of my shirt, and I help him, removing it as I back up toward my bedroom. We walk, kissing the entire way. A part of me worries that, if we stop, we’ll come out of this fog and remember all the reasons this is a bad idea.
First being that I’m in love with him.
Second being that he does not love me.
But I’m not asking for more. I want what he offers now—s
ex.
“God, Delia.” His voice is deep and feels like a caress.
“Stop talking,” I tell him as we enter my room. “I don’t want words. I don’t want to talk. I just want to feel and touch and . . .”
“Fuck?” he finishes.
I nod. “There are no delusions here.”
Maybe if I say it, I’ll actually believe it.
“Good.”
Josh lifts me, and I giggle as he drops me on the bed. “No words, huh?”
I shrug. “Dirty ones are fine.”
“Yeah?” Josh grins. “Want me to tell you what I have planned?”
“I didn’t realize you had a plan.”
“I do. It’s been a long time that I’ve thought about this,” he confesses, and my heart rate accelerates.
No, Delia. Do not let that statement mean more. It’s not that he’s dreamed of you, just fucking you.
“I see,” I say as nonchalantly as I can.
His denim-colored eyes turn almost liquid as he runs a finger down my chest, stopping at the button of my jeans. “I plan to strip you down.”
“Good start.”
“Then I’m going to lick off every bit of icing or cake left on your body.”
“Now I wish I had bathed in it.”
He grins. “I do too, but don’t worry, sweetheart. I don’t plan to stop there.”
I like this. “No?” I ask, my voice low and gritty.
Josh hooks his fingers in the beltloops, pulling me so I’m against him. “No.”
His lips hover over mine, and we breathe each other in. “What else do you want to do, Josh?”
“I want to taste every inch of you. I want to slide my dick inside you and fuck you until you can’t think of anything else but me. I want to take you so high, you never come down. I want this to be the best fucking day of your life and nothing ever compares to how I make you feel.”
I don’t think he has to work too hard for that because there’s not a snowball’s chance in hell I’ll think of another man after this.
“Well, I think this plan of yours has merit.”
He unhooks the button of my pants, and our eyes don’t break as the sound of the zipper sliding down echoes in the room. “Lie back and let’s pray you had cake fall where I really want my tongue.”
He pulls my pants off, finding that I don’t wear underwear, making this much more efficient.
I lie here, panting, and Josh hovers over me, staring at my body. He lifts my hand, sucking my fingers one at a time, then moves down my arm where there’s icing. I groan as he takes extra time there, sucking off the sugary mixture.
“You taste so sweet. I wonder though, are you sweet everywhere?”
My eyes close as he moves his mouth to my chest, licking my nipple before playfully biting it.
I look at him. “Well, is that spot sweeter?”
“A little bit, but I think . . .” he trails off as his finger swipes a spot of cake on my neck. “I think you will be much better lower.”
“Do you?”
His finger swipes there, grazing my clit. “I do, and look, there’s some cake.”
I bite my lower lip. “Are you going to clean that up?”
“I’m a man of my word,” he says before dropping down, pulling me to the edge of the bed, and then I feel his mouth on me. Josh licks, sucks, and flicks my clit, pushing me toward a climax much faster than ever before.
It’s him.
It’s always him.
When I make a noise, he refocuses on that spot again.
My breathing is labored, and I start to mutter words and his name. He obliterates my ability to think as the most intense orgasm of my life comes. Wave after wave of pleasure takes me under until I struggle to breathe.
Josh climbs up next to me, his hand resting on my cheek. “Hi,” he says with an air of arrogance he’s earned.
“Hi.” I barely get it out between breaths. “That was . . .”
“Good.”
“What’s next on your plan?” I ask as I start to come back to reality.
He grins. “A lot of fucking.”
I get up on my knees. “I have a request.”
“What’s that?”
“Since this is all we’ll have, I want”—I lean down, pushing him back onto the mattress—“to do . . .” My hand moves to his pants, mimicking the way he stripped me of mine. I pull his pants off, his dick springing free, and I lean down. “This.”
Josh’s hands fly to my hair as I take him deep. I use every skill and trick I’ve seen to drive him crazy, which he seems to like because his hips start moving.
“Shit. Delia. Fuck. Baby. I . . .” Josh stammers, and I love that I’m driving him wild.
Another pump, and then he’s pulling me off him and pushing me onto my back again. He grabs for a condom in his wallet and gets it on faster than I ever thought possible.
Our eyes meet, and it’s as though the moment speaks louder than any words could. There is no going back. No pretending anymore that we don’t know what the other feels like in the single most intense encounter two people could have. Josh will be inside me, in every way.
I reach up, pressing my palm to the scruff of his cheek. “Finish the plan,” I say, somehow sounding confident.
I don’t blink. I don’t move or breathe or flinch as he lines up. The look of bliss on his face as he slides in is one I commit to memory. When his eyes close and he drops his forehead to mine, I allow the tear to fall.
Because I know, regardless of whatever lies I feed myself, I will never be the same again.
Chapter 4
Delia
“Where the hell have you two been?” Jessica asks when we arrive back at the party.
“Sorry, there was traffic getting to Melia Lake,” Josh explains so I don’t have to lie to my best friend.
“Oh, I tried calling you.” She looks to me, and I shrug.
“I didn’t hear it.”
Lie. I heard it blaring while we were having sex. Then when we were getting dressed. And again as I waited for him to get cleaned up at his place.
“Well, you’re here now. Stella and Jack took Kinsley back since they only have a few more days with her. You just missed Alex, he said he had to handle something, God only knows what, but Oliver is still here.”
Josh’s hand moves to my back. “Excuse me,” he says and walks away.
I watch him go, feeling the loss of him already. Ugh, I’m such a damn headcase.
“Still over him, huh?” Jess asks quietly, and I look back at her.
“Yeah, over him.” It’s not a total lie, I was on top for a period of time. So, I mean, it’s true.
“Are you okay?” she asks, tilting her head a bit.
“I’m fine.”
“I know that you’ve always had this thing for Josh, and since we’re all going into business together, I imagine it’s hard for you to have him in town full time.”
A few months ago, Josh, Alex, and Oliver moved back to town because all the siblings left their father’s company and decided to start their own venture. With Grayson owning a very large chunk of land, it was an easy decision for the five of them to build their own resort.
“It’s fine, Jess. Truly. Josh and I . . . well, we know what we are and what we aren’t.”
“Still, your heart wants something different.”
I smile at her. “I’m glad my head knows the truth.”
She sighs deeply and wraps her hands around my arm. “You know, it wasn’t all that long ago that I didn’t know if Grayson and I would be together, but it worked out.”
“You and Grayson are different.”
“True, but I have to believe your heart will get what it wants.”
Jessica is the sweetest. She has been through so much to get where she is now. I don’t have the luxury she did when it came to Gray. He has loved her—always. Josh does not love me and never has.
“I have a great job, my mom is healthy, I own my home, and my best
friend is back. I think my heart has all it needs.”
“You want a family too, Deals.”
“Yes,” I agree. “I also want a man who thinks the sun shines from my ass, but that’s a fantasy. I am totally fine being an amazing aunt to your kids.”
She rubs her belly. “You’ll be the best.”
“I’m sure Stella will fight me on it.”
Jess snorts. “Stella works on bribery, that’s a short game.”
We enter the living room where the three remaining Parkerson brothers are watching the football game. Amelia sits on the couch between Josh and Ollie, pulling their attention whenever she demands it.
It’s sad because, if Josh would allow himself the opportunity, he would be an amazing father. The way he dotes on Amelia shows it.
Not my problem, though. We are nothing other than two people who had fantastic sex.
My phone alarm goes off.
“I have to go,” I explain to Jess.
“Already?”
“I have work.”
She gives me a sad smile. “You’re leaving me with the three of them?”
“You married one.”
Jessica groans. “Fine. I guess I’m stuck with him.”
“I can hear you!” Grayson yells from the couch.
“I wasn’t trying to be quiet,” she says back.
“I’ll give you a call this week, and we can have lunch,” I say as I grab my purse off the counter.
“Okay.”
“Bye, Amelia. Happy Birthday, Monkey!”
“Bye, Aunt Delia.”
I love that in the span of a few months, I gained what feels like a whole family. My mom and I have been on our own since my dad died when I was four. We’ve done all right, but it’s been lonely. Jessica moving home was like getting my sister back, and with her came a whole family.
I kiss Jess’s cheek, wave to the guys, and head out to my car. Since everyone else has left, I can actually get out of the driveway now.
When I get to the driver’s side, Josh calls out, “Delia, wait.”
I turn, plastering a smile on my face. “Hey.”
“You’re leaving?”
“I have work.”
“Right, which was why you needed to change . . .”
A Moment for Us Page 2
