by Jenna Mills
“I’d see pictures of you online,” he went on, his voice still so, so quiet, “at parties, and I knew I had no right to take that from you, not after we agreed to see other people. I knew I needed to let you live your life, that it wasn’t fair to ask you to wait for me. But then I’d be out, and it was like I didn’t belong there either. Didn’t belong anywhere.”
“You sure looked like you belonged.” I didn’t need to say more than that. He knew. We both did.
“She never meant anything to me,” he said quietly. “She was just someone who was there.”
My heart squeezed.
One moment. That was all it took. One moment, one decision, one discovery.
If I’d never gone to Ft. Collins—
I had no idea. I had no idea what would have happened if I’d never gone to surprise him that night, never let myself into Josh’s apartment. Never sat waiting in the shadows for him to come home.
“I’d change everything if I could, fix things.” He was still looking beyond me, toward the darkness outside the sliding glass doors. But the stark look on his face warned that he’d gone somewhere much further. “That’s all I could think about that night when I followed you, that I had to fix this…fix us.”
And then I knew where, knew where he’d gone. To a different night, a different mountain.
Fast. I’d been going so fast. Crying, everything distorted, the world like fractured crystal around me.
I never saw his car behind me.
“Then I saw you swerve…and go off the road…”
I never saw the curve, either.
But he did. Josh saw.
Everything.
“I saw the lights and the darkness…”
And he was seeing it again, I knew. Living it.
“…and it was like something inside me died.”
And then I was there, too. I was there again, screaming as I tried to stop, as the cold and dark rose to slam against me.
“I remember slamming on the brakes, getting out…running—”
“Josh,” I finally said. “Don’t—”
But he was beyond the point of hearing. “I saw you, and you were so still…and there was so much blood, and it was like everything just stopped, locking up that moment and holding me there in it, trapping me, no matter how hard I tried to run. I started to pray, to bargain with God…that if he’d just let you live, I’d leave you alone. I’d let you go. And I’ve tried,” he said. “I’ve tried to stay away, but…”
Memories played, jumbled. Waking up in the hospital and feeling the warmth of his hand holding mine. Opening my eyes to see him, and feeling everything inside of me settle into place.
“I don’t know how to stop wanting us…to be us again.”
My throat worked, but I said nothing.
“You’re always there,” he said, and somehow he was closer, no longer sitting on the table but right there, by the sofa. “In my dreams—” His hand lifted, coming closer, his fingers finding the side of my face and sliding to thread through my hair. “My heart.”
I couldn’t move. Couldn’t breathe. Could only look at him kneeling in the play of firelight, for the first time in weeks allowing myself to see, really, really see him. The wide cheekbones and full mouth, the shadow at his jaw, in his eyes. The pain. The regret. The longing.
And somewhere deep inside I started to bleed.
Chapter 11
I’D BEEN HOLDING on so tight, holding everything together, holding on because I had to, because I knew if I let go, for even one broken second, the free-fall would start all over again. But from one breath to the next he was reaching for me, or maybe I was reaching for him, or maybe it didn’t matter, maybe we were both reaching, both letting go. I only knew that he was pulling me into his arms and holding me, holding me so, so tight. Holding me like he used to, like always, like he’d never, ever let me go.
I’d been cold for so long, shivering from the inside out. Not just since the accident, but before. All those weeks and months when we lived apart, and drifted. When the ground beneath my feet fractured, shifting, leaving me alone and afloat. But now warmth streamed through me, thawing the ice and bringing me back, back to feeling, to being alive.
To him.
I held him to me, lost and found in the same moment, home in the crush of his arms. I could feel his heart thrumming against mine, into mine. And then there was only one rhythm, one pulse. Achingly familiar. Ours. I opened to him, opened to him in the way of my dreams, of before. One touch, one kiss, and I couldn’t get enough. His mouth, his hands. They were everywhere. Rough but soft, urgent but gentle. Taking. Claiming.
Giving.
So were mine.
Thought fell away. Time lost meaning. Every second. Every breath. There was only us, us alone in the darkness. Feel him. That’s all I wanted. To feel him against me. As much of him as possible. All of him. All of him I’d missed, longed for.
Through the shadows, our eyes met. “Emily,” he whispered, and my whole body sang. “God, Emily.”
“Josh,” I murmured, and then, wrapped in each other, we fell onto the sofa, his mouth returning to slant against mine, tasting—exploring. Sliding lower along my jawbone and neck, lower to my chest. I cried out, my shirt gone in a heartbeat, my bra, leaving only my breasts and his mouth, and the ache that quickly became a fire.
But I wanted to taste, too. I wanted my mouth on his body, to feel the familiar hard heat, to lick and suck, to claim what was mine. What had always been mine.
I shoved at his shirt. He obliged and ripped the soft cotton away. I lifted first my hands, then my mouth. All the while he explored, sliding lower to my shorts and slipping inside the waistband, my panties, between my legs, where his fingers slipped through the wet heat, and I arched up in urgent, familiar welcome.
My body wept, begged.
Josh. It was Josh. With me. Again. Him, like this. Like before. Like always. And I could feel him, feel the ridge of him pressing into me as I reached for him, into his jeans and closed my fingers around him, hard and ready. And all I could think was yes, finally. Yes, now. Yes—
And then, clothes on the floor, there was nothing between us, only us, body to body, tangled, together, urgent, and I opened to him, loving the feel of him settling between my legs and needing to feel him deeper. All of him. Feel him, taking me.
“Josh,” I whispered—and then, with nothing more than his name, everything came crashing into focus, and I was shoving, shoving and rolling and grabbing for the blanket as I tried to breathe.
He drew back, naked in the flickering glow of the firelight, beautiful, dark hair falling in a sweep against his face and his eyes burning.
Incinerating.
Incinerating everything.
And deep inside, that place, that fragile, walled-off place, shattered all over again. Shattered because this was Josh, here with me. Because I’d been wrong, I realized. I wanted him still, even when I didn’t want to. When I knew better. I wanted him despite everything. Like a drug. A drug I didn’t know how to live without. And for a few mindless moments, I’d let that blind, out-of-control need override all the broken pieces.
“No,” I whispered. Just… “No.”
“Emily-” he started, but I didn’t want to hear it. Hear him. Hear anything he had to say.
“This is wrong,” I said, through tears I had no way of stopping. Tears that had been bottled up for weeks. Tears that now overflowed, stung. “So wrong—”
“No, it’s not—”
“Yes, it is.” And the words were a broken shout, like all the broken shouting inside me. “We can’t rewind, Josh. It doesn’t work like that.”
“But we can move forward—”
“No! I can’t do this again.” Wouldn’t. “You need to go—”
And then he was. Yanking on his jeans and pulling his shirt over the beautiful bronze of his shoulders, watching me all the while, watching me as if I’d just lifted a knife to his gut and stabbed, over and over and over
, and he was the one bleeding now, bleeding out. His eyes were dazed, glassy, his face twisted—
And then he turned and walked out the door.
Finally.
Like I wanted.
Like.
I.
Wanted.
I didn’t go to the window. I didn’t watch. But I did hear the engine and the screech of tires against the gravel.
Then…silence.
Even my tears. Hot and salty—but silent as I crossed to the door and, this time, fastened the chain.
I drove.
Everything blurred, jumbled. I felt like I was running, hard, fast, in a race with no end in sight. But I knew, I knew I couldn’t allow myself to turn back, not ever, because if I turned back, Josh would be there, waiting.
Always.
Forever.
And I didn’t want that, couldn’t want that.
Somehow I made it down the mountain. Somehow I made it to The Java Joint the next afternoon. Somehow I took orders and counted change, made drink after drink.
But I couldn’t fool Zoe.
The second the afternoon rush fell into silence and Cheryl left us alone, she pulled me aside.
“Em, what’s going on? You’re like a zombie.”
I blinked, doing my best to paste on a smile. “Just tired.”
The blue of her eyes darkened, the way it always did when she stared out the window, searching for phantoms that weren’t there. “Are you sure?”
Images played, one after the other, Josh kneeling by the fire, making hot cocoa, reaching for me. Josh’s eyes, his touch. His kiss.
His admission.
It’s always been you. Even when I didn’t want it to be.
“Yeah,” I lied, but finally I realized what I’d been denying all along. I didn’t want to want him. Didn’t want to want Josh.
But did.
Zoe stepped closer, lowering her voice. “Did you see Dr. Rivers today?”
“No,” I said thinking she was finally changing the subject. “Why?”
“You just…you remind me of—” she started, but then broke off the second the shadows drenched her eyes.
I shouldn’t have asked. I should have turned away and let everything drop. But curiosity got the better of me. “Remind you of what?”
Slowly she lifted a hand to the dragonfly inked against her throat. “Hannah,” she said as the front door swung open and a group of college girls strolled in. “The last time I saw her.”
The words whispered around me as Zoe turned to the counter and started taking orders. I’m not freaking out, I wanted to promise her, but five minutes later the front door opened again, and this time a man walked in, a middle aged man in a baseball hat, delivering a bouquet of flowers.
Of white lilies.
To me.
This time there was a card.
I’ll never let you go.
Darkness fell around me. I gulped greedily from the bottle of water, swallowed, then pushed open my car door. Everything inside of me jumbled, twisted. But Lexi promised that would all go away now…
That I’d forget.
Be okay.
That, within minutes of swallowing the pill, there’d be nothing holding me back, nothing preventing me from severing the ties that kept trying to bind me, hold me, those between me and the past—between me and Josh, forever. That the fear would finally go away, and the future would be mine.
The future I wanted.
Needed.
More than anything.
The future without Josh.
The future without the lines and rules and cages of the past.
Where I could finally let go of all the hurt.
There’d be no more fear or doubt, no more good girl.
Weak girl.
No more little miss perfect.
And if she wouldn’t go on her own, I would make her.
A few seconds later I slipped into the cool breath of evening. Or maybe those were minutes, too. I really didn’t know. Time was all flowing together, an endless rush cascading down a shifting path.
Seconds. Minutes. Hours. None of that mattered.
Only the warm swirl inside me, and soft glow of light through the windows.
The walkway.
The big, castle-like door.
And making everything else go away.
Stay away.
Forgetting
Becoming.
I didn’t hesitate knocking.
Soft light played against the porch, but from inside, only darkness. The thick wood concealed any movement or sound.
But then, like my confusion, that was gone, too, and he was there, tall, forbidden, standing in the shadows in an untucked grey button-down and well-worn jeans, looking at me with a slow burn in his eyes.
“Emily—” His voice was rough, urgent. “What are you doing here?”
Shaking. I couldn’t stop shaking. “I-I don’t know.” Truth. It was the truth. But it was also the lie. Because I did know. I knew why I was there.
What I didn’t know was how truth and lie could both be the same.
“I didn’t want to go home,” I whispered, “and…didn’t know where else to go.”
Except here.
To him.
To forget.
Start over.
Be someone new.
Different.
Alive.
Because I couldn’t be who I was anymore.
Who’d I’d been.
Couldn’t feel—
—anymore.
Couldn’t—
—hurt.
The wind kept whispering around me. Cool, I knew. It was always cool at night, sweeping down from the Flatirons. But the haze seeping through me made it impossible to feel anything else. “I-I saw Josh.”
His eyes hardened. “Goddamn it—did he hurt you—”
“No—”
“Then what—”
Everything tilted, started to spin. “I don’t want to talk about him.” Think about him.
Remember him.
Want.
Him.
Ever.
The old Emily, the foolish one who believed in hope and promises and forever, was gone, dead. Forever. That’s all that mattered, what he needed to realize.
She died that night on the mountain, in his cold, shaking arms.
“What then?” the man I’d always trusted asked. “What do you want, Emily?”
This. Yes. This was what I wanted. The thrill. Anticipation. Something else. Something different. This was what I needed. To forget, rewrite. To step outside the lines, off the edge.
To let go.
Move forward.
Away.
From who I’d been.
What I’d always thought I wanted.
Moistening my lips, I slipped the hair from my face and lifted my eyes to his. Just a look, that was all, but I felt the touch, the streak of possession deep, deep inside.
“Can I come in?” I asked.
He didn’t move, just stood there all granite still, those dark eyes of his burning down on me like hot coals. There was a struggle there—I saw it—disbelief, hesitation…hunger.
The swirl inside me thickened, carrying me deeper into the fog. Knowing the move was mine, I stepped into him and went up on my toes, lifting my hand to his chest.
A rough sound ripped from his throat, and then his hand was there, too, holding me against the wrinkled cotton of his shirt.
The world wobbled.
He knew. We both did. We’d stood in this exact same spot dozens of times. I’d walked inside his house.
But this was different.
Tonight.
Me.
Him.
His chest rose, fell. “I need you to be sure.”
I could have played a game—or I could have heeded the last, faintest trace of warning echoing through me: run. I did neither. Instead I went with the haze of the moment and spread my fingers against his chest.
“I’m
here, aren’t I?” Stepping into a new story.
A new life.
Where I wasn’t trapped in a tight little box.
His throat worked. “Yes, you most certainly are.”
All those rivers inside me, the hot, liquid ones that streamed in one direction, ran hotter, faster. He asked for words, but the way he looked at me, the unguarded hunger, had me pressing up instead, and feathering my mouth along his.
He tensed, his whole body going rigid as if I’d struck him.
Panic spurted. It was sharp and it was cold, and for a second I felt like a little girl, a foolish, naive child—
Spinning. Everything kept spinning, spinning. This was what I wanted, I reminded myself. Needed.
Him.
He was older, experienced, and so undeniably hot, the perfect first step toward the new me.
He would make it okay.
He would.
Just like Lexi said.
Even if I needed a pill to loosen myself up enough to go through with it.
“Something wrong?” I murmured, lifting a hand to skim fingertips along the stubble at his jaw. Something dark and urgent drove me, a reckless determination I’d never felt before.
The brown of his eyes darkened. Suddenly he looked so big—imposing…a stranger in a familiar body. And then he was moving, moving without warning, dragging me closer, until I was fully against him, his mouth a breath from mine.
“No,” he said hoarsely. “Everything’s finally right.” And then on a low growl his mouth came down against mine, hot and hard and powerful, slanting against me with a soft scrape of whiskers. With one kiss he staked his claim, drawing me into him and anchoring me there, until there was no space, no beginnings or endings, only us right there in that relentless, drugging haze.
Somehow we moved. We must have. But my body was so past the point of working normally, of perceiving moment by moment. Everything throbbed and pulsed, the thickness pulling me so far under, until it was all I could manage to simply breathe. Vaguely I was aware of his arms around me, his hands against my back, of his body. So strong and hard. All of him. Straining. Wanting.
Somewhere inside me the alarms still echoed, but I shoved them as far away as I could. I buried them, didn’t want them, even if they persisted, dull, muted. And for a fleeting moment I was lost, floating, aimless. There was something I needed to grab onto, I knew that, to pull me, save me…
