The Choice

by Alice Ward

  “No, fucking warm as hell!” I splashed him again and proceeded to launch myself onto his shoulders, trying to push his head under the water. He was too strong for me, though, and he just trapped me against his shoulder and carried me farther out into the bay as I laughed like an idiot.

  Then he dunked me again. The second I reached up and grabbed him, pulling him to me, something changed. Desire pulsed between us. The freezing water was forgotten. Now, it actually felt quite necessary to douse the flames burning inside me.

  “Did I tell you how incredible you look in the moonlight?” His fingers trailed down my spine.

  I placed my hands on his chest, feeling his heart pound underneath my fingertips. “You don’t look too bad yourself,” I replied, my voice breathy.

  I could feel his erection growing against my stomach, and it made me even more on edge. His hand dipped below the surface of the black water, cupping my ass. I closed my eyes.

  “You know what I can’t stop thinking about?” His voice was a dark murmur in my ear.

  I shook my head, and for just a moment, I dared to believe that he’d say something that I wanted to hear. I’d felt it when he talked about painting me — I was his muse. I’d felt it when he said that he’d protect me, that he wouldn’t let anything happen to me. That’s why I was hoping for something else to show me I mattered. That this wasn’t just an escape from the city to fuck the girl he was seeing on the side. Something to say that he couldn’t stop thinking about being with me, that we needed to be together forever, screw what the public or his family thought — he wanted me.

  He squeezed my ass cheeks hard under the water. “How luscious your ass looked as I fucked you from behind. In the shower. I love your ass.”

  My eyes flew open. Just sex. That’s all. I tried to keep my breathing even at the desirous look on his face, his hand on my ass. He spanked me lightly. I inhaled, and as I did, I thought of Owen and Kiera.

  “I never knew you were into asses,” I told him, trying to play along. But something in me had begun to dissolve. Was I really going to betray my best friend and her father for a few well-played orgasms?

  I tilted my head back, and he kissed me. He pulled me up until I wrapped my legs around his waist, climbing onto him so that he held me above him, bobbing on the surface of the dark water. Being this open against him, the worry started to slip away, at the thought of our naked bodies rubbing together. Cameron kept kissing me, his mouth hot and insistent, as the small waves lapped around us.

  Then he broke the kiss, drawing me back into reality. “What is it? Are you okay?” he asked me.

  “Why?”

  “You just seemed tense—”

  I stopped him with a finger to the lips. Too much thinking would ruin this moment, and even if it was just sex, it was worth it, if only for that momentary, fleeting feeling of completion. Feel first, think later.

  Concentrating on that, I gripped his shoulders, trying not to sink underneath the water, completely under his spell.

  He nodded, understanding. It seemed so crazy that he could sense so much in me, but not see what was at the core of my thoughts. Namely, that I didn’t want to let this go. From the way he gazed at me, it seemed he felt the same. He leaned down to flick his tongue over my nipples, and they puckered at once.

  “God, you’re fucking gorgeous.”

  I moaned and held tight to his shoulders as he sucked one nipple then the other, cupping my breasts gently, as if exploring them for the first time. It was like all feeling centered where he was touching me, and it was unbearable. He pinched a nipple, and I let out a soft cry, digging my nails into his shoulders.

  He swam us over to the ladder and hooked an arm through it, holding us both up so we didn’t drown. His gaze was dark. I knew what he wanted me to do.

  Shifting my core against him, I reached down, lifting his cock into position. When it was at my opening, I slid down onto it.

  He held me there as I climbed up and down on him, fucking me slowly, and every time he pushed into me, I gasped, feeling my climax getting closer. The only sound in the water was the sound of our heartbeats, and the low, faraway bleat of a boat’s horn as it headed out to sea.

  I wanted more than anything to bottle this feeling. With someone like Cameron, whose life was so different from mine in almost every way, I should have felt like I didn’t belong.

  But we fit. Somehow, we fit. Perfectly.

  Even if it was just for now.

  As I came, he buried his face in my breasts, and I tilted my head back, looking up at the stars, the moon, wondering if it was possible to feel so complete and so shattered, all at the same time.

  Afterwards, covered in sand and saltwater, we retreated to the house, shivering. He drew a hot bubble bath, and we settled into the large clawfoot tub, me between his legs, resting on his chest. It felt warm, and heavenly, and… temporary.

  “Tell me something more about your life,” I asked him as he ran a washcloth gently over my breasts.

  “More?” He laughed softly. “You know everything about me. I know nothing about you.”

  “Well, what else do you want to know about me?”

  “There are a thousand things. But I’ll start with your name, for one.”

  I shook my head. “Try again.”

  Before he could say more, Mr. Fluffers trotted into the bathroom and looked at us with mild disinterest. Then, circling, he took a space on the bathmat beneath us. “Hey, Fluffs,” Cameron said, splashing him a little. It didn’t phase the dog in the least. He yawned and closed his eyes.

  “How did Mr. Fluffers get his name?” I asked.

  He started to protest my changing the subject, but then heaved a sigh and leaned his head back against the edge of the tub. “Fine. Mr. Fluffers.” He paused as if he was about to launch into a long tale. “I’d just graduated from Harvard Law and was doing pro bono work over the summer at Boston Children’s Hospital.”

  He paused to make sure I was still listening, maybe because he didn’t think it was all that interesting a story, but of course, I was. I was rapt. I nodded.

  “Well, there was a girl there. Her name was Kelsey. She was six, and an orphan. Actually, she’d been there all her life. She’d been a failed abortion, but one of the nurses who was supposed to leave her to die simply couldn’t. The nurse brought her to the hospital, but she had a lot of problems. Both of her hips were dislocated, her kidneys weren’t functional, and she couldn’t breathe on her own. She was confined to a wheelchair, but she had a lot of spirit, you know? She was a complete firecracker. I was assigned to look after her rights, and every time I would go in there, she’d say, ‘Cammy, when are you going to break me out of this place so we can run away together?’”

  Even though tears were pricking at my eyes, I laughed.

  “Anyway, all she ever did was draw pictures of the dog she wanted. They were all over her hospital room, everywhere. It was this big, fluffy white thing. It’s like in the Velveteen Rabbit, you know? Where a child loves her stuffed animal so much, she makes it real? We thought she loved that animal in her drawings so much, she’d make it real. It kept her going. And for a while, we really did think she was going to get out. She’d gotten better. So when she turned six, the nurses and I chipped in and got her this mutt from the pound.”

  “He’s a mutt?”

  “Yeah. Komondor and... who knows what. But she named him Mr. Fluffers.” A long breath shuddered from him and he stiffened against my back. Tears burned my eyes when he sniffed, but I didn’t look at him. I stroked his arm instead. “And then three months later, she contracted an infection and died. Just like that. It was so unexpected.”

  I blinked away the tears in my eyes. “Oh, my god.”

  “Yeah,” he said somberly. “She’d left a note that she wanted me to take care of him. So I did. He’s a good dog. We get up to visit her grave every year or so, and when we do, he takes off running and lies there next to her for hours.”

  I turned around
and looked at him, then rested my cheek on his firm chest and he stroked my hair. For a conservative, with a stick-up-his-ass ego, he could be so different. So sweet. Once again, he’d surprised me, and it made me want to pour out every single detail about my life to him.

  But I couldn’t. I fucking hated that I couldn’t.

  Of course, he didn’t love me now. He didn’t even know me. My name. My hopes and dreams.

  But even though we were all wrong for each other, it was surprises like this that made me think that, one day, he’d be able to tell them all to go to hell. That one day, he could love me.

  But not like this. Not with the way things were.

  “Even if we don’t agree about everything, you’re a man of morals and convictions. You care about others, not just about yourself. That’s rare in politics,” I told him. “And it’s what sets you apart. Don’t ever change that, okay?”

  He was quiet, contemplating this.

  “And you don’t always have to act like a machine in front of people. You can show your human side.”

  He let out a laugh. “My father says showing too much of that will only convey weakness. They want someone powerful.”

  “No. Power corrupts. That’s why people think you’re a douche. If you show them a dash of humility, they’ll love you like—” I stopped before like I love you could slip out of my mouth. Even though I felt it, I knew it was too soon… too wrong… to say. After all, even though I’d been close to him every day for a month, he’d only been with me for four days. Four insignificant days, wherein I’d revealed absolutely nothing about myself. “Like you deserve to be loved. And I bet you’ll be president one day.”

  He mock shuddered. “A conservative slash leaning toward liberal president? With morals? Is there such a thing?”

  I smacked him lightly on the shoulder. “I didn’t think so, until I met you.”

  He kissed the tip of my nose. “That’s a big compliment. I’m sure as hell going to try to live up to whatever you see in me,” he said, running the washcloth over my stomach. “I know honesty is a rare quality in my line of business. But a lot of politicians think you’ve got to play a dirty game in order to win. And I don’t want to.”

  I felt tears being pulled from my eyes, and I was ashamed to think it wasn’t so much about Kelsey. It was because I’d done this to myself, pulling stories from him. Everything that I learned about him only made me care more, and yet if he knew anything about me, especially who I really was, he’d be more than disappointed. He’d be furious.

  I planted a single kiss on his chest, leaned against his strong body, and closed my eyes, trying to concentrate on the moment. On us, here, together, savoring the waning hours of what was by far the best night of my life.

  But inside, I hated myself. I hated myself for entertaining the impossibility that this could be real. I hated myself for conspiring to hurt a man who’d made me feel things I’d never felt in my entire life.

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  Cameron

  I woke the following morning to the smell of bacon and coffee.

  Looking over the fortress of rumpled sheets, I saw the indentation of her head on the pillow beside me and smiled. It was still damp from her hair, and it smelled like her, not of any perfume, but of the unique, Cassandra-like smell I’d grown to yearn.

  Getting up, I pulled on my boxer briefs and went downstairs. The Fluffmaster bounded over to me, barking, announcing my arrival. I scratched his ears and found Cassandra standing in my kitchen with oven mitts on, hair coiled in a bun, wearing my white sweater. It was huge on her, falling off her shoulder, and there were two little mountains rising where her nipples peaked. I didn’t think I’d ever seen her looking so effortlessly sexy.

  “Breakfast?” she asked, taking off the oven mitts and starting to slice oranges at the center island. Meanwhile, her eyes were focused intently on the television, which was tuned to the local Sunday morning news.

  I came up behind her and tossed my phone on the counter before lifting the sweater, happy to find she was completely bare underneath. I squeezed her ass, and my fingers found their way between her thighs. “I think my breakfast is right here.”

  She wriggled in ticklish jerks, still watching the television. I groaned as I saw what it was. A bunch of protesters that had been at the groundbreaking ceremony at the site of the Hunter’s Hill Development on Saturday.

  “Ah, the tree huggers,” I sighed, reaching over to turn it off. “You’d think they’d have something more important to do.”

  Her head swiveled slowly in my direction. “You don’t think what they’re doing is important?”

  I shrugged, not really paying attention, and tried to get in her business again. I felt her in my pores now, but I’d just come from brushing my teeth and was dying to taste her on my tongue again. Right now, that was important.

  She swatted me away. “Answer?”

  I sighed. “Having convictions is important, yes. Like you said last night. I just happen to have different ones.” Then I pretend-coughed my next words into the back of my hand. “Better ones.”

  “What did you say?” She smacked my hand as I feigned innocence and reached for her ass again.

  “All right, all right,” I said to her, sighing. I slipped my arms around her and pressed her against my growing erection. “Turns out, you win. I didn’t receive all the information about the toads from the study I’d ordered from the EPA. Anyway, I’m going to recommend to the developer to conduct additional studies and recommendations to ensure the survival of the toads.”

  Her mouth opened slightly, and she looked at me. “Really?”

  The truth was, I’d made the decision after the meeting with Larsen and presented my thoughts to the developer on Friday. “Well, since it means that much to you. But I don’t know what the developer will do. It’s out of my hands now.”

  “But that… that’s amazing!” she said, pulling me closer against her. I could feel the shiver of excitement under her skin, and it only made me want her more.

  She wriggled around, smiling at me, her blue eyes sexily bleary. I lost count of the number of times we’d come last night, but we’d definitely gotten our exercise, first on the bed, then in the lake, in the bathtub, and back on the bed again. Unbelievably, I wanted her again. My cock rose up for the challenge. I felt giddy, like a teenager. “Eat the breakfast I made you first,” she said, swatting my hand away for the umpteenth time.

  I wrapped my arms around her, not letting her go so easily. Eventually, she turned fully around and let me kiss her. The kiss deepened, and my hands roved underneath my sweater, baring those thighs. I sank down to the floor, then hoisted her onto the edge of the counter with no protest.

  She spread her legs wide as I lowered my mouth to her core. She moaned, her thighs closing on my head, her fingers sinking into my hair as I found her clit with my tongue, but then she settled into it, gasping, pressing herself into my waiting mouth. I sucked on her, flicking my tongue as she moaned. God, this woman was everything to me, simply everything, and the crazy part about it all was that after today, I’d have to give her up. Our time had run out.

  Or was there another way?

  I didn’t know. But Cassandra, or whatever the hell her name was, didn’t give me much hope that things could be different.

  Even now, it was like she was saying goodbye, because when she arched her back, tangling her hands in my hair, saying my name over and over again, it was as if this was something she didn’t want to forget. When she came, I found myself clinging to her, holding on for dear life.

  This really could be the end.

  On Thursday, I was supposed to propose to the woman who’d been matched with me, the woman who would march beside me to the White House.

  If that happened, this would be over, and this perfect woman, who made me feel, for once in my life, something… would be gone.

  If Cassandra would at least tell me her name, if she would give me some indication that she would w
ant to walk that path with me… then maybe.

  I held her, wanting to beg her, force her, shake her until she told me she’d stay.

  It wouldn’t be easy, I knew. Her life would be ripped apart by the media, every detail exposed. There would be lies told, stress beyond what this sweet, pure woman should ever have to endure.

  And that was what stopped me.

  I couldn’t put Cassandra through that.

  Bernadette, yes. She knew exactly what she was getting herself in to. She’d been polished for it her entire life. She had wealth as a shield, breeding as an anchor to hold her down against any political storm.

  But Cassandra…?

  The thought destroyed me. Bitterness overtook me, and I started to spiral down, desperate and out of control.

  “Tell me your name.” I knew I shouldn’t do it, but I whispered the four words into the skin of her neck.

  She let out a single exhalation that sounded more like a sob. “No, I—”

  “Tell me!” I growled at her, pushing aside my boxers as I held her in place. She wanted it, I could tell, from the way she wrapped her legs around me. I thrust into her, and we both let out a breath. I fucked her hard, angrily. All these other times, when it’d been sweet and gentle were a warm-up to this. I’d lost my patience. I fucked her like I should’ve fucked a stranger whose name I didn’t know.

  We stared into each other’s eyes as I moved against her, as she lifted her back off the counter, meeting my every thrust, hard. There was defiance in her eyes. She grasped my ass, pulling me harder, as if it wasn’t enough, as if she was punishing herself.

  She came for a second time that morning, breathing hard, and then whispered into my shoulder, “It doesn’t matter.”

  I grabbed her hair by the roots, yanking it enough to rip a few strands free, lifting her face to mine, fervently searching her eyes for something that could make me understand. “Don’t say that. It matters. It fucking matters.”

  I came then, unleashing my white-hot fury into her, as if I wanted to punish her too. But I didn’t. I wanted… something I couldn’t give. Something she couldn’t give me.