Only Love (The Atonement Duet Book 2)

by Selene Chardou

  “No, nothing like that. Just a favor I have to ask and I am hoping to God you say yes.”

  “All right. I will see you tonight. Until then, take care of yourself and love you.”

  “I love you too,” I responded, and ended the call.

  “How sweet. It’s so nice to know young love still exists. I remember when those words flowed so easily out of your mouth to me.”

  I looked up, startled by a crimson-faced Colin. He didn’t look well. In fact, he looked exhausted, as if he hadn’t had a decent night’s sleep in weeks. There were dark circles under his brilliant blue eyes and his blond hair was mussed. Although he certainly didn’t seem to be in tip top shape, his black stovepipe jeans fit him perfectly and he wore a Thirty Seconds to Mars t-shirt and a pair of pristine white Converse tennis shoes.

  “I didn’t know you would be here. I checked the schedule and I’m supposed to be closing tonight,” I replied cordially.

  “You were looking at Thursday’s schedule. Today’s Wednesday. I close this evening so you are free to leave and go be lap dog to your new significant other at Rouge.” This made me look up from my personal Facebook feed. “I assume there is a reason why you feel you can talk to me any way you want now that we are no longer together, but we’re both adults here. When do you plan to grow up? We’re no longer in college and the insults seem a bit childish. I never once disrespected your skank and we both knew Cassie wasn’t going to last. She’s a college student, for God’s sake. I doubt the poor woman even knows where her clitoris is, or did you help her find it?”

  He shrugged, the look in his eyes icy. “You’re right of course. She was an awful screw. I had to think about you just to get off every time we had sex. Sad, isn’t it?”

  “Not really. She’s young and inexperienced. Drake, on the other hand, is a man, and I can assure you I never had to think about you to get off with him.”

  It was a low blow, but he’d hurt me worse than he could ever know and it was the only way I knew to make him feel just a semblance of the pain he’d caused me.

  “Well, I have decided to move on to bigger and better things. This young woman in question is exquisite and she knows herself and her body. I don’t think I will have any issues picturing her in the throes of lust to come. And I sure as hell won’t be thinking about you,” he said angrily.

  I smiled. “That’s good. Nice to know you found someone who could put the wind back into those sagging sails of yours. I am genuinely happy for you and it makes all of this much less adversarial.” I placed my hands in my lap and stared at him with a sincere look on my face. “I don’t want to fight with you, Colin. I still love you, but I can’t be with you knowing what you and Liam did.”

  He opened his mouth to speak but I held up my hand. “Wait, let me get this out first. It’s not you—it was never you—it was me. I shouldn’t have forgiven you in the first place. I was in shock, and the implications of what you and Liam had done hadn’t set in yet. All this is my fault.”

  I breathed deeply. “When the doctor told me the baby was Liam’s in so many words, I knew you, Colin. You didn’t want another man’s kid, even if it was your brother’s. If I am being honest with myself, I didn’t want the baby either when I found out it belonged to him but I couldn’t dare have an abortion and I knew if I just left, with the baby and I on our own, I would learn to love him or her. It would be inevitable.

  “I didn’t come here thinking I was going to meet some guy who would take me and my child in. I came here to escape and to bury myself in work, and anything that would make me stop thinking about what I put you through. I couldn’t marry you and not tell you the truth, but at the same time, I didn’t want you to think I was running away from you. I was running from the situation.”

  Colin took my hands under the table and held them in his. His palms were soft and warm against my skin. “Why couldn’t you just tell me that, Deirdre? We would have dealt with it. I admit raising my brother’s kid wouldn’t have been a walk in the park but I would have done anything just to have you by my side.”

  The tears fell from his eyes and he didn’t bother to wipe them away. “You broke my heart when you left the way you did. I have never loved anyone as much as I love you, and I never will. Every time I think about you in an intimate way with that prick, I have a panic attack so severe I can barely breathe. This can’t be the end for us and you know it. You can’t do this to us, baby.”

  He had me in tears now and I sobbed quietly. “That is the point, Colin. Maybe if all of this hadn’t happened. If you and Liam hadn’t done what you did…if I hadn’t done what I did…it would have been so different. Unfortunately, it did happen and we can’t just pretend it didn’t because we both crave a happy ever after. I can’t live a lie, and as much as I love you, I can’t be with you. I’m sorry.”

  I snatched my hands from his, slammed my laptop closed, threw my iPhone in my handbag, and walked out. I thought I heard him call after me but I couldn’t be sure. I just needed to be somewhere else. More than anything, I needed to breathe, and around him, I couldn’t.

  I cried all the way to the restaurant. All he did was remind me I hadn’t gotten over a damn thing. All I had done was bury my emotions and that made me feel like shit. Drake deserved someone so much better than the broken and walking disaster that was my psyche and my tortured soul.

  Chapter Seventeen

  Somehow, I made it to Rouge in one piece and had my car valet parked.

  I walked to the bar and ordered a Dirty Martini with an extra olive. I downed it as soon as it was set in front of me and ordered another.

  Drake walked out of the kitchen and kissed my cheek. “What’s the matter? Your eyes are red and you look like hell. Let me guess, you ran into Colin and he made you feel a bunch of shit you thought was dead and buried?”

  I laughed out loud. “Is it that obvious I’m all fucked up?”

  He tipped my chin upwards so I would look at him. “It’s not like I’ve never been there before, Deirdre. It’s happened a time or two to me. Always with the same woman. Gisele. She was the love of my life and I didn’t think I would ever love anyone as much as I loved her. You have proven me wrong because I know it here,” he said, pointing toward his heart. “I am feeling it again for the very first time in what seems like decades. I don’t expect you to forget about Colin or banish the thoughts of him from your memory. What you two had was special. You had something so rare, and yet it still didn’t work out. No one ever said we end up with the people we are in love with, and…I can learn to live with you loving me even if you are in love with someone else.”

  The tears came again. I was happy only a few patrons were at the bar and they were seated too far down to see my hysterics.

  “That isn’t fair, Drake. I can’t ask you to accept being second best to Colin. The fact is I can’t be with him. Even if I am in love with him, I can’t live with what he did to me and my family. I can’t stand to look at him thinking how he and his brother ran over my father and then walked away like it meant nothing. Their crime wasn’t victimless. He was my only surviving biological parent. Caitlyn’s mother adopted me, but my real mother died when I was a baby. It isn’t simply about burying what happened. It’s not as simple as just ‘getting over it’ for me. He shattered my heart into a million pieces.”

  Drake embraced me as I continued to sob on his shoulder.

  “I wasn’t suggesting you go back to him, sweetie. I want you for myself. What I am saying is we can work through all of this. I am willing to do whatever it takes for us to be together. I know you might not have the kind of feelings for me as you had for him, and that’s okay. We will do what we need to do and we’ll take it one day at a time.”

  My tears finally dried up after what seemed like a lifetime of an emotional rollercoaster. “I’m sorry. I do want to do whatever it takes for us to be together. You are too good of a man for me to pass up, so I am going to hold on tight and I don’t plan to let go.”

&nbs
p; He ran his fingers through my hair, then kissed my lips softly. “Didn’t you say something about a favor? And what are you doing here so early?”

  “I misread the schedule. It’s Colin’s day to close, which means I was supposed to be there this morning when we were making love,” I whispered conspiratorially. “Anyway, my sister’s engagement party is this weekend and I wanted you to come with me for moral support. I will show you around Seattle and we can see Drew and spend some time with him and Aubrey. Please say yes. I am begging you, and I’m not afraid to tempt you with unlimited blow jobs if necessary.”

  Drake laughed then leaned over and murmured, “I would rather eat you out for hours at a time than have you giving me unlimited blow jobs. The answer is yes. The food might suffer a bit but that’s not my worry. I want to be there for you in your time of need.”

  I wrapped my arms around his waist and kissed his left cheek. “You are an absolute prince. Thank you for doing this for me.”

  He stared deeply into my eyes and the look of love they held for me was more apparent than ever. “What are boyfriends for?”

  I kissed him again and moments later he joined me.

  ***

  Drake and I arrived in Seattle on a rainy Friday afternoon.

  Although we had been given an open invitation to stay at my old place with Drew and Aubrey, we opted for a hotel and decided W Seattle would be perfect. Drake had reserved the Extreme Wow Suite, which was over one thousand square feet.

  After spending three hours on the plane and renting a comfortable and gas guzzling Cadillac Escalade at the airport, we drove to our hotel and settled in for the night.

  We took a shower together, and Drake ordered room service while I blow dried my hair and tried to work some of curls through to make it wavier as opposed to just a mop on top of my head. I knew I would end up putting it up for my sister’s engagement party. The pretty scarlet dress I had chosen for the occasion wouldn’t look as stunning otherwise.

  I joined Drake in the sitting room as he opened up a bottle of vintage Dom Perignon and we enjoyed it while wrapped in one another’s arms. Wearing our plush hotel robes, we enjoyed the comfortable silence between us.

  “Are you nervous about tomorrow?” he inquired in deep-throated sexy voice that drove me wild with desire.

  “I’ll tell you all about how I am feeling when you tell me what you ordered from room service,” I answered seductively, positioning myself on his lap.

  He studied me intently. “I don’t think I like the sound of blackmail, especially coming from you, Ms. Bardot.”

  “It’s not blackmail if I am willing to do whatever you desire.” I ground my groin against his growing hard-on and he tried not to moan.

  Our lips found each other’s with a natural intensity and we kissed, gently at first, then his lips parted and his tongue sought mine. His fingers slipped the clip that held the fragile bun from my hair and his hands massaged my scalp as he brought me closer to him.

  I surrendered to the pleasure of our caresses and began to move my hips in a highly sexual manner against his erect member though layers of cloth separated us.

  Drake pulled away and sighed. “We have room service coming soon. I just ordered from Trace, a restaurant located in the bar. I got a variety of the sushi they offer. I also ordered us some sake. I hope the Ichishima Junmai Silk Deluxe is a brand you will appreciate.”

  “Why shouldn’t I when it is the most expensive brand of sake on the menu?” I said. “How long did room service say they were going to take?”

  “Forty-five minutes to an hour…that was a half hour ago,” he replied.

  “That’s plenty of time for a quickie, you know.”

  Drake moved me from his lap and sat me next to him. He turned toward me and stared deeply into my eyes. “I know you are worried about tomorrow and I won’t let you fill our conversation with diversions of sex. I want to know what has you so spooked and anxious about what’s going to happen tomorrow. If you say it is Colin I will choke you myself.”

  I dropped my plastic smile. “No, it isn’t Colin. I am genuinely concerned about my mother. Although tomorrow is my sister’s day, I worry about her well-being. She is slow to -communicate and I’m not stupid. I have heard the stories about some spouses not being able to go on when they lose their life mate or soul mate or whatever you want to call it. I sometimes worry she might commit suicide. The thought is always on my mind.”

  Drake caressed my neck. “That’s not all. Spill the rest.”

  “I worry about…us. I love you and you love me, but is love ever enough? I don’t want to make the same mistake I did with Colin, and for God’s sake if you have some kind of colossal secret then just tell me already.”

  Drake’s lips set into a firm line. “I don’t understand what you mean.”

  I glared at him with a less than pleased look. “Why did your parents disown you? I know your family. I dated Drew for a very long time and his parents always thought we would get married. When I visited his aunt’s place, there is not one picture of you to be found. What happened?”

  At a knock on the door, Drake hopped up. “Saved by the bell.”

  I laughed, though there was little mirth in it, and he fetched our order, handing the waiter a fifty dollar tip.

  He set the food in front of us and instead of attacking the sushi, both of us went for the sake. He poured us each a shot and we downed it quickly after a toast.

  Drake breathed deeply and slipped his arms around my waist. I settled into his warm embrace as we lay on the sofa with the sushi in front of us on an art-deco glass table.

  “My parents disowned me because when my sister and I were at college, there was an accident. We were the younger two. We have a sister and brother who are several years older than we are. My sister Lauren is married to a senator from Massachusetts and considered quite the progressive. Her husband is half-black and half-white. He was adopted by a very wealthy Anglo-American family and he is going to go very far. Some people say he might be the second coming of Obama, minus the Kenyan lineage.

  “My brother Carlton is also married, and he’s in the House of Representatives for Massachusetts in Washington. His wife is the perfect WASP heiress and they have two perfect children. It was always Katherine and I who were the most rebellious. We were close in age and we both decided to attend different universities than what were acceptable to the family.

  “Anyway, we were driving home for Christmas break and she was at the wheel. It was snowing and I told her to slow down. She didn’t and we were in a horrific accident. She died, I survived, and my parents blamed me because they said I should have been driving. I suppose in a way they have a point. I should have been behind the wheel.” I stared at him intently. “Your parents blamed you because your sister didn’t make it?”

  “Well, that wasn’t all. They found drugs—cocaine and Xanax—in her system, and I was the reason they were there. We’d both sniffed a few lines and popped a Xanax before we set off for our trip. It was my fault and I accepted full responsibility. I can live with them hating me but I would give anything for Kathy to be alive, just like they would.” He breathed deeply again. “No one ever said life was fair, and perhaps that’s why I can empathize with Colin and Liam, if only a little. Accidents aren’t planned…they just happen. We make them possible due to the lousy fucking choices we make in life.”

  “True but you didn’t run over a pedestrian and try to get away with it.” “I still feel just as guilty. I should have been driving that vehicle. I allowed Katherine to drive and I will never be able to see my sister again except in photographs, home movies, and at the cemetery. The ironic part is my parents didn’t have to disown me—I hate myself enough knowing I let it happen.”

  I kissed his lips and squeezed my arms around him tighter. “It wasn’t your fault. You have to stop blaming yourself for something that could have happened to anyone, Drake.”

  We sat there for a while as I held him, and he sobbed on my
shoulders. His eyes eventually ran dry and he looked deep into my eyes. “I suppose this is just about as bad as what Liam and Colin did. No, I didn’t cause the death of a member of your family, but one of my own, and I guess that might make it infinitely worse.”

  “How can you say that? What happened to your sister was an accident. You could have easily died as well, and I’m sorry your parents won’t forgive you, because the punishment doesn’t fit the crime.”

  Drake lifted me up as if I weighed nothing and he walked us into the bedroom. “You truly believe that? You don’t think they are punishing me for something that was truly my fault? I was the one who had the drugs. I should have never offered her any, and if I had been wiser with my decisions, she would still be here.”

  He laid me on the bed and I looked up at him. “You can continue to blame yourself or accept that it wasn’t meant to be. Your sister lived as long as she was supposed to and she’s gone now. You still have a wonderful family. Of course you miss Katherine and wish she was around, but my father died over bullshit and my family is not intact any longer. My mother is a depressed mess and I keep waiting for her to snap out of it. I don’t think she ever will. She loved my father very much. It would be the same as if I lost you…I’m not exactly sure yours is a death I could easily get over.”

  “You’re not just saying that because we are together now? Your feelings might change and perhaps Colin is the one for you and the love of your li—”

  I silenced any further talk by kissing him long and hard. I wrapped my arms around his neck and he collapsed on the bed beside me. His tongue entered my mouth and mine swirled with his in a delicious ecstasy that could not be explained. I simply wanted him to make love to me and I threw back my head with abandon as his lips traveled over my chin and down my neck, leaving a trail of unfulfilled passion in its wake.

  Drake straddled my body and undid the tie around the hotel robe, exposing my naked flesh. My sex was on fire and in need of his touch while my breasts ached with desire and couldn’t wait to feel his hands and mouth on them.