by Hart, Eve R.
I went to the doorway and listened for a long second. Yeah, I heard her downstairs moving around. By the sounds of it, I would have bet she was in the kitchen.
I took a shower, feeling like I needed to be fresh for some reason.
Then I went in search of her, finding her in the kitchen attempting to make some eggs.
“Morning,” I said as I went and grabbed a cup so I could get coffee into me immediately.
“Morning,” she parroted with a small smile.
I wasn’t sure why, but this felt a little bit awkward.
I stood there and debated what I should do for far too long. I was sure I looked like an idiot holding the cup in mid-air while my hand was frozen like I was reaching for the fresh pot of coffee.
Should I kiss her?
Should I act like this is any other day we’ve had together?
Should I pretend last night never happened?
What the hell?! No, I knew that last one was all wrong. Not like I could even if I tried.
So, I’d never really done that whole morning after thing. Not that I was saying this was anything close to that. But I was basically clueless when it came to the next step kind of thing.
“I want to kiss you again,” I told her without realizing that I’d actually said that out loud. Then I mentally tugged on my balls and fucking went for it with more confidence. “I’m going to kiss you again. Right now, and later too.”
“Oh my God,” she said as she turned to face me and her hand definitely came up to slap me on my good shoulder. At least she was laughing. “I can’t believe you. Have you always been this smooth or is it just me?”
“It’s all you, I can’t even lie about that.” My shoulder gave a little shrug like I wasn’t even sorry about it.
“Okay, from now on, if you want to kiss me, then just do it. Don’t tell me you’re going to. I’m telling you that it is a welcome thing. Alright?”
“Yeah?” I asked with a hint of playfulness as I snagged the bottom of her shirt and pulled her in closer. “So, I should just do it then.”
“You are so ruining this, I hope you know that.” She giggled and it was so cute. Her hands went around my neck like it was the most natural thing. “Plant one on me, baby.”
“Baby, huh?” I said as my lips drifted closer to hers. I wasn’t sure what I liked more, the playful banter that just seemed to flow between us or the kissing.
The kissing, oh, yeah. That was for sure the winner. But everything else with her was a close second.
“Shhh,” she whispered as her eyes drifted closed and her lips met mine.
And shhh I did.
Her soft lips slid against mine and it was all I could do to hold myself back. I had made a promise in my head that I was going to take this slow. One thing at a time and I was going to fucking savor and enjoy every step.
My fingers slid into her hair and I loved the feeling of us being connected. Not to sound sappy, but the world sort of fell away for a moment.
Her lips parted on a soft sigh and I went for it, you know, in the sweet, tender way, taking her bottom lip into my mouth and nibbling on it lightly.
I felt the tip of her tongue brush over my top lip and I held onto her tighter. I didn’t want to stop this but I had a feeling if I didn’t, I wouldn’t be able to take it slow.
But I needed another long minute of enjoying it first.
I let my tongue barely dance with hers. She tasted like coffee and cream and sugar, and I didn’t hate it at all.
“We should stop,” I whispered, my eyes still closed and my lips still against hers.
“We don’t have to,” she whispered back and damn, that didn’t help anything.
“I don’t want to,” I admitted, pressing my lips against hers quickly.
“I don’t either.”
“But we should,” I said as I tried to get the blood to flow back up to my brain.
“We should?” she asked and before I had a chance to answer she was pulling me back into her and there was more kissing. Which did nothing for my blood flow.
So I went with it. But I told myself it would only be for a few more minutes.
“Jessica,” I said as I pulled back enough to put some distance between our faces. “I think it’s pretty obvious that I want this. I’m guessing you do too. But I just need to… I want to do this right with you.”
“Okay,” she said and looked to the side for a moment. “Can I be honest with you?” I opened my mouth to tell her that she could but she kept talking. “I don’t really know what right is.”
“Well, I honestly don’t know either.”
She smiled at that. At least she wasn’t mad.
“I’m pretty sure you get by now that sex in my life has just been, well, sex. Most of the time it was a means to something. I know that’s not right and I’m not saying I’m proud of it, but it is what it is.”
“I hate that saying,” I muttered with a shake of my head and I was a little bit worried that I was fucking this up when she took a big step away from me. “It isn’t what it is. I’m not going to judge you or call you names. Not ever. And I don’t think you should brush off what you’ve been through with such a generic saying. I don’t think any less of you. You did what you had to do to survive. While it might not be a perfect example of how to do things, it doesn’t mean that it’s not right.”
She looked up at me, her eyes bouncing between mine like she was trying to see if I really believed what I’d said. How could I not? It wasn’t like I was a poster child for how to deal with things either. And though our paths might have taken a darker turn, the important thing was that we’d live through it. We were still standing.
She swallowed hard and I saw the tears well in her eyes.
“I don’t think I’ve ever looked at it that way. Matter fact, I try not to think of it most days,” she said and her voice cracked. It was heartbreaking and I all I wanted to do was wrap her up in my arms and tell her that I’d always be there for her, no matter what. It would have been the truth too because that was how I’d felt all of these years we’d been apart. “I think you are the best kind of man.”
Well, damn. I didn’t think so. I had trouble believing those words even though I could see the truth in her eyes.
All the reasons I wasn’t the best kind of man came to mind. And on top of that list, was a collection of all the answers followed by why I should let her go. She’d spent her life trying to get away from people like me, and yet here I was, trying to pull her back into the darkness.
“You are,” she said as her hand came to rest on my chest right over my heart. “I can see it in your eyes that you don’t believe me, but you are.”
“I’m not,” I told her in a cold tone. “I’m not what you need and I am the worst for even pursuing this.”
“Silas,” she whispered and I couldn’t deny that I loved the way my name sounded coming off of her lips. “I knew you before all of… this stuff happened. And the thing is, I can still see that boy inside of you.”
“I’m a killer, Jessica, how does that make me any different than… Ray?”
She paused. It was almost like she’d been thinking about that exact same thing. I really wished I could have been inside her head right now.
“Because Ray was in it only for himself. Yeah, he had a shit life growing up, but it was like he forgot all of that the moment he got to the top. You,” she made a point to poke my chest, “never lost your heart.”
“How can you look past what I’ve done?”
“Because, as strange as it sounds, you have morals in your darkness. I see that now. Your heart is pure even though it’s hurting.”
I got lost in her gaze, seeing myself through her eyes for a long moment.
“I…” I let the word hang there not knowing what the hell I was going to say. Or maybe I did but was afraid that it would scare her.
“You what?” she asked with a small smile.
“I don’t want to lose you,” I admitte
d softly. Maybe it wasn’t the whole truth, but it was the part that I’d figured out by now.
“I think we are well past that part by now,” she told me with a teasing smile twitching on her lips. “I think I’ve grown strong feelings for you too.”
“I don’t know what I’m doing.”
“Neither do I,” she said and there was a calmness in her tone that soothed me. “But maybe we can figure it out together.”
I didn’t know what else to say.
So I kissed her again, trying my hardest to keep it sweet.
“How about some breakfast,” she said like she just knew what I needed right now. And I wasn’t talking about food.
“Yeah. I’m excited for some eggs.” I had a feeling that though the burner was off, they were way overdone. It didn’t matter, I’d choke them down if it made her happy.
As I sat down at the table, my mom’s words replayed in my head.
Keep Jessica safe and protected.
Yeah, that was the plan.
It was the deep need that I felt growing in my soul.
But could I go on until I knew that I could do that?
I was starting to wonder if I had a choice.
-28-
Silas
My phone finally rang with the call that I had been waiting on for far too damn long.
“Hey,” I answered right away.
Thank God I was in my bedroom alone. Then again, I’d kind of planned it this way knowing he would call. Granted, it was a couple hours earlier than I had expected, but I wasn’t going to complain. It seemed like he was breaking his twenty-four hour thing and I hoped that meant he had some good news for me.
“You might not like this, but this is really the best thing I could do.”
“Just fucking tell me already,” I barked at Dalton.
“I have a friend that needs to meet with her. He’ll be at the closest FBI location to where you are tomorrow.” Yeah, I didn’t fucking like that.
“And what if I say no?”
“You want this whole thing over, then you’ve got to trust me.”
“I need to know how this is all going to work out,” I told him. “I’m not sending her in there if there is even a chance that I’ll lose her.”
“Yeah, I figured that much out already,” he said. If he were an eye-rolling kind of man, I imagined he’d be doing it now. “Just show up. Don’t make me regret doing this, I burned a lot of bridges for you today.”
I had no clue what he was talking about and I probably didn’t want to know. As long as I wasn’t one of those bridges then it didn’t matter. I could only imagine the kind of information he had to offer up to get the type of strings pulled that we needed.
The more I thought about it, the more worried for him that I became. Giving up the kind of information that he had was bound to put a target on his back.
Which led me to wonder yet again why and how the fuck he had contacts in the FBI.
To try and figure out a man like Dalton was nothing but asking for a headache.
And I didn’t have time for that shit.
“I owe you one,” I told him in an attempt to lighten the mood.
“I have a feeling you’ll be paying up soon,” he said and there wasn’t even a hint of playfulness in his tone. “I’ll send you the time and the address. You better have her there or I’m coming for your ass. You asked me to fix this and I am, don’t make me look like a damn fool.”
Then he hung up, not too nicely either.
I didn’t have a feeling in my gut about this whole thing. Nothing good. Nothing bad. I wasn’t sure what that meant but at this point, all I could do was keep my fingers crossed and hoped it all worked out. Dalton hadn’t ever let me down but then again, this was a whole different ballgame.
“Everything okay?” she asked with pinched brows as I came back into the living room.
“Yeah,” I told her with a smile that was hopefully covering up how unsure I was. “Want to join me out on the porch for a beer?”
“Sure,” she said cheerfully as she jumped to her feet.
I grabbed a couple beers from out of the fridge, thankful that Dalton had left a few behind.
We sat on the front steps since that was really the only place to sit. I hadn’t ever gotten around to getting some chairs out here or even one of those porch swings. I didn’t really ever have a need for any of those things. Though I couldn’t deny that I had thoughts of the two of us sitting out here watching the sunset together every night.
“So why did you buy this place?” she asked, both of us staring out into the surrounding forest.
“Not sure,” I told her. “It was actually the first place I bought for myself. I think at the time, I was just looking for a place I could go to quiet all the noise. The city was loud, my head was loud. I was still dealing with things and trying to figure out a way to live with the fact that I might not ever find you. It wasn’t something I ever wanted to accept but holding on to the hope was really starting to get to me. Especially when there was nothing.”
I let out a small sigh.
“Do you come out here a lot?”
I nodded slowly.
“I say that I love the city life but I don’t usually last two weeks before I find myself back here. I bounce around a lot, I guess. Never really feel happy and settled any place.”
“Oh,” she said and then took a sip of her beer. “Do you think that will ever change?”
My head turned and I studied her for a long moment.
God, she was really beautiful. And I wasn’t simply talking about her looks. There was something I couldn’t explain as I sat there taking her profile in. Despite the hard life she’d had there was something warm that radiated from her. And happy. It was like I couldn’t stop myself from smiling when I looked at her.
“Are you going to stare at me all night or answer the question?” she asked as her eyes slid to the side to look at me. Her brow raised in a way of letting me know she was waiting.
“Will I ever get to a point where I feel settled?” I asked and she nodded. “I don’t know. Maybe. Hopefully.”
“When are you going to take your life and make it yours?”
“What do you mean?” I asked as she turned her head and looked into my eyes.
“I mean you’ve been searching for me all this time. That became your life. And it’s pretty obvious what it’s done to you.” She sighed and I lost her eyes as she looked down. “I didn’t want that for you. I left to protect you guys. So that you would have a future.”
“Shhh. Don’t feel bad for the choices I’ve made. It was all on me. I just… I couldn’t seem to let it go.”
“But now you can,” she said and I let that reality sink in for a good long moment. “You saved me, mission accomplished.”
She smiled over at me teasingly.
“I didn’t really save you. It’s more like I got you into deeper shit.”
“Oh, but you did, Silas.” She brought her hand up and threaded her fingers through mine. “I thought I was going to die that night. I knew… I knew Ray was going to kill me and if you hadn’t been there, he would have. There was no way out for me.”
“What about you? What’s your plan now?”
“Get out of this deep shit first,” she said with a small chuckle.
I took in a deep breath.
Now was the time. Clearly, it was. As much as I didn’t want to ruin this moment, I had to tell her what was going on.
“About that,” I said and my eyes went to my lap. “Tomorrow morning you have to meet with a man from the FBI.”
She gasped and her body went rigid.
“Dalton worked whatever magic he has and this guy should be able to help fix this whole mess.” I tried to get the words out quickly so she’d understand.
This wasn’t betrayal.
This was me trying to give her freedom again.
Only a part of me didn’t want to.
I wanted to keep her here with me.
“What am I supposed to say to him?” she asked sounding shaky.
“I don’t know. I never did ask you what happened before, when the cops took you in.” There was a huge hint in my tone letting her know that I was curious if she said anything about me.
“Mostly the truth, you know if you bent it a lot and left a bunch of things out.” She shrugged. “I never mentioned you. I told them I passed out when Ray hit me and I didn’t see anything. When I came to, you were gone, there were dead bodies everywhere, and a gun beside me. I wasn’t sure what was going on, so I grabbed the gun. That’s when the cops stepped off the elevator. They thought I shot him because I had a gun in my hand. Well, at first they did.”
“But they suspect someone else?”
“Yeah. The annoying fucking detective told me that he believed there was someone else in that room. But I just kept telling him that I didn’t see anyone.”
I breathed out a sigh of relief. I knew in my heart that she hadn’t said anything but the words helped set me at ease.
“I’m scared,” she whispered as her eyes shifted to look into mine.
I was too but I couldn’t tell her that. She needed me to be strong right now.
I tucked her hair behind her ear then brought my lips to hers. I kissed her sweetly, trying my hardest to burn this moment into my memory.
“Silas,” she whispered against my lips as she moved to straddle my lap.
I knew what she was saying. What she needed. And I needed it too.
As much as I hoped this wouldn’t be my last moment with her, I wasn’t sure how tomorrow would turn out. So I was going to take all that she wanted to give.
Her hands went to my shirt and a second later it was free, fluttering to the ground behind her. I kissed along her jaw as I slid my hands up her body.
Nothing could ever compare to how it felt having her in my arms. It was like nothing before now mattered. As if my entire life was leading up to this moment. To her.
