Redemption

by Rebecca Sharp

  “There’s still chocolate.” His gruffness only softened slightly when he looked at her.

  I tried to look for a change in him. He’d been more absent from Roasters since the confrontation with Blackman, and I worried he’d taken matters into his own hands… taking out the garbage, or so to speak.

  The atmosphere at the coffee shop had suffered for it. I would swear half the people came in there just to see him and check in, tell him about what’s new in their life, or ask advice. Taylor said a few people had wondered where he was, almost demanding to know if he was okay. Even Eli, who normally held his cool composure like fucking Atlas held the world, who was still calm after meeting with Dex, had finally begun to crack.

  Eli stopped by the restaurant yesterday and his eyes held the bleakness of burned wood—an ashen frustration rolling around in them that didn’t bode well. But he didn’t say anything, even when I asked what was going on. I wasn’t going to be the one to point out that though he and Larry weren’t related, they both sure-as-shit had the same gene that didn’t know how to reach out for help when they needed it—or even when they didn’t.

  That was the thing about people who spend their lives looking out for others, they don’t know how to let the rest of us return the favor.

  Meanwhile, we still knew no more about Blackman Brews or its connection to the Rock Beach Resort and Larry’s estranged family. I had a feeling that Eli probably asked Larry about it and Larry pushed him away. And if he wouldn’t tell Eli, he definitely wouldn’t say anything to me.

  Of course.” She grinned.

  My girl loved chocolate. I think even more now that she was pregnant than before. Everyone always thought the dark chocolate bars requested backstage at every show were for Blake; I was one of the handful that knew they were Taylor’s secret stress indulgence.

  “You sure it’s good for you to have a whole bar of chocolate every night after dinner, Larry?”

  It was no secret that four donuts in the morning and chocolate at night were Larry’s secret to a long life. As I asked, I gave him an eye, not that it mattered.

  Larry harrumphed and replied, “My doctor said it’s good for you. Something about antioxidants or some mumbo-jumbo. More importantly, he hasn’t told me to stop yet.”

  “Larry,” I said incredulously. “Of course, he didn’t tell you to stop; Eli told me your doc died more than ten years ago.”

  In my defense, I tried to say it with a serious face, but it was impossible. A smile broke out on my face as he waved me off like that was only a minor detail. Meanwhile, Taylor burst out laughing.

  “How’s the restaurant?” The gravelly voice of the King of Stubbornness broke through my thoughts. Perceptive eyes locked on mine, like he knew I was thinking about his stubborn ass. “You pick a name for it yet?”

  I wore a guilty face as I shook my head.

  We were getting close now. All the furniture was set to arrive next week, along with the inspections. And then it was only another one or two tops after that point assuming everything passed final inspections before my dream would be living and breathing. And even with that deadline looming, I still couldn’t settle on a name.

  “Taylor, please tell this young man he can’t open a restaurant with no name.”

  “Larry, it’s going to have a name,” I assured him. “I’ll come up with one eventually. It’s not that important. Trust me—having walls and a roof and a kitchen… slightly more important than the name right now.”

  “Ashton Tyler.” Both our eyes widened at his hard tone. “A name is everything. A name is what turns a dream into a goal. A name defines. It gives meaning. A name means you take possession of it—whatever the hell it is. A restaurant. An addiction…”

  My muscles tensed at the reminder.

  And just like that, the harshness disappeared. “A name means you’ve made it a part of you—whether it’s a part that you need to grow out of or grow into.”

  Christ.

  It felt like the man had just reached out and grabbed me by the throat with those words.

  “Larry, I’ll pick a name,” I said with a choked voice, leaning forward to grip his shoulder reassuringly. “I’ll pick a name.”

  He seemed to visibly relax with that.

  “Here, why don’t I clean these plates off for you and you boys can move into the living room?” Taylor murmured, reaching across the table to collect our dishes before anyone could stop her.

  As soon as she disappeared into the kitchen, Larry pushed back his chair with a grunt and stood, walking over to the windows that faced out the back.

  His house had even better views of the ocean than my restaurant. Rumors from Eli were that he’d been offered at least twenty million to sell the house, always refusing because it had been built by his great-grandfather. Honestly, parts of it still looked like it might not have been updated since then even though when Eli lived with him, he’d made some improvements.

  “Larry, what’s going on?” I asked, standing next to him, unable to see much of anything except the way the moon reflected off the ocean.

  “She needs a name.”

  Christ. “I just told you, I’ll name the damn—”

  “Not that.” I just caught his eyes as they looked to me from underneath his heavy eyelids. There was a tiredness. Maybe even pain, hidden in them.

  “Taylor has a name,” I said with a low voice. “You know that. Seems to be the only name you can remember when it comes to any girl I’ve ever been with.”

  “Because it’s the only one worth remembering to me for you.” I couldn’t disagree. “But I want to know who she is to you.”

  “Larry, it’s not that simple.”

  “Yes, it goddamn is, son. It is that simple,” he accused. “Just like when I took you to that first meeting. All your anger… all your mistakes… all your mess that you trailed here with… You stood up and said, ‘Hi, my name is Ash and I’m an alcoholic,’ and all of it became simple. It had a name and that name let you face it. That name gave you something to conquer.”

  I didn’t know what the hell to say, mostly because I had no idea where this was coming from. It was all true though.

  It was all so fucking true.

  “There may be a million things between you and her, but they only need one damn name. One. To tell you if you’re fighting for more or fighting to let go.”

  My mouth thinned as I stared him down.

  I didn’t want to admit it because it was the same thought I struggled with earlier—that I wasn’t enough for Tay. That she deserved better and until I was better, I couldn’t have her. Even though I could acknowledge my shortcomings, I couldn’t stop punishing myself for them. But it was no longer my place to judge or to punish.

  “I can’t stop feeling guilty,” I admitted quietly, for a second needing him not as a mentor or as my sponsor but as my friend. “I can’t stop feeling guilty that who I am still isn’t enough.”

  It was that kind of thinking that pushed my drinking over the edge in the first place. It was that kind of thinking I’d tried to drown out. Now, I admitted it. Step Ten. Continuing to take inventory of my shortcomings and admit to them.

  “I know,” he said with a haggard voice, reaching into his pocket. “Dan told me about what you said the other week.” He held out his hand and I jerked back, realizing he held the six-month blue sobriety chip between his fingers for me to take. “We all fall short, boy. Mistakes don’t mean we aren’t enough; mistakes just mean there’s an opportunity for us to be more. You either take that opportunity or you don’t.”

  I hadn’t for a long time but now I did. I took every opportunity to be so much more than the self-loathing asshole that I was.

  Swallowing over the boulder in my throat, I took the warm metal from his fingers and stared at it.

  I knew it was time.

  I’d confessed to Taylor. It was finally time to confess to my sister and the rest of my family the mistakes I’d made, and the opportunity I’d taken to
become more.

  “Now. Who. Is. She?” he demanded.

  He could wait for the name of my restaurant; he couldn’t wait for this.

  With a harsh exhale, I turned toward the window. Just like the ocean reflected the moon’s light, there was no hiding the truth. There was no more running from it.

  “She is mine.” But it was more than that. “She is my redemption.”

  Taylor

  I chewed on my lower lip. Ash had been basically silent since we left. Even after I rejoined him and Larry for that promised chocolate, he didn’t say much. Although, I caught him staring at me with a new kind of intensity that drove straight through my heart before traveling further south.

  “Is everything okay?” I couldn’t stop myself. “Is Larry okay?

  He just nodded, making my anxiety worse.

  What if Larry had chastised him for getting involved with me? Because of the baby? What if he was upset for Danny?

  My mind rattled through all of the possible options while my heart shrunk farther back into its cell.

  “How’s baby Ragnar?”

  I blinked twice before I had the wherewithal to frown.

  “That is not her name.” My arms crossed over my stomach, as though I could save him or her from hearing what their father insisted on calling them.

  Even his smile didn’t reach too far as we pulled into the drive. There was a heaviness between us. I could say it was a lot of things, but I knew it was mostly desire—the kind so intense that it was like trying to use a pail of water to put out a forest fire. No matter what we did to put out the edges, at the core, everything inside us was consumed by it.

  Ash shut the front door behind us. There was the sound of the ocean surrounding us as it broke over the shore and echoed up the side of the cliff. A cool dampness in the air lingered from the rain earlier, and the pale blue moonlight streamed so brightly into the cabin, bathing it in an ethereal glow, that I could see every shadow and hard plane of his face, the rise and fall of his sculpted lips, without any trouble even though there were no lights on.

  The silence between us was the noiseless moment before a sonic boom—and we were about to go from frozen still to faster than the speed of sound in barely a second.

  “Ash…” I turned and whispered his name, sighing as his warm hands cupped my face. His thumb brushed over my lower lip like it was knocking, begging for confirmation from them.

  “Taylor” –my eyes fluttered open—“I want you. I want you so damn bad sometimes I think my body might give out if I don’t have you. I want to mark every inch of your body, watch it go from pale to red from my teeth. I want to feel your tight little pussy around me… strangling me as you come.”

  I gasped and his eyes pinned mine.

  “But I need to know it’s what you want. Because, fuck, Tay, I know things are complicated for you. Being here. Your family. The baby. I know it can’t be easy for the girl who always has a plan to not have one right now. But I don’t want this to turn into a regret. I won’t let that happen. You’re too important.” His voice broke on those words and set off fireworks in my chest. “I’ll be here, sweetheart. I’ll be here for you no matter what happens or what you decide.”

  Licking my lips, I leaned in closer to him, needing to feel his warmth and protection. Tears pricked in the corners of my eyes—again. Every time he swore to take care of me, to not let anything stop him from doing that… I couldn’t even describe how it made me feel. More than just safe and secure. More than cared for.

  He made me feel cherished.

  No one ever made me feel like this before. And especially not since I became pregnant. I’d been treading murky waters filled with guilt and shame, trying to keep my head above water before I came to find him. In his presence, I couldn’t remember how I’d ever let myself feel like that about something so beautiful.

  “I just want you, Ash,” I whispered, trailing my eyes up the pulse in his neck until they finally dropped off into his blues. “I’ve always wanted you.”

  Demanding lips captured mine as I felt his groan against my chest. He tasted like red wine and chocolate. Dark and decadent and everything that had invaded my dreams long before he’d ever kissed me.

  His mouth always took my breath away. Every single time. At least now I was prepared for the theft.

  Strong fingers threaded through my hair, pulling it back and cupping my face at the same time. Tilting my head, his tongue dove deeper inside my mouth, marking every inch with a new possessiveness.

  The room spun, twisting me away from reality into a world built solely around him. The ground made of his body. The air made from his breath. The sun made from his mouth—bright and burning, warming my body from the inside out.

  Just one time, I promised myself. Just one night.

  And then tomorrow, I would tell him. Even if it only changed the world and not how he felt, I wanted one night under the sun before I weathered the storm.

  Taylor

  I shivered as he pulled my light sweater up over my head, the soft fabrics leaving a trail of embarrassment over my skin.

  There was no reason for it.

  We’d been naked and fooling around every day and sleeping in the same bed every night since that first time, but tonight was going to be more and for some reason, that made me feel like less.

  My bump had popped out further in the past week and a half, making me feel well on my way to a beach ball with legs. My mind knew he’d seen this. My mind knew he’d seen all of me—if not when his mouth was on me, then when he was rubbing my back or my feet because they ached. Still, knowing did nothing to calm my nerves.

  I shivered as he unbuttoned each ivory attachment down the center of my shirt, his touch whispering over my body until the whole thing was undone and he gently pushed it off my shoulders, leaving me in nothing but my bra.

  He pulled back, desire flaring in his eyes as they drank in the way my breasts spilled just a little higher out of my bra that stretched to its limit over them.

  My knees went weak when he felt down my back for the clasp. The tension released with a soft pop and I whimpered as the support fell away.

  It was shameful and sacred how my body responded to his gaze. My breasts tingled, my nipples hardening into eager peaks, reaching toward his touch. Heat pooled between my legs, preparing—knowing—what was finally happening. My body ached to be filled by him once more.

  “Ash…” I moaned his name as his lips trailed along my jaw to my ear. Goosebumps laid heavy tracks all over my skin, easy trails to follow to the very source of my desire.

  His strong hands pushed down the elastic waist of my jeans.

  “Off,” he growled at me, moving back only enough so I could comply and peel the jeggings down off my legs.

  I shuddered. Not that there were people around to see but standing in the middle of the living room in nothing but my white lace-edged panties with all the windows open was probably something I shouldn’t feel comfortable with—but I did.

  I waited for the embarrassment. I waited for the guilt of less than to remind me I was bigger and bloated, to remind me my boobs were too big for my small frame, to whisper how I was a million shades of not-sexy… until I caught his gaze.

  I waited for the guilt to remind me how bare my left hand was.

  But it only lingered in the distance. Like water behind a dam—one that Ash had built and continued to reinforce every single day.

  In his eyes, any lingering embarrassment disappeared. Melted. Evaporated under the heat of his feral desire, his lip twitching as though he were about to devour me on the spot, unable to wait to even get me in the bedroom.

  “So fucking beautiful, Pixie,” he rasped.

  He didn’t know it, but he’d looked at me like this the first time, too. Afterward, I told myself it was because he was so drunk he was probably seeing whatever he wanted. Now, my heart squeezed to know that he’d always seen me. That he’d always wanted me this way.

  “Feels lik
e I’ve dreamt about this moment for too damn long… for my whole damn life.” His unsteady breaths tightened his shirt against his chest.

  My heart wanted to tear in half.

  Instead, I settled for stripping him down as bare as me

  Curling my fingers into the edge of his shirt, I peeled it up over the hot ridges of his torso. And, as though they were slathered in paint and I could mark him, I splayed my hands on the muscles of his chest, feeling them vibrate underneath me with the beating of his heart.

  Dragging my fingers on a greedy path lower, I reached the waistband of his jeans. I brushed against the head of his erection in my attempt to undo them and moisture rushed in a hot wave between my thighs. I looked at the long, thick outline of his arousal embedded against the front of his pants.

  For me.

  Because of me.

  A second later, I found my wrists imprisoned and held to my sides.

  “Shit, Tay,” he whispered, and I gaped at the effect I had on him.

  The tensing and tremors of his torso as he fought for restraint in even breaths.

  His eyes snapped open and drowned me in a desperate blue sea.

  I didn’t know why I doubted myself. Every time he saw me, he was like this—on the brink of losing his sanity if he didn’t touch me, if he didn’t claim me in some way.

  He stepped toward me like a predator, ignoring my small yelp as he gripped the fleshy curves of my butt and hoisted me up against him. My cry was swallowed by his mouth as he kissed me hard, my legs clamping around his waist for security as he carried me back to the bedroom.

  It was only a few steps, but in temptation-tainted-time, it felt like eons. And when I sensed him stop in front of the bed, I was moaning against him, frustrated beyond all measure that the swell of my stomach prevented me from grinding my hips harder against him.

  “Patience, Tay,” he rasped softly against my mouth as he laid me down on the bed, making no move to leave the space between my thighs. “Just let me love you.”