Ready For You

by J. L. Berg

  I glanced over at Mia, and her eyes grew a bit wider at my mention of her.

  “I usually shied away from any girlfriend talk. I thought my dad was cool, but there were limits.”

  That earned me a laugh from the crowd, but I didn’t join in. I wasn’t doing stand-up. I was just trying to explain.

  “As my sixteenth birthday grew closer, we were nearing the end of the car rebuild. One day, I found myself asking my dad a question. I said, ‘Dad, how do you know if you’re in love?’ His head popped out of the hood and just about hit the top. He gave me an appraising look and finally said, ‘It’s pretty simple really. If you can’t imagine your life without her in it, you’re in love.’”

  The wood of the podium was smooth and polished, and my gaze drifted down to it as I gathered my last thoughts. It was better than staring out at that quiet crowd.

  “He left me alone for a while to finish up, and I remember sitting on the hood of that car, thinking about what he said.” I took a strangled breath and choked out, “He was right, you know. Love is a simple thing—whether it’s the love of your life or a father. Right now, I’m having the hardest time trying to imagine my life without him in it.”

  I should have ended on an uplifting note like the rest of my family had, but I couldn’t speak anymore. If I did, I’d break down, and I didn’t want to do that in front of an entire church full of people.

  I took the stairs one at a time, and each one felt like another nail in the coffin—final and irreversible.

  The rest of the funeral passed in a blur of sobs and tears. All I remember is Mia’s warm hand in mine, and the immense feeling of peace it gave me. I didn’t know what I’d do when she left tonight.

  Chapter Fifteen

  ~Mia~

  Garrett hadn’t said a single word so far on the way back to his apartment from the funeral. He just blankly stared out the window, watching the leafy green trees pass by in a blur while I drove his car. The lines etched in his face and the dark grooves under his eyes explained what I already knew.

  He was exhausted, both mentally and physically.

  It had been a long day. After the funeral service, the family had driven out to the gravesite, and they had a private service. There was no big funeral procession stopping traffic and involving police. Just the family and minister were in attendance. Garrett had explained that his father wasn’t big on showy ordeals, and he would have hated all the fuss. The service alone would have been considered over the top, but his mother had known the many people who had loved him needed to mourn. So, they’d gone with a large funeral and a quiet graveside service.

  Not once through the entire day had Garrett allowed himself to cry, even as they lowered his father’s casket into the ground. There were several times I’d caught him pinching the bridge of his nose or squeezing his eyes shut as if he was forcing the tears away. Why he wouldn’t just allow himself to let go, I’d never understand. No one in his family would have judged him for that. Everyone in that room had cried, including myself, and it had been years since I’d seen Thomas Finnegan. He used to make me turkey sandwiches and sweet tea on Saturday afternoons when I’d sit in the garage, watching Garrett work on his car. He was still one of the most dedicated fathers I’d ever known.

  “You missed the turn,” Garrett muttered quietly, pointing to the street sign.

  He was right. I was two blocks past where I should have turned.

  “I’m sorry,” I sighed. I had been so wrapped up in my own thoughts that I hadn’t been paying attention.

  I flipped us around at the next block and managed to get us parked and settled in front of his large apartment building a few minutes later. I didn’t know how I got a parking spot right in front, but I thanked the parking gods for the gift. I quickly locked the door and handed Garrett his keys.

  My car was parallel-parked about three blocks down. This was the joy of living in this area of town. It was always a game of hide-and-seek when it came to parking. Finding the right spot was a constant challenge.

  “Why don’t you come up for a bit?” he suggested. He shoved his hands into his pockets and watched a car pass by.

  It wasn’t quite nighttime yet, so if I left now, I wouldn’t have to walk to my car in the dark, but I was finding it hard to say no. I didn’t want to disappoint him.

  “Sure,” I answered.

  He let me lead as he trailed behind me. We took the two flights of stairs up to his apartment, and the entire way I felt his eyes on me. Even from behind, I knew his eyes were traveling every inch of me, and my skin prickled into goose bumps at the thought.

  His door was the second to the right. I waited while he fished his keys out of his pocket and unlocked the door. He was pressed up so tightly behind me that I could feel every hard line of his body, and I swore I heard him inhale, like he was smelling my hair. My heart kicked into overdrive at his nearness, but then he took a step forward and opened the door. Relieved for the distraction, I followed and let my nerves settle.

  No other man in my life could set my body ablaze like Garrett Finnegan. One heated gaze, and I was on fire. One single touch, and I was begging for more. When I was young, I’d never questioned it. He was my ever after, and I loved the way he made me feel. Leaving him, knowing everything I was giving up, had been the hardest thing I’d ever done.

  But now, returning and finding myself still hostage to his touch, was the worst kind of agony imaginable. Knowing my heart belonged to someone I couldn’t have felt like walking through life with half of my soul missing.

  I dropped my purse on the kitchen counter separating the tiny kitchen from the equally small living space. The entire apartment was pint-sized. With Garrett’s six-foot-plus size, he looked like he was standing in the middle of a hobbit hole.

  “Have you lived here long?” I asked, noticing the absence of wall art or decorations.

  There was a black couch pushed up against the far wall with a small end table standing next to it. The end table was littered with black-and-white drawings. Some were shoved into notebooks and others were stacked into messy piles. Now, I knew what Garrett did with his free time.

  “Since I moved back from college,” he answered.

  I chalked his lack of decorative skills to the fact that he was male, but it felt like he’d never really settled, or he’d refused to.

  “Do you want a drink?” He shuffled through a cupboard and pulled out a bottle of whiskey.

  I cocked my eyebrow, remembering the state he had been in this morning when I arrived.

  He quickly defended himself. “One drink,” he clarified.

  “Okay, but no whiskey. I don’t know how you can stand that stuff.”

  I gave a sour face, and the corners of his mouth curved into a slight smile. It was the first time I’d seen a hint of one all day. He turned back toward the cupboard and pulled out some rum and orange juice from the refrigerator.

  “I don’t have pineapple juice, but orange juice will be a good stand-in,” he said.

  Malibu and pineapple was my favorite drink, and he still remembered.

  He began mixing everything and chuckled to himself. “Do you remember the first time we got drunk?”

  “Ugh, yes. You stole a bottle of whiskey from your parents’ liquor cabinet, and we sat at the river with Olivia and whoever she was dating.”

  “You ended up puking your guts out into the river that night,” he said.

  “You held my hair, and I kept telling you to go away because I was mortified of you seeing me get sick.”

  “I would have gladly held your hair back any day,” he replied as he handed me my drink.

  It wasn’t the last time he’d held my hair while I got sick.

  “Hey!” Garrett greeted me with an enthusiastic grin, “You ready for lunch?” With his green eyes blazing, he looked young and vibrant.

  “Yep, let me just drop this stuff off in my locker!”

  I twirled around the lock, and I had to start over several tim
es when Garrett kissed my cheek, flicked the pendant around my neck, or tickled me.

  “We will never get to eat if you keep doing this!” I teased.

  He immediately stopped but had a devilish grin on his face.

  “Can’t have that. Man’s gotta eat. In fact—” He took my backpack without letting me unload it, and he threw it over his back. He grabbed me around the waist and hoisted me up and over his massive shoulders.

  “Garrett! Put me down!” I screamed.

  “Nope. I’m hungry, and we need to eat,” he said, slapping my ass.

  “Oh my God!” I said when I heard everyone in the hall laughing and cheering.

  He didn’t set me down until we were all the way into the cafeteria. His shit-eating grin said he’d loved every single second, and to be honest, I had, too—minus all the blood rushing to my head.

  “Come on, babe, let’s get some food.”

  As soon as we hit the line, my stomach rolled. The instant smell of pizza, french fries, and hamburgers made me nauseous. Cafeteria food wasn’t the best to begin with, but I usually could stomach it without much fuss.

  “Hey,” Garrett said, cupping my chin. His emerald eyes were filled with concern. “You okay?”

  “I don’t feel so well all of a sudden.”

  “You want me to get you some crackers or water?” he suggested.

  Just the mere mention of food was making me gag. “I think I’m going to be sick.”

  I ran for the restroom, passing everyone who’d just cheered for us in the hallway, and I made it just in time. My stomach unloaded everything, yet I was still gagging and heaving.

  Suddenly, someone was behind me, holding me and protecting me.

  “Shh…it’s okay,” Garrett soothed.

  I was clammy and sweaty from being sick. I flushed the toilet, and we walked out of the stall, so I could wash my hands. A freshman looked over at us and saw Garrett, and she quickly scurried out.

  “Flu maybe? Do I need to take you home?”

  I shook my head, finally coming to terms with what I’d been fearing for weeks. It wasn’t the first time I’d been sick.

  “Garrett…I haven’t had my period in two months.”

  While his parents had still been at work that afternoon, he’d held me, and we had cried together as we waited those three minutes for that stupid stick to tell us our future. It was called a pregnancy test, but it should really be called a crystal ball. Gaze into it, and it will tell you your future. When it had come up positive, I hadn’t known what to do, but Garrett had.

  Sitting on Garrett’s couch, I found myself staring into an empty glass. I didn’t even realize I’d finished it.

  “Don’t go,” Garrett said.

  I looked up and found him moving toward me. He sat down on the couch and took my glass before setting it down.

  “I saw that look in your eye and knew you were thinking of leaving. Please don’t.”

  “Garrett…”

  “I just don’t want to be alone, not tonight. Look…” he said with a sigh. “Ever since you came back, I’ve been trying to push you away. Every time I push, I find myself right back on your damn doorstep, so I push harder, and I’ll be damned if I don’t find myself right back where I started. The harder I fight it, the stronger the urge to give in becomes. It’s exhausting, and I’m fucking tired. So, for one night, please…help me forget about all the shit going on in my life, and let me finally fall asleep with you in my arms again. Help me forget.”

  I stared into those green eyes and knew I’d never be able to say no.

  “Okay.”

  ~Garrett~

  I was a fucking moronic fool, but I couldn’t let her leave.

  I’d spent the entire day touching her, feeling her beside me, and the thought of not having her next to me anymore left me feeling cold and restless.

  I knew I was just delaying the inevitable, but avoidance was something I’d mastered a long time ago, and right now, I was going to use it to my full advantage. I didn’t want to think about the consequences of what having her in my bed would do to me—what I would be like after she was gone and I was alone again. I didn’t want to worry about the loss I would feel when I couldn’t feel her soft skin under mine anymore even if was just her fingers.

  Nope, I was avoiding it all and doing a pretty good job—or at least pretending to.

  We ordered a late-night pizza and spent some time going through my piles of drawings. It was something I’d never shared with anyone, but I shared it with her.

  “These are really good,” she said.

  “They’re all right.”

  “Garrett, you should be doing this every day,” she urged.

  “And what about you, Miss Accountant?” I countered.

  “I’m not an accountant anymore.”

  After we cleaned up, she made a call to Liv and asked if she could check on Sam. I didn’t hear the rest of the conversation because she ducked into the bathroom, but I did her say, “Shut up, Liv!” a few times, so I was sure Miss Prescott had an opinion about where Mia was spending her evening.

  As she was finishing up her phone call, I padded into my bedroom and slipped into a pair of loose-fitting sweats. Mia had seen me naked many times over, but I figured dropping my pants in front of her wouldn’t give her a good impression of my intentions for the evening—not that I would mind if she offered.

  Jesus, Garrett…get your fucking head on straight.

  I was just slipping a T-shirt over my head when she came in. She took in my change of clothes and looked down at her black dress.

  “I don’t have anything to wear,” she said.

  “I have a T-shirt you can change into.” I pulled open a drawer and handed her an old college T-shirt. Then, I sat down on the bed and waited to see what she would do.

  Her eyes drifted down to the shirt and back to me. She took in my casual position on the bed, realizing I wasn’t making any attempts to vacate the room for her privacy. She hesitated a moment longer and then swiveled around in the direction of the bathroom.

  I wasn’t sure if I was more relieved or bummed. I wasn’t positive I’d be able to handle watching her strip down bare in front of me right now, but seeing her flee at the thought of getting undressed in front of me still hurt.

  Mia returned no less than two minutes later with her black dress tucked in her hands. She nervously stopped at the doorway and looked around as if she were unsure of how to proceed.

  “Come here,” I murmured.

  Her dress fell to the floor at the door, and she came to my side as I sat at the foot of the bed. Against my better judgment, my fingers reached out for her, curling around her bare leg and up her thigh.

  Her breath caught, but she didn’t stop me.

  “Garrett…” she started to say.

  “Shh…just allow me this. Just for tonight. We’ll go back to being friends tomorrow, but tonight…just help me remember.”

  I could see the split decision swirling in her steady gaze. I knew this decision would end me. I knew I’d most likely never recover from a second blow to the heart by Mia Emerson, but I’d just lost my father. I wasn’t sure there was much of a heart left.

  Finally, she nodded, and I had my answer. My hand slipped higher under the ratty T-shirt covering her body until I found the edge of her panties. I curled my hand around her ass and pulled her down, letting her legs spread open so she was straddling me. Our eyes met, and I knew this was no favor she was doing for me. Her eyes were heated and filled with desire. She wanted this as much as I did.

  Lifting the T-shirt she no longer needed, I threw it to the floor and found those perky round breasts I’d become reacquainted with in New York. I fisted one in each hand, and I took my time sucking and savoring each nipple until she was writhing so hard in my lap that I thought I might explode from the friction.

  It wasn’t enough. I needed more. I needed all of her. Eight years of starving for the one thing I needed most in the world had left me a
shell of a man, and now, I was finally feasting again.

  I wanted it all.

  My mouth made a scorching trail up through the valley of her breasts, and I trailed kisses along her neck until I found her lips. She moaned into my mouth as my tongue found hers. My hands snaked around her body, leaving a fiery path over her soft skin. I gripped her ass and pulled her closer positioning her exactly where I needed her to be. She moved and wiggled her sexy little body right on top of my hard cock, and I groaned in pleasure. Her hands found the hem of my T-shirt, and I helped pull it up and over my head. She tossed it on the floor, and her hands went to my chest, tracing every hard line and defined edge.

  I closed my eyes and tried to memorize the feel of her touch on my body, knowing it would have to last me a lifetime. Tomorrow, reality would come back, and I would remember why this would never work.

  But tonight, she was Mia, and I was Garrett, and that was all that mattered.

  With one arm under her back, my other grabbed her behind the knee, and I flipped us onto the bed. Her hair fanned out on my sheets, reminding me of the way it had looked under the hot August sun on lazy summer days at the river. Her hands never left my body, and she traced every inch of my stomach, chest, and arms. Her fingers curled into the waistband of my sweats and tugged. Never breaking eye contact with her, I slid them off my body.

  No words were said as I slid my fingers into her panties. I nudged a single finger inside her slick core, wet from her own desire. She moaned and bucked. I added another digit, fucking her with my fingers, as my thumb found her clit.