by Milly Taiden
“Ryan was diagnosed with cancer a year ago. He fought it hard and there was a point the doctors thought maybe he could pull through, that he was strong enough. They were wrong; he wasn’t strong enough. I watched him die, felt his breath leave his body, begged him to stay with me, to not leave me alone, but—” Jet’s arms tightened around me, and I couldn’t fight the emotions any more. Big deep sobs spilled out of me and I clung to him, distantly aware that he was crying too.
We held each other, our pasts so different and yet, filled with the same things. Guilt, shame, grief and pain, mingling into a quagmire that had sucked us both down so deep. That darkness, though, seemed to recede with the words that spilled out of me, giving me, for a moment, the chance to see what life could be if I let it. Something better, something whole.
Shaking with the intensity of my grief, I slowly came back to myself. Aware that I’d monopolized the whole sharing business. With a man I’d barely known for three days.
“I’m sorry,” I said, brushing tears from my face. “I didn’t mean to cry like that.”
When I moved as if to shift off his lap arms tightened further, stopping me. Jet put his chin on my shoulder, his face buried in my hair whispering the pain he couldn’t speak.
“Our stepmother abused him . . . while our father beat me. I didn’t know. I didn’t know. I didn’t know.”
His fingers dug into me, and I held him as tight as I could, crying fresh for the little boys they had been, for the horrors they’d had foisted on them. His body shook, his breathing ragged with pain, and there was nothing I could do to make it better. Like being with Ryan in the hospital again, I could do nothing to ease this except hold him, and pray. Stroke his back, whisper that the darkness would pass, the pain would ease. That I would stay, I wouldn’t leave him alone to face this.
How long we sat like that . . . it could have been hours. More maybe. The light faded slowly, the sunlight shifting from rock to rock, but never lighting on us. The world moved on, as if our pain was nothing. But I already knew that; that was the way of the world.
“Why did you look so sad when I called you Jazzy?” His lips were right below my ear and I leaned my head into him so mine were right below his.
“That was Ryan’s nickname for me. He was the only one who ever called me that.”
“I’m sorry, I won’t . . .”
“Don’t be. I don’t mind it from you. Somehow it fits.”
His hand slid under the back of my shirt, fingers tracing designs on my bare skin, sensual, but not sexual. Like he needed to feel me, almost like a favorite blanket you’d cling to in order to fall asleep as a child.
“Is what you told me, is that—” I didn’t need to say what ‘that’ was, didn’t want to give it more power by naming it. “Why you and Jasper don’t work together?”
Jet took a slow breath. “He blames me, for letting it happen. Rightfully so. I should have seen through it. Now when I look back, the signs were there, but I missed them all, too intent on getting through each day, each beating.”
I leaned back and cupped his face with my hands. “Jet, you were fifteen, and barely surviving your father’s ‘tender care.’ What happened to Jasper wasn’t your fault.”
His eyes flashed, but I didn’t let him go. “He could have told you.”
“This is not something men talk about. You hear it around, hear about it happening to others and people say shit like, ‘Good for him, what a fucking stud.’”
“You weren’t men, you were little boys, children.”
He wasn’t having any of it, though.
I changed tactics. “Is it my fault that Ryan died? Is that what you’re saying? That I should have been able to do something about it?”
He shook his head, frowning at me. “No, that’s different.”
“It isn’t,” I said, my voice firm. “What happens to us in this life isn’t always of our choosing. But what we do when we’re handed a bucket of shit is our responsibility. We can throw the shit out, clean the bucket and start fresh, or we can wallow in it. You, my friend, are wallowing in a bucket of shit that isn’t even yours.”
His head was bowed, and slowly he lifted his eyes to mine. A smile quirked across his lips.
“Listen here, potty mouth.” My face heated and he went on. “That’s actually pretty good advice. But like all advice, it’s a helluva lot easier said than done.”
I gave him a tentative smile. “I know.”
He ran his hands through my hair, massaging my scalp. “How’d you get so wise when you’re so young?”
“I stole most of my wisdom from my brother. I think losing our parents and being the oldest just made him grow up too fast.”
He chuckled, soft and low. “I wish I could have met him.”
My lips trembled. “I wish you could have met him too.”
8
Jet
If there was a heaven on earth, I was in it and I didn’t want to ever leave. And that scared the shit out of me.
Jasmin sat on my lap, her arms looped around my shoulders, fingers brushing along my neck, easing what was left of the tension in me. For the first time since Jasper had told me the truth, I was at peace inside. She didn’t tell me it was my fault, she didn’t tell me it wasn’t my fault. With very few words, the guilt I’d been carrying was almost completely wiped away. It would always hurt, I think, mostly because I loved my little brother, and even now felt it was my job to protect him.
But because of one green-eyed Spitfire that wouldn’t let me wallow in my own shit bucket, I was starting to see it wasn’t my fault that it had happened. I smiled as I thought about her way of putting things, and the guilt eased a little more. She was right, but to hear someone else say it the way she had, someone who didn’t look at me like I should have done something more . . . it made all the difference in the world.
“Should we head back soon?” she asked, though she made no move to get up. She’d opened herself to me, let me see into her fear, the deep dark pain, and grief of losing her brother and her parents.
At least I still had Jasper, even if he hated me.
“Do you want to go back?”
She took a deep breath and her breasts rose, brushing against my chest. “No, this is nice. I like it here. I feel . . . safe with you.”
I slipped my hands further up her spine, fingers massaging her silky bare skin feeling my body harden in response to the shift in her body. With my lips, I traced up the side of her neck, down again, across the hollow of her throat and up the other side of her jaw. I couldn’t get enough of her, not even if I never let her go. She was the balm to my soul and the hurts of the past were muted when I was with her.
Just a little more and I’d let her go, push her away. Because that was the right thing to do, because she deserved better than me. But not yet. Not quite yet.
A soft moan whispered past her lips. “Jet. I don’t know if this is a good idea.”
“Just kisses, I promised. Nothing else. Not even if you beg.”
My hands skimmed around to her taut, flat belly, the skin jumping under my fingers, quivering at the light touch. Her arms stayed wrapped around my neck, but she turned, seating herself on my lap facing me, long legs draped on either side of my hips.
The heat between her legs beckoned to me and I grabbed her ass, grinding upward, letting a moan out as she arched against me, breasts brushing tantalizingly close to my mouth.
“You said just kissing,” she whispered.
“Our clothes are still on.”
She pursed her lips as if she was upset. “Good point. So it doesn’t count if clothes are on then?”
I didn’t need to hold her hips, she swiveled, finding a sweet spot for both of us. I pinched her jaw between my fingers and drew her lips to mine. Hot need flashed through me and I fought it back, knowing all the reasons why we shouldn’t and wanting her anyway.
Her hands slipped between us, she pushed my shirt up, worked her way across my chest, fingernails sc
raping me, teasing my nipple ring. A panting breath, a groan, escaped my lips, and again I pushed my hips against her, cursing inwardly at the clothing between us.
No.
Jasmin wasn’t like the other girls. She wasn’t the girl you took home for a night.
She was the girl you took home forever.
The thought skittered around my brain and I tried it on for size. Considered the implications, and then cast it all aside. I wouldn’t think about that now, not here. This wasn’t forever, I’d already decided that. She was just for now, for this moment, and then I’d let her go—after all, she deserved so much more than I could give.
I sucked at her lips, teased her mouth as I wanted to do to other parts of her, dipped my tongue in deep, sliding in and out, slow and steady as my hands tightened on her pert ass. God, I wanted her naked, wanted to feel her skin hot under me, feel her warmth circle my hardness and drag me under whatever spell it was she wove around me. Her breath came in little heaving drags, faster with each one, as did my own. Each moment that passed, our bodies stayed on this side of the precipice simply based on the thin layer of clothing between us. Without it, we would have been long gone into orbit.
It took everything I had to pull back, to lift her off my lap, put her beside me, and not touch her. “Just . . . give me a minute.”
Hands on my knees, I leaned forward. Think of something else, anything else but her. Anything. But I couldn’t. It was as if someone had left my screen saver on too long and now the picture was burned into me. I couldn’t evict her from my brain. That was not good, not good at all. One night stands, women you forget in the morning. That was the way to do things. A shiver of uncertainty, almost fear if I didn’t know better, smacked into my desire, cooling it better than anything else could.
Fear nothing? Maybe I could amend that to fear nothing, except the green-eyed girl who seemed to be stealing my soul.
“I’m sorry, that was so unprofessional of me. I don’t want you to think I do this with all my assignments,” she said and my head snapped up.
“Unprofessional?”
She swallowed hard, and scooted backward on the flat rock. “Yes, I mean, I didn’t mean to—”
“Spill your guts?”
Her dark hair slid over her shoulders as she nodded. “That.”
“Kiss me as your body begged for more?” She went bright red, her cheeks two flaming spots that I wanted to rub against, feel the heat for myself. This was madness, hadn’t I just been thinking she wasn’t for me?
“Yes, that too.”
“You regret this?” Just saying the words was a knife in me. I hadn’t asked for much in my life, but please God don’t let her regret this. Don’t let her regret me. Not in this moment.
Her eyes flashed. “Never!”
“Then what’s the problem?”
She deflated, her shoulders slumping. “I can’t be with you. I’ll lose my job, the bills from Ryan’s cancer treatments are huge—”
“That’s it? The job is the only thing between us?” I knew in my gut that wasn’t it. Maybe she was embarrassed to be seen with someone who was an idiot on screen. I’d known she was too good for me, right from the start. Now was the final nail in the coffin. I’d heard it before, from girls. “You’d embarrass me in front of my friends, family. I don’t want to be seen with you. You’re too much of a fool.”
Reaching over, she took my hand in hers, turning it over so she could touch my palm. “I can’t go through it again. Losing someone I love. And if I stay with you, I know what will happen. I’ll fall for you, it’s happening already, and then you’ll do a stunt and something will go wrong and I’ll be alone again, my heart shattered. I can’t do it. Not again. It’s too high risk for me. I’m sorry.” She stood, stumbling over her feet in her haste to get away from me, and bolted from the clearing, climbing the short ascent and disappearing into the canopy of the forest. I watched her go, long legs eating up the distance, dark hair sweeping out behind her, stunned at her honesty.
Weren’t women supposed to be mysterious and confusing? Wasn’t that their prerogative? To keep men guessing and wondering what the hell was going on inside their heads? Yet here she was, open with me in a way that left her exposed, showed me how very raw she was under her facade. I knew her secrets, knew her desires, knew she wanted me. Fear was all that was holding her back. Fear I understood, had learned to conquer. Even if that same fear was circling around my head, waiting for me to give into it.
Her words rattled around in my head, foreign and mind blowing.
A part of me knew she was right—most of me knew she was right. This whole thing, whatever it was between us, was a bad idea. A shitty idea. An idea that wouldn’t leave me no matter what I tried.
She was just like all the other girls. She couldn’t be more different.
Jasmin didn’t really want me. Except her body claimed otherwise.
This was a fucked up idea that would leave us both hurt. Now that was the truth.
Climbing back up into the forest, a muffled sob reached out to me, nearly stopping my heart. Was she hurt?
No, she hadn’t gone far, and she wasn’t hurt. I’d thought I was going to have to chase her down to her hotel again.
She crouched beside the hanging vines that would let her back out to the path, arms over her head, face buried against her knees. I crouched down beside her, ran my fingers along her hairline sweeping the long dark strands back behind her ears. “Couldn’t find your way out?”
“My zipper on my suitcase is broken,” she said the words as if they should make sense to me, muffled into her arm, and I wasn’t sure I’d heard her right.
“Your suitcase is broken, and that’s why you’re crying?”
She laughed, her shoulders shaking. “No . . . I can’t leave until I get a new suitcase. And I have to go . . . .”
Taking her hands I stood, drawing her to her feet. “You have to go so you don’t fall in love with me.” I was joking of course, trying to lighten the mood by being a goof as usual.
Her tongue darted out, touching the tip to the center of her top lip, beckoning me closer. “Yes, that’s the whole of it, I guess.”
Shit. I hadn’t expected that. Now what? Finally, a woman who didn’t talk in riddles, didn’t make me wonder what the hell she was thinking.
I was thinking as fast as I could. Maybe I could have her for a little bit, just a while. Just long enough to get her out of my system. At least, that was what I told myself. “Well. What if I promised you wouldn’t fall in love with me?”
One dark eyebrow quirked up. “How could you promise that? You can’t make a guarantee when it comes to hearts. And if you start acting like a jerk, I’ll know it’s a ruse and probably fall for you anyway.”
“I promised I would only kiss you. I kept that promise, even though you were more than tempting.” I tugged her into my arms; she resisted at first, but then stepped closer and leaned her head against my chest. Like two broken pieces from different puzzles that miraculously fit together.
The deep part of my brain that remembered loss and pain keener than anything else screamed at me to let her go, to run far, far away. To never look back and to stop getting sucked into her eyes.
Fear nothing. Not even a woman.
“If you could keep the promise, if you know for sure I wouldn’t fall in love with you, then, maybe I could stay for the full week, I suppose.”
“We could just be friends; we’re adults. No more kissing. I could show you around, let you see that things aren’t always so scary, that there isn’t anything to be afraid of,” I said. The words were bitter. I wanted more than friendship. Much, much more.
She was right, though, we really weren’t good together, but I refused to be afraid of being around her. This would be a test, like a spectacular free-falling stunt that made me sweat before I stepped off the ledge.
“No more kissing?”
“Not even a peck on the cheek.”
She slid out of
my arms and I cursed myself inwardly. She was afraid, afraid of love too. What a damn mess the two of us were in. Even more reason to keep her at a distance. If I couldn’t help myself and couldn’t help Jasper, there was no way I could help a girl like her get over her fears.
“When does your plane leave?” I reached past her to lift the vines back. She stepped through, brushing past me, her skin so close I could almost taste her again. Just that simple movement and my body responded, begging me to change my mind, to take her now on the forest floor. Screw rationality, having her naked and writhing was a much better idea.
“Saturday, early.”
I watched her walk ahead of me, enjoying the view immensely. “That gives us only three more days. Not really long enough, but I can make do.”
Jasmin glanced over her shoulder at me. “What do you have planned exactly?”
I grinned at her, and then smiled wider as she grinned back, her eyes sparkling.
“Just you wait and see, Spitfire. Just you wait and see.”
* * * * *
My master plan came to me in the middle of the night, and the next morning I was at Jasmin’s hotel room banging on the door before the sun had even crept over the horizon. A stumbled curse from the other side of the door made me smile and then she pulled the door open. Messy dark hair, eyes at half mast . . . and wearing nothing but a tank top that skimmed the top edge of her lacy green panties.
She cleared her throat and I realized I was caught staring at her panties and fantasizing about getting her out of them. With my teeth, if at all possible.
“I said I’d be picking you up early.” I handed her a sheet of paper.
“What’s this?” Her brows came together as she read, and I took the moment to stare at her body, barely concealed behind the thin clothes. The dark tips of her nipples were visible through the worn out white shirt, and they hardened as I stared. I raised my eyes to see her flushed, staring at me while I stared at her.
