Could Be the Reason: (Gabe and Sadie) (A Back to Jetty Beach Romance Book 3)

by Claire Kingsley

  I’m just not sure how to get through.

  At the end of the night, when everyone is gathering their things and leaving, Sadie waits for me. She always does. I love to see her hesitating in the back, pretending to look for something in her purse. Like she needs an excuse to stay.

  I think it’s time I stop standing on the other side of her wall, and see if there’s a door she’ll let me through.

  “How you doing?” I pick up her hand and kiss it. “Tired?”

  “A little,” she says. “My feet hurt.”

  “Yeah, it was busy tonight.” I pause and kiss her fingers again. “What would you think about coming home with me tonight?”

  Her eyes widen and her lips part. I keep hold of her hand, rubbing the backs of her knuckles with my thumb.

  “I’m not sure.”

  “There’s no pressure for anything if you do,” I say, and I mean it. “I’m just not ready to let you go tonight.”

  She nods. “Okay.”

  “Good.” I lean in and brush my lips against hers. It’s tempting to grab her and press her body against me, but my gut is telling me to be careful. So I listen.

  I offer to drive her—we can leave her car at the restaurant—but she insists on driving herself. We get to my place and she parks her car next to mine.

  It’s where Amanda used to park, and the feeling I get seeing Sadie’s car there is not lost on me. I like it.

  I like it a lot.

  She seems nervous when I walk her up to my front door. I rub slow circles on her lower back. She comes in with me and puts her things down. I tell her to make herself comfortable on the couch while I go into the kitchen.

  “Wine?” I ask.

  “Yeah, that would be great.”

  I open a nice bottle of red and pour. We sit on my couch, facing each other, and sip our wine. Sadie’s legs are tucked up beneath her. I rest a hand on her thigh and trace little circles with my thumb. We chat for a while and she seems to relax.

  She sets her empty wine glass down. I lean in and touch her face, running my fingers along her jaw. She’s so delicate. Tilting my face, I connect my mouth to hers, pressing my lips in a soft kiss. My hand moves back, threading my fingers through her silky hair.

  She sucks in a breath and pulls away.

  I drop my hand. “Are you okay?”

  “Yes,” she says. “No. I don’t know.”

  I lick my lips and avoid her gaze. Why does she do this? Why does she pull away? “Sadie, if you didn’t want to come tonight, it’s okay. You can go home.”

  She bites her lower lip and looks away. “No, that’s not it.”

  “Then what is it?” I ask. “What’s happening here? If you’re not ready for this, it’s all right. I like you. A lot. I’m not some twenty-one-year-old douchebag who just wants to get in your pants. I’m way past that at this point in my life.”

  “No, I know you aren’t,” she says. “And I like you too. So much. That’s why this is so hard.”

  “You need to tell me the truth.” I take a breath. “Sadie, who is Adam Cooper?”

  She wrings her hands together in her lap, watching them. “Okay.” Deep breath. “He was my brother Tyler’s best friend. Still is, I guess. We all grew up together. My parents treated him like another son. When we were kids it was usually fine, but as we got older, he started to make me uncomfortable. He never did anything when other people could see. But he’d catch me alone and whisper things, or try to touch me. He’d walk in on me in my room and pretend it was an accident, things like that. My family thought he was great, but he was so different when people were watching.

  “I went away to college and didn’t see him for a long time. After college, I moved back to my hometown. He had moved away, so it wasn’t a big deal. But then he moved back. One night, I was at my parents’ house and he showed up with Tyler. He was polite in front of my family, but he kept looking at me. It made me sick the way it used to when we were younger.”

  She pauses and shifts a little, but I stay silent, waiting.

  “After that, he started showing up everywhere,” she says. “He’d come to my work. He got my number from Tyler and started texting me constantly. I’d see him when I was out shopping or running errands, and I realized he was following me around. I tried to tell Tyler that Adam was getting weird, but he didn’t believe me.”

  She stops and stares at her hands for a long moment. I have a feeling I know where this is going. My heart rate speeds up and a hot ember of anger smolders in my gut.

  “It got worse. Adam started showing up at my house, sometimes in the middle of the night. He’d leave notes on my car, or slip them under my front door. Some of them were lines from books or movies, but most just said you’re mine. He always knew where I was, no matter what I did. I was dating a guy named James at the time and Adam started texting him, telling him that I was sleeping with Adam behind his back. I tried to tell James that Adam was crazy, but eventually he decided I wasn’t worth the hassle.”

  “After James broke up with me, Adam got worse,” she continues. “He started sending me pictures of women, usually tied up and gagged. He left a vase of dead flowers on my porch. He called my boss and tried to get me fired. I should have told someone, but it all seemed so insane. Who would believe me? I couldn’t prove it was Adam. The only thing I could prove was that he’d been texting James, but that could have been chalked up to jealousy—a guy trying to chase my boyfriend away. Adam admitted that he liked me, and my family was encouraging me to give him a chance and go out with him. They were mad at me for constantly turning him down.”

  “Then one night, he came over, late. He was banging on my door and I wouldn’t let him in. I thought about calling the police, but I didn’t. I should have. But I didn’t think he’d actually hurt me. I thought he’d get tired of it and go home.”

  She stops again and I’m almost afraid to let her continue. I know what she’s going to say. I hold still, my body tense, the burning coal of anger growing hotter with every word.

  “I made the biggest mistake of my entire life that night. I opened the door for him. I thought if I let him in and talked to him, I could tell him to go home and he’d leave.” Another deep breath, and when she continues, her voice is shaky. “He didn’t. He pushed his way in. He said I was his and no one else was ever going to have me. That I’d been his since we were kids. And he was tired of waiting for me.”

  I clench my teeth together and ball my hands into fists.

  “I tried to fight him off, but he was so strong. And I was so shocked. I couldn’t believe what was happening at first, and by the time it really sank in what he was doing, it was too late. He bent me over my dining table and ripped my pants down.”

  Breath comes faster, my chest rising and falling rapidly.

  “I couldn’t stop him. I screamed at him to stop, and he wouldn’t listen. I don’t want to tell you all the things he did. When it was over, he just left. I didn’t know what to do. I went to my room and curled up in a ball and cried all night. I was in so much pain and so scared. The next morning, I decided to go to the hospital. I wasn’t sure what they would do, but I couldn’t lie at home doing nothing. I told them what happened and they called the police. I told the police everything. Every bit of it. And then I called my parents.”

  A red haze colors the edges of my vision. I stay calm on the outside. On the inside, I’m a storm.

  “My parents took me home and sat in my living room with me. My dad was pacing up and down the floor. And they told me I had to drop the charges.” She sniffs and swipes a hand beneath her eyes. “They didn’t believe me. They couldn’t fathom that Adam Cooper, the boy who had practically grown up at our house, could have done such a thing. They said I must have done something to lead him to believe that I wanted to sleep with him. They said I was awful for throwing out such a hateful accusation.”

  She covers her mouth with her hand and looks away. I think she might be done, but I don’t know what to say. Then
she drops her hand and meets my eyes. They’re shining green, flinty with anger and pain.

  “It got worse when Tyler found out. He yelled at me, saying I’d ruined Adam’s life. How could I do something so horrible to another person?” She’s breathing as hard as I am and her jaw sets in a firm line. “They thought I lied, Gabriel. They thought I slept with Adam, and then he rejected me, so I made up a story about him raping me.”

  “I let them bully me into dropping the charges,” she continues, and I see her fighting with her rage. “One of the police officers came over to my house to try to talk me out of it. But it was my word against Adam’s, and I didn’t have much of a case. Adam didn’t deny we’d slept together, so the physical evidence the hospital took hardly mattered. He said it was consensual, and that we had a fight afterward. He painted me as a spoiled little girl who had been harboring a crush on her big brother’s friend since she was a kid. He implied that I pushed him into sleeping with me.”

  “So I gave up,” she says, her anger melting away, her tone full of defeat. “My parents wouldn’t stand behind me. My brother stopped speaking to me. I didn’t have anyone who believed me. Adam acted like the victim, like I’d ruined his life by accusing him of rape. We lived in a small town, so everyone heard. People watched me when I went out, looking at me like I was the one who had done something wrong.”

  “I didn’t hear anything from Adam for a while,” she continues. “I thought maybe things would die down and I could go back to my life. But then I saw him when I stopped to get gas. And again at the grocery store. He left a note on my car. I saw him drive by my house. I got more pictures in the mail and left on my doorstep—pictures where the women looked dead or hurt, always tied up. I realized he was never going to leave me alone. And next time, it was going to be worse.”

  I finally manage to ask a question. “Is that when you left?”

  She nods. “When he started stalking me again—because no matter what my parents say, that’s exactly what he was doing—I knew I’d never be safe if he could find me. So I made plans. I packed what I could carry, sold my car, dumped my cell phone, and paid some lady to buy a bus ticket for me. I changed buses several times in different cities. I actually didn’t know where I’d go. I just kept riding. Paying cash for cheap hotels. I stayed in different places for a few weeks at a time. I even got a job in some small town in Idaho, but I decided not to stay. Eventually, I made it all the way out here.”

  “No one believed me,” she says, her voice so quiet. “He tortured me, harassed me, stalked me, and raped me. My own family—the people who should have stood by me—took his side. They said I ruined his life. But he ruined mine. He ruined me.”

  My hands shake with rage and I’m not sure I trust myself to speak again. My chest feels like it’s been ripped in half, my heart crushed under the weight of her pain. I’m second-guessing everything I’ve ever said to her. Every time I’ve touched her. Have I pushed her too hard? Have I scared her? Does she see him when we’re together? Is she afraid I’ll do the same?

  I literally want to kill this guy. I want to find him and wrap my hands around his throat and squeeze until his fucking face turns purple. I want to choke the life out of him so he pays for what he did to Sadie. So he’ll know, in his final, agonizing moments, what real pain is.

  And then he’ll be gone, and he’ll never hurt my Sadie again.

  “Gabriel?” she says, her voice trembling. “Please say something.”

  I reach out and scoop her into my arms, drawing her close. Rage pours through my veins. Not only did he violate her in the worst way, her family betrayed her. Left her on her own. I think about my own family, the people closest to me. I know, deep in my soul, that if I was in trouble, they’d stand by me. Hell, I have more than just my relatives. I have Clover, and the entire Jacobsen family. I have Finn and Lucas. They might be goofballs, but they’re loyal. They’d have my back if I ever needed them.

  Sadie has no one. She was wounded and left for dead, like an animal on the side of the road.

  I won’t let that stand. There isn’t anything I can do to change what happened to her, but I can sure as shit change what happens now.

  I move back and cup her face gently in my hands. “I want you to listen to me. I believe you. I would never doubt you, and I know this is real. And this is important, baby. Hear my voice. I will never hurt you. And I will never, ever let something like that happen to you. It doesn’t matter if he finds you. It doesn’t matter what he does. I’ll keep you safe. I swear it.”

  15

  Gabe

  I wake up with Sadie in my arms.

  I couldn’t bear to let her go last night. We were both exhausted, and after a little coaxing, I convinced her to stay with me.

  Yes, having this sexy-as-hell woman sleeping next to me in just one of my t-shirts and a pair of my boxers was a little torturous. But it was blissful torture. I gave her space, keeping to one side of the bed. But sometime in the night, I woke up with her snuggled up against me. Careful so I wouldn’t wake her, I tucked her into my arms. The scent of her in my bed and her body curled up next to mine were like heaven. I settled in with her, feeling more whole than I have in a long time.

  Maybe more whole than I’ve ever felt.

  Hearing what she’s been through—hearing the dreaded word rape—almost tore me in two. A part of me suspected. But listening to her tell her story, it was worse than I thought.

  She thinks this broke her—that he broke her. But she doesn’t see her strength. She’s so strong to have survived everything she’s been through.

  I hear her deep breath, feel her begin to stretch languidly as she wakes. It’s not the first time we’ve woken up together in the same bed, but this time, everything feels different.

  She finally let me in.

  “Morning,” I say, placing a kiss on her nose when she looks over her shoulder at me.

  “Good morning.”

  I trace my fingers along the bit of exposed skin between her shirt and shorts. I wish I wasn’t wearing sweatpants—I want to feel her bare legs against mine.

  She nuzzles into me while I trail kisses along her neck and shoulder. I slide my hand beneath her shirt, touching the smooth skin of her taut belly, up her ribcage, beneath her breast. I kiss her neck again, just behind her ear. “Is this okay?”

  She nods and her back arches, her ass pressing against my erection. I run my hand down to her hip and grip it, firm but gentle, and press my cock against her.

  Her body stiffens and immediately, I back off. I actually have no idea how to navigate this without hurting her. I already know I’m never going to push her into doing something she doesn’t want. I’ll be the most patient guy on the fucking planet for her. But if I never try, we won’t ever see where this can go.

  “Sorry,” I whisper. “I won’t push you, baby. You just feel so good.”

  She turns so she’s facing me, and tucks her hands beneath her cheek. “You feel good too. So good. I didn’t think a man could make me feel like you do. But I’m still not sure I can do this.”

  I reach out and brush the hair back from her face. “Then we take it slow. We figure this out together.”

  “Are you sure?” she asks.

  “Positive.” I get an idea, and I wonder how she’ll feel about it. “What if we try something?”

  “Try what?” she asks.

  “What if you’re completely in charge,” I say. “I’ll promise not to do anything unless you tell me to. I won’t touch you, or even move unless you tell me. You can take it as far as you want, stop whenever you want.”

  “So you’ll just lie here?” she asks.

  “Exactly.”

  “But I can touch you?”

  I take a deep breath. “Sadie, you can do anything you want to me. If you want to try this, you’re in complete control from this moment on. I won’t do anything unless you tell me to.”

  Her eyes take me in for a long moment, like she’s considering whether this
might work. She licks her lips and touches my chest through my shirt. I’m already hard, and the feel of her hand on me—and the knowledge that I can’t do anything to her—makes my groin ache.

  But I can do this for her.

  She grabs the bottom of my shirt and lifts. I sit partway up and let her take it off me, only moving enough to be cooperative. I prop myself up on my elbows while her eyes rove down my chest, my abs, to the hard bulge in my sweats. She chews on her bottom lip and looks me up and down again, sending out a tentative hand to touch my chest. Her fingers are warm against my skin.

  “Lie down,” she whispers.

  I lean back, letting my head hit the pillow, and nudge the covers down with my feet. Sadie’s fingers whisper through my chest hair, her touch leaving a trail of heat.

  Two hands touch me and I work to keep my breathing even. She slides her fingers down to the waistband of my sweats and I swallow hard.

  “Can I?” she asks, her fingers tentative over the waistband.

  “I told you, baby,” I say. “Anything.”

  She lowers them down my legs slowly, and the act of her undressing me only makes my cock harder. I lift my hips so she can pull my pants off, then lie still.

  I watch her trail her fingers up and down my thighs, her auburn hair falling loose around her shoulders. I glance down at her breasts, see her nipples poking through her t-shirt, and quickly look at the ceiling. I don’t need visuals to make this harder.

  She runs her hands up my legs and past my cock. Involuntarily, I twitch, and she pulls her hands away.

  “Sorry,” I say.

  “It’s okay.”

  She keeps touching me, exploring my body with her fingertips, her caress light. At first, she seems wary, her movements tense and halting.

  I hear her deep intake of breath and she spreads her hands, pressing her palms into my chest. The increased contact and pressure has me groaning, a low sound in the back of my throat. It’s taking every ounce of willpower I have to keep my hands at my sides.