Finding Fate

by Charisse Spiers

  “Good, just wanted to be sure it was you.” Then she disconnects the call and speeds up her pace, opening the passenger door a few seconds later to hop in. The overhead light comes on as soon as she does, giving me a better view. I can barely breathe. Her bright blonde hair is hanging long and straight, framing her made-up face, and suddenly her scent is consuming the cab of my truck and waking up all of my senses.

  She looks over at me as the door shuts with the same dark eyes that have lingered in my mind since the second I saw them, the brown so dark the two colors run together. With the cab light being on a timer, I have a few more seconds to stare at her before it returns to a dark space only lit up by the dash lights.

  The few photos she’s sent over text don’t do her justice, even though I’ve saved every one. I’d forgotten exactly how beautiful she is in person. I’ve never seen anything like her. I want more of her and we haven’t known each other long. She smiles at me. “Miss me, did ya?”

  I smile back instantly, unable to help it. There isn’t a shy bone in her body. It’s something I like about her. Usually when I talk to girls or flirt, they’re awkward and clam up with pink cheeks. You have to come up with every topic to have a conversation, and it always feels one-sided. Not her. She owns the room wherever she is. From the second I spoke to her I felt like I’d known her forever. “Maybe . . . Did you have trouble getting out?”

  “Nope! Daddy-O is out of town this weekend. Some work thing. I just didn’t want our neighbors to see you pull in the driveway and ask him who it was.”

  “And your mom?”

  Her smile drops off her face, making my chest tighten. “Don’t have one anymore,” she says.

  Shit. “I’m sorr—”

  “Don’t be. If she didn’t wanna stick around I don’t want her here.” A smirk returns in place of the previous smile, relieving me. “Just means I have less to worry about and more fun to have. What do you want to do?”

  Excitement courses through my blood. She’s finally here, with me, in my truck. A girl riding shotgun never fit so perfectly. She belongs there. My smile is back full force. “That depends. What time do I need to have you home?”

  “Sunday before sunrise? The staff has been sent home for the weekend. My dad expects me to be at my best friend’s house, which is where I always stay when he’s away or I get bored. I just didn’t tell her I was for sure coming. Otherwise, just whenever you have to be home is fine. You can always drop me off on the way.”

  I look around me to ensure no one is outside that I can see, and then put my truck into drive and start inching forward before turning my headlights back on. It’s hard to keep the smile off my face. Best idea I’ve ever had was asking her to sneak out. “My parents are at our camp on the Jourdan River this weekend. I have the house to myself until Sunday night.”

  Within twenty minutes I pull into my driveway and kill the engine. It’s a neighborhood on the outskirts of town. One of those that have enough space and trees between each house that it seems more private than it is. And based off my physical address you’d think I’d attend the school in the next town over since they match, but it’s one of those school district things that puts me in the bigger school of the two.

  I park in front of the freestanding garage that my parents let me convert into a place for our band and shut off my truck. They never used it for parking anyway. It quickly became a storage unit until my dad bought the camp and remodeled it. Then they went through it and either took half of it out there or got rid of it and then organized what was left. A lot of unused space remained after the boat and jet ski were gone. Since my brother is grown and out of the house, they let me have it. It gives us our own space to come together and hang out or practice. Landon’s grandparents were in the process of upgrading their kitchen and living room at the time and gave us their old refrigerator and couches. My dad and his dad had some spare plywood for us to build a stage. Riggan’s mom bought a newer laptop and gave him her old one. We’re in the process of soundproofing it with our extra money from working.

  “You don’t live all that far from me,” she says, already hopping down out of my truck. I pull my keys out of the ignition and open the door to my old Ford F-150 that was handed down by Dad just as she rounds the truck.

  I get out and lock the doors, grinning at her as we walk side by side down the sidewalk toward the front porch. “Small world.”

  Our hands graze as we climb the steps and make our way to the front door. I wonder what she would do if I took hold of it, or what it would feel like. Instead of finding out, I unlock the door and open it for her to walk inside first. She looks around, and I’m not sure what she’s thinking since her house is double the size or more. Our house isn’t small, and it’s two story, but she basically lives in a mini mansion. “I like your house. It feels . . . homey. Mine is too . . . designer. It comes off as more of a showroom than a home.”

  I walk over the threshold and shut the door. “Never heard a girl complain about that before.” It makes me like her even more.

  She turns around with a grin on her face. “Didn’t anyone tell you?”

  My brows draw in. “Tell me what?”

  “Not all girls are the same.” She pokes her tongue out for effect, making my heart beat through my ears.

  I walk closer to her until our fronts lightly touch, towering over her and looking down. “You’re definitely not like the girls I’m used to. You’re better.”

  She wraps her arms around my neck and kisses me wildly, pulling an automatic groan out of me the second she slips her tongue in my mouth. I’m already hard. That didn’t take long. I pull away when she lowers her arms to go for my jeans. “We don’t have to do that, Gabby. I don’t want you to think that’s why I wanted to see you. It’s not.”

  She steps back before I can close my arms around her waist, a mischievous smirk on her face. “Looks like I’m the one trying to undress you. If I was expecting a date I wouldn’t have snuck out in the middle of the night.” Then she removes her shirt, forcing my eyes down to her black bra. She has a smaller rack than Courtney, like it hasn’t been all that long since she started really filling out, but there is something about the missing overflow of cleavage I like. Innocence maybe. I don’t know. This is a foreign like for me. Since I hit puberty it’s been all tits and ass like most of the guys my age, which is essentially the same thing as the bigger the better. My eyes finally rise to meet hers. “If you want it, come and get it.”

  Then she takes off running up the stairs, the sound of her footsteps hitting against the steps echoing as I watch her disappear onto the second floor. My lips curl when she runs into the right room—my room—as if she’s been here thousands of times.

  Games.

  My dick is throbbing in a way it never has, and suddenly I’m craving the feel of her in my bed. My feet start moving forward before I tell them too, climbing at a steady pace, and before I know what my hands are doing my polo is on the staircase. I walk into my room as I unbutton my jeans and halt at the sight of her sprawled out on my bed completely naked. What a fucking view. “What about now? Still don’t want to do anything?”

  “I hurriedly kick off my shoes before I shove my jeans and boxer briefs down my legs and step out, my hand already enclosed around my dick as I make my way to her, stopping at the edge of the bed. “We can watch a movie after we’re done while I give myself time to get hard again.”

  “Good,” she says. “Better make the time count in case it’s a while before we can do this again.”

  I hope not.

  I open my nightstand drawer and reach to the back where I keep them hidden from my parents, grabbing a condom from the small folded over paper bag they’re in and rip it open. She watches me roll the latex on with a hunger I haven’t seen in her eyes yet. She wants me, and something about that has me feeling high. I come on the bed between her legs, my hand already exploring her body.

  I kiss her, working her up. The heat skyrockets, both of our mo
uths twisting and tugging. Tongues collide and swipe. Suction rotates between us. We exchange heavy breaths. I lay her back. She’s running her fingers through the back of my hair. It feels so good; like nothing I’ve ever experienced. I can’t understand why. Courtney has done it plenty of times, yet it never feels like this.

  Her chest starts heaving as I trail my fingertips up her inner thigh, every intake of oxygen rugged. Her tongue brushes mine again, and when I glide the backs of my fingertips between her thighs over every part of her, she moans against my mouth, temporarily frozen. I push a finger inside her wet core, already feeling the bead of pre cum ooze from my dick as I work it in and out. It feels as good as it did the first time; so tight.

  I tug her bottom lip out and insert two. “You’re all I’ve been able to think about.”

  Her back arches, her lazy eyes zoned on mine. “I think about you too, and that night we met. I want to feel you inside me like that again.”

  “Has anyone else touched you here since I did?”

  She shakes her head. “Have you?”

  I shake my head. “I don’t want the girl I was hooking up with before. I want you.”

  “Then have me. I’m giving myself to you.”

  A phrase that changed my life. I pull out my fingers and fist my dick, pushing the head inside her just barely. I can already feel her muscle tight around the tip. I prepare myself for what it will feel like, and when I imagine the band playing on the stage that night, I push inside her wet channel, the muscle gripping me like a fitted sheath and emitting heat.

  She whimpers as I hit the back. “Are you okay?”

  She nods. “It still hurts a little, but not as much as last time. Do it again.”

  I pull back and rock against her, causing her toes to curl on my calves, and then I use my hips like a swing, feeling like I could combust with every thrust. “I’ve never felt anything like you,” I grit out, her eyes hypnotizing me.

  “Me either. I don’t want it to end.”

  “Then be my girlfriend.”

  With a smile from her and a kiss, we never looked back.

  Forty

  Gabby

  Present . . .

  I pull Maddox closer to me and wrap my arms around his neck, my nerves still haywire. He caught me. Yes, I know I don’t have to worry about Sayler with my man. I wasn’t lying. The night that me and him got engaged and we had the experience in Konnor’s Tahoe—not sure what else to call it—I said I let everything related to Maddox and Sayler go. Let bygones be bygones. But the fact of the matter is, when you see someone you love talking to a hot female that he previously hooked up with, it still triggers jealousy. I don’t care who you are. A girl is lying if she says otherwise. My heart has a death grip on Maddox Burns, which makes me protective. He still makes my stomach flutter and my heart race just like he did in the beginning. I can’t let him go no matter how hard I try.

  I press my lips to his, just needing to be close and feel him against me, to make all the anxiety of the day wash away, because the truth is, I feel stupid being here again—pregnant without being married first. Our history is repeating itself, which terrifies me. The previous ending was not a good one. And I’m not any more at ease about the situation now than I was the second that test showed two pink lines.

  He slips his tongue inside my mouth, letting me taste him, and never making a move to pull away until I’m ready. Maddox has always been that way. He’s not stingy with his love or his body. “Get a room,” Riggan shouts, making Maddox smile.

  I peek just in time to catch Maddox flipping him off. He pulls at my lips one last time before pulling back, but he never takes his eyes off me. He rarely does. If you’re lucky enough to catch Maddox’s attention, you have it one hundred percent. I always wondered what he saw in me that night and every day after that we talked or were together. I’m just an average girl, but I’ll forever be thankful that something stood me apart. No one else makes me feel the way he does. No one else will ever win my heart the way he did. “Payback’s a bitch, Rig.”

  “Yeah, yeah.”

  Sayler’s dad has been gone for a while. I was expecting for this to be a clean take it out, bandage me up, and let me go. It didn’t take much to put it in. I’m not sure what his absence means, but it’s spiking the stress in my body. I feel unsettled about everything. There are so many unknowns as to how this happened. “Gab.” I look into his eyes, bringing my focus to him instead of my thoughts. “It’s okay. We can do this. I love you.”

  The tear I didn’t know I was holding back slips from my eye with a blink. I think I’m still in shock, to be honest. This isn’t easy to absorb. Every time I start to relax, a wave of anxiety washes over me. He kisses my wet cheek. “I promise I’m not going anywhere. I’ll never leave your side. I’ll go to the doctor’s appointments and I’ll be there when it’s born. This time will be different.”

  I wrap my arms around his waist and press the side of my face against his chest. “I love you too. I’m just scared.”

  The door finally opens and Sayler’s dad walks in, quietly closing the door behind him. He’s handsome for his age. Like really handsome. And as he walks across the room, he has zero expression on his face. I wonder if doctors have to practice that straight face that they all seem to have. Doesn’t matter if they’re giving you good news or telling you that you have cancer—they all wear the same expression. Maddox is now standing beside me with his arm around my back. Dr. McKenzie sits on the corner of his desk and crosses his arms at his chest and his feet at the ankles, staring at me. “Daddy, why did you—”

  He holds his hand out at Sayler, stopping her midsentence. The man radiates a lot of power. Can silence a person with a simple physical command. He reminds me of my father in ways. My heart feels like it’s rising like acid reflux and beating in my throat. “Where did you get the birth control?”

  “I’m sorry, sir, but where?”

  “Did a physician administer it? More specifically, did a Gynecologist administer it?”

  “I think so?”

  His eyes narrow a little. “I’m going to need a better explanation than that, Gabby.”

  I look at Maddox, silently pleading with him to help me out somehow, but really, how could he? He wasn’t there. “Dr. McKenzie, should I be worried?”

  “That depends on your answer, Gabby. I can’t help you until you’re honest with me. Do you want the others to step out of the room? I’m not your friend’s dad right now, I’m your doctor.”

  I glance at Maddox first. “I’m not leaving you,” he assures me.

  I nod, going to Sayler. She gives me a small smile. “We can step out if you want us to. No hard feelings.”

  My eyes sweep beside her to Riggan, where they’re both sitting on the couch. He’s looking at the floor, but as if he can sense me looking at him, he tilts his head up until his eyes are on mine. Within seconds he stands and helps Sayler up, both of them walking toward the door.

  Maddox grabs my hand, breaking my line of vision as I glance down at the two of them together. I can see my name tattooed on the inside of his wrist, remembering what he told me about Riggan coming to see him at his brother’s place not too long after he moved away, where he tattooed my name on Maddox at the kitchen table. I’m reminded of every talk we had in the past where Riggan’s name came up. They’ve been best friends since they were kids, and although I was never really around Riggan last time we were together, I can see how close they are.

  One thing I’ve tried hard to do since we got back together is catch up on things we missed out on with each other over the years. Maddox has told me tons of stories, including that Riggan has been there for him, like when I went to get my things and my dad took me. He was drinking pretty heavily and Riggan was there. Maddox was there as much as he could be for Riggan after Abby died, which still seems surreal even though I didn’t know her. There have been so many times when I had a gut feeling his friends hated me over everything that happened, and I want to be in
their good graces. It doesn’t matter how little you care of what others think about you. The best friends of the love of your life are different. I want them to like me, because I want us to have a happy life.

  Despite everything I had concocted in my head, Riggan hasn’t treated me any differently. If he hates me, I wouldn’t know it, and I don’t know if that has to do with Maddox or just because that’s Riggan. When I was at the tattoo shop and the stick came back positive, it never occurred to me to keep it a secret from Riggan. They all know the gist anyway.

  They’re Maddox’s family, which means they are my family, and Sayler has been nothing but nice to me, like right now, at the drop of a hat getting her dad to do this. She’s made me feel included when she could have made me feel like an outsider. It’s time I stop shutting people out. Not everyone is out to destroy my happiness.

  Riggan grabs the doorknob. “Wait,” I call out, halting them. They both look back at us, Riggan’s eyes meeting Maddox’s. My shoulders drop, trying to relax when I’m used to always keeping myself so put together around people not in my immediate circle. “I want you to stay.”

  They turn around and Riggan pulls Sayler in front of him as he leans against the door, wrapping his arms around her front. Maddox kisses my temple. I assume I’m wearing my anxiety all over my face. I look back at Sayler’s dad, who is studying me. “When Maddox and I met I was thirteen, he seventeen. My dad is very busy, but he’s very traditional in how he was raised. I had few rules since he was raising me alone. We would have been together for a year at the end of May. My dad found out in February that I was dating an older guy. I was fourteen. He had not long turned eighteen. My dad could see how I felt about him. That jeopardized his plan for me to marry in a much higher social and financial class—someone he and my grandfather arranged for me. He threatened to press statutory rape charges . . .”