Tethered Love (The Knot Duet Book 2)

by M. Mabie

  His kind of love led to formal courtship and engagements. Living together and getting married. Although none of those things had been on my radar before him, and everything was still so new, I’d been thinking about them lately, which made me feel like an entirely different person.

  It reminded me that historically my family failed at these things. That I too would fail, I knew no other way.

  I didn’t know how to answer.

  I loved all my lovers in some way or another, that’s why I was with them. But wasn’t that a different kind of love?

  He sighed. “You’re taking too long. I want to see you.” He was right down the hall but in a different world.

  If it was this hard, and so early in our relationship, how would I ever navigate it? How would I survive?

  I had to get something off my chest before I burst from the mounting guilt.

  “I’m going to Switzerland before Thanksgiving. I’ve told work I don’t know when I’ll be back, and they’re fine with me working from there. I’ve wanted to tell you, but I didn’t want to tell you because I knew it would only disappoint you.” I heard his gentle knock at my door. “I don’t want to anger or worry you, and maybe I’m just having a bad day, but I need to be alone.”

  “You sound sad. We don’t have to talk if you don’t want to. Let me in.”

  I wasn’t selfish and hated feeling like I was taking and not giving him anything in return.

  “I’m fine.” I didn’t deserve his affection, it would only confuse things more. “You asked me what I needed, and I told you the truth. I need a little space.”

  “What if I need you?”

  Hearing him say that tugged at something so deep inside me, I had to knock the cobwebs away to get to it. Reagan needed someone who could please him, and there were thousands of women who would love to be his. Women who knew exactly what they wanted, and how to love him the way he deserved. Women who didn’t have to question themselves or their feelings.

  I knew I was tired, but, by the way I was thinking, surely delirium had set in.

  He needed me? That was laughable.

  I hung up and walked to the door. I didn’t look through the peephole; he was still there.

  We didn’t say anything.

  He came in and switched off the lamp and lights in the kitchen, walked to the television and pressed Power. Then he returned to me, as I stood there watching him with only the lights from the city illuminating us, and he led me by my hand to my bedroom.

  I didn’t question his motives. He only ever had one.

  I was tired and scared and nervous that I was fucking something up. Something I wasn’t even sure I wanted but wasn’t ready to give up on yet. I just didn’t know how to fucking do any of it. And do the damn thing right.

  He went to my closet and found my favorite yoga pants and a camisole. I stood while he took my clothes off and dressed me for bed, watching as he cared for me. Watching him love me like no one else ever had. Selfishly, I adored him for it.

  Reagan had a sexual touch, it didn’t matter where his person touched yours. You felt it. It elevated you to his level, somehow willing your body to connect with his. It was tantalizing.

  Conversely, as he tended to me, I felt none of that. His touch was intimate more than lustful. Then, he pulled back the covers and picked me up, sliding me into the crisp sheets.

  He turned on my bedside lamp, and I rolled to face him. Even in my confusion, being in his presence soothed me. He pulled the chair from the other side of the room up next to the bed, then sat and took off his shoes.

  Yogis should play video of him doing mundane tasks to heighten meditation. He was that peaceful to watch.

  When he was comfortable, he lounged in the chair and propped his feet up on the bed next to me. He put his arms behind his head and gave me a cool smile.

  I returned it from my pillow.

  “I’m not here to make things harder for you,” he said in a tone that wasn’t debatable. I believed him.

  “Maybe I’m not cut out for this, Reagan. My head is screaming at me all day that I’m going to hurt you, and it’s making me insane.” It was hard not to tell him the blunt truth face to face. Over the phone, I didn’t have those warm, trustworthy eyes or the vibration of his comforting tone to charm it out.

  Easily, he coaxed me.

  I added, “What if I can’t give you what you really want?”

  He squinted his eyes and his mouth crooked to one side, then answered, “That does seem like a problem. I think you’re forgetting one of my best qualities. Problem-solving. And it just so happens that all of my qualities are at your service.”

  I grinned when he did, not because I had an answer, but because he made it feel like it wasn’t the end of the world.

  “First, we have to decipher what it is that I want—to know if you’ll fail at this. Correct?”

  I nodded.

  “So?” he asked, like I was missing something and he was waiting for me to get there.

  “So?” I asked back.

  “So ask me,” he said, and his bare foot, lying on my sheet, nudged me. “Ask me what I want, Nora.”

  How did he always find a way to make it all seem so simple?

  “What do you want?” I asked him, the lilt of my voice humoring.

  He leaned forward, stretched his neck, and made himself more comfortable. “Thanks for asking. Let me think.”

  Oh, Jekyll.

  I laughed, but it merely expressed itself as an awkward sigh.

  “First,” he said and held up a long, deft finger.

  First. Here we go.

  “I’d like you to realize when you don’t talk to me it causes serious anxiety.” He’d never admitted to his anxiety before, although I knew he took medication for it.

  I’d seen a prescription bottle in his travel bag at the lake but tried to ignore it. I didn’t want to snoop. Then I’d worried, thinking he was really sick or something. So I looked again and read that it was Valium. It made sense, and it was much less daunting as the tragic things I’d given him in my head. At the moment, I had considered taking one, having freaked out like I did.

  Yet, this was the first he’d mentioned it. He was being so frank.

  “I’m sorry.”

  “Don’t be sorry for something you have no control over, I basically want you to know. I want you to talk to me. If we can’t work it out, then fine.”

  Fine?

  No. Instantly, I didn’t like that fine, and I shifted uncomfortably.

  Don’t give up on me.

  “Second, I’m designed to want you. I’m convinced this is anatomical, and you can’t argue with nature. All of this...” He waved his hands down his reclined body. “Wants all of that.” Then, he motioned to me. “I have no control over it. Trust me, at first I tried. Remember?”

  I did. My body must have had the same manufacturer. “I remember.”

  “Third, I need you to understand my head is more rational than that. It only wants you, if you want me back. Otherwise, it’s wasteful, and no one benefits.”

  I took a deep breath and sorted through what he’d told me.

  “Those are the basics. I need you to talk to me, give me your body, and want me back.”

  My hand reached out for his foot, and his eyes closed when my thumb stroked over his skin. Then, he blew out a long stream of air.

  TEN

  PAST

  REAGAN—Thursday, September 25, 2008

  When she touched my foot, as crazy as it sounded, it felt like she’d thrown me a rope. I just had to keep climbing.

  I’d gone stir-crazy the night before, and so I doubled up on my Valium. Even after taking the recommended dose, I’d started counting again. So I took two, and thankfully it was working.

  I wasn’t there to fuck her. I wasn’t there to fight. I was there for a resolution to the tension that had started to build between us. And the stubborn rocks we were, if we didn’t air it out, the things that had seeped into us woul
d crack us along with the first freeze of the year.

  “I’m trying,” she said. I couldn’t ask for more than that.

  “Can we talk about Switzerland?” That was a subject I wanted to revisit, sooner than later.

  “Yeah,” she answered, but her expression wasn’t as defeated as it was when I’d come in. She looked so fragile laying there in her tiny-ass bed. “I have a lot to do there with my father’s estate. I probably should have gone back again before now, but I can’t keep putting it off.”

  Was there a possibility I could go? She mentioned earlier she wasn’t sure, but I needed an estimate. “How long will you be gone?”

  “I don’t know. Maybe a few months.”

  Even though my exterior remained calm, something tightened inside my stomach. I didn’t want her to go, and I couldn’t miss that much work.

  It was faint, but I tasted dread.

  I’d told her what I needed, and she’d told me—patience and time. I didn’t have a choice. There wasn’t anything to gain from arguing about something when I had no power to change it.

  Since the lake, she’d been all mine. At times, I felt like I was holding her hostage. Denying her what she wanted. That may have been the reason; since then she hadn’t wanted to be around her friends with me. Possibly, she hated seeing what she was missing. This was all speculation.

  The scene around the fire pit hadn’t been bad, and I’d been thinking up other ways I could give her more of what she liked—ways that of course included me, too. Ways that stretched my comfort, but I was willing to try.

  Also, I could offer her a different kind of support.

  “You know that’s some of what I do, right? If you need help with your dad’s affairs, I can do that.”

  I’d done more research. He’d owned properties around the world, had ties to almost every industry. Hugo Koehl had an empire. I didn’t know all of the details, but she had brothers, and I wasn’t so sure they’d be looking out for her from the little she’d mentioned of them.

  “I know. Thank you, but Ives has handled most of that stuff for me for a few years now.” She yawned. “They’ll be there.”

  That polarized me.

  They’ll be there. I won’t.

  She fell asleep with my foot in her hand, and I sat there and thought.

  Would she ever need me?

  From what I gathered, she didn’t need to work, but did. She hardly relied on anyone, not even when they dumped, from what I could estimate, billions of dollars on her lap. There was nothing I could give her that she couldn’t get on her own.

  That was an emasculating feeling.

  It wasn’t about gender, but more about the incessant urge to provide for her. To care for her. If I stood any chance, I’d have to find other ways.

  FINALLY, I SLEPT IN the chair. To my surprise, it wasn’t uncomfortable, but I woke up early. Earlier than normal.

  I stretched out as I walked to her kitchen, deciding since I had plenty of time before work that I’d get a cup of coffee and hoping maybe she’d wake up and feel differently than she had the night before.

  Then I wouldn’t have to worry so much all day.

  She had been under a lot of stress at work. Add to that the pressure she was burdened with over her family’s estate. She didn’t need me adding to her troubles, and I’d told her that much.

  I’d taken my shirt off sometime in the night since I’d gotten hot, only to wake up with a blanket over me. Still in my work pants from yesterday, I stood in her kitchen and rolled an orange while the coffee maker heated up.

  I’d said a lot of things last night, but I didn’t regret them. Hell, I’d asked her if she loved me, which neither of us really answered.

  One of the best things about the medication I took was I didn’t fret over every single thought. I was able to confidently say things without first scrutinizing them to the point of madness. It took the edge off of my apprehension.

  I didn’t feel as sure standing there, but at least I had a plan. One that had taken me hours of watching her sleep to devise.

  The noise I made must have woken her up because she padded into her kitchen still rubbing her eyes and sat at the bar dreamily holding her head up on her hands.

  “Good morning,” I said.

  It felt like we’d survived something, but barely. I’d slept okay, but I didn’t feel like doing much.

  Okay, maybe I had two plans.

  “Hi,” she croaked.

  “Did you sleep well?”

  Her arms collapsed, and her head fell to the side landing on her shoulder as she slumped against the marble. She was pathetically adorable.

  “No.” She pouted. “I didn’t. I just want to go back to bed.”

  This might be easier than I thought.

  My flat palm rolled the orange a little more. I loved when the white fascia stuck to the peel, and each piece was rind free. She watched with rapt attention. Or maybe she was sleeping with her eyes open.

  Grabbing a knife from the drawer, I slit the skin of the fruit and began undressing it in a spiral motion, shedding it in one long twisted ribbon of peel.

  To my surprise, her breathing quickened, and I saw a flush creep up her neck.

  I wasn’t off my game. It was unmistakable now, my body knew when hers called.

  The changes were always subtle at first. Her lips would part, and she’d gasp ever so slightly. Her shoulders would tense then relax into it. Her eyes would become lust-heavy, blink by beautiful blink.

  I observed her as she examined me with my orange, and I liked what I saw.

  There were a few white strings that I didn’t particularly want, so I made a show of stripping them off the pulp.

  She swallowed and squirmed in her chair.

  “Call in to work and tell them you won’t be in, Nora.”

  Her eyes didn’t leave the orange. I wasn’t sure she even heard me.

  She needed more sleep, but even more, she needed me to hang her off a cliff and let ecstasy catch her.

  I slipped my middle finger through the citrus’ center.

  “Mmmm,” she hummed. Then, she went directly to her phone, hardly even watching where she was going, and picked it up from the end table by the couch where she’d left it when she hung up on me.

  I’d get my pound of flesh for that.

  “Hi, it’s Nora. I’m not feeling well today. I’m staying home. I’ll check my email, and work a little from here, if I’m feeling better later. Talk to you tomorrow.” I’d never heard her speak with that tone to anyone but me. That almost meditative voice, like she was in a trance. They’d surely notice the difference and believe her ill.

  I turned my back to her and leaned against the counter.

  Come to me, baby. Let me know you want me.

  She rounded the island with begging eyes and faced me, almost chest to chest. It was a colossal feeling—one worth fighting for.

  I pulled a slice from the fruit, and she opened her mouth.

  Did she know how it pleased me? Was it a peace offering? It felt like one.

  I fed her. One piece at a time.

  Yes, let me give you what I can.

  She leaned forward with a sticky tongue and licked my throat. I swallowed, and my dick twitched and strained against my pants. Then, she rubbed her thumb over my neck and kissed it.

  We spoke at the same time.

  “Reggie, I more than love you.”

  “I want to have a threesome with you.”

  We both straightened, gulped for air, and stared at each other. The moment sobered.

  I could give her that, if that was what she desired.

  Watching the way she nearly came from peeling an orange, that’s what she wanted. She liked visuals, the voyeur she was. If being with someone else—along with her—was something that would put that very same hungry look on her face, then I’d do it.

  Like with the orange, I’d feed her what she needed.

  What she’d said finally sunk in and swelled ins
ide me. I wasn’t sure what more than loved me meant, but I’d sure as fuck take it. Happily.

  Then anatomical things out of my control happened, and I left them to it.

  I carried her down the hall to my apartment—new neighbors be damned. I wasn’t about to fuck her anywhere but in my bed.

  She clung to me, and she didn’t let go until we were behind the closed door of my room. I placed her on her feet and spun her around.

  As I moved her hair to the side and kissed her neck, I said below her ear, “Baby, raise your arms.” She lifted up and linked them behind our heads, reaching back caused her ass to bend into me. I ran my hand under the front of her shirt, over her stomach and then straight up her arms, where the shirt fell off behind us. Then, I reversed my touch down the same trail, and my hands met in front of her, sinking into her pants.

  “I want to take care of you. All. Fucking. Day.”

  “Yes,” she panted and rolled her head as I kissed her nape and then her other side.

  “I didn’t touch you last night because that’s what you needed.” I bit her earlobe, the notion that she loved me had sent possessiveness and an unstable desire to claim her for my own through my limbs. “But now I need something. I need this in return.”

  I ground against her, then pulled her pants down her legs as far as I was willing to reach, and I unbuckled my belt with stealth I didn’t know I was capable of.

  “Anything. Yes. Anything,” she quietly chanted.

  “I want to fuck you. Hard.” I folded us forward. Her hands moved to brace herself against the bed, then on her own, she spread her legs. I fisted my cock, running it through her wet seam, and she lifted onto her toes offering herself to me.

  “I need it like this. Then, I’ll take care of you.”

  She looked over her shoulder, her hair falling from her face, and begged, “Please.”

  I pushed into her with such force that I’d went up on my toes, too, and I held myself there. She fell forward, one long moan tossed from her lips. My fingers tight on her hips, my knuckles white.