by J. L. Berg
The war that had been raging within me, deciding between what was the right thing to do and what my heart wanted, suddenly ended.
With a single, passionate, soul-binding kiss.
I reached for her, our lips meeting in a frenzy of words unspoken, lives now altered and a thousand crazy decisions we had yet to make.
I knew our future might be unsettled.
I knew I had to eventually tell her everything, but for now, all I wanted to do was be wrapped in her embrace for as long as I could.
Just like this.
Every time felt like the first time with Millie. Every caress of her body felt like I was exploring it anew. Removing her nightgown, I covered every inch of her beautiful tan skin with my lips, making sure to kiss away tears on her cheeks as I worked my way down.
She wore lace panties again, something I was growing quite fond of, as I took one last appreciative glance before sliding them down her long legs and dropping them on the floor.
“God, you’re beautiful,” I murmured.
“So are you,” she answered.
I made quick work of the condom, hating that we still had to use it, but both of us had a history we couldn’t ignore, hers more recent than I liked to think about.
And I hadn’t exactly been a saint either.
But none of that mattered now.
Sitting up on the bed, I pulled her into my lap. Her knees were at my sides as she straddled me, our bodies close.
So close.
“I want to kiss you, hold you, while I make love to you,” I said softly, as I slowly lowered her onto my throbbing cock.
Our eye contact never wavered as she slowly melted into me. Two bodies becoming one. Two souls united.
“You feel so good, love,” I groaned. “So damn good.”
I didn’t have to tell her what to do; she knew. Wrapping her arms around my neck, she leaned her head to the side, and her lips found mine in a surge of passion. Her hips moved, mimicking the rhythm of our kiss and frenzy and fire within.
It was magic when our bodies came together, and I knew now that I’d never be able to give her up. She was it for me. My muse, the only inspiration I’d ever need for the rest of my life.
“Oh God, I’m getting close,” she cried out.
I watched as she arched her back while she rode my cock with reckless abandon, all the way through her orgasm, screaming her release for the whole damn town to hear. It was the sexiest fucking thing I’d ever seen, and as I came right behind her, I knew I wasn’t going anywhere.
Not for a long time.
Not ever.
This was my home, right here in this woman’s arms.
Forever.
“Twenty Questions?” Millie asked as we lay in bed, hours after making love several more times.
Neither of us could sleep, so wired from our time together that we’d decided to watch the sun rise instead.
“You know this isn’t how the actual game works,” I explained.
“What?” She shifted under the covers, her naked skin sliding against mine. She turned to face me, her breasts pressing against my chest as she looked up at me with hooded lashes.
“The game Twenty Questions is actually meant to be a guessing game. Someone picks something, an object or a person, and then the other person has twenty questions to guess what it is.”
“Wait, have we had this conversation before?”
I grinned. “Yes.”
Her face soured. “This is one of those things that happened that I don’t remember, isn’t it?”
I chuckled. “Yes.”
“Oh God, and we played it for hours in the car. So, that whole time, you were, what? Just placating me?”
“Yes.”
She nudged my bare hip, making me laugh. “Jerk.”
“Well, I had questions. It was a good way to get them answered. I’m assuming that was why you started the ridiculous game in the first place. Plus, I thought it was kind of adorable.”
I placed a tender kiss on her forehead as she stared up at me.
“What was it like?” she asked, resting her chin on my chest. “Our night together.”
I began to play with a strand of her blonde hair as I thought back. “It was perfect,” I said. “It was the kind of night where time stood still, and we seemed to be in our own little world. We talked for hours—about everything and anything. We laughed. God, did we laugh.”
“Well, we were drunk.”
“We did go through a lot of your sister’s alcohol stash. But still, I’ve had my share of drunken one-night stands.”
“Didn’t need to know that,” she said.
“Sorry,” I replied. “Just stated a fact for reference. Our night was different. And I know that because each night since has been exactly the same.”
“Then, why are you running?” Her voice turned serious.
“I’m not running anymore.”
“Does it have to do with that letter? And don’t tell me it had to do with a client because I saw my name on it, Aiden,” she insisted, her eyebrows rising in challenge.
“Is this your version of Twenty Questions again?”
“Our lives are more than twenty questions,” she whispered.
I let out a heavy sigh. “I promise I’ll tell you everything, just give me time. I’m not running anymore; I swear it.”
I could have told her everything in that moment, but instead, I asked her to wait because, as selfish as it sounded, I needed more time.
More time like this.
“Okay,” she answered.
“Oh, so it’s all right for you to say it but not me?”
She nodded on my chest, a wide grin spreading across her face. “Yes, exactly.”
“You know I’ve been living in this country for fifteen years. That’s almost as long as I was in England.”
She shrugged. “And yet when I say the word okay, it sounds perfectly normal, but when you say it, nails on a fucking chalkboard.”
“Was your family quite cross with me?” I asked, feeling like the largest ass for storming out on them.
Millie’s face scrunched slightly. “My mom kind of already knew you were a tough nut to crack, so she wasn’t too upset by it, although if you do it again, she might just charge after you. ”
“Duly noted. I’m sorry I did. Run, I mean.”
Her hand skimmed the skin on my stomach, drawing lazy circles up and down my happy trail. “I forgive you,” she said. “But you’ll explain?”
“Yes,” I said. “Soon, I promise. Just trust me. Can you do that?”
She looked into my eyes, as if searching for something. “Yes,” she finally answered. “But will you at least tell me one thing?”
“Anything.”
“Who is Ben?”
My throat moved, trying to swallow the deep lump that had formed there. “My brother,” I answered. “My younger brother. He died while we were in foster care together. Millie, I’m not what you read in that bio.”
Her head lifted, and the motion of her hand on my skin stopped. “Aiden,” she whispered. There was pain in her voice as she said my name.
Empathy.
Love.
“No,” she said, reaching up to cup my face. “You’re more. Will you tell me about him?” she asked.
Letting out a breath I didn’t realize I’d been holding, I told the story of my brother Ben.
For the first time.
I told her how we’d met and the circumstances that brought me to him and James.
“Were your foster parents nice?”
“They were invisible,” I said. “And so were we. It was an agreeable living situation—one we cherished because it meant the three of us stayed together.”
“That’s sad,” she replied.
“No it was wonderful, because I had Ben and James. It was more than I’d ever had before, and I wouldn’t trade them for the world.”
“Then, why don’t you want to go back? To England, I mean.”
>
I let out a hard sigh. “When James and I scattered Ben’s ashes, our foster parents handing them over to us without more than a glance, I was ready to move on. Ben’s memory didn’t need to live on in that shitty neighborhood with those terrible memories. I just…I thought I could honor him with more.”
“So, you ran?”
I met her gaze, realizing how much of me she saw when I said so little.
“Yeah, I guess I did.”
“And, now, you honor Ben through your carving?”
I nodded, going on to tell her of Ben’s love for stone carving and how he’d shared that love with me.
“I have him to thank for your relentless patience then?” She smiled, turning her head up toward me.
“Ben was infallible with his never-ending patience. He would, still, to this day, say I have the patience of a gnat. And, in comparison, he’d be correct.”
“He sounds amazing.”
“He was the best.”
“How did he die?” she finally asked.
“He was always a sick kid,” I said. “Ben was consistently smaller than the rest of us. Pale, you know? I just figured it was his coloring, but then he began to thin out even more and grow weaker. He’d shiver at night, even in the summer. When we asked him about it, he’d brush it off as a summer cold or a winter flu. It went on and on.”
“He was sick all that time?”
I simply nodded.
“When he got real bad at the end, I became so angry and swore I’d go in and demand that our foster parents do something, anything, but Ben made me promise I wouldn’t. He was terrified they’d separate us. But it didn’t matter; James and I were about to age out anyway.
“So, one day, I finally stomped into the living room and told my foster dad off. I told him he was a sorry son of a bitch with no love in his heart. I asked him how he could sit around and watch a boy die right there, in his own house. It was the only time he ever looked at me with any sort of emotion. It was pity.
“‘Ben is dying,’ he said. ‘He’s known ever since we took him in. He just needed a place to do it.’”
“That’s horrible. What awful people you lived with.”
“I honestly couldn’t even focus on their lack of empathy as I stood there in shock over the fact that my brother had known he was dying and didn’t tell us. All that time, and he never said a word. I felt utterly betrayed.”
“And what would you have done if you had known? Tiptoed around him all that time? Sat around, waiting for him to grow sicker?”
“I don’t know,” I answered, sitting up as she did the same. “But I could have at least done something. Maybe fought for him.”
“Babe, you were teenage kids in the foster system. You can’t blame him for wanting to enjoy the fact that he had a family for probably the first time in his life.”
I looked down as she pulled my hand into hers, the warmth of our fingers intertwining, filling my heart with hope. “You’re right. I know you’re right. But, God, I wish I could have done something.”
“You did do something. You gave him happiness. You filled his heart with joy every single day when you sat down with him and let him teach you how to carve, and you carry on that joy even now through your artwork. I know it for a fact.”
My brow rose at her decidedly resolute statement.
Reaching over, she grabbed the stone bird that still resided on my nightstand.
“You put this bird in every piece you make. It’s your signature. I remember seeing it in the memorial in Ocracoke and the piece in your bedroom that you made for the elderly couple.”
A sad smile made its way across my face. “It is,” I answered. “He gave that bird to me and made me promise to do amazing things with my life.”
“And have you? Done amazing things?”
I looked at her, so beautiful under the rising light of the sun. Smiling, I answered, “I think I’m about to.”
“What is he doing?” Molly asked, having just come in through the front door to find me standing in the parlor with a glass of iced tea in my hand, watching Aiden like a creeper.
“I don’t know,” I answered as she joined me, a sleeping infant in her arms. “That giant chunk of granite arrived on the morning ferry today, and, wow, you should have seen the tow truck that had to lift that sucker into the backyard.”
“What? Through my garden?” My sister suddenly looked panic-stricken.
“Relax. I made sure they didn’t touch a single rose.”
“Oh, okay. Well then, carry on with your story.”
I smiled. “Well, since the shed hasn’t been used since Daddy lived here, Mama offered it up as a second workspace to Aiden—you know, to store his tools and stuff since, apparently, he can’t work in the shed. Too much dust or whatever. Too small. Anyway, he’s been out there ever since.”
“And you’ve been standing here for how long?” she asked, rocking back and forth next to me.
“Since I noticed his shirt on that chair about an hour ago,” I answered with a wicked grin. “Do you blame me?”
“He is…I mean…well, damn,” my sister stuttered out a response seconds before we heard a throat clear behind us. Molly jumped, her hands surrounding the infant in her arms as she turned to see her very jealous-looking husband standing in the entryway. “Oh, hello, dear husband of mine. There you are!” she said, turning five shades of red. She turned to give me a death stare before scurrying off into the kitchen.
Jake rolled his eyes before his focus moved to Aiden outside. “Could he at least put on a shirt?”
My eyes followed his, and I resisted the urge to sigh at the sight of all those burly muscles glistening under the summer sun.
Damn.
“Sorry, Jake, I simply can’t allow that.”
His brows furrowed as his arms folded tightly across his broad chest. “So this thing between you two, it’s serious?”
Taking a sip of my iced tea, I turned as he joined me at the window. I tried not to show my amusement as he put his back toward the glass to talk to me, thus avoiding the sexy, shirtless male altogether.
“It is,” I said. “Or at least, it’s going that way. I mean, we haven’t picked out china or discussed living arrangements, but what I feel for him is definitely serious.”
His gaze shifted, finding a huge interest in the wooden floor as he let out a deep sigh.
“What, Jake?”
“Nothing,” he answered.
“Nothing? Since when have you been one to beat around the bush?”
“I promised Molly I wouldn’t say anything,” he confessed.
“Molly?” I said, my gaze traveling to the kitchen. “You guys talked about me?”
His brows lifted. “We’re just worried, Mills. You’ve known this guy only a few days, and with the way he stormed out last night at dinner, you can’t blame us for being a little concerned.”
Stepping back, my fingers clutching the cold glass in my hands, I asked, “Do you all feel this way? Mom? Daddy?”
He shook his head. “Your mom believes in you—that you’ve made the right choice.”
I let out a breath, my lip quivering as the air escaped. “But the rest of you? You don’t?”
His eyes rounded. “Millie, what do you really know about this guy?”
Placing my tea on the table, no longer in the mood for it, I answered, “Enough to know he’s worth the risk. I thought someone like you would understand.”
“Me?”
“You came back here like a damn ghost, Jake. Twelve years, you left my sister hanging. No note, not even a phone call, and she took you back because, despite everything that had happened in those twelve years, you were worth the risk to her.”
“I—”
I held out my hand, stopping him from speaking any further. “Just don’t,” I said. “I need some air. Just tell Aiden—if you can stand to talk to him—that I went for a walk. I’ll be back later.”
And then I turned and walked away, willin
g myself not to cry.
I made it to the threshold before the dam broke, and the tears fell.
I hadn’t really thought out my dramatic exit all that well.
About five minutes into my walk, I was sweating like a dirty whore in church, wondering what I had been thinking when I decided to go for a leisurely stroll in the middle of the freaking summer in North Carolina.
How in the world did I used to run around and play in this weather?
Just as that thought rolled around in my head, two kids waved to me on bicycles, looking happy and carefree, completely unaffected by the sweltering heat or the insane humidity suffocating me from all sides.
But I refused to turn around.
If I did, it’d do nothing for my cause.
What is my cause exactly? I asked myself as I ambled down the road.
Oh yes, making my brother-in-law and the rest of my family feel bad for their actions.
Sure, they might have had my best intentions in mind, but damn it, how dare they talk about me and my love life behind my back?
At least my mother seemed to still be on my side.
My phone vibrated in my back pocket, and I instinctively reached back to grab it. After years of being attached to it for work, old habits died hard.
Speaking of old habits…
A Google alert I’d set up ages ago to monitor internet activities on the company—one I had yet to turn off since quitting, just in case my little video made the news—had just sent me something rather interesting.
Clicking on the email, I stood in the middle of the street, the sun no longer captivating my interest as it once had.
“Son of a bitch,” I said out loud.
Lorenzo Russo Declares Love For Employee!
The headline was everywhere—well, everywhere that the fashion world cared about—and I couldn’t click on the article fast enough, my hands a shaky mess.
If I thought I had been sweating before, it was the damn waterworks now.
Lorenzo Russo, CEO of up-and-coming fashion house Bella, went on record this morning, stating he is involved with an employee of his company and is in love.
“I didn’t want this information to be discovered in the wrong way. We are very much in love and want the world to know it.”
