As he flung his guitar behind him, Lexi collapsed.
* * *
This didn’t feel like her bed. The pillow was too thin, and she had a crick in her neck. It was also a little cold, so she snuggled deeper under the thin comforter. She edged closer toward Jordan, but then sat up suddenly, realizing he was no longer there. Half asleep still, her eyes adjusted to the darkness, and she could see he was no longer in the room.
The scent of the oil he’d used on her skin drifted around her, reminding her of the way he’d used his huge hands to loosen every muscle in her body when they’d gotten home. Massage had always been something purely practical for her. Something to help deal with the aches and pains of the job. But after last night, she doubted she’d be able to look at it the same way again. Only next time, she wouldn’t fall asleep in the middle of it.
Embarrassed at having fainted, she’d been relieved he hadn’t pushed her harder as to why. She’d skipped dinner, going straight from rehearsal to the concert. Tomorrow she was flying to New York for her meeting, and she was sticking to her commitment to keep the calories down on non-rehearsal days. She’d done this a hundred times before, but something about this time felt different. It felt . . . necessary. Less of a choice and more of a need. There was a line between what she was doing and anorexia, but even as the thought crossed her mind, a small part of her recognized that she was on the brink of crossing it. Lexi shook her head to clear it. As long as she remained aware and didn’t obsess about it all the time, it wasn’t anorexia. She was so close to her goal weight that she could justify staying the course just another couple of weeks. Alain had finally noticed her dancing, her father would let up once she was at her target weight, and it was so close to her next performance. No, she would keep it up, right up until Sleeping Beauty started.
Shivering as her feet touched the cool wood floor, she reached for the hoodie that Jordan had worn the night before. It was draped over the back of the chair that sat pushed up against the desk. There was no way she was going to go wandering around a house full of men without a stitch of clothes on. It skimmed the top of her knees, and she pushed all the surplus fabric of the sleeves up her arms.
In a momentary flash of inspiration, she reached into the bedside table to find a condom and tucked it into one of the hoodie pockets. It would be one of their last nights in the attic before they moved into Dred’s room. Well, before Jordan did.
Lexi made her way through the house, conscious of every creak and groan of the old stairs, and padded into the family room where she saw Jordan asleep, lying on his side on the large sofa. Why would he choose to sleep downstairs when she was upstairs tucked in his bed? Asleep, he looked so young. When he was awake, he often looked like he carried the weight of the world on his shoulders—his brow furrowed, his posture rigid—but now he looked rested and handsome.
Gently, careful not to wake him, she joined him. There was a throw over the back of the sofa. Lexi reached for it and pulled it over the two of them.
Jordan stirred slightly and wrapped his arms around her. “Can’t sleep?” he whispered, opening his eyes. Even in the low light, they were still the most beautiful thing about him.
Lexi placed her hand against his warm cheek and smiled as the beard tickled her palm. “I woke up and you weren’t there.”
“I was worried about you. Couldn’t sleep, so I came down here so I wouldn’t disturb you with my tossing and turning,” he said. His eyes searched her face. “Moments like this, I believe it’s possible.” Jordan ran his hand up her thigh and rested it on her butt.
It amazed her the way the simple touch of his fingers could turn her on like it did. “You believe what’s possible?” she asked curiously, wiggling closer to him.
“This. Us. A life that doesn’t have to be so damn fucking hard every day.” Every part of his life, including his reluctance to jump into this relationship with her, had something to do with his past.
“Tell me. I want to know. I want to understand you. I want to be there for you. What happened to you, Jordan?”
“I don’t know that telling you will help, and I’m scared you might leave if I do,” he said, sadly. “Where I’ve come from shouldn’t really matter. Only where I’m going.”
Lexi ran her finger along his brow, pushing his hair back from his face. “Do you really believe that?”
Jordan slid a little further down the sofa so they were completely face-to-face. “I have to,” he said before kissing her lips sweetly.
“Was it awful?” she asked quietly.
He fixed the throw so it covered them both properly, repeatedly smoothing the fleece. He placed his arm back around her waist. “I don’t really remember being any place other than the attic.”
“Upstairs?” she asked. “When I woke up, I was curious why it was decorated the way it was because the rest of the house seems so . . . I don’t know . . . luxurious.”
Jordan shook his head. “Not upstairs. A different attic. I lived with a man and woman, who I’d always assumed were my parents, until I was ten. I don’t remember when exactly, but I think it was somewhere around five or six, I remember us moving house. I thought it would mean a new start. That they wouldn’t beat me. That I’d get to go to school properly. The woman took me upstairs, told me I was going to see my new room. In our old house, they’d locked me in my room periodically as punishment or when they wanted to get high without worrying about me. But they kept me locked in the windowless attic for the next four or five years, and I’ve never known why.”
Lexi gasped. Of all the things she’d imagined, none of them came close to what he’d just shared with her. “Permanently. Like you were never allowed out?”
“No. I wasn’t. You know, I think not knowing why they did it might be the absolute worst part of all of it,” Jordan said. “It got so fucking hot up there in summer, and so cold in winter that I could see my own breath.”
“So you never got the chance to attend school after that? Did they homeschool you?” she asked, desperate to be reassured that she had misunderstood what he was saying.
“No, they barely spoke to me outside of bringing me food, and coming to empty the bucket I used as a toilet. And once I was found, yes. I had to go to school. I had to do a shit ton of special classes to catch up on just about everything I’d missed in those years.”
“So how did you learn to . . . I mean . . . everything? “
“Well, I kind of remember going to school. Perhaps it was kindergarten, maybe first grade. The details are hazy. I could talk, dress myself, and shit. So I had the basics down. The roof leaked, and the attic flooring was so rotten that there were a few places I could spy through. I couldn’t see the TV, but I learned a lot by listening to my parents watch shows like Due South and The Kids in the Hall. Occasionally I’d scream and shout in the hope that somebody would hear me, but every time I did, my dad would beat me so badly, I couldn’t move for days. Eventually I stopped screaming because nobody ever came.”
Tears pricked Lexi’s eyes, and one ran down her cheek. “Oh God, Jordan. I’m so sorry.” She kissed his lips softly and felt his quiver against hers. So she kissed his cheeks, his chin, and the tip of his nose.
Jordan coughed gruffly. “One day, I couldn’t believe it. They let the cat I’d seen through the cracks in the floor come into my room. Didn’t think about it then, but it was as skinny and as emaciated as I was. I had nothing to compare it to, though, so I thought it was normal.”
There was such intimacy in the darkness that Lexi could feel Jordan’s pain. Her stomach hurt, and her heart felt as though it were in free fall. Tears ran freely down her cheeks. Jordan paused to wipe them away with his thumbs but didn’t stop talking.
“Some days they’d forget to bring me food.” Jordan’s voice cracked and tears started to appear in his eyes. “So it was no big deal when they missed a day. . . . But there were no lights on downstairs. No noise. Nobody came home that night. And so there was no food the next day . . . or th
e next.” Jordan swallowed, his body starting to shake. “I didn’t want to get beaten again, and I sure as fuck didn’t want them to take the cat away. I can’t tell you how long it went on for, but I know it was two days after my cat died before I finally heard a voice. I saw a light, crawled to one of the holes, and peered down. There was a man there on his phone cursing the shit out of my parents. I banged on the floor, even tried to cry out, but my throat was too raw, and I . . . I couldn’t . . .”
Lexi wrapped herself around Jordan and hugged him tightly. His head pressed into her neck.
“He called the police,” Jordan mumbled against her shoulder. “And here I am.”
And here I am.
Her heart squeezed even tighter at the way he glossed over the next seventeen years of his life, but tonight wasn’t the time to push him. He’d shared more with her than she had expected. Lexi turned her cheek and kissed his face. Jordan’s lips made his way to hers, and their tears mingled. His hands slipped under the hoodie she was wearing as he reached for her breast and squeezed it harder than she was used to. She gasped.
“Let me love you,” Jordan whispered against her lips. “Like this,” he said, tugging on her nipple, the sensation foreign yet intoxicating. “I need to replace all that with something more, Lex. Help me figure out what that is.” His kisses became more aggressive, their lips clashing, his erection pressing against her bare thigh.
Lexi reached into her pocket and pulled out the condom, intending to place it on the chair arm for when they were ready, but Jordan grabbed it and lowered his jogging pants far enough over his hips to allow him to put it on. He pushed the hoodie up and lifted her leg over his thigh. She gasped as pushed his way inside her in one stroke. Let me love you. That’s what he had said, but this was something different. Something way more basic.
“Oh, fuck, Lex. This is what I need.” He pressed his head into the crook of his neck, his groan reverberating across her skin, making her shiver.
He pulled out and thrust back into her quickly. No foreplay, no seduction, just pure sex and emotion. If this was what he needed after the horrors he’d just told her, then this was what she would give him.
She placed her hands on either side of his face and kissed him, using her tongue to mirror the strength of his strokes. It was messy, and ugly, and most of all hot. She felt taken, and possessed. He pressed into her, thrusting so aggressively that she wrapped her arms around his neck for fear of being thrown from the couch.
He rolled onto his back, taking her with him, and braced his feet against the edge of the couch to hammer into her. Both hands grabbed her butt, stretching her, holding her exactly where he wanted her, and he fucked her hard. His fast stokes straddled the edge of desire and desperation, both emotions etched across his face. She saw them in the firm set of his jaw, in the intensity of his gaze.
“Ah, fuck. Lex. Please.” He slid a hand between them and reached her clit, circling and tugging on the wet nub. Being manhandled this way shouldn’t turn her on, shouldn’t excite her the way it did.
Lexi almost bucked off him as her core tightened around him, fireworks erupting deep inside, but he held her down. “Look at me,” he commanded. “Let me take you.” His eyes were wide, and she couldn’t have looked away if she’d tried. He owned her heart and soul. She knew him. She loved him. With her hands braced on the sofa arm above Jordan’s head, he sucked her nipple into his mouth, almost biting. The slight sting only heightened everything she was feeling.
“Jordan, I’m—” Her orgasm bore down on her, starting at her core, sending wave after wave of energy through her.
“I can feel you, Lex. Fuck, yes,” Jordan cried out. He slammed against her, one teeth-jarring stroke after another, harder and harder, until he cried out in relief.
Lexi collapsed breathlessly against his chest. Wordlessly he held her, his arms wrapped tightly around her lower back as he thrust slowly and gently in and out of her. He held her while they both came down, as their breaths evened out, and sleep came for them.
But when she woke in the morning, he was gone.
* * *
The Sunset Grill in Bloor West Village was one of Jordan’s favorite breakfast spots. He’d found it when he’d taken a part-time job one summer at the No Frills grocery store across the street. He hadn’t had it in mind when he’d set off that morning, but ninety minutes later he was standing outside the red awning. Before he’d gone inside, he’d made a quick phone call, and now he was waiting, staring at a bottomless coffee cup.
What the hell had he done to Lexi? He’d fucked her senseless in the living room of his home where any of his brothers could have come downstairs and seen the two of them. What would Lexi have done if one of them had seen him slamming into her so hard that he wasn’t sure he hadn’t broken the sofa arm? Or his cock. Or worse, her? And they hadn’t been exactly quiet. He couldn’t decide if he felt like more of a bastard because of what could have happened or because he’d loved the whole fucking thing, minus the part where he’d shared all his miserable shit. The orgasm had blown the top of his fucking head off and had knocked him out cold. It was at least an hour or two before he’d woken up filled with remorse for what he’d done. What a clusterfuck.
The door opened and Maisey hurried toward him wearing a burgundy wool coat. Out of habit, he stood and hugged her. “I came as quickly as I could, my sweet boy,” Maisey said as she sat across from him. “Let’s order because I do have to be at work by nine and I want to spend as much time as I can talking with you.”
Jordan ordered the Meat Lover’s Omelet with extra toast, and Maisey ordered the Sunset Yogurt with granola and a fresh-squeezed orange juice. Maisey carried the conversation while they waited for their food. Once it arrived, he found he needed a couple more moments before he hit her with the big stuff.
“I fucked up last night,” he began as Maisey started to eat.
Maisey waved a spoonful of yogurt at him. “Tell me what happened, and then I’ll decide on what scale of fucked-up-ness you fucked up,” she said. Her straight shooting was the reason he’d called her. She called him on his shit. Always had. So it was hard to be pissed when she did it straight out of the gate.
“Fine,” he said gruffly. “I told Lexi a little of what happened to me last night, and then I—”
“Wait. There’s a girl? Why did I not know there’s a girl? Start there.”
How to start describing Lexi? He was no fucking poet. “She’s a dancer at the National Ballet of Canada. A principal. She’s the most beautiful dancer you’ll ever see, Maisey.” He couldn’t help but smile thinking about her, even though they had last night to deal with. “And she’s sweet. Swear to God I saw her help this little old lady across the road. And the guys love her. You need to see her with Petal.”
Maisey sniffed. Tears. He couldn’t deal with more fucking tears this morning. “No. Don’t do that,” he said, handing her a napkin across the table. “I’m not sure I even want to know why you’re doing that,” he grumbled. “You and Ellen are worse than leaky sieves.”
“You have a girlfriend. And it’s perfect. Your face completely changed when you talked about her. Did you know that?” Maisey said, dabbing her eyes. “So I have every right to be a, what did you call me, oh, right, a leaky sieve.”
“Why is this such big news, Maisey?” He cut into his omelet, taking a large mouthful.
“I’ll come to that in a second. Do you have a photograph?”
He’d been hoping to get straight to the point, but as he pulled up the picture she’d sent him for her publicity shot, he realized that this was what families did. “Here,” he said, handing the phone across the table.
Maisey studied the photograph. “Oh, Jordan. She’s lovely,” she said and handed him back his phone.
He took another look at the image and smiled. “Yeah, she is. But she deserves better than me.”
“What a load of tosh,” Maisey said.
“Oh come on, Maisey. You know my shit.”
Maisey leveled him with a look. “Do you want me to tell you why I named you Jordan?”
Jordan rolled his eyes. “You told me already. You thought it was a strong name.”
“That was all I could tell you until you were eighteen. And by then, you’d stopped asking me.” Maisey leaned back in her chair and took a sip of her orange juice.
An invisible band tightened around his chest. “So there’s more to it?”
“Of course there is. It was never my job to push you into religion. In fact, it’s kept out of social work for a reason. We’re multicultural, and to push any one faith above the other would be discriminatory. But I’ve never hidden the fact that I believe in God.”
Jordan nodded. “I know that. I was at your wedding, remember?”
“I do. And the five of you were perfect ushers. But did you know the River Jordan is the lowest river on Earth?” Maisey asked. “It’s over four hundred meters below sea level before it hits the Dead Sea.”
“You’d make a great presenter on National Geographic, Maisey. You should see if they’re hiring.”
“Oh, shut up and listen,” Maisey said good-naturedly. “Do you want to know how I know that?”
“No, I think I’ll grab my coat and go . . . of course I want to know! But you’re doing that really annoying teach-y thing that used to bug the shit out of me.”
“The fact that you speak your mind so bluntly is one of the reasons I love you so much, Jordan. The Sunday before I was called to come and see you, the minister at our church gave a sermon on the River Jordan. And then I saw you. And all I could think of was the sermon. That the river is the deepest on Earth, and I could only imagine how deep your pain went. The Jordan flows through the Great Rift Valley, and the rift between you and the life you deserved seemed so wide. In the rainy season, the Jordan becomes this fierce, turbulent river, and I saw you those first few days as you fought everything in the flood of experiences you went through. And most of all, I named you for the River Jordan because it was the river the Israelites crossed when they made the journey from slavery to freedom. Your path has been so arduous, and so painful, but I knew you would succeed in getting to the other side.”
Jordan Reclaimed Page 17
