Rivers

by S. L. Scott

  Jet accepts the award with Tulsa piping in his ecstatic two cents. Rivers doesn’t need the glory. He’s won for doing what he loves to do, for doing something that pays the bills for us to have a better life one day. While his brothers thank the fans, Rivers stands in the back with his eyes on me, thanking me.

  When his brothers head for the side stage with the award in hand, Rivers hops off the front. Coming up the aisle, he starts into a jog.

  I know what he’s doing. I would do the same—our breath, our beats in sync.

  The auditorium isn’t that big, but guests aren’t allowed where the nominees are seated. The bands themselves take up too many seats. That doesn’t bother me. He deserves all the glory.

  He’s been my rock, my partner, my lover, my whole heart since the day we first spoke. Even though I don’t need any recognition for loving him, he needs me.

  God, do I love how much he needs me. He’s not alone in his needs because they’re rivaled by my own. We’ve been inseparable for years and taken this journey together.

  Although I’m trapped in the middle of the aisle, I stand so he can find me in the crowd. Other musicians and fans here to celebrate the best Austin bands watch one of the best there is run toward me. He stops at the end of the aisle and huffs his disapproval. Not deterred, he steps up on the armrest. The fans lift their arms, letting him walk right over them until he drops back down in front of me amongst cheers and hollers. Taking my face between his hands, he says, “None of this would be possible without you, without your support. My win is your win, baby. I wouldn’t be here without you. I love you.”

  He kisses me with no hesitation, my lips meeting his in a kiss that speaks to my heart and my head. The clapping starts slow and builds fast to a loud roar as we get lost in each other like we do every other time. Though, it’s usually without an audience. Our lips part but hearts are hooked together. “I love you,” I whisper, opening my eyes slowly.

  . . . He didn’t return to his seat up front after that kiss or the next four. He chose me instead. That night, we celebrated by making out until my lips were swollen and his beard had scraped along my chin so much that my skin was pink.

  Consumed was a word others always used to describe us.

  Rivers and I preferred in love.

  This is the Rivers that has come back for me. The way he kisses my neck, the movement of his hard body against mine as we lie on this bed feels so much like my cherry on top for the hell I’ve been through.

  “How can you look at me the same when so much has changed?”

  A hand slinks under the side of my shirt and rests on my bare hip. Leaning down, he kisses my chest over the fabric still covering me. “Loving you is my greatest honor and hurting you my biggest regret. No matter where I was in the world, my heart stayed here with you. You were more than my girlfriend. You were my sanctuary, my haven.”

  “What am I now?”

  “My home.” And somehow, I think he’s my home too. Again.

  16

  Rivers

  Despite the rumors and reputation, I never claimed to be smooth. But looking at Stella’s face, I see what I thought was only possible in my dreams, the flicker of hope that I prayed for shines in her eyes. Maybe I am the Romeo she likes to teasingly call me.

  My mind is not racing, not searching, or lost. My soul is at peace and my heart calm. We were so close to exposing more than our regrets and feelings. We were so close to sharing our bodies. But holding her in my arms, in this bed, in the quiet of the night again feels like the home I’ve been missing.

  She feels like home.

  “Rivers?” she whispers.

  “Yes?”

  “Is it bad to want to move forward physically when there’s not a perfect bow on the resolutions to our past yet?”

  “I don’t know. Most important to me is your happiness. So do we pull the Band-Aid off? Maybe. I’ll follow your lead. I want us to date again. I want us to be . . . us again.”

  Lifting her head, she looks up at me with a sweet smile before scooting higher and leaning back next to me. “What about the others we’ve been with?”

  “I can’t say anything about you being with others while we were apart.”

  Her shoulders rise and fall quickly. “What if I want you to know?”

  Her confession causes me to tense. “You only have to tell me what you want me to know.” For her, I’ll go where I don’t want to. For her, I’ll go where she needs to be.

  Since the conversation is steered into choppy waters, she shifts, adjusting to the tide as it turns. Sitting up, she eyes me. “I’ve been with two other men.”

  The topic is unsettling and angering. My jealousy spikes through my veins as I silently repeat to myself that I don’t have a say in what happened after we broke up.

  She adds, “I needed you to know that.”

  “What do you want me to say, Stella?”

  “I don’t need to hear words. I need to feel this love you say you still have for me because there was no love with either of them.”

  “We can make love. We can fuck. We can do whatever you want, but it’s not just being here that will bring us together again.”

  “I don’t understand what you mean, Rivers.”

  “We had a show last summer and a rare day off to ourselves in Denver. Tulsa was off fucking around doing who knows what, probably chasing Nikki around. Jet went back to his room to call his wife, and I went to my room to do nothing. I didn’t have anyone to call or spend time with. I didn’t have anyone who made me want to chase them. So I sat there in the room staring out the window for an hour before I walked out of the hotel and just kept walking. I ended up a few miles away standing in front of a building that had graffiti on the side brick wall.” Raising my arms, I can visualize it so clearly. “Painted in familiar green was the phrase: the truth will set you free.”

  “That’s from the bible.”

  “You know I’ve never been a religious man. My father left years prior, before my mother was taken too soon. I had a lot of fucking blame to dole out, and I took some of that out on you.”

  “You took it out on yourself—your body, your mind, your heart. You chose to slowly kill yourself for something you aren’t responsible for.”

  Reaching between us, she takes my hand and folds her fingers with mine. “Why did that quote speak to you?”

  “We were destroyed by lies. I need you to know the truth. All of it.” Looking into her eyes, I say, “But it wasn’t just the quote that spoke to me.”

  “Familiar green. What does that mean?”

  “You have unique green eyes. They’re the ones that I see when I pray to be set free from the lies.”

  Her lips part just enough for me to see the center of that upper lip that I want to kiss and nip. Her hand holds mine tighter. “Let me be the one to set you free.”

  My mouth pours the truth at her feet, hoping she can survive the flood. “I did not have sex with Naomi.”

  She leans forward, dropping her head into her hands. “Rivers,” she says my name as if her patience has worn thin. “People saw you with her.”

  “Fucking John Cables, her ex, saw me at her house.”

  Her ponytail whips around when she turns to face me. “I don’t understand.”

  “I know you don’t, Stella. I swear to the God I know and pray to on the daily that I never wanted to hurt you.”

  “I don’t know what to think.” Slipping out of bed, she walks to the window and looks back. The room is lit by the moonlight, but it’s enough to see the fire raging in her eyes. “The truth will set you free. Can you tell me more? Because just thinking about that night is ripping me apart again. Please set me free from this torture where you left me.”

  “I didn’t do it. I didn’t touch her, Stella. And I wasn’t there for any other purpose than to help her.” I climb out of bed, slowly, careful not to send her running. Walking to her, I take her hands in mine, which is a good sign that she’ll let me, and bring them to
my chest. I close my eyes as her palms warm my skin.

  My eyes open again when she says, “Look me in the eyes, in these familiar green eyes that you see when you pray for peace, and tell me the truth.” Tears form and fall as she pleads, “Please stop my heart from hurting.”

  I look directly into her eyes, sharing the truth the best I can. “I wouldn’t do anything differently, and you wouldn’t want me to. I helped a friend in need. You weren’t supposed to be hurt because I didn’t think you’d think the worst of me. But I can’t break a promise—”

  “That’s it? That’s all you’re going to tell me?”

  The moonlight reflects in her eyes as she stares into mine. “I told you I didn’t have sex with her, and I helped her because she needed help. I should have gone about things differently, but as for where my love laid, I never stopped loving you.”

  “We didn’t have secrets until then.”

  “You’re right. We didn’t have secrets, which was why I thought you’d trust me regardless of what you heard. But you chose to believe the lies. I hate that trying to do the right thing ruined what was already so right. Please believe me, Stella. If I had cheated, there is no way I would have come back for you, because there was no way I could have forgiven myself. I’m not that person, and I never was.”

  Her shoulders relax, and the emerald rage I saw earlier in her eyes calms into a soft sage I love. I need her to believe in what we were; otherwise, we can’t move forward. “Maybe because there’s been time and distance, and I’ve grown up, but I believe you, Rivers. I believe that you couldn’t sit here now looking me in the eyes and lie if you had cheated. I believe you’re too good of a man to do that.” She touches the collar of my shirt, gently stroking like she used to do when she was deep in thought. “I’m sorry. We can’t take it all back though, can we?”

  “No, baby. But I’m here, and if you want me, I want us to move forward. Together.” Desperately. With all my heart. I watch her take a few deep breaths as a war rages within her. Please choose us, Stella.

  Her gaze dips to my shirt, and her hand slips under, navigating my chest and tracing the star by heart.

  “Take this off. I want to see it.”

  She always found comfort in seeing the permanency of her effect on me. I’m willing to do whatever she wants me to do. When I lift my shirt, she lifts hers and removes her bra, baring her body as I bare mine. Her fingertips bypass my three crows to trace the star that’s inked on my chest, over my heart, for the star of my life.

  I mimic her light touch and outline the crow she wears permanently on her skin for me. There’s something heavy in the moment, in the light touch that I feel beneath the skin. She whispers, “I remember when we got these.”

  “I do too.”

  I can’t call it a smile, but it’s not a frown I see on her lips. “My dad was furious.”

  “Your mom told me that my brothers and I were a bad influence.”

  “She called me a whore.”

  I remember that too well, and it pisses me off to this day. It also makes me feel sad for her. “You were a good daughter. She was a terrible mother.”

  “Yeah. I didn’t regret getting the tattoo, though.”

  “Did you after we broke up?”

  “Every day until—” She stops and takes a deep breath, then exhaling slowly.

  My gaze slides up from her fidgeting hands to her eyes again. “Until?”

  “Until I had more important things to regret than a tattoo I got out of pure love.”

  Taking her hand, I press mine against it, holding them between us. “Pure love. How did two innocent kids handle a love that was too big for the two of them?”

  Now I see the smile I adore. “Our love was never too big for us. The world just couldn’t handle something so good.”

  “You make references to regrets beyond your family. The world’s treated you badly?”

  “Standing in front of you makes me believe it can be good again.”

  I run my hand down the curve of her waist as she runs hers over my stomach muscles that lead her lower. “You don’t even understand how much your body affects me.”

  She giggles softly. “I have a pretty good idea.”

  Her hot hand takes hold of my erection, drawing every ounce of blood to the spot, and I find myself holding my breath and releasing harshly. “Fuck, that feels so fucking good.” Detouring, my hand slides between her legs. I move into the heat of her hand, her stance loosening before me, her body welcoming me by parting for me. Her exhale comes with a small whimper that I remember like the melody of my favorite song. Dipping my head down to her shoulder, I say, “Let me make you feel good. Let me remind you that the world doesn’t have to be so bad.”

  When I reach the valley between her leg and promised land, I pause and meet her eyes. Her breathing has picked up, each breath verging on the next in rapid succession. This is new; my memories of her were much more comfortable when we were together. “You doing okay?”

  “It’s been a while.”

  “For me too.”

  Surprise colors her expression. “Really?”

  But she stops stroking me and I just need her to start doing it again. “Please.”

  She grins, and her hand begins moving again with the right amount of pressure to her grip. “Sorry.” While I stroke the soft skin of her bare pussy, she squeezes her eyes closed, struggling to reopen them again. “That feels so good.” Her focus is divided though when she asks, “How is it that it’s been a while for you?”

  “How?”

  “Why?”

  “Just don’t stop, okay?”

  “Okay, but why?”

  Fuck this and the twenty questions. I slide my middle finger between her lips and when her eyes close and her mouth opens, I kiss her—deep and long, like I want to be with her in other ways. Finding the secret entrance, I dip my finger in and pull back to her dismay. “Don’t stop.”

  I’m going to make her forget her name by the time I’m done with her. I drag my finger along her slick center and up, bringing it to my mouth. “Do you taste the same, baby?”

  The guard she was building in angry protest to the vacancy I’ve left lowers again. “You tell me.”

  I suck my middle finger in knuckle deep and pull it out slowly, sucking all of her off me. “Better.”

  She lifts up on her toes and presses her lips to mine but doesn’t kiss me. Instead, she drags the tip of her tongue across the middle of my lips and says, “I cannot wait to taste you again.”

  Fuck me. I bend down and lift her naked body up so her legs wrap around my middle. It would be so easy to push against the wall and fuck her hard and fast, to come inside her while she comes around me.

  But that’s not what this is. Tonight is about beginnings not endings. There’s still no way I’m missing the opportunity to lick that sweet pussy until an orgasm coats my mouth. We kiss as I carry her to the bed and set her down.

  Climbing to the middle, she lies back, her body ready for me with pert nipples and spread legs. I kneel beside the bed between her legs and start kissing a trail up the inside of her thigh. She shivers, and says, “I’ve missed your mouth on me.”

  I’m not beneath a challenge, not only to make her mine but to also make her forget the time we spent apart. I owe her no less. “I missed my mouth on you too.” I never mind giving her what she deserves. I’ve come from her coming. I can’t wait to feel her legs stiffen around me, to know that I’ve caused her body to give to me her sweetest pleasure. Me. I do that to her. Fuck. I’m turned on. I’m fucking licking her skin, my girl, my woman, my soul’s body is mine right now for the taking as she gives me all access to possess her like I used to.

  “Move higher on the bed,” I direct. She’s quick to obey and gives my body the room I need to dig my hips into the mattress, knowing the pressure against my cock can get me off before she has a chance to. Do I want that? Fuck, yeah. I’ll take coming against the mattress in exchange for her coming any day all
day long. I want her to come, to take what I can give and give me the symphony of her ecstasy.

  I don’t know why that little space at the apex of her legs, the valley of her leg gets me harder, but I have always love that part of her body so fucking much. I flatten my tongue, teasing her.

  A groan causes me to look up. With her forearm over her eyes, she almost appears to be in pain, so I stop. “Stella?” When her head pops up, I ask, “Everything okay?”

  The line of her brows softens, and she nods. “I want you . . . I want this. It’s just been a long time, and I’m caught up in my head.”

  I move up higher because her comfort in what we’re doing wins out over anything I need or want. Lying next to her, I kiss her before I stroke her hair back. “What’s going on in your head?”

  She caresses my cheek. “Being with you like this makes me feel like a teenager again.”

  “Me too. It feels good to be with you again.” I slide my hand down her stomach and lower between her legs, this time going straight between those pretty little pussy lips and deeper inside her. “I like touching you. Do you like that?”

  “Oh God, I love it.” Her eyes practically roll to the back of her head, and she drops down on the mattress. I kiss her forehead and then nose, cheek, and chin, and her neck, lower to her chest, and then to the tattoo that will always mark her as mine.

  One of her hands tugs at the hair at the back of my head, and this time, she moans in a weighted sigh with a slight smile on her face. “That’s it, baby. Just feel.” I start a slow fuck with my finger before I add another. Her body moves, reacting every time I push in or pull out. I rub my thumb over her clit, and her back arches, her legs tightening around my hand.

  I keep going, fighting through the tension of her thighs around my hand. While I kiss her nipple and gently take it between my teeth, my cock presses against her hip, and I thrust to ease the ache, falling into rhythm with my hand and the ways her body takes me in.