by Komal Kant
“I have.” I nodded even though her words were more of a statement than a question. “Many times.”
“Why?”
I sighed, running a hand through my hair which had grown a fair bit since I’d first arrived here. “Lots of reasons.”
Hadie took a step closer, her eyes never leaving mine. “Any that you’re going to share with me?”
My breath caught in my throat. I knew tonight was the night to do this but the night wasn’t over just yet. I still had time to tell her. “Maybe later.”
She nodded in response, seeming alright with the fact that I was skirting a major issue. There was something else more important on her mind; I could see that now, see it burning in her eyes.
Hadie reached out and took my hand in hers. She hesitated, but then seemed to gather her courage as she studied me. “I love you, Lincoln Bracks. I’ve wanted to tell you that for a while now but I’m glad I waited until this moment to say it.”
Shit. Hadie loved me. She freaking loved me.
I felt winded, like I’d run up ten flights of stairs without stopping. She wasn’t taking pity on me; she wasn’t trying to make me feel better. She really did love me. She loved me for who I really was, not for what I’d become.
“Lincoln,” Hadie prompted, looking a little scared, “say something.”
Coming to my senses, I stepped forward, closing the distance between us. I wrapped both my hands around Hadie’s small waist and hoisted her onto the hood of the car. Hadie’s eyes registered shock at my spontaneity, but she didn’t protest.
“I love you, Hadie Swinton,” I said, because that’s all that needed to be said, before crushing my mouth against hers.
Hadie wrapped her legs around me and pulled me in closer until our bodies felt like they were one and the same. We breathed the same air as we broke apart, met each other’s eyes, and then continued kissing.
The same goose bumps popped up on our arms as I carried Hadie to the backseat of her car. The very same anxiety and apprehension I was feeling flashed in her eyes as I lay her down gently on the seat.
Then finally, after so long, the wall I’d so carefully built around my mind and my heart crumbled. Something inside of me snapped. I was done holding back how I felt. I was done trying to suppress what I really wanted to do.
In this moment, I felt like the seventeen-year-old boy that I really was. Free from my problems; free from the thing that was holding me back. I was free to be myself. In this moment, I was free to be with Hadie the way I wanted to be with her.
Words didn’t need to be exchanged. We both knew exactly what we wanted. I could see the determination in Hadie’s eyes as she pulled off my shirt and tossed it aside. Her eyes drank in my upper body in a way that made my face heat up and I was secretly thankful for the years of early morning and late afternoon football training I’d endured to look this way.
Leaning over, I planted kisses along her collarbone before finding her lips again and teasing my tongue into her mouth. She stroked my tongue with her own and began running her hand over my stomach muscles.
Then, without waiting any longer, I hitched her dress up over her head and threw it aside—the last obstacle standing between us gone.
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Hadie
I stared up at Lincoln in awe as he took in every inch of my bare body like he was trying to memorize it.
It was finally happening. Lincoln and I were finally going to give ourselves to each other in every way possible.
I couldn’t say that I hadn’t thought about this moment for a long time. It had been in the back of my mind ever since we’d started dating, but Lincoln had never made a move, never tried to get me into bed.
I respected him so much more for that. It made this moment so much more special. Our time together, all those small moments, had brought us to this place. We were closer now than we’d ever been. And I loved him. I loved him for teaching me how to laugh again, to not dwell on the bad, to move on when things got rough, to embrace the ups and downs that life presented me with.
There was no doubt in my mind that Lincoln Bracks was the love of my life. I could feel it, just as I could feel the sun on my face each and every morning. The notion had been growing inside me for the past few weeks and now it was a constant. Now it was real. Now I relied on it to grow and to live.
That was why this moment felt so right.
I wasn’t even embarrassed to be naked in front of him. It didn’t seem to matter. Whatever he saw of me, I wanted him to see. I was completely at ease and comfortable around him like I’d never been with anyone else.
I felt breathless as Lincoln touched his lips to my bare stomach. Tingles shot through me in places that I had never imagined possible. I loved how unbridled he was tonight; the passion was burning so clearly in his eyes. Passion for me.
My heart leapt into my throat as our eyes met. I never thought anyone would look at me the way Lincoln was looking at me right now. I loved how he wasn’t holding himself back the way he always did.
Without warning, Lincoln pushed me back and for a moment I was confused by his actions until I saw that he was struggling to get his pants off in the confined space.
Laughing, I reached over to help him. When I’d pictured having sex with him for the first time, I’d never imagined it would be in the backseat of my car.
After his pants off, we spent several long minutes just getting to know each other’s bodies, learning what worked for the other. My hands travelled the length of his body, lingering on muscles of his arms as Lincoln’s lips eagerly sought any part of my bare skin that he could get at.
Each kiss that Lincoln planted filled me with desire. I wasn’t sure how much longer I could put up with his teasing. The way he kissed me was full of hunger and passion, like he couldn’t be satiated. No one had kissed me like that before, as though his life depended on kissing every inch of me.
Lincoln was gentle, with a hint of raw lust about him. It was that rawness that did funny things to me—made me quiver as he sucked at my neck and let out a soft moan when his mouth moved to the hollow of my throat.
My fingers dug into his back as I pulled him in closer. He raised his head to look at me and when our gazes locked, I tried to express everything in that one look.
I wanted him, and I wanted him now.
Lincoln gave me a slow smile that sent shivers shooting through my body. He knew exactly what that look had meant. Raising himself up, he reached over and pulled something out of the pocket of his pants. It was a condom.
As Lincoln ripped open the packet, I closed my eyes. This was really going to happen. It had taken a lot for us to trust each other, but it had finally happened and now we were ready to take the next step.
When Lincoln’s hands grasped my stomach again, I arched my back, wanting him close to me again. His arms wound their way to mine and pinned me down before he pushed himself deep inside of me.
***
If you asked me how long we lay there in the backseat of my car, I couldn’t tell you. The only thing that I could say with certainty was that Lincoln’s heart had beat erratically the entire time as though being close to me made his heart behave abnormally.
We were still in the back seat and I was lying on top of him—he didn’t seem to be bothered by my weight so that was a good thing. It’s not that I was heavy or anything; I just didn’t want him to be uncomfortable.
“How are you feeling?” Lincoln asked, smoothing my hair off my face. “I didn’t mean for this to happen here but by the time I started I couldn’t stop…” His voice trailed off as he lowered his gaze as though he was ashamed of where we’d had sex for the first time.
“It’s fine,” I said, “I’m fine. It was…amazing.”
Now I was the one left feeling embarrassed. I wasn’t really sure what you were supposed to talk about after sex. Did I shake his hand and thank him for his time? Did we lie here and do nothing? Was it okay to comment on the actual act?
With Bennett, we had only slept together once and he had left quickly after it had happened so I didn’t have to worry about making idle chit-chat with him. But Lincoln wasn’t the kind of guy to bolt afterwards. He was the kind of guy who stayed, who held you close, who planted soft kisses on your mouth and who asked if you were okay.
Lincoln grinned at me and rubbed my back. “It’s okay, you can tell me anything. You know that.”
I nodded absently, relishing the taut stomach muscles that I was lying against. Oh my, was Lincoln fine. He was fine in so many ways that writing a list would take too long. He was gorgeous on a physical level, but that’s not what made him so special.
What made Lincoln special was the way his personality called out to me. It was like he’d come here just for me, like we were meant to meet and heal each other. He was kind, generous, caring, and everything he said touched me in a way I couldn’t explain.
If he’d been the ugliest person on the planet, I still would’ve fallen for him because he was gorgeous on the inside in a way that not many people were.
I sat up, taking a deep breath. My thoughts were scattered and I was trying to compose myself before I spoke and rambled on and on like I normally did.
“Um…I’m finding it hard to focus on one single thought.” I bit my lip and twisted around to watch him as he shifted into a position that allowed him to recline against the seat.
Lincoln watched me with curious eyes. “Come on, tell me what’s going through that pretty head of yours.”
It made me giddy and, quite honestly, a little light-headed to hear Lincoln say that I was pretty. Once I was done acting like a kid who’d just hit puberty, I wet my lips and managed to find my voice again.
I met his gaze with hesitance, feeling anxious. “I’m falling for you in a way I never imagined. I don’t know what happens next, I don’t know if this feeling will last, but I find myself not wanting it to end.”
Lincoln was silent, his whole body rigid. He didn’t look at me as he stared straight ahead at the seat in front of him, his eyes unseeing. A muscle was working furiously in his jaw and I’d never seen him look so tense. His lack of response sent a thrill through me, and I actually felt fear snake its way through my body.
“Lincoln?” I prompted, almost afraid to hear what he would say next.
He turned his head to look at me. His face was blank and there was a deadness in his eyes that I’d never seen before. It, quite honestly, terrified me.
“Nothing lasts forever, Hadie,” he said, his voice low. “Not you, not I, not anyone. Nothing is permanent—everything changes.”
The fear seized ahold of me and constricted around my heart painfully. I was finding it difficult to breathe, to think straight. Those were not the words of someone optimistic and in love—they were the words of someone who had given up and lost all hope. It was so unlike the Lincoln I had come to know and grown to love.
“What are you saying?” I managed to choke out. “That we won’t last?”
It was hard to believe that the sweet, spontaneous Lincoln was now staring at me like there was something wrong with me. I couldn’t figure out what was going on. We had just shared one of the most intimate moments that two people could ever share. He had just shown me how to let go of the things that were holding me back—to scream my frustrations out on the world and move on. Was he now trying to move on from me?
“I’m saying that I let this go too far. I should never have done this with you.” He gestured between us as if to emphasize his point. “I told you once before by the lake that I was no good for you. I warned you to stay away from me, but you didn’t listen. Now, it’s too late. The damage is already done and I can’t take back any of it. I can’t do a goddamn thing!”
He punched the seat in front of him, seething with rage. His chest was heaving from whatever he was keeping bottled inside. I couldn’t figure out if he was angry at himself or angry at me for saying that I was falling for him.
“You don’t mean that,” I said, in a state of semi-shock. “You just told me you loved me.”
Lincoln’s face was twisted in a mask of pain and regret. “I do love you, more than you know, but this should never have happened between us. This was a mistake.”
His words were like a slap in the face. My eyes were stinging and my chest was so sore that it felt like I’d slammed straight into a brick wall. It was the same feeling I’d experienced when I’d caught Bennett kissing that hoe bag from Penthill High. The pain washed over me in crashing waves—it was crippling.
I kept making the same mistakes; I kept falling too hard without any thought for the consequences because I expected someone to love me as much as I loved them. Was it too much to ask to be loved wholeheartedly by someone? Was it impossible for a girl like me who was plain, boring, and bookish to find someone who wanted to be with me for me?
I hadn’t learned anything from my disastrous relationship with Bennett. I was still naïve and foolish. I kept thinking that maybe I would find someone who loved me the way the characters in my favorite books loved each other. The kind of love that is unconditional and undemanding. The kind of love that is epic and sweeps you off your feet. The kind of love that keeps you on your toes and makes you swoon.
I thought I’d had that with Lincoln. I thought we had the kind of love that would last forever. But I was wrong. I was delusional. I was in a fantasy world where I couldn’t see the truth if it bitch-slapped me across the face.
As much as I was hurting inside, I didn’t want to give him the satisfaction of seeing me cry. I’d tell him to go to hell, and then I’d drive home and cry myself to sleep.
Feeling suffocated, I opened up the door and climbed out on shaky legs. The door shut behind me and I knew Lincoln had followed me out.
I slowly turned to face him and found him staring down at me with devastation clear across his face. I imagined that I looked pretty similar to him.
Taking a deep breath, I tried to stay calm. “I’m going home now. I’m sure you can get Samantha to pick you up since she seems to want to be with you so bad. I bet your mom would love for the two of you to get together since she hates me so much!”
Turning on my heels, I marched towards the driver’s side door but was forced to stop when Lincoln wrapped a muscular arm around my waist and spun me around to face him.
“Let me go!” I cried, struggling to escape from his hold. I sounded pathetic and I was acting like a toddler throwing a tantrum, but I wanted to be far away from him so I could cry in peace.
“Stop it, Hades.” Lincoln’s brow creased as he waited for me to calm down and act my age. “What are you talking about? What about Samantha and me?”
I stopped thrashing around and fixed him with what I hoped was a steely glare. “Don’t act like you don’t know. Obviously something went on between the two of you in New York. I noticed the way she looked at me like I wasn’t good enough for you or something. It’s the way your mom looks at me.”
Lincoln sighed and relaxed his hold on me. His hands came around to rest on my shoulders as his azure gaze pierced right through me. “I already told you that my mother is shallow and judgmental. It’s sad that regardless of the crap that our family goes through, she will never change. It’s the same old bullshit over and over again with her.”
His words did nothing to reassure me because as hurt as I’d been by his mother’s behaviour, that wasn’t what I wanted to hear. I wanted to know about him and Samantha. I wanted to know if there was anything between them. I wanted to know why she looked at Lincoln and me as though we shouldn’t be together.
“Fine, your mother is shallow and judgmental, but what about Samantha? Why does she look at me like she hates me?”
“I didn’t want to do this here, not like this, but I guess fate had something else in store for us.” Lincoln sighed, pressing his fingers to his forehead as though his thoughts were overwhelming him. “Samantha doesn’t hate you, not in the slightest. If anything, she is angrier w
ith me than you could ever know. She thinks I’m playing a game with you, that I’m going to ruin your life.”
He halted, studying me as though to gauge my reaction.
I wasn’t sure what to feel or think. My mind was cold and numb like a block of ice. I still didn’t understand where Lincoln was going with this or what he was trying to say.
“Are you playing a game with me?”
“No, I’m not.” Lincoln shook his head. “But I never wanted things to get this serious between us. This was never supposed to happen. I came here to get away from my relationships, not to make new ones. And definitely not to fall in love.”
My heart sped up at his words. He did love me. He’d said it more than once, yet he still wasn’t making any sense. “But you said that we were a mistake; that falling in love with me was a mistake.”
Lincoln’s eyes were conflicted as he nodded. “Falling for you was a mistake, but it was the best mistake I ever made.”
“Then why does Samantha think that you’re going to ruin my life?”
“Because I am,” Lincoln breathed. “I am going to ruin your life so completely that you won’t know what hit you. Samantha doesn’t like seeing us together, not because she wants to be with me, but because she knows that there’s no way for our relationship to work. It’s something that can’t last.”
“Why?’ I demanded, placing my hands on my hips. “Why can’t our relationship last? If we love each other then…”
Lincoln was shaking his head as his face turned pale. “It can’t last because there’s something I haven’t told you, Hadie. Something that got harder and harder to tell you the more time we spent together.”
My heart stopped, and a feeling of dread settled in the pit of my stomach. “What is it?”
Lincoln squeezed his eyes shut as though he was being tortured. The pain was so raw, so real, that I could practically feel it radiating from his body and curling itself around me.
“Hadie, I don’t have much time left.” He opened his eyes, fixing me with a helpless look that ripped my insides apart. “I’m dying.”
