Love, Always and Forever

by Alexis Morgan

  “So did I, a little too much. That’s the problem.” He pushed himself up to support his weight on his elbows and remained motionless. “I promise we’ll get back to this shortly, but I have a few other things in mind first.”

  His eyes about rolled back in his head when the vixen reached between them to give his balls a gentle squeeze. “And if I don’t want to slow things down?”

  It was adorable how daring she’d become. “Let’s see if I can change your mind about that.”

  He started by kissing her, keeping it soft and teasing. “Did that convince you?”

  She grinned. “Nope.”

  “How about this?”

  He caught her nipple between his lips and teeth and suckled it hard. She gasped and closed her eyes tightly as he paid equal attention to her other breast, licking his way up the soft curve before once again tugging rhythmically on its beaded tip. Oh, yeah, she liked that all right. Time to move on or, better yet, down.

  When he blew on her damp curls, she sighed and spread her legs wider. He accepted her unspoken invitation to taste her. After only a few quick flicks of his tongue, she moaned and kneaded the bedspread with her fingers. From the tension thrumming in her lush body, she was but seconds away from a climax. He intended to make sure it was just the first of many tonight.

  He eased a finger deep within her, seeking out her sweet spot. Two licks and one stroke had her body bowing up off the bed. “Misha! Yes!”

  His turn. He surged back up her body and buried himself deep within her welcoming heat. A few hard strokes later, she was right there with him and holding on tight as they both shuddered and shouted in release.

  While he struggled to find the strength to speak, he tucked her in at his side. “Take a second to catch your breath, babe, because I promise that was just for starters.”

  She smiled up at him. “Conceited much?”

  “It’s not conceit when it’s fact.”

  He loved that she laughed as she snuggled in closer. In fact, he loved her, period. With no idea what to do about that realization, he gave himself over to sleep and hoped he’d be thinking clearer when he awoke.

  —

  In the dark quiet right before dawn, Mikhail stared up at the ceiling. He was sending Amy a whole mess of mixed signals, but he couldn’t seem to help himself. Everything she’d told him about her life before and after her surgery scared him shitless. He’d also told her nothing less than the truth about his concerns about surviving another epic failure to protect someone in his care. Losing his mother all those years ago had left him badly damaged. Losing Amy might just destroy him.

  She also didn’t want or need another man in her life who would hover over her and constantly worry about what would happen if she pushed herself too hard. He understood that. Amy deserved better than to live her life completely smothered in the bubble-wrapped worry of her loved ones. A man would have to be strong enough to let her live a normal life, one without restrictions and without lies.

  Could he be that man? God knows he wanted to be.

  If only he could pick up the phone and call Joe like he used to when he was stationed in some hellhole on the other side of the world. Unfortunately there was no cellphone service where his father was now. Jack or Tino would do their best to advise him, but they all three knew it wasn’t the same as talking to their father. They’d all been seen as damaged goods when they’d first arrived on Joe’s doorstep. He had rejected the labels society had put on them and helped mold three teenage boys with bad attitudes into the men they were today. God knows where they would have ended up without him pushing them to excel.

  Mikhail dragged his thoughts back to the present, where a quick check of the time made him want to curse. He didn’t have long before he had to be at work. He eased away from Amy and got out of the bed, trying not to disturb her.

  Despite his best efforts, she stirred and blinked up at him. “Misha?”

  “I didn’t mean to wake you, but I have to get ready for work.”

  He stepped closer and brushed her hair back from her face. “You had a long night. Go back to sleep. I’ll let Panda out and feed him before I leave.”

  Amy pushed herself up into a sitting position, her legs drawn up, and her arms folded on her knees to support her chin. “Before you go, we need to talk—or at least I do.”

  His heart did a stutter step. “Okay.”

  Even in the dimly lit room he could feel the intensity of her gaze as she watched him with those pretty, dark eyes. “Last night was…amazing. A gift, really, and I’ll cherish what we shared forever.”

  The best he could do was nod.

  “But, Misha, it can’t happen again. As great as it was…as special as you are, I need someone who’ll let me live, and you need someone who’ll play it safe. Those two things aren’t exactly compatible.”

  He knew a goodbye when he heard it, but he hadn’t realized it would feel like a knife in his heart. That didn’t mean she was wrong. All that was left to do was man up and make this easier on one of them.

  “Thank you for, well, for everything you’ve shared with me, Amy.” He knelt on the bed to give her one last kiss, which tasted both sweet and sorrowful, before starting for the door. At the last second he turned back one last time. “If somehow, someway, I can get my head straightened out, we’ll talk again. You know, about us. I promise.”

  In the dimly lit room, he couldn’t be sure if she actually nodded or if that was wishful thinking on his part. Gathering up his clothes along the way, he headed for the kitchen and let the dogs out. He got dressed while he waited for them to take care of business. Locking up on his way out, he left to get ready for work.

  Forty-five minutes later, he pulled out of his driveway, wishing like hell he wasn’t leaving something precious behind.

  —

  Amy woke up again two hours later, alone and hurting, her eyes burning from crying herself back to sleep. She regretted the need to redraw the line between her and Mikhail, but it had been the right thing to do, not just for her sake, but his as well. That knowledge hurt every bit as much as she’d expected it to, but she refused to regret what they’d shared last night.

  As she went through her morning routine, she considered what he’d said about the need to get his head straightened out. Maybe he wasn’t the only one who needed to do that, and right at the top of her to-do list was mending some fences with her family, not something that could be accomplished over the phone. No, they all needed to sit down and discuss a few things. Maybe draw a few lines there, too. It wouldn’t be fun, but it would be the adult thing to do. But when? All things considered, sooner was better than later. She wasn’t ready to watch Mikhail going about his daily life, especially when her role in it had changed so drastically.

  So, for both their sakes, she’d leave for a few days and give both of them a badly needed breather. She checked the weather—sunny and warm, perfect for a long motorcycle ride. Unfortunately, she couldn’t take Panda with her if she did that.

  Besides, showing up on her bike might not be the best way to start off a discussion with her folks. She sent her mother a text to expect a visit later in the day. Her phone pinged with a response within seconds. To her surprise, the message was from Mikhail. I hope you’re okay. I hated having to leave so early even if it was for the best. Ricky will check in on Sarge for me today, so don’t worry about him. Or me.

  She stared at the words. Darn him, anyway. It was just like him to worry more about her and his dog than he did himself. Then the phone pinged again signaling a second message, which simply said, I won’t forget my promise.

  She stared at the screen. Like she had already told him, hope was a tricky thing. Could either of them move on if they clung to the possibility that he might find a way to accept her determination to live a normal life? She had to say something, to let him know she’d gotten his message. She kept it simple. Stay safe.

  There was so much she wanted to say, things that couldn’t be put in a t
ext message or left on his voicemail. As a compromise, before she left, she’d stick a note in his mailbox. For now, she needed to get moving.

  It took her ten minutes to put Panda’s crate in her car and another ten to gather up his toys and food. She dithered for twenty minutes deciding which clothes to pack and collecting her toiletries. Finally, she wasted another hour on a dozen failed attempts to compose a message for Mikhail before she came up with something remotely satisfactory.

  She studied the note one last time, still not sure what else she could say beyond repeating that last night had been amazing and how much it meant to her that he’d been so honest with her about…well, everything. She’d also made it clear that she hoped they could figure out how to still be friends when she got back from visiting her family.

  Although friendship seemed unlikely. How could they go back to the way things had been before they’d foolishly erased that all-important line in the sand?

  After signing her name, it took her three tries to stick the note in the envelope. The fact that her hands were shaking probably had something to do with that or maybe it was the sheen of tears that made it hard to see clearly.

  There was nothing more to be done now. She shoved it in his mailbox, got in her car, and headed down the road to face off against her family.

  —

  Mikhail dragged himself home, depressed and tired, but not sleepy. For once he’d gotten a full eight hours of sleep at the firehouse. Going twenty-four hours without having to respond to a bad car wreck or a house fire was a rarity. Normally a quiet shift was something to be grateful for, and he was. Sort of, anyway. He didn’t want to wish anyone ill, but he would have preferred to have been busy. The quiet had left him with far too many hours to think.

  As a result, Amy had never been far from his mind.

  Maybe he’d feel better if he took Sarge for a long walk. Would it be wrong to stop by to see if Panda would like to tag along? At least that would give him a legitimate excuse to see how Amy was doing. After outfitting Sarge in his harness and leash, they headed over to knock on her door.

  No answer.

  He peeked in the front window. No sign of either Amy or the dog. Maybe they were around back. Again no answer when he knocked on the kitchen door. There were no lights on in the house and, worse yet, Panda’s crate was missing from its usual spot in the corner of the kitchen by the table. What the hell?

  She normally didn’t take Panda with her when she ran errands, but maybe she’d needed to take the little guy to the vet or something. For now, he would take Sarge for his walk and then check in with her when they got back to make sure everything was okay.

  But after taking a leisurely stroll around the neighborhood, there was still no sign of either Amy or her roommate.

  “Well, dog, guess all we can do is wander on home.”

  On the way inside, he picked up his mail and tossed it on the kitchen counter. After grabbing a soft drink out of the fridge, he flipped through the stack. As usual, it was mostly junk mail and bills, but at the bottom there was a small envelope that simply had Misha handwritten on the front.

  “Sarge, why would Amy leave me a note instead of calling or at least sending a text message?”

  The dog woofed softly, echoing Mikhail’s own suspicion that it wasn’t a good thing. “Only one way to find out, I guess.”

  He ripped open the envelope to get at the folded paper inside and read the first sentence. “Well, boy, it says here that she’s gone home to visit her family and isn’t sure when she’ll be back. That explains why both she and Panda are gone.”

  Sarge made no comment this time. Continuing on, Mikhail forced himself to read the note slowly, taking each word as it came.

  As if sensing his owner wasn’t happy, Sarge parked his backside next to Mikhail’s foot and leaned against his leg. He patted the dog on the head and went back to reading, picking up where he’d left off. “She says she’s grateful I was so honest with her about my past and my mom. Why I am the way I am. I’m not sure she should feel that way considering I know it hurt her, especially when it comes to how I reacted to her situation.”

  He suspected that he had disappointed her, proving himself to be just like her family. Hell, he was disappointed in his reaction as well.

  The dog grumbled in what sounded like sympathy. “You’re right, Sarge. I don’t like this, either, but at least it sounds like she thought the sex was great.”

  She was right about that, even if she didn’t have any basis for comparison. He drew a slow breath and read the last line. Then he read it again. She appreciated his promise, but she wouldn’t hold him to it, not if it only made things harder for them both. Seriously? Couldn’t she have given him a little time to figure things out before giving up on them?

  He could only come up with one reason for that: she thought he’d given up on them first.

  He sank to the kitchen floor. What was he supposed to do now?

  Numb, he wasn’t sure how long he sat there before Sarge whined and crawled up in his lap. He obliged the dog by scratching his head. “Dog, I wish you could talk. I could use some good advice about now.”

  Sarge responded by snorting in Mikhail’s face, startling him into laughing. “I appreciate your support, big guy, but I wish bulldog love wasn’t always so slimy.”

  Another reason to wish it was Joe sitting there with him instead of a fifty-pound dog with a habit of drooling. After wiping his face with the hem of his shirt, Mikhail picked up the note again, intending to put it away to reread again later. But when he reached for the envelope, he froze. Something about seeing his name handwritten on an envelope like that meant something, but what?

  Then a memory popped into his brain that had him wanting to smack himself upside the head. True, it wasn’t possible to talk to Joe, but Joe could talk to Mikhail, at least in a manner of speaking. The man had left a letter for each of his three sons with his attorney. Mikhail had no idea what he’d written to Jack and Tino, but he knew for a fact those letters had helped each of them get through some tough times. The only downside was that reading those letters had also been painful for his brothers. They’d both admitted that reading Joe’s last words to them had been like saying goodbye to their father all over again.

  As a result, Mikhail had been in no rush to read his own letter, but his gut said the time was now. He gently shoved Sarge off his lap and headed for his bedroom. The letter was in the same drawer where he kept his one picture of his mother.

  He studied her mug shot for what felt like a long time. As always, he saw past the dark circles below his mother’s eyes and the stark pain in her expression to the fragile beauty underneath. Staring into the pale blue eyes so like his own, he did his best to make peace with his memories. “Mom, I told Amy all about you. About us. I’m still all tangled up inside about what happened back then, and I’m scared I’ve let it screw up all the good things I had going on with her. Talking to you like this isn’t going to help with that, so I’m going to go see my other mother. It doesn’t mean that I love you any less, but I really need to talk to her before I see what Joe wanted to tell me.”

  Then he carefully returned the picture and took out the letter. It felt far heavier than it should have, but maybe that was only his imagination.

  “Come on, Sarge. Let’s go see Mom.”

  An hour later he was sitting at the table in Marlene’s kitchen. He’d already given her the PG version of what had happened between him and Amy.

  Marlene refilled his coffee cup and sat down next to him. “I’ll tell you the same thing I told your brothers, Misha. You made the mess, so you need to find a way to fix things. I have every confidence you’ll be able to do that if she really means that much to you. For the record, Amy was right about one thing. Your mother wouldn’t have wanted you to spend your life afraid to love because of what happened to her. Try as you might, it’s just not possible to protect your heart from hurt. It nearly killed me to lose Joe, but I wouldn’t have given up
the years we had together for anything. The love all of us shared as a family made it all worth it.”

  She reached across to put her hand on his. “One more thing. I won’t lie to you. It wasn’t easy to have my three boys in danger all the time. To be honest, son, I worry about you being a fireman, but I also knew that was your decision to make. What I’m trying to say is that you have to let the people you love live their lives, risks and all.”

  “I know.”

  He finally pulled the envelope out of his shirt pocket and laid it on the table. “I think it’s time I open Dad’s letter, but it didn’t feel right reading it at my house. Jack and Tino both read theirs over in the annex, so that’s where I’m headed next.”

  “Sarge and I will be fine right here. But if you need us, call and we’ll come running.”

  “Good to know.”

  He stood up and kissed her on the cheek before heading over to the annex. Once inside, he took a minute to look around. Joe had helped his three sons finish the garage into their own three-bedroom apartment, and he’d left his mark on the place just as he had on Jack, Tino, and Mikhail. No wonder he’d felt compelled to return there to read Joe’s letter.

  He settled on the couch and carefully opened the envelope and pulled out the single sheet of paper inside. “Dad, whatever you told Jack and Tino worked for them. I hope like hell you’re batting a thousand in this, because I really need you to help me get my head on straight one last time.”

  Dear Mikhail,

  Misha, my boy, I can’t tell you how sorry I am that I’m not sitting there knocking back a few beers with you. But things are as they are, so this letter will have to do instead.

  God knows, I never claimed to be all that wise, and I can just hear Marlene laughing at the very idea. However, that’s not going to stop me from offering you one last piece of advice.

  Son, it’s past time for you to dig down deep and find a way to forgive yourself for what happened with your mom. It was never ever your job to take care of her. After all, she was the adult in the family, not you. Having said that, I always figured she must have been pretty special to have raised a son with a big heart like yours. She would’ve never wanted you to bear the burden of guilt you carry over her death. Believe that, even if you never believe anything else I have ever tried to teach you.