Down Too Deep

by J. Daniels

  “I almost did when it refused to come off. What the fuck?” I tucked messy strands behind her ear, getting them out of her face. “That was the most confusing piece of clothing I’ve ever seen. Never wear that again.”

  “You figured it out.” She leaned over, pressing her lips to my abs and then resting her cheek there. She sighed in content. “That was some top-notch romantic fucking. Well done, Mr. Bell.”

  I smiled at her.

  “I saw the new billboard today. It looks really good.”

  “Yeah, I thought so too. Tori did a great job with it.”

  I was kicking myself for not giving Tori a management position a long time ago. I could’ve been spending more time with Marley. With Sadie…I pushed that guilt out of my head. I didn’t want to think about what-ifs right now.

  “What made you want to own your own restaurant? Did you always want to do that?” Jenna asked.

  “No.” I bent my arm and slid it behind my head, raising myself up higher. “Not until college. Sadie came up with the idea. We met working at this restaurant on campus.”

  “I don’t know that story. Tell it to me.”

  “There really isn’t a story. We were both servers…”

  “Who made the first move?”

  “I guess I did.” I chuckled at the memory. “She, uh…This place we worked at, you had to write your name backward and upside down on these paper tablecloths when you first introduced yourself, before going over specials and shit.”

  “That sounds difficult. Backward and upside down?” Jenna lifted her hand and slowly traced her finger in the air. “I don’t think I could do it.”

  “It was hard, but I got good at it. Sadie was terrible. She couldn’t get it down. So I started watching out and when people got seated in her section, I’d go over there first and write her name for her.”

  Jenna smiled against me. “That’s sweet. I love a good meet-cute.”

  My brow furrowed. “A good what?”

  “How a couple meets for the first time…a meet-cute.”

  “Did you just make that up?”

  “No. People use it.”

  “Who are these people besides you? Did my daughter teach you this phrase? This sounds like something Marley would say when she first started forming sentences.”

  “Shut up.” Jenna giggled, and I laughed with her. “So you got together and talked about owning your own restaurant?”

  “Eventually it came up. I majored in business to cover my ass. I didn’t have one fucking clue what I’d end up doing. During one of our shifts together, Sadie mentioned something about owning our own place and everything we’d do better than the management we were working under. We’d throw out ideas, trying to top the other person. Closer to graduation, I thought more seriously about it. Then it became something I had to do. I wanted it.”

  “Did Sadie ever work at Whitecaps?”

  “Not like I do or how you’re thinking. She was a financial examiner—that was her actual job—so yeah, she did stuff on that end…I mean, Whitecaps was ours. We were in that together, but she also worked a lot on her own. There were weeks where she’d work more than I did. Until she had Marley…”

  I thought about how different Sadie became after that. Going from a woman who barely spent any time at home to one who hardly ever left the house. I remembered our conversation about her wanting to cut short her maternity leave.

  “You were both workaholics,” Jenna concluded.

  “Can we talk about something else?” I asked. She nodded immediately. “Sorry, I just…That’s basically the whole story anyway. There’s not much else to say about it.” That wasn’t entirely a lie. At least I’d given Jenna what she’d asked for.

  “What do you want to talk about?” she said.

  “You.” Her one visible cheek deepened in color with her flush. “Where did you go to school? I don’t think you ever told me.”

  “I probably didn’t. I went to this little community college out in Denver. You wouldn’t know it.” Her gaze fell between us to a spot on the sheet. The corner of her mouth twitched.

  “What are you thinking about right now?” I asked.

  “I’m not thinking about anything.”

  “And I’m not borderline obsessed with your rack.”

  Jenna looked into my face and smiled. When my phone began to ring, she lifted her head and peered over at the nightstand. “Do you need to get that?”

  I reached over and checked the caller. “It’s just my parents. I’ll call them back,” I said, hitting ignore. “They’re probably calling to talk to Marley anyway.” I settled against the pillow again. “Go ahead. Tell me what you were thinking.”

  Jenna sighed, dropping her cheek against me. “I’m not sure I want to admit this, or if it’s even something I should think without anyone else knowing about it…”

  “Well, now you absolutely have to tell me,” I said, pushing my frames up my nose. “I kept the glasses on for you, didn’t I?”

  “Oh, I hadn’t realized your sight was something only I cared about.”

  “Jenna.” I forced a serious tone. “Why are you such a liar?”

  Her mouth dropped open. “How am I a liar?”

  “You wanted me wearing my glasses because you like how I look in them. Your request had jack shit to do with my vision.”

  I could see fine without my glasses, as long as I wasn’t trying to read something. She knew it too. I’d shared that information with Jenna before. And I knew exactly how she looked at me when I wore them, compared to when I didn’t. The difference was subtle, but it was there.

  Jenna lifted her head and fought a smile. “I care very much about whether you can see properly. Even during intimate moments.”

  “I was thinking about changing frames.”

  “You better not.”

  “No? Are you saying you prefer these? I thought it was all about my vision…” I grinned at her then.

  She huffed out a breath and rolled her eyes. “Fine…but I do care about your sight, Nathan.”

  “That’s sweet.”

  “Thank you. It is, isn’t it? You’re welcome for that.”

  We were both laughing now.

  “Damn, you’re fun,” I said, stroking her cheek.

  A warm look passed over her face. “So are you.”

  “What were you thinking about before? You can tell me.”

  Jenna bit her lip and shook her head.

  “Come on…” I rubbed her side. “I want to know.”

  Shit, I felt like I needed to know. Had any thought ever been this important?

  “I wish you’d been the boy in my freshman psych class,” she blurted. Her eyes closed and pinched shut. “Um…yeah, I totally said that.”

  I stared at her. I couldn’t blink. Breathe. I didn’t dare move.

  “I just…I wish there was some way I could have everything I have right now.” She looked at me then. “And you could have everything you have, minus…I wouldn’t want the bad things too. I’d never want that…What I mean is, if there were a way it could’ve been you instead, but obviously I wouldn’t want to take away what you had with Sadie. That’s not what I mean.”

  Jenna flinched and sat up, kneeling beside my hip. She quickly gathered the sheet in front of herself, tucking it underneath her arms and around her thighs so she was covered.

  “See, this is why I didn’t want to admit this—I know exactly what I’m trying to say and it’s coming out all wrong…” She started rushing through the rest. “What I meant to say was, if there were a way to keep things how they are now, with the kids, but change how it happened…for me.” Her hand flattened to her chest. “Change it for me, not you. I don’t mean you, Nathan. I’m not saying—”

  I jerked upright and kissed her.

  Jenna moaned when our lips touched. Her breath was quick against my mouth. “I’m sorry…I know how that sounded. I shouldn’t have said that.”

  “Stop.” My hand slid from her cheek to the
back of her neck. I guided her down to her side, pulling the sheet away and rolling Jenna onto her back.

  She stared up at me, expecting me to say more, and I couldn’t. I couldn’t think to speak. My heart was pounding too loud. I could barely hear Jenna’s quiet begging voice when I began to kiss my way down her body, let alone the thoughts I was trying to grasp at.

  I didn’t dare move before. I couldn’t stop myself now.

  I kissed her breasts, her ribs, the sweet dip in her stomach and lower. I hovered my mouth between her legs and watched her eyes roll closed as I breathed in and out, right fucking there.

  “Nathan.” She gasped, spreading her thighs wider. Urging me.

  I nuzzled my mouth against her pussy.

  Jenna whimpered and pushed her hand into my hair. She held me still when I tongued her clit like she never wanted me to move, but when I licked lower between the folds of her sex, she jerked her hips up and pressed herself against my mouth. She rocked into the pleasure.

  “God…oh God, please,” she begged. Her stomach quivered underneath my hand.

  I slid my touch up her body and squeezed her breast. I worked her with my tongue, licking where she grew wettest, and sucked on her clit until she trembled against the bed. And when she arched her back and shook against my mouth, I didn’t dare close my eyes.

  Jenna panted and writhed as she came, gripping my hair and tugging, her pretty voice crying out.

  Again, still, I couldn’t speak. I could only move.

  Her legs fell heavy against the mattress as I slid them from my shoulders and then curled around my waist when I crawled up her body. I sank over her.

  We kissed long and deep. Jenna moaned when she felt how hard I was, trapped between our bodies. She tried peering down to see it. Her hand sought me out and cupped the tip.

  “I want you,” she said.

  Move, I thought.

  I pushed up, straightening my arms, and reached for the nightstand to grab another condom.

  On my knees between her bent legs, I rolled the rubber down my shaft, then covered Jenna’s body with mine again and pushed inside her.

  Finally, finally, words flooded my mouth. I chased after my thoughts, sharing every single one as they came to me. I couldn’t stop giving them to her.

  I told Jenna how amazing she was. How again, this was too good. How is this real? Tell me. I said she made my favorite sounds. And after I came seconds before she did, I pressed my mouth to her ear and told her how hard I was again already. How I’d never been this into someone before.

  I said everything short of admitting I felt the same way she did, that I wished it had been me in her psych class too. That I knew exactly what she had been trying to say and how she said it perfectly to me. No one could’ve said it better. I didn’t think those words were needed. She had to know…

  I was out of my mind for this woman. How could she not see it?

  Chapter Twenty-One

  JENNA

  After Shay dropped the girls off with freshly painted nails, Nathan offered to make us dinner. A gesture I was beyond excited about—no man had ever made me dinner before. Not one I was dating anyway. He also insisted on handling all preparations and forced me over to the table after I kept grabbing ingredients to rinse, chop, and/or dice, even after he told me not to.

  “I said I’ll do it. Do I need to tie you down?” Nathan asked low in my ear, pulling out one of the kitchen chairs and guiding me to sit.

  “I’m sorry! I can’t help it.” I laughed. “I’m just used to doing everything. It’s weird when I don’t. And it isn’t like I mind lending you a hand…”

  “I know you don’t mind. That’s not the point.” Nathan moved around the kitchen. “I’m not great at this. I can cook three things really well and spaghetti is one of them. That’s why I suggested we have spaghetti.” He stopped in front of the cutting board, admiring the prep I’d completed. “Jenna…”

  “What?” I giggled at his solemn expression.

  “I’m trying to show off a little here,” he said, lifting his gaze. “How am I supposed to do that if you dice the onion better than me?”

  Every muscle in my body tightened in delight. “I didn’t know you were trying to show off.”

  “For you? When am I not?”

  Nathan studied me for a moment like I was insane to think anything different than what he’d just shared, then gathered the cut-up veggies and walked over to the stove, dumping them in the sauce.

  I looked down at my lap and bit my lower lip. I couldn’t stop smiling. He was trying to impress me. How could I not feel so happy I could burst?

  No one had made an effort like this for me before. No one had come close.

  Earlier, I had been terrified to share what had been on my mind, not only in that moment, but recently, for at least the past few weeks. I had no idea how Nathan would react to hearing me say I wished it would’ve been him and not Derek nine years ago. I knew exactly how that admission sounded and the implications it would lead to. Revealing that was a huge risk. Even worse, I’d gone on trying to explain myself and had failed miserably in my clarification.

  I should’ve felt embarrassed, and for long, uncomfortable seconds, I did. I wanted to take it all back. Way to show your inexperience with relationships, Jenna. I’d said too much. I was moving us too fast. Nathan would pull back and slow us down. His apprehension would be obvious. I waited for it.

  He kissed me instead. And the way we came together after, the look in Nathan’s eyes and every moaned word he spoke, his desperate grip on my body…I’d never felt so sure of my feelings for someone before. Any worry I’d had, any regret that I had misspoken and overstepped, it slipped away.

  Falling in love was overwhelmingly scary. It was also becoming the easiest thing I had ever done.

  The girls giggled from the family room, getting my attention off my lap. I leaned over to peer at them around the table.

  Olivia was on her hands and knees, stacking dominoes behind the couch in a slithering snake pattern. Marley sat beside her, watching closely while clutching the bucket of tiles in her lap.

  I stood, heading for the stairs. I’d left my phone on Nathan’s nightstand, forgetting to grab it after we hastily dressed.

  “What are you doing?” he asked, his back to me. “I swear to God, Jenna, if you touch that garlic bread…”

  I laughed loudly, and hearing me, Nathan looked over his shoulder and grinned.

  “I’m just getting my phone,” I told him, pausing at the corner of the island. “The girls look so sweet. I want to take a picture of them before they move.”

  “Here.” Nathan kept stirring the sauce with one hand and with the other, dug his phone out of his pocket. He stretched his arm out and held it above the counter. “Take pictures with mine. By the time you come back down, they’ll be doing something else.”

  He was right about that.

  “Thanks.” I hurried over, reaching across the island, and took Nathan’s phone.

  “The password is 0502.”

  I blushed, meeting his eyes.

  “Surprised I told you that?” he asked.

  “No…”

  “You sure? You look surprised.” Nathan turned back to the sauce.

  Surprised wasn’t the word I’d use for what I was feeling. I was happy. This was another first for me. I’d never been serious enough with anyone to be in the “sharing passwords” stage. Mm. I really liked this stage.

  “Mine is 1387,” I announced as I moved out of the kitchen. When I glanced back at Nathan, our eyes met.

  He’d already been looking at me. And he was looking at me in a way that told me he liked this stage as much as I did.

  In that moment, another piece of my heart became his.

  I stopped in the family room a few feet away from the girls and clicked the home button. Several notifications appeared on the screen.

  Nathan had two missed calls now, both from his parents’ house. His ringer must’ve been off, bec
ause the last call was made two minutes ago. There was also an unread text from his dad.

  Checking in. Call me please.

  “Hey, did you know your parents called you again?” I asked, peering behind me. Nathan was carrying the large pot over to the sink. Steam wafted into the air as he dumped the water and noodles into a strainer. “Your dad texted you too. He says to call him. Do you want to do it now?”

  “No. I’ll call them after dinner. I’m sure they just want to talk to Marley. They haven’t in a few days.”

  “Okay.” I entered the passcode and pulled up the camera mode, turning the phone sideways to get the shot. “Girls, smile!”

  Olivia and Marley whipped their heads around. Both of them grinned. “Cheese!” they said in unison.

  I took three quick photos, catching the two of them as their heads drifted closer together. “So cute!” I crooned.

  I spun around and drifted back into the kitchen, nearly reaching the island when Nathan’s phone vibrated in my hand. I glanced at the screen. It was a text from Davis.

  Don’t read it. This isn’t for you, I thought as my eyes automatically scanned the message. I stopped frozen, a foot away from the counter, and read the message again.

  Your dad just called. Says he’s been trying to reach you. I know today is 2 years. U ok?

  I lifted my head and looked at Nathan.

  He was standing at the oven, adding more seasoning to the sauce. He gave it a stir and then tasted it as today’s date flashed in my mind.

  It was July 29.

  A date that had absolutely no meaning to me before this very moment. Now I knew it as the day Sadie took her own life.

  “It’s almost ready,” Nathan said, pushing bottles around the spice cabinet he was searching through. “Am I out of red pepper flakes? I can’t find any.”

  My breathing slowed and grew louder as a single, worrying thought circled inside my head. Nathan could not have spent the afternoon with me, doing everything we did and saying everything he said without forgetting what today was. I didn’t think this sweet, thoughtful man would be cooking us dinner and making me feel so incredibly important to him without overlooking the reason I could be here right now.