Chapter Thirty Five
Extra-Ordinary
My father never missed an opportunity to make me feel any more than just ordinary. We never got along well, but we always tolerated each other.
“How’s the company?”
I shrugged, “business is good.”
Probably not the answer he wanted to hear—and of course, I wouldn’t want to crush his dreams and not let my company perish so I can one day run his wine business.
“Heard you did a couple remodeling jobs for Amber,”
he said, like my work was meaningless, sipping his tasteless wine.
I nodded. “Yeah.”
I knew it was a bad idea to come here sooner than I needed to be—there was something I wanted to take care of, something I wanted to verify and that was the only reason why I was sitting here in the living room with my father making small talk, long before dinner time.
He set the glass down. “What’s gonna happen once you’ve remodeled everywhere in this small town?”
I took a long breath. “I don’t know, Dad, I could probably retire.”
“Retire,”
he repeated, “you mean giving up?”
“Whatever’s easier for you to believe,”
I mumbled.
“Ardley is about to have a baby—”
I rolled my eyes. “Yeah, I know I should have a family of my own by now—”
“No,”
he cut me off, “I was going to say I think what he did was unorthodox.”
Why am I not surprised?
“If he couldn’t have kids, why didn’t he just adopt? This way if far more shameful—”
I quickly stood up. “That’s your grandchild you’re talking about, Dad, what’s done is done, can’t you just be happy for us once?”
I walked away before he could get another word in.
Honestly, it didn’t look like he’d try to apologize or anything, he just leaned back in his chair and took a sip of his wine—gazing off into his perfect imagination, probably a world where I ran his wine business and I was married to some rich girl whose father was just like mine, and Ardley was happy with Celeste pregnant.
I shuddered at the thought.
I walked to the back of the house and grabbed a shovel then walked across the estate to reach the barn. I walked all the way behind the barn.
I would probably spend the whole afternoon digging because I didn’t remember the exact spot where we buried this thing, but I needed to be sure that I wasn’t going crazy. There’d been too many coincidences, and there was a voice at the back of my head who wasn’t quite sure if everything was truly as it seemed. I pushed down the shovel into the dirt with a grunt.
I was going to dig up that time capsule.
Junior, the head of staff was going to hate me because I’d dug about six holes already. I’d have to buy new grass to cover up these holes. It’d been hours already and I hadn’t found anything yet. The sun was starting to go down, though it’d been sweltering. The sky looked darker now though, like it would rain soon. I took my shirt off long ago because it was too hot—my pants felt like they became part of my legs. I was dirty from head to toe. The shovel felt like it weighed a thousand pounds.
I dug and dug until my shovel hit a metal piece and I heard the clunk sound.
I dropped my shovel and fell onto my knees and started digging with my fingers. I pulled out the silver lockbox with the combination lock. The box looked old and rusty from being buried eighteen years ago.
I wiped the box as best as I could and entered the code. As silly as it sounded, it was twenty-four—my favorite player’s jersey number.
I held my breath as I opened the box, nervous to find the answers I was looking for and nervous that I might be going crazy from thinking what I was thinking.
I grabbed the piece of paper. My note. The paper was still folded, but it looked old, and it clearly lost its original color. I didn’t exactly remember what I wrote but I had an idea of what it could be about, so I didn’t open it. I saw my signed hockey puck, but Juliette’s bear was missing, my mother’s hairpin was missing. The hairpin I gave Juliette wasn’t in the box.
Juliette’s stuff wasn’t. In. The. Box.
I released a heavy breath, closed the box, and stood up.
I was fucking right. Juliette was my Juliette.
When I got into the house Juliette was in the middle of an awkward hugging session with my mother. She just came in I’d assume.
I hid the box behind my back before they both noticed me.
“Callum…”
My mother greeted me with a disgusted look on her face as she looked at me from head to toe. Probably worried I was tracking dirt on her expensive wood.
I was still shirtless, dirty khaki pants with dirty brown boots, sweaty hair and dirt smeared all over my chest.
“Where are you coming from?”
she asked.
My eyes met with Juliette’s brown ones—I watched her throat bob as she swallowed.
She was wearing a long flowery patterned dress, her curly hair slicked back into a low bun. She was wearing the red boots again, the ones I got her.
She looked gorgeous.
My chest heaved, “I was with the horses…”
I looked at my own dirty two feet, “I feel down.” I lied.
“Go shower. Juliette’s here for dinner,” she said.
I looked up to look at Juliette, her innocent round face greeted me with a soft smile. But she couldn’t pick which appropriate part of my body to look at so her eyes were switching from my chest to my eyes.
I chuckled. “Yeah I’ll be ready in a few,”
I said as I headed for the stairs.
“Don’t be long!”
my mother shouted at me then turned to Juliette, “do you need a tour, dear?”
“Sure.”
She laughed nervously.
It was pouring outside and Ardley came in time for dinner. I guess mom really did have her ways with him because he showed up after all. He was still ignoring me, but he said hey to me today—he acknowledged me. We were making baby steps.
He still looked tired, and his hair was a mess, all grown out, and his beard was coming in too. I didn’t think I’d ever seen Ardley with a beard.
He wore a black hoodie with sweatpants, and it looked like he could only focus on his food.
We were having strip steak au poivre. My father, that wine addict, wanted to add wine into the steak, but mom disagreed because Juliette was eating with us. He was still whining about it.
“Isn’t drinking wine enough, honey?”
my mother asked politely, her eyes were sending daggers at Dad, probably embarrassed in front of Juliette.
I didn’t understand why she was so obsessed with impressing Juliette because it was clearly freaking Juliette out. She was nervously picking at her food.
I looked at Ardley. “How are you doing?”
“His wife is dying, what kind of question is that?”
my father chimed in.
“Robbert!”
my mother yelled after him.
I sighed as I picked up my fork again.
“Juliette, dear, forgive us, it’s a sensitive time for us all.”
“No, yeah, I understand. It’s really okay, I don’t mind,”
Juliette quickly said.
I didn’t look at her, but I could tell how nervous she was by just the tone of her voice. I thought of warning her before the dinner, but I didn’t think she would come.
“What do you do? I mean…is this your job?”
my mother said carefully picking her words not to offend her.
“No, uh, I make stuff—pottery.”
My father let out a gruffly laugh and shook his head.
He was such an asshole.
A pretentious douchebag who always thought too highly of himself and looked down at anyone who wasn’t anything like him. He was obsessed with his persona, his money, his wine.
I glared at my father who sat at the head of the table. We exchanged a challenging look and he caught onto my distaste.
He tilted his head to the side with a smile that I knew meant no good. “Didn’t we used to know a girl named Juliette too?”
He hummed, “right, Cal?”
“You liked that girl so much,”
he chuckled, “you used to sneak her around everywhere on our estate, and your mother and I had to pretend we didn’t notice to avoid all your whining.” He kissed his teeth and reached for his glass of wine.
I looked at Juliette, her eyes were glued on the food. She refused to look up. She was right next to me yet so far away.
I can’t imagine how awkward this must be. I wanted to grab her hand under the table and hold it to ground her with some sort of comfort.
“There was a time, you came to me and begged me to help you find her.”
His voice was like the sound of nails scraping against a chalkboard. “Whatever happened to that girl, Cal? Ever find her?”
I swallowed my food, my appetite all gone. “You know as much as I do.”
He hummed as he chuckled.
Before we all sat down for dinner, I asked my mom about the hairpin and she did nothing but whine about how it’d been stolen for years—reminiscing about how special that pin was, apparently it was from the Song Dynasty in China.
A rare piece she kept saying.
She did mention she had her initials engraved on the pin and there it was, my one and only piece of proof.
I stole glances of Juliette throughout the rest of the dinner watching her awkwardly answer every single one of my mother’s crazy questions just to be polite. And not once did my brother talk to her. He never asked about her health, or the baby’s health.
He just acted like Juliette wasn’t sitting across from him carrying his child.
I kept to myself, still trying to make sense of my thoughts. I could be wrong as much as I could be right. And being wrong could do a lot of damage.
Since it was still pouring outside my mother insisted we stay over and sleep for the night because the drive to my house was kinda far and it was too dark and dangerous. Her words, not mine. And I completely agreed because Juliette drove herself here, and she’d have to drive herself back for the sake of her truck.
She looked tired enough, and since she was focused on being polite to my mother she agreed to spend the night.
Once dinner was over, I followed Juliette into the kitchen as she tried to help the staff wash the plates, and I pulled my sleeve back to help her achieve that task too, but my mother chased us out of the kitchen. Once that was over I followed her upstairs because Mom said Juliette would sleep in my room tonight because she “sensed”
that we were more than what we say and I didn’t protest. But I wasnow positive she didn’t tell Juliette it was my room she would be sleeping in tonight because she was going up the stairs acting like I was following her.
Once she reached the door, I immediately said, “are you going to bed?”
She looked at me over her shoulder with a curious look on her face, a little deviance in her eyes. “Possibly.”
She smirked as she looked at me up and down.
She looked beautiful, her eyes had a certain glint I couldn’t describe, her vague answer could be the start of anything, it was like an opened door.
I was tempted.
I took a step in front of her, shoved my hands into my pockets as I tilted my head to the side. “Let’s sleep together tonight.”
I was fully in over my head now, the possibility that she could be my Juliette was vast, and I felt more confident than ever that I wasn’t crazy for noticing the small details.
Her brows shot up, but her reaction didn’t seem like she would turn down my offer—besides that, we’d share the room anyways because it was my room, so asking her to share the room and the bed was just me being polite.
And because I wanted to see that flustered look on her face.
She bit her lips as her hand dropped from the doorknob. “What will your parents think?”
she turned around to fully face me.
I shrugged. “Does it matter?”
I whispered as I leaned down to meet her flustered face.
My eyes dropped on her soft lips, I smiled, then slowly slid my hand under arm and watched her breath hitch as goosebumps rose onto her skin.
I tilted my head to the side, our lips brushed as I twisted the doorknob and opened the door.
I smiled as I pulled back, looking at Juliette with squeezed her eyes shut and parted lips.
Her hair brushed against her neck, her chest was still softly heaving like she was out of breath. My eyes followed the goosebumps on her neck to her face, her lips, her creased eyebrows, still waiting for me…
“Fuck it,”
I whispered under my breath, closing up the space between us completely as I crashed my lips on top of hers.
God she was soft. So fucking soft.
I pushed my hand into her hair as I cupped her jaw and tilted her head to the side as I deepened the kiss. I walked us backwards into the room and closed the door behind me.
She moaned into my mouth as I gripped a handful of her hair and pulled her head back to suck her tongue. My nose flared, I was barely pacing myself, taking her top lip into my mouth, sucking it, then slowly releasing it in between my lips. I kissed her cheeks then lowered my head to the crook of her neck as I licked her skin.
There was this intense need inside of me to explore her. Every part of her. To taste her everywhere. Have her on my tongue, squirming over my face, scaring my skin with her nails from such an intense pleasure.
I wanted Juliette undone.
I needed her.
Juliette. My Juliette.
It took me so long to find you,I thought as I gently walked her towards the bed
“Callum,”
she whispered, gripping my shoulders. I looked at her grip on my shoulders then looked back at her, her eyes, fuck. They really did drive me crazy. That glint, it was like an eternal, ever undying light in her eyes. And when she furrowed her brows and bit her lips…
I sighed as my eyes dropped on her lips, then her eyes. My shoulders dropped as I sat her on the bed.
I brushed my lips against her ear, “stop looking at me like that…For my sake and yours.”
She released a soft breath and her grip over my shoulders tightened again. “Why?”
“It makes me want to fuck you all night, sweetheart.”
I licked her earlobe. “I want to fuck you so hard that you won’t be able to keep those pretty eyes of yours open to look at me the way you’re looking at me right now.”
She smiled, fucking smiled.
“Then what? You wanna pin me under you too?”
she whispered as she leaned in and brushed her lips against my neck, “you want me to be desperate?” She licked my neck.
I shuddered as I suppressed a moan. “What’s wrong with that?”
“Nothing. I want you exactly like that too.”
I lightly shook my head as I kissed her shoulders. “Once again, Juliette, that’s the difference between us. I’ve been at your mercy the second I laid eyes on you, and I’ve been so,”
I sucked in a breath then kissed her skin again, “so fucking desperate to have you since the first night we kissed.” I grazed my teeth against her shoulder.
She moaned as her back arched.
I couldn’t take it anyone, the soft smell of her supple skin, how amazing it felt to run my hands down her back, her thighs, her face, kissing her soft lips, hearing her moans—
“I need to taste you or I’m gonna lose my mind,”
I mumbled.
Juliette pulled me up from the crook of her neck and pushed down until she placed her foot on my shoulder and pushed me down onto my knees in front of her as she sat on the bed. I wasted no time and pushed her dress up to her waist, just…completely enamored with her skin, her scent, her voice.
“Uh-oh you’re gonna have to taste me.”
She grinned.
I smiled, shaking my head as I kissed her calves, fixing her leg on my shoulder as I got deeper in between her legs until I reached the middle of her thighs.
She moaned with just the brush of my lips against her skin, my fingers digging into her flesh, finding a way to stay grounded with every rough breath I take, getting closer and closer towards her pussy.
I slowly brought her leg down as I bit her inner thigh and this time her hand dropped on my head as she gripped my hair and sighed, struggling to stay still.
I hooked my fingers around the strap of her underwear and pulled it down, looking up to find Juliette’s eyes pinned on me, waiting for my next move. She was still trying to catch her breath, pretending like none of this was at all that affecting.
Confidently, I used my pointer and middle finger and held eye contact with Juliette as I brushed my fingers over her pussy, coating them with her wetness before pulling them out and licking them clean. I watched her mouth part open as her brows creased together with arousal like this was the hottest thing she’d seen.
“You know what you taste like?”
I licked my lips.
She shook her head. “What?”
“Like mine.”
She giggled but the sound died short in her throat as I licked her pussy clean, then grazed her clit, lapping my tongue over it. Juliette dropped to her elbow, struggling to keep herself up as I sucked her clit.
With no resistance whatsoever I used my middle and ring finger and rubbed her clit. Juliette let out a broken gasp as she winced at the pressure. My tongue lapped over her pussy again as I whimpered, an incoherent plea for permission. Her hand slipped into my hair again as her fingers dug until she gripped a handful of my hair.
I took that as yes and slipped a finger inside of her as I looked up at her. Her wetness coated my chin, and I wore it with pride, licking my lips as I stared at her. Her brows furrowed with arousal, and her eyes were closed, I watched her tongue dart out and licked her lips only to pull her bottom lip in between her teeth then releasing it.
I bit my lip with a smile, relishing in the fact that I could feel her clench around my fingers.
Juliette. My Juliette. I had her back.
“Callum.”
She moaned loudly and I chuckled because she tensed almost immediately.
“Relax, love,”
I mumbled as I leaned down and kissed her pussy. “The walls here are really thick, besides…” I slipped in another finger inside of her and curled them and continued with the familiar rhythm, “my parents’ bedroom is on the other side,” I said as she clenched around my fingers, finally letting out another one of those heavenly moans.
“Ugh,”
she groaned as looked down at me with hooded eyes, “you feel so good.”
I hummed as I fixed my own dilemma in my pants. I was rock hard, throbbing. Going completely crazy. There was no way I’d fuck Juliette tonight, not at my parents’ place, but I could enjoy her for as long as I can. Listening to her soft moans as she grew closer and closer to her release.
I dipped my head down and licked her as I pumped my fingers in and out of her. Immediately she tugged at my hair and held my head down, as she started grinding, making herself feel good until she started panting like she could barely breathe.
“Fuck.”
She moaned, clenching around my fingers for a couple seconds as she came, then she sighed as her body relaxed, she pulled her hand back and fell back on the bed.
“Good,”
I mumbled against her pussy as I licked her clean. “Good girl.”