Chapter Twenty-Four Jamie
Chapter Twenty-Four
Jamie
Jamie died the second Elliott kissed him.
He came back to life when she didn’t stop.
He wrapped his arms around her waist, lifting her against his body to carry her inside as the door swung shut.
Her arms clamped around his shoulders in a viselike grip, as if she was worried he’d disappear. She kissed him with urgency and impatience and without finesse, and it was utterly perfect.
Vaguely he wondered what had changed. What had happened to bring her here and kiss him like this?
He didn’t care enough to ask.
Disoriented, he took another step back as he lifted his head to figure out which way he needed to go to get her somewhere—a couch, a bed, a fucking table—and he tripped over his overly excited dog.
Jamie went down with a crash, his hip hitting the coffee table and his flailing arm pushing the remotes to the floor. His glasses went flying. He landed on his back with a grunt, and Elliott ended up on top of him in a tangle of limbs.
They looked at each other and burst out laughing. Hank shoved his wet nose between them and went back and forth, licking their faces.
“Um,” Jamie said.
Her eyes dropped to his lips, and she came at him again. He elbowed Hank out of the way and dropped his head to the carpet, burying his fingers in her hair and inhaling her scent as he tasted her. Her tongue entered his mouth as she straddled him, and he’d never cared less that he was on his back on the floor. They could be rolling around in the dirt as long as Elliott’s lips were on his.
He angled his head to kiss her deeper, his hand spanning the back of her head, tracing her ear with his thumb. She shivered as her fingers moved all over his chest and abs, leaving trails of fire everywhere she touched.
The pressure had been building for sixteen months. Now that it was finally happening, he didn’t know how to be gentle. He was too far gone. Had denied himself too long.
He shifted her hips to where he wanted her, and she let out the sexiest little sound he’d ever heard.
“Oh my ... Jamie,” she panted, sitting up a little, which put more pressure there, and his eyes almost rolled to the back of his head. “We’re on the floor. I didn’t mean to, um ...”
“Do I look like I care?” He lifted his hips a little. He pulled her back down and growled against her lips. “Does it feel like I care?”
Her already flushed cheeks went a deeper shade of red. She kissed him for a long moment before she pulled back again. “Still. I didn’t mean to come over and attack you like that.” She slid off him and stood, holding out her hand.
He lumbered off the ground on his own, knowing if he touched her he’d just pull her back on top of him. “Again, I’m not complaining. Do that every day. Please.”
Hank wormed his way between them and sat in front of Elliott, his tail sweeping the floor. Jamie didn’t have to see his face to know he was giving her his best puppy-dog eyes.
She laughed and knelt down to hug him. “Hey, bud. I didn’t mean to ignore you, but I was on a mission.” She nuzzled his neck and rubbed his ears, and as he watched them, Jamie’s heart filled to the brim.
Also: a mission?
Was that her way of saying this was a go? She wanted to be with him for real?
He was too afraid to ask. Was that pathetic? That even if she walked out the door right now, he’d take these last several minutes over the alternative?
They’d spent a lot of time together the last couple of weeks. Running, talking, trading books. Once she spotted him at the dog park with Hank and came out to sit with him while Hank spent an hour running himself ragged. He’d learned a lot about her, and she him.
They’d become friends, and it had been incredible.
But it wasn’t enough. Not for him.
After she’d finished loving on Hank, she straightened. He hadn’t even gotten a good look at her when he first opened the door. She was perfect in jeans and a relaxed V-neck shirt showing off that sexy collarbone that drove him crazy. The tiniest hint of her port was visible on the left side before disappearing underneath her shirt. Her face was devoid of makeup, and her soft hair hung straight to her shoulders, where just seconds ago he’d pressed his nose to inhale her citrusy scent.
She was so very Elliott, and he could hardly breathe.
Her gray eyes searched his face, and she stepped forward to slide her hands around his waist. She laid her cheek against his heart, breathing deeply and humming with satisfaction when he returned the embrace.
“So,” he finally said.
“So.”
“We gonna talk, or should we just head to my room?”
She smacked his chest and he laughed.
“Seriously, though ...” He wanted her with a ferocity that quite frankly scared him.
She looked up at him with a smile. “I vote for both, but we should probably talk first.”
“Yeah, probably. But you have to sit over there.” He sat in the armchair and pointed to the couch. “I need to keep my distance if you don’t want me to touch you.”
“Same,” she agreed, though she looked just as unhappy being several feet away. “Thanks for giving me some time.”
“I’d never want this if you weren’t sure. It might have killed me if you didn’t decide to give me a chance, but it was a risk I was willing to take.” He passed a hand across his jaw. “I might regret asking this, but what changed?”
“Everything and nothing at all.”
“I see.”
She laughed. “Nothing changed about the way I feel about you. It’s been the one constant ever since we met, a lingering awareness that never faded. At first it was warm and good and gave me hope. But even when it became something sort of dark and that I felt guilty about, it was still there. No matter what I did or how hard I tried to pretend it wasn’t.”
“Add to that a few months of pathetic pining, and I’ve had the same experience.” He’d been a real stage-five clinger to her memory.
“I’m sorry,” she said again. “I’ll always wish I handled that night differently.”
He shook his head. “Don’t be.” He wasn’t trying to make her feel bad. He’d do it all over again as long as they ended up here, tonight. “What matters is now and what happens next.”
“Your sister said the same thing,” she said with a wry grin.
“Did she?” He wasn’t sure how he felt about his sister meddling, but Elliott was here, so who the fuck cared?
“Yeah. I stopped by there tonight, and we talked it out. She made a lot of good points.”
“She usually does.”
“After talking to her, and based on what Yuka’s been saying for weeks now, it seems ... different somehow,” she said. “Now that more time has passed and Carly has left town. I know it’s stupid, and it’s probably just in my head. But no matter how much I like you and how badly I want to be with you, it doesn’t change the fact that I owe Carly everything.”
“What did change, then?”
“Since the moment I found out you and Carly were together, I’ve lied. To you, Carly, myself. I’ve tried to convince myself we could just be friends and that would be okay. It wasn’t until Blythe said Carly started making plans that didn’t involve you, and I saw her laughing with someone else, that I let myself admit what an outrageous lie that was.”
She seemed to study his face when she said the part about Carly with someone else. He hadn’t known Carly was dating again, but the news didn’t upset him. On the contrary, he was relieved. His hands shook with anticipation of where she might take this. “What’s the truth?”
“The truth is, I’ve thought about you every single day since the night we met. The memory of you carried me through months of solitude in a hospital bed. There was one week when things got kind of scary and my body wasn’t doing well, and I honestly wasn’t sure I’d come out of it. I’d picture your face and think of the things we talked about and the sweet things you said to me and told myself if I could just be strong enough to get through it, I’d let myself come find you someday.” She swiped at her cheeks, smiling through her tears. “I really did move to Omaha for a job and to start fresh. But I could have done that anywhere. There’s a reason I wanted to do it here, in this town. That reason was you.”
In one fluid motion he was up and at her side, his palms framing her face.
She covered his hands with hers. “I can’t even begin to tell you how crushed I was when I saw you and Carly together. But I forced myself to accept you were with someone else and that my chance with you was gone. If I really have a second chance, this time I won’t let you walk away without telling you how incredible I think you are, and how badly I want you to be mine.”
He pressed his forehead to hers. “I’m not going anywhere. You fit me like no one else ever has.” He tilted his lips forward and kissed her softly.
“I think you might be everything I’ve ever wanted,” she whispered.
They kissed for several minutes, thorough and unhurried. Instead of hiding behind mutual self-denial, they were stepping forward to explore what was there all along, and God, it felt good.
Somewhere in the back of his mind he wondered how this kiss compared to their first one at the hotel and quickly decided this one was better. This time he knew her. He knew more than just her middle name and a few random facts about her personality. Now he knew who she was and who she wanted to be. He knew what she’d gone through to get here, and that he wanted to walk beside her as she continued on the road to achieve her dreams.
“Jamie,” she murmured.
“Hmm?”
“I ... want you. But do you think we should wait?”
“Why?” Maybe in this moment it felt like zero to sixty, but in reality this was more than a year in the making.
“I don’t know.” She glanced up at him from beneath long, dark lashes. “Can we, then?”
He smiled against her mouth then stood and reached for her hand, leading her farther into his apartment than she’d ever gone. He paused at the door and ushered her in, then turned to Hank, who had followed them. “Sorry, bud. No dogs allowed for this part.”
He closed the bedroom door, leaving Hank in the living room. When he turned back to Elliott, her hand covered her heart. “Did you see his face?”
Jamie chuckled at her distress. He loved his dog, but ...
He stepped closer and smoothed her hair back. “The first thing he’d do is jump in the bed with us. I’d be distracted and that’s unacceptable.” He dipped his head and pressed a kiss to her neck. “I want to focus on you, and only you.”
She tilted her head to the side to give him better access. Her audible sigh was thick with desire, but when she slid her fingers into his hair, her hands were shaking. Jamie reached up to take her hands and wove their fingers together, lifting his head to look at her.
“You okay?”
She nodded, her gray eyes wide and focused on his face. “I’m good,” she reassured him. “Nervous and excited, but in a good way. It’s just been a while. A couple of years.”
Years? It made sense when he thought about it, with everything she’d gone through. That meant she hadn’t slept with Stephen, and all he could think about that was, Thank fuck .
He kissed the back of her hand. “We don’t have to do this tonight.”
Smiling, she walked backward until her legs hit the bed, pulling him with her. “I want to. Do you?”
He snorted at the ridiculous question. “Clearly.”
Her smile widened and his heart stopped beating. She released his hands and pulled her shirt over her head before scooting back to lie down. Immediately he put his hands on her, sliding his palms up her smooth stomach. He pressed a kiss to her belly button, eliciting a giggle from her.
“I love your laugh,” he said to her ribs. “Making you smile puts me on top of the world.”
“You must be there now,” she said, sounding a little breathless. “I can’t stop smiling.”
He grinned and delivered another kiss between her breasts. “Me either.”
She tugged at his shirt, and he yanked it off, watching her devour his body with her gaze.
“Your body is incredible,” she sighed. “I can’t stop looking at you.”
He slid one hand up her side while the other burrowed under her back to press her up and against him, bringing their hearts as close as they could get. “And I can’t stop touching you.”
Leaning up, she captured his lips, and they kissed long and slow and deep. She wrapped her legs around his waist, the fabric of her jeans brushing the bare skin of his back, and he arched into her. She moaned at the same time he let out a groan.
She hadn’t been with a man in years, and he could take that two ways. One, she probably wouldn’t notice if he was a fumbling idiot as he lost his mind over her. It took a little pressure off, but he also considered the second point, which was this: she’d gone a long time without, and she deserved the very best he could give her. She deserved fireworks.
Jamie smiled as he slid down her body.
He was up to the task.