40. Love to Love You Baby
CHAPTER 40
Love to Love You Baby
KEY
“J ust pull up here by the curb,” she says, pointing to an open space in front of a laundromat.
“Sure.” I look through the window and read out the neon sign. “ The Sudsy Dream ?”
Her cheeks turn pink in the light. “Yeah, I . . . my apartment is upstairs.”
“Oh,” I say, glancing up at the dark windows above. “Right.”
We’re quiet for a few moments, and I rake my brain trying to think of something to say. This drive has been torture. I know she and Joel talked. I made myself scarce so they could have their time, plus I didn’t want to pressure her. I know her too well, even after all these years apart—the last thing she needs is to feel backed into a corner.
But her decision is looming, and I’m itching to know it.
I wish I could tell her I’ll live with whatever she decides. That I’ll always love her and that if she doesn’t want me, I’ll stay away so she can be happy. But that honorable part of me is dwindling by the second. My chest gets tighter the longer my mind spins without real answers and . . . shit, what if I lose her again?
“Do you want to come up?” she asks.
My stomach tumbles. “What?”
“I can give you the songs,” she continues, waving her hand.
Right. The songs. “Uh, yeah. Sure.” But this isn’t just about the songs. She’s inviting me inside because we need to talk.
Meowing starts from the other side of her door when we make it up the stairs, and there’s soft scratching against the wood.
“Yes, I’m home!” she calls.
The door opens to reveal a perturbed-looking orange cat.
“Oh, Stella, I’m so sorry, I didn’t mean to leave you so long but—you would not believe what happened.”
Dusty heads into the apartment and disappears around a corner, but Stella glares up at me. I’m genuinely concerned this cat is going to attack me. “Heyyy, kitty cat,” I draw out, stooping low and offering her my hand to smell.
The cat doesn’t move, and for ten agonizing seconds I feel like a complete idiot. Of course this cat hates me. She probably thinks I’m here to ruin Dusty’s life.
“I promise I won’t hurt her,” I whisper.
The cat tilts her head, then with a quiet meow, rubs her head against my hand. Something lifts in my chest. I never thought that I’d need to ask for the approval of a cat, but here we are. I chuckle softly, then stand as Stella scampers off back into the apartment.
Dusty pops her head out from around the door. “You can come in.”
“Right,” I say, stepping across the threshold before shutting the door behind me.
“I’m just going to turn on the shower, then I’ll grab those songs for you.”
The apartment is one big room. Her bed is still unmade and there are a few dirty dishes in the sink, but it’s clean and tidy. It smells like peppermint and roses. I remove my shoes and feel the textured carpet against my feet. The sun shines in through the open curtains, flickers of light bouncing off dust particles that Stella kicks up as she hops onto the windowsill. It’s beautiful.
Dusty crosses the room and opens the top drawer of a vanity. For a moment she searches through it, then pulls out an old folder. She opens it, rifles through the pages, then looks up at me and smiles.
“Here they are,” she says, walking over to me. “I never could get rid of them. No matter how many times I moved around they were always the first thing I packed. I don’t know why?—”
“Thank you,” I whisper. My voice is gone. It has no strength left.
“I—” She pauses. “I didn’t realize you only ever wrote them down this once.”
I shrug, my insides buzzing. “They were about you. Seemed only right that you had the only copies.”
She hands me the folder and I open it, staring at the crumpled, aged paper within. The horrendous handwriting staring back at me.
“Are you okay?” she asks.
I nod. “Yeah. It’s just?—”
“What?”
Tears well in my eyes and my nose begins to run. “Sorry.” I sniff. “I just . . . it’s this place. It’s this.” I gesture to the folder. “It’s you.”
Her eyes bounce between mine and I stretch out a hand, gesturing to the apartment.
“This could’ve been ours.”
She tenses. “What?”
“This life,” I continue. “This apartment.”
There’s a nervous kind of chuckle that leaves her lips. “Key, don’t be silly. It’s not the Ritz, it’s a studio apartment?—”
“And yet it’s the most incredible place I’ve ever been.”
She’s quiet.
“You were always like that. Turning the ugliest, most unfortunate, sad thing into something beautiful. The scars on my hands, the cabin . . . me.”
Tears spill down my cheeks.
She steps closer to me and presses her palm to my heated cheek. “Why are you crying?”
I hold her hand to me, closing my eyes as I take a deep breath. “This could’ve been our life.” I can feel her step toward me, and a shiver races up my spine. If this is the day she decides, she needs to know everything. “You know, I thought I saw you six months ago,” I admit, wiping my face on the back of my hand. “We went to this award ceremony for Izzy—all of us, together. We were in this big fancy theatre when I saw this woman with curly red hair.”
Her eyes flit over my face.
“Every time I saw hair like that it felt like having a heart attack—I was going out of my mind. All I wanted was to go back in time and take back all the awful things I said to you in Vegas. Then a few weeks ago, it was the anniversary of the day you left. The day my family betrayed me. The worst day of my life, and I just . . . I needed someone to talk to. I flipped through the phone book and I saw this ad. What are the odds that you were the one who answered my call? The one person I wanted to talk to more than anything, and I had no idea.”
She presses her hand over my heart and it pounds against her palm, as if it’s trying to tell her exactly what I want to say but can’t.
“I love you, Key.”
My eyes open and she is smiling at me.
“I’ve loved you my whole life. I think that’s why I kept your music. You had my heart . . . so I held tight to your soul.”
In a flurry of movement, I grasp her face. “I love you, Dusty, and I always will. Through the years, the loneliness and frustration. Through thinking I wasn’t enough for you. Through knowing you also love my best friend . . .” I swallow hard against the lump in my throat. “And now, I love you even more for it. Of course you love him and of course he would love you. It makes so much sense now, and I’ll continue to love you through everything that has yet to come our way because when the love is real, it will always find a way back.”
She smiles. “I did promise I’d come back for you.”
I kiss her then, and it’s like finally breathing clean air when everything has always been smoke. My head is light and dizzy; my lungs expand and my mind revels in the first real bout of clarity to hit me in years. Her kiss ignites nostalgia and reminds me of stolen time and joy and wonder. She tangles her fingers in my shirt as she kisses me back. It’s not the same as I remember it being all those years ago—it’s better. It’s grown-up. We’re grown-up, and I can’t believe she’s back in my life after all this time.
She pulls back, her face flushed, and whispers breathlessly, “I should shower.”
I let go of her face. “Right.”
When she looks at me again, her blue diamond–eyes sparkle. “You should come with me.”
She grasps my hand and with a subtle smile pulls me toward her bathroom. I go with her, because where else could I possibly be but with her. The room fills with steam, the heat caressing my sore bones. In truth, I’m exhausted. I’ve been awake for more hours than I can count, but as she turns to me and pulls her shirt over her head, I’m shot with adrenaline.
“Dusty—”
Her blue eyes flick up, her gaze hooded and dark. She turns away, facing the mirror. “Will you help me take it off?”
My cock twitches, all of the blood rushing downward with unprecedented speed. It makes me light-headed. “Sure.”
I glide the backs of my fingers up her spine and I watch with fascination as her eyes flutter. I snap her bra clasp and it comes undone in one swift motion. Dusty gives an audible gasp then giggles.
“Your technique has improved,” she teases.
I chuckle, then turn her toward me, allowing the bra to fall to the tile floor. Her breasts are larger than I recall. Fuller—with the tiniest pink nipples. They’re so goddamn perfect. She hooks her thumbs into her jeans and shimmies them down her legs and I follow suit.
“What’s that?” she asks, her finger tips tracing over the sun tattoo on my back.
“My tattoo?”
“It’s beautiful,” she whispers.
I swallow my fear and tell her, “It’s you.”
Her forehead creases. “What?”
“You were always the sun, Dusty,” I say. “You were the light that gave me life. When you were gone, I had to immortalize that in some way. A reminder to keep me from getting lost in the dark.”
She smiles. “Somehow we always come back to each other.”
I’m desperate to touch her, but also to feel that hot water on my skin.
She opens the shower door, peering at me over her shoulder, her long red hair skimming the top of her plump ass. “You coming?”
Something sharp hits me in the guts and I think of Joel, alone in that hospital bed. Before I do this, I need to know she’s choosing him too. I can’t bear to lose either of them.
She frowns. “What’s wrong?”
“I just need to make sure?—”
With a step toward me, she holds my face in her hands. “You want to know what I figured out on the way here?”
My eyes dart over her face. “What?”
“That I can choose for all of us to be happy. I want both of you. I love both of you. Never in my wildest dreams did I think I could have so much love in my life. It was my greatest wish. Knowing there’s a door number three where we can all be together?—”
“But if the three of us are going to be together,” I push, “you need to be sure. If you’re not?—”
“I’m sure, Key. I’m still working out all the details of how everything will work. But what I know for sure is that I want to be with you—with him—all of us, together .”
I pull her toward me by the waist, her back arching, and lean down to capture her mouth with mine. Our bodies press together and I’m overwhelmed by the newness and the familiarity. We part again, and Dusty leads me into the shower. Her hair darkens as the water hits her and my muscles scream with joy at the instantaneous relief.
She slots in next to me and heaves a contented sigh. “Oh god, this feels so good.”
I tip my head back and let the showerhead soak my hair. I didn’t realize just how awful I felt until now, and it’s as though I’m being baptized, only this time it’s my choice. I can exit here with a new sense of purpose and love because she loves me back. She’s not going anywhere this time.
Dusty grabs a bottle of shampoo and pops the cap. “Here, I’ll do it,” I say, reaching around her.
“No, I got it. I can do it.”
“Dusty,” I say, “I know you can do it, but you don’t have to. You’re the strongest woman I know, you can take a break.”
I see it in her eyes. The way she wants to fight. To prove that she can do it all on her own, and I know she can. She’s proven over and over again that she can take care of herself. To survive. She’s survived so much.
“I’m not trying to be a hero. I just want to take care of you.”
For a moment all I can hear is the gentle rushing of the shower until she nods. “Okay.”
I smile. “Turn around.”
She turns her back to me and I grab the shampoo. I lather up my hands then gently massage her scalp, watching the lather spread and turn sudsy, already seeing the tension rolling off her shoulders. Her head becomes limp in my hands, her neck loose, and the sound of a moan makes me bite my lip as I wash her hair.
“That feels incredible,” she says.
The water cleanses away the shampoo, and it feels like she’s finally letting go as her doubts and fear wash down the drain. When she turns to face me again, her eyes are bright.
“Kiss me,” she whispers, before wrapping her arm around my neck. Her lips are frantic and addictive. I pull her to me tighter and she grabs my bicep with one hand, her fingertips squeezing delectably. Soon I can’t get enough of her. I can’t get close enough, then we’re falling into the shower wall as I try to press our bodies closer than is possible—my cock squeezed between us begging for her touch.
She presses her breasts against my chest, her tight nipples rubbing against my sensitive skin. Like a drug, I crave her and it’s not enough. It’s been too long. It’s been too much to overcome. Too much heartbreak and lies and surprises. She’s my destiny and if it took all of our past to get to this point, that’s something I can live with.