Chapter Twelve #3
She leaned down, forehead pressed to mine. The anger was gone. All that was left was the exhaustion, the afterglow, and the certainty that neither of us would ever be the same. To be honest, I didn’t want to go back to the person I was before Tessa came into my life.
With the most beautiful smile I’d ever seen, Tessa sighed and draped herself over my body, her sex dripping my cum onto my lower belly where she lay. My cock gave an interested jump, but I wasn’t sure I could rebound that fast. And the emotional release had been as much for me as it was for her.
After that, we stayed tangled up on the bed for a long time. I could tell she was awake by the way her fingers traced slow, idle lines over my ribs. She found the thin white scar at the base of my sternum and followed it up to where it vanished into muscle.
“Darby’s mother’s name was Jennifer,” I said. “She was an artist. I met her when she was painting a sunrise at a nearby park in Nashville. She was brash and smart and absolutely relentless when she wanted something.”
Tessa stilled, listening.
“I was twenty-four. I thought I knew everything. She thought the opposite about me and she was right. We were together just shy of two years when she left.”
“I take it things didn’t work out?”
“I honestly couldn’t tell you, honey. Jen was the most independent person I’ve ever met.
Man or woman. She chafed at my need to know where she was.
Not to control her, and she didn’t really see it as me trying to control her.
She just rebelled against authority.” I sighed, shaking my head slightly.
“It wasn’t anything unusual for her to leave for days or weeks at a time.
She would usually call or even leave a note telling me she’d be back in a little while.
“One day, she was gone.” I gave a little wave of my hand before dropping it back to my chest. “I didn’t think much about it at first. Like I said, she did that on occasion. But this time she was just… gone.”
“Did you ever find out what happened?”
“Only that she spiraled into heavy drug use and OD’d, leaving Darby on her own. After searching for her for several weeks, Seth finally told me to let her go. I don’t know what happened to make her run, but Darby paid the price for it.
“Before she left me, I got her pregnant with Darby, though I didn’t know,” I said. “Not until a couple of years ago. Darby was only seven when Jennifer died. The foster system and Darby… well, they didn’t mix.”
Tessa stroked my jaw in a gentle caress. Then she kissed my shoulder and settled her body close to me, snuggling contentedly. “That painting in the sunroom,” she said, “is hers.”
“Yeah. She painted it the week we met.”
“It belongs with you,” Tessa said, simple as a fact. “You loved her.”
I thought about that statement for a long moment, needing to think about my answer. “Yes. I think I did. Just not in the way I first thought.”
She raised up slightly, looking at me. “I don’t follow.”
“I loved the idea of Jen. She was every man’s dream woman.
Well, most men’s. She couldn’t care less what I did or who I was with.
I told her I’d never be with more than one woman at a time, but she waved me off.
And no. I don’t think she had other lovers.
I mean, I thought that maybe at first, but that wasn’t Jen.
She’d have come out and said something. She definitely wouldn’t have moved in with me.
Took me long enough as it was to get her to agree.
It took me a really long time to figure that out about myself.
That I was with Jen because I got the freedom I wanted with the commitment from her to be my woman.
She never worried about where I was or what I did.
My father said she wasn’t the woman for me, but I didn’t believe him.
” I studied Tessa’s face, then reached up to stroke her cheek, brushing my thumb over her lower lip.
She took it into her mouth and sucked, closing her eyes like she was in bliss.
When she opened them again, I held her gaze.
“But Seth was right. Jen wasn’t the woman for me.
You are, Tessa. So, you be as badass as you want.
Or you be as docile as a kitten. I don’t care. Just as long as you’re with me.”
If I lived to be a hundred, I’d never know if I said the wrong thing or not. But Tessa dissolved into tears. And she clung to me as she cried. For a very, very long time.
I tried to comfort her as much as I could, but she just buried her face in my chest and cried all the harder, hanging on to me like she’d never let me go. So I did the only thing I knew how to do. I wrapped my arms around her as tightly as I dared and let her cry it out.
It took a long time for her to wear herself out. But when she did, despite the red cheeks and nose or the puffy eyes, she looked more relaxed than I’d seen her since we met. She was completely passed out. Exhausted.
I watched her as she slept. Her hair spread over my arm and upper belly, twining us together. I made myself a promise, right then. I’d lost Jen for reasons I couldn’t imagine. But I would not lose Tessa. I’d hold her until she told me to stop.
And then I’d hold her anyway.