Chapter 26
Avery
I couldn’t believe how fucking blind I’d been.
My whole life, I’d always felt like a stranger wading through the small twinges of envy that had constantly prickled at the back of my mind from being surrounded by couples and their happy endings while my own seemed to be nowhere in sight.
No matter how hard I’d tried to look for my soulmate in the faces of those around me, or believing the lies I told myself of it one day happening when I least expected it.
I’d soon become resigned to swallowing the harsh pill of reality that my father had fucked me up too much—that I was too far gone in the bitterness he’d instilled in me—to believe in trusting and opening myself up to someone like that ever again.
I’d never been the type to believe in divine intervention or whatever it was that Hallmark loved to peddle to the hapless romantics of the generation before mine.
It was too cheesy for me to buy into. Too convenient of an excuse to hypothetically find myself going back to the same small hometown I grew up in, only to realize that my soulmate was there the entire time and life had thrown so many curveballs that it was impossible to tell until it was far too late.
Funny that in reality, I was actually just too stupid to realize I’d been my own worst enemy the entire time. That my apathetic nature when it came to all of my past relationships wasn’t some by-product of being raised by a covert narcissist and, in reality, I’d been denying myself the inevitable.
I wished I could remember why I ever stopped writing to Brandon. Why I cut off contact and decided it was best for both of us to move on with our lives when all I’d felt since then was an impending sense of doom and melancholy.
Chalking up my indifference toward my life to finally shedding the shackles of my father had given me the excuse to float through life without caring about anything outside of the remedial pleasure that came with climbing up the corporate ladder and making an obscene amount of money in the process.
I’d detached myself, pulled on an aloof mask that only Marlow and Silas could see through. All for it to be fucking shattered the moment I stepped into Brandon’s body shop and was reminded that I actually did have a beating heart still left in my chest.
One that was sickeningly in tune with my former best friend and that longed to have him back in my life like I was dependent on it.
What did it mean other than the obvious?
Was I alone in this, or was Brandon also willing to drudge through the unknown with me?
Sex with Brandon last night had been eye opening. Way more than I thought it would be when he’d first invited me inside and had looked at me with that cautious gaze right before yanking me down into that first kiss.
Now that he was in my veins, I was sure that there would be no end to this. I’d always feel like I was starving until I had him back in that bed with the both of us naked and panting.
I was growing hard again, even reminiscing about it now.
We’d left his place to come back to mine right after we’d showered and gotten dressed.
Him in his shop’s uniform and me in the sweat suit set I’d bought day two at the hospital after finally giving in to needing a fresh set of clothes that weren’t wrinkled with the remnants of sweat and other things from our almost-date.
Upon pulling up to the circular driveway outside of my family’s home, I threw the Audi into park and killed the ignition.
Brandon slipped his hand down between the console and his seat to unhook his seatbelt, turning slightly toward me as he did so.
As soon as the belt moved across his chest to retract back into the door, my knee-jerk reaction was to bridge the small gap between us and cup his face in my hand like I’d been doing so often lately in order to bring his mouth to meet mine.
I couldn’t get enough of him. Of touching him and tasting him. Of the little gasp he made every time I pulled him closer to me. Of when that subtle shiver rolled through his body whenever my hand wandered.
I fucking needed him so badly.
Would there ever be a time when I got used to any of this? That my need to invade his bubble with my touches and caresses until there was no telling where he ended and I began would ever fade?
My intuition was telling me no. Screaming it, rather.
I’d lived so long with feeling numb, and now I was dying to keep that fire within me burning bright. Stoking it with whatever kindling Brandon was willing to give me.
His lips were soft and tasted like mint against my tongue. They pursed slightly and then parted to let me in, his tongue meeting mine in the same kind of fervor that we’d shared when he’d invited me into his house.
How fucked would we be if I dragged him across the center console and into my lap and threw back my seat while trying to work my hands down into his jeans?
The estate had cameras out here facing the driveway, yet there was a part of me that was willing to test out just how good my Audi’s tint was.
I brushed my hand down between the door and my own seat, feeling for the control button on the side of it to start the decline. The second my finger brushed over it and pressed it, Brandon grabbed my arm.
He pulled his mouth away from mine and huffed out an amused, “Behave.”
I tightened my hand on his face. “No.”
He laughed when I tugged him down into another kiss, tilting my head to deepen it while he slapped at my arm again. As we were lowered together, his torso was practically hanging over the center console and into my lap from the awkward angle.
Brandon could protest all he wanted but the ironic part about it was him kissing me with the same amount of animalistic lust that had me lowering the goddamn seat in the first place.
“Avery.” He laughed again, tilting his head to the side and away from me the second my seat was flat.
I leaned up to nip at the skin along his jaw. Keeping my hands and mouth off of him was impossible with my head swimming with this much lust.
“We’re not fucking in your car.” He had a more serious tone this time, but I knew if I grabbed the hair at the nap of his neck and tugged him back around, I’d see a delighted smile on his face that was completely at odds with it.
“I’ll turn around and face us away from the house,” I offered.
He slapped my chest, turning back to glare at me. “Knock it off, you horndog.”
Can you blame me?
I got a taste of fucking paradise.
How the hell was I supposed to properly behave after that?
I needed to hear those incredible sounds tumbling out of Brandon’s mouth again—the sooner the better.
Unfortunately, he shoved himself off of me too fast for me to catch and shimmied back into his own seat still wearing that amused smile. “Come on. Feed me and then we’ll think about sneaking up to your room after.”
That had me kicking my door open almost instantly. Music to my fucking ears.
Before I had Brandon pinned against my bed again, I’d need to tell him that this wasn’t some kind of hookup situation where I was looking to blow off steam and he was simply an available party.
Sure, I was new to this entire part of life with no experience whatsoever and no prior curiosities, either.
However, that wasn’t about to mean I’d be using Brandon to do a little soul searching. Whatever emotions were coming to the surface because I was allowing myself to be open to them were the real deal. Not some kind of passing interest that would soon fade once I got this all ‘out of my system’.
Something that I doubted would be happening anytime soon, if at all.
I had to tell him before he got up in his head again. He had to know I wasn’t going to leave him to pick up the pieces of the aftermath.
I slammed my own door shut and came around to the other side of the car while Brandon did the same.
He flashed me a quick smile and then headed up to the front steps, a single pace ahead of me.
As we both reached the top landing, I snagged his hand and wrapped my fingers tightly around his, causing him to whip around and regard me with the beautiful eyes of his that were slightly wide.
His mouth pursed together as if to form a question, only to be interrupted when the front door was kicked open.
“Morning,” I chimed to Jonas, whose brow was raised rather high as I slipped through the crack of the doors with Brandon in tow. “Hazel up yet?”
“Yes,” he said slowly, nodding and then closed the doors behind us shut with a firm push. “We weren’t expecting to see you, or Mr. Anders, back so early. So forgive us for being ill-prepared for breakfast this morning.”
“Um, it’s Carmichael now. Sir,” Brandon corrected. His fingers tightened around mine, twisting slightly as I felt a slight, nervous jitter in his hand. “And that’s okay. We figured if we came early enough we could make a special request.”
Jonas glanced down at our hands, causing me to slightly move myself between him and Brandon protectively.
If there was going to be anything said about this, even as an off-hand comment, I wasn’t going to have it.
It’d break my heart to fire any of the staff that had been here for most of my life, but intolerance of any kind wasn’t going to fly.
No matter whose mouth it was coming from.
Jonas’s brow simply rose further but he said nothing else on the matter. Instead, he gestured with his chin down the hall to the kitchen while saying, “Better go let Hazel know now before she starts putting something elaborate together. You know how she gets.”
His casual words had me relaxing a bit. Behind me, I adjusted my hold on Brandon’s hand, running my thumb over the top of his palm in a soothing way and nodded to Jonas. “Some special occasion coming up?”
“Not that I’m aware of. But last week, she made a whole quiche, so anything’s possible.”
I breathed out a laugh. “Got it.”
“Thanks, Jonas,” Brandon said, moving from behind me.