Chapter 36
FINLEY
Nobody should be so beautiful while they sleep. In true Elijah form, he’s so gorgeous that I can’t bring myself to move when I reach the end of the chapter I promised myself I would pause at and go to sleep. That was before Elijah dozed off.
Now he looks peaceful and perfect, and he’s meant to be getting as much rest as he can. Instead of waking him up, I burrow deeper into the thick blanket we’re sharing and inch my legs closer to his as I get back to Angel’s and Tess’s story.
His couch is so deep and long that the two of us have been sitting on it without so much as brushing our legs together. And after all the tactile attention from Jayden, I’m craving it non-stop. Like a drug that I’m on a constant come down from, even when I’m living at the peak.
Touch is such an underrated sense that you don’t realize how incredible it is to be touched by and to touch another person unless you’ve lived without it.
Reaching the end of another few chapters, I can’t help the smile that stretches across my face while I read Jayden’s annotations on Angel sending Tess away. My heart is breaking for her, but his note, has me feeling all kinds of giddy.
What an ass. Come on, dude, you’re making us all look bad right now! Jackass!
Tess, baby, you better make him work for it now.
“You’re smiling.”
I glance up from the page to find Elijah watching me.
“You should be sleeping,” I say, placing the book on my chest so he knows he has my full attention.
“How much sleep have you had in the last couple days?”
Trying to retain my cool when his leg nudges mine purposefully, I tell him, “I’m at the point where I’m past tired and too wired to sleep.”
“Strung out.” His leg nudges mine again, except this time he smiles at me.
Good Lord.
I’m speechless as he sits up and pats the empty space next to him, motioning me closer.
Of course, my heart gets away with itself. The excitement too much for it to remain steady as I crawl to his side and sit.
“I’m sorry I scared you,” he says, tilting his head to rest it on mine while he switches channels on the almost muted television. “If I had known the migraine was going to get that bad, I would’ve gone to see Doc the way Jayden told me to. I just… I panicked. I don’t want to let them down.”
My chest clenches. “Elijah… Love…”
“I want to play the best hockey of my life, but I want to be here too. Every time I’m not, all I want is to get back to you as quickly as possible. To make sure that you’re okay and safe and—”
“I can’t be the reason you’re sick.” The hand resting on his thigh shifts to sit on mine, covering my trembling hand.
“It’s not you, Fin. There’s so much at play right now, and then the photos happened, the damn lamb’s head… and even though I tried to put them out of my mind, all I kept thinking is where does it end?”
“I’ve turned your life upside down and…” I stutter to a pause when he leans closer.
“You got your ears pierced,” Elijah mumbles with a wistful smile.
“Jayden took me.”
“Of course he did,” he says, hovering his lips over the tip of my nose. “I like it. The pearls suit you.”
I’m one second away from hyperventilating if he does and if he doesn’t kiss me.
Because the kiss we shared the other night is still living in my head—the rough way he touched me with his fingers digging into my flesh.
His breath scolding my skin. The taste of him—different to what I remember. Bolder. Stronger. Demanding.
“None of this mess is on you, Finley-James,” he says, nudging the tip of my nose with his warm, rough-bitten lips. “You’re everything that’s good and right.”
“Doesn’t feel that way.”
“It was always going to be like this. Jayden’s right, we can’t hide.”
Jayden.
My insides buzz at the gruff reverence of Elijah’s tone. The way each syllable licks over his tongue with a hot breath that I drag into my lungs greedily when he rubs his nose along mine. My pulse skitters out of control as his hand cups the base of my skull, holding my face to his.
“Elijah…”
He chuckles quietly at my breathless stutter. “Yes?”
“Are you going to kiss me?”
The entirety of his body stills. “Do you want me to?”
“So much,” I exhale, leaning closer, tilting my face to the side so that he has open access to my aching lips.
“Come here.” The hand at my nape tightens his hold on me as his fingers twist into my hair while he maneuvers me onto his lap.
I’m cradled in his hold when his large hand molds to my face with a firmness that has all my synapses firing. As his mouth lowers to mine, my head tips back onto his bicep, offering my lips brazenly.
“So beautiful,” he whispers into my gaping pout. Lust burns up my chest while my belly tightens into a thousand knots with the hum of his voice. “Angel…”
Oh God, please kiss me. Just kiss me… “Elijah.”
“I like it when you say my name,” he blusters down my throat before his tongue licks into my mouth, pulling a sigh all the way from my toes as they curl into the plush velvet seat.
Everything fades to black, lighting up my senses into an overwhelmed, heated frenzy of sensation I can’t contain when my fingers tunnel into the longer tendrils of his hair and I pull myself deeper into his heat.
I don’t simply want him to kiss me; I need him to touch me. For his hands to etch their strength into every nook and cranny of my body. I want every inch of him to ache and hunger for me the way I am starved for him.
With my ragged breaths sticking in my chest, I twist my fingers in his hair while my other hand grapples with the hem of his loose t-shirt, lifting it between us so that my exposed skin melds with his.
“Fuck…” The curse rumbles from deep in his chest, vibrating through his hard muscles into my bones when I swivel on his lap, straddling his thighs.
My hand dips beneath his shirt, exploring the defined grooves of his chest.
“Don’t tempt me like this,” Elijah groans, his hand tugging at the loosened hair at my nape so that it escapes its messy knot.
It’s not the first time he’s spoken those words to me. Last time we were kids and had no idea what we were doing or how good it would feel. How addictive the sensation of being a physical part of each other would be.
I know now. He knows too.
Every inch of his body is tightening beneath mine with each writhe of my hips over his groin.
The pressure of his need pressed between my thighs as his mouth continues devouring mine is more than I can bear. Better than anything I’ve ever felt while he nips at my lips until they burn and the slight tang of my blood rushes to the surface.
“Elijah…” The moan escapes me with the forceful tug of his hand in my hair, freeing it completely so that it cascades around us, trapping the heat between us when I trace my lips down to his jaw all the way to the top of his chest.
“Oh God,” I cry loudly when his grip on my hip tightens, his short nails claw into me, threatening to sink through my skin when my hands knot in his shirt and pull it all the way up his chest.
Pressing a kiss over his heart, I hold my lips over the frantic thrum as it pounds harder and faster in contrast to the stark stillness of his body. His pulse is so loud, I can’t hear past the heated patter of mine rushing through my veins.
Everything about Elijah is so gorgeous, so strong, so perfectly contained that I have to steal a glance up at him just to check that this is real. That we are tangled together. In our need.
All the breath leaves my lungs at the sight of him with his head thrown back on the couch, his eyes screwed shut while his teeth blanch his perfectly chiseled lip.
I’m in awe.
Overwhelmed by the instant clench of my chest around my heart as it pangs for him endlessly.
I love you. The words coil around my ribs, weaving up my throat until they’re eager to blossom on the tip of my tongue.
I’m dying for him to look at me. To see the way I have pined for him so long and still yearn for his love over every other dream I have. I’m so enraptured that it takes a moment for the picture of him to fully sink in.
The flare of his nose and the tightly clenched set of his jaw. The bulge of his muscles thickening the curve of his neck along his collarbone.
He looks… pained… and tortured.
Overcome by the impulse to make him feel good, I brace myself on his biceps, holding on to him as I lower my lips back to his heart and deposit another kiss. Another. And another.
I swear he whimpers when I drag a trail of my affection back to his neck and pour all the love I have for him over his strained muscles. It doesn’t matter how much I give him, there’s always more.
My pecks morph into open-mouthed desperate kisses while my hands curl tighter around his muscles. I'm burning, aching to move, to feel the friction of his body beneath me as my thighs close around his hips.
When I lower, his hard length strokes over my core. I can’t contain my moan as I circle his stiff nipple with my tongue and he shudders.
“Slow down,” Elijah chokes out the words breathlessly. “Please… please… Stop… please.”
His hand twists in my hair, and with a harsh yank, he sits me on the coffee table in front of him.
His face is flushed and beautiful and conflicted while he roughly tugs his t-shirt back into place.
His eyes never meet mine as he pulls the blanket over his lap like if he hides his reaction then what we just did, didn’t happen.
“I can’t…” Elijah shakes his head down at his bare feet as though he’s trying to come up with something that will ease the heaviness and the hurt hanging in the air around us. When he peers up at me, his stare is glassed over, distant as he tells me, “I can’t do this. I’m… Fin…”
“Why? Elijah…” Desperation pitches my words so high that I flinch at myself.
He shakes his head. “I…Fin…you and…it’s…Finley…”
“What?” The questions tumble from my lips with an angry grate as my disappointment sinks in deeper, twisting with the insecurities whispering in my head.
Stupid girl. You’re not his type.
“You deserve better.” Throwing the blanket on his lap to the side, he stares down at his lap.
“But I want you.” I wipe at my stinging eyes before my stupid tears drip down my face.
“And Jayden?”
I freeze, bracing my hands on the edge of the glass table, focusing on the way his feet are grinding into the long pile of the cream rug.
Jayden.
My chest squeezes tight at the mention of his name. I can’t lie. I can’t tell Elijah that I don’t want Jayden.
“He’s…sweet.”
“Yeah.”
“And…”
He continues watching me intently. As though he can read every thought about his best friend that has ever crossed my mind. Maybe if he did it would make this so much easier than having to verbally dance around my feelings.
“And?”
“And he’s… he makes me feel safe and…”
“Wanted? Beautiful?”
“Elijah.” My stare sticks to his feet.
“Look at me, Finley.”
When I follow his gentle command, he says, “I like that JJ cares for you. That he makes you laugh and that he’s protective of you.
” He smiles, and my chest loosens a tad.
“The way he’s as obsessed with you as you are with him is mesmerizing, and I…
” Glimpsing up at me, he spears me with his dark stare. “I fucking love watching him with you.”
I don’t know what to think. What to reply. I’m not sure what that means. Yet, it eases the hurt of his rejection and the vice it locked around my heart.
“He’s good for you. Jayden’s funny and light all while being steadfast and strong. And he cares so damn hard. He’s perfect, Finley. Nothing short of what you deserve.”
Who knew a smile could cut as deep as a knife?
“You’re right, Jayden is all those things. But you are the boy I fell in love with before I knew what love was.”
“How I wish I was still that boy for you. I’m not, though, I haven’t been that person in so long. I don’t even know who he was.”
“Yes, but, Elijah, I’m not that girl either. We’re not those kids who used to watch the birds and give them stories of the life we wanted for ourselves…” I pause as my phone blares to life somewhere on the couch.
“Christina,” he reads the name flashing on the screen when he finds it.
“I’ll call her later.”
He hands me my phone, still ringing. “Pick up.”
“No. We’re not done.”
Pushing it into my hand, he reiterates, “Answer it.”
There’s no chance to argue as he gets up and walks away.
“You’re running from something you don’t have to run from,” I call after him.
Elijah spins back to me with a frown. “I’m giving you the chance to pick the better man.”
“I don’t want to pick.” His brows pull tighter
I don’t know what I’m saying. What my own words mean. I just know it’s the truth.
Watching as he heads to the kitchen, I call Christina back and allow her to do all the talking while I try to figure out my thoughts.
Because how can I love Elijah with all my heart when a part of it pangs relentlessly for the man across the hall? For his best friend?