Chapter 33
33
[Ruthie]
I just needed to hear your voice .
I hadn’t known how much I needed to hear his as well. His proposal to have a baby came out of left field, and in the throes of passion, I wasn’t certain he meant his suggestion. However, Bolan was attentive the remainder of the week. Very interested in the practice of making babies.
Last night, his phone call rattled me. The tremor in his voice. The quiver of hesitation. The adamant resolve that nothing happened to warrant such a stressed call, when something clearly happened. He needed me and I hadn’t been there, to hold him, to calm him, to care for him.
So, I make a bold decision.
Tulane and I head to Cleveland. A six-hour drive and a last-minute ticket to the game set us just off center from the visiting team’s dugout.
Before the game starts, I wasn’t certain I could grab Bolan’s attention. He once told me how he drowns out most of the stadium, especially as no one was present to see him specifically. Before . No immediate family. No former girlfriends.
The second Bolan is looking in our direction, I wave. Then blow him a kiss, hoping he catches sight of us. His feet stumble over the sandy strip running down the third base line as he crosses it toward the visitor’s dugout. Then he lifts his hand, jumping in the air to catch a kiss that went over his head.
A smile breaks out on his face. One that pops that dimple as bright as the stadium lights.
During the game, Bolan hit like a champ, bringing in a run and scoring one. When the game ends, he comes to the netting that protects fans from fly balls, and motions for me to come to the edge of the field. With his fingers through the woven protection, I slip mine over his.
“You came to my game.”
“We came to your game.” I jostle Tulane in my arms, glancing at her before looking back at her dad.
He blinks a few times, looking from her to me and back again. “I need to fucking kiss you.”
Leaning as close to the net as I can get, Bolan gives me a quick peck that isn’t enough for either of us.
“Why didn’t you tell me you were coming?”
For half a second, I worry that I’ve made a mistake. That Bolan doesn’t want us here. That I’ve ruined some plan he has. But I quickly shake the thought.
“I just wanted to see you. Surprise you. You seemed pretty upset last night.”
“Best fucking surprise ever.” He wiggles his fingers toward Tulane.
Someone calls his name, and he glances to the side, brows furrowing before he looks back at us. “I’ve got to shower and head back with the team. I share a room with Cyrus.” Those furrowed brows deepen .
I knew I couldn’t stay with him. I’m hoping he’ll stay with me. “I got us a room in your hotel.”
His smile grows wide again. “You’re just full of surprises.” Then he turns a little serious. “But you should have told me. If something had happened. A car crash. A choking issue. A snake bite. I wouldn’t have known because I would have thought you were home.”
“Well, good thing I wasn’t planning on roaming the desert in Cleveland.” Said tongue in cheek.
“Flower,” he admonishes.
I jostle Tulane on my hip. “We’re safe.”
“You’re beautiful.” His gaze shifts to Tulane. “Both my flowers are lovely.” He glances back at me. “I’m so happy you’re here.”
“Yeah?” The niggle of doubt needs extra reassurance.
“Of course, baby. I’ll see you back at the hotel. Give me about an hour.” He tugs at the netting, forcing me to come close to him again and kisses me through the square of rope.
I giggle at the feel of the net around my lips and the way Bolan doesn’t care that he’s kissing me in public.
By the time I arrive at the hotel where the team is staying, Tulane is heavily asleep, and I set her in the portable crib. With her in the room, Bolan and I aren’t going to do anything sexual. Still, I want to comfort him, hold him, like he’s done for me so often in the past month and more.
When a quiet knock comes to the door, I jump, even though I’ve been anticipating his arrival, and I let out a low, nervous giggle. Leaping up from my seat on the edge of the bed, I cross to the door and open it.
“Hi,” I say, taking a deep breath at the sight of him, like I haven’t seen him in years when it was only an hour ago .
“Hi.” Before the door is even shut behind Bolan’s entrance, I’m plastered against the wall and his lips land on mine.
We kiss like we haven’t kissed in decades, instead of a week. Like that kiss all those years ago, when a clock was ticking, and sixty seconds was all we had.
Bolan pulls back, breathless a second, before he moves along my chin and down my neck. “You are such a sight for sore eyes. And my heart.”
“Bolan,” I quietly moan. He can be so sweet.
His mouth meets mine again, his large body still pinning me to the wall. His hands quickly roam over my shoulders to my chest, cupping one breast and pinching my nipple, peaked against my bra.
“Bolan,” I whisper. “Tulane.”
While I’m not saying no to sex, I am saying no in the shared room with a child. If all we do is kiss and he holds me all night, that’s the reassurance I need that everything is fine.
Bolan breaks the kiss and turns his head toward the crib in the corner of the room. Then he shuffles us into the bathroom.
“What are you doing?” I chuckle as he hits the light, blinding both of us with the sudden brightness and closes the door.
“I need to see you.” He spins me to face the mirror and returns to sucking along the column of my throat.
In the harsh light of the bathroom, my eyes are dilated. My skin pink where Bolan’s scruff has tickled it. His fingers come to the buttons of the jersey I’m wearing. The one with his name on the back.
Our name.
“Want to fuck you with this jersey on, baby. But also want to see every inch of you again.”
My knees give a little, and I catch myself on the edge of the countertop as he continues to pop all the buttons until the two sides separate. Pressing my ass backward, I catch on the front of him, where he’s long and hard and eager for me.
He slips his hands inside the jersey, where the length covers my waist, and pops the button on my jeans. In seconds, I’m out of my pants and underwear. Bolan even has me remove my bra but leave the jersey on. With the front panels separated, a slim line of skin is exposed right down the middle of my body.
“Bolan,” I whimper as his hands skim over my ass and hips, rounding to the front of me. One dips between my thighs.
“Watch us,” he demands as he palms me, then slips a finger easily inside me. My head tips back, and my eyes close.
“Watch,” he commands, nipping at my neck. “See what I see.”
I open my eyes and meet his gaze in the reflection of the mirror. “What do you see?”
“The most beautiful woman I’ve ever known. My wife.”
A second finger joins the first and my breath hitches as he fills me up. He smiles against my neck before nipping me once more. His other hand slides up my middle, cuffing my throat. That inked forearm on display. I swallow against his tender hold.
“Bear,” I whisper.
Bolan chuckles but doesn’t break his attention on my body. His fingers slip and slide. The build inside me climbs. The flutters collide like a storm.
Suddenly I’m soaring, head tipped back, mouth wide, free-falling through the sky. Like the hits Bolan makes out of the park. Then I drop.
The orgasm came too fast. The end too soon, but Bolan isn’t going to quit at one.
“Sure like seeing my number on your back, flower.” He slowly removes his fingers from me and presses at my back, causing me to bend forward. He traces over the number bracketing my spine. “And I know this isn’t a romantic moonlight balcony, but I need to have you like this again. Where I can see my name draped over you. See my cock entering you, stuffing you full.”
He kicks lightly at the inside of my ankles, spreading my legs in a new way. He tugs off his shirt and I watch the show through the mirror. The clink of his belt buckle follows, and the soft thud of his jeans hits the floor.
His gaze is lowered, aimed at where he’s stroking his tip through soaking folds.
“Want to put a baby in you, flower. Want to bury my seed deep inside you and plant a new life.”
I’d snort at his metaphor if I wasn’t so turned on by the possibility.
With an easy glide, he slips inside me, buried deep within seconds, and stills. He meets my eyes in the mirror.
“Still good with that?”
“A baby?” I choke. I want that more than anything. A piece of him I’ll always have. Because I’m still not certain where we’ll be in a year, but for now, we’re here, taking pleasure in one another.
“ Our baby.”
“Bolan.” My eyes prickle as I struggle with his name, and then he’s moving, quickly picking up the pace and distracting me. His hands spread over my back. His palm splays over his name stitched on the jersey. He grips my hips, pistoning into me like he can’t get deep enough, and I meet his thrusts, like I can’t pull him far enough into me.
He slides one hand around my front, his fingers finding that trigger spot. My skin is slick. The sound of us echoes in the small confines.
“Bolan.” My voice hitches, and he moves faster. His fingers. His hips. The glide in and out of me.
I cover my mouth to prevent the scream that would bounce off the walls in this tiny space and wake a sleeping toddler, as I spiral out of control, releasing a ripple up my belly and a trickle of down my inner thighs. The orgasm is so powerful my knees buckle, but Bolan holds me upright.
He tugs me back, my ass flush with his pelvis, and he stills, jettisoning inside me. His groan is deep and throaty. A vein bulges along his neck but his eyes catch on mine through the mirror, and he smiles like he did earlier. With that dimple bright and beautiful and full of promise.
Like he’s truly happy to see me.
He leans forward, keeping himself seated inside me, and wraps his arms around my belly.
“I’m still green for you, but I sure like you in Anchors blue.” He chuckles as he presses a kiss to the side of my neck.
I giggle, shaking my head at how ridiculous he can be. How ridiculously romantic without meaning to be.
I shift, prepared to release him, but he tightens his embrace, looking at me in the reflection. His chin on my shoulder.
“Not yet,” he whispers. “Just another minute.”
Another moment between the two of us.
Our spent bodies wrap around each other as we snuggle in the hotel bed.
“I need to tell you something.” Bolan’s voice is serious, tight even, which is so unlike him. “I don’t want any secrets between us.”
I stiffen beneath his hold, swallowing thickly as I worry that he’s found out the secret I’ve been keeping from him. The innocent slip of truth I haven’t revealed yet.
However, as he prefaced this conversation by saying he had something to tell me, my skin prickles, goosebumps forming and not the good kind.
“ Oo - kay .” I hesitate, shifting in his arms, attempting to pull away from him, but he holds me tighter, like he’s afraid I’ll slip away.
He rolls me to my back, positioning half his body over mine. His leg between mine. His arms at the sides of my head, brushing back my hair. The weight of his broad chest pins me in place.
The room is dark except for a sliver of light coming from the bathroom where the door is almost closed by not quite. Tulane is used to a night light and I didn’t want her to wake up and be frightened, especially in the unfamiliar surroundings of the hotel.
“When I called you last night, I really needed to hear your voice.”
I swallow the sudden lump in my throat. The prickle of tears almost instant, as if my body knows before my head can catch up that something happened. Something I don’t want to hear. Something I won’t be able to handle, especially after what we just did in the bathroom.
“It was nice to hear your voice, too,” I counter tersely, my voice quivering. I squirm beneath him, preparing to flee.
“Something happened before I called you, and I just want you to know.”
My body goes cold. I’m stiff as a board beneath him. My hand had been on his bicep, but it slips free, fingers clutching the sheets instead. My breathing starts to exaggerate.
I nod. The only motion I can muster.
“Someone hit on me.” His admission slams me in the chest, and I can’t help the strangled gargle that escapes. The rush of pain up my throat and out my mouth.
Bolan continues, the words in a speeding stream of confession. “Nothinghappenedwithher. Ididn’tinitiateanything. Didn’t hardly speak to her. Didn’t do anything.”
My breaths come faster. My heart hammering, the rattling enough to knock me over if I wasn’t already lying down. I don’t know how to respond. Instead, I look away from him, but he gently pinches my chin, forcing me to look at him.
“I want you to know because I’d never do anything to hurt you like that, Ruthie. I am not tempted by anyone but you. I?—”
He cuts himself off and I’m grateful that he’s stops his tongue from saying something he’ll regret. Something I don’t want to hear in the midst of a confession about someone trying to pick him up.
“I swear I didn’t touch her. The second I got away from her, I rushed to my room and called you. You can ask Cyrus.”
Because his friend will cover for him . The situation was too familiar. The ache in my chest almost worse than I remember.
Bolan continues to hover over me, keeping me in place. “I just wanted you to know. I made a commitment to you. You’re my white. And we promised to be honest with one another. I’m still your green.”
I nod, but I don’t feel safe. Suddenly, I’m spent in a totally different way than having sex with him in a bathroom. I’m drained, but the tears leaking from the corners of my eyes cannot be withheld.
“No, baby. No, don’t cry. I swear nothing happened.” He leans forward to kiss my lips, but I can’t find it in me to respond. He takes my hand instead, lifting it to his mouth and lingering against my palm. His eyes close. “Please believe me, Ruthie.”
I lick my lips. I want to believe him. Deep down, I’m certain I do, and I attempt to tease him about the situation, but my throat constricts around the words. “You can’t help it that you’re irresistible.”
Bolan lifts his head. “But I did resist. I didn’t want her. I don’t want anyone but you. Only you.”
I nod, still struggling to find my voice. “Why didn’t you tell me last night?” Before I dragged his daughter across three states.
“I didn’t want to worry you. I didn’t want you to doubt me like you do right now. I can feel it. That distrust. And last night, I wanted to hear your voice. Knew you’d calm me down.”
And he didn’t want to tell me the truth.
But he’s telling me now.
Cliff was repentant. He’d beg for forgiveness. He’d assure me it meant nothing.
Bolan isn’t doing that. He’s only asking me to believe him, trust him, that nothing actually happened.
“Shit. I’m just fucking this up.” He lowers his forehead to mine. “I just wanted to be honest, but instead, I’m hurting you.”
“No,” I squeak. “No, I appreciate the honesty. I want the truth. Always the truth.”
“I don’t want you to worry about me on the road. I only have eyes for you, baby. Your eyes.” He rubs his fingertip over my brow and around one eye.
“Your kiss.” He presses one to my lips, the sensation featherlight.
“Your heart.” He lays his hand flat against my chest.
“I’m all yours, flower. Only yours.”
Slowly, I run my hand up his arm again, tracing along the ink before coasting over his shoulder and around his neck, tugging him down on top of me. He relaxes a little, drifting to his side but keeping me pinned to his chest.
“All I can do is trust you,” I whisper. Until he proves otherwise. “But, if you ever feel tempted?—”
“I won’t. I swear.” He clutches me harder, pressing his face into my neck, inhaling my skin where I smell like him and me.
“Green, Ruthie. Always green.” He continues to hold me, smoothing down my hair and all I can do is hold on tight in return, and hope he means it.