Fallon
Chapter fifty
Breaking Boundaries
Cyrus shows up as the last rays of daylight fade. I tell myself he’s here for the kids. I know that’s a lie, though. Telling myself that I haven’t been listening for his truck for the last hour is another lie. The lies keep stacking against me.
I left the salon after we both promised to talk tonight.
When I open the door, he’s leaning against the frame, his face hollowed out from exhaustion.
Shoulders slumped. Eyes shadowed. Fingernails still faintly stained with streaks of paint they couldn’t scrub away today.
Jordan really outdid herself this time. I lean up, brushing my lips to his for a soft, quick, kiss. My lips come away.
“You look like hell,” I say softly.
He gives me that tired, half-smile. “I would say ditto. Though I don’t think it’s possible for someone so beautiful to resemble such an awful place.” He says all the right things.
Stepping aside, I gesture for him to enter. “Well, thank you. I love to hear you think I’m beautiful.”
“You are beautiful.” We share a tired smile.
The house still smells of lemon cleaner, sweat, and effort.
Focusing on anything except the way his words make me want to pace the floor, or climb into his lap and run my tongue over every inch of him.
I grab two beers from the fridge, giving my hands something to do, to keep myself from overthinking the way he looks sitting there on my couch, like he’s holding himself together with nothing but stubbornness and obligation. I don’t know why it’s such a turn-on.
When I hand him the bottle, our fingers brush. It’s barely anything. It’s everything. Electricity sparks between us; my longing to get lost in his arms is almost unbearable.
We sink into my couch, settling in silence, both decompressing from the day.
I adjust, pulling my feet up, tucking them beneath me.
He tips the bottle up, his throat bobs as he swallows his drink, his sun-kissed summer skin has a sheen of sweat on it that should not be a freaking turn-on.
My thighs clench. Naturally rubbing together, causing friction.
I’m torn between the need to cry and wanting to strip our clothes off.
The sensation has me sitting straighter.
“I hate that they did that to you,” he says eventually.
I shrug. “It’s only paint and vulgar words.”
“It was meant to hurt you.” I meet his eyes, and something in me splinters because he sees it. Always has. The shame of preconceived assumptions not founded in character, but in reputation.
“It did hurt me. It didn’t break me, though. That’s the difference,” I say, but the words fall flat even to me. I’ve danced this dance for too long. Preferring to ignore or keep others at a distance in an effort to avoid causing trouble. I’ve helped perpetrate the harassment by staying silent.
“You shouldn’t have to be this strong all the time.” His lips press into a tight line.
“You don’t get to decide that for me, Chief.”
He nudges me. “I get to worry.”
And damn him for the way that lands, comforting with no pressure. Fucker. “You look exhausted,” I say.
“I am.” The words hang heavy between us. I don’t want him to leave. “I should probably get back to my house soon.” I’m not sure how to ask for what I need.
“You can stay,” I blurt out before I can talk some sense into myself. What is wrong with you? He looks at me carefully.
“For a bit.” He’s giving me room to take it back.
“I mean it,” I add. “You helped all day. You deserve to…relax. The kids are already sleeping upstairs.” He studies me momentarily before rewarding me with a simple nod.
“Liam is here an awful lot.”
It’s a statement, but I still agree, “We love having him.”
“I miss not having him with me all the time.”
“We can work that out later. Come on,” I set the beer down and take him by the hand. Leading him down the hall. His presence behind me sends shivers down my spine. I can’t see him, but I feel him eating up the space of the hallway. He’s impossibly big, everything about him. Is big.
Upstairs, I turn the shower on without thinking too much about what I’m about to do. The spray of water fills the space, grounding me. The steam curls around the bathroom, blanketing me. “You’re covered in sweat and grim,” I tell him quietly. “Shower with me.”
He hesitates. “Fallon—” my name is a prayer falling from his lips.
There’s a look of desperation in his baby-blue eyes.
I want to wipe that look of anguish from his face.
He has done nothing but sacrifice these last several months, losing his partner, his job, his home, coming here, finding out about Billy, juggling the responsibilities of this town and facing the firing squad online.
He is always sacrificing for others. I want to take care of him as he takes care of us.
“Cyrus, don’t be stubborn,” I say quickly, even though my chest is already betraying me. “You look…wrung out. Let me take care of you.” His eyes soften in a way that’s dangerous to my heart. It’s in that look that I lose myself every time.
His slow approach is lethal. With every step that brings him closer to me, my heart hammers harder.
I want to whimper. My fingernails graze the crevices of his muscles as I slowly pull his shirt over his head.
The tension in his shoulders eases immediately.
He’s been as starved for my touch as I’ve been for his.
I work his belt buckle, enjoying the way his jaw locks and his eyes flare.
Ahh, that’s the reaction I was hoping for.
His pants fall away, leaving him in his boxer briefs.
Hooking my thumbs on the inside. I make sure that my nails graze the contour of his hips. He rewards me with a groan. That’s hot.
Fully naked before me, he stands there. Waiting for me to make the next move. My fingernails graze over the bulge in his boxers. I swear his dick pulses as I move over the tip.
“Go ahead, I’m right behind you.”
When he steps under the water, something in me loosens—slowly, deliberately, it’s our trust in one another settling into place. Not reckless. Not careless. Built. Day by day. Until it was earned.
I watch the way the water glides over him as he runs his hands through his ashen locks, how the steam clings to his skin, and the tension I’ve carried for so long is giving way to something soft, something more.
I dim the lights, letting shadows play across the tiles, letting the quiet stretch between us.
Every small gesture—the tilt of his head, the way he shifts beneath the spray—pulls me in deeper, reminding me that letting him into my heart again isn’t a weakness. It’s courageous to love another person.
“Cyrus?” I hesitate briefly, not able to refuse this undeniable longing I have to be in the shower with him, running my hands over the hard planes of his chest. There’s a pining to kiss him up his throat. A desire to run my fingers through his hair and let him know he isn’t alone.
“Yeah?” he hesitates.
“May I…?”
He pauses. “You don’t have to ask.”
“I know,” I whisper. “I was trying my hand at politeness.”
“Don’t start using those manners now.”
I nibble my lip for a moment. This was my idea.
I don’t want to chicken out. My undressing isn’t as sexy as his, but I strip before I tuck tail and run.
The moisture in the air hits my nipples, causing them to pebble harder.
Dampness pools between my thighs. My body slick with need. I take a steadying breath, and exhale.
Opening the glass pane, I step inside, close enough for the heat coming from the steam to lick against my skin, close enough to hear his ragged exhale.
We face one another, the air electric between us.
Two people who are too tired to pretend anymore.
Two people who want nothing more than to be with one another.
“You do so much for us,” I murmur.
“You don’t owe me anything.”
“I know.” My voice shakes. “That’s why it matters.” I reach for him. Driven by a desperate need to have that connection between us. To lose myself in his proximity.
He doesn’t pull away. Instead, he embraces me tighter, his hands moving in small circular motions between my shoulders-warm, steady, careful, delightfully tantalizing.
His hold on me borders on a fine balance between fragility and adoration. “You’re going to get those curls wet, Fal.”
I smile against his skin. “It doesn’t matter.” My hair shifts as he buries his face in my hair.
“I love the way your curls wrap around my fingers. I hope you don’t expect me to keep my hands to myself. I’m not that honorable of a man.” He confesses, my toes curl.
Cyrus has been trying to get me to be reasonable.
We’ve flirted and skirted around the idea of us.
It wasn’t until he walked through the door tonight, exhausted, that I wondered how many nights he’s had to be burdened this way by himself.
Yet, he’s had no one. I can’t picture him being at his house alone.
I think it’s past time I was honest with him.
“I believe the hardest part was being alone.
In the quiet, with no one to share my grief with, or to celebrate with.
The pressure to settle was there; I just knew that if I chose to try and with someone else, it would end up being pointless, that I would always compare whoever I chose to you, and they would always be lacking.
So, I chose to be alone, and the loneliness was at times unbearable.
Until you came along and filled the space that had been empty for so long.
I had that hollow place inside me for so long that once it was gone, it scared me.
The power you have over me, the potential we’re wasting because we keep choosing everyone else over each other.
I’ve been angry. I’ve been wrecked. And all this time, you’ve been the one holding my heart.
I don’t want you to leave, Cyrus. Not tonight. Not tomorrow.”