28. Chapter 28
twenty-eight
Asound vibrates through my room. I blink, listening. Someone’s knocking on my front door. A glance at the clock tells me, it’s after midnight. I’ve been dead asleep.
My throat tightens as I throw off the covers, half awake, padding through the house to yank open the door. “Laurel.”
“We… we need to talk,” she stutters.
“About what?” I look past her, left and right, my pulse hammering. “Where’s Bowie?”
“With my parents.” Her voice cracks. “I told them there was something I had to do.”
She’s trembling.
“Get in here.” I step back, holding the door for her, but she doesn’t move. “What’s happened?” My heart’s drumming hard.
“I need to know.” She blinks through tears.
“Dammit, Laurel, get inside. I’ll make coffee.” Taking her hand, I pull her into the living room, turning on lamps, guiding her to the kitchen.
“The house… looks different,” she mutters in a tiny voice.
She was here when we were young. My parents loved her.
Hers loathed me. At least, her father did.
“I’ve done some work to it.”
She glances at the wall. “You bow hunt now?”
“Yeah.” Taking her shoulders in my hands, I set her at the table and pour a shot of whiskey, setting it in front of her. “Sip this.”
She needs something to calm her down. Her eyes are wild. That paternity test must be heavy on her.
I need coffee and a clear head to deal with whatever this is. “Talk to me.”
She stares at her hands, not touching the whiskey. Then she asks in the tiniest voice, “Have you ever been to Nashville?”
“Nashville? Yeah.”
Her eyes lift to mine. “When?”
I hike a shoulder. “I don’t know. A few years ago.”
She groans, dropping her head, burying her face in her hands.
“Laurel. What is it?” I set my coffee cup under the stream.
“What time of year were you there?” She wipes at tears.
“Christmas.”
She begins sobbing into her hands and I spin around.
What the fuck is happening?
It’s killing me, her crying like this. Me helpless over here.
I down my shot of espresso, pour a full cup, and move to the table, sitting beside her. “Tell me what this is about.”
She lifts her eyes to mine. “When you were there—did we?”
I freeze, my scalp tightening. She’s spiraling. That paternity test was one shove too far.
“Did we see each other?”
She nods, terror filling her eyes.
“You don’t remember?”
She shakes her head. “I’m… not sure anymore.”
“No, Laurel. I didn’t see you when I was there. Tanner and I went for a hardware store convention. When we were getting our business plan together.”
What the fuck did that son of a bitch do to her? He accused and now she’s drowning in guilt for something neither of us ever did.
She just sits there, her head hanging, staring down.
“Are you asking me if… Bowie… if we…” I wrap my hand around her forearm. “Why would you even ask that?”
She blinks, disbelieving.
“Take a sip,” I say softly, placing the glass in her hand. “It’ll make you feel better.”
Taking it, she mutters, “It was a dream. But it felt like… a memory.” She looks up at me, her lashes laden with tears. “It… it felt so real.” Her shoulders shake, the same way Bowie’s do when he cries too hard. But Laurel only manages quick glances at me. She doesn’t look at me the way he does.
“Say it.”
“I… we… were in Nashville. It was Christmas. We… we made love.”
I exhale hard, stroking her hair out of her face. “Dreams can be so real you wake up wondering what’s memory and what’s not. It happens to everyone.” It happened to me for years. “You’re under so much pressure, it’s not surprising. Him filing for that paternity test.”
She buries her face in her hands again, and I pry them away.
“But… I came. My panties were wet.”
Fuck, I have to turn my head and swallow. It would be funny if wasn’t so goddam heartbreaking.
Pulling her into my lap, I wrap her in my arms, whispering in her ear, “I’ve had the same dream with the same results more times than I want to confess to anyone. It. Wasn’t. Real. We haven’t—”
“Yes, we have.” She blinks defiantly. “When we were young.”
Cupping her face in my hand, I softly stroke my thumb across her cheek, drinking her in, remembering.
“Yes,” I whisper. “Do you think I could ever forget that? You were terrified you were pregnant and I was scared shitless. But I was excited at the same time, thinking maybe we’d have a family and be together forever.
But you weren’t. And then you were gone. ”
Makes my fucking chest hurt like it hasn’t in years.
Her shoulders loosen, and she leans against me, her head tucked under my chin. “I wish I never left.”
“Me, too.”
Laurel tips her head back, looking up at me. “I wanted you to come for me.”
“When?”
“When I left.”
My breath hitches and I swallow hard. “I did come for you, Laurel.”
She blinks in surprise, stuttering, “Wh… when?”
“Fall break after you left. I drove to Houston.”
She shoves back to look at me squarely. “How would you know where I was?”
“Mercy.”
She whispers, “She never told me.”
“She didn’t know. She told Tanner what dorm you lived in. When I got there—you were in the middle of a bunch of friends. Laughing. Happy.” I draw a bitter breath with something kicking in my chest. “You were in your element and I knew I didn’t fit in. I knew you’d moved on. Forgotten me.”
“I never forgot you, Calder. I just… accepted. I did what I was expected to do.”
My chest goes tight like a fist locking around it.
“I wish he was yours,” she whispers softly.
“I do, too.”
Laurel tilts her head, finally looking into my eyes. “Calder, make love to me.”
Jesus.
Fuck.
I’m only a man.
“You’re going to be the death of me, you know that?”
She pushes away from me to stand. “I’m not going to beg—”
I tug her back.
She looks at me with longing in her eyes—and all my control is gone. I kiss her with everything I’ve got—hungry as a starved lion—but I’m so fucking scared my heart thunders in my chest.
I can’t say no to this. My dick’s throbbing like a stallion at the starting gate.
I slide my hand under her sweatshirt, taking her breast into my hand, feeling the puckered nipple. Fuck, she didn’t wear a bra.
Leaning her back in my arms, nudging her shirt up with my head, I take that beautiful breast into my mouth, pulling her hard into me, sucking, working my tongue over that tan, tight nipple.
I’m in danger of losing it just doing this.
“Calder,” she whimpers and my cock throbs.
Standing with her in my arms, I carry her to my bed, my mouth over hers, kissing her every step of the way like a goddamn madman—our tongues tangling, her arms looped around my neck.
How many times have I dreamed of this. Her in this bed.
When I set her feet to the floor, she yanks her sweatshirt off over her head, and her breasts fall free, with that luscious long hair cascading over her shoulders.
I’m battling to keep it under control, looking at her like this.
Laurel is more beautiful than she was at eighteen, her breasts fuller, her waist even smaller.
She lies on the bed, and I tug off her leggings and panties together, stepping out of my briefs.
My raging cock springs free, engorged, pre-cum already on the tip.
Crawling onto the bed, I lie on my side, pulling her against me so we’re chest to chest, and I run my hand over the curves of her body, taking in the slope rising from her waist to her hips, the dip in her lower back that rounds to her firm ass.
I grip her thigh, pulling her leg on top of mine, opening her up.
She closes her eyes as I slide my hand between her legs. Finding her soaking wet—I spread her arousal, softly stroking her clit.
“Oh, Calder,” she moans.
I slip my fingers inside her, feeling the warmth and my dick jerks hard as Laurel hunches into my hand.
Fuck, I can’t take it—one hand working her pussy, I grip her breast with the other, sucking it into my mouth.
She should’ve been mine. She should never have been put in this painful position.
“Calder, please.”
I can’t last, Laurel.
“I need…” She bucks her hips into my hand. “To feel you… inside of me.”
I roll onto my back, pulling her on top of me. Straddling me, she fists my cock, spreading the pre-cum with her thumb—and I groan. I’m a drowning man—but what a fucking way to die.
Her hazel eyes glisten like a spring meadow with dew on it as she slowly sinks down my cock, her eyes growing wider and wider as my cock stretches her.
“Oh, God.” Her head tilts back, her long hair brushing my hands on her waist.
“Fuck, Laurel.” I’m breathless.
She arches her back farther, her head tilts back, and with my hands around her waist, I lift her then, draw her down as I drive into her.
Ten years waiting… thrust… fantasizing…thrust—
I can’t go slow. I can’t believe this isn’t a dream.
Our fingers lace together, our gazes holding tight, and as she rides me, we move in perfect rhythm. I power into her again… and again—until her breath catches—her thighs clench around me like a vise—and her body shudders. “Calder!”
She stills, her chest heaving as her walls throb around me and my cock explodes, buried as deep inside of her as her body can take me.
We both fall still, breathless, as I stroke my fingers through her hair, then slide it down her back, cupping her ass in my hand, pressing her deeper into me.
Laurel lies down, her breasts pressed to my chest. Her head under my chin, her fingers glide through my hair as she whispers, “I know I’m not supposed to say it. But I love you, Calder. I always have. I always will.”
Knocks what wind I have left out of me.
Holding her against me, feeling the drumming of her heart, I open my mouth to say it back—and choke on the words.
Not because I don’t love her. Because I’m a fucking coward.
And she’s not.
My hands grip her waist. I pull her higher, drinking her in with my eyes. My beautiful Laurel. Cupping the back of her head with my hand, pressing her mouth into mine, I kiss her like she’s my last meal—because God help me, she is. The only one I ever want.
My dick throbs again.
I flip her onto her back, hover over her, and slide my palm between her legs, spreading the mess we made. As our gazes lock again—her eyes full of hurt and wanting, I push inside.
Her head falls to the side as I drive in deep and pull out, again… and again… and again.
Hell, yeah, I’m walking through fire a second time.