26. Chapter Twenty-Six
Chapter Twenty-Six
Jamie
“ P lease don’t regret this.”
Caiden looks at me with bright eyes that show not only lingering lust but a touch of fear, too. Shaking my head, I press my lips to his cheek then skirt them across his lips until I’m placing open mouthed kisses on his other cheek.
“I could never regret you. I’ve told you that already,” I promise as I move slowly down his body. My tongue traces the rose tattooed over his right pec and down the vines that snake over his ribs. Petals fall from the rose, and between them, tiny stars are tattooed into his skin.
When I reach his open waistband, I ignore his hard cock and nibble the skin around it. He hisses and writhes on the bed, twisting his hips. It takes me a second to realise that he’s trying to roll over. Sitting up, I straddle his waist and place my hands on his hips.
“Keep still,” I command, moving my hands to the fabric of his waistband. As I start to tug at the wet fabric, Caiden shakes his head, and covers his eyes with the back of his arm.
“Please stop. Stop,” he begs, and I slide off of him and lie at his side. I would never do anything he didn’t want, but I’m certain I know what this is about, and I need him to know it’s okay.
“Look at me,” I say, pulling his arm away from his face and rolling him onto his side, so we’re face to face. “You don’t need to hide from me.” He blinks then blinks again, his eyelashes dark with tears that aren’t falling.
“I don’t let anyone…. I can’t let you see how damaged I am. Then you'll see I'm nothing like Cooper. I can't be him for you, I can't.” His voice breaks and his cheeks turn a deep shade of red.
“I don’t want you to be anyone but you, Caiden. I know you’re having a hard time believing that but it’s true. Just be my pain in the ass stepbrother, with a bad attitude and terrible taste in music.” That gets a small, barely audible chuckle from him.
When Caiden rolls onto his back, I cover his body with mine, my hand finding his throat again. His eyes go wide, the blues hidden by black depths as he flicks his tongue ring between his lips.
“You’re scared, I get that, so am I. You’ve turned everything upside down and I barely understand myself at the moment, but I do know this. I’m not comparing you and I don't wish you were him. Whatever paths we took led us here, to this moment where I'm with you, sunshine. You.”
With my hand resting on his neck, I dip my head and press my lips to his, in a hard, closed mouthed kiss. “You’re not damaged.” Moving down his body, keeping my eyes on his, I kiss around his now flaccid cock, then move my hands to the fabric of his waistband. Lifting a brow, I tug at the fabric and he nods, then lifts his ass and lets me shimmy them off of him until they're lying on his bedroom floor along with his boxers.
My eyes don’t leave his face when I say, “You're amazing and so fucking beautiful.”
My tongue runs through the crease where his leg and groin meet before ghosting my lips over the silvery scars on his left thigh, careful to avoid the newer, redder ones.
“You’re strong.” I move to the other thigh and give it the same attention. Caiden’s body trembles under my touch but he doesn’t look away from me.
“Intelligent.” I spread his thighs and lift his legs until his feet are flat on the bed. “Talented,” I add, breaking eye contact as I bend down and lick a stripe up his taint. He sucks in a breath and groans, his hips moving to chase my lips that have moved to mouth his balls.
“Delicious.” I tug on them and then suck one into my mouth, eliciting the sweetest sounds. When I release him and lick up his thick shaft, he moans, his hands roughly grabbing my hair.
“Jamie, please,” Caiden rasps.
“What do you need?” Mouthing the head of his cock, I dip my tongue into the slit and lap up a salty drop of precum. His hips jolt upwards, and his hands push on my head until his cock slides right into my mouth and hits the back of my throat - showing me exactly what he wants and needs.
Taking him deep, hollowing my cheeks, I suck until his legs quake and his hands loosen in my hair.
“Jamie, Jamie, Jamie,” he chants. His breathing picks up and I pull away before he can reach that inevitable peak. Caiden whines and I sit back on my knees and rub up and down his thighs.
Light streaks through the window, casting him in a glow that makes him look unreal, ethereal, like a dream I’ve never dared to have. Cooper may have been his identical twin but everything about Caiden is different - more intense - from the sounds he makes, to the way he smells, to the sweet and salty taste of his skin. My body hums with a mixture of arousal and delight as my eyes feast on his pale, flushed body.
My cock throbs and I finally pay it attention, stroking it a few times and rubbing the tip of it over his hole.
“Condom?” I ask.
Caiden takes a second, his chest rising and falling with each shallow breath. He shakes his head. “I’ve never…never not used one and I got tested after….that one time.” That anger I experienced the night I hit the guy who hurt him, makes a sudden and unwelcome appearance, swirling in my gut, and I clench my jaw and turn away from Caiden. I don’t want this moment to be ruined by that creep.
“Same for me,” I say. “It’s been a long time since I went without, not since…” Caiden doesn’t make me finish the sentence, he simply reaches onto the bed next to him and tosses me the lube.
I make quick work of opening him, basking in the feel of his warmth and the whimpers he exhales as he fucks himself on my fingers. When he feels ready, I pour more lube onto my cock and slide inside him. He’s warm and tight and my heart beats erratically as I pause to let him adjust to me.
Covering Caiden’s body with mine, I trap his cock between my stomach and his and thrust deep and quick, snapping my hips. Need builds in my blood, and my mind shouts at me to fuck him harder. To own him. To make him forget anyone else before me.
Caiden’s legs wrap around my hips, holding me to him, and I wrap one hand around his throat, as I look deep into his eyes.
“Tap my side if you need me to stop, okay?” I tighten my grip, restricting his airways, not enough to stop him breathing but hard enough for him to feel my control.
“Fly for me, sweetheart.”
Caiden’s eyes roll before fluttering closed and I hover my lips over his, not kissing him but breathing in his air. Sharing the very life force from his lungs. Heat blooms in my veins and my balls draw up tight, tingles starting in the pit of my stomach.
He starts to swirl his hips, meeting my thrusts, whining from deep in his chest like a needy animal as his hands grip onto my shoulders for purchase. My movements speed up and his lips find my neck. He torments me with bites and kisses until he’s grunting, thick warmth coating my stomach as he comes for me again.
“Good boy, Caiden. Cover me in your cum. That’s it.”
He latches onto my neck with a punishing grip, teeth breaking skin, and my body tenses, blood roaring in my ears as pleasure ricochets through me. I come deep inside him, emptying my load and coating his channel in me. I pull out, slide my fingers inside him and scoop up my cum, then leisurely wipe it over his stomach, mixing it with his. His eyes widen and I smile at his fucked out expression and the red marks on his pale, slender throat.
We’re sticky with sweat and cum, the room stifling hot in the July sunshine. But still, I lie next to him, gather him into my arms and kiss the top of his head.
“We’re a mess,” Caiden jokes, his voice hoarse and I hum a response under my breath. Not really sure if he means physically or in general. Quite possibly both.
Cooper smiles at me. He’s sitting on the edge of a hot tub, snow falling behind him. “I could stay here forever with you,” he says, reaching out for me. I lace my hands with his and pull him into the water and onto my lap. The warm water swirls around us and he laughs, his head thrown back with delight.
“We can do that, baby,” I say, kissing his neck.
“No, Jamie. We can’t. Don’t you know, silly? We don’t have forever.” When I lean back to look at him, he’s not on my lap and I can’t see him anywhere. The water is red with blood and I move frantically through it, looking for him.
“Cooper! Cooper!” I shout, tears clogging up my throat, making it harder and harder to yell.
Caiden pulls me out of the water and I stumble into him, clinging to his hoodie. He has blood dripping down his forehead and a sad smile. “Everything ends, Jamie. Everything.”
I shoot up in bed, sweat soaked and panic stricken, momentarily forgetting where I am. It’s not until someone shifts next to me and I notice a mop of black hair fanned out over the pillow that I remember. Caiden stirs but he doesn’t wake. My body trembles and silent tears fall as I slide out of bed and pad barefoot into the kitchen.
Nightmares are nothing new but they’re getting more frequent and more vivid. Thankfully, Caiden is a deep sleeper and hasn’t noticed, because I’d hate for him to know that I dream about losing Cooper most nights. A week has passed since he joined me in the shower, setting off days filled with sex, food and more sex. We talk and joke but never about the things we really need to address - never about what we’re doing, what this means. And never about Cooper, or our parents or Rachel. I think we’re both too scared to burst the bubble.
Everything ends, Jamie. Everything. Caiden’s words from my dream haunt me as I take a soda out of the fridge.
This thing between us, the way we've been living and mostly ignoring the world, isn't sustainable. I know it and so does he.
Caiden goes to work each morning and I do what I can remotely. When he gets home, we eat and fuck and sleep and watch true crime documentaries until we're exhausted, and then we wake and do it all again.
When Rachel calls - which is most evenings - I reluctantly answer, giving her yet another excuse that I doubt she's buying. I know I need to end things with her but can’t bring myself to do it over the phone, nor can I bring myself to leave, so I keep pretending and hate myself for it every time. When she ends the calls with ‘love you’ and I reply with the same, I feel the betrayal like a knife to my heart. I’m not proud of my actions but I can’t stop them either. I’m the villain in her story and while I regret the hurt I'm causing her, I don't regret him.
Three years ago, Caiden Carrington was a thorn in my side - my boyfriend's needy twin who often needed helping out of one situation or another. I resented him for that, for how he could manipulate Cooper with a bat of his eyelashes. Yet, if I look back closely at that time, there was something else there too. Some other feeling that hid itself inside me. It was there the day I placed that bracelet on his arm, when I’d held his hand a little too long, and on New Year’s when he’d rubbed his lips against my palm. It was there in the tiny pitter patters of my heart that beat outside of my love for Cooper.
If I believed in such things, I’d think there was an invisible string connecting Caiden and I back then. And maybe there was, but I couldn’t see it because I was too in love with his twin. Even thinking this now sours my stomach though, because I love Cooper. Or I loved Cooper. My own feelings are no longer as sharp or clear as they used to be. Last week I could have sworn on my life that I was still in love with him. Now I wonder if my love has been so wrapped up in his memory, I’ve forgotten what it even looked or felt like.
Footsteps sound behind me just as warm arms wrap around my middle. “Why are you awake already? It’s Saturday, we get to sleep in.” Caiden kisses the back of my neck and a shiver races through me. Turning in his arms, I wrap mine around him, too. His face is soft and sleep wrinkled, his hair flat on one side and sticking up on the other.
“I was thirsty,” I hold up the can which he takes from me, and with his other hand, he leads me back to bed.
“Get some more sleep,” he says, his lips finding mine in the dark. His tongue swipes into my mouth and our kiss deepens until he’s climbing over me, his naked body rubbing against mine. It’s slow and languid and when he buries his head into my neck, my arms come to lay over his back. He’s asleep moments later and I stare at the ceiling while his heart beats in time with mine.
The sun is shining brightly through the window when Caiden finally rolls off of me, stretching like a cat and nuzzling into my armpit. “Hmmm, morning.”
“Hey, sunshine. Sleep well?” Rolling onto my side, I smile at his sleepy grin.
“Pretty good. Work has been so busy this week, think I needed the rest.” He yawns. “Give me another thirty and then I’ll get up. What do you want to do today?”
“Come home with me,” I blurt out, the thought having come to me sometime in the night. His eyes shoot open at the same time he pulls back. “Not for long. We can come back tomorrow night and we don’t even have to stay with our folks, I’ll find a hotel.”
He’s out of the bed and shaking his head before I can say anything more.
“No, I can’t do that.” He rubs his hands together anxiously.
“Why not?” I sit up, leaning against the headboard. “It’s been three years, Caiden.”
“Exactly!” he yells, then paces his room. “Cooper died because of me and then I left. You said it yourself, I left you to pick up the pieces, to take care of my dad. What kind of a son abandons his father at a time like that? Me, this fuck up.” He slaps his chest before pacing the room again.
Jumping out of bed, I grab his biceps to still his movements. “You did what you had to do to survive losing Cooper. Your dad will understand, he loves you.”
“You don’t get it, Jamie. Even before Cooper died, even before you came into our lives, I was awful to him. I don’t deserve his forgiveness and I don’t deserve….”
“Do not say you don’t deserve a family. Do not fucking say it. I know your mother made her love feel conditional, but Duncan is different. My mum is different. Maybe it’s time to stop running away.”
He shakes out of my hold. “That’s rich coming from you,” he scoffs. “When will you stop running? That’s what you’re doing here, isn't it? Running away from everything you’re afraid to face. You think I don’t hear you calling his name in your sleep, or telling your girlfriend you love her? I hear it all, Jamie. How many more times are you going to tell your mum you’re on a work trip because you can’t tell her you’re with me?”
My heart sinks as a slow puncture forms in our bubble.
“I will tell her about us, I will. I haven’t because I didn’t know if it’s what you wanted. We never talk about what we want, so how am I to know?”
“What I want,” Caiden says, while pulling on a pair of black jeans and my black hoodie, “is to not talk about this anymore.” He reaches his bedroom door and I stop him with a hand on his arm.
“Where are you going?”
“Out. I need….I just need a moment.”
“You’re running,” I say bitterly, dropping my hand from him so I can throw on my own clothing.
He doesn’t answer and it feels like the air is sucked from the room when he storms out and slams the door behind him. I know he’s scared, and pushing people away is how Caiden deals with his fear so, I don’t chase after him. I’ll give him the time he needs to work through his fear. I’ll be ready to talk when he gets back.
Sinking onto the sofa, I stare at the black screen of the television until the ringing of my phone grabs my attention.
“Hey, Jay,” my mum’s voice sounds panicked. “It’s Sage, she’s gone into labour.”
Fear laces through me. “It’s too early,” I say, standing and making my way to Caiden’s bedroom.
“I know,” Mum replies. “We’re at the hospital now and she’s been admitted. She’s asking for you. I tried her mum but she’s not in the country right now and her sister had her baby last month and can’t get here.”
The plan was always for me to be there when the baby was born. With the father out of the picture, I’d promised Sage I would be with her, that she wouldn’t have to do this alone, and I have no intention of letting her down.
“I’m coming, I’ll be there as fast as I can. But Mum, I’m still up in London, it could take me some time. Stay with her?”
“I will, I promise. Drive safe.” Mum hangs up and I try Caiden’s number, only to hear it ringing from the kitchen. A quick check confirms what I already worked out - he’s left his phone on the counter.
“Shit!” I yell into the empty flat.
I can still smell his amber scent on my skin as I pack up my things then wait for Caiden to return. When he still hasn’t returned after half an hour, I make the hard choice to leave. I don’t know if I’ll even make it to Sage before the baby is born but I can’t wait around any longer.
Digging through a drawer in his room, I find a pen and a sticky note and jot down a short message.
Sage went into labour. I had to go. I’ll call you.
Then I walk out the door, ignoring the sound of our little bubble shattering.