Chapter Twenty-Two
Twenty-Two
Olivia
Ihad no idea what had brought about the 180-degree turnaround in Justin, but I was not going to complain. This open side of him that held all of my deepest pain in the palm of his hand while conversely bending me over a table and fucking me until I forgot my own name... he was the stuff of wish upon a star fairy tales that I’d long ago given up on. I couldn’t get enough. I’d never felt safer, yet still so petrified of being hurt. Not physically. No, I knew he’d do anything to protect me physically. But it was my heart I was worried about at this point, because as intrigued as I was by the man who stonewalled me at every turn in the name of professionalism, I was nothing short of smitten over this new, open, flirty banter and soft caresses guy.
“What are you thinking about so hard over there?” he asked, wiggling our interlaced hands as we sat cuddled on the couch watching a movie that afternoon.
“You,” I admitted.
“What about me?”
I reached over and turned down the volume to focus on him. “Just how much you’ve changed.”
“Changed good or changed bad?”
“Good. It’s definitely good. It’s just...” I glanced down at our hands, my stomach doing a nervous flip. “I’m just scared to trust it.”
“You’re scared to trust me?” He sounded gutted and when I met his gaze, I saw devastation staring back at me. “Are you serious?”
“No! It’s not that!” I yanked his hand to try and bring him closer, but it was like moving a boulder. “I trust you more than almost anyone. I’m not talking about my safety, Justin. I’m talking about trusting this...” I waved a hand between us. “You talk about wanting me and being possessive and not sharing, which I agreed to because I don’t want to share either, but the switch up has been a bit fast and...”
“And what?” he gritted out. When I didn’t respond, he gently tipped my chin up with a finger. “What? Tell me.”
“I want more,” I breathed out, relieved that I let the words free. When his brows dipped in confusion, I cupped a palm over the back of his hand. “I haven’t let a man in since Christoph. I’ve been too afraid to go there, and I have to protect Elizabeth. But you...” I closed my eyes and inhaled. “But here I am with these big feelings for you—even though you fought me for a while—and it’s scary because I want to feel so much more than possessed. I want to feel...” I shrugged.
“Cherished.”
My eyes slid open at his unexpectedly emotional word choice. “Yes.”
He ran the back of his knuckle down my cheek. “I know.”
“You do?”
“Of course I do. You’re a woman who doesn’t let many people in, but those she does, she cherishes them with everything’s she’s got, and it’s obvious you want that in return.” He pressed a kiss to my palm as heat burned behind my eyelids. “You deserve nothing less, Olivia.”
I nodded, not missing the fact that while he was technically saying all the right things—he wanted to be as exclusive as whatever this was between us could be, and he would always protect me—he wasn’t saying what I wanted to hear. It was early. I knew it was a lot to ask of anyone, especially in our situation. Heck, we’d just become intimate after him basically working for me. I was probably pushing for too much too soon. I also had my daughter to think about, and she would always be my priority.
“Hey.” He cupped my cheek and forced my eyes onto his. “Why the face?”
“What face?”
He touched the tip of my nose. “This one. What’s going on here?”
“Nothing.” I shifted to stand. “I need to go check my sauce.”
I felt him follow me, but I kept my back to him as I stirred the sauce and tried to get my emotions in check. I knew I was being silly, reading too much into things, expecting too much.
I was weirdly grateful when his phone rang from the other room. “You should probably get that,” I said over my shoulder. “It could be important.” I went about pulling out another pot for pasta, then filling it with water.
I heard his muffled voice as he answered. I tried not to eavesdrop as I set the pot on the stove and turned the burner on, then opened the fridge to look for some vegetables for a salad.
“You need to stop calling like this...” His irritated words trickled to me, and I straightened up, glancing toward the living room. Like a magnet, I couldn’t help myself and I walked back that way, pausing at the threshold.
The relaxed guy I was just watching a movie with was gone. He still had mussed hair and a five o’clock shadow, but that icy expression was back, his spine steely straight, his jaw clenched so tight I thought he might crack a tooth. When he sensed me standing there, his eyes slid my way and locked on my face. In that moment, I watched as he thought something through, then something else clicked into place for him.
He pulled the phone away from his ear far enough to stab a button, putting it on speaker so I could hear a woman’s voice.
“...stop pushing me away, Justin. You can’t ignore me forever.”
“Tricia,” he bit out, making me flinch at his ex-wife’s name. “I told you last time you called, this is not my problem, I’m not your husband anymore. You were the one who burned this bridge when you fucked my friend while I was deployed overseas, remember?”
“Justin—”
“No! I gave up everything to try and make it work.” His eyes blazed as he kept them pinned to mine. “My career. Practically my sanity. And you let me do that while you were planning to leave me for him anyway because...” His breath choked off and I walked over, sensing he needed my support.
Her sigh hummed over the line and a part of me hated this woman I’d never met for doing this to him. “Because of the baby,” she finished for him, making me rear back as if she’d slapped me. “I didn’t have a choice, Justin. He was the father.”
A baby? He’d never said anything about a child.
So much more about him made sense now. The pain I saw in his eyes. The way he held himself back like he was made of steel, even though it was so obvious he wasn’t.
And that was it.
The moment I heard the tumbler click into place, giving me access to the lock he kept so safely guarded around his heart. It was also the moment I irrevocably fell for Justin Ashford and his broken soul.
It was also the moment I was done letting any other woman screw with his head like that. He could speak for himself, but when he’d gone all caveman possessive on me, I guess it had awakened something inside of me as well, and as far as I was concerned that meant I was all in for staking my claim too.
Gently, I pried the phone from his hand, keeping my eyes on his.
“Tricia?”
Her pause was palpable, clearly not expecting to hear another woman’s voice. “Who the hell is this?” she demanded.
“I’m the one who is going to be taking care of Justin from now on, in every way that you obviously couldn’t, so there’s no need for you to call him again. Honestly? I think I should thank you for being such a despicable person because it has given me the chance to be with such an amazing man. But, hey, your loss is my gain, right?”
She sputtered in my ear, making me smirk.
“Sorry about... well, actually, no, I’m not. Just do us all a favor, Tricia, and listen to the man. He’s taken now, and I don’t share,” I said, echoing his words. “I’ll also be the one blocking your number from his phone now.”
“You can’t do that, you crazy bitch! I’m his—”
“Watch me.” I hung up on her, and it felt entirely too good.
I lifted a brow in question, but he just shook his head like he couldn’t believe I’d just done that, so I hit the buttons to block her number, then handed his phone back with a flourish. “You should’ve done that a long time—”
He flung the phone to the couch and swung me up into his arms, his mouth colliding with mine as he captured my words in a possessive kiss, making me gasp and clutch at his shoulders as I melted into him.
“You’re insane,” he said between kisses, his smile against my lips.
“Maybe about you.” I smiled as I drew back. “Seriously, though, was that too much?”
“I think it was kind of sexy.”
“Sexy?”
“Very.” He nipped at my throat. “So, you’ll take care of me in every way, huh?”
“You are such a man.”
“You have no idea.”
“Well, I’m beginning to.” I pressed one more kiss to his jaw, then drew back with a grin before sauntering off to go check on my boiling water.
Silently, he followed and without asking, helped me chop up a salad and set the table while I finished our pasta, then we sat down to eat.
Before I could pick up my fork, he reached over and covered my hand with his. “I didn’t expect this, Olivia.” His eyes begged me to understand something he seemed to be having difficulty saying.
“Expect what?”
Those icy eyes of his dipped down as if whatever he was feeling was too heavy to bear. I slipped my hand out from under his so mine was on top and squeezed, making him look up. “You want someone who cherishes you, but that word pales in comparison to how I feel. I would give you my breath... I would literally take a bullet for you, and not because it’s my job. I’d do... anything, and I know that makes zero sense, and that scares the hell out of me.”
“Why?” I whispered, my heart pounding so hard I could feel it in my throat.
“Because it’s not about the damn paycheck anymore. It’s just... you.”
Tears flooded my eyes, and I began to shake, not sure how to process all of this. He was saying all the right things and it felt so perfect, yet there was still a part of me that was afraid to trust it one hundred percent. I’d had a man say the right things before, then throw me away like trash. Could I trust him? Could I trust myself? For Elizabeth’s sake I had to be sure. Still, he had laid out too much for me not to give him something in return.
“I know,” I said. “I feel it too, and I’m just as scared as you are. Probably more.”
“Because of Elizabeth.”
I nodded, somehow not surprised at his perception. I twisted my hand so our fingers interlocked, needing him to open up. “Do you want to talk about what happened with Tricia?”
His eyes shot up to mine. “Which part?”
“Any of it.” I squeezed his fingers. “Maybe the part where she hurt you by getting pregnant by your friend, then leaving you after you gave up everything for her.”
“I’m not sure there’s anything more to say at this point.”
But his gruff voice gave him away. There was still pain there. “Did she come clean about the baby not being yours right away?”
He nodded. “She kind of had to. The dates didn’t add up and it was obvious I couldn’t be the father.”
Something in his expression was breaking my heart, though I could tell he was trying so hard to pretend it didn’t bother him anymore. “Wow. That’s... I don’t even have the words. Did you want kids?”
He paused for a long moment, making me wonder if he was going to answer. Eventually, he nodded. “More than anything.” Then his head fell, and he pinched the bridge of his nose. “I think that’s what actually hurt the worst... having his baby instead of mine. It felt like she ripped that away from me.” His words became choked on tears.
“Oh, honey...” I jumped up and collected him into a hug, his face in my chest as he wrapped his arms around my waist and sought whatever comfort he needed from me. I forked my fingers through his hair and kissed the top of his head, murmuring how sorry I was over and over as he mumbled into my shirt about a miscarriage and how hard he’d tried to be a good husband and all he’d wanted was a family. He was literally breaking my heart and I could do nothing but hold him and try to soak up some of the pain that he did nothing to deserve.
As he quieted, I kept going back in my mind to the little bit he’d told me about his family. His sister had died when she was sixteen and he wasn’t close to his parents. I knew from my own experience how a loss like that can devastate everyone it touches, even extended family members. I couldn’t help but wonder if he had dreams of creating something for himself because he’d missed out on it.
He pulled back and dried his eyes, not giving any indication of shame that he’d cried in front of me, making my heart melt even more. “The divorce was the nail in the coffin with my relationship with my parents,” he said, as if he could hear my silent thoughts.
“What? What do you mean?” I was shocked. How could that be true when the woman had cheated on him with his friend, then gotten pregnant?
“They’re old school. Divorce is just not something you do, under any circumstance.” He reached around me for his water glass as if he was going to sip it, but instead just turned it on the table and stared at the condensation for a moment as if lost in painful memories. “I think they were more concerned what their friends at church would think.”
“Justin...” I was speechless. My parents had been so wonderful to me when I came home pregnant and unmarried and unwilling to divulge details. I simply could not fathom that kind of treatment.
He waved me off. “Don’t. There’s nothing to say. Honestly, I kind of expected it. My dad is a retired Marine and has been hard on me my entire life. Nothing I do is good enough, not even when I became a SEAL. For whatever reason, I just never measure up in his eyes. Maybe because I was always a stubborn kid and I refused to bow down.” He blinked, drawing in a breath. “Jessica was the favorite. Sweet and well-behaved. She excelled in everything she did and made friends everywhere she went. She was literally the perfect child. I’m sure—no, I know—my parents wished I would’ve been the one to die instead of her.”
“Justin, no! That can’t be true!”
He nodded. “It’s very true. But I finally did something right when I married Tricia. She was like the great reset. A new daughter for them to love. Sweet and pretty and said all the right things. Screwing things up with her was a cardinal sin and I’ll never be able to repent enough for it in their eyes.”
Holy. Shit.
This man was like a beautiful onion that I was just beginning to see all the layers to, and this particularly painful one made me want to wrap him up in my love and never let him go—something I knew should terrify me. Instead, I went with my instincts and decided to let the chips fall where they may.
I moved to his lap and straddled his hips, cupping his jaw so he was forced to look in my eyes. “You did nothing wrong, Justin.” When he shook his head and started to talk around me, I shushed him with a kiss. “You are a good man. You tried your best to save your marriage. You did nothing wrong, and you deserve a family.”
Yes, I know it takes two people to make a marriage and two to break it, but it was clear that he did his part and he deserved to be exonerated from this self-imposed hell he was in. So, I kept repeating myself until he relaxed in my hold and began kissing me back, as if he was finally beginning to believe the words.
His phone rang from the counter, but he ignored it, forking his fingers through my hair to hold me close as he changed the angle of the kiss.
I’d never felt so possessed or so wanted in my life, and it was all because of one wounded man and my desire to share his pain instead of focus on my own. Panting, I drew back and caressed his face. “I hate that they hurt you.”
His eyes dipped to my lips, then back up. “It’s done. My future is now.”
My heart began to do crazy flips at the hidden meaning in those words. Did he mean with me? Is that what I wanted?
Yes. No. Maybe so.
Yes.
I dropped my gaze and played with the collar of his shirt.
Luckily, he let me off the hook as he ran his hands over my hip. “Should we finish our food? I’m sure it’s cold. I can heat it up.”
I wasn’t hungry anymore, but I agreed. I sipped my drink while he reheated our pasta. While it was warming, he checked his phone, listening to his voicemail. His frown told me it was something serious.
“What?” I asked.
“That was Kade.” He put the phone down, then brought back our plates. “He managed to run down the person whose been writing your brother those crazy letters.”
My stomach knotted. “Really?”
“Yeah. It’s a female inmate at a prison in Kentucky. It wasn’t caught initially because she mailed them to a friend outside who readdressed them for her, then mailed them on to Camden. Kade looked into both women thoroughly, and neither of them are people who could be doing this to you. So that’s one person to eliminate from my suspect list.”
“Oh.” A sigh rushed from me, though I knew those things she wrote were still all kinds of messed up. “Wow.”
“The letters will be turned over to the proper authorities to be handled. Now we can move on. I’m still working on tracking down some other leads. Don’t worry, I’ll figure it out and take care of it.”
“I know.” I swallowed, mentally smacking myself for how quickly I’d gotten lulled into forgetting why he was there.
We finished our meal quietly, letting some of the emotion dissipate.
He glanced over at me as we finished up the dishes. “Do you need some space? I can go get some work done in my room if you need some time to yourself.”
I frowned down at the towel in my hand, touched and a little afraid that he could read me so easily. I forced a smile as I looked up. “If you have work to do, especially after that message from your boss, it’s totally fine. I don’t need a babysitter.”
Now it was his turn to frown. “Hey. What’s wrong? I never said anything about babysitting. Why am I sensing...?” He waved a hand in my direction as if he didn’t know how to finish his question.
“What?”
“A change in the force?”
A laugh bubbled up from my throat before I slapped a hand over my mouth as I took in the serious look on his face. Slowly, I dropped my arm and tilted my head. “Okay. So... you’re the first man with the emotional intelligence outside of my family to read me, and after everything that’s happened between us, you’re offering me space?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
His frown grew as if he sensed there was no right answer to this one. “Things got a little emotionally heavy tonight, and I figured you might want time to process it.” He shrugged, looking deflated. “I don’t want to crowd you, Liv. Not when we’re barely a thing yet.”
I blinked at him, processing as some of the things he’d said about his failed marriage now clicked into place. “I’m not her, you know,” I said softly. “I’m not going to push you away.”
Something on his face changed in that moment. It was as if peace began to rain over his features and soak in his pores. “You swear?”
I reached over and traced his stubbled jaw. “I swear.” I let him pull me into his arms and I didn’t even try to keep my heart out of my eyes as I stared up at him. There was no point. “I don’t care if this thing between us is new. I’m Team Justin, all the way, and that means I want you around all the time. During the fun times, the emotionally heavy times, and all the in between times. I’m scared of getting hurt again too, and I have no idea what’s going to happen, but I do know that I trust you implicitly, and I’m willing to take the leap and see where this goes if you are.”
His fingertips trailed up my spine to tangle in my hair. “Sorry, Liv...”
What?
That sexy, dimpled smirk nearly killed me when I glanced up. “...I’ve already leaped. Team Olivia for the win,” he murmured as his lips descended to mine, sealing it with a kiss to end all kisses, taking ownership of me, mind, body, and soul.
We moved together, ripping at each other’s clothes, as we stumbled out of the kitchen and to my bedroom, where we fell to the bed. He worshipped every inch of my body with his fingers and his lips before he made love to me. There was no other way to describe it as there were new emotions arcing in the air between us. Softer touches, tender glances, soft sighs. I’d never experienced anything like it.
He held me afterward, curled around me in a tight spoon, our fingers interlaced at my stomach, lit up by a small moonbeam.
After several minutes, his breathing was slow and deep, and I thought he was asleep, but he kissed my shoulder. “I wish I could go back in time and have met you instead of her. Everything would’ve been so different.” His warm breath fanned across my flesh as he spoke of a different life for both of us.
I squeezed his fingers. “Same,” I said, letting him know I wished I would’ve met him instead of Christoph. “But we wouldn’t be the people we are today without the scars they caused.” I turned to look at him over my shoulder. “So I’m okay with that, if it brought you to me now, just as you are.”
I’d swear I saw the shimmer of tears in his eyes, but he squeezed them shut just before he leaned in and kissed me. Slow and emotional, full of everything he had no words for in that moment, yet I felt him loud and clear.
Eventually, the kiss turned from emotional to heated as his tongue slid along mine and his palm moved between my breasts. I turned to face him, hiking my thigh high over his hip, opening myself to him as we continued to explore each other’s mouths and skin. He pressed into me with his cock in a smooth thrust, using his hand at my backside to guide my hips.
I gasped into his mouth and adjusted myself to get him deeper as we sank into a slow lovers’ pace. We weren’t in a hurry, simply enjoying the feel of each other as he thrust in a steady beautiful rhythm.
Eventually, he began to move faster, his grip on my hip tighter as he thrust deeper and propelled us closer to the edge. He shifted his hand between us to find my clit and I began to buck against him as sensations swirled in my core.
“Olivia,” he gritted.
I opened my eyes and what I saw reflected back in his rocked me. He was a wide-open book, there for me to see. The tough guy who would do anything to protect me had been set aside and was letting me know, in that moment, I could hurt him. I bit my lip to keep from spilling out any love words we may not be ready for yet, and instead poured myself into him.
“Justin,” I whispered back, nipping the cords of his neck. “I’m here. I’m not going anywhere.”
That seemed to be enough to send him over the edge. He grabbed ahold of me like he’d never let me go and began to thrust like a madman. This tipped me right over the edge of the universe, making me come so hard I was nearly crying as he growled out his own release.
I flopped to my back, and he got up and went to the bathroom. He returned a minute later with a warm washcloth and helped clean me up before climbing back in the bed where we naturally assumed our position with me snuggled up into his side with my head on his chest.
“You’ll need to tell me the story behind this sometime.” I traced my fingers over his tattoo, caressing the dove.
“Not much to tell. Doves symbolize peace, and I needed that, so it seemed appropriate. Why? You like it?”
I pressed a kiss to his chest just above the bird. “I do.” Then I told him why. I told him about my sweet cousin, Claire, who was known as her father’s little dove and how she’d gone missing without a trace when she was fifteen, leaving the family with no real answers for over a decade until her body was found, along with several other girls, in the Sam Houston National Forest.
“Colomba is Italian for dove,” I said, caressed the wing on his tattoo, still a bit surprised by the serendipity. “It was my way of honoring her memory.”
He kissed my head. “That’s beautiful.”
I also told him how much it hurt to be around my extended family sometimes because of how much I resembled her. “I hate to cause the people I love pain because of something I have no control over.”
“Ah, baby.” He pressed a kiss to my head. “I’m so sorry. Are you sure it hurts them? Maybe it’s more bittersweet. I’m sure they miss her, and maybe they like having you around as a little living reminder of the sweet girl they lost.” He shrugged. “I have no idea, just a thought.”
I rested my chin on his chest to look up at him. “I think you’re right. My uncle has said as much. It’s just the whole thing has been such a sore spot for my entire family for so long. Especially her family. She has a twin, Silas, he took it the hardest. I can’t wrap my mind around losing any of my brothers. But as a mom? No way. I don’t think I could survive losing Elizabeth.”
He rubbed my back, his gaze muted in the dark. It was not lost on me that his family had also lost a daughter, but clearly had not come through it as resilient as mine. As strong as he was, nobody was meant to be an island. As I lay there getting drowsy in his arms, an idea came to me. If I was truly taking the leap and going all in, I guess it was time to go all in.