Chapter 17 #2
“I think that’s family. That’s the gamble.
You and I know what it looks like when people avoid that.
When people don’t build connections. When they choose to sever them instead.
So maybe the real reason to say yes is just because you get to build something.
And we’ve had very few opportunities in our lives to actually do that. ”
He looked down at the salmon sculpture then, his eyes moving over the curves of the wood, and she followed.
“It’s why I wanted to do art,” he said.
Her chest squeezed. She had a feeling that what he was about to say was something he hadn’t said to anyone before, and it made her feel intensely honored.
“The world is full of people who break things. People like my mother who break things because she can’t fix herself.
People who are happy to be critical of other people, of the work that they do, but who never actually put any of their own creations out there.
I wanted to be someone who made things. Somebody who left the world a little bit fuller than when I entered it, rather than somebody who just destroyed the creation that other people had the guts, the vulnerability to make. ”
He straightened and looked at his work. “It’s easy to be a critic.
It’s a lot harder to do this. To imagine something from nothing, to make something that maybe nobody wants to see, to trust that they will.
I’ve never really considered myself an artist in the way that some people are.
Because I don’t feel like the work itself is some kind of piece with a deep meaning or anything like that.
I feel like I’m looking at nature and just copying what she already did.
But the act of creation in and of itself, that means something to me. ”
“I love that,” she said. “I mean, I feel that a little bit. We are building something here. Building something that’s going to last. Something that can be attached to our family name.
Something nobody can take away from us. And when I think about my biological father, my sperm donor, I think about the fact that he had all of this, but he didn’t love it.
He didn’t appreciate it, he didn’t expand it.
And I think it speaks to the kind of person that he was.
He couldn’t build bridges between himself and his children, so why would he be able to build up this place?
This place that requires love and soul and investment.
More than just a desire to turn a profit, but a real connection with the land.
You’re somebody that creates, someone that builds rather than destroys. ”
“Yeah. So I suppose I have to build this, don’t I? Whether I feel ready to or not. Whether I feel like it’s going to be a huge amount of work or not.”
“You don’t have to. But I think it would be walking away from a calling that you know you have. Walking away from what you really want to be. And I know you really want to be that person. I know you really want to be what you just told me.”
“Alright. I’ll confirm the visit.”
“Good,” she said.
He climbed down off the ladder, and her stomach went tight as he closed the space between them, moved to where she was sitting on the counter. “You are quite something, Lila Grayson.”
She reached out and touched his face, because she could. Because she had spent so many years wanting to and not being allowed to. Because she had access to his body now.
Because things had changed. She didn’t have to look and long, she could touch and have.
She smoothed her thumb over his cheekbone, down his face. And then she slid off the counter, kissing his neck, his chest, back up to his mouth.
She took his hand, and led him away from where they were standing, all the way over to the couch.
She pushed him down onto the surface, and stripped her shirt off. She was only wearing a pair of white underwear underneath, and she could tell by the hungry look on his face that it was exactly what he wanted to see.
Nolan was the person who respected her most. And that had been true before he had ever touched her. It was a jarring realization, but one with clear and obvious clues.
Nolan had looked at her and seen her competency. Had seen her struggle, and the ways that she had overcome it. He was the one person who had ever really acknowledged that there might have been some loneliness for her, growing up and being the youngest, the only girl.
He saw things in her that she hadn’t even readily identified.
He cared about her in a way that was profound, and so different from her brothers.
Maybe that was why it had never felt right to call him a brother, even though she had always attributed that to her crush on him. That she didn’t like thinking of him that way because... well, the obvious.
But it was more than that. Deeper than that. There was something deeper here.
And she wasn’t going to say it, not right now, not in this moment, but she was going to show him.
She pressed her knee between his thighs, leaned in and kissed his neck, and he groaned. Then she kissed a trail down his chest again, but this time continued on, all the way down his abs, above his belt buckle. She slipped the belt through the loops, unbuttoned his jeans, and lowered the zipper.
She reached in and took out his erect cock, sliding her hand up and down his hard length as she looked at him, greedy desire rising up in her chest.
“You are the most beautiful man in the world,” she said.
She watched as his abdomen tensed, his muscles shifting. “You haven’t seen every man in the world.”
“I don’t need to. Some things you just know.”
And that meant more than she wanted to admit.
To him or to herself. So instead of going on, she found a way to keep her mouth busy.
She leaned in, flicking her tongue over the head of his glorious body, then taking him in deep, as deep as she could, worshiping that body that had given her so much pleasure with everything she had.
She had done this before, a few times, but he never let her get all the way to completion, and she wanted it.
She needed it. For herself, for him, she needed to show him what he meant to her.
How beautiful and wonderful and marvelous he was, how much she appreciated that he was a man who built rather than tearing down.
It made her want to give, to build his pleasure like a palace they could both enjoy.
She licked him from base to tip, then took him in all the way again, compensating for her inexperience with enthusiasm, making up for her lack of skill with her absolute enjoyment of the task.
He pushed his fingers through her hair, pulling tight, and she kept on going. Kept going until he cried out her name, hips flexing hard, the tip of him hitting the back of her throat as he spilled himself.
And she was relieved that he didn’t apologize. That he didn’t say she shouldn’t have done that. She was relieved that he honored her choice in that.
For the most part, he had. In everything.
He had done a little bit of that dance about needing to protect her, but that had faded, and quickly. Particularly as the attraction between them had become undeniable.
It was part of the way that he saw her, she supposed.
The way that he respected her as a whole person, as who she was, in a way that maybe she never even had.
He was breathing hard, and he was all sweaty. But she never minded that.
She sat beside him on the couch, aching and wet, and desperate for her own release, but she would get it. Sometimes with him, the anticipation was part of the fun. Knowing that she would have him, all of him, when the time came, was the most delicious thing.
So she didn’t have to hurry, she didn’t have to be rushed. Not when she knew that there wasn’t an end to this.
At least not for now.
“You did it,” she said. “You made all this success. You have something that you can go and show your family.”
He stroked her hair, slowly. “Yeah,” he said. “I did.”
But there was something that sounded hesitant there. And that was alright. Because she would be there for him, every step of the way. Whatever he needed.
She didn’t say it out loud, but it was a promise that she made in her heart.
And Lila was never one to back away from a promise.