Chapter 31
“We should do this more often,” Jules said, sucking Frankie’s pulse point.
“If I didn’t have a job that took me out of town so often…” Frankie panted as Jules slid her hand underneath Frankie’s Halifax Harbour sweatshirt to palm her bare breast.
Jules grinned against Frankie’s skin and moved her lips up to the shell of Frankie’s ear. “Maybe I just need to go to more away games. I liked what happened the last time we were in a hotel together.”
“Jules…I…”
Jules was straddling Frankie’s thigh on her couch and she rocked forward, pressing her knee into Frankie’s centre.
“You love me when I’m like this baby, I know you do.”
“I…fuck, I do. I really do.”
And Frankie gripped Jules' hips to prove it to her. She held her tightly and moaned when Jules rolled her hard nipple between her thumb and index finger.
“Are you going to be thinking about this tomorrow night when you’re behind the bench?” Jules whispered, making sure Frankie could feel every single one of her words. “Is the memory of me grinding your leg like this going to be a distraction?”
It had become one of her favourite ways to spend their free time; turning Frankie into putty in her hands and God, it was so easy.
Frankie, the professional hockey coach with a stern face that gave nothing away when she was working, a woman who dealt with more judgement in a single day than some did throughout their entire careers, absolutely melted whenever Jules took control.
“And when you win…how are we going to celebrate?”
Frankie whined as Jules shifted her attention from one breast to the other and her head fell back, mouth open in pleasure. “Jules…”
“Tell me, Frankie. Please.”
Swallowing back a gasp when Jules nipped her neck and squeezed her breast a little harder, Frankie bit her lip then grabbed Jules’ chin and brought their faces level.
She traced the seam of Jules' mouth with her thumb and Jules sucked the finger between her lips, flicking the tip of it with her tongue before letting it go with a wet pop.
“You want to know how we’re going to celebrate?
” Frankie smirked and pushed her leg up into Jules just as Jules rocked her hips down in search of more friction.
Her hands fell to the bottom hem of the t-shirt she was wearing and she tugged it up over her head, tossing it to the side, leaving herself half naked in Frankie's lap.
Frankie's eyes fell to her chest and her pupils dilated.
“Baby," Frankie moaned, "I’m going to fuck you right here on this couch until you see stars and then I’m going to… "
Jules didn’t let Frankie finish because she needed to kiss her, needed to taste her, and she slipped her tongue into Frankie’s mouth, her body shuddering at the way Frankie whimpered into the kiss.
They were so caught up in each other that they didn’t hear the sound of the door clicking as it opened or closed, didn’t have time to react to the last person either of them wanted to see before it was too late.
“Hey Jules, hope you don’t mind but I ran out of bananas and I wanted to make a…”
Jules tore her lips from Frankie’s and whipped her head around to see Cam standing in the kitchen, his hand hovering over the fruit bowl on her kitchen island, his eyes wide.
To say he looked shocked would be an understatement.
There was no world in which he hadn’t just seen what they were doing, hadn’t noticed the very more than friends position she and Frankie were in, and Jules quickly reached for her shirt, tugging it back over her head before she scrambled out of Frankie’s lap and hopped up from the couch.
“Cam…” She coughed, her pulse thundering her ears as she quickly crossed her arms over her chest to conceal herself more than her t-shirt already was. “We were uh, we were just…”
“Are you fucking my sister?”
The question wasn’t directed at Jules the way she’d been expecting, and was instead meant for Frankie. Cam’s eyes were fixed on her and full of anger as he clenched his fist at his side.
“Frankie, are you fucking my – ”
“Yes," Frankie said matter of factly, her voice unyielding.
“Wait, hold on a sec.” Jules threw a glance back at Frankie then stepped in front of her in an effort to shield her from the hurt and disbelief on her brother’s face. “Cam, I wanted to tell you but I didn’t know how. Frankie and I, we’ve been…”
“Been what, Jules? Sleeping with each other? Dating?” He raised his voice and pointed at Frankie.
“She’s my fucking coach, and you didn’t think this was something I should know?
Do you have an idea how much I’ve defended her lately?
The things some of the guys on MY team have been saying about her? And this whole time…”
“Hey, watch your tone.”
Jules dropped her arms and strode across the room towards him. Sure, she expected her brother to be a hurt because she’d kept a big part of her life from him but what she hadn’t expected was for him to be…offended? Frankie didn’t deserve this kind of reaction and neither did she.
“Frankie has done nothing wrong and my relationship with her does not affect your job as a hockey player.” She pointed at him and then at Frankie. “And it doesn't affect her job as a coach. She and I, what we are, is something I have a right to and something you have no right to judge us on.”
“So it’s a relationship then?”
“What is wrong with you! You have never acted this way before when it comes to who I date. I don’t even recognize you right now.”
Cam scoffed and waved his hand around the room. “Yeah, well, I’ve never walked in on my sister fucking my coach before, have I? Pretty big deal, if you ask me.”
"But I didn’t ask you! Cameron, do you hear yourself right now?
I have spent my entire adult life being what you need, being where you need me to be, doing whatever I could for your career.
Hell, I've even dated women who were only with me to be closer to a celebrity so I do not need to justify my feelings for Frankie to you.
I've finally met someone who makes me feel like for the first time in years, maybe even for the first time ever, I can be Jules.
Just Jules, not the sister of a hockey player. "
"But out of all the women in this city, it had to be my coach that you started fucking behind my back? I know I said you should start dating again but come on, Jules, Frankie? Of all people?"
His voice was laced with vitriol and Jules didn't know what else she could say to make him understand, to make him see that what she felt for Frankie had nothing to do with him, that he had no right to stand there and make her feel bad for finding something, finding someone, that made her so happy. She had given up so much for him and it hurt that he couldn’t see why she’d been so happy and what the reason for it was.
Frankie stood up then and Jules stepped aside as she crossed the room, coming to a halt a few inches away from Cam. At nearly the same height, Frankie stared him down and he stumbled back slightly, as if he wasn’t expecting her to stand up to him, to challenge him the way she was.
It wasn't the right time to acknowledge it but Jules couldn't deny the attraction she felt for Frankie at that moment.
No one had come to her defense like this before, no one had chosen her to fight for and all she could do was stand there and watch it happen.
Her brother and the woman who had flipped her world upside down facing off against one another all because of her?
File that under things she never saw coming.
“Clarke," Frankie said, her voice low and demanding.
"It is in your very best interest right now to show your sister some respect because if you continue speaking to her the way you are right now, you will regret it. Our relationship, whatever it may be, is none of your business just as she told you and if I were you, I would walk out of here right now and get ready for the game you have to play tomorrow. You are the captain and your team is relying on you. Am I clear?”
Cam's gaze flicked back and forth between Frankie and Jules before his stare settled on Jules.
"Clarke," Frankie repeated. "Am I clear?"
He glared at Jules expectantly for a few seconds, watching her, waiting for her to give him an apology, to say something to put him at ease, but he had no right to demand that from her.
Jules knew he wanted more, wanted to hear an explanation that made sense in his mind but she'd already said what needed to be said and if he couldn't accept that?
It was something he needed to handle on his own.
She held his disappointed stare for as long as she could before she looked away and a disbelieving laugh fell from his lips.
"Wow," he muttered, spinning on his heels and walking back to her door.
She and Frankie had become friends, then they’d become more and now…
well, now Jules was in love and she would not apologize for it.
The sound of the door slamming echoed around them and Jules hugged herself.
Frankie was at her side in seconds, her strong arms wrapping around Jules' smaller frame to hold her, to comfort her in whatever way she could.
“It’s okay,” Frankie said, stroking her back. “Just give him some time to cool down and it’ll all be okay.”
“You don’t know that.” Jules pressed herself against Frankie and shut her eyes, wanting to erase the way Cam had looked at them, wanting to rid her memory of the anger in his voice, the way he regarded their intimacy like some sort of deliberate betrayal.
“But hey,” she said with self-deprecating laugh. “At least he knows now, right?”
She leaned back and looked up at Frankie, at the woman who'd walked into her life that morning in the gym and reminded her that it was okay to want more for herself.
Before Jules could question it, before she gave herself any time to second guess it or fill with worry that Frankie didn’t feel the same way, the words she'd known to be true for weeks now fell from her lips.
“I love you.”
And she meant it. She knew in her heart that what she felt for Frankie was real and it was right and she didn't want to hold it inside any longer.
Frankie’s eyes widened but never lost their softness, and then she smiled. It was the kind of smile Jules had only ever seen on her face when they were together and she didn’t need Frankie to say it back to her to know she felt the same way, not when it was written all over her face.
Jules could see it in the way her eyes crinkled in delight, could see it when Frankie bought her flowers and filled the fridge with the drinks Jules liked, when she trusted Jules with the stresses of her job and leaned on her when she needed support she’d never allowed herself to truly have with anyone else. And Jules did the same.
“I know that this is an absolutely a crazy time to tell you,” she said, nervous to be laying her heart out in the open this way despite being so sure of it all, “and I know it’s fast but I just need you to know how I feel. It’s okay if you’re not ready to say it back yet, if you don’t-”
“Jules. Feel this.”
Frankie linked their fingers together and brought their hands to her chest like she’d done the night they first slept together. Jules opened her palm, flattening her fingers over Frankie’s heart. She felt it beating, felt everything Frankie kept there just for her.
“It might be a crazy time for me to say it back, but, I love you too.”
“Really?” Jules swallowed hard and her bottom lip trembled. “You’re not just saying it?”
“Do you really think I’d say if I didn’t mean it?” Frankie questioned, her voice barely above a whisper. “Of course I mean it.”
The world around Jules went hazy and rose coloured as the confession sunk in. Suddenly it all made sense; everything in the songs she listened to, in the movies she watched, and in the cheesy sapphic romance books she loved so much. It had to be some kind of magic.
She pressed up on her tiptoes to make herself taller and she kissed Frankie, keeping their hands clasped between their bodies over their hearts.
She had no idea what was going to happen next, if her relationship with Cam was as fractured as the slamming door made it, but nothing else mattered right now because Frankie was kissing her back.
Frankie was kissing her, they were in love, and hockey could wait.