Chapter 19 #2
“Yeah, obviously, right? You’d think it would be, but it’s a privilege you all fucking take for granted.
Do you know why we faked our engagement?
Because none of you could be assed to show up to celebrate the most important moment of her life – and she knew instantly that if she had a ring on her finger instead that you would all drop whatever was going on and be there.
And she was right. Of course she was. She’s always right about shit like that.
She’s been there for all of you, for your best and your worst. I used to wonder about the people she was always dropping everything to show up for, whether any of you were worth the way she was killing herself to be there for you in the middle of the toughest academic work of her life.
It turns out, you are. I know now how much you love her, how much she loves you all, but Jesus fucking Christ, even in the middle of being pissed off at you, rightly so, she was still there for you, showing up every time you needed her, every time you called, and enough is enough. You need to be there for her.”
“It sounds like you want that job,” Erik says.
“It doesn’t matter what I want. What matters is that she’s happy.”
“She’s the happiest I’ve ever seen her right now,” Lexi insists.
“She has every reason to be. She’s a doctor and her dream job is hers. Nothing should have gotten in the way of that happiness, but you all did and you need to fix it.”
“I meant with you,” her sister corrects him.
Xavier shakes his head. “It’s not real. It was never real. Her life is here. Mine isn’t. And that’s the reality of it. But you’re her friends, her family, blood or not, and she needs you all to start stepping up for her the way she does for you over and over again.”
“As much as it pains me to admit it, you might be right,” Frankie says.
“I know I’m right,” he says, “and once I’m gone, you’re going to start showing her.”
When he gets back to the house, his car is fully empty, the boxes packed away in storage with the rest of his stuff. He called Paolo and his plane ticket, one-way, is bought and paid for, flying out tomorrow morning at five.
There’s just one thing left to do. Maybe the hardest thing he’s ever done.
“Hey,” she says, her back to him when he walks in the door.
She’s washing the dishes, barefoot, still in the shirt she fell asleep in last night, hair at the top of her head and the sexiest he’s ever seen her.
This is the life he’s giving up. Fuck. “Do you want to go get breakfast? I haven’t been to Jacks N Joe in forever and . . .”
“Bianca,” he rasps and something in his voice must give him away because she turns around, concerned.
“You okay?”
“Yeah, I’m okay.”
“When I woke up you were gone. Where did you go so early?”
“I . . . I went to put my stuff in storage and clean out my desk at work.”
“All before ten? Feeling motivated this morning?”
“Ah, well, that’s . . . No, I . . . Can we talk?”
She tilts her head to the side in question. “Sure?”
“I . . . Shit, I’m just gonna say it. I’m leaving.”
It’s not the way he wanted to do it, though if pressed, he’s not sure he could have described what the perfect thing to say in this moment would be.
“You’re leaving . . .” She trails off and she’s smart enough to figure it out. “Now?”
“Yeah, well, tomorrow. Paolo booked me on an early morning flight.”
“They need you out there already?”
That’s it. That’s his easy out. He could just tell her that the job is going to start sooner than he thought, that they’re making him go, and she’ll understand that, of course she would, but . . . he just can’t bring himself to lie, not so completely.
“No, I . . . I want to go. When Paolo was here, he said they could get me started a little bit early and I think it’s a good idea. I might as well get over there, get settled, experience Greece a little before work really gets going.”
“So . . . you want to call this off early?”
“Yeah . . . I guess . . . yeah, I guess that’s what I’m saying.”
“Okay, if . . . if that’s what you want.”
“It’s . . . fuck, it’s not what I want .”
“Then why?” she asks. “I don’t understand, if . . . Why wouldn’t you stay as long as you can? I thought . . . I thought we were on the same page about this.”
“We were.”
There’s silence for a moment and then another. She holds his eyes with hers and he wants to look away, but he can’t.
“Okay,” she says finally. “Okay, then, I guess. Do you . . . do you need help with anything? I . . . I could give you a ride to the airport or . . .”
“No, shit, no, I don’t . . . You don’t have to . . . fuck.”
“I . . .” She shakes her head. “Did I do something? I thought we talked about it. I thought we were okay?”
“We were. We are. I . . . I just can’t stay anymore.”
“I don’t understand.”
“Neither do I. You think I have everything figured out? I don’t have anything figured out. I’m just taking everything a day at a time.”
“That’s not what it looks like from here.”
“Yeah, well, I’m a good liar or haven’t you noticed?”
“So it was all just a lie?”
His silence must be enough of an answer for her. Shaking her head, fighting back the tears, she tries to push past him, but his hand darts out, fingers closing around her wrist in a loose bracelet.
“Bianca, please.”
“What, Xavier? There’s nothing else to say.”
“The only lies I’ve been telling this entire time have been to you.”
“Oh . . . okay then, that makes everything clear.” The sarcasm rolls off her tongue, but then she softens. “I guess . . . I’m sorry if I made you uncomfortable. Really, I must have misunderstood . . .”
“No, Jesus, you’re so fucking smart, B, except when it comes to this. Both of us are such idiots.”
“I never should have agreed to this.”
“You never would have if I just told you the truth from the beginning.”
“I don’t understand.”
“Of course you don’t.”
“Xavier, please, I just . . . I can’t stand this anymore, please just tell me . . .”
“I can’t.”
“Why not? What the hell do you want, Xavier?”
You .
He can’t say it. It’s too much, to say it out loud, to give voice to that one word that could change everything, that could ruin anything. She doesn’t even need him to say it, but she has to know, right? How can she not, after everything?
“It’s the right thing,” he says instead. “I . . . It’s the right thing.”
“But why?”
“Because . . . because I can’t stand it anymore. It’s exhausting, I’m exhausted and I just . . . can’t do it anymore. It feels like . . . like it’s getting worse.”
“What’s getting worse?”
He just shakes his head in defeat. He doesn’t know what to do now, doesn’t have any idea at all what the right thing to say to her is, how to make it better without also making it worse.
But then she’s stepping closer to him, slowly, giving him time to back away.
He doesn’t.
She’s so close now that he has to look down to look into her eyes and he can see the moment when she decides to call him out on his bullshit; her gaze changes from confusion to determination and God help him, there’s no way she can see it there in his gaze, the absolute control he has over himself, control that she can snap if she just gives him a sign.
She lifts her hand to his cheek. As soon as her fingertips make contact with his skin, his eyes shutter and he leans into the touch.
“Bianca,” he murmurs, turning his face into the palm of her hand, pressing a kiss there. The contact sends a shiver through her that he can almost feel himself. “We can’t . . .” he starts, leaning down into her, his forehead against hers, his hand coming up to cover hers, “can we?”
“We can do whatever we want. We make the rules,” she whispers, her words barely a breath against his lips.
“Fuck it.”
He has to kiss her. One last time.
He loves and hates this kiss because he knows this is the last time he’s ever going to feel this way.
“Please,” she begs as his mouth finds that spot just below her ear at the edge of her jawline, her hands sifting through his hair before giving it a sharp tug.
He pulls away and follows her direction, back to her mouth, hot and open and wild under his.
“Whatever we want?” he asks against her lips.
“Whatever we want,” she agrees. “And I want you.”
“You have me, boss.”
“Show me.”
“I will, gonna show you with my fingers and my mouth and my dick until the only word you remember is my name.”
“Xavier,” she gasps against his ear.
“Yeah, just like that.”
His hands slide down over her ass to grip her hips and pull her against him, and then down to her thighs, wrapping around those sweet curves and lifting her into his arms.
Carrying her from the kitchen straight to her bedroom, he only stops when her tongue runs along the shell of his ear, and then she bites down at the earlobe and he has to press her against the wall and suck at that spot on her neck again.
And part of him, a part that he doesn’t like all that much about himself, wants to leave a mark, wants her to look in the mirror a few days from now – hell, maybe even a week from now – and see it, still there, a reminder of him even though he’ll be long gone.
Maybe he’ll leave one at the curve of her breast and the inside of her thigh too.
He tries to drop her down to the bed once they make it inside her room, but she holds tight to him and draws his body down with hers.
“Easy,” he groans as the feel of her body, giving against his, jolts through him.
“You really want that?” she asks, rolling her hips, and a rumbling groan slides out of his throat.
“No,” he admits. “I don’t.”
He yanks his shirt up and over his head, dropping it who knows where as he slides down her body.
His hands push her shirt up and he lowers his mouth to the warm skin of her belly, nosing gently at the easy slopes that lead up toward her breasts.
And when he takes her into his mouth, he feels more than hears her call his name again, vibrating out from her throat.
With his tongue and his teeth and his lips, he makes a mark that matches the one at her neck.
“Xavier,” she calls out, and he rears up as her blunt nails drag down his back and her thighs rise up to wrap around him, and when he releases her, he looks up to her head thrown back in pleasure, her hair a wild mess across the sheets and the prettiest pink flush across her cheeks.
“What do you need, boss?”
“More. I need more,” she breathes, but he’s already headed there, his tongue tracing every curve on the way down.
“Look at me.”
Her eyes snap open.
So he gives her more, gives her his fingers and his mouth until she’s writhing beneath him, her voice cracking on his name when she falls.
He rides it out with her, his mouth against her until finally she swats him away gently. Xavier moves up her body, breathing in the sweet scent of salt and sweat on her skin and when his mouth finds hers again, she wraps her arms around his neck as her toes run up the backs of his calves.
Then he’s on his back so fast his mind didn’t even register the tilt of her hips that got him there until it was over.
“Fuck, you’re gorgeous,” he says, jaw jutting out and his tongue swiping down over his lower lip as he watches her lift her shirt up over her head and toss it behind her. Her curves bared to him, just as sweet as he remembers.
Her fingertips trace along the line of his collarbone and then to his mouth.
“Whatever we want?” she asks him now, her voice low and soft, brown eyes glowing at him.
“Whatever we want,” he gasps as the fingers of her other hand twist against the button of his cargo shorts and make even faster work of the zipper.
“And what do you want?”
“You, wrapped around me,” he manages to rasp as her mouth travels the same path his did, while her hands push down the last of his clothes and they both fumble for a condom from her nightstand.
When she sinks down onto him and his hands settle at her hips, he forces his eyes wide open, taking it all in despite the urge to throw his head back and escape into the sensation of it.
Their eyes lock and he sits up, her chest flattening against his, his mouth at her neck again, her hands at his shoulders, holding tight to him, as they rock together.
Her ring is cool and sharp against his skin and he unwinds an arm from around her body to grasp her hand in his and press that cold metal to his mouth.
“Xavier,” she calls out again, as her body shakes and takes him with her, wildfire igniting through his veins, aware of absolutely nothing except the softness of her skin and the heat of her body and how much he fucking loves her.
He just barely stops himself from saying it, muffles something unintelligible into her hair instead, trying to catch his breath, trying to prolong the feeling knowing he’ll never feel this again, never feel this whole, this complete.
But it has to end. She has to slip from his arms and slide off the mattress and disappear behind the bathroom door and when he hears the shower running, his heart clenches in his chest, a vice tightening until he can barely breathe.
He needs to go. Needs to get out right now.
Xavier pushes up off the bed, desperate to get away from her scent, the soft powder of her perfume, the light floral of her shampoo and the intoxicating undertone of them, together.
He’s dressed, somehow, the last of his bags packed, the stuff he’s taking with him to Greece, and, avoiding Amelia’s judgmental stare, about to walk out of her life forever when Bianca emerges from the bathroom, wet hair hanging down her back, skin flushed from the warmth of the water.
Her mouth falls open as she takes him in, almost at the door, a suitcase in one hand, a bag slung over his opposite shoulder.
“Were you . . . you were leaving . . .”
“Yeah,” he manages to choke out. “I can’t . . . I can’t stay anymore.”
She nods, her teeth digging into her bottom lip, and he can still taste it on his tongue and has to look away.
“Before you go, take this,” she says, moving closer.
“What?” he asks, still trying desperately not to look at her.
“The ring,” she says, holding it out to him, her fourth finger bare.
His eyes almost cross, looking down at it, her just a blur at the edge of his vision. “No . . . I . . .”
“Please,” she says, her voice cracking, and the vice tightens again, “it was your mother’s . . . you have to . . . I can’t . . .”
“Bianca,” he says softly, looking, “it’s yours. I’m never going to give it to anyone else. Do whatever you want with it, okay?”
“Xavier.”
She says his name again, soft, like he’s never heard it before, and it’s too much.
“Please,” he begs, not even recognizing his voice as it drops to an octave he’s never reached before, rough and desperate, even more desperate than he was minutes ago in her bed.
“Okay, okay. I’ll keep it.”
“Good . . . that’s good.”
“Goodbye, Xavier.”
“Goodbye, Bianca.”
And when the door closes behind him, he can finally breathe again, but fuck does it hurt even more than the vice.