42. Brielle
Chapter forty-two
Brielle
M y family liked to go overboard with presents every year. My sister got me a new easel, and my parents got me a new acrylic paint set. When I left last year, I sold most of my art supplies to help fund my move to Italy.
“You can leave it all here in your room for when you are done with your beautiful Italian life,” Aubrey stated.
A grunt came from the other side of the room, but I ignored it. I stood and hugged her. “Thank you.”
“Hey, when is that, by the way?” Link joked. “I need my sister back so my wife can stop giving me random Italian facts and telling me what time it is in Italy every few hours.”
Everyone laughed.
“I will be there for a while. Tomasso is taking over my position in the U.S. for now.”
He held up his soda in cheers.
Aubrey huffed. “Well, I need you to hurry up. You only have about seven months to get back here.”
Seven months?
Then it clicked. “No. Fucking. Way. You’re pregnant?”
Tears filled her eyes as she nodded. Link handed me an ultrasound with a perfect little blip on it. “You are going to be Auntie Bean.”
I put it down and jumped at my sister. “You’re fucking pregnant. Oh my God.” Tears began running down my face.
She laughed. “Careful. You don’t want to hurt them.”
“Them?” I screeched. I pulled the ultrasound back over to me.
She laughed again and pulled my hand toward her. “No, there aren’t two. We are just saying them till we know if it’s a girl or a boy.”
I pulled her and Link into a group hug. “I am so fucking happy for you guys.” I let Link go and then looked at my sister. “You are going to be an amazing mom.”
“From your lips to God's ears,” she joked.
I lay in my bed, staring at the ceiling once again. Watching the fan was oddly satisfying.
As I drifted off to sleep, I heard a light knock on the door. “You up?”
Opening my eyes, I sat up and pulled the blanket up to cover myself. “Yeah, come in.”
“Hey, MP.” Eli walked in and sat in the chair to the left of my bed. Thoughts of the last time he and I were in these spots flashed through my head.
I pulled my knees up to my chest and leaned on them. “What’s up? Can't sleep?”
He looked at me. “Something like that, yeah.” He stood, walked over to the window, and motioned to the snow outside. “Looks like we are getting a white Christmas after all.”
I chuckled. “Yeah, that hasn’t happened since I was little.”
“Maybe it's good luck, then.”
“Totally could be, I guess,” I responded.
I appreciated how good he looked. His face was a bit fuller, and I could tell he was taking better care of his facial hair. It was more even, at least from the side.
After we were both quiet for about a minute, I couldn’t take it anymore. “Why did you come in here, Eli?”
He turned toward me and leaned on the window. “We never got to finish our conversation earlier.”
“Which one?” I asked, already knowing the answer.
“Why did you come up here earlier?”
I shook my head. “Eli, please.”
“Brie.” His voice came out sharp but pleading.
“I was just overwhelmed. I am so fucking happy for you. I am so proud of you.”
“So why was there a need to come up here?”
I looked at my hands. “I can be happy for everything you gained and sad for everything I lost simultaneously. I just needed to let out a good cry. Okay?”
He stepped toward me. “You never lost me.”
“I lost you in the way I wanted you.” I looked down as my eyes stung with tears. He moved toward me until he was right next to the bed. His finger lifted my chin.
“I am right here.”
I grabbed his wrist with both of my hands. “And I am so grateful for that.”
His closeness was becoming too intense. I pulled my face back and threw the blanket away to go to the bathroom. “I’ll just be a sec.”
“Brie…”
“Just a sec.” I tried my best to hold the tears in until the door shut. I stood against it and quietly cried.
I heard a soft thump against the door. “Baby,” he whispered.
I told myself I wouldn’t get emotional. I can't. He was doing too well for me to derail his success. When I told Amani the same thing, she tried to make me see that I, of all people, would be the last to derail him, but I didn’t believe that.
There was no more avoiding it. When I opened the door, he was right there, arms up on the door frame, looking down.
I pushed him to the side, but I didn’t make it far. He gripped my arm and pulled me into him. Both my hands landed on his chest.
“Come back to me, baby.” He tried to lift my gaze to his, but instead, I put my arms around him so I could hold him for just a few more seconds.
He picked me up, walked over toward my bed, and sat on the chair with me on his lap. He pulled my face to look at him. “What do I need to do to make you mine again? I will do whatever it takes.”
“We can’t,” I cried.
“Why?”
His look was mixed with anger and confusion, but also a bit of understanding. He used his thumbs to wipe the tears from my eyes. “I love you. I have never stopped fucking loving you.”
I bit my lip as he ran his finger over it.
“Just say yes.”
“To what?” I asked.
“Being mine.”
“What if—”
“What if it works? What if we could have the most beautiful life? What if we get married and have beautiful children and grow old together with our friends and family all around us?” He swallowed as he stared deep into my eyes.
“What if we try again, and this is it? This is everything we could have ever dreamed of?”
My head swirled with everything he said and everything I wanted to say back, but only one thing came out of my mouth, “Kiss me.”
His lips took mine in a deep, passionate kiss. I moved my body to straddle him. I could feel his arousal in his jeans. I ground down onto him.
He let out a groan. “Fuck.” He kept talking between kisses, “I’ve missed you so fucking much, baby.”
“This doesn’t mean everything is okay. We have a lot to talk about,” I panted back.
He stood and began walking toward the bed with a slight smile. “I know.”
“We need to figure this out.” I tried to drive home the fact that we still had things to work on and talk about.
As our kisses slowed, he flipped our positions so I was on top of him. He was hesitant, but he pulled me toward him. “I really fucking missed you.”
I ran my hand over his cheek and leaned in to kiss his lips softly. “I missed you, too.”
We both got comfortable under the blanket, and I put my head on his chest. He kissed my hair. His fingers drew circles on my upper arm. “What are you going to tell Tomasso? How serious were you?”
I leaned up on my arm. “What? You thought I was with him?”
He sat up a little. “Are you not?”
“No. You are more his type than I am,” I said with a laugh.
He put his head back down and grinned. “So Link was breaking my balls, then.”
I put my head back down. “Sounds like it.”
After a few minutes of joyful silence, he spoke again. “So what now?”
“I don’t know.” I sat up, legs crossed so I could look at him. “You are still on your healing journey, and I am…I have a different life now. Neither of us should be giving that up. Especially you.”
He brushed my hair off my face and pushed it behind my ear. “I would give up everything for you.”
I pulled his hand into my lap and held it. “But I would never ask you to. Your sobriety is something you will always struggle with.”
“What does that have to do with anything?”
I grinned, a bit embarrassed. “I don’t know. I'm just…I’m scared, I guess. You lied to me. You hurt me in a way you promised you never would.”
He sat up, pulling me into him. “I am so sorry I hurt you. I am sorry my addiction won.”
I studied his face for a moment. “What happened after I left?” I asked.
“What do you mean?”
“Fill me in on everything that happened while we were apart. We can't keep any secrets. We need to know everything about our time apart.”
“The moment you left, my world fell apart. I took about a month and went off the rails, broke my arm, and got in bar fights. Things like that. One day I had a nightmare that you died.”
“Oh, Eli.”
He gripped my hands. “I knew at that moment I never wanted to be away from you again. I went to three meetings that day. I quit the band the next. I moved into the Fosters’ guest house so I wouldn’t be around my brother and all the stuff he does, and now here we are.
I have been sober ever since. I periodically asked Link about you, but he wouldn’t tell me anything, only that you were thriving. He never even told me you had moved.”
I winced. “Yeah, sorry about that. I left and got a new number. I didn’t want to have the temptation of reaching out to you.”
He chuckled. “Guess that’s why you never answered then, huh?”
I leaned down to kiss him. It quickly became passionate. I felt his hardness rub against my thin shorts. I stared at him as I reached down to unbutton his jeans and pull out his cock. He looked down, then back at me. “You sure?”
I nodded, and his hand went into my shorts to play with my clit. I rode his finger for a few minutes before I pulled his hand out, and I guided his length into the leg of my shorts. I rose onto my knees to put his cock inside me. I slid him inside me slowly.
“God, baby. I forgot how tight you are.”
Through a soft moan, I said, “I thought you didn’t believe in God?”
He pulled my body toward him, kissing my nipple through my top. He began thrusting himself into me even deeper, causing a sting inside me. “You are my fucking God.”
I laughed. My laughs turned into moans as I became fully seated on him. The sting from his size turned into a sensual feeling. My clothes rubbing against us both created a new kind of friction.
He filled me so deeply. I was brought back to our first time and how beautiful it was.
“I don’t have a condom on,” he whispered through gritted teeth.
I leaned down and whispered in his ear. “I’m on the pill.”
He smiled, and we fell into a beautiful rhythm. I didn’t know what was going to happen from here, but I did know this man was mine.