Round Twenty-Nine #3
“And then to find out that silly, cheeky boy Billy Caster was my new neighbor? The boy I loved my whole life? And worse, to realize you lived next to my grandmother for a decade, and she never once thought to reply to my letters and tell me. To hear that she shoved my name into your happy marriage time and time again—which makes me the other woman, by the way. Unintentionally, but still.” She paces the kitchen, jamming her thumbs against her eyes.
“Aria was selfless and kind and sweet and entirely, ridiculously gracious about my presence inside your home, even when I wasn’t actually here.
And now look at me!” She comes to a stop, her chest sprinting with heaving breaths.
“I’m inside your home. Again! I’m in love with your son.
With her son. This is the crisis I’ve been having for days already, because we did that thing we did on Saturday night, and I liked it.
” She brings watery golden eyes back to mine. “I liked it, Billy!”
“I mean…” I step forward with a smirk as pleasure sizzles in my veins. “I liked it, too. A lot.”
“I’m sick of everything always being out of control!
Life happens to me. Around me. In spite of me.
” She blinks, blinks, blinks until tears ball in her lashes.
“I grieved you, too. I’m still grieving you, but now there are two of you, and I swear to God, it feels like I can hardly breathe when you and I are in the same room.
Because what if we have another fight? A big one.
And that big fight leads you to cutting me off. ”
“Cutting you off?”
“From Jeremy! From you. You are in control, Billy, and it scares the hell out of me, because I can’t sustain those kinds of hits either.
I’m the queen of suffering the consequences of everyone else’s actions, and we’d done that thing we did.
We gave in to what we both wanted, so next time we fight, it’ll be bigger. It’ll be louder.”
“So you ditched?” I step in her way and grab her arms. Thunder booms outside, rattling the roof and dropping the house into complete darkness. Not even the clock on the oven works anymore. The TV has switched off. The motor behind the fridge stops running.
I hold my breath and listen for my son’s screams. For his terrified whimper. But when twenty seconds pass, thirty, maybe even a full minute, and he remains sound asleep, I bring my attention back to Maggie and stare down at her quivering lips.
Fuck it. Mine curl higher.
“You’re so afraid of being cut off from my son, you decided to cut yourself off instead?”
“No, I—”
“Instead of having the fight you figured we were due, you decided to stay gone instead?”
“You’re intentionally making it sound dumb.” She attempts to jerk free of my grip. “And I was right. We’re fighting.”
“You’re fighting.” I tug her in, crushing her chest against mine and swallowing her whimpered exhale. “I’m not fighting.”
“Billy—”
“I picked fights with you to keep you away, because I didn’t want to know what it was like to have you again, only to lose you. Meanwhile, you’ve been avoiding me so we can’t fight, because you don’t wanna lose us either. Am I reading this correctly?”
A low, dangerous growl rolls along her throat. “You don’t have to be so friggin’ haughty about it.”
“The more you bicker with me, the more I wanna bend you over the kitchen counter and take a little more of what I had on Saturday night.”
“Y—” Stunned, her eyes flicker and melt. “What?”
“Just thought you deserved to know, since we’re spilling our secrets.” I drag her to the tips of her toes and trap her bottom lip between my teeth. “It’s not that I mean to disrespect your current crisis, but every time you snap at me, I swear, my cock starts to ache.”
Breathless, her mouth drops open. “Billy—”
“So I’m gonna taste you a little bit.” I nip at her jaw.
Her throat. “Remember how I said I get three minutes a month where I’m not a cop and I’m not a dad?
” I drag my tongue down the column of her neck and bask in the way she stops pushing me away and starts pulling instead.
“These are those three minutes, Magnolia. My son is asleep, and my phone is quiet. I have a million really dumb things just begging to be vocalized, but for right now, I’ve got them on lock.
If it helps ease the anxiety coiling in your belly, I swear on my life, on his life, no matter how much you and I fight, I will never, ever take Jeremy away from you. ”
Her breath comes out on a choked cry, rasping and aching. “You promise?”
“Cross my heart.” I wrap my hands around her thighs and scoop her up, gratified in the way her legs automatically circle my hips, then I carry her out of my kitchen, through the mudroom at the back of the house, then onto the porch where the storm roars across my yard.
The ferocious wind masks the sound of my pounding pulse. The falling rain covers the sound of our racing breath.
“So now that that worry has been eased, why don’t you focus on me for a second?” I spin and slam her against the house, trapping her between me and the wall and sliding my tongue past her lips. “Because once wasn’t enough, Magnolia. Fuck,” I groan. “It wasn’t even close to enough.”