Chapter 6 #2
"I love you." Her voice is raw. Wrecked. Beautiful. "I love you, Briggs Holloway. I love you, and I'm sorry it took me fifteen years to see you clearly."
She kisses me. Both hands on my face, mouth on mine, pouring every apology and declaration into a single act. My arms wrap around her. Pull her down onto my lap. She straddles me in the kitchen chair, her chest against mine, fingers in my hair.
"Take me to bed." Against my mouth.
I stand with her. Her legs wrap around my hips. Down the hall to my bedroom, the bed I've slept in alone for eight years, the room that smells like woodsmoke.
She unwraps her legs, stands, pulls the tank top over her head. No bra. Her breasts are heavy, beautiful, and I cup them with both hands. Thumbs rolling over her nipples until she arches into me.
The sweatpants come off. No underwear. She came over in pajamas with nothing underneath, which means she walked through those trees knowing exactly where this was going.
My clothes follow. Shirt. Jeans. Boxer briefs. She looks at me. All of me. Her eyes track down my chest, my stomach, my cock already hard, and her lips part.
She reaches for me. Wraps her hand around my shaft. Strokes once, base to tip, her thumb circling the head. My hips jerk forward.
"On the bed." Her voice has dropped. Low, certain. "Sit against the headboard."
I do what she says. Back against the headboard, legs out. She climbs onto me, straddling my lap, knees on either side of my hips. My cock presses against her stomach. Her pussy is wet against my thigh, and the heat of her drives rational thought from my head.
"Condom." I reach for the nightstand drawer. Roll it on while she watches, lip caught between her teeth. Then her hand wraps around me again, positions me at her entrance, and she sinks down.
Slow. Inch by inch. Taking me all the way in while her forehead drops to mine, eyes closed, mouth open on a sound that comes from somewhere deep. She's tight. Wet. Every nerve ending in my body is focused on the place where she's wrapped around me.
She starts moving. Rolling her hips in a slow grind that has me gripping her waist hard enough to leave marks. My mouth finds her breast. Tongue circling her nipple, sucking, teeth grazing. She gasps, grinds harder.
"God, Briggs. Right there."
My hands guide her hips. Lifting her, pulling her back down. She plants her hands on my shoulders, riding me faster, her breasts bouncing with every stroke. One hand slides between us. My thumb finds her clit, slick, swollen. Circles it with firm pressure.
Her rhythm falters. Speeds up. Her nails dig into my shoulders.
"I'm close." Breathless. Forehead against mine.
My thumb presses harder. Circles faster. My hips thrust up to meet her on every stroke, driving deep. She clenches around me so tight my vision blurs.
"Come for me, Margot."
She falls apart. Body arching back, head tipped, mouth open on a cry that fills my bedroom. Her pussy pulses around my cock in waves, and I follow her over. Burying deep. Hands locked on her hips. Emptying into her with a groan that comes from the center of my chest.
She collapses against me. Sweaty. Shaking. My arms around her, holding her steady. Her face buried in my neck. Both of us breathing hard in the warm quiet of a room that hasn't been this alive in years.
"Stay." My voice is rough. "Not tonight. Stay. Here. With me."
She lifts her head. Her eyes are clear. Brown, warm, no walls behind them.
"I'm not going anywhere, Briggs." A smile. Small, real, unguarded. "But we're alternating cabins. Because Princess Buttercup is getting separation anxiety and your dog keeps trying to eat her."
"Tinsel doesn't eat cats."
"Tinsel tried to put her entire head in his mouth yesterday."
"That's affection."
"That's attempted murder."
She laughs. Full, deep, the sound vibrating through both of us. I pull her close. Kiss her temple. Hold on.
Outside, the porch light is still burning. It's been on for three nights. Tomorrow I'll turn it off, because the woman it was burning for is right here.
My phone buzzes on the nightstand.
Mom:
Thomas Parker says there's a woman walking barefoot through the trees between your properties. In pajamas. In September. Please tell me this means what I think it means.
Me:
It means exactly what you think it means, Mom.
Mom:
FINALLY. I'm making pot roast Sunday. She's invited. Non negotiable. Also tell her I have cinnamon muffins.
Me:
I'll tell her.
Mom:
I KNEW those sight lines would pay off.
Margot reads the texts over my shoulder. She's laughing so hard Princess Buttercup would be jealous.
"Your mother has been waiting for this."
"My mother's been waiting for this since the day you moved in."
"She called the kitchen window 'good sight lines.'"
"I'm aware."
She settles against my chest. Her hand flat over my heart. Tinsel clicks into the room, circles three times, and collapses at the foot of the bed with a groan of a dog who has finally gotten what he wanted.
Through the window, the tree line between our properties is dark.
Forty feet of pine. The distance between two lives that orbited each other for fifteen years without ever touching.
Until a broken porch, a burst pipe, an escaped cat, and a woman in pajamas crossing the property line in bare feet closed the gap for good.
I press my mouth against her hair.
"I love you."
"I love you too." She looks up. "Also, your porch light is still on."
"I know."
"It's been on for three days."
"I know."
"That's a lot of electricity, Briggs."
"Worth every watt."
She puts her head back against my chest. Tinsel snores. Outside, the mountain is quiet, the air is cold, and the porch light burns until I get up at midnight to finally turn it off.
She's already asleep when I come back to bed. I pull her close. My arm over her waist. Her back against my chest. She fits. Same as before. Same as always.
Except now, for the first time in fifteen years, I'm not carrying a secret. And she's not carrying a grudge. And the forty feet between us has finally, permanently, closed.