CHAPTER FOUR
CORA
AXEL: You’re close, aren’t you?
AXEL: Never mind.
AXEL: I can smell you. You’re here.
I grinned down at my phone as the text messages rolled in. The five-hour first-class flight from LAX to JFK on airplane mode had been a nice pause on life. And now, as I drifted untethered through the throngs of people in the airport, I realized this was true luxury. My father wasn’t breathing down my neck for once. I’d managed to swindle my way into booking the flight home with our travel agent all by myself. And now that I was in New York proper, all I could think about was Axel. What he might taste like once I kissed him. How good he’d smell as he wrapped his arms around me.
It had been three months since we’d last seen each other—back in August, during one of my visits home from Stanford. We’d only gotten two days together, since my father made a habit of overscheduling my visits home. But we’d crammed in enough love and tenderness to last us these months apart and more.
Even though Axel was my true love—the one man I could be my true self with—my stomach was in knots imagining how it would be to see him again. Three months was both nothing and everything. Doubts crept in no matter what I did to bat them away. Maybe he wouldn’t like what he saw…maybe I acted differently now after so much time away and didn’t even realize it. Doubt and insecurity circled like a predator while I speed walked through JFK, clutching my rolling luggage behind me.
DAD: Got your flight details from the agent. Vince is waiting for you. See you soon.
Fuck. The doubts and insecurities from before began churning, hissing bubbles as they fermented into something new altogether. A familiar paralysis that spread through my veins like ice and iron at the same time. Weighing me down, trapping me. My father loved to orchestrate everything. The car. The destination. The time. My entire fucking life.
I fired off a quick text to Axel letting him know I’d landed, and then slipped my phone into my oversized Dior purse. It was just after seven p.m., darkness creeping at the edges of the earth despite the bright haze of activity emanating from the airport. This night would be mine. No matter what my father thought.
I strode quickly through the crowded terminal, my black rolling luggage a perfect companion to the Hermes bag hanging from the crook of my elbow. My parents formed me in their image, and that image included expensive accessories, picture-perfect hair at all times, and a take-no-shit attitude in negotiations. Nothing else mattered. Not to them, at least. They wanted the finest things in life, with the finest looking people, at the most favorable rates possible. That was it.
Which meant that Axel loved giving me shit about the accessories. I could already feel him ribbing me about the Hermes bag, which was less mychoice and more of a requirement for the upcoming meeting this weekend. I knew this—it was just part of the life that I lived. I couldn’t show up to a meeting with Eli’s parents carrying the teal handstitched cross-body bag I’d bought on the Venice boardwalk last spring, even if it was my favorite accessory. I needed to bring the items that fit the persona they expected from me. Starting with this $25,000 French handbag.
I knew that my late brother, Chris, would have preferred the teal cross-body bag too. I’d heard his voice in my head when I bought it, which had made me cry into Axel’s shoulder for fifteen minutes in broad daylight.
No. This huge, disgustingly glamorous bag was considered an occupational obligation. With a few other choice four-figure-price-tag items that I had tucked away in my rolling luggage, like the Chanel laptop case and the 24K gold USB drive. These were items I knew I needed. For them. Not for me. None of these things were items I would have picked if I weren’t trying to create the image they wanted for me.
The closer I got to baggage claim, the closer I got to Axel. I imagined he’d be waiting just outside the automatic doors of baggage claim, maybe backed up against the long string of cars that dotted the inner belt of JFK like dirty pearls. I was five steps into baggage claim when my forearms went prickly. Excitement swirled in my chest, so intense I was already breathless. All I could focus on was the sliding doors leading out into the world. My heels clicked against the tile of the floor, wheels of my luggage clacking in time. Axel Axel Axel.
A strong arm caught me around the ribs. I didn’t even have time to gasp, or even blink, but my body knew what had happened before my brain did.
“There you are.”
Axel’s gruff bass traveled through my body like an electrical current. Every inch of me understood his touch, the solid warmth of him as he gathered me against him. I wasn’t sure if I said anything or if my shock—or maybe my relief—had rendered me mute. My face was against the flat plane of his chest, buried into the sweatshirt he wore beneath his trademark—if battered—black leather jacket.
His arms squeezed around me, locking me against him. Tears pricked at the corner of my eyes as I melted into him, clutching him wherever I could grab—the side of his jacket, the waist of his jeans.
“Jesus, Axel,” I blubbered into his chest, heart racing like I’d run a marathon. The hug couldn’t go on long enough. I could hug him until three a.m. and still want more.
He pressed kisses to the top of my head as I drank him in with my senses—the ropy muscle of his arms around me, the outdoors-and-cedar scent of him, as if he carried the woods of Kentucky with him wherever he went.
When his grip around me loosened, I pushed onto my tiptoes, my lips seeking his like two parts of a magnet coming together. Our mouths smashed together, too urgent and greedy for a delicate peck. His hand snaked up the back of my neck, fingers knotting in my hair at the base of my skull. I whimpered through the kiss while he tugged at my hair slowly, gently. Exactly as I liked it. Moisture surged between my legs. Axel knew all my secret spots and loved to tease them. Even in the middle of JFK baggage claim.
“I’m gonna eat you alive, sweet cheeks,” he promised, his lips still pressed to mine. His mouth curled at the corners, and he lifted me off the ground, twirling me in a circle.
“Promise?”
“Promised and notarized.”
I nuzzled him, giggling as he set me back down. But his arms didn’t leave me. I tilted my head to really look at him, drink in all the changes and minute differences since I’d seen him last. His dirty blond hair was longer at the top, disheveled in a way that I wanted to protect. The stubble on his jawline scraped at my fingers as I stroked him, trying to memorize every detail about this moment.
“Get a fucking room,” someone muttered as they walked past. Axel and I stared at each other with big smiles for a moment before bursting into laughter.
“I would if I could afford it,” Axel shouted in the general direction of the person who’d scolded us. “This city is so expensive, you have no idea!”
I collapsed against him, laughter shaking my body.
“Good thing we only need a closet,” Axel went on, pressing a kiss to my forehead. “Because you know that’s what I got for ya.”
“It’s my favorite closet in Manhattan,” I told him, eyes drifting shut as he placed another kiss to my lips. The kind that was crushed velvet and heat. The kind that made panties smolder.
“You ready to go cuddle up by my shoe rack?” His eyes twinkled as he teased me, his palm smoothing over my hair. I loved being admired by him—nobody else in the world had ever looked so genuinely and deeply elated to see me.
I opened my mouth to tell him that my dad had snooped my flight plan and sent the driver, but being around Axel again emboldened me. Let the consequences pile up as they may. I needed to spend the night at my boyfriend’s house, and if that included telling Vince to fuck off, so be it.
“Of course I am.” I slung my arms around his neck, and we kissed again. And then again. When we broke apart, I spotted my father’s driver Vince over Axel’s shoulder. My stomach pitched to my feet.
“Let’s go to the other side of baggage claim,” I said softly. “Vince just showed up, probably to find me and steal me away.”
Annoyance flashed across Axel’s face, but he must have squashed it because he scooped my hand into his and brought the back of my hand to his lips.
“Time to start the kidnapping,” he said.
I followed Axel’s lead, and we scurried away, easily getting lost among the throngs of people crossing through baggage claim. All I wanted was for us to escape for a long weekend—head to a cabin, snuggle up in some blankets, stare at a fire for days. But given my current circumstances, the weekend getaway was impossible. This would have to do—a stolen night here, a renegade brunch in two days if we were lucky. And then…more waiting.
Waiting, waiting, waiting until we could steal another night. Until my father stepped down as the main obstacle between us. Until the stars finally aligned so that we could be openly happy together. Making plans without friction and secrecy. God willing, we might even be able to wake up and go to sleep in the same house someday. It was a reality I could almost taste but had no road map for how to arrive there.
We got lost in the stream of pedestrians as Axel guided me back into the airport, up toward departures. Every step at his side felt like an adventure—it had since the day I met him, in line at the student union waiting for a mid-day grilled cheese with a slice of pepperoni stuck in the middle, and he’d asked if I wanted to ditch class and go to Chinatown with our grilled cheeses. He’d been a total stranger, but something about the mischief and innocence in his gaze had made me answer yes. And I’d been answering yes ever since.
“You’ve got the fancy purse today, I see,” he murmured as we maneuvered through the crowds.
“I have the Venice Beach bag along too.”
“Good. It brings Chris with you, you know?”
I smiled. Axel wasn’t afraid to talk about Chris. Not like everyone else was. My parents had only mentioned him a handful of times since he’d taken his life six years ago.
“You know, every time I wear that bag, I can hear his laugh in my head. I think he was with us that day on the beach.”
“That shit happens to me with Jordan and Kaylee,” he said, smiling warmly at me. He’d lost his two younger sisters—victims of the foster care system. Kaylee had passed away the brothers’ freshman year of college. Jordan had simply disappeared, and though the brothers still held out a flicker of hope, they told themselves she’d suffered a similar fate as Kaylee. The same system that took his sisters had allowed him and his biological brother Damian to flourish. “Sometimes I just swear they’re hanging out with me for a day.”
I laughed. “Maybe they just pop in from Heaven to visit.”
“It’s like the spirit version of Bring Your Kid to Work Day, except—” he glanced at me, probably reading the confusion on my face. “No, Margulis Realty didn’t do Take Your Kid to Work Day, did they?”
“They did not,” I said with a laugh.
“You didn’t miss much,” he mused.
But our lost siblings were still heavy on my mind as we moved through the airport. “Do you ever beat yourself up trying to still honor their memory?”
Axel let a low whoosh of air go. But not because this was too heavy. This was just how we were—we could talk about it all. Whenever and wherever. He was the first person I could just let it all out with.
“Every fucking day,” he confirmed. “Damian too.”
“I feel like there’s so much I have to do to make things right,” I murmured. These were words I had never—could never—utter around my parents. They viewed Chris taking his own life as an act so heinous and embarrassing that they refused to speak about it. Even with me.
“Sounds like you need some TLC, babe. I don’t know if I’m gonna let you go this time,” Axel said, squeezing his arm around my shoulders as we weaved through the crowds. “Your MBA isn’t that big of a deal, right? You’ll be fine if I lock you up in my apartment.”
“Yeah. As long as you feed and water me. I wouldn’t even be considered a victim.”
“Because you’d be willing.” The sexy smirk that stretched across his face as he looked down at me had the power to turn this joke into reality. Because I’d do anything for him. Including sabotage my career, if necessary.
Including forsake my family…if necessary.
“We can just share your MBA,” I cracked, as a gust of the chilly wind whipped past. I burrowed deeper into his embrace.
“You can have it,” he said. “I’m only getting it for you anyway.”
I laughed and swatted at his chest, but he didn’t return my laughter. “You aren’t serious.”
A shrouded look crossed his face. “I know it’ll look better to your dad if I have my MBA. And it’ll look better for the CEO of our business to have an MBA. But after the week I’ve had, I’m ready to fucking drop out.”
I patted his chest. “We’re almost through it. Because you’re right. It will look better to have it. You’ve come this far. Why stop now?”
He grunted in the most Axel-like fashion, a mix between a petulant adolescent and a bull. “Because I’m over it.”
“You’re more than halfway through—”
“And more than halfway broke. Trace is graduating this semester, which means we can get a jump on the business. And we need to. Besides, I was ready two years ago to be CEO; so why flush all this extra money down the drain just to receive the bragging rights of a Colombia MBA?” He sighed, the blue thunderstorm of his gaze darting over the crowds. “I’m so conflicted. Trapped between money and commitment yet again.”
“Axel, if there’s anyone who can figure out a solution to this problem, it’s you.”
“I’m sick of having to always figure out the solution.” His throat bobbed as he gazed off into the distance. “I’ve been dealing with this shit my whole life. I just thought that once I got to this point, it would get easier.”
A sad laugh floated out of me. I could relate to that statement in about a hundred different ways. “It doesn’t get easier. You just get used to it.”
Axel squeezed his arm tighter around my shoulders. “I didn’t want to start our night with all my bitching. Will you forgive me?”
I grinned up at him. “Hmmm. I suppose there is a way you could make it up to me.”
That heartbreaker smile returned to his face—the type of look that held me hostage whenever he directed this brilliance my way. The type of smile I’d see even when I was dead. “Can I start making it up to you now?”
I couldn’t respond before he scooped me up into his arms with a whoop. I clung to him, giggling and delirious with joy. I was no stranger to the random public displays of affection that Axel loved to put on, yet they never failed to delight. My rolling luggage was forgotten as he tossed me over his shoulder, patting my ass like this might help me stay in place.
“There we go,” he said. Loudly. “Right where I like ya.”
Laughter cascaded out of me. “Oh my god, Axel. Put me down.” People streamed by us, barely registering the ripple in the space-time continuum of the walkway.
“I’m making it up to you. You get to stare at my ass for the next hundred yards. There’s no greater gift, babe.”
I couldn’t even talk for how hard I was laughing. His arrogance was only preceded by his humor. This type of bawdy display would earn us plenty of stern looks and even a vicious dressing-down from my mother if this were happening anywhere near them. But that was one of the things I loved about my boyfriend.
He didn’t give a fuck about the rules of my world.
And I loved flying free in his.
An hour later, we stumbled up the steps of his walk-up, barely able to focus on walking between all the kisses and laughter. I’d laughed more in the past hour with him than I had in the previous two months without him. Further proof that my sanity and well-being required Axel in my life.
He fumbled with the lock on the door, trying and failing to insert the key.
“Come on, babe.” I snagged his lips in another kiss, tugging at the buckle of his belt.
He drew in a sharp breath, sending me a warning look. Heat pooled in his slate blue gaze, a promise of the passions lurking inside him, waiting to explode the second we got behind the closed door of his bedroom. “Cora…”
“What?”
He stilled, his throat bobbing. Emotion crowded out the heat in his gaze, the entire world around us disappearing until only this moment remained. “I love you, you know that?”
“Of course I know that. I love you too.”
He smashed his lips against mine, a kiss both desperate and hungry. When we broke apart, my lips tingling and entire body electrified, he finally managed to insert the key.
“There we go,” he said as it swung open.
“I was about to call the cops,” someone deadpanned from inside. Damian. He leaned his head back from his position on the couch, laptop in front of him as always.
“For what? Breaking and not entering?” Axel teased, his grip tight around my hand as we came inside. I smiled brightly at Damian, waving with the tips of my fingers.
“Long time no see, Damian.”
“Glad you made it back to our neck of the woods,” Damian said with an imaginary hat tip.
“Couldn’t keep me away.”
Axel shot me a mysterious look. Trace emerged from the hallway a moment later, a reassuring smile at the ready.
“There’s Cora,” he said as he came my way to wrap me in a side-hug. “The only woman who Axel looks at, thinks about, or talks about.”
“That’s enough chitchat, guys,” Axel said. His grip around my hand tightened, and he beelined for the bedroom door. “Got some things to do. See you tomorrow.”
Axel tugged me behind him, and I offered a helpless smile to his brothers. As we stepped into his room, I heard Trace laugh and say, “Right. Things to do.”
The door clicked shut. The muffled undertones of Trace and Damian’s conversation outside faded away as Axel gripped my arms, pinning me with a look that promised he’d devour me.
But instead of kissing me, his throat bobbed. “Cora.”
“What, babe?”
His gaze fell, and he sank to his knees in front of me, his palms tracing slow, intentional lines down the sides of my body. Every inch of me went electric beneath his grip. He didn’t normally waste time when we were alone together. And getting down onto his knees…was he finally going to pop the big question? He’d been hinting at it for over six months. Butterflies swarmed my belly as I waited for him to finally make good on the hinting.
But he didn’t say anything, just kept me pinned against the door with his gaze. His hands converged on the mound of my pussy, which was covered by my expensive leggings. His thumb slipped into the hot groove between my legs. I hadn’t worn panties—for him—but he was so good at weaponizing my own thoughtfulness. What was supposed to be a sexy surprise for him would now become my own unraveling. He dragged his thumb in a slow circle, and I arched toward him.
“I can’t believe you’re here,” he finally said, curling his fingers around my hip. His thumb pressed in just the right spot against the fabric of my leggings. My breath hitched.
“Oh my God, Cora.” He dragged his thumb back and forth over the tight peak of my clit, which he could probably feel though my leggings, from how turned on I was. “You’re not wearing any panties, are you?”
A weak laugh slipped out of me. My head dropped back to the door. “How could you tell?”
“Because you’re always so sweet like that.” He wet his bottom lip and tugged at my leggings, jerking them down to my knees in one practiced swoop. His jaw flexed as he looked at my bare pussy head-on.
“Spread your legs.”
He never wasted time. I loved this about him. But the leggings bunched at my knees didn’t allow for a lot of give. “Babe, I can’t—”
“There we go.” The corner of his mouth lifted as my legs parted just a couple of inches. And then he dove forward, mouth to mound, burying his tongue between the lips of my pussy. His tongue found my clit first, eager and expectant, the warm heat feeling like both an old friend and the newest, most amazing sensation in the world. A moan began to escape, but I cut it off—his brothers were outside. Not like they couldn’t imagine what our first order of business was.
Axel made a muffled, sloppy noise. I was embarrassingly wet. It was always this way with him.
“Jesus, Axel,” I breathed, running my fingers through the messy length of his hair. I knotted my fingers in the strands while his tongue assaulted my clit. To ground myself and because I knew he loved it. He grunted, plunging his tongue into my slit with abandon. I arched harder against him, welcoming more. Axel snaked his fingers between my legs, pumping two fingers in and out of me slowly.
“You’re dripping.” He pulled back to look at me, his face shining with my juices. His heated gaze dragged up my body, then back to my pussy. “Jesus, you’re a fucking dream.”
A lazy smile drifted across my face, but it faded quickly when his thick fingers filled me again. He sucked at my clit, my head thudding against the door from the jolt of pleasure. I moaned again, but this time I couldn’t stop it. Axel worked his tongue mercilessly back and forth against the peak of my clit. The impossible bliss began a slow uncoiling inside me, sending out exploratory paths of heat and pinpricks through my entire body.
“Ohhhh, Axel. I’m close.” I thrust my hips against him, the pleasure rising to a rapid crescendo. When he eased his fingers deeper inside me, he sucked hard at my clit, and all the walls came tumbling down. Knees to jelly. Fireworks. Heat pummeling me, perfect bliss from head to toe. I slumped but he caught me, the door banging behind me as he propped me up.
From the living room, Trace and Damian were mocking us. “Oh, Axel!” Trace mimicked in a falsetto.
Giggles floated out of me. I couldn’t even open my eyes.
Axel’s rough voice brought me back to earth, the barely-there Kentucky accent making me melt further. “You okay, babe?”
I laughed and laughed. I was more than okay. I was perfectly happy in this moment.
And I knew it, because I spent every other moment of my life not happy.
I needed to hang on to this bliss for as long as I could.
Because the clock was ticking until real life set in again. As soon as I stepped outside the door of this apartment, the honeymoon was over.