Chapter 9
Jennifer
The rain started around six, a torrential downpour that turned the streets into rivers and made the windows of my studio rattle in their frames. I'd been staring at the same fabric samples for an hour, unable to concentrate on anything except the email burning a hole in my inbox.
I'd read it four times already. Clayton's letter. His confession. Every ugly, broken, honest word of it seared into my brain like a brand.
The panic attacks. The sleepless nights. The way he'd used Grace as an emotional crutch because she was safer than me. The admission that he'd been so afraid of losing me that he'd pushed me away with both hands.
And at the end, the part that made my chest crack open every time I thought about it:
I don't expect you to forgive me. I don't deserve your forgiveness.
But I need you to know that I see now. I see every time I chose silence over honesty, every time I locked you out of the rooms where I was falling apart.
I see the woman I married, the woman who deserved a partner instead of a project, and I am so fucking sorry that I couldn't be that for you.
You looked free at the gallery. Happy. Like the woman I fell in love with, before I spent eight years slowly suffocating her.
I want you to stay free, Jennifer. Even if it means staying free of me.
I'd cried the first time I read it. Ugly, heaving sobs that left me curled up on my bathroom floor with mascara streaking down my cheeks. The second time, I'd felt nothing but numb shock. The third and fourth, a confusing swirl of grief and anger and something dangerously close to hope.
This was what I'd wanted. For years, this was exactly what I'd begged him to give me. Honesty. Vulnerability. The real Clayton, not the polished mask he showed the world.
So why did it feel like it was tearing me apart?
A knock at the studio door made me jump, my heart slamming against my ribs. I glanced at the clock. Almost seven. I wasn't expecting anyone, and Skylar would have texted before showing up.
I crossed to the door and peered through the rain-streaked glass.
Clayton stood on the sidewalk, completely soaked.
His dark hair was plastered to his forehead, his white dress shirt transparent and clinging to the broad planes of his chest. He wasn't wearing a jacket, and his hands were shoved in the pockets of his ruined trousers like he didn't know what else to do with them.
He looked miserable. Desperate. Beautiful in a way that made my stomach clench with unwanted heat.
I should have turned off the lights and pretended I wasn't here. Should have let him stand in the rain until he gave up and went home. That would have been the smart thing to do. The safe thing.
Instead, I opened the door.
"What are you doing here?" My voice came out sharper than I intended.
"I saw your car." He gestured vaguely toward the street, water dripping from his fingers.
"I know I shouldn't have come. I know you need space.
But there's a shipment being delivered to your building tomorrow, and the weather reports are saying this storm is going to get worse, and I remembered you mentioned those architectural panels you ordered were supposed to arrive this week, and I thought maybe you could use help moving them inside before they get damaged. "
I stared at him. "You came here in a hurricane to help me move panels?"
"It's not a hurricane." A ghost of a smile flickered across his face. "Just a really aggressive thunderstorm."
"Clayton."
"I know." He ran a hand through his wet hair, and I watched the muscles in his forearm flex beneath his soaked shirt.
My mouth went dry. "I know how this looks.
I know I'm probably the last person you want to see right now.
But I couldn't stop thinking about those panels, and how heavy they are, and how you'd probably try to move them yourself because you're too stubborn to ask for help, and I just...
" He trailed off, his hazel eyes searching my face.
"I needed to do something. Something useful.
Something that wasn't just sitting in my empty house, going crazy because I can't stop thinking about you. "
The honesty in his voice made my chest ache.
"The panels aren't being delivered until tomorrow," I said quietly.
"I know. But the loading dock floods when it rains like this. I thought maybe I could help you move some of the stuff that's already down there, make sure nothing gets ruined."
He was right. I'd been meaning to deal with the storage situation for weeks, but between the showcase and the new clients and the constant effort of rebuilding my life without him, it had fallen through the cracks.
I should have said no. Should have told him to go home and let me handle my own problems.
Instead, I stepped back and held the door open.
"You're going to catch pneumonia," I said. "Get inside."
He moved past me into the studio, and I caught a whiff of rain and cologne and something underneath that was just him.
My body responded with a flush of heat that spread from my chest to my belly, and I hated myself for it.
Hated how eight weeks of separation hadn't done a damn thing to dull my physical response to this man.
"I have some towels in the back," I said, not quite meeting his eyes. "And maybe an old sweatshirt you can borrow."
"Jen." His hand caught my wrist, gentle but firm, stopping me in my tracks. "Did you read it? The letter?"
I couldn't lie to him. Not about this.
"Yes," I whispered. "I read it."
His grip tightened slightly, then released. "And?"
I finally looked at him, really looked at him, and what I saw made my heart stutter.
He was terrified. This man who had spent our entire marriage hiding behind walls of composure and control was standing in front of me, dripping wet and completely vulnerable, waiting for me to deliver a verdict that could destroy him.
"I don't know," I admitted. "I don't know what to think, Clayton. I don't know what to feel. Everything you wrote, everything you said... it's what I wanted to hear for years. But I don't know if it's enough. I don't know if anything could be enough after everything we've been through."
He nodded slowly, pain flickering across his features. "That's fair."
"Is it?" I laughed bitterly. "Because it doesn't feel fair. It feels like you're finally giving me everything I asked for, and I'm too broken to accept it."
"You're not broken." His voice was fierce, intense. "You're the strongest person I know. You walked away from a marriage that was destroying you, rebuilt your life from scratch, and threw a showcase that had half the city talking. That's not broken, Jennifer. That's fucking magnificent."
The words hit me somewhere deep, somewhere I'd been protecting for weeks. My eyes burned with tears I refused to let fall.
"Stop," I managed. "Stop saying the right things. Stop being vulnerable and honest and everything I begged you to be. It's not fair."
"I know." He stepped closer, and suddenly he was right there, close enough that I could see every droplet of rain clinging to his skin, every fleck of gold in his hazel eyes.
"I know it's not fair. I know I don't deserve another chance.
But I can't help it, Jen. I can't help wanting you.
I can't help loving you. I've tried to stop, and I can't. You're in my blood.
You're in my bones. You're the first thing I think about when I wake up and the last thing I think about before I fall asleep, and I am so fucking tired of pretending otherwise. "
My breath caught in my throat. He was so close now, the heat radiating off his body cutting through the chill of his wet clothes. I could feel the pull between us, that magnetic force that had always been there, stronger now than it had ever been.
"Clayton," I whispered, and I didn't know if it was a warning or an invitation.
"Tell me to leave." His voice was rough, desperate. "Tell me to go, and I will. I'll walk out that door and I won't come back until you're ready. But if you don't tell me to leave..."
He didn't finish the sentence. He didn't have to.
I should have told him to go. Should have protected myself, protected the progress I'd made, protected the fragile peace I'd built over the past eight weeks.
Instead, I grabbed the front of his soaked shirt and pulled his mouth down to mine.
The kiss was nothing like I expected. It wasn't soft or tentative or careful.
It was desperate and hungry and bruising, eight weeks of loneliness and anger and grief pouring out of both of us in a tangle of lips and tongues and teeth.
His hands came up to grip my hips, pulling me flush against his body, and I felt his cock harden against my stomach as a groan rumbled through his chest.
"Fuck," he breathed against my mouth. "Jen, we should stop. We should talk about this."
"I don't want to talk." I bit down on his lower lip, and he made a sound like I'd wounded him. "I've spent eight years talking to a wall. Right now, I just want to feel."
His control snapped.
He spun me around and lifted me onto my drafting table, scattering pencils and fabric samples across the floor.
His mouth found my neck, hot and open, and I arched into him with a moan that echoed through the empty studio.
His hands slid up my thighs, pushing my skirt higher, and I wrapped my legs around his waist to pull him closer.
"I missed you," he growled against my skin. "Every fucking day, Jennifer. I missed the way you smell. The way you taste. The way you say my name when I'm inside you."
"Then stop talking and remind me."
He kissed me again, deeper this time, his tongue sliding against mine in a rhythm that made my toes curl.
His fingers found the edge of my underwear and tugged, and I lifted my hips to help him pull them down.
The cool air hit my bare skin, and then his hand was there, stroking through my wetness with a reverence that made my breath catch.
"So fucking wet," he murmured. "Is this for me, baby? All of this?"
"Yes." The word came out broken, desperate. "It's always been for you. Even when I hated you, my body still wanted you."
He made a sound low in his throat, almost pained, and sank two fingers inside me. I cried out, my head falling back as he curled them against that spot that made me see stars. His thumb found my clit, circling with practiced precision, and I rocked against his hand shamelessly.
"That's it," he breathed. "Let go for me. Let me feel you come apart."
I was close already, embarrassingly close, my body wound tight from weeks of deprivation.
His free hand came up to fist in my hair, tilting my head back so he could watch my face as he fucked me with his fingers.
The combination of pleasure and vulnerability was overwhelming, tears pricking at my eyes as the pressure built and built.
"Clayton," I gasped. "Please. I need..."
"I know what you need." He kissed me again, swallowing my moans. "I've always known. I was just too much of a coward to give it to you."
His thumb pressed harder, his fingers curling deeper, and I shattered. The orgasm crashed through me like a wave, my whole body shaking as I cried out his name. He held me through it, murmuring praise against my lips, telling me how beautiful I was, how good I felt, how much he'd missed this.
When I finally came down, he was watching me with an expression that made my chest ache. Tender and hungry and so full of love it hurt to look at.
"I want to be inside you," he said quietly. "But only if you want it. Only if this is what you need."
I should have stopped. Should have pulled back, gotten dressed, told him this was a mistake.
Instead, I reached for his belt.
We fucked on my drafting table like it was the end of the world.
Hard and fast and desperate, his cock driving into me with a force that rattled the legs against the concrete floor.
I clawed at his back through his wet shirt, bit down on his shoulder to muffle my screams, and came so hard I forgot my own name.
Afterward, we lay tangled together on the floor, both of us breathing hard, the rain still pounding against the windows.
"Jen," Clayton murmured against my hair. "What does this mean?"
I closed my eyes, feeling the weight of his body against mine, the steady rhythm of his heartbeat beneath my cheek.
"My body still wants you, Clayton," I said quietly. "But my heart doesn't trust you. Not yet."
He was silent for a long moment. Then he pressed a kiss to my forehead, gentle and achingly tender.
"Then I'll wait," he said. "However long it takes. I'll wait."