Chapter 28
Ava
Eli kept his distance the rest of the evening. I’m sure everyone picked up on our mutual silence, but I kept my head down to avoid any questioning glances.
As soon as we’d cleaned up dinner, I ushered Nina downstairs for bedtime.
The tingling from Eli’s hand on my waist persisted through teeth brushing.
His voice echoed in my ear as I sang Nina’s songs.
By the time she’d finally fallen asleep, I must’ve replayed that kiss fifty times.
It was an ad at every commercial break, louder than the scheduled programming, until you started thinking, yeah, maybe I need this.
I grabbed the TV remote and plopped onto the couch in the den. The screen illuminated the room in a bluish glow. Hundreds of choices flooded the TV guide channel, but as the minutes passed, the titles blurred into nothing but a shelf of flippers and bumpers that kept my pinball thoughts in motion.
Why had I hesitated? Did I feel guilty for wanting someone?
It’s not as if I could have Jason back. He wouldn’t want me to fade away from life or love, or whatever fell in between.
And spending time with Eli didn’t take away from moments with Nina.
Often, we were all together. In fact, he engaged with her more than most people did.
I tipped my head back and stared at the ceiling; the texture resembled the contour of Eli’s biceps.
His jawline. The tight pack of muscles above his waistband.
I should just go to bed. Sleep it off. Wake up with fortified resolve in the morning.
But hyperactive energy sizzled under my skin.
I didn’t need my pillow. I needed a grounding wire.
Another metal ball entered the game. “Relax a little,” Terry had said.
When? I had deadlines and promises to keep.
When did it end? The constant climb? I could feel myself nearing a threshold.
Waning motivation. I’d been letting things slip: Nina’s extra screen time, putting off tasks I needed to finish.
I rubbed my hands down my face.
“You don’t want to burn out before you even start.”
Eli’s kiss came in for another commercial break, and all my shiny pinballs fell through the drain.
I was tired. Tired of being responsible. Tired of always having to do the right thing. Of endlessly busy days proving my worth, wondering if I was enough, hiding my loneliness.
I wanted him. More than I’d wanted anything for myself in a year. A few hours of me time. That was healthy, right? Surely, better than burnout? A night off from being a single mom or a grieving widow. I’d been living in a state of constant exhaustion. What would one more wakeful night hurt?
If he’d have me. Not such a forgone conclusion anymore.
I crept into our room. Nina slept soundly. She’d been sleeping through the night for almost a week now. Ever since we set up house in Bill’s lower level.
Could I?
Should I?
“I’ve been thinking about kissing you for so long …”
I would gladly assure him that keeping his hands to himself would not be for my benefit.
The back door of our room didn’t make a sound as I opened it and climbed the dark stairwell, silent as a predator to the mudroom. Maybe I was a predator. Or maybe I’d get to his door and chicken out.
I passed through the quiet house, into the garage, inhaling the heady blend of astringent lubricants, the bouquet of his trade. His eager and competent hands had been all over my Chevy, under my hood. Would he give me that same kind of attention? That level of care?
Wait. What if it was the kiss? Maybe, after building it up in his head, I’d left him disappointed?
My feet paused on smooth concrete. What if I got to his door and he had to spell it out for me?
Would I survive the embarrassment? I brushed fingers over my lips.
It couldn’t have been that bad. Not when my end exploded like fireworks.
I pushed through the doubt, navigating the first tread of the stairs that would bring me to his door.
He’s probably asleep. I’d probably climb up only to blunder back down in pitch dark, hoping I didn’t tumble head over tail. My hand skated the half-wall as my toes searched for the edge of each rise.
What would I even say to him?
The closer I got, the worse this idea seemed, until my hand met a corner. The end of the stairwell. The raised edge of the door frame.
“Relax a little.”
There were three possible outcomes: he’d be asleep, he’d tell me to go away, or maybe, just maybe, he’d pull me in and kiss me until I saw stars. One light knock. That’s all I’d do. Not enough to wake him.
I tapped my fingers against the wood and held my breath.
This is stupid. If he wanted me, he wouldn’t have left.
This time, I couldn’t blame the beer. My buzz had worn off hours ago.
The seconds passed, and I considered a fourth outcome.
Maybe he’d ignore me as he had during dinner.
Why did that feel like the worst option?
Blood swished and pounded through my head.
He wasn’t coming.
I turned in silent retreat. No chickens or predators here.
Just a lonely stray with her tail between her legs.
As my bare foot met the first descending step, the door swung open, unleashing a blue glow into the stairwell that cast jagged shadows on the walls.
Eli’s bare-chested silhouette filled the frame.
Thrill, terror, relief, and a million other impulses overwhelmed my cognitive function. “S-sorry, I didn’t mean to wake you.”
“What’s wrong?”
Everything. “Nothing.” Suddenly, I understood my hesitation. Eli had awakened something in me that I thought I’d cremated with my husband. I may not have expected long-term, but I’d hoped for it. And that scared the S-H-I-T out of me.
My foot staggered down another step, but Eli’s hand shot out to grab my wrist. His fingers flexed against my thrumming pulse, and the world hovered in a single, weightless moment. I could feel myself rising from the ashes. But what would I become?
With a swift yank, he hauled me to the landing, the azure glow painting the scene surreal. My pulse spiked. This could’ve been a dream. Maybe I’d fallen asleep on the couch hours ago.
But his rough voice sounded real when he said, “Don’t go.” And heat radiated off his skin. “Please?”
He pulled me past the threshold, into his room. Stole my breath. Filled me with hope. I’d stopped retreating, but he tipped his forehead to mine and begged again, “Don’t go.”
With the next inhale, his hands slid to my waist, fingers digging into the fabric of my shirt.
All those looks, those touches, made me greedy for a conclusion.
I wanted to feel all that glorious skin, discover what he liked.
To close the space between us. To lose myself.
Future-me could deal with the consequences.
The percussion in his chest called to mine, lending me courage.
I captured his face in my hands and brought my lips to his.
I should’ve been kissing him all along, because now the pressure had built, and I couldn’t stop. He took my mouth like a starving man. Patient turned urgent, tentative to fevered. We toppled further into his room, sparse and cool in contrast to my heated skin.
“Ava, you have no idea …” he breathed.
He tore my hands from his face and dragged them down his bare chest in a slow, sensuous trek over taut muscle, then back up, looping them behind his neck while his mouth moved over mine, dancing in chaotic choreography.
I followed, finding his rhythm, reveling in the contrasts: demanding kiss, yielding lips.
Sharp inhales, fuzzy thoughts. Awake. Dreaming.
It carried me in its melody. I held on, no longer caring about tomorrow.
Or the day after that. Only this moment, and what we were doing in it.
His hands skated up my sides, to my neck, my jaw, into my hair. When he tugged, urgency morphed into ravenous, demanding, all-consuming hunger.
“Dammit, Ava, why do you have to taste so good?”
His praise moved down my neck. Teasing, fluttering kisses mixed with feral bites.
Moments blurred together. Erratic breath, synching hearts.
Hot skin, wet hair. The door slammed. Our feet scuffed against the wood until my back hit the wall.
I gasped and pressed my pelvis into him, thrilled at the hard edge that met me.
Mouths locked. Nails scratching. My blood burned outward, igniting every long-ignored corner and crevice, and I ached to be closer.
Eli hooked my thigh around his hip and pressed into my soft curves.
Every contact point pinged–a light-up map of travel destinations.
Places I yearned for him to meet me. My humanity ebbed, and a primal Ava awoke.
She made non-human noises and caught his bottom lip between her teeth.
Swept her tongue inside his mouth and pulled an answering growl from his chest. At any moment, my clothes would combust.
I grabbed a fistful of my shirt, yanked it over my head, and Eli’s appreciative exhale brought my nipples to hard points. Our bodies met again, skin to skin, intoxicating every nerve ending I didn’t know I had.
His lips traveled across my collarbone, found the spot on my neck where my pulse pounded out of control. Warm palms slid up my rib cage, slow, reverent, stopping at the swell of my breasts.
“Ava, I can’t stop thinking about you.”
“Same,” I uttered.
“You can’t stop thinking about you?”
“About you,” I laughed. This was really happening.
Teeth scraping. Hands teasing. My skin pricked with heat. He feathered a hand up my outer thigh, gripped my butt, and lifted me. I locked my legs around his waist, my elbows behind his neck, barely holding onto my feeble grasp of reality.
Was this flying? Or falling?
Eli reclaimed my mouth as he carried me deeper into the room, the strength in those brawny arms swinging me halfway to delirium. Soft breasts, firm chest. My fingers sank into his cool, damp hair. My lips tingled from the scratch of his stubble.
One minute, we were upright, bumping from wall to counter, to wall.
The next, falling into the contours of his comforter.
It hugged me like a cloud and filled my nose with the refreshing spice of his soap.
We were always meant to end up here. Of this I knew.
If I had just admitted it from the start, I could’ve paced myself.
His body hovered over mine, a Greek statue honed and formed with attentiveness to detail. I needed to run my fingertips over every peak, smooth and hard as sculpted stone.
I pried at the waistband of his shorts, shoving them past his hips with frenzied intensity. In contrast, he pressed sweet, measured kisses down my neck. A slow, deliberate seduction. Honey dripping down the sides of the jar. How could he practice such control while I ran off the rails?
With devastating leisure, his fingers hooked my shorts and slid them down my legs, scorching trails along my skin. I moaned his name as he ran a palm up my inner leg.
“Say it again,” he said to the bend in my knee.
“Say what?”
“My name.” The inside of my thigh.
“Eli.”
I fisted the sheets as his hand settled over the valley of my pelvis. Too close to imploding. Not close enough.
He leaned in, pressed a teasing kiss to the right, then the left, his warm breath stirring every sensitive nerve ending. Pleasure built like a riptide. If he stopped, I might die. If he kept going, I definitely would. Twelve months of pent-up everything, bubbling to the surface.
My body reached for him, and finally, finally, his mouth landed home. Gentle tongue, firm fingers. Blue glow. Red hot. A tsunami rushed in and swept me under.
I crashed out of my skin, and each wave sent me further from shore.
I gasped. Sputtered. Groaned. I may have even cried. Life was bliss in that string of moments, my problems reduced to shadows. Nothing existed aside from the two of us.
Eli moved up my body, coming into focus over my head. I pulled him to me, pressed kisses into his neck, breathed him in. A sensual mix of heated skin, fresh soap, and zesty allspice. Now, any one of those scents would transport me back here.
My fingers dug into his shoulders, finding hard, flexed muscle and unyielding endurance. “Your turn.”
I shifted forward, hips searching for hips. Wanting to feel everything everywhere. To know the mashup of my soft against his hard. Eli’s kiss turned primal as his weight settled over me. Every cell buzzed to life, my blood coursing, my heart racing.
Beneath this heady thirst shook the cowering prospect that tragedy lay on the horizon. Maybe this wasn’t a good time to get involved with someone. But this man knew exactly what to do with me, and I had no intention of stopping him.