Be Here Now: A Cedar Creek Novel (20 page)

Jason lifted both of his hands to cup my cheeks and he pulled me close to his face, his eyes boring into mine.

“You love me?” he asked.

I swallowed then said, “Yes.”

“You wanna be with me?”

I nodded and repeated, “Yes.”

“Don’t you think we’ve wasted enough time?” I closed my eyes and leaned into him as I nodded again. He kissed my forehead and wrapped his arms back around me.

“Then it’s decided. We’re getting my stuff after breakfast and I’m staying here with you. I told you last night I would never be able to let you go again and I meant it. I’m here and I’m staying. Everything else we’ll figure out later.”

“Okay,” I agreed.

“Okay,” he said on a squeeze before he let me go. “Now, let’s eat breakfast.” I smiled as he turned and fixed himself some coffee. Then I got the bacon and toast and we sat down for breakfast.

I hadn’t even taken the first bite of my toast before my phone started ringing.

It was Chris.

Seeing his name flash on the screen made me realize that he hadn’t come home last night. I snatched up the phone and brought it to my ear.

“Chris?”

“Good morning, gorgeous. Happy Birthday!”

“Thanks,” I replied. “You at your place?”

“Yeah. I figured you had someone else holding you last night.” He said teasingly.

“Very funny.”

“So have you guys talked yet?” He asked, his voice more serious now.

“Some. He said we would talk more later.” Jason caught my eyes and his warmed as he gave me a reassuring smile before he took another bite of his bacon.

“He there now?”

“Yeah. And he says he’s staying.” Another reassuring smile.

“Staying in town or staying at your place?”

“Both. We’re getting his stuff from Cal’s house after breakfast.”

“Good. I’m glad. Though I’m a little disappointed that I’m losing my own personal cock blocker,” Chris went back to teasing.

“I’m sure you’ll be strong enough to keep it in your pants without using me as a shield, Chris.” Jason lifted his eyebrows in surprise and question at me. I smiled at him and shook my head, indicating I would tell him later.

“I hope you’re right.”

“I’ve got faith in you.”

Chris chuckled. “At least that makes one of us. You still coming to the bar to watch the guys set up?”

I rolled my eyes, but said, “Of course.”

“You bringing Jason?”

“Probably,” I said as my gaze went back to Jason. He sat back in his chair while he sipped his coffee and watched me.

“That’ll be interesting,” Chris mumbled.

“Interesting? Why?” I asked.

“Nothing. I’ll see you later then.”

“All right, see you later. And Chris?”

“Yeah?”

“Thank you.”

“Anything for you, Lore. Anytime. You know that.” Then he hung up. I placed my phone back on the table and reached for my coffee.

“Chris needs your help keeping it in his pants?” Jason asked, amused.

I gave a short laugh. “I know. Who would have thought he would ever want to keep it in his pants. But apparently, he’s tired of all the empty sex he’s been getting and is looking for something real.” The laughter left Jason’s eyes as they went from me to the table and he took another sip of his coffee. I felt the smile leave my face as I guessed why he was avoiding my eyes now.

“I don’t want to know,” I said. And I didn’t. I didn’t think I would be able to stomach hearing about what he’d been up to. Just the thought of how many women he had slept with in the past six years made my stomach drop and pain slice through me.

“And I don’t want to tell you. But we’ll have to talk about it.”

“No, we don’t.”

He gripped my hand and squeezed it. “Yeah, baby, we do. I know it’s unpleasant and I’m not gonna share any details. I also don’t wanna hear any details from you. But we gotta get this out of the way, because you’ll eventually hear or read about it and I want you to hear it from me instead of someone else or finding out shit online when I’m not around to explain.” I pulled my hand out of his and crossed my arms across my chest as I glared at him.

He sighed, but continued talking. “There were others, lots of others, but—”

I held up a hand to stop him. “I get the picture. I saw it firsthand that one time. I don’t need any visuals. I mean it, Jason. I know you haven’t been celibate. I get it. We weren’t together. You don’t owe me an explanation.”

“I know I don’t, but you still deserve one.” His voice was determined.

“Let me rephrase then. I don’t want one.”

I got up from my chair and started to clear the table, but Jason snatched my hand with his and pulled me in his lap and wrapped his arms around me tightly, keeping me in place before I could even react.

“I need you to you listen to me, baby. Yes, there were lots of women, but none of them came even close to meaning anything to me. I know it makes me an asshole, but not one of them was more to me than a convenient fuck.” I flinched, but he ignored it and went on being brutally honest with me. “I’ve fucked a lot of women, Loreley, too many to remember.” I closed my eyes in an effort to block out his words and struggled to get out of his hold. Jason only gripped me tighter. “Look at me, baby. Look into my eyes.” He shook me and my eyes snapped open again. “None of them meant anything to me. I did it because I was trying to forget you, because I missed you so goddamn much. You’re the only woman I have ever loved, Loreley, the only woman I have ever felt anything for. It’s always been you.”

Okay, that made me feel slightly better. Yes, I was terribly jealous of all the women he had been with, but could I blame him? No, I couldn’t. We hadn’t been together. Neither of us knew we would see each other again, least of all
be
together again.

“I wouldn’t tell you any of this under normal circumstances, but once the media get wind of you and me, you’re gonna hear it anyway. What I want you to know deep down to your bones is that you have no reason to be jealous. I belong to you. I will not stray, no matter the opportunity. You own me, heart and soul. I don’t see anyone but you. I don’t
want
anyone but you.”

I could see it in his eyes; he meant every word he said: that I could trust him to never betray me; that I was the only woman he wanted to be with, the only woman he loved; that he wouldn’t hurt me. But I had known that already or I wouldn’t have let him back into my life the way I had.

That’s why I said, “I know.”

“You believe me?”

I nodded. He studied me for a few seconds then he covered my mouth with a hard kiss. “Thank you, baby.” Another kiss, this one softer. “Now, your turn.”

I froze. “My turn?”

“Yeah, tell me who in town you’ve dated, so I don’t get blindsided in case we run into them.”

I tried to push away from him and get up, but he only tightened his hold on me once more.

“Tell me, Loreley. I need to know.”

I stopped pushing against him but shook my head. I didn’t particularly want to share that I hadn’t been with anyone; that I hadn’t so much as kissed anyone. It was embarrassing and pathetic. I also didn’t want him to feel any guiltier than he already did. So I stayed quiet.

He misunderstood my silence and narrowed his eyes. “Tell me.”

I knew he wouldn’t let this go, so I squeezed my eyes shut and whispered, “None.”

Jason’s body froze underneath me. Then he asked in a hoarse voice, “None?” I shook my head again. “None as in we won’t run into anyone in town, or none as in there was no one at all?”

“The second,” I mumbled, my eyes still firmly shut.

The next thing I knew, I was up in Jason’s arms as he carried me out of the kitchen and his lips were on mine. “I know this makes me a hypocrite and a caveman, but I don’t care. You just told me I was the last person you gave yourself to. Knowing that you haven’t shared yourself with anyone else makes me hard as a rock and I need to be inside you again.” To my surprise, he walked through the bedroom and into the bathroom where he placed my ass on the counter. Then, with his lips still on mine, his mouth devouring mine, he started to untie my robe and slid it down my shoulders.

He ended the kiss and followed the path of the robe as he froze. His eyes roamed the mirror behind me as he kept pushing down the robe all the way until it was pooled around me on the counter. Then his hands started roaming my back as his eyes stayed glued to the mirror.

“You have a tattoo,” he whispered reverently. His fingers ran over every branch inked on my back. “It’s a cherry tree.”

I said nothing, just studied him as he gazed into the mirror and let him explore. He had taken me on my back last night, so he hadn’t seen the tattoo. His fingers went higher and stopped at my new raven.

“This one’s new,” he said as he carefully touched it. It wasn’t completely healed yet and last night’s activities had made it a little sore. “You have a cherry tree and two ravens on your back.” His voice was hoarse now. He looked at me with so many emotions shining in his eyes that I couldn’t read him.

“The cherry tree is—”

“From the cemetery. I wanted to tell you, you picked a beautiful spot, Loreley, next to your mom where she can watch over him.”

My breath hitched.

He remembered.

I had told him about how my mother had loved that spot and had often taken me there for picnics before she died.

He moved his hands from my tattoo, cupped my face and pulled it up so our noses were almost touching. His eyes bore into mine with an intensity that took my breath away.

“Now, I get why you would get a tattoo of a cherry tree, but why the ravens?”

At the time, Jesse’s fascination with ravens had been somewhat ironic, seeing as the father he didn’t know existed was the front man of the band named
The Crowes
. I had tried not to think too hard about that fact, had tried not to interpret it at all, dismissing it as a coincidence. But to be honest, it had always freaked me out a little bit, made me wonder if there was some kind of connection there, if Jesse had inherited his fascination with ravens from his father. Just like he had inherited his looks: light brown hair, always dishevelled no matter how hard I tried to get it under control; warm hazel eyes with flecks of honey in them that in the right light would shimmer golden; and always a cute and warm smile or mischievous smirk on his face. Their laugh had been the same as well and every time my son had laughed, I had been reminded of how I had enjoyed making Jason do the same, how getting that loud and full belly laugh from him at least once a day had been one of my goals in life. It was glorious, and being the reason for it had made me feel special.

I held Jason’s gaze as I told him, “Jesse loved them.” The intensity in his eyes grew even sharper at my words.

“Jesse loved them?”

I nodded. “He was fascinated by them.”

“All this time you kept me with you,” Jason’s whisper was rough with emotion. “First you had me in Jesse and when he was gone, you tattooed both of us on your back.” I nodded again, because it was the truth. No matter how much I had denied that fact to myself, I got the tattoo not only with Jesse in mind.

“Take off my shirt.” My body jerked at the sudden change in topic. “Do it, baby,” he urged me softly when I didn’t move. I gripped the bottom of his shirt and lifted it up and over his head. He took it out of my hands and dropped it to the floor. Then he slowly turned around.

It took me a minute to make sense of what my eyes were seeing, but when I did, I gasped. There on his back—his whole back—was a tattoo of Loreley, The Siren, as she was sitting on the rock, combing her hair and singing. It was stunning. Her hair was golden as it blew in the wind and her face…her face looked like my face. She was me. He had me tattooed on his back portrayed as The Siren, her eyes—my eyes—teasing and seductive, beautiful and fierce. On the bottom under the rock, my name was spelled out in a beautiful filigree font. And in the back flying over her there were two ravens. My hands were shaking while they touched the marked skin on his back.

“I never let go of you either, baby. I couldn’t. I carried you with me wherever I went. And unknowingly, our son.”

“When did you get this?” I asked as I kept my hands on his back.

“I started it a few months after you left. It took almost a year to finish.” At his words, silent tears were running down my face. Jason had branded me on him. And he had done so only a few months after I had left. He never let me go, he never stopped loving me.

I lay a soft kiss right between his shoulder blades, right where the two birds were flying in the wind and worked my way down towards my name.

Jason groaned.

“I have waited so long for you to do that, baby. I never thought it would happen,” he said in a throaty whisper.

“I love you. So much,” I said with my lips against his skin. The last word hadn’t completely left my mouth before he turned around, cupped my head almost violently, and pulled me up to meet his mouth in a fierce and hard and deep and wet kiss.

“You have no idea what that means to me, having your mouth on my back, hearing you say you love me. It means everything, baby.
You
mean everything.” Then he took my mouth again and his hands started wandering over my body, brushing, stroking, pinching.

“I want to make love to you right here, take you where I can see your tattoo in the mirror while I can look into your eyes. And I want your hands on my back the whole time, baby. I want your hands on your brand with you knowing it’s there.” I wanted that, too. This time, it was me who took his mouth in a fierce kiss as I wrapped my arms and legs around him, my hands on my brand on his back, touching, stroking, groping, his hands on my back doing the same.

And we made love right there on the bathroom counter. Jason’s eyes didn’t leave mine unless to take in my tattoo; my hands didn’t leave his back. It was the most intense lovemaking I had ever experienced and one of the most passionate moments of my life when we reached our climax together while our gazes were locked on each other.