True for You (15 page)
His
free hand comes around me, grabbing mine, and I watch in complete
fascination as he puts it between my legs. “Touch yourself.”
“Like
this?” I put my fingers right where I’m throbbing.
“Oh
yeah. Play with that swollen clit, Bliss.”
My
head falls back against his shoulder as I rub myself. His hand goes
to my breasts, plucking at each nipple and making them hard.
Just
as I’m about to come, he pulls his fingers out of me. “No!
Don’t do that… wait.” He shoves the head of his
erection in me. “Oh God.” I try to sink down, but he
grabs my waist and refuses to let me go further.
“Just
like this, beautiful girl.” The hair on his legs rubs against
the back of my thighs and my butt. He feels so different from me, so
hard and overwhelming.
“More.
I want—”
He
bites my shoulder, and I cry out in pleasure and pain. “Not
this time. This time I’m in charge.”
I
whimper. “Okay.”
“How
about another inch, since you’re being so agreeable.”
“Please,”
I moan, and he slides a bit deeper.
“Oh
sweetheart, you feel so damn good,” he rasps, like he’s
about to come apart like me. “So damn tight. This hot little
body of yours is mine,
all
mine
.”
“Yours
is mine too.”
He
slides in even deeper. “Say that again.”
“You’re
mine.”
Another
thrust and he’s halfway inside. “Louder.”
“Mine,
mine, mine,” I shout.
He
pushes me down on the bed, my face landing on a pillow. The movement
sends him deeper than ever. I can’t move; he has me pinned to
the bed.
Grabbing my waist,
he pounds into me, hard and out of control. I keep touching myself,
like he asked, building closer to my orgasm again.
This,
whatever is happening right now, isn’t making love… it
isn’t sex... it’s desperation. We’re desperate for
each other. This is months of waiting, of longing, and of wanting
each other.
His
hips twist, and my eyes widen. “Do that again.”
“No.”
Belatedly
remembering his bite, I quickly add, “Please, baby.”
He
curses and does it again and again, until I come, sobbing his name.
He joins me seconds later, and then collapses on top of me.
He
eases up on his elbows, pulling out of me, and I turn over to face
him.
“Were
you touching yourself the entire time?” he asks.
Blushing,
I nod. “You told me to do it.”
“I’m
not complaining, just making sure you were taken care of.”
“You
take very good care of me.” I reach up, tracing his bottom lip.
“I don’t want to leave this place, ever
.
This
is my home. This is our home. No matter where we go, we should always
come back here.”
A
questioning look enters his eyes. “Why would you have to
leave?”
“When
the honeymoon’s over, I assume we have to go,” I frown a
little, “somewhere else.” Where that would be, I have no
idea. I assume Jackson doesn’t still live with his parents in
Nashville.
He
raises a brow. “Who said it has to be over?”
“Eventually,
you’ll have to face the music, Jackson.” I exhale. “You
can’t hide away here with me, forever, no matter how much I’d
love it. You still have contracts, recordings, interviews, and other
stuff.”
Rolling
to his side, he dislodges my fingers and props his head up with one
of his hands. He draws something on my stomach, and I shiver. “I’m
not hiding, really. I just wanted some time.”
“To
get over Violet?”
He
gives me this look, but I don’t care. He wants a non-quiet
Bliss, then this is what he gets. “To get over a lot of
things.”
“Like
what?”
“My
life for the past year and a half.” Blowing out a breath, he
rolls all the way to his back. I scoot closer to him, placing my chin
on his chest. “Earlier today, when you asked me about my
tattoo? I…” His words trail away, and I’m not sure
if he’ll actually tell me anything.
“Go
on.”
“The
one on my heart—it’s for the baby Violet and I lost. She
has one just like it on her hip. Hell, all my tattoos are for what we
went through.” He runs a hand across his face, staring up at
the ceiling. “You can’t go through what we did and not
have it stay with you forever.”
“Did you want
to have… were y’all trying to have one?” I’m
stupid for asking this, for asking something that I know will pierce
my heart.
He
shrugs. “We weren’t careful, so we didn’t care if
it happened or not. It wasn’t like either of us couldn’t
afford one, and I thought I was going to marry her.”
And
just like that, I know he’ll never be mine.
No
matter how many times he wants me to say it during sex. There will
always be a part of him that belongs to Violet. But I can’t be
completely mad at him. Not over losing a baby. Certainly not over
being in love with a person I think is kind and good, and treated me
with respect with her peers wouldn’t.
Still,
my heart is shredded and I don’t know if I’ll ever be
able to mend it back together.
Jackson
I
feel Bliss withdraw from me, before she actually scoots away.
However, I don’t stop her from leaving our bed.
Instead,
I stare at the ceiling and listen to the water running. The shower
comes on and ordinarily, after making love like that to a woman—okay
to Bliss, because I’ve never had sex like that before—this
would be a perfect time for after-sex shower sex.
Then
I hear it—muffled sobs. I shake my head. There’s no way
she’s crying. Bliss never cries. Even the time I thought I
heard her cry, she never did.
The
water stops and so do the sobs. Maybe I’d imagined them after
all.
Bliss
walks in the room, and I turn to look at her. She’s wearing one
of my t-shirts and a towel wrapped around her hair. Her glasses are
foggy, hiding her pretty eyes from me.
“I’m
not sleepy. I think I’ll go watch a movie in the living room,”
she announces, but she doesn’t move from the spot beside me.
This
is our defining moment. This is where I convince her that what I said
has nothing to do with us, and everything to do with my personal
feelings on what an ass I’d been to everyone. My feelings about
my life up until now. Just everything.
But
unlike in my songs, I can’t explain myself very well.
And
this is also where I can let her go, pretend that nothing ever
happened between us, and find a way for her stay in school, get a
job, and an apartment.
I
gaze at her, my mind made up. “Take off your glasses, baby
doll.”
Hand
trembling, she does, and I’m not shocked to find that her eyes
are rimmed in red. Tears spills over one, and then another. She makes
no move to wipe them away, but I do.
I
jump up from bed and cup her sweet face in my hands. “I’m
not in love with her anymore. I’ve barely thought of her, until
you bring it up, and I’m not blaming you, just telling you
what’s in my head.”
Another
tear falls, and I kiss it.
“I
haven’t cried in four years, Jackson,” she whispers. “The
last time I cried, it was because Brian Corey beat me so bad that I
could hardly move. I refused to cry after that, to give anyone the
power to see me cry over them, and what they do to me.”
Acid
pours in my gut, eating at me. I wish it would consume all of me,
until nothing is left. The hell this girl went through is nothing
compared to mine. Or in my mind it isn’t. “Then why are
you crying now?”
“Because
I gave you that power, and look at where it got me,” she sobs.
“I can’t even compare to—to—Violet, and it
doesn’t matter that you don’t love her, because she’ll
always have a piece of you that I won’t.” She smashes her
lips together and looks away.
My
heart breaks for her. I can’t even breathe, because I’m
hurting for her so bad. Falling to my knees, I press my head against
her stomach, wrapping my arms around her. “You have all the
power, not me. You have all of me. Every bit.”
Her
hands go to my hair, gently stroking me. She’s always so
careful, never rough unless I ask her. “I’m scared of
what’s going to happen now.”
“No
matter what happens, Bliss, I won’t leave you again,” I
promise. “You’ll have to leave me.”
“You’d
have to crush my heart before that would happen.”
“And
you’d have to crush mine.” I stand up again, looking down
at her. “You have my heart, and I’m trusting you with
it.”
I
can’t bring myself to say the words
I
love you
,
and it’s not because I don’t think she feels the same. I
think she does.
But
I’ve only said it to one other person and meant it.
Really
meant
it. Now I’m not in love with that person anymore, and I wonder
if by saying those three words to Bliss, if what I feel will diminish
over time as well.
I
don’t want to find out.
Bliss
sighs, and then lifts up on her toes to kiss my cheek. “You’ve
had my heart, too, Jackson. Now we just have to face the real world
and see if we can hold on to them.”
“Come
to bed with me,” I say.
“I’m
a little sore,” she says with a shy smile.
“You’re
not the only one,” I remark wryly.
She
gapes at me. “Guys get sore?”
“Sensitive,”
I correct, and she busts out laughing.
“Bless
your heart, between that and your stomach, I don’t know how you
carry on like you do.”
I
roll my eyes as she climbs in our big bed. I get in too, settling
beside her and pulling her into my arms. Her hand hovers over the
bluebird tattoo, like she wants to touch me like usual, but she can’t
bring herself to do it. So I place my hand over hers and press down,
placing it directly over the tattoo.
A
little sigh leaves her, familiar and sweet. I grin. “Sleepy
now?”
“You’re
so warm that I can’t help it.”
The
power goes off, the lights come on, and then it goes dark again. The
pattern repeats a few times, until it goes dark for longer than ten
minutes and the generators start working again.
“Is
it the generators?” she asks.
“Yes
and no. I heard on the radio this morning that power crews from all
over the country had come to Charleston to help out.”
“Cell
phone towers can’t be far behind then.”
“Yeah.”
Would it be wrong to pray for God to send another storm, one caused
by Mother Nature, and not the clusterfuck that I have no doubt will
happen?
Bliss
It
feels as though I’ve barely been asleep before I’m shaken
away.
I
blink up at Jackson. He’s dressed, in a tailored shirt and dark
slacks that make him look older. More powerful. I’ve never seen
him like this, not even during the months on tour. Usually, he
dressed all casual, in jeans and t-shirts.
Sitting
up, I clutch the sheet to my chest. Silly, if I think about it, with
everything we’ve done over the few days. The past few months
while we were on tour, too.
His
sexy blue eyes flicker over me. “Honeymoon’s over. The
power’s back on and cell towers are working.”
“What
does that mean?”
“It
means that it’s time to get back to the real world,” he
says, and just like that, the man I’d come to love is gone. In
his place is the one I recognize from the tour, arrogant and
surveying his surroundings like some kind of king, but that attitude,
along with his clothes, make me nervous. “Get dressed, baby
doll. We‘re heading to Nashville today.”
He
leaves the room and I stare at the empty space he’d just
occupied. Throwing back the covers, I get out of bed and into the
shower. Afterwards, I put on my prettiest outfit, the one I got
married in.
I
glance at the dresser. The ring he’d given to me is still
sitting on the top where I’d left it. I grab it and slip it
back where it belongs.