Authors: Anna Kristell
“Cody, if you’re hoping to have a replay of that night in the hotel, then by all
means, go for it. If that’s the only way you can punish me for not telling you sooner then do what you have to do, but at some point you’re going to have to sober up and talk.”
He grabbed her, roughly pulling her to him. She could taste the beer on his breath when he leaned down to kiss her. He kissed her hard on the mouth, roughly at first then the kiss suddenly changed to one of deep, divine passion. She could feel herself giving in to him
and she responded, putting her arms around his neck and running her fingers through the wavy, light brown hair that she loved so much.
“You are mine forever, Jessie
,” he murmured in her ear as he leaned down again, this time to kiss her neck, the stubble of his beard burning her tender skin.
She shivered.
He is so right. I am his forever, whether he wants me or not.
He lifted her into his strong, muscular arms and carried her to the bedroom where he tore at her clothes in his haste to remove them. She held out her hand to him. He joined her on the bed and began to kiss her again. His hands roamed freely over her
once familiar body. She moaned with desire for him.
“You want
me, baby…you can’t deny it…I’ve got what you want…and no other man can satisfy you like I can.”
He’s right. He
’s ruined me for every other man in the world.
“Tell me, Jessie…tell me how much you want me
.”
“Cody, I do want you…and God help me, I need you.”
“That’s it, Jessie…tell me again…tell me how bad you’ve missed it.”
“Cody…I’ve missed
you
…I love you so much.”
“Tell me you can’t live without it…tell me, baby.”
“Cody…make love to me…please.”
“Oh,
yeah, baby…that’s it…beg for it.” His hands continued to caress her body as he spoke.
“Beg
some more, Jessie…I won’t give it to you if you don’t. Tell me, baby, tell me how much you want me.”
He was drunk and she knew she should get out of his bed and leave
, but she simply couldn’t make herself move. She’d been so lonely over the long months without him
.
“Don’t
stop, Cody…please…” she begged, any pride she owned replaced by her need for him.
“That’s it…
Beg…you want more? Beg, baby…tell me you missed it…tell me nobody can give it to you like I can,” he continued to tease, not giving in to the fire burning between their souls, denying her what he knew to be the one thing she needed most in the world.
“Oh…y
es…I want more…I want it all. God help me, Cody, I want you...only you. I love you.”
“Not yet baby…”
He kissed her again and whispered in her ear, “God help me, too. I love you, Jessie.” He gave her exactly what she craved then, making sweet love to her, as only he could do.
“I still do it for you.
Don’t I?” he finally asked as he rolled off her.
“I am yours forever. You told me that once and it’s true, Cody. We real
ly need to talk…I came to talk…”
“But you really came over for this…I know you, Jess
ie, inside and out, remember? It’s all about hot, nasty sex. I’m your boy toy, isn’t that what your ex said?”
“No, Cody…that isn’t t
rue. We need to talk about us…”
“We’ll talk some other time…
I’ve done without you long enough…” he reached for her.
“Cody…”
“I was going to say I’ve been getting plenty of it without you…and send you on your way, telling you I had a hot date… but I can’t let you go, Jessie. You’re going to love me all night long…”
“Cody, this is getting us nowhere…sooner or later… we have to dis
cuss where we go from here and…” He silenced her with a kiss.
“Face it, Jess
ie. I’m not going to talk to you tonight. I’m drunk and I’m horny and in no shape to discuss something as important as the future. Now you can stay and be with me all night like I know you want to or you can go home and spend another night in your bed alone or with one of your fancy army buddies. It’s up to you, but there won’t be any talking tonight.”
She looked at him. The
fleeting thought crossed her mind again that she should get dressed and leave him right now, hard and wanting her. But the thought of another night without him was more than she could bear. Being with him again, even like this, was better than not being with him at all.
“Okay, you win this time. But the day will come when you have to sober up and we have to have a heart to heart talk about whether or not we have a future together. You owe me that much for letting you treat me this way.”
“But I’m not making any promises as to how soon that will be. You really did a number on me, Jessie.”
“I know that and I apologize, but you can either get over it and move on or you can continue to drown your sorrows in a bottle and we can both be miserable the rest of our lives.”
“Well, at least for tonight, neither one of us will be miserable. I’m going to love you all night long, just like the old days.”
“You remember those times?”
“How could I forget anything about the times we had together, Jessie? The times we went to the lake and just walked and talked, all the meals we cooked together or for each other, the movies we tried to watch and never could quite get through the whole thing without ending up in the bedroom. Loving you on the floor, on the couch, in the hotel, I even remember the whipped cream. Jessie, I haven’t forgotten a single detail…but that doesn’t mean we can make it work. Too much water under the bridge… you see, it really wasn’t just about the sex for me…”
“It wasn’t for me either, Cody…it just took me
a while to admit it.”
“No more talking tonight. The timing isn’t right.”
“Cody…I want you to make love to me…real love…not just sex. Even if we’re never together again after tonight…do that for me.”
“I can do that for you, Jess
ie…that won’t be hard for me at all. Because no matter what happens, I love you, I love you with every breath that I take, I love you with my very soul…I just don’t know that I can be with you forever.”
If there was ever a doubt in my mind that he loved me, it’s been laid to rest tonight. He could never have made love to me the way he did if he didn’t love me completely,
she told herself later that night.
He
’d even gotten out of bed and shaved after noticing the whisker burns he’d put on her body earlier in his drunken state of blind passion.
He loved her slowly and passionately throughout the night, taking her to paradise with him several times. He teased her, tantalized her, whispered sweet nothings in her ear all night long and told her again and again how much he loved her. He kissed her like she had never been kissed before, even by him after all their many times together. He gave her the one thing she needed most of all. But he
couldn’t give her a promise of forever.
They
finally gave in to sleep at dawn and slept peacefully until noon. It was a Saturday so neither of them had to worry about work. Had things been resolved between them, they could’ve had the entire weekend together. But as things stood, however reluctant she was to leave him, it had to be done.
She showered and dressed, packed the things she had left at his apartment then took the cup of coffee he offered her and sat down at the kitchen table. “I’ll be out of here as soon as I drink my coffee.”
“You don’t have to hurry on my account, Jessie.”
“Thank you for last night. No matter how this turns out, I’ll always have that memory. You’ll never know what that means to me.”
“Know that I will always love you, Jessie, no matter what. Things are…difficult right now. I’ve got problems I’ve got to work out. I need to pull myself together. I’d be no good to you now anyway. And I can’t honestly tell you I’ve totally forgiven you for keeping your secret for so long. I know you must’ve had your reasons, but you have to understand how foolish and used I felt, especially hearing it from that guy.”
“He was my cheating
ex-boyfriend, trying to get revenge because I chose you over him. But Cody, I planned on telling you that night. You have to believe that. I know it doesn’t make up for the fact I should’ve told you sooner, but I just couldn’t. I was too afraid of losing you, which is what happened in the end anyway. I was confused about my true feelings. I never intended to fall in love. It started just the way you said, as a fling, fun and games. I had just broken off with Dan and wanted to have some good times, which we did.”
“I can’t say I intended to fall so hard for you either, to be quite honest. But I did and in a big way. I wasn’t the forever type of guy until I met you. But so many things have happened. I
’ll never forgive myself for almost raping you at the hotel that night, even if I didn’t really do it…and I’m so sorry for the hateful things I said to you. That was inexcusable. And what I really can’t believe is that idiot cheated on you. Was he nuts?”
“Dan and I never had what you and I had.
He cheated on me more times than I can count.” She continued, “Cody, that night, you needed to say those things. You thought I used you. I can’t blame you after the things Dan said. How could you not think that about me? He was pretty convincing. And this crap about you nearly raping me…I seem to recall asking you to make love to me.”
“I was angry…much too angry
, that night…which is one reason I’ve stayed away from you.”
“Cody, you
do realize I’ll be getting my new orders soon?”
“Yes, baby. I know. And I may be an even bigger fool for not taking you in my arms and never letting go. If I was smart, I’d march you down to city hall and marry you as soon as possible but I can’t. Not now. I have to get myself back on track. I’ve gone way down since we split up…you saw that firsthand. Hell, I almost raped you again…you don’t deserve that.”
Shaking her head she replied, “You can’t rape the willing, Cody, but I’ll respect your wishes. If you need me, all you have to do is call. Otherwise, I won’t call or stop by unless it’s to say goodbye and I’m not sure I could handle that.” She got up, took her cup to the sink and rinsed it. Taking her keys out of her purse, she took his apartment key off her key ring and laid it on the table. “I love you more than you’ll ever know.”
****
Picking up the key, he twirled it between his fingers then threw it across the room, laid his head down on the table, and cried like a baby. That afternoon, he called the local chapter of Alcoholics Anonymous to see when their next meeting was. He was told to come that night at seven and he would have all the support he needed to get started. He was also told if he was in a crisis situation, someone could help him sooner. He was in a crisis situation, but he told the woman on the other end of the phone he’d be there at seven.
He took a nap that afternoon, then ate a ham and cheese sandwich, showered,
dressed in jeans and a denim shirt and went to face his first AA meeting.
I’m going to have to stand up in front of strangers and admit I’m an alcoholic, but I’m willing to do whatever it takes if it means I might someday get my pretty lady back. I know I could have her now if I’d say the word, but she deserves better than the half a man that I’ve become.
The meeting went better than he’d expected. Everyone was very supportive,
many of them had problems similar to his, a love gone wrong. He was matched with a sponsor and he was actually looking forward to his next meeting. He had stood in front of the entire room and uttered the words, “Hello, I’m Cody and I am an alcoholic.”
Jessica had gone home and called Missy and
they talked a long time about what had happened.
“I’m glad Andy ran into you. He’s wanted you to know the shape Cody’s been in for a while. He hoped you could help.”
“And hopefully, on some level, I did, Missy.”
“Hang in there, girlfriend, it
’ll get better.”
“I hope so. Maybe I’ll come up there the next chance I get and visit you. I’m
still hoping when I get my orders, by some miracle I will be coming to Fort Riley with you.”
“That
’d be awesome, but with Uncle Sam, who knows?”
“Roger that, my friend,” she replied. They hung up, agreeing to talk again the
following week.
Jessica stripped off her clothes then and slipping into a satin nightshirt crawled into bed. She tried to immerse herself into oblivion by sleeping, but sleep wouldn’t come. She relived every moment of the night before.
Every word, every kiss, every touch will be burned into my memory forever, she thought as she finally gave in to sleep.
The weekend came to an end and Jessica had to force herself to go on with her life. For the next several weeks, she went to work. She went out with groups of coworkers and pretended to have fun. She didn’t date, although
she’d been asked out a couple of times She kept in constant contact with Missy and Andy. She knew from them Cody was trying to put his life back together and he was attending AA meetings on a regular basis. As far as Andy knew, he hadn’t touched a drink since the night Jessica had gone to the apartment and found him drunk.