“My god. What happened?”
I pause. I’ve never told this story, not to anyone, not out loud. Maritza’s hand lifts to my back and she scoots closer.
“I told him the truth,” I said. “And he left. We don’t know if he was walking down to the Conoco to get his car or if he’d just had enough … caring for his sick wife and trying to support his six kids … but he never came home after that. The next day, we got a call. Someone found his body in a ditch off the highway a few miles from our house. He’d been mugged, assaulted, left for dead. He died for a Timex watch and the twenty-dollar bill in his wallet.”
My hands form a bridge over my nose and I take a few moments to compose myself.
“Isaiah …” Maritza nudges her cheek against my shoulder. “I’m so sorry.”
“My whole family blamed me for a long time. Now they don’t talk much about it,” I say. “Ma doesn’t know exactly what happened of course—she doesn’t know about the car keys thing and me trying to get back at Ian. But everyone else does. Ian made damn sure they all knew.”
“So when your brother said you had demons and that you ruin lives … is that what he was talking about?”
“I imagine so, yeah.”
Her hand lifts to cup the side of my face and for a moment we just sit and breathe, her warmth mixing with mine.
“I hope someday you’ll be able to let that go,” she says. “I hope you’ll be able to stop blaming yourself.”
“Yeah,” I say. “Maybe someday.”
Sitting up, she rests her palm on my face and her eyes lock on mine. “Thank you for sharing that with me.”
A moment later, her pillow soft lips graze mine and she breathes me in, but before we kiss, I have to say one more thing.
“I’m not a perfect man,” I say, my voice low and soft. “And I’ve made a lot of mistakes in my life. But letting you go? Letting you walk away without a fight? That might be the biggest one of all. And I can’t do that, Maritza. I can’t let you go.”
Pulling her into my lap, I hold her stare and reach for her face, guiding her mouth closer, until I taste her familiar strawberry lips and peppermint tongue.
“Then don’t,” she says a moment later, coming up for air. “Don’t let me go.”
IT’S CRAZY HOW MUCH life can change in an instant.
One minute I’m serving pancakes, the next minute I’m spending a week with an Army corporal who makes my stomach somersault every time I look at him.
One minute I’m writing him letters, the next minute I’m writing him off.
But now we’re here—in the present moment.
And all those minutes have added up, turning into days and nights and weeks and months and now that same broody Army corporal is standing in my grandmother’s trophy room listening to her wax poetic about her Hollywood golden years.
“And that’s how I knew Richard Burton was going to go back to Elizabeth,” Gram says with a melancholic sigh, twisting her pearls around her fingers. “They were just meant to be. But it’s all right. Everything worked out. Had I not met my husband, I wouldn’t have had my two boys or my two beautiful granddaughters.”
Isaiah turns toward me and I give him a wink.
“Everything always has a way of working out, doesn’t it?” he asks.
“Always.” Gram smiles. So far she seems to be quite taken with him, at least judging by the fact that she’s been leading him from room to room ever since breakfast this morning, showing off her awards and movie props and costumes. Isaiah seemed to take a particular interest in the white bikini from the Davida’s Desire poster, even going so far as to jokingly ask if she ever loaned out any of her costumes.
I smacked his arm when she wasn’t looking.
Sicko.
“We should probably get going, Gram,” I tell her when she attempts to lead us to the room where she keeps her framed posters and the actual baby grand piano she danced on in 1968’s Sunset Sonata.
“So soon, Lovey?” She pouts, turning to face me. “But you two just got here. And I wanted to show him my posters.”
I check the time on my phone. “We’re catching Splendor in the Grass at the Vista. Starts in an hour.”
Gram’s eyes shift between the two of us and she wears a knowing smirk. “Well, all right. Some other time, then, Isaiah?”
“Of course, Mrs. Claiborne,” he says.
She bats her hand. “Please. Gloria’s fine. And I do hope I’ll be seeing more of you around here. It’s good to see the sparkle back in my granddaughter’s eyes. It’d been gone for so long.”
I saunter up to Isaiah, sliding my hand into his and grinning at him the way I haven’t been able to stop doing since yesterday, when we had our heart to heart.
“Pretty sure it’s here to stay this time, Gram,” I say.
She hooks a hand on her narrow hip before pointing at Isaiah. “But if she ever loses it again—”
“She won’t,” he says, giving her his full attention. “I’m not going anywhere. I can promise you that.”
“Have fun at the movies, you two …” Gram sashays down the hall in her fur-lined, white satin robe, disappearing into her master bedroom and closing the door.
“You want to hear something completely insane?” I ask him when she’s gone.
“What? You think you love me?” he asks.
My jaw falls. Of all the things that could come out of that gorgeous mouth of his, I wasn’t expecting that.
“I was going to say that this week is my parents’ twenty-fifth anniversary and that my mom had to choose between my father and my uncle but …” I draw in a deep breath, “yeah, I do think I love you.”
His lips curl into a slow smile, the very same one he wore this morning in my bed as he peeled the sheets from my naked body and climbed over top of me for the third time in under twenty-four hours.
With his hands cupping my waist, he pulls me in and crushes my lips with his. My body surrenders and I’m having second thoughts about going to that movie because suddenly I’m thinking spending the afternoon in bed with this guy sounds like a lot more fun.
“You just going to leave me hanging, Corp?” I ask, my mouth brushing against his as he kisses me again. “I just told you I think I love you.”
“I heard you,” he says, stopping to stare into my eyes. “I just wanted to let it soak in first before I said it back. I want to remember how this feels for the rest of my life.”
Isaiah’s fingers lace up the back of my neck, his palm cupping my jaw, and he brings his mouth onto mine once more.
“I love you, Maritza,” he whispers. “And I’ve known it was going to come to this since the day I left LA with your picture in my pocket. It just took losing you completely for me to finally accept it that my feelings were real and they weren’t going anywhere.”
“SO THIS IS HER? This is the girl who put the smile back on your face?” Ma rises from her chair as I bring Maritza inside.
The doctor’s switched up her prescriptions a bit since her hospitalization last week and ever since then, she’s become a completely different person, almost a better version of her previous self—the woman she was before she got sick. Granted, she still has a few moments where she’ll be tired or achy, but we’ve improved leaps and bounds from where we were before.
Originally, I didn’t want to bring Maritza around Mom until Mom was feeling up for visitors … just didn’t know it’d be so soon.
“Mom, this is Maritza.” I give my girl’s hand a reassuring squeeze that she probably doesn’t need. She didn’t seem the slightest bit nervous on our drive over here. In fact, she was pretty excited. “Maritza, this is my mother, Alba.”
Maritza releases my hand and meets my mother more than halfway across the small living room. “It’s so nice to finally meet you.”
“Likewise,” Ma says, eyes twinkling as she smiles. “I hear you’ll be joining us at Calista’s barbecue in a couple of weeks?”
Maritza nods. “Can’t wait. Isaiah s
ays it’s your birthday?”
Ma’s brows rise and she swats her hand. “It’s a family barbecue that just so happens to be on my birthday. Honestly, I couldn’t even tell you how old I’ll be. I quit counting a long time ago. And Isaiah, can you believe Ian said he can’t make it? Said he’s traveling for work or something.”
“I can believe it. And you’ll be fifty-seven,” I remind her.
“Shhh, shh, sh.” Ma silences me, wagging her finger. “In my mind, I’m still thirty-five. Forever thirty-five.”
“We’re only as old as we feel, right?” Maritza asks.
“Right!” Ma cups her hands, laughing, and leads her to the sofa. “So have a seat. I want to hear how you two met.”
“He hasn’t told you?” she asks.
“No, he has.” Ma rolls her eyes. “But I have a feeling his version is a bit condensed. I want to hear your side of the story—the unabridged version. Women have more of a penchant for the important details, don’t you think?”
Maritza glances at me. “I’d have to agree.”
“All right. I’m all ears.” Ma leans in. “Tell me how my favorite son finally took my advice and found a nice, sweet girl to spend time with.”
I exchange smirks with Maritza from across the room as she starts from the top, when it all began with a stolen pancake and ends with a stolen heart.
When the story’s over, I kiss the top of Ma’s head. “Sorry to have to bail, but I’ve got something special planned for Maritza tonight.”
“You do?” Maritza asks. “You didn’t mention anything earlier …”
“It’s a surprise,” I say, taking her hand. “Bye, Ma.”
“Be good, you two.” Mom waves from her chair, and I take Maritza to my car.
“Okay, so where are you taking me?” She asks a minute later, fastening her seatbelt.
Starting the engine, I glance across the console at a wild-eyed girl with contagious excitement. I still struggle to believe she’s finally mine. And while I never would’ve believed she was my type, she’s somehow exactly what I need.
“I have it on good authority that there’s this little band you love having a jam session at the lead singer’s house in Malibu … and I also have it on good authority that we’ve been invited to sit in and watch.” And by invited, I mean … I called my brother-in-law who put me in touch with Case Malbec so I could explain how important it was that I give Maritza the Panoramic Sunrise experience she deserves.
“Shut. Up.” She reaches for my hand, squeezing it hard as she bounces in her seat. “You’re joking. Tell me this is a joke. I don’t believe you.”
I laugh. She’s so freaking cute when she’s all worked up. “It’s no joke. We’re going to Case Malbec’s place to watch the band write some new songs.”
And then just like that, her eyes begin to well with tears and she covers her face with her hands.
“Are you … are you crying?” I ask, yanking away one of her hands so I can see her face.
Thick tears slide down her cheeks and I can’t tell if she’s laughing or crying or both.
“Maritza, are you crying?” I ask again. “What’s wrong?”
Dabbing her wet cheeks on the backs of her hands, she peers at me through glassy, chocolate-colored eyes. “These are happy tears.”
Unfastening her seatbelt, she leans across the console, cups my face in her hands, and kisses me harder than she’s ever kissed me before.
“I’ve never been this happy in my life,” she says. “You make me so happy, Isaiah. You’re everything.”
There aren’t enough words in the English language to convey to her just how mutual those feelings are, so instead I kiss her back, slow and lingering, savoring her soft lips and relishing in the fact that this woman, this beautiful, sweet, loving soul … has a heart of gold that beats only for me.
She’s mine.
And I’m hers. God, am I hers.
“I’M NOT REENLISTING AFTER this.” Isaiah hooks his hands around my waist as we skinny dip in Gram’s pool under a moonlit, midnight sky on an unusually warm spring night.
This marks the first time in for-ev-er that I’ve had Gram’s place to myself for a full week. Melrose is shooting some Lifetime movie on location in Vancouver and Gram decided to tag along before she embarks on a fourteen-day Alaskan cruise with Constance.
“Really?” I ask, circling my weightless legs around his hips.
“Yeah. Really.” He pulls me against him and I kiss his chlorine-flavored mouth. “I think it’s time to start thinking about what comes next.”
“Sounds like a good idea to me.” I hug him, our wet, naked bodies gliding against one another as we bob in the water. “What do you think you’ll do?”
“Maybe I’ll go to school for astronomy or physics?”
“God, you’d be the sexiest freaking nerd I’ve ever seen in my life.” I throw my head back. “Do it.”
Isaiah chuckles. “I’ve got three years to figure it out, but I’m leaning that way. How are your classes going by the way? Finally made it through all those letters.”
I smirk, thinking about how I’d handed him that old notebook from my nightstand where I’d written all those letters I never had the chance to send.
“That was fast,” I say.
“I devoured them,” he says. “And I’m so fucking proud of you, by the way.”
“You are?”
“Yeah. When you thought I’d ghosted you, you dealt with it, you acknowledged how you felt, and then you forced yourself to move on with your life,” he says. “Makes me proud as hell to know you respect yourself like that.”
“Thanks, Corp.” I kiss his wet lips again, my legs cinching tighter around him.
“You keep rubbing yourself against me like that and I’m going to have to take you right here, right now.”
“Is that a threat? Or a promise?” My hips circle against his growing hardness and I wear a teasing smile that I bury in the solid bend of his neck. His corded steel arms wrap around me, holding me tight, and I swear I could live here in this moment for the rest of my life and be perfectly content.
Striding to a shallower corner of the pool and taking a seat on the steps, Isaiah’s hands slide up my outer thighs before gripping my ass and pushing me down onto him.
I exhale as he fills me and I lower myself deeper before tossing my head back and holding onto the back of his neck. He takes a pointed nipple between his lips as I grind against him, rocking slow then fast then slow again.
We’ve got all night.
And all day tomorrow.
And the rest of the week.
Hell—the rest of our lives.
Neither of us are going anywhere.
Isaiah’s rough palms skid along my slick body, the pool water lapping around us, ripples of water kissing our skin as we move.
Dragging my hands along his sculpted shoulders, I lower my lips to his neck, peppering kisses along his collarbone then working my way up to his jaw before finishing at his mouth. I could kiss Isaiah a million times and it still wouldn’t be enough to show just how crazy I am for him.
“You’re so fucking beautiful,” he says, lips tracing mine as he drives himself into me, our bodies rocking in tandem. “You’re the best thing that’s ever happened to me, Maritza. And I’m going to spend the rest of my life proving that to you. I love you, Maritza the Waitress.”
My lips curl. “I love you, too, Corporal Torres.”
Three Years Later
Dear Isaiah,
It’s so strange to think that this will be the last letter you ever get from me while overseas. In a way, it’s bittersweet, like the closing chapter of an amazing book you’ve spent years devouring, but mostly it’s just sweet because now we get to start our sequel.
No more goodbyes. No more sleepless nights. No more waiting. No more worrying.
I don’t know about you, but I’ve spent a lot of time thinking about what’s next for us. I’ve always kind of liked not knowing what wa
s next, and I’ve always thought it’d be nice to wing it with you because I can’t imagine any scenario being less than amazing as long as you’re in it.
In your last letter you mentioned that you’d never wanted kids until you met me, and that one night you dreamt we had three kids and it got you excited. To be honest, it caught me off guard because I never knew if I wanted to have a family either. Being an only child with one cousin and parents who were never around all that much doesn’t really instill much for family values, but since I’ve met you, I’ve been thinking …
And I want a big, loud, crazy family and I want it with you.
So yes. Let’s do it. Because I can’t imagine doing it with anyone else.
See you soon …
Yours forever,
Maritza
P.S. I love you.
I spot her from the other side of a high school gymnasium in Burbank, where my troop is making their official homecoming entrance. It’s loud as hell in here, people crying tears of joy and shouting and running into each other’s arms, but there’s my girl, standing under a basketball hoop in a pretty floral sundress, scanning the room.
It only takes a moment until our eyes catch and the way her face lights sends a shock of joy to my chest. A second later, she runs to me, jumping into my arms and wrapping her long legs around me.
“We made it, baby,” I say, holding her tighter than I’ve ever held her before. “I’m done. I’m all yours now.”
She kisses my neck and breathes me in again and again. “I’ve waited so long for this day.”
I think about everything we’ve been through. Our chance meeting. The fact that, against all odds, we somehow couldn’t get enough of each other. I’ve never once believed in fate, but I’ve always believed in karma, and I like to believe I did something right to get an effervescent girl like her to fall head over heels in love with a damaged soul like me.
[2018] PS I Hate You Page 21