Liam's Secret

by Jadyn Chase

  I gazed up at her, fascinated. So many deep layers to her unfolded before me in that moment. I didn’t understand half of what she was, but I didn’t need to. Just looking into her eyes filled me with curious longing. I didn’t need to understand her. I only needed to give to her. I could think of thousands of things I wanted to give to her, myself not the least.

  I wasn’t worthy to polish her shoes. She might be poor, but she was still far too fine to bother with a scrap of discarded trash like me.

  What a waste of a life mine turned out to be! I didn’t see it until now. I chased girls I cared nothing about. I worked at the only job I could stomach, and then only because Pop insisted I do something around the homestead to help the Clan. If he didn’t demand that I work, I would have thrown away every day chasing girls, driving around the mountains in search of trouble, or eating the food out of Ma’s fridge.

  It never once occurred to me to do something productive or useful with my time. It never occurred to me to seek out a nicer girl, a finer girl, a girl with some substance. I never really believed such a girl could exist.

  Now here she was, standing in front of me. She wore loose-fitting sweat pants with bare feet and a sleeveless tank top that left her arms bare. She inspired me to do so many things. She made me want to help her and her father, to use my skills and my strength and my time for something that might actually make the world a better place. How could a girl like that exist in the world?

  She broke my gaze first. She looked sideways. “I heard you banging around.”

  I jerked my thumb over my shoulder. “I was just going down to check the pipes. Will you do me a favor?”

  “Sure. Anything.”

  My insides quivered. Anything? I would certainly do anything for her. I couldn’t allow myself to believe she would do anything for me. That was asking too much.

  “I cut some boards for the floor. They’re outside. Would you bring them in here, please?” I heard my voice speaking that lilting, polite question, and I didn’t recognize myself.

  She nodded and left. I ducked under the floor into the dark, dank understory beneath the house. I located the pipes from the bathroom. They were all sound and solid, too. Then I remembered what Amy told me. She said water flooded the floor when she turned on the water to the bathroom. That meant the break must be somewhere inside the building.

  I popped my head through the hole to find Amy squatting there. She held a dozen lengths of board ready for the floor. For a second, I came eye to eye and nose to nose with her. A hint of vanilla and cinnamon drifted into my nose. The green fibers of her irises startled me with their intense, radiating color.

  The next instant, she lowered her gaze. “Here are the boards.”

  She started to stand up. I fumbled for any way to keep her near me so I could continue drinking in the sight of that face, those eyes, the luminous magic of her presence. “Maybe you could help me put them in.”

  She glanced to her right. One of the bedrooms stood open to the hall, and I followed her gaze into a sunlit room like nothing else in the rest of the house. A pristine white quilt covered the bed. A bright red woolen throw lay across the foot. The wrought-iron frame made a mind-bending contrast with gauzy curtains around the window and a quaint, antique desk looking out at the forest. Framed, pressed, dried flowers decorated the walls.

  That was the bedroom of a young girl. Unlike the rest of the house, the room spoke of wonder, daydreams, cleanliness, hope, and beauty. Nothing in it spoke of the poverty and deterioration of the rest of the house. Looking in on that room, no one would ever guess it was part of the same building.

  Amy snapped me out of my reverie. “What do you want me to do?”

  I swiveled around. There she was, in front of my face. This was the person who created that room. I saw her as if for the first time. She made that room for herself. That was her sanctuary from the pressure and unrelenting demands of her existence.

  That hope, that beauty, those sweet daydreams—they existed inside her, in her heart. What did she think about when she sat at her desk and looked out that window? What future did she imagine for herself after her father died? Did she ever secretly wish he would just kick the bucket already and leave her to live her life in peace?

  More than ever, my heart ached for the trials and pain she must have endured all these years. She sacrificed everything for her family. She would continue to sacrifice for her father as long as he lasted. She didn’t care about herself. She had her room. She could do anything, endure anything, as long as she had to, so long as she had that one secret relief.

  She regarded me and waited for me to tell her what to do about the boards. She didn’t have a clue the change that came over me when I saw that room. She was too good for that. This was all normal to her.

  I didn’t think. I darted forward and kissed her before I could change my mind. I couldn’t let this moment pass me by without doing something. I would finish working on the house in a few hours. Then I would leave. I would have no more reason to come back here. This might be my one chance to express…. I couldn’t define my own feelings

  The instant my lips made contact with her mouth, I froze. She froze, too, and we both stiffened. Her eyes burned into me from an inch away. Did I blow it by kissing her? How could I when I had nothing lose?

  She blinked. I couldn’t read her face at this distance. My heart thundered in my ears. Tension racked my nerves, but I commanded myself to keep still and not pull away. Micron by micron, her lips softened. Her eyes widened.

  I sensed an opening and let my lips explore the delicate petals of her mouth. I allowed my mouth to collapse into the delicious peril of kissing her. How long would she let me keep doing this before she shoved me away? How deep would she let me go before she shut herself down and threw me out of her house?

  She didn’t pull away, though. She didn’t throw me out of her house. She just stayed there while I delved her mouth with my lips.

  All at once, she broke off and fell to shuffling the boards around on the ground. “You can probably handle this on your own.”

  Before I could stop her, she rushed off somewhere and left me alone with my stupid boards. I took a second to realize it was over, but that bloom of rapture and realization still clung to my mind. I kissed her. Her delicate lips infused their beauty into my being so I couldn’t shake it off.

  I didn’t want to shake it off. I wanted to hold it in my heart as long as possible. If I was going to walk out of her life and never come back, at least let me keep that one kiss in my memory.

  I could never go back to the way I was before. I couldn’t go back to pretending women existed in the world to satisfy my idiotic need to prove myself. I couldn’t go back to skating by on the absolute minimum. If women like Amy were out there somewhere, I had to find one. If I couldn’t have Amy, I had to find someone as good as her, if that was possible. Only she could make my life mean anything.

  I got back to work, but I couldn’t stop thinking about her. She made me a different person. I probably didn’t change anything for her. I didn’t see how anything could.

  I returned to the bathroom and stripped back the plaster behind the sink. I pried some paneling boards away to expose the pipes buried in the wall. Yep, there it was, plain as day. The tiny toothmarks of rats scored one of the pipes. The little pests chewed a hole right through the pipe. God knows why they did that with a stream not far away, but who could explain the mind of a rat?

  I went back to the truck for my plumbing tools. Mr. McMasters sat in the same spot. He never moved. I didn’t see Amy anywhere, but I didn’t expect to. She would keep away from me from now on. She would probably hide until I left. I didn’t blame her. I would do the same thing in her place.

  I sawed out the ruined section of pipe and replaced it. I hammered the panel boards back in place, but I left the plaster alone. I returned to the hole in the hall floor. That was my last job for the day. If Amy planned to avoid me for the rest of our natural lives, I
better get the floor finished and make tracks for my own land. What was the use in hanging around prolonging the inevitable?

  I knelt down and picked up the first board. I fitted it into place and tapped in the nails. I got through the whole job until I sealed the hole. When I finished, I got to my feet and stomped on the floor just for good measure. That was the end of that. Now I could pack up and go home to nurse my bruised ego.

  I slid my hammer into its loop. I turned around and almost jumped out of my skin when I came face to face with Amy. She blocked the hall and leveled me with those piercing eyes of hers. “Thanks. I appreciate it.”

  Such a clipped, heartless declaration should have stabbed me in the guts. Instead, it gave me a sizzle of excitement. She was here. She was standing right in front of me. She came in here to talk to me after all. She wasn’t going to let me walk away without a word.

  I inclined my head over my shoulder, but I couldn’t tear my eyes away from her face. “The floor’s all done. I fixed the pipe in the bathroom, but I haven’t tested it. You just need to turn the water on. I’m sure it will be fine. You can…. I guess you’ll have to let me know if it leaks again.”

  I sounded like a fool, but nothing I could think of made this moment any easier. She nodded up at me. “Thank you for doing all that. I don’t know what we would have done without you.”

  I blushed. She should have been the one to blush, but she didn’t. She just gazed up at me with an inscrutable blank on her face. What was she thinking?

  I shifted from one foot to the other. “I guess I’ll…. I guess I better go.”

  She nodded again but said nothing. She made me uncomfortable standing there like a wooden statue. None of the warmth or friendly amity enlivened her features. I might as well be talking to the wall.

  I gave up. I started to bend over to pick up the old ends of boards I tore out of the floor. All at once, she lunged at me and kissed me. She took me completely by surprise and nearly knocked me off my feet with the power of that kiss.

  She planted both hands on my chest. Her lips mauled me faster and deeper than I could imagine. I never would have dared to kiss any girl like that, let alone her. She pushed me back, and my shoulders hit the doorjamb of her room.

  My mind sailed into a tailspin. What was she doing? Her father was right out there on the porch. What if he suspected? What if he heard?

  What could I do? He couldn’t see straight, much less get up and come after me. Still, my pulse hammered trying to comprehend what was happening. Amy plastered her body against me—that glorious body I saw at the fishing hole. I lusted after that body, but now that it undulated on top of me in obvious desire, I cringed. Why?

  My blood boiled, but I couldn’t bring myself to touch her or even to return her kiss. I couldn’t return it with the energy and passion she rendered to me. That would be out of the question. She was too fine and good for base, carnal passion. She existed on a plane above me. I couldn’t touch her like that. I couldn’t even think of her like that.

  She had other ideas, though. She raked her fingernails down my chest to my stomach. She took hold of my waistband and yanked me toward her. She ground her pelvis into me until I had no choice but to respond.

  My crotch swelled to bursting, and I felt the soft give of flesh between her legs. I should want to be in there. I did want to be in there, but I couldn’t. I couldn’t even put my arms around her to kiss her, not with her attacking me like that.

  She ripped at my fly while her tongue probed down my throat. She nipped my lips until they hurt. Her breath blew into my nostrils. Everything about her intoxicated me out of my mind, but a little voice whispered in my ear, No. Not like this. Not like this.

  She wouldn’t stop. She tore my pants open. Before I could stop her, she plunged her hand inside. Her fingertips grazed my bulge and an electric shock rocketed through me. My hand flew to her wrist to stop her. “No, Amy!” I grated. “No.”

  She heaved off me enough to look me in the eye. “I want to,” she whispered. “I want to. I know it’s not right, but I want to, just for myself. I never get anything I want, and I want you. Just once, I want to get what I want. I want it just for once. Come on. You know you want to.”

  She jerked out of my grasp and spun me off the doorjamb. I teetered into the bedroom with her still glued to me. She kicked the door closed behind me with her lips locked on my mouth.

  She kept slipping her tongue into my mouth. I had to answer it with ravenous licks. Her devilish fingers closed around my manhood and I thought I would drop dead then and there. She massaged the thickening shaft through my shorts until my head whirled.

  She towed me by the crotch toward her bed, her immaculate white bed in that spotless white room. Her scandalous attentions sparked all my most fevered desires, but none of it made sense in that room. She couldn’t be this cruel seductress, not after I found out who and what she really was. Those two personalities couldn’t live in the same woman.

  She dragged me another step back and tipped over on the bed. She landed sitting on the edge and I toppled on top of her. I crashed down on my knees between her legs.

  Christ, I wanted her so bad, but my heart and soul still held back. How could I go through with this? How could I violate something so good and true and selfless? My experiences of sex didn’t match her. I idolized her. I couldn’t debase her with my touch.

  I tried to pull away. My mouth came unstuck from hers and her hand slipped out of my pants. I tilted back on my knees. For a second, I looked her in the eye. There she was, the angel, the martyr, the saint.

  At that moment, with the crimson blush still glowing on her cheeks, with her legs spread to receive me, I beheld something so much more than all of that. She was no saint. She was just human, a human girl with wants and desires and hopes and dreams like the rest of us.

  She wanted me. She wanted release from the stress and sacrifice of taking care of her parents. She wanted the attention of a man. Why shouldn’t she?

  I wouldn’t be violating her by giving in. I wouldn’t be tainting her or lessening her goodness. I would be giving her a gift. I would be giving her one little pleasure in an otherwise dreary life. If she really wanted that, who was I to withhold it?

  At the same time, I saw myself through her eyes. My desire for her wasn’t dirty or immoral, either. I was a man and I knew her. I could want her body and still respect her as a person. Why shouldn’t I have that pleasure, too?

  I leaned in and kissed her ever so lightly. That kiss communicated so much more than the lust-fueled assault of a second before. This was her and me coming together as two people who saw and knew and acknowledged each other. That could never be wrong.

  She slipped her arms around my shoulders, and her fingers threaded into my hair. Her mouth opened in a delirious swirl of heat and sparks. She aroused me so much more like this. I couldn’t keep my hands off her.

  I wrapped my arms around her waist and pulled her legs around me. I jammed my swollen member between her legs and she mewed in unvarnished ecstasy. Oh, God, yes, she was so impossibly sweet.

  I slid my pants down to my knees, and my engorged shaft sprang out to her. I hooked my thumbs into her sweatpants. She hopped off the bed to let me slide them down. That’s all the space we needed, and my hot tip touched her molten wetness.

  Just for a second, we both froze. We stared into each other’s eyes. A thousand questions seethed in those eyes, but I couldn’t look away. I could never look away again.

  The next instant, her fingers tightened in my hair and she pumped her hips toward me. A chain reaction went off in me. My muscles contracted and my stiff length plunged into her. I couldn’t stop it.

  She gasped out loud, but she stopped herself from making any noise. I couldn’t breathe. I stared deep down into the astonishing pit of her eyes. Her volcanic tightness clamped around my distended veins. Her slippery juice bubbled to my very core.

  She clawed at my shoulders. Tortured emotion flickered across her fac
e. She jumped from confusion to bliss to fear to joy. I couldn’t follow the changes fast enough. So many fireworks of catastrophic ecstasy exploded in my mind all at once.

  I dug my fingers into her ass to pull her in tight. I couldn’t get deep enough inside her to satisfy my raging hunger for her. Damn, she was so hot and juicy and wet. I dove into heaven each time I thrust home.

  She bit her lip and her eyelashes drooped. Her head lolled with the incessant rhythm of my driving beat. I couldn’t stop now. She sighed little whispering peeps of rapture with every effortless penetration. Her father couldn’t hear them, but I could.

  She swayed before me on a cushion of air. A force beyond nature brought us together and carried us to the heights of heaven. Was this really happening? I never could have imagined getting together with her like this, but somehow, being in that room made it natural.

  Her head toppled back and her hair caught the sun. Her whole being glowed with angelic beauty. I felt myself approaching a precipice from which I could never return. I circled her slender waist with both hands, but she continued that sinuous ripple against me to match my strokes.

  A fragrant bloom of sweat broke out on her skin. Her lips parted. She looked straight up into my eyes with a stunned, far-off gaze. I couldn’t hold myself back a second longer. My lifeforce poured into her. I ground my teeth to hold back any noise, and I unleashed my essence into the welcoming abyss of her channel.

  I croaked out my agonizing release. She went limp in my grasp and her eyes drifted closed. At that moment, a wretched, rasping cough sounded from the porch. In a split second, Amy twisted out of my grasp and raced away.

  6

  Amy

  I took the card off the noticeboard and carried it to the hardware store counter. I held it up for the proprietor to see. “This says to talk to you about buying cords of firewood.”

  “That’s right.” He propped his hand on his hip. “How much do you want?”