“Much better. He’s at a baseball game with Zac and Laney right now.” I quickly wet my lips. “I’m sorry I called you that night. I should’ve called his pediatrician, but you came to mind first.”
“I’m glad he’s feeling better.” He took a deep breath. “How about you start with why you stopped taking my calls?” Tegan sat back in the booth as if he didn’t have a care in the world.
I groaned quietly, wishing there was somewhere easier to begin. “Well, to do that, I have to go back a little bit. You met Ian.”
Everything about Tegan hardened at the mention of my ex-boyfriend’s name. They’d met earlier in the summer at the pond when he’d come here with Rhian. “Yeah, I met him.”
“So I started dating him last year. It seemed great at first. This was the kind of guy most girls hoped to meet, or so I thought. After a while, he’d ask these weird questions.”
“Like?” He prodded.
“Like… I’d have my hair done and he’d ask if I was going to do something with my hair as if I looked terrible. Or he’d comment that I needed to do my makeup when I already had. Or even that I had too much makeup on.”
His face contorted in disgust. “Seriously?”
I nodded. This was what had happened. “It was like nothing about me pleased him a lot of the time. But he didn’t do it all the time and never too frequently. So I thought maybe I was being dumb for letting it bother me. And it didn’t start until we were really comfortable together. He wanted me to move in with him, but I wasn’t going to do that with Dylan. He really didn’t like that.”
“Obviously, but he had a problem with you being a mom, right?”
“Yes though I didn’t know that for a long time. He’d get mad because we could only spend the night together when Dylan was with Zac or my parents. It wasn’t enough for him.” I paused while the waitress set our food before us. I’d asked for a small order of sweet bar-b-que boneless wings without the intention of actually eating then. Though now I thought I’d nibble just to give me something to do.
Tegan, on the other hand ordered a much larger but still boneless wing basket with a much hotter sauce. He’d also asked for an order of fries that he moved to the middle of the table to indicate he’d share with me if I wanted any.
The more I gazed across the table at him, the more desperate I became for him to forgive me and for us to move on from this ugly chapter.
“He was a little pushy when it came to getting his way.”
“In what way?” He popped a fry into his mouth.
“In every way, but specifically things he wanted me to do in bed that I didn’t want to.”
Tegan’s knuckles whitened as his hands gripped each other. “Did he force you to do things you didn’t want to do?”
I shook my head. “He never tried to force me. He more tried to make me feel like I was supposed to be keeping him happy. Then this summer he started butting in between Zac and me where Dylan was concerned. I think it bothered him that I’d had sex with Zac, even though it was forever ago.”
“So he wanted a virgin.”
“Basically.” Now it was my turn to take a bite of food, though my stomach didn’t love the idea. I was hungry but nervous. Not the best combination. “It all came to a head in Chicago after I didn’t even want to go with him. But I’d already agreed and didn’t want to rock the boat.”
“You should always rock the boat,” he told me.
“I know that now. However, the thing you don’t know about me is that I don’t have the best track record when it comes to guys. I haven’t dated the most upstanding men.” I glanced up quickly. “Not that there’s been a lot of them. They just haven’t been good.”
His eyes narrowed on me. “When you say not that many… ”
I rolled my eyes and bit back a smile. I’d tell him anything he wanted to know. “If you’re asking… five, including you. That doesn’t include first dates that never got a second or someone I dated more casually but didn’t have sex with.”
“So it’s just the guys you’ve slept with?”
“Exactly.”
“Five?” he asked as if he didn’t believe me. “It’s not that I care—because I don’t—but looking at you, it seems like that number should be higher.”
I smiled over at him and said, “That’s not the number who have tried.”
“I’m sorry I made that stupid joke.” He frowned. “I didn’t even think about it and was just joking. That’s why Rhian laughed. She knew. I swear I didn’t mean anything by it.”
I swallowed hard. After five bites, I was pretty sure I was done eating. “I know that now. If I would’ve let myself think, I would’ve known that then. But something inside me… snapped.” My eyes began to water. “Suddenly I was completely paranoid that it was the first sign of things to come and I’d just ignore it like I did with him and I needed to figure myself out. My heart was telling me one thing but my head wouldn’t let me listen.”
“You thought I could be like him?” His eyes locked with mine. I couldn’t have looked away if I tried.
“No. Not really. But I wasn’t rational right then because that was something Ian used to say. That if I wanted to be a trophy wife, I needed to lose weight or learn how to style my hair, or whatever his complaint of the day was.” I finally pulled my eyes from him and quietly added, “It freaked me out.”
Tegan’s jaw tightened. He didn’t really like that answer.
“I’m sorry I said that,” he told me.
“I know. Thank you,” I said quietly.
“You could’ve just told me.”
“I know. I should have.” Now was the time to be honest. “But, and this isn’t an excuse because there isn’t an excuse. Reason had never worked with him before and I thought if I talked to you, you’d convince me I was being crazy because that did always worked for him. I didn’t realize that by taking time I’d be freezing you out or I didn’t let myself realize it and this way there’d be less hurt to go around.”
“For you.”
I shook my head. “It killed me, Tegan. Not talking to you. Not seeing you. It killed me.”
The waitress dropped off the bill probably because both of us had stopped eating at some point. I’d planned to pay for my own, but before I could offer, Tegan dropped some money in the leather bill holder and the waitress picked it back up.
“So?” I asked.
“So?” he repeated as if he didn’t know what I was asking.
I rolled my eyes again. I needed to stop doing that before I damaged something. “Do you think you can forgive me?” I asked him.
He thought about it for a moment before speaking. Finally, he put me out of my mysery. “I don’t know, Maddie. Can you trust that I’m not like the other guys you’ve been with?”
“Yes,” I answered right away. “I know now that I can’t let anybody else inside my head like that.”
“Can you trust that I’m not with you to change you? That I love you the way you are?”
My chest tightened. He said, love me the way I am. But I chose to ignore that for now. “Yes.”
“And could you try to talk to me next time something bothers you? Because I don’t pretend to be perfect and things I do might irritate you. You can tell me. I’m a big boy.”
“Yes. I’m sorry I didn’t do that. And I’m sorry for whatever happened at Zac and Laney’s the other day to cause the argument between you all. Nobody has really told me the details but I feel certain, it was my fault.”
He waved a hand in front of me as if all that was an afterthought. “I don’t care that you talked to your friend. I expect that.”
“Sometimes good things come from talking to her, too.”
“Like what?” he asked as he brought his glass of water to his mouth. The soft lips that I’d missed so much over the last weeks. The ones I wanted to feel against my skin again.
“Oh, uh, after witnessing the argument between all of you in the backyard, Rhian and I had… ” I clea
red my throat. “A few words.”
He chuckled deep in his chest. A sound I’d also been missing. “I heard. She was going insane at home. Pacing around and mumbling to herself. When Porter called her later she told him she couldn’t even deal with him right then.”
I groaned audibly. “Oh no. I didn’t mean to start trouble between them.”
“Don’t worry about it,” he told me. “He came by later and they were fine. Or, I assume they were fine given the noises coming from her room.”
I snickered at the image. Living with his sister probably made him privy to more than he’d ever wanted.
“For the record, I’ve never slept with Porter. He’s like a brother to me. I only said it because—”
“She was being a bitch,” he interrupted. “I know. She told me.”
“But after all that, I was at Laney’s and we were talking and I explained all my fucked up thoughts and that Ian had more of an impact on me than I’d ever considered and she asked me if I was afraid of the power you’d have over me.”
His eyebrows slammed down. He didn’t understand her question any more than I had, at first. “Power?”
I shrugged. “Yeah. Power. She helped me realize that I hadn’t been in love as an adult and told me that when you love someone they have a lot of power over you. Power to hurt you. Power to make you crumble if they left. Power to break your heart. She asked if I was afraid of that.”
“And?”
I nodded slowly. “I was. Because I’d given power to someone I didn’t love and look how that ended.”
“Wait.” Tegan adjusted in his seat. “You’ve never been in love?”
I rolled my eyes. “In high school but no. Not anything real or lasting and I think that’s why I waited so long for it to happen with Ian.” I took a deep breath to steady my heart for the next question. The one answer that could crush me or make me the happiest ever. “So, can you forgive me?” Then I held my breath to brace for the answer.
“Of course.”
My chest sagged as I let out the breath I’d been holding. Literally holding my breath to see what he’d do. “It’s that easy?” I asked him. “I apologize and you forgive me?”
Humor played on his face as he leaned across the table. “Crazy, isn’t it?”
Tegan slid out of the booth and I followed. He’d paid, so I guessed it was time to leave, but I wasn’t ready to leave him.
“Why don’t you come over for a while?” I offered. “Unless you have something else to do?”
He smiled that great Tegan smile and shook his head at me. “Everyone I know here has plans tonight. I couldn’t possibly have something else to do. I’ll follow you.”
Something about knowing he was coming over thrilled me. I wouldn’t be keeping him at arm’s length anymore. The entire time he’d been doing everything in his power to be with me and prove himself to me.
I really didn’t deserve a second chance but I was going to do my very best not to fuck it up this time.
Chapter Twenty
That was the longest drive home I’d ever had. Tegan stayed behind me the entire way and just the close proximity, even in different cars, turned my legs to Jell-O and dampened my panties. I didn’t know for sure what would happen when we got back to my place, but I knew what I wanted to happen.
I let him inside and offered him a drink before we settled in on the couch. I pushed my shoes off and brought my legs up. Tegan took my feet and pulled them onto his lap, running a thumb over my calf. That shouldn’t have felt as good as it did. But at this point… Just about anything from him would turn me into a puddle.
I hadn’t felt awkward with Tegan once since meeting him until now. How fast were we taking this? Were we going to start where we’d left off or start over? I didn’t know the answer to any of my questions, but there was a man who did. He scowled at me when I pulled my legs away from him, but that look softened when I climbed onto him, straddling his lap.
His hand gripped my hips.
“At the restaurant, you said you love me the way I am,” I said softly.
He nodded gently. “That’s because I love you, Maddie. I didn’t tell you before because you were still working it out, but I love you.” Tegan ran a hand over my hair. “I noticed that you said something about loving me.”
My eyes began to water. Not a full-out cry, but he loved me and I’d almost ruined it. “I do love you. My heart is full of love for you. I’m so sorry I tried not to allow it out.”
“Maddie,” he said seriously. “The power I have over you… I won’t ever use it to hurt you.”
“I know.” My eyes filled with real tears this time. I’d never thought I’d be the kind of girl that cried over words from her boyfriend but I absolutely was. Pair it with the relief that washed over me as he hardened beneath me and I was fast on my way to becoming a blubbering mess.
“Don’t use yours to hurt me,” he whispered.
That was the moment a few tears escaped and slid down my cheeks. “Never. I promise.” Then I pressed my lips to his.
Tegan slid a hand up my back and fisted my hair, holding me in place, tilting my head to take the kiss deeper. When his tongue slid across mine, his hand slid up my thighs. Bless past me for choosing a skirt, but he stopped before his fingers hit the elastic of my panties.
Suddenly, he pulled back and said, “We can slow this down if you need to.”
“Don’t you dare.”
A great smile spread across his face before he clasped the back of my thighs and stood up at the same time. I wrapped my arms around his shoulder to hold on and kissed him with everything I had and everything I was, hoping to convey everything I felt. How much I wanted him, yes, but how much I loved him and my promise to never hurt him again.
Then he was walking, but I couldn’t have cared less because all I wanted was both of us naked and him inside me.
He took us into my room and kicked the door shut behind us even though we were alone. Then he dropped me on the bed. I bounced only once before looking up at him and sucked my bottom lip into my mouth. He slid to his knees then lifted my shirt over my head and made impressively quick work of my bra. Tegan wasted zero time sucking one of my nipples between his teeth, which elicited a deep groan.
I was sensitive as hell.
He released my flesh with a pop and said, “Middle of the bed.” It wasn’t a full sentence and I didn’t need it to be. I began to slide against the mattress, but my skirt and panties didn’t come with me. He’d pulled them down as I moved up.
I laid there, completely naked, while Tegan took off all of his own clothes. Naked and together was exactly how I’d wanted us.
But the memory of Tegan naked did not do him justice. He was long lean muscles everywhere. The delicious V that led to one of my favorite things about him must’ve taken him a lot of work to achieve and I was extremely grateful he wanted to achieve it. His glorious erection stood like marble but bounced as he came to me.
Tegan kissed me deeply again. When he did it that way, it took all of my sense away. I couldn’t think clearly or of anything other than him. Then he kissed his way down my body until he settled between my thighs. My breath caught in my throat with the first lick. I fisted the blanket in my hands, not knowing why I was trying too hard to be quiet. Dylan wasn’t here. We were alone. There was no need, yet there I was doing just that.
Tegan licked and sucked and pushed my legs farther apart until the building pressure released my entire body into a state of euphoria. I hadn’t done a thing yet was left breathless just the same. He was ridiculously good at that and I knew, with absolute certainty, that there would never be a mediocre orgasm in my future.
Before I could get my bearing, Tegan removed his weight from me, grabbed a condom from my top drawer, and slid it on. He was back, hovering above and pushing inside me before I’d finished my thought. It was as if he didn’t want me to be even-keeled.
“Ohmigod,” I said quickly as his hips moved against mine. If he kep
t it up, this would be a multiple orgasm night. Probably all part of his plan.
I did my best to meet him movement for movement, but he seemed to have a lot more control than I did. He’d kiss me breathless, hold my wrists against the mattress, all while playing my body like a fiddle.
The man had many talents.
He dropped his head to my shoulder and let out a low growl, the indication that he’d found the same release he’d given me twice already.
After kissing me twice more, he asked, “Do you want to go first or me?”
“You.” I gave him a gentle push. I couldn’t have gotten up if I’d wanted to. My legs didn’t feel attached to my body and it was going to take me a moment to regain the strength.
Instead, I closed my eyes and relived every moment of our reunion so I didn’t forget a single detail.
“Your turn,” he said far too soon.
It took a lot of effort to get myself moving but through sheer will, I did it.
When I came out of the bathroom, I was sad to find that he’d put his boxers back on and was lying on top of my blanket. I narrowed my eyes on him but grabbed his T-shirt and let it fall over my head. He watched as it slid down my body, then as I climbed up next to him. Only I went underneath the blankets. It might’ve been summer, but I still slept under my covers. The benefit of central air.
Tegan lifted an arm for me to snuggle into his side before he slid under the blanket with me. “I’ve missed you,” he said into my hair.
“I’ve missed you.”
We didn’t have to talk about the fact that he was staying the night. I sure as hell didn’t want him to leave. He didn’t seem to want to leave, either. I knew then that I’d have to talk to Zac about whether he was comfortable with Tegan spending the night when Dylan was home because that was what we did. We discussed the things that affected our kid. He’d talked to me about moving in with Laney.
Now, I didn’t think Tegan would be moving in, but I definitely wanted him to stay as often as he wanted to. A lot hopefully.
Hard to Say Yes (The Fallout Series Book 3) Page 18