Here's To Box Set (Complete Series)

by Teagan Hunter

  Sweat beads its way down my back as I drop to my elbows, bringing us flush together and changing our position into shorter thrusts. I place my forehead against Maura’s and rest my mouth on hers. That’s all I do. I merely rest it. Every movement lets our lips brush. It’s soft and intimate, and it feels damn good.

  “Tuck…,” I feel rather than hear her say. “I…think…oh!”

  There comes a time in a man’s life when he learns that women have lied to him about his sexual prowess in bed. This moment is my time.

  Because for the first time in twenty-four years, I feel a woman’s orgasm.

  Maura’s muscles tighten and pull around my dick, and the feeling is fucking incredible. So incredible that I follow her into oblivion about two thrusts later, collapsing on top of her in a haze I’ve never encountered before. I assume that this time, this amazing, wonderful time, was so good because of the person it happened with. Maura. It always leads back to Maura.

  After lying there for several moments, I pull myself from her body and roll away before things start getting messy. Walking across the hall butt naked, I clean myself and take a glance in the mirror. The first thing I notice is my flush. The second thing is my eyes. They’re glowing. They’re happy. I’m happy. Smiling to myself, I shake my head.

  Finally. I finally got her.

  My heart does that stupid beat beat skip thing it’s been doing since last year when I first couldn’t get Maura out of my head. I realize then how stupid it isn’t and how amazing it is.

  Because I love her.

  The apartment is still quiet as I make my way back into the bedroom. Maura gets up and takes a turn cleaning herself. She comes back in a few minutes later and crawls into bed next to me. At this point I’m worried that something’s wrong since we haven’t spoken a word to one another, but then she snuggles up next to me. I automatically welcome her warmth and wrap my arm around her.

  “Tucker?”

  “Yeah?” I say, my throat scratchy from being quiet for so long.

  I wonder if she didn’t hear me since she doesn’t speak straight away. But then she does.

  “That was incredible,” she admits quietly.

  I laugh lightly. “I get that a lot.” I yelp when she pinches my nipple. “Okay, fine, I deserved that. Kind of.”

  I grab her hand before she can do it again and hold it against my chest. She flattens her palm out over the hole sitting over my heart. I can feel her breaths on my chest. She’s trying to match her breathing to mine, and it’s the cutest thing ever. We lie there in the stillness of the moment, enjoying be wrapped up in one another.

  “I’m sorry,” I hear her say.

  My eyebrows pinch together. “For what?”

  Maura doesn’t answer immediately, and I begin drifting off before she speaks again.

  “For not picking you in the beginning. I let your appearance and my need for my parents’ approval stop me. I feel like we’ve missed out on a lot because of it.” I feel her blow out an unsteady breath. “And I feel like I gave away a part of myself that I should have saved for you.”

  I want to be able to tell her it’s okay, but it’s not. I feel like we’ve wasted a lot of time avoiding our feelings and skating around something that could have been amazing from the beginning.

  And yes, I’m jealous as fuck that another man has touched her. I hate it. But it’s not like I went into this untouched, so I can’t fault her for having urges.

  Instead of telling her all this, I shrug the best I can in our position and say, “We’ve got the now together. Stop worrying about the yesterdays.”

  She suddenly sits, hand still on my chest, and stares down at me with her mouth sitting slightly ajar.

  “But it’s not okay, Tucker. Your tattoos are sexy as hell. I’ve always thought that. It’s just, my parents hate them. So yeah, at first they were part of the reason I gravitated toward…” She trails off, avoiding mentioning my brother’s name. “The rest was all me and my clouded outlook on the type of man I was supposed to be with. I was wrong though. I sort of fell into this bitchy, judgy version of myself, and I’m not proud of it. I hate that side of me. It’s a shitty excuse, but it’s ingrained in me.”

  “Maura, I—”

  “I’m trying to get rid of it,” she interrupts. Her head drops along with her voice. “I promise. I don’t want to be anything like them. I just want to be me.”

  Part of me wants to tell her she should have been stronger and told her parents to go fuck themselves a long time ago, but I also get it. I’ve met them and can understand where they fucked up her perception of people.

  But the Maura I’ve always known has fought against them from the minute I met her. And that’s all that counts for me.

  Pushing her chin back up until her alluring, aqua-blue eyes meet mine, I tell her, “You’re nothing like them, Maura. I promise.”

  Her eyes are still sad when she says, “How can you be so sure?”

  “Because I wouldn’t love you like I do if you were.”

  A gasp leaves her mouth, and I’m momentarily confused, but then I realize what I said.

  Love.

  I said I wouldn’t love her, not I wouldn’t like her.

  But I’m not taking it back, because it’s true. Instead, I’m going to pretend I didn’t say it and see where that leads us.

  Apparently she wants to ignore it for now too, because she lies back down on me with her head in the crook of my arm and her hand back over my heart. She begins tracing the lines of the tattoo, and I slowly start drifting off.

  “Why don’t you have condoms in here?”

  Random.

  “I never bring girls in here,” I tell her honestly.

  She flings herself up again. “Shut the freak up! You do too!”

  I shake my head. “I don’t. Promise. I…I haven’t had sex in about a year.”

  “A year?” she questions skeptically.

  “A year.” I smile shyly. “There was this girl who was stuck in my head. She was all I wanted, so I didn’t see the need to find anything elsewhere.”

  The look in Maura’s eyes is one I won’t be forgetting for a long time to come. She’s happy. Elated, even. Because she knows I’m talking about her. And she knows I mean every single word of it.

  I do my best to convey to her what I’m feeling in this moment with my eyes. I think she gets it, think she understands, because a small grin pulls the corners of her mouth up. She curls back into me, and I bend down to plant a kiss on her head, holding my lips there for longer than necessary.

  “Goodnight, Maura.”

  “Goodnight, Tuck.”

  18

  A pounding in my head wakes me from what may be the most peaceful sleep I’ve ever had. Maura fidgets next to me, and I do my best to even out my breathing again so I don’t wake her, because having her in my arms is the best I thing have ever felt.

  She’s amazing. Everything about her is so fucking special and memorable, and she doesn’t fully realize it. Last night with her was…spectacular. Watching her come apart is something I’ll never forget. The look of surprise on her face and the glow she was sporting afterwards was genuine and pure.

  “I love you,” I whisper aloud for the first time to her sleeping form, brushing my mouth against her forehead.

  The pounding starts again, and I faintly hear a voice calling my name.

  Weird. I’m definitely awake, and Maura isn’t talking, so that must mean someone is at the door.

  I carefully extract myself from her grip, pausing every few seconds to make sure I haven’t woken her up. I must have been a ninja in a past life, because I manage to make it out without waking her.

  As I walk into the living room, I recognize Hudson’s voice as the one coming through the door.

  “Tuck! Open the door, man. It’s really fucking important,” he says in a panic.

  I rush the last few steps and fling the door open to find him and Rae standing there with sorrowful looks on their face
s.

  Fuck. Whatever this is can’t be good news.

  I open the door wider and let them in without a word. Rae rushes in first, probably searching for Maura, and Hudson follows, giving me a heavy clap on the shoulder. Okay. This can’t be good. Hudson flicks on the big screen and takes a seat. I continue to stand and stare at the screen until he flips it to a news station.

  That’s when my knees fall to the ground.

  “Breaking news out of North Carolina,” the voice on TV says. I hate that voice so much in this moment. “At United States Army base Fort Bragg, a helicopter has crashed due to technical difficulties.”

  A helicopter. Tanner works with helicopters.

  “As of six o’clock this morning,” the voice continues, “two soldiers have been reported dead.”

  Rae gasps as two pictures flash up on the screen. I close my eyes and cover my ears because I can’t hear or see any more.

  He’s dead.

  “and one seriously injured,” the evil reporter says. “No civilian injuries have been reported at this time.”

  I try my best to suck in air, but nothing is coming.

  Tanner is dead.

  My lungs are slowly emptying, and I’m beginning to feel lightheaded.

  Tanner is dead.

  Everything feels so far away.

  My brother is dead. And the last thing I said about him was “he’s dead to me.” Fuck.

  I feel two hands clasp my shoulders, shaking me hard. “Breathe, Tuck. Fucking breathe,” Hudson urges. He shakes me again. “Come on, man.”

  I stare into the eyes of my best friend, trying to find anything stable to grasp on to.

  I can’t.

  I can’t find anything at all. Because my fucking brother is dead.

  “Where’s Maura?” Hudson asks with tears filling his eyes.

  I drop my head to my chest, not answering him. Maura. I slept with the girl my brother was in love with, the girl I’m in love with.

  He died hating me.

  He died hating Maura.

  He died.

  Air is in short supply again as I struggle to breathe. The sound is harsh in the otherwise quiet apartment. No one is moving. No one is talking. We’re only…existing.

  “Tucker?” I hear her soft, silky voice say. She drops down in front of me, grabbing my face and bringing it up to hers. She wipes away the tears I didn’t realize were falling. “Tucker, you’re scaring me. What’s wrong?”

  Before I can talk myself out of it, I slam my mouth against hers, cradling her head between my hands and holding on for dear life. She hesitates only briefly before she returns my kiss with equal want. And then we’re lost in each other for what is probably the last time.

  Trust me, I know this isn’t my finest moment. If anything, it’s my most selfish moment. Because I know—I know—that she’s going to freak out in about twenty seconds when I tell her about Tanner.

  And I’ll lose her. I know I will. Some of the tears falling down my face belong to her; they belong to us.

  Or what we were.

  Because whatever it is we had yesterday won’t make it to tomorrow. It probably won’t even make it five minutes from now.

  I pull back from the kiss and nuzzle my nose against hers. It feels familiar, like it’s something we’ve always done when this is only our first time.

  I study her face and memorize it because I don’t ever want to forget it. I take in her glassy blue eyes and platinum blonde hair with the dark pink tips and the three small freckles she has by her left eye. I take in the way her lips have the cutest pout to them.

  Everything. I take it all in.

  And then I tell her.

  “He’s gone, Maura,” I rasp out, my voice weak and tired from crying and not being able to breathe. “Tanner is dead.”

  I expected her to be sad, angry maybe. What I didn’t expect is for her to slap me. But she does. Hard.

  Then she’s gone.

  She’s sunk in a heap on the floor, sobs roaring from her curled-up form. Rae goes to her, holding her together when I know that I can’t. I watch like an outsider as the woman I love breaks apart for the brother who loved her too. And I know that I shouldn’t be jealous of her reaction, but I am. It’s all twisted and confusing and painful. I want to hold her and comfort her, but I can’t. I know she won’t let me.

  “Tucker?” Hudson says. “Does your family know?”

  They must. If it’s on TV, they know. And they didn’t fucking tell me. Either that or the damn media fucked up and leaked info they weren’t supposed to. But I’m guessing they know.

  I don’t answer him. I only watch Maura.

  “What’s going on?” Gaige asks, emerging from his bedroom.

  Out of my peripheral, I watch Hudson go to him and break the news. He hangs his head and pulls Hudson in for a quick hug.

  I guess now is the time to hold on to one another. Now is the time to tell each other how we feel, because we don’t know if we’ll get to tomorrow.

  But sometimes, something so terrible happens that the yesterdays don’t matter, the tomorrows don’t exist, and the now is nothing but pain and heartache.

  A haze, that’s what I’m in. I’m moving through the motions and trying to ignore the woman sitting next to me.

  Maura’s currently comforting my broken mother. Apparently the news of the split between her and Tanner never made its way back to my parents. Because of this, I’ve spent the last few hours having to listen to her being called and introduced as Tanner’s girlfriend, not mine.

  Although it was never made official out loud, it was in our actions and our connection. We knew.

  And now, we have no idea. We haven’t spoken a word since this morning before I kissed her for the last time. We only accidentally made eye contact once, and it only lasted mere seconds before we both turned away.

  “Tucker, baby,” my mother cries. “Will you please stay for the night?”

  “Ma, I can’t. Besides, I don’t live far.”

  “Oh, please. I need to have someone here with me tonight, and your father hasn’t come out of his garage since we got the news.”

  I want to bring up the fact that it was hours after they knew Tanner was dead before they called to tell me. Hours. It wasn’t until after Rae took Maura home post-breakdown, and Hudson stayed with me and Gaige, that my mother finally called.

  “Fine,” I concede, because she does need someone to stay with her so she doesn’t hit up the local quick mart for booze.

  “And Maura? You’ll stay too?”

  “Of course, Mrs. Bentley. Whatever you need,” she tells my mother.

  It’s funny how the tables have turned in such a short amount of time. Mere hours ago I never wanted to leave my bed, a bed that had a sleeping Maura in it. Now I’m dreading sleeping in the same house as her, because I’m going to want to touch her and kiss her and hold her.

  And I can’t do any of that.

  I don’t have to look at Maura or hear her talk to know how sad she feels. I also don’t have to do any of those things to know how guilty she feels, to know how much she’s regretting us. Because I’m feeling sad and guilty too.

  But I’m not regretting us at all.

  It doesn’t matter that it’s been over a month since the dreaded party when our feelings for one another surfaced. All that matters now is that we never got the closure with him that we needed. We never got the chance to say how sorry we were—for hurting Tanner, not for falling in love. We never got the chance to earn his forgiveness.

  Because of that, we’re stuck in this perpetual place of not knowing. And it’s killing both of us.

  I wish Tanner had answered all my secret phone calls I made to him after Maura and I had promised to not dwell on it and had listened to my side of things.

  I wish he hadn’t been a competitive asshole.

  I wish he had never met Maura.

  But wishes are pointless.

  “I’ll go make the beds for you two,” my moth
er says, lifting herself off the couch and heading upstairs.

  Rather than sitting here in silence with Maura, I search for my stepfather to see what state he’s in.

  Walking into the garage, I smell that it’s apparently a drunken state. I know this is where the alcohol is kept locked up because of my mom. I never thought it would be him in here. Guess things do change.

  “Aaron?” I say tentatively, turning on the overhead light.

  “Turn that back off, you fucking bastard,” he growls.

  Ignore him. He’s drunk and grieving.

  I ignore his request and move farther into the garage. He’s sitting on the floor with his back to a workbench, hunched over a bottle of Jack. He smells like vomit and sweat and piss. It’s fucking disgusting. Crouching in front of him, I cautiously grab the bottle from his hands and try to hold back my own puke.

  He stares up at me with dead eyes. “He’s gone. My son is gone. What the hell am I supposed to do now?”

  “I think getting up off the floor and out of your own waste would be a great start,” I tell him.

  He nods and holds his hand out to me. I help pull him up and throw his arm over my shoulder, practically dragging him across the floor since he’s too drunk to walk himself.

  “I’m sorry, Tucker,” he slurs.

  “For what?”

  “For meeting your mother. It’s her fault all this happened. He wouldn’t have joined if she wasn’t a whore or a boozy.”

  Fighting the urge to drop him, I say, “And maybe he wouldn’t have run off if you weren’t such an asshole.”

  “But that’s your fault, too.”

  Fucker.

  Biting back the hateful words I want to spew at him, I help him out of the garage and into the living room, where he falls into a heap on the floor.

  Glancing up, I notice that Maura is still sitting on the couch. By the expression on her face, she heard all that because I left the garage door open. Her eyes darken for only a moment, and I sense that she wants to say something, but she doesn’t. Instead, she closes her eyes, drops her head, and doesn’t say anything.