I shook my head, taking a quick drink before I ran my hands back through my hair. It was frizzy and sticky, not used to the Florida humidity.
“And I know that’s ridiculous, because look at me. Look what I’ve done with you. I’ve done the same thing, betrayed him the same way, but—”
“It’s not the same.”
“It’s not,” I agreed. “At least, it doesn’t feel like it to me. I mean, maybe it is. Maybe we’re both going to hell.”
Reese chuckled at that. “Don’t worry. I’ll build us a big mansion there before you two arrive. We can all live happily ever after.”
I tried to smile, but failed, reaching for my drink, instead.
We were both quiet for a bit, listening as the thunder got closer, a few flashes of lightning illuminating the bar now and then. After a while, Reese turned to me, pulling my hands off the bar and into his lap. I had no choice but to meet his eyes then, and when I did, I found just as much pain and sorrow in his as I knew existed in mine.
Maybe that was where our love was born, mine and Reese’s — between the lines of our scars.
“One thing I love about your heart is that it continues to love, even when it’s bruised and beaten. You have always been the girl who loves, Charlie. You loved me when I was a stupid, bored, depressed teenager,” he said, smiling. “And you love your husband still, even when he has hurt you. It’s okay that you still love him. It’s not what most others would do, and that’s what makes it amazing.”
He paused, his grip tightening on my hands.
“But, it’s also okay to let him go, if that’s what your heart is telling you. Just because you’ve given him so much of your life, so much of your heart, does not mean he is entitled to the rest of it. You deserve to be happy, truly happy, whether it’s with him or me or some lucky bastard you haven’t met yet, or hell, even without any man at all.” Reese smiled. “But, what I want you to know is what he did to you, it is not a reflection of who you are. It does not mean you weren’t good enough, or pretty enough, or sexy enough, or interesting enough,” he said. “You are all of those things and more, Charlie. You are the most sensational woman I have ever known. And your worth is not defined by him.”
My eyes bubbled with tears, and I watched Reese through them, his features morphing as his words settled in my bloodstream along with the alcohol. I hadn’t even said that I’d felt those things — that I’d felt less than after what Cameron had done — but Reese had heard me, anyway. He’d known the whisperings in my heart before I’d even heard them, myself.
And it was then that I realized that no matter which direction I went, no matter which man I chose, both would exist in me forever. They were valves in my heart, and I could not beat on without both of them present in some way.
One tear slipped free, and I laughed, pulling my hands from Reese’s and swiping them over my face. “Ugh, I’m sorry. I’m a mess.”
“Yes, you are. But, you’re the prettiest damn mess I’ve ever seen.”
I shoved his shoulder, and he laughed, catching my hand in his and lifting it to his lips. He pressed a kiss to my knuckles just as the rain started to fall, soft at first, but quickly turning to a downpour. Reese peered up at the roof before he gazed back at the beach, and his eyes found mine with a mischievous smile.
“Come on.”
He tugged on my hand, pulling me from my barstool, but I held onto the bar with my free hand.
“Wait, where are you going?”
“Just come on.”
“We haven’t paid.”
He huffed, tapping on the bar to get our bartender’s attention. “Can you add our drinks to my room tab, Leila?”
She nodded, but I still hadn’t moved. I just stared at him, at where he held my hand in his.
“Damn it, Tadpole, stop being so stubborn and just trust me.”
I laughed, my hand still gripping the bar until he tugged me forward again. I stumbled into him, and Reese steadied me before jogging toward the beach. I couldn’t protest before we were out from the cover of the bar, the rain soaking through our clothes, and Reese just kept running.
He pulled me by the hand until our feet touched the ocean, and then he stopped, and I ran right into him, crashing into his chest. But Reese caught me effortlessly, the rain pouring down loud and chaotic around us as he pulled me into him.
“I’m getting soaked!” I screamed over the rain, laughing as Reese wrapped his arms around me.
“Exactly!” He smiled, shaking his head fast and hard, spraying me with even more water. “Let it wash it all away. Let it take every thought, every doubt, every anxiety — consider the rain your spin cycle, Tadpole.”
He gripped one hand then, spinning me in the sand as I laughed and laughed, the rain flying off me as I twirled. Thunder clapped around us, and Reese pulled me back into him, my hands landing on the wet t-shirt that stuck to his chest.
Lightning flashed, and his lashes dripped as he watched me, eyes searching mine under the warm Florida rain. There were a million questions in his eyes, most not meant to be answered, and I was thankful he didn’t whisper even a single one out loud. Instead, he framed my face with his hands, his fingers sliding between the wet tendrils of my hair, and then he leaned in, and he kissed me.
He kissed my lips the very same way the rain kissed my skin — with gentle ease and purpose. He wanted to wash away the confusion, the pain, and with every kiss he took more and more of each. I wrapped my arms around his neck, pulling him into me more, our chests pressed together as the rain poured down.
I didn’t know what would happen next, but in that moment, he was all that I saw. We were all that I felt. He rained down on me, and I drowned in his love, lungs adapting to breathe under water.
“Take me somewhere,” I moaned into his lips as he gripped my ass through the wet fabric of my dress.
Reese groaned, kissing me harder before he broke contact and searched the beach for an escape. We were the only ones that I could see, everyone else inside and sheltered from the rain. When he spotted a lifeguard stand, he tugged me toward it, and we sprinted through the rain again.
He stopped every now and then to kiss me, his hands fisting in my hair or tangling in the straps of my dress, and once we were under the cover of the stand, he pressed me against the wood, his lips on a hot trail from my neck to the swell of my breasts.
“Someone will see us,” I breathed.
“I don’t give a fuck.”
I giggled, looking around us as he lifted the hem of my skirt long enough to peel my soaked panties down my thighs. I couldn’t see anyone watching — not on the beach and not in any of the bars or hotels behind us. It was dark, only the lightning revealing us with each flash, but the stand only provided so much shelter. If someone wanted to see us, they could.
Still, when my panties hit the sand and Reese ran a hot hand up the inside of my thigh, his fingers sliding just between my lips, I realized I didn’t give a fuck, either.
Let them watch.
He didn’t enter me this time, just slid his fingers between my lips, groaning with appreciation at the wetness he found. It was a different wet than the rain — silkier, hotter, born from desire for him instead of from the clouds.
Reese kissed me hard again as he tore at the buttons of his shorts. He pulled them down just enough to free himself of his briefs, too, and then he lifted me.
My ankles wrapped around his backside, hands clawing his shoulder for any kind of grip, and we both moaned in unison when he slid inside me — hard and fast and mercilessly. He hit me deep, withdrawing just an inch before he plowed in even more, and I ran my nails down his back, desperate to feel him, to make him feel me.
Reese made love to me under the cover of rain, the thunder colliding with our sighs and moans for the soundtrack of the night. Every sigh was a flash of lightning, every kiss a burst of wind, and every time we touched, I felt the storm surge inside me, forever reminding me of the half of my heart that belonged to Reese
.
The rain washed away the pain, just like Reese said. It washed away the confusion, the hurt, the scars and the questions. I laughed and loved, leaving all the what ifs behind, reveling in the feel of the water on my skin.
Yes, the rain took all that had weighed on me that weekend, but in turn, it revealed the sinner who lived beneath that weight. Everything I felt was wrong, every kiss was a sin, every touch a transgression. And I couldn’t even find it in me to pray for forgiveness.
I would take whatever punishment would come for my crime, because the truth was as clear as the sky once the rain subsided.
I wasn’t sorry at all.
And I didn’t want to quit Reese Walker.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
* * *
Cameron
Charlie thought I cheated on her.
She wasn’t the only one. I wasn’t naïve enough to think word hadn’t spread around the office, and perhaps around the town — seeing as how Reid’s Energy Solutions was so involved in the community. I imagined even Charlie’s father knew, though he’d never confront me. Maxwell Reid knew more than he should about everyone who worked for him, but he was a man of respect and privacy.
Everyone thought they knew the real story, and I hadn’t even tried to correct them. I hadn’t even tried to explain the truth to Charlie, because in my mind, none of it mattered.
I had still hurt her, no matter what the circumstances actually were. That was what mattered, and that was what I’d always told myself.
But Patrick had a different theory.
He wanted me to tell Charlie the truth — all of it — every single detail of what happened between me and Natalia. It was uncomfortable enough for me to even talk to him about her, let alone to Charlie. Just the thought of it made me want to jump in front of a bus.
“She deserves to know the truth,” Patrick had said at our session that Friday. It was the day after Charlie left for the conference. The day after she left to spend an entire weekend with him. “Let her be the one to decide if the truth makes a difference in how she feels or not.”
In a way, I understood what he meant. Perhaps Charlie would see it differently, and maybe she would actually forgive me — but I would never forgive me. That was the truth of it. No matter how anyone else saw it or what they believed, I had still hurt my wife. I’d betrayed her trust. I’d broken my vows.
There was no excuse for that. No valid one, anyway.
Still, I replayed the words I’d say to Charlie as I put the finishing touches on my project for the weekend. I hoped it would show her my love, what my hands had built, and that my words would bring clarity to a time we never discussed.
I built her an aviary.
Charlie had let Jane go free, but I knew in her heart that it killed her. I knew she missed Jane and Edward both, and that our house had felt a bit empty since they’d gone.
Charlie was a woman of simple pleasures — she loved her books, her garden, her birds, and, for reasons unknown, me. I couldn’t bring Jane or Edward back, but I could give her new birds to love, and a new place to find peace in our home.
I’d thought of just getting her two Budgies again, but I knew I could never replace Jane and Edward.
So, instead, I’d built a large aviary downstairs in our sun room.
It took up half the room now, the other half housing a bright couch, matching chair, and glass table Charlie had picked out when we first bought the house. I’d started building the aviary the second Charlie left on Thursday, forgoing work on both Thursday and Friday to spend the time I needed to complete it before she got home. Perks of not taking vacation time in years was that I had plenty to spare, and thankfully, my boss hadn’t questioned my frequent use of it recently.
Maybe he knew Charlie was cheating on me, too.
Regardless, I’d spent the entire weekend bringing my vision for the aviary to life, and I couldn’t wait for Charlie to see it. It was just as grand as I’d imagined, spanning from floor to ceiling, the welding wire stretching over the rustic metal framing I’d selected to give it a modern feel.
There was a small hammock inside, one Charlie could lie or sit in as her birds flew around her, and the sun shone through the glass ceiling of that room in such a way that I knew would bring a smile to Charlie’s face every morning. I’d filled the aviary with plush greenery and branches for the birds, as well as several nest boxes, and the last and final touch had been to get her very first birds.
Two Bengalese finches.
They twittered around me as I set up the last perch inside the aviary, and when it was complete, I sat in the hammock, watching them flit around from branch to branch in their new home.
I read when researching the aviary that keeping a single pet finch happy and healthy was nearly impossible. They thrived in pairs or groups, always needing the love and company of another to keep them satisfied.
I could relate.
The thought of losing Charlie was one I never liked to dwell on, but it was impossible to avoid that weekend. I knew she was with Reese, on a beach, in another state, far, far away from me. I could only hope that our weekend together was still fresh in her mind, that she believed the words I’d said to her, that she felt my love the way I’d always felt hers.
But I also knew there was a part of her that would never trust me again, part of her that had forgiven me, but would never forget what I did.
And so, with our new birds chirping in the background, I focused again on what I had to tell Charlie when she got home.
I didn’t want to relive that time in my life, and I definitely never wanted to discuss that day, but I had no choice. Patrick was right. Charlie deserved the truth, and more than that, she deserved to know what I had been thinking, what I’d been feeling.
Charlie thought I cheated on her, but I didn’t.
Natalia Aleppo had been a partner of mine for years. We worked our first project together when I was in my second year at Reid’s Energy Solutions, and from the very first moment I met her, I liked her.
But not in any way a married man wasn’t allowed to like a woman.
I thought she was intelligent, and well-spoken. I liked that I could depend on her to pull her side of a project, that she could speak to a crowded conference room of people and articulate our ideas while I stood silent in the corner with the numbers and figures. She was the face of our team, I was the machine in the back. I liked it that way.
Natalia was always professional with me, always nothing but sweet and friendly. She and Charlie met many times, and she’d always treated Charlie with respect, too.
But after we lost the boys, when depression took me under, something in Natalia changed.
I liked to think of her as a predator, and me her prey, one she watched carefully from a distance until the exact right time to pounce. But I couldn’t blame her for everything, not when I was equally as guilty. I may not have ever slept with her, but I had leaned on her — I had let her in when I should have been talking to Charlie, and to this day, I didn’t know why.
She was just there, that’s what I had told Patrick, anyway. When we were working long nights at the office, when I was trying to give Charlie space to heal while I dealt with the loss of our children on my own, Natalia was right there. She was asking questions, bringing me coffee, rubbing my shoulders, telling me it was all going to be okay.
And I should have told her to stop.
I should have told her no well before I did, should have seen the warning signs, should have admitted to myself that the way she looked at me had changed. But I didn’t. Not until that very night when she let herself inside my office after hours and closed the door behind her.
I could still close my eyes and see the smile on her red lips as the door latched closed, hear the click of her heels on my floor as she crossed to my desk, feel the pressure of her fingers on my shoulders as she climbed into my lap. She didn’t give me a chance to stop her, to argue, to even realize what was happening until her legs were s
pread over me, her skirt bunching at her hips, panties pressing to the zipper of my pants.
“I’m looking for trouble,” she’d whispered, grinding her hips against mine.
But as she’d leaned in to kiss me, I’d stopped her, gripping her wrists hard and peeling her off me.
“I’m not.”
She’d pouted, tilting her head to the side. “She doesn’t have to know. Just… let me make you feel good, Cameron. You deserve to feel good.”
Charlie was all I’d seen in that moment, she was all I cared about, and I didn’t for one split second give in to Natalia, not even when the carnal urges inside me screamed for me to let go.
I told her to get off me.
I told her to leave.
But none of that mattered, because it was too late.
Charlie walked in. She saw Natalia in my lap. She saw the skirt around her hips, smelled Natalia’s perfume on my shirt. I’d chased her down, begged her to listen to me, to hear me out, but once we’d gotten home, I knew in my heart there was nothing I could say.
It didn’t matter if I hadn’t slept with her, everything Charlie had seen had still been true.
Another woman had sat in my lap, with her bare thighs against me, with her arms around my neck, and I hadn’t pushed her off. I hadn’t stood and knocked her to the ground. I hadn’t told her no, not fast enough, anyway. Not with enough conviction.
And I’d let that woman in.
I’d talked to her about my fears, about my pain, about the very loss my wife was dealing with on her own. I’d stayed late at work because I enjoyed being in Natalia’s company, and I’d told her things I’d never once told Charlie. The more I told her, the more I opened up to her, the more I liked her. And even if I hadn’t acted on it, I couldn’t deny that I hadn’t felt the energy change around us. I felt the pull, I felt the want, I felt the desire.
Best Kept Secrets: The Complete Series Page 37