“Thanks,” he says, his mouth quirked in a dreamy smile. “That would be nice.”
“Really?”
Reilly shrugs. “I’ve had your potato salad. And I’ve heard wonders about your fried chicken, so I’d be stupid to say no.”
I’m pleasantly surprised. “Good.”
We exchange a smile, my heart flutters a little bit and my cheeks probably flush, but I grab a couple forks and some napkins and wobble my way to the couch.
Reilly follows behind me and sets our plates down on the coffee table. With a sigh, we both plop down on the couch and get comfortable. He reaches for the remote, turning the TV back on. The zombie marathon is still on, but he doesn’t seem to care.
Reilly raises his milk glass. “Cheers,” he says, and we clink our glasses together. “Dive in.”
My stomach rumbles with anticipation, and I can’t shovel the first bite of food in my mouth fast enough.
I can feel Reilly’s gaze on me before he speaks. “When is the last time you ate something?” he asks, popping a potato into his mouth.
I think for a moment, finishing chewing. Part of me doesn’t want to answer him because I feel like he’s weighing my response, but I do anyway. “This morning,” I say. “I was really busy today.” I focus on the TV instead of at his knowing expression. “Then I had that awesome date I had to get ready for and we both know how well that turned out.” I take a few more bites and almost moan in pleasure as I sop up some of the broken egg yolk with my toast, savoring the bite. “I love food.”
“I can tell,” he says with a chuckle, and he wipes his mouth with his napkin. “I wasn’t insinuating anything.” He glances over at me. “I asked you to stop assuming things with me. You’re generally wrong.”
I squint at him over my glass as I gulp down some of my milk, taking in the sight of his smirk before I refocus on the television. A few more minutes pass, and surprisingly enough, all the boot-smashed faces and the blood and ooze that fill just about every other scene don’t tamper my appetite in the least. In fact, I’m done before Reilly takes his last bite.
After wiping my mouth off, I toss my napkin onto my empty plate and set it on the coffee table. Exhausted and my stomach full, I throw myself back against the couch and sigh in complete contentment. All I want to do is curl up into a tiny, safe little ball and pass out.
Reilly must read my mind, because he hands me the wadded-up blanket from the cushion next to him. I happily accept it. “Thanks.”
With a nod, he takes our plates into the kitchen, and by the time he comes back, I’m wrapped up and warm, my legs curled under me. My dress is riding up my thighs, but Reilly can’t see, so I don’t care. I’m not sure if I would anyway. He turns the volume down a smidge, then settles in next to me.
Like it’s second nature, Reilly’s arm wraps around me, pulling me closer, and we lie there in silence, save for the hushed screams and growls coming from the TV. That’s the last thing I register before I fall asleep.
* * *
I wake as Reilly jerks in his sleep beside me. The sound of gunshots emanate from the TV and I blink a few times. Reilly’s hands twitch—a little at first and then more aggressively—and he groans. When his features pinch and he groans again, I begin to worry.
“Josh?” I try to shake him awake, but he only moans and shudders again in response. I shake him more firmly. “Josh—”
His eyelids fly open. Though my heart is racing, I give him a moment to register what’s happening. Finally he blinks.
“Are you okay? You were having a dream.”
Reilly stares at me a moment before he nods and runs his hand over his face. He’s sweating, and I wonder if it was a dream or a nightmare. “Stay here for a sec, okay? I’ll be right back.” I hobble quickly into the kitchen and dampen a hand towel. The clock on the stove reads 2:35.
Reilly is leaning forward, his elbows on his knees, when I get back to the couch. His gaze is narrowed and fixed on the wall, his eyes gleaming in the flickering darkness.
“Here,” I say and hold the damp cloth up to his face. “Do you have bad dreams a lot?” I dab some of the sweat from his brow then his temple, and then I lean over him slightly to wipe the other side of his face.
“Sometimes,” he says, his voice a grave murmur. “Sometimes they’re about my old man . . . sometimes other things.” Our eyes meet and we’re so close our noses are almost touching. “Thanks for waking me up.”
I barely nod and slowly lower the cloth from his face. “You sure you’re alright?”
He just stares at me, his eyes shifting over my face.
I wait for the nerves I always feel around him to return, especially in our close proximity, but they don’t. Something’s different now. The air between us buzzes, charged and sizzling. I nearly stop breathing when he wraps his arms around me. An unasked question grows more expectant with each of our measured breaths, until finally, Reilly leans into me, slowly but decisively, and brushes his lips against mine. His kiss is careful and soft, unlike any kiss he’s ever given me before.
I can feel everything, heightened and tingling: the gentle firmness of his lips; then the sensation of his tongue stroking mine, wet and warm; the trace of his fingers sliding down the backs of my arms; the heaviness of his breath as he inhales and exhales.
Wanting to feel the warmth of him again, the assurance of his weight, I wrap my arms around his neck, willing him nearer. His hands splay against my back, his fingertips kneading my skin as we explore the taste and feel of one another, less urgent than the other times before. I let my mind flutter away, further and further, and I know I want this, whatever it is, to never ever stop.
The moment I even consider it ending, my chest tightens and a lump forms in my throat. I try to ignore it, pulling Reilly closer, kissing him harder, fingers gripping his shoulders, silently pleading.
He stops. He straightens, and when I open my eyes, ready to protest, I find his eyes searching my face, taking in my expression. He’s thinking, deciding something, and I squirm in his indecision, vulnerable, but I wait because even though I want this, I want him to want this as much as I do.
Reilly swallows and, like he’s made his decision, he pulls me closer again, like he needs me, like he won’t ever let me go. His lips are deft and purposeful, parting mine like it’s the most natural motion. “I love you, Sam,” he breathes against my mouth, and I still. He rests his forehead against mine. “I’ve tried not to.”
I try to shrink away from the shock of his words, but he holds me, unrelenting.
“I’ve loved you since the first time I saw you at the dock. Since you saved me.”
Searching his face, torn between looking away and losing myself in his gaze, I try to think, but I can’t. I can only feel. I didn’t know it was possible for words to hurt this much, to cut and sting as they slice into me. They sear into my soul, branding it with an unsaid promise I know he will break.
“Will you stay with me tonight?” he asks, and I know what he’s asking me.
I’m nodding before I can overthink it. I want this. I’m petrified, but I want Reilly—all of him—for as long as I can have him.
In silence, he stands, extends his hand to me, and leads me toward his bedroom. My eyes never leave the back of him as I follow, completely lost to the sound of our footsteps, in the disbelief that floods me in this moment, the feelings of how right it all seems to be.
We walk to the far side of the queen-sized bed, and Reilly pulls the gray comforter back, exposing pale sheets in the moonlight. He looks at me, perhaps trying to gauge what to do next, like I am.
I turn my back to him, gathering my hair and pulling it over my shoulder.
Carefully, Reilly unzips my dress, the searing touch of his fingers trailing down to my lower back, and he peels the dress away from my body. My eyes close of their own accord, and everything twirls insides me, my red-hot desires and the biting past a nexus of what’s to come.
My dress drops to my feet, and whe
n his fingers linger at the lace underwear band around my hips, a thrill of urgency spirals through me.
Turning around, I finger the hem of his t-shirt, playing with it before I pull it up for him to bow out of. I see the chills covering his body before I feel them against my fingertips, and I can’t help but smile. Oblivious and like he’s suddenly starved, Reilly pulls me into him, kissing me more fervently than before. In the blink of an eye, he’s gathering my body against his chest, lying me down in soft cotton sheets that smell fresh and clean, like him.
His body hovers over me, his hands traversing my body, pressing and caressing and searching as his lips and tongue mark my mouth, the base of my throat, the tops of my breasts . . .
When his fingers glide over the marred skin on my hip, we both still. My heart’s racing, but now it’s with fear.
Reilly scoots down, and I reach for his face, willing him to ignore it, to just let it be. But he pays no attention to my grasping at him and leans down to kiss the skin around the healing cut and scarred tissue. The sensation is so foreign, so acute, that I can’t help it, I can’t help any of it. My hands fly to cover my face.
Reilly’s fingers curl around my wrists, pulling my hands away when all I want to do is hide.
“Look at me,” he whispers. I shake my head, trying to keep myself from crying, from losing myself again. “Look at me, please.” It’s a plea.
Reilly presses his lips against my palm, against my wrist and shoulder, beneath my jaw, and whispers, “It’s okay.”
I shake my head. It doesn’t feel okay. My heart feels wretched and raw and gaping.
“It’s okay.” He breathes the words again, and when I open my eyes, his bleary form is peering down at me. And even though Reilly doesn’t say it, I know he’s telling me he’s here, that I’m not alone anymore.
Twenty-Nine
Reilly
Predawn light pours through the blinds, washing my room in a blue so pale it looks ethereal, and I wonder if I’m dreaming. This is the first time since I’ve been back that I’ve felt anything resembling “home,” and the first time in over four years I’ve dared to feel something like happiness. I’m afraid to get out of bed, worried all that’s transpired in the past ten hours will somehow be erased.
With a deep inhale, Sam’s hair tickles my face. Gently, so as not to wake her, I brush it away from my whiskers and smile.
“You’re awake,” she whispers. It sounds like she’s smiling.
I nod, nuzzling the crook of her neck. “I love the way you smell,” I say. I always have because it’s familiar and heartwarming. “Not in a creepy way, though.” I pull her tighter against my chest.
She cranes her neck to look at me, a smile making her face glow and my heart swell. “Yeah? And what do I smell like? Sweat? The barn?” She chuckles softly.
I shake my head and brush my lips across the soft skin at the base of her neck. She shivers, and I inhale again. “Vanilla? And maybe a little bit of sweat.”
She bats playfully at my hand as my fingers trail the curve of her body, the side of her breast to her hip. When I brush the cut below the hollow of her hip, she stills. I kiss her shoulder, hoping she doesn’t start closing down on me now.
“I was still in the hospital . . . the first time I did it,” she says quietly. Not wanting to rush her, I remain quiet, slowly stroking her soft skin as I wait for her to continue. “When I woke up and found out about Papa—” Her voice clips and she takes a deep breath. “I was on so much pain medication I couldn’t do much of anything. All of it hurt too much, just below the surface, and I wanted to feel, but I was too numb.” Sam’s voice gets quieter, but she continues. “As the days went on . . . I needed to feel something else.”
All I can do is imagine her in the hospital, in a sterile and cold room, probably without Alison at her side. “I’m sorry I wasn’t there,” I think aloud. If I had been, things might have been different for her, maybe easier in a way. I pull her tighter against me. I hadn’t heard about the accident until after I’d already left.
Sam wraps her arms around mine and kisses my hand. “You are now,” she says.
“I know I hated my life back then,” I admit, “but now none of it seems important enough to have left.” I only had to hold on another year or so. I could’ve done it.
She shakes her head. “You deserved a better life. I don’t blame you for leaving, not anymore.” Her voice is thoughtful, like memories of our past are unraveling before us both.
I think of the scar above my eye. “Sometimes I would egg him on, so he’d do something to make me remember how horrible he was, how much I hated him and why I made the decision to leave in the first place.” I’d struggled so much with my decision to leave, but none of that needs to be said—it doesn’t matter anymore.
We’re quiet for a moment, then Sam squeezes my hand. “You have your entire life to plan for now, and it’s all yours. You can do whatever you want and you never have to worry about him again.” Her voice is lighter and holds a hint of promise. I smile and resume tracing a line up and down her side.
I’m content to lie like this, in bed, with her in my arms, forever, but I know how her mind is, that she’s thinking—overanalyzing. I can tell by the way she taps on the mattress.
“What are you thinking about?” I ask, apprehensive of her answer. The longer she’s quiet, the more I regret asking.
Her shoulders rise and fall, and then she finally says, “I’m wondering what happens now,” and I’m not surprised.
“Well,” I say, choosing my words as carefully as I can. “You know what I want.”
In a cocoon of sheets and my arms, Sam twists and turns to face me, studying me, searching for the truth. “I thought you wanted to leave, that you didn’t want to stay.” Her voice is skeptical, hopeful maybe, and I don’t understand how she can’t get it.
“All of that changes if I have a reason to stay. I never wanted things to end between us, Sam.” I don’t mention how close I was to reenlisting.
She stares at me, but her eyes are vacant and glazed over, like she’s thinking too much.
“I want to be with you,” I say, adamant. “I’m willing to stay here, to do whatever it takes, if you are.” I tuck a strand of hair behind her ear because I want to touch her, and I want her to come back to me instead of floating away.
I prop myself up on my elbow, suddenly anxious for this conversation to go in another direction. I need her to reassure me that this is what she wants, and that last night wasn’t just some fluke and an in-the-moment decision she regrets. “What do you want to happen?”
She sighs and gives me a tiny, one-shouldered shrug. “I’m not sure.”
My muscles tense and I hold my breath, praying that’s not true.
“I like this,” she says, unable to contain a small, giddy laugh that eases the tension, just a little. “But it just seems too good to be true, you know?”
It’s the same thought I’ve had a hundred times in the last couple hours. “We don’t have to make it complicated. It can just be what it is—we can see where it goes. I’m willing to try.”
She smiles, though I’m not sure why, and it makes me happy.
“You said we.”
I lean forward and kiss her soft lips, something I’ve been wanting to do since I woke up.
Sam cups the side of my face and leans into me, kissing me back this time, her lips warm and lingering on mine. “I like the sound of that,” she says and lies back down. Her eyes are smiling for the first time, and the fact that it’s because of me makes all the heartache and bickering between us one-hundred-percent worth it.
“What’s your plan for today?” I ask. I want to know how much I can bother and bug her, since I won’t be able to get her out of my head.
“The usual chores and there are horses to ride, but nothing too crazy.” She rests her cheek on my shoulder. “What about you?”
“Well, the list is still long for this place, but I need to at least pick paint col
ors for the outside.”
“Yeah?” She gets a distant look on her face, but catches herself and smiles. “What about red? I like cream and red, not like candy apple, but like a rusty, farm red. Papa wanted to repaint ours when he was finished with the inside, but—” She shrugs and smiles, though I can tell the memory is painful.
“I like red,” I say.
And her smile pulls up in the corner. “I’d never have guessed given the red monstrosity in your driveway.”
It’s my turn to shrug this time. “What can I say, red looks mean on a truck.”
“Well,” she says with a sigh. “It’s just an idea. Don’t feel like you have to choose those colors.”
“I’ll take it into consideration,” I tease, though I already know I’m going to do it.
I have no attachment to this place, though the more the house changes, the more at ease I am. I know most of it wouldn’t have been possible had the old man not left me money, but this is all I have to spend it on right now, so why not make it someone else’s dream house while I’m at it?
“What else do you see for your future dream home?” I ask, an idea forming.
She blinks up at me, thinking. “Well, since you asked . . . I guess I do have a list. They’re mostly changes I’d like to make to the ranch house one day, but . . .”
After listing a white picket fence, raised vegetable gardens in the back, and a few other “wants but not necessarily needs,” I grin because she’s not only animated, smiling and laughing, but smiling and laughing with me.
Thirty
Sam
The crisp morning air and sunshine are refreshing as I walk down the final hill toward the farmhouse. Reilly’s slippers are big on my feet, the wool lining a little too warm, but they’re more comfortable than the heels that dangle from between my fingers, and I grin.
I feel like I’m finally free—free to breathe, free to fly or swim instead of tread water until I’m near drowning. It’s like I woke up to not only a new day, but an optimistic beginning to a new me. I’m not sure what all changed, but I know that Reilly has everything to do with it. He’s the part of me I’ve needed, the part that’s been missing, and now that I’m whole again, I feel a sense of pride, like this new me would make Papa proud.
Saratoga Falls: The Complete Love Story Series Page 28