by Kaia Bennett
The dress she wore tonight sealed it, and he knew he was never going to forget how beautiful she looked. Red, satiny, strapless fabric fanned out over her full breasts and hips. It cinched in at her hourglass waist and fell to just past mid-thigh, with a pair of gold heels and a gold cuff on her wrist to round out her look. She didn't need much else to make her skin glow, not when she was beaming, her bright smile and dark eyes catching the light in the room. Her hair, which was slowly starting to grow out, was swept to the side and flipped a little at the ends leaving just one piercing-laced ear exposed.
He knew she parted her hair that way to cover the scar that crept out about an inch and a half past her hairline from her fall. It still made her a bit self-conscious. He'd already told her she was still as gorgeous as ever, that it would heal and fade into her beautiful skin in time. He'd even run his fingers over the scar when they were out a couple of nights back, and his body had hummed to life when she grew still under his touch and licked her lips.
She still wanted him. He was sure of it. And that's what made shit like this so much harder. Watching her across the room with him, the other man in her life and in her story, reading her book that made it seem as if that was where she belonged. It was all some horrible form of karmic retribution. It had to be, because all the while he knew deep down that if he was given an opening, if he could just get her alone long enough to show her how much of that familiar magic they still had, he could get her back. He could make her sigh, and whisper, and scream how much she still wanted him. He could do things to her body that should be criminal. He'd make her beg for him to do them again and again, and then he would until she begged him to stop.
He sighed and took a long, mind-numbing swig of his drink. Vodka might not be able to help him out tonight. It'd been a while since he'd had sex, and it was really starting to fuck with his equilibrium. Everything she did and said made him think about her naked and gasping under him. He would scroll through the thousands of memories he had of fucking her into submission, taking every opening of her soft, curvy frame and filling it up with his come. The sound of her groans and the way his hand connected sharply with her supple flesh was the stuff that haunted him during idle moments of the day, and especially at night. A relatively popular, good-looking musician like him had pussy flying towards him every day, and all he could think about was getting inside of Nicole Langley's again.
"Okay, you have got to stop staring at her like that," Nuke said, exasperation tingeing his voice. "It's obvious what you're thinking and The Warden's got his eyes on you, so chill the fuck out."
Gabriel looked at Nuke with his most eloquent "shut the fuck up, man" expression and turned his attention back to the throng of people celebrating Nicole's first novel. And sure enough, Nuke was right. Travis' eyes were on him, triple-dog-daring Gabriel to look at his girl one more time like he wanted to take her in a back room and have his way with her in that pretty little red dress.
And as if taking on Travis' dare, his mind started to wander over all the things he could do if that fantasy were to become a reality. Would he turn her around and hike the skirt up over that delicious ass of hers? Or, would he pull down the top so he could he play with her breasts while she kneeled in front of him and sucked him between her full, red lips. Or, maybe he'd just lay her down on some dirty floor, dress be damned, and plow into her missionary style so he could watch her face while he made her come for him. He wouldn't even bother to peel off her panties before he took her... if she was even wearing any. Just shoving them to the side would be enough...
"Fuck..." he hissed, wiping a hand down his weary face. He was torturing himself and he couldn't stay here any longer. He didn't care if it looked bad. It would look worse to stand around staring at her like a hungry wolf eying an all-too-knowing-lamb, one that was practically begging him to eat her if he was reading the subliminal messages right. The tag-team ache of his cock and his heart was too much to bear.
He made his way over to her, and his heart leapt when her smile widened and she looked up at him the way she had so many times before. Like she was truly happy to see him.
"Hey you! Enjoying the party?" she asked. "Jackie did a pretty decent job, huh?"
"Yeah, she did," he said, eying the decorations, the displays of her book, and the well-dressed people munching on tiny delicacies and enjoying drinks from the bar. "All these people are here just for you."
"I know right? It's got to be a huge practical joke, or something." She giggled lightly, sweeping hair out of her eyes.
"Nah, everyone knows exactly why they're here. You did a great job and you deserve it," he said softly. "I'm so proud of you, sweetheart."
There was a wistful moment of silence, but it didn't last long. Gabriel had forgotten himself and this time Travis was there to catch him. He turned away from a peripheral conversation he'd been listening to and wrapped an arm around Nicole's waist.
"Yeah, we're all really proud of her. Nice of you to come out and show your support for the book. I know a busy musician like you should be off making music or trading in groupies, right?"
Gabriel watched Nicole bite her lip, a dark cloud drifting over the light in her onyx eyes.
"Yeah," Gabriel said with a good-natured smile, rubbing his chin to keep from clenching his fist. He swept his dark jacket and maroon shirt away from his waist and shoved the other hand into the pocket of his dark jeans. "Fucking fame-whores and making forgettable tunes is what it's all about. Nice to see you don't buy into clichés about the business and completely write people off, Travis. That's really thoughtful of you."
It was almost worth it to see the utter shock on both of their faces. Nicole's lips twitched upwards, and then she made an attempt to laugh off his words. But Travis wasn't willing to play that game, and tonight neither was Gabriel.
"I'd love to stay, Nicole, but I gotta..." He didn't even bother to lie and say he had somewhere to be. He was too weary. He just bent down and gave her a kiss on the cheek and a hug. "Congratulations, Nicole. You did real good."
She looked up at him when he pulled away, her fingers clinging to the arms of his jacket and her eyes were pleading with him.
It almost broke his heart when she said, "You're leaving already?"
He wanted to take it back then, but that annoying fucker was practically waving him off, telling him he wasn't welcome here anymore and he knew Nicole wouldn't argue with him.
"Yeah. I'm sorry. But, um, I'll call you later, or something. Save me an autographed copy, okay?"
She nodded, and plastered on a smile. "Okay, I will."
And the truth was he didn't know if he even meant that or not. Why would he want an autographed copy of his own demise? Or, was it just another token from her that he wanted, a piece of her handwriting or proof she was thinking about him, that she once wanted him.
He walked out feeling like his skin was on too tight, like he couldn't breathe. He sensed something shifting in the air, but he couldn't touch it, he couldn't stop it. That smirk on her boyfriend's face, the book, his music, it was all a huge dose of truth that was painful going down, that sat heavy as lead in his gut and warned him that something was about to give.
"Gabe! Gabriel!?"
He turned just a few feet from the corner where he was about to hail a cab and saw Nicole shuffling in her heels to reach him faster.
She was holding her arms against the cold air, a slight shiver already passing over her soft limbs. Why hadn't he realized how cold it was?
"What are you doing out here? It's freezing, go back inside."
"I'm s-sorry about what he said in there. He d-didn't mean to be r-rude."
Gabriel sighed, shook his dark hair out of his eyes and peeled off his jacket. He draped it over her shoulders and tucked it tightly around her chin, moving her to side to let people pass them by. She looked so cute swallowed up in the fabric, rubbing herself inside of it for warmth, and he had to resist the urge to pull her to him and kiss heat back into her gorgeous body.<
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"Actually, sweetheart, I'm pretty sure he meant to be ruder, but he didn't want to upset you. And this is your night; you shouldn't be worried about him or me."
"But I a-am w-worried about... f-f-fuck me sideways, it's f-freezing out here!!" she muttered skipping from one foot to the other and shaking like she'd just taken a straight shot of strong alcohol.
He groaned and leaned his forehead against hers. "You can't say those words around me anymore, Nicole. At least not tonight."
"What words?" she asked. Then she caught his eyes and shuddered. Not from the cold either. "Oh. Oh, I'm—"
"You shouldn't be out here with me. He's going to get the wrong idea. Shit, he already does, doesn't he?"
She didn't answer that, but she didn't need to. It was clear there'd been talk of her relationship with Gabriel. Bad talks, like the ones in her book.
"But I didn't want you to leave upset or sad," she whispered, forcing the words out through clenched teeth to avoid the sound of them chattering. "I just want things to be okay. It's been going so well." She was barely talking to him now. She was convincing herself, a franticness in her voice that belied the certainty her words should hold.
He swallowed back his fear of the future and said, "Yeah, it has," even though the truth was he'd been circling the drain of his own private hell for months now, drawing closer and closer to that big, black hole at the bottom.
"Don't worry, okay? I talked to him," she said with a big grin and a sniffle. "It's gonna be alright. He just needs a little coaxing, a little smoothing over."
He nearly shattered his teeth thinking about how she might be able to coax Travis into not feeling threatened by him. He'd been privy to that kind of coaxing himself. He knew how powerful it felt.
His head was swimming. He was too close to her, and his mind circled too many dirty thoughts for this to be wise. He was stronger than this, stronger than his dick's acute urges.
All he could muster was, "Okay, Nic," his voice hoarse with longing, sadness, and a sense of foreboding he couldn't shake.
A plume of smoke from his mouth met hers, entwined and then floated up between them. His hands shook with the desire to pull her to him. Several cabs had already passed by. It would be so easy to end this torture. A tug and a few steps and they would be inside of one, huddling together in the warmth as they rode back to his place. He doubted he’d be able to wait that long to touch her though. He couldn’t help but imagine the show they’d give the cab driver as he lay her down in the back seat...
"You have to go. Now," he said through gritted teeth.
"Shit, I'm sorry. You must be so cold."
He swallowed hard, looked up just in time to see confirmation that she should go: Travis was at the doorway, waiting for her.
She followed his eyes, turned back to him and shook her head. "Men," she said.
A fitting sentiment for the kind of woman that could have two of them pitted against each other, a woman who didn't realize just how desirable and precious she was. She relinquished his jacket, and when he slid it back on he could feel her warmth, the sweet tendrils of her scent filling his nose and wrapping around his tortured member, teasing it into the fierce beginnings of true arousal.
"I'll talk to him. It'll be okay," she said. She was already backing up. "I'm really glad you came!"
And before he could say something trite like he was glad she'd invited him, she turned around and headed back to Travis. He hailed a cab, got inside and sighed with gratitude at the blast of heat. He sat for a second, giving halting instructions to the driver, because he was distracted by the uncomfortable looking exchange between Travis and Nicole.
She'd promised it would be alright. But when her eyes locked on his as he drove past and Travis stormed back inside, something in him began to unravel. Something told him that tonight the fragile façade he'd built up had suffered a fatal crack. Life imitated art. Art imitated life. His songs these days were all about getting back the one that got away. And her book was all about letting that person go for something better.
He wasn't sure which of their art was stronger, but judging from the way Nicole had lowered her head when their eyes met, he'd wager it wasn't his.
***
Nicole sat in her car for a good thirty minutes before she got it together. Every time she thought she could do it, every time she tried to leave the car, she burst into tears. She watched kids ride by on their bikes, couples walking hand in hand with scarves wrapped around their necks and hats on their heads, oblivious to the cold because for them, love and a winter coat was enough to fight it.
Love. She started to cry again at just the thought of that twisted, double-edged sword of a word. Since she was a little girl she'd been given a pre-packaged idea of what the word meant. She loved her mother, her sister, and her father. She loved the pets she’d had growing up. She loved writing, and books, and music. She loved springtime and she loved how the leaves changed in fall. She loved all of those things at once, and yet when it came to love between a man and woman, it was do or die. One or the other, not both; a crossroads where the only certainty was the choice you made to walk down one of those paths.
She hadn't known this was going to happen, though she should have sensed it. Maybe two weeks ago, a month ago she would have been relieved. But in the time it had taken her to prove to herself that she could function with Gabriel in her life, she'd come to crave that friendship. Or, in actuality, she had just come to crave his presence. She couldn't lie to herself and say that sometimes the lines between old friends and old lovers didn't blur. But she'd been willing to work around them, to make space for him and allow herself to acknowledge the space she'd saved for him in her heart.
And it had backfired. The minute she told Travis she loved him, the second she tacked that word onto her choice to be with Travis, everything changed. Travis had his ideas about love, too. If she loved him, there was no more room for Gabriel in her life. He was sure Gabriel still wanted her, still loved her the way a person couldn't conceive of loving someone they deemed just a friend.
"It's not about you, Nicole. It's him," he'd said that night after her party, weary from an hour of arguing. "All he has to do is look at you, and it's clear. Everyone can see it. He knows he fucked up and he wants you back. All he needs is a moment of weakness from you. A bad day, a bad week. All he needs is a sign from you that you want him back. How can you ask me to be okay with him as your friend, when I know what he's after?"
And that's when she realized that pride was no substitute for the truth. Gabriel had said as much, had promised that and more if she so much as whispered she wanted him back. Since he'd spoken those words, the weight of them hung in every conversation, every glance. They followed her into her dreams, and when she woke they made guilty fingers rush over the skin he used to make feverish with ecstasy.
It stopped being all right to be friends with Gabriel long before the night of her book release party. But she hadn't wanted to let go. She hadn't realized until then the reason she truly wanted to hold onto him was because she simply couldn't let go. She loved him more than she realized.
"Okay," she'd said finally. She was tired of fighting, tired of lying to herself. She didn't want to start lying to Travis, too. Her back faced Travis and she forced a steady voice, forced her eyes to remain dry. "I'll... I'll end it. If that's what you need."
He didn't say anything. A week later and they still hadn't talked about it.
Travis had gone from jealous and possessive, to quietly apologetic and lost. He didn't know how to reach her. He didn't know how to handle how hard she was taking ending things with Gabriel. She didn't have the heart to pretend it didn't hurt her. She could have said it was the lack of trust. She could have said it was truly just his friendship she desired and that giving it up was at the heart of the matter.
But she wasn't a liar. So she said nothing. And finally, heavy-hearted and ill, she drove a few blocks away from Gabriel's apartment to avoid being seen entering h
is place teary-eyed by paparazzi, and then sat sobbing into her hands while time fluttered past her, taunting her with her inevitable mission.
She wasn't even good at pretending. She loved Travis. But she still loved Gabriel, too. Loved him so much that she tried to delude herself into thinking this tight rope of friendship would be enough, just so she could have him near. It was all her fault.
Everything flashed before her eyes. From the beginning, from the first time he caught her in his room years ago all the way up to these last moments. This was what their love had come to. The very thought of looking back on this and him years from now, and having it all come down to cutting him out of her life on a chilly winter afternoon made her feel like her heart was ripping at the seams. She felt it tear her in two all over again. She hated herself for that. She'd tried so hard to move beyond this ache. She wanted so badly to be stronger than this. Realizing how weak she truly was broke her. She wiped at the never-ending stream of tears with both hands, begging for mercy from some unseen source, for a little help because she didn't know if she could do this alone. She didn't know if she could say goodbye to Gabriel like this again. For good.
It took her a half-hour of weeping, blowing her nose and willing herself to get out of the car, before she finally could. Her steps were leaden and she felt hollow. A husk of human flesh masquerading as a girl named Nicole. She barely saw the world around her as she neared his building. Only the sinking sense of inevitability served as her map, letting her know when she'd reached his place with a painful squeeze in her chest where that useless heart must be.
She bit down on her lip to keep from crying and hit the buzzer. She almost sobbed when she heard his voice asking who it was.
"It's me," she said softly, willing herself not to cry as he let her into the building.
Chapter Eleven
He knew as soon as he saw her face he knew that something was horribly wrong. Her eyes were red and weary looking. Her voice was quiet, and she refused to sit down or take anything to drink. In a morbid, twisted way, he hoped it had to do with Travis. Had they broken up? Maybe there was trouble in paradise. He knew just the way to cheer her up.