Stubborn Love

by Natalie Ward

  Eventually though, it’s Mia who takes things further. I feel her hands as they slide up under my t-shirt. I think I’m going to explode just from her touch, from the feel of her fingers on my bare skin again, her nails as they dig into my back. Fuck I want this, want her. I am desperate for her and I know she must be able to feel what she’s doing to me. I’m as hard as a rock now and I couldn’t hide it even if I wanted to. I try to angle my lower half away from her.

  “Are you okay?” she asks, pulling back a little to look me in the eye as she presses her hips harder against mine and feels everything she is doing to me.

  I stop and look at her. “Definitely, are you?”

  Smiling she pulls away and takes my hand. “Almost,” is all she says as she leads me through the living room, past the closed door of the spare room and into my bedroom, where she closes the door behind us, locking both of us in here, alone.

  Fuck, it really is going further.

  I stand, unable to move as Mia walks towards me. I can’t speak and I can’t take my eyes off her. She’s smiling at me and I feel like there is no one else in this world but her. We are finally alone, with no chance of interruption and both of us finally on the same page about what we want here.

  I watch mesmerised as she pulls off her top to reveal an unbelievably sexy black bra. Her hands move to her jeans, and I watch as she pushes them down, silently undressing in front of me, but never once taking her eyes off my face. The look she gives me when she’s standing there in nothing but her underwear is what undoes me, finally gets me moving. I can’t take it any more so I step towards her, holding her eyes as I take her hand in mine and bring it to my mouth, kissing each of her fingertips. Stepping even closer, I kiss the bare skin just below her collarbone. Kiss all down her arm to her elbow, her wrist, the palm of her hand.

  “You are beautiful Mia, so fucking beautiful,” I murmur into her skin. It smells like vanilla, a scent I forever associate with her now.

  “You make me feel beautiful,” she whispers softly and it almost breaks my heart hearing her say that. How could she possibly think she isn’t beautiful; how could she even doubt it?

  But I don’t get a chance to say anything else as Mia slides her hands under my shirt and lifts it over my head. Her hands trace their way down my chest, sending jolts of electricity all through me. Her fingers find my belt now, undoing the buckle and buttons, before pushing them down my hips. I help her out, shoving them down my legs and over my feet, flinging them somewhere across the room. Mia bites her bottom lip, her eyes still on mine as she reaches out and slips her hand inside my boxers. I suck in a hard breath when her hand finds out exactly what she’s doing to me.

  Fuck I want her, so bad.

  I look down into her eyes, which are still fixed on mine. And this time, I see everything I want to see. I see Mia’s eyes are focused and determined. I see that she knows exactly what she is doing, and I see the want and desire I know is definitely in my eyes too.

  “Hey you,” I whisper to her, smiling as I step closer so our bodies are touching.

  “Hey yourself,” she answers, smiling back at me.

  I lean down and kiss her again, the taste of her mouth on mine pulling a groan from my throat, as I wrap my arms around her. Mia has one hand on my chest, the other on my dick, gently stroking me and I know I’m gonna lose it very quickly if she doesn’t stop soon. Somehow though, I can’t bring myself to ask her to.

  “Do you have any protection?” she murmurs into my mouth.

  Thank fuck I do, I think to myself as I whisper, “Yes,” against her lips, because my balls will surely explode if she makes me stop right now. I back her towards the bed, where I gently push her down so she’s sitting on the edge. Smiling at her, I reach over and open the drawer beside my bed, pulling out a row of condoms to show her.

  Mia laughs a little when she sees them, before gently biting her lip and saying, “Isn’t that a little ambitious?”

  I look down at her smiling face, unable to wipe the grin off my own. “Is that a challenge?” I ask, wondering if she remembers.

  “Think you’re up for it?” she asks me, the adorable smile on her face telling me she does.

  “I told you Mia,” I whisper as I lean down to kiss her, my hands resting on either side of her hips now. “Anytime, anywhere.”

  My lips are less than an inch away from hers when she says, “So that’s a yes then?”

  I gently nibble on her bottom lip, run my tongue along it as I answer, “That’s a fuck yes, Mia.”

  Mia laughs now as she grabs my hips and slides her hands around to my ass, pushing my boxers down so I am completely naked. She pulls me down onto the bed beside her, her hands sliding all over me. All over my chest, my stomach and my hips. I am dying to taste her, but I want to make this moment last, so I force myself to take it slow, even as she starts to drive me crazy with her hand on my dick again.

  “Mia,” I practically beg, as I slide my fingers up her back and undo her bra.

  She just laughs, before kissing me again, her fingers still holding me. I throw her bra across the room before reaching down and grabbing her wrist. I pull her hand back to my mouth where I kiss her palm, gently bite her thumb. She laughs again and I roll over, bringing her with me, so she’s lying on top of me now.

  “These,” I say, sliding my fingers into the side of her panties and pushing them down her hips. “Need to go.”

  She shuffles around so we can get them off and then takes them from my hand and flings them across the room, where they join her bra somewhere near the door. I can’t help but laugh before she pushes her mouth against mine in a hard kiss that silences everything. She’s grinding her hips against mine and kissing me like she can’t get enough and although it’s hot and sexy as fuck, I need to make this last. I’ve spent months dreaming about this and I don’t want it to be over too soon.

  “Mia,” I beg again. “Go slow, I want to go slow.”

  “I need you now, Jared,” she says urgently as she reaches for the condoms. “We can go slow next time.”

  I swear my heart stops in my chest at her words. At her needing me now, at her mention of a next time. It makes me lose my mind and as soon as the condom is on, I’m rolling us over and pushing inside her. The groan she lets out is sexy as hell, but it’s how she feels that really gets me.

  “Fuck Mia, you feel amazing,” I growl against her throat. I’m kissing her skin, kissing all over her neck, her chest, her lips, anywhere I can.

  “Jared, please,” she commands, and it undoes me completely.

  I start to move; hard, fast, giving her exactly what she wants. Mia is moaning against my mouth now as she kisses me and it’s only getting me harder, getting me so fucking turned on. I drive myself into her and her legs wrap around my hips, forcing hers higher as she rises up to meet me. I move one of my hands down so I can touch her, because at this rate, I am really not going to last much longer.

  And then I don’t, and neither does Mia. Both of us coming together, the sound of our groans the only noise filling the room.

  Today, 1:33am – Mia

  “We did find a way, which was just as well, because apparently just kissing you wasn’t enough,” I say, my hands covering my cheeks as I feel them get hotter.

  Jared smiles, threading his fingers together as he rests his hands on his stomach. I glance at them, picture my own hands resting in that exact same spot, against his hard flat abs, his warm skin. I feel a flutter in my stomach.

  “It wasn’t for me either,” Jared eventually says, smiling at me still.

  “It was good between us, wasn’t it?” I eventually ask, lowering my hands to my lap.

  Jared smiles at me. “Yeah it was Mia, really good.”

  “Even if it did get off to that rocky start?” I suggest, smiling back at him.

  Jared laughs a little now. “Rocky? Maybe confusing would be a better word,” he says.

  “Yeah, nothing like me throwing my drunken ass at you and making
a complete fool of myself as a solid start to a relationship.”

  Jared’s smile disappears now. “You didn’t make a fool of yourself Mia,” he says, his voice serious. “I just didn’t want you to regret it. And I didn’t want you doing it for the wrong reasons.”

  I watch, as he looks at me, open my mouth to tell him that there’s no way I ever would have regretted it, even if it had been the only kiss we’d ever shared.

  “I wanted you to want to kiss me and I wanted you to remember it,” he says, before I get a chance to say anything. “Because Mia I knew, it was going to be a moment I’d never forget.”

  I’m completely speechless. I had no idea it was such a huge moment for him, that it had meant that much to him.

  “No?” I say quietly.

  Jared blinks. “No,” he says. “Never.”

  We sit in silence, both of us watching the other and I can’t help but wonder, hope even, that maybe it’s still enough for him. That I, am still enough for him.

  “You snuck out though,” he eventually says. “That first night.”

  “I know,” I say, moving my hands and sliding them under my butt so I don’t reach out for him. “I was nervous. I did want more, a lot more, but I thought it was a bad idea, I always had,” I say. “I was scared of our connection, scared at how much I wanted you, especially when I knew I shouldn’t even be thinking about it.”

  “What, why?” he asks.

  I look down and take a deep breath, knowing I have to start right at the beginning if I’m going to have any chance of him understanding where I’m coming from. He still might not get it completely, but I know it’s where I need to start.

  “Once,” I say, my voice quiet. “Luke had this friend, some guy from school.” I glance up at Jared and see he is still watching me, his hands still clasped together on his stomach. “I was only sixteen at the time, so it was a year before he left, but I’d gone to visit him at school. This friend of his, I don’t know why, but he’d taken an interest in me.”

  “What?” Jared says, his head lifting sharply off the headboard to look at me.

  “Not like that,” I tell him, even though it probably was like that. “Luke and I had run into him while we were out together and he’d sort of invited himself to join us. Neither of us really wanted him there, but I guess Luke was just being nice, and I felt like I couldn’t really say anything.”

  Jared is watching me intently now, listening as I tell him this story. I can see the wheels turning inside his head, I already know he will hate Brian because I can already imagine the things he’s picturing. Even now, it hurts just to think about it, but it hurts even more when I realise what Jared is going to think when he hears what this has to do with him.

  “Anyway, we went out, got some lunch together. This guy, Brian, spent the whole time talking to me. Asked me a million questions about where I was going to go to school, what I’d major in, blah, blah, blah. It drove me crazy because all I wanted to do was talk to my brother, spend time with him.”

  “Should have just told this guy to fuck off,” Jared says, his voice low, but firm.

  I half laugh, knowing that’s exactly what I wanted to do, but being too scared to do it. “I know, but I was only sixteen, remember?”

  “Didn’t Luke say anything to him?” he asks.

  I breathe out. “Yeah, he did, but you know what Luke’s like. Sometimes he’s too nice for his own good. I don’t think he wanted to be rude to this guy.”

  “So what happened then?”

  I take a deep breath. “Well, after we went to lunch, we decided to go and see a movie,” I continue, nervous now.

  Jared fingers unlock, his hands sliding off his stomach as he pushes himself into a sitting position. “And?”

  I fix my eyes on his chest, unable to watch Jared’s face as I tell him this. “And, sometime during the movie, Brian tried to do something that I didn’t want him to do.”

  “What?” Jared says now, his body jerking on the bed. “Where the hell was Luke?”

  “He was on the other side of me, but it was dark,” I say quietly. “But when he noticed me jump away from Brian, when he saw what was happening, what he was trying to do, well the next thing I knew, I was yanked out of my seat and Luke and I were walking out of the movie theatre.”

  “He didn’t say anything to him, do anything to teach him a lesson?”

  I finally lift my eyes to look at him. “Luke is not my father, Jared. He isn’t like that.”

  Jared’s eyes close, a look of regret passing over his face. “Yeah I know, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean it like that.”

  I reach out, tentatively squeeze his feet to let him know I understand. I know he doesn’t see Luke like that. I know that any other person, Jared included, would’ve punched Brian because it was exactly what the idiot deserved. Hell, even I should’ve punched him and if he’d pulled that stunt on me today, I would. But it’s just not Luke, it never was and it never will be, and I get that too.

  “If it makes you feel any better, Luke did throw a soda at him.”

  I watch as he tries to laugh, but fails. His eyes open and they are watching me once more. “I would have decked the fucking asshole myself, but yeah, I get why that didn’t happen.”

  I leave my hand resting on his feet, my eyes still locked onto his beautiful blue ones. The care and concern is back in them now and it melts my heart a little, gives me another tiny ounce of hope.

  “Were you okay Mia, he didn’t hurt you, this Brian guy?”

  I run my thumb over his toes. “No, he didn’t hurt me Jared, I was more shocked than anything,” I say, half smiling at him. “The only thing that hurt was Luke losing a friend, because of what happened that day, because of me.”

  Jared is staring at me, his hands moving so they are resting back on his stomach now. He takes a deep breath as though he’s choosing his words carefully. “It wasn’t your fault you know,” he eventually says. “Guys like that are born assholes and Luke would have found out sooner or later.”

  I bite my bottom lip, wishing that was true. “Maybe, but to a sixteen year old girl who idolised her brother, the one person who loved her and protected her from everything, I felt pretty fucking awful for what had happened.”

  “And that’s what you thought would happen with us?” he asks, his voice hurt now.

  I squeeze my fingers around his toes, desperately holding on. “It’s not that I thought you were like him, Jared. You’re as far from Brian as it’s possible to get. But…” I close my eyes, nervous at what I’m about to say next. “…But, I was scared that one day you would be forced into something, a situation that meant you had to pick one of us and that you’d pick me over him.”

  “It wouldn’t have been like that Mia,” Jared says quickly, interrupting me. “I wouldn’t have done that.”

  “You don’t know that Jared,” I tell him, knowing that in some ways, it did come down to that in the end. “But I knew, I didn’t ever want to be responsible for Luke loosing another friend. Ever again.”

  I watch as Jared’s eyes close as he starts to understand what I did, why I was so scared. Scared of being with him because I didn’t want to come between his and Luke’s friendship, scared of all the things that could mean.

  If only he realised there was more to be told.

  Four years ago – Jared

  I wake to the sound of rain against the window. As I open my eyes, the first thing I see are four empty condom wrappers, lying on the floor. I smile at the memory, at all the amazing things that happened last night. We might have gone hard that first time, but we made up for it by going slow the second time. Third time too, which was possibly the slowest and hottest of them all. The fourth was faster again, both of us pushing each other as we exhausted ourselves in the best possible way. I’m sure I fell asleep immediately; my body curled around Mia’s and no doubt a massive fucking smile on my face.

  I have never met a woman who’s made me feel like this. I always knew there w
as something between us, a connection that couldn’t be ignored. And I knew that all of the things I feel for her are more than what I’ve ever felt for any other woman. And because of that, I always knew if anything did ever happen between us, it would be really fucking good.

  But last night, yeah shit, last night totally blew my fucking mind.

  Smiling, I roll over to see if Mia might be interested in setting a new challenge today. I have no idea what time it was when we finally did fall asleep and I’m still dead tired this morning, but I know I won’t have any problem if she’s up for it.

  Problem is, my bed is empty, Mia is gone.

  “Fuck,” I exhale, raking my hands down my face in frustration. Had she seriously snuck out in the middle of the night? My hand moves to the empty pillow beside me even though I know she isn’t there. It’s not even warm on her side of the bed anymore. I wonder when she snuck out, whether she even bothered to go to sleep or if she just waited until I drifted off.

  Annoyed that maybe last night hadn’t meant as much to Mia as I had originally thought, that it hadn’t meant as much to her as it had meant to me, I roll over to the side she once occupied. Pressing my nose to the pillow, I try to drink in the smell of her, remember what it had felt like to hold her, to kiss her, to touch her. Try to ignore how much I want to do it all again.

  I must have drifted off because the next thing I know, a warm body is sliding into bed beside me, pulling me from my sleep. I feel lips at my ear and warm breath that whispers, “Luke’s gone to work, do you have to go to work today?”

  It has to be a dream I think, as I roll over and find Mia beside me again, dressed now in a t-shirt and boxers that are both adorable and cover far too much of her.