“For a while,” he continued, “I was obsessed with understanding why he’d done it. I thought back to every time I’d seen him in the past year, looked all over his house for clues. The only odd thing about the house was that he’d cleared out the basement. It was as if he’d wanted me to have less to deal with afterward. But there was nothing else. He’d retired two years earlier, and maybe that was part of it, that his life felt empty without a job. But he was never particularly attached to his job. It was just a way to make a living. And if you knew my dad, he was nothing like me. He was the sort of easygoing guy who’d enjoy sitting around the TV with a few friends, watching the football game. I tried and tried, but I couldn’t understand how he’d come to take his own life. Eventually, I had to let it go and just accept.”
Blaine moved Cassie slightly apart from him, needing to see her face as he spoke. Her chin wobbled, but she said nothing as she trailed her hand up his back.
“Did you feel guilty?” she asked.
He let out a humorless laugh. “Lots of suicide survivors—the people left behind, that is—feel guilty, thinking, ‘If only I’d done this or that.’”
She nodded. “That’s what I’ve heard.”
“But not me. My dad never gave me a hint that anything was wrong, and I talked to him regularly, saw him once or twice a month. So even though I tried to understand what had happened afterward, I didn’t feel there was something else I should have done while he was alive. I didn’t feel guilty about that…but then I started feeling guilty that I didn’t feel guilty.” He laughed again without humor.
The silence stretched for a minute or two. Cassie was here with him, and he didn’t feel the need to fill it with meaningless words.
“I thought I was broken,” he said at last. “Most people have to learn to let go of the guilt, but I didn’t. I felt like a freak, like I wasn’t normal. And the one person who’d always thought I was okay just the way I was…he was dead. There was no one to reassure me.”
“Oh, Blaine.” She sounded so pained. “You are not a freak because you didn’t feel guilty. Don’t put that on yourself. You are okay, just the way you are.”
She sounded sincere. That made him feel a little better, so he went on.
“I kept working after he died. I liked having the structure of my regular life. But after a few months, I knew I needed to get away. So I threw a tent and a sleeping bag in the back of my car, and I just started driving. And then—”
“You met me.”
He recalled that moment in Tim Hortons when he’d first seen her. Just another Tim Hortons in a nondescript Ontario town, and he’d just been there to get a coffee, on the way to who-knew-where. Nothing special should have happened there, but it had.
“I saw you,” he said, “and the fog lifted. The world was in color again, and I could finally breathe. It felt just like love—love at first sight. But my rational side said it had to be an illusion, that I was feeling things that weren’t real. It was just me being emotionally needy because of how awful my life had been. That made more sense to me than love at first sight. How can you love someone you don’t know? So I told myself I would enjoy that wonderful feeling for a week, but it couldn’t last.”
She cupped a hand over the side of his face and stroked his cheek.
He swallowed. She could be so gentle and understanding.
“But it did last,” he said. “For over a year, half of me loved you, and the other half thought I was kidding myself. None of it made sense. Then I started dating again, and I knew. It was only you.”
He placed his hands on her cheeks and brought her face toward him in slow motion. He kissed her on the lips. Once, twice, three times.
“I also knew that I’d treated you badly and you might be reluctant to take me back. But I was finally convinced my feelings for you were real. I hoped yours were real, too, and if I apologized enough, you wouldn’t be able to say no to a relationship.”
He’d tried not to think about the alternative, not then.
“They’re real,” she said, pressing a kiss to his lips.
His heart stuttered. “You’ll stay with me?”
“I didn’t say that.”
The stutter became a painful twist. “Tell me what you need, and I’ll give it to you.”
She gazed into his eyes. “I need to believe, with absolute certainty, that you won’t leave me again. Because I wouldn’t survive that. I think I finally understand why you did what you did. But that doesn’t mean I can trust you.”
Despair washed through him. “What can I say to convince you?”
“I don’t know if there is anything.” She shook her head bleakly. “I just don’t know.”
Tonight he would drive her back to Georgeville.
It might be the last time he ever saw her.
Chapter Nineteen
Cassie had arrived in Ottawa with little more than her wallet, her phone, and a beaver costume. She’d had to borrow a toothbrush and a comb. But one thing she did have was her e-reader, which she carried in her purse out of habit.
With a cup of coffee on the table beside her, she lay back on the sofa with it now, her feet in Blaine’s lap as he picked up a science-fiction novel.
It was nice to be peaceful with him after that difficult conversation. It was nice to just be.
This was what a lazy weekend afternoon would be like if she lived with him—the two of them reading together and—
No. She would not let herself fantasize about that.
However, as she read her novel, she did some fantasizing of another kind. It was an erotic romance about a young woman who was curious about BDSM and went to a kinky party at a CEO’s mansion. Obviously, she attracted the attention of the CEO himself, and he took her to his playroom and did unspeakable things to her. Some of the things, Cassie had done with Leo…and hadn’t particularly enjoyed. Still, she found herself closing her eyes and picturing a man flogging her. She hadn’t gotten wet when Leo had done that. But the scenario was still something she could fantasize about—if it was with Blaine. Not that she wanted him to actually flog her in real life, but that was the great thing about fantasies…they were totally safe and painless.
“Cassie?” Blaine said softly—not in her imagination. “You awake?”
She put down her e-reader and climbed onto his lap, plucking the book from his hands and tossing it to the ground.
“I was reading about a BDSM party,” she said.
His eyes flared. “Is that so?”
She didn’t know how he did it so quickly, but two seconds later, she was flat on her back and he was on top of her, his weight pressing her into the couch. He pushed down the neckline of the burgundy dress and sucked on her nipple. She tipped her head back in pleasure. When he bit her lightly, that pleasure increased.
His hand dipped between her legs, and he pushed aside her panties and touched her.
“Are you sore?” he asked.
“Yes. But not so sore that you can’t fuck me. Just be a little gentler than usual.”
He swirled a finger around her clit. “Good. And don’t forget, you promised we could do it again someday.”
“I misspoke,” she said, shifting a little closer. She had no plans to see him again after tonight.
“Next time, I’ll get a toy for you, and I’ll make you wear it for hours before I fuck you with my fist. And you won’t be allowed to get yourself off. You’ll just feel it inside you and squirm with need. Until I give you some relief.”
She squirmed against his hand, wanting him to do it now. “You’re trying to convince me to stay again.”
“Is it working?”
“I can’t forget the heartbreak.”
“Maybe this will help.”
He shifted and circled his tongue around her other nipple, sliding two fingers into her pussy. And she did, momentarily, forget about the heartbreak as he touched her body like no one else ever had.
She struggled with his shirt, so he sat up to pull
it over his head.
She wanted to memorize every detail of his body. This might be the last time she ever saw him naked.
She pushed that thought away.
Her hands went to his crotch, where her fingers fumbled with the zipper on his jeans. Eventually she got it, sliding her hand inside to grip him. He was deliciously hard for her.
Their touches were all desperation now. His mouth sloppily met hers before he pulled back.
“You know what I want?” he said. “To take you bare. Nothing between us. Perhaps you could go on the pill or get an IUD, and then…”
He was talking as though this would continue.
And oh God, she wanted him like that. Wanted him to slip inside her, just like this. No barriers.
He shoved her panties down and pushed up the skirt of her dress so he could rub his cock right against her.
“Wouldn’t you like that?” He dropped his voice. “Being able to feel my cum in your pussy? I could stay inside you until I got soft…”
Her inner muscles clenched.
“Stay with me,” he said. “Give us the chance to do that.”
She wanted it, but she couldn’t stay.
However…
“We don’t have to wait,” she said. “I went on the pill after the pregnancy scare, and I got tested a few months ago. I haven’t been with anyone since.”
His breathing went shallow and jerky. He rubbed himself against her again, more firmly this time. “I haven’t been tested in two years, but you’re the only woman I’ve been with since then.”
“Let’s do it, then. Please.”
He smiled and pressed the tip of his cock to her entrance. Was he going to plunge into her right now, just like that?
Her pulse rocketed. Then fell again when he rolled off.
He was being a tease.
He stood up and said, “Let’s go upstairs.”
…
They were naked in bed, skin against skin. Blaine kissed his way down Cassie’s neck to her breasts and over her stomach. Every inch of this woman was exquisite. He would never find anyone this lovely again. He pressed a kiss between her legs before continuing down her right thigh.
She groaned. “Please, Blaine.”
How he loved to hear her plead his name.
He kept kissing, all the way down to her toes, sucking one into his mouth before switching to the other foot and sliding his mouth upward again. His pace even more leisurely now, he kissed his way up to her left thigh. She grasped his hair in her hands, and then he was licking her pussy once more, glorying in all of her sexy noises and unconscious movements as she soared toward climax.
But he didn’t let her come. Not against his mouth. When he knew she was about to finish, he pushed his cock inside her, and she cried out as she tightened around him.
“Yes,” he said. “I’m here. I will always be here for you.”
She was so wet around him. So hot.
He kissed her as he moved slowly within her, nothing between them for the first time. It felt so right.
“You have to stay,” he whispered. “I need you.”
No matter what she’d said earlier… The fact that she was letting him inside her like this—it had to mean something, right?
He kept thrusting gently. Normally he would be rough with her, but all kinds of sex were amazing with Cassie. And this was a time to savor her, slowly and thoroughly.
“You feel so good,” she murmured. “So hard.”
“Only for you.”
He lost track of time when he was inside her. Eventually he slid out and sat on the edge of the bed. She sat on top of him, easing down onto his cock. He grabbed her breasts from behind, pinched her nipples, and she turned around for a kiss as she moved up and down.
“You’re mine,” he whispered. Wanting to claim her. Needing to own her, body and soul.
“You feel amazing,” she said.
He wrapped his arms around her, and they lay back on the bed together. He thrust into her from underneath, a little more urgently than before.
When he put his finger to her mouth, her tongue darted out and licked it. He dropped his hand between her legs, touching her clit, and she came once more, shattering on top of him.
Afterward, he rolled her onto her back, and then he was in her again. She seemed to be capable of nothing but whimpering beneath him.
“Slow down for a minute,” she whispered. “It’s too intense.”
He looked down at her and smiled. He knew what she meant. It was almost achingly intense, in a different way than their earlier activities.
He moved within her slowly, the only woman he would ever want. He could be with her over and over and over again, and he would never tire of it. How could you tire of perfection?
“Come inside me now,” she said. “I want to feel it.”
He picked up his pace for a few strokes, and then he spent himself with a savage combination of a growl, a scream, and a whimper.
He stayed inside her afterward, planting kisses over every inch of her skin that he could reach. Sweat held their bodies together, and her hair was a wild mess, but still, this was all so beautiful. She was so beautiful.
“Have you ever done that with another man?” he asked.
“No,” she said, and it was the answer he’d expected. And wanted, if he was honest. “You?”
“With an ex-girlfriend. Ten years ago, maybe?”
“I was still in high school then.”
“And I’d finished grad school.” He paused. “Do you think I’m too old for you?”
She shook her head. “Don’t be ridiculous.”
He slipped out of her and rolled onto his side, throwing his arm over her. But he couldn’t resist sliding his finger into her yet again, feeling his semen inside her body.
“In the unlikely event that you get pregnant, I will be there for you. You don’t ever have to worry.”
They lay like that for a little longer, then she went to the washroom to clean up. As he lay there alone, he felt a tightness in his chest as he realized that the reason she had agreed not to use a condom was not because she planned to stay with him.
No, she’d told him they could do it today because she wasn’t going to stay with him. This was the last chance they’d have to be together.
Chapter Twenty
The rest of the afternoon passed in quiet discomfort. Cassie read some more, but she could hardly concentrate on the words. And even when she could read the words, the sentences didn’t make sense. Still, she persisted. She needed to do something.
For dinner, Blaine made grilled chicken and salad. “Since we weren’t exactly healthy the rest of the weekend,” he said.
It was nice to have someone looking after her, but she refused to get used to it.
After dinner, she searched for the ammonite sketch she’d made yesterday and found it on the shelf with his collection.
“Blaine,” she said. He was in the kitchen, scrubbing a pot, but he came immediately. “Ammonites had soft bodies, right? There must have been something inside the shell. Like snails.”
“There was.”
“Do scientists know what they looked like?”
“They have a pretty good idea.”
“But soft bodies aren’t preserved, right?”
“In rare cases they can be. Very special conditions are required. For example, there is excellent preservation of the soft parts of animals in the Burgess Shale in British Columbia. But those are from the Cambrian, and I don’t think ammonites appeared until the Devonian.”
“I can’t figure out,” she said, “whether I would have learned better in school if you were my teacher, or if I would have been too distracted by your good looks to absorb any information.”
He chuckled. “Where is the Burgess Shale?”
“British Columbia. You just said that.”
“See? You would have learned just fine.”
She made a face at him. “You liked school, didn’t you?”
>
“I enjoyed university. Before that, I liked learning, but I didn’t always enjoy school. How about you?”
“I didn’t mind it, but there was never anything that truly captured me. Unlike you, who seems to find so much interesting.”
“Perhaps you just haven’t found the right thing yet.”
“Perhaps. I like art, but it’s a hobby. I’ve never had a desire to pursue it further.” She paused. “I do like my job, actually, working in healthcare. After the pregnancy scare, I got more interested in women’s health in particular. I’ve considered studying to be a nurse but never seriously. I’m not sure what I want, and sometimes it feels like it’s too late.”
“Which is ridiculous. You’re young.”
“I know,” she said. “I know.”
“You could live with me and go to school in Ottawa. Free accommodation.”
“Blaine. Don’t.”
He looked at her sadly. “You’re going to leave me, aren’t you?”
“I am.”
He sighed. “What can I do to change that?”
“Time machine?” she suggested. “Or you could knock me on the head and give me amnesia. But it would have to be just the right sort of amnesia, so I’d forget the week we spent together and how heartbroken I was afterward, but not the rest of my life. You’re an engineer. You should be able to figure it out.”
He quirked his lips as he picked up the picture of the ammonite.
“May I keep this?” he asked.
“Sure.”
He returned the drawing to the shelf. “I’d feel guilty if I needed to resort to amnesia. And if I had a time machine, I suppose I would try to save my dad, so we might never have met.”
There was no point in thinking about how things could have been different. It was what it was. They’d had one week plus a weekend together, and that would be the end of their story.
“Your father,” Blaine said. “He cheated on your mother, she took him back, and then he did it again with a different woman, right?”
Seriously? These were their last few minutes together, and he had to bring up that unpleasant memory? She ground her teeth and nodded. “That’s right.”
Seducing His True Love (Small Town Temptations) Page 12