by Aubry, A
“Wow, someone’s looking fancy for just a normal dinner with her ex,” Angie teased as she stopped playing peek-a-boo with Leo to look at me.
“He said to dress nice,” I advised.
“So, out of everything else you have in your closet, you chose your first date outfit?” She raised an eyebrow.
I shrugged and placed my clutch on the foyer table.
“Is someone looking for a renewal of their relationship?” Angie asked as she picked up Leo and walked over to me.
“It’s been a month since we separated. Shouldn’t I be over him by now?” I looked at her after putting on a bit of lip gloss.
“Not if it is meant to be. Sorry to break it to you but you two are meant to be together.”
“Just like you and Bo?” I smirked.
Angie blushed and brought up her left hand to show me the large engagement ring on her finger, “Yep. Just like us.”
“And how do you know we are supposed to be together, Ang?”
“It’s in the way that he looks at you and he talks about you. I had never seen a man more in love with his woman than when I saw Finn with you. Now, I see it in Bo when he looks at me. I know I told you to confront him when you caught him cheating. But you two are miserable.”
“I am not miserable,” I protested.
“Jules, be honest. When Leo is with Finn, all you do is work. When you have Leo, he is the center of your attention but once he goes to bed, you lay on the couch and watch rom-coms or Nicholas Sparks inspired movies. Just the other day you were crying over A Walk to Remember.”
“Uh, because she fucking dies in the end, that’s why.”
“No, because you found a love that was real and then something happened, and you temporarily fell apart. Talk to Finn tonight. Get his side of the story. He still loves you, I just know it.”
I sighed, “You have given pretty good suggestions thus far in our friendship…”
She smiled and bounced Leo on her hip, “Yep, the last best suggestion was when I told you to have sex to induce labor. By the end of the day, this little guy finally popped out.”
Rolling my eyes at her, Finn’s soft knock came on the door. I went to the door and opened it for him. He stood in front of me in his black dress slacks, white button up shirt, and black blazer.
“Woah, déjà vu,” I said aloud.
He smirked, “And you still look beautiful as ever in that dress.”
My cheeks flushed as I grabbed my clutch from the foyer table. I quickly turned back to Angie who held Leo.
“You be good, sweet boy. Mommy will be back soon. I love you,” I kissed the top of his head.
“Keep her out as long as you want,” Angie called out to us as we closed the door behind us.
I sighed, “Sorry about that, you know how Angie is.”
He chuckled, “Yep, she definitely hasn’t changed one bit.”
We climbed into his car and he started driving us towards our dinner reservations.
“She has changed one little bit…” I admitted.
“How so?” He asked, not taking his eyes off the road as he focused on the traffic ahead.
“Her and Bo got engaged.”
“So he finally did it. It’s about damn time. He’s been holding onto that ring for months.”
“You knew about it?” I looked over at him.
“Of course I knew about it. Bo is my best friend. Even asked me to be his best man at the wedding for whenever he did pop the question,” he took his eyes off the road as we sat at a red light.
“Yeah, Ang asked me to be her maid of honor.”
“Very fitting since you two are best friends.”
I nodded and looked out the window as we pulled into a parking space. When we stepped out of the car, a sign on the building said Bar La Grassa. It was a place I had never heard of. I followed Finn into the restaurant and to the table that the hostess led us to. It was in the back corner, almost like our first date. It was an Italian themed restaurant, just like where we went the first official date we had ever had. We ordered our meals and I took a sip of my water. I was nervous, but I knew I had to follow Angie’s advice and hear his side of the story.
“Why did you cheat on me?” I asked softly.
“I thought we were here to talk about Leo,” he cleared his throat after taking a sip of his drink. I had caught him off guard.
“And we will, but we need to talk about this first,” I rested my hands on the table, my fingers laced together, “Now, Finn. Why did you cheat on me?”
“To be honest, it felt nice to be wanted again,” he paused when the waitress came to refill our drinks.
“What do you mean wanted again?” I asked once she left.
“After Leo was born and I was back to work, it was like I took a back seat. You were always worried about Leo or talking about Leo whenever I was home. The only time I could get you to shut up about him was when we had sex. Then I knew that you were focused on me and me alone.”
“Finn, the only reason I talked about Leo so much to you was because you were gone a lot. You have practice during the day, away games where you are gone for a few days at a time. You miss things. You missed his first tooth finally pushing through, you missed when he first held a bottle all by himself. I thought if I filled you in when you got home on everything that we had done or what he had done, then you wouldn’t feel like you missed out on those things.”
“It does hurt me to miss those things. But it also hurts me to be away from my wife. When I come home, yes, rundowns of what happened with Leo are nice, but what I want is for my wife to tell me that she missed me. All I wanted was for us to snuggle on the couch and watch a movie like old times when Leo went to bed. I didn’t want to lose what we had before he was born,” he sighed and leaned back in his chair.
“We weren’t going to lose that part of ourselves. Yes, I doted on our son a little too much, but I was trying to make up for the fact that his father was traveling and couldn’t be there with him. This is all a learning experience for me as much as it is for you, Finn. Leo is our first child; all parents spoil their first kid with love and attention and neglect each other slightly. It takes some time for adjusting to finding the right balance.”
“Okay…I get that now…”
I took another drink of my water, my throat getting dry at the thought of my next question.
“Did you have sex with Victoria?”
“Nothing past oral.”
“Now all I’m gonna think about is your mouth on another girl and your fingers in another girl when I look at you,” I said, disgusted.
“Julianna, I never did anything to her.”
“You just said nothing past oral.”
“Okay, let me rephrase that, nothing past foreplay.”
“That’s the same damn thing!” I whispered harshly.
“No, it’s not. I never touched her besides her thighs and maybe her breasts once or twice.”
“They looked much better than mine,” I rolled my eyes.
“Hers were fake, not as good as your real ones.”
My mouth dropped open.
“So what, you just let her suck your cock?” I pursed my lips at how I felt like my voice carried as I said cock, but no one seemed to notice around us.
“She only gave me hand jobs.” He admitted quietly.
“God, you’re disgusting,” I sighed as I covered my face with my hands.
“I felt like you didn’t want me, Jules. What the hell was I supposed to do when a girl stuck her hand down my pants and jacked me off?”
“Uh, I don’t know? Maybe say, stop I’m married?”
“I told her that! Do you think I wouldn’t tell someone that I’m married? I wore my fucking wedding ring around her all the damn time! She didn’t give a fuck.”
I stood up abruptly from my chair, “I want to go home.”
Grabbing my sweater and my clutch, I stormed out of the restaurant. With my sweater on, I walked around the side of the
building, leaning against it as tears threatened to fall. I wiped my eyes, willing the tears to just go away.
“Julianna,” Finn finally said from beside me.
“Finn, this can’t work between us,” I quietly stated.
“And why not?”
“Because if you loved me, you wouldn’t have let a girl do that just because you felt like I didn’t want you. You didn’t fucking talk to me about how you felt. Am I supposed to read your damn mind now? Did I become psychic at some point in time and you know it, but I don’t?”
“But I do love you. I love you more than anything in the world.”
“Then why didn’t you fucking talk to me?!”
“Because I’m fucking stupid, okay? I followed my fucking hormones and they led me in the wrong fucking direction.”
I looked at him, “You can’t say that. I still had sex with you whenever you wanted to. I never told you no.”
He took a small step towards me, “In my mind, you weren’t all in it. I don’t know why I felt that way, but I did. I thought if you didn’t want to take care of me like that then fine. That was when I met Victoria because her dad is our medical coach. She practically threw herself at me. My body and mind reverted to its old ways of all the girls before you and found that attractive.
“But the more time I spent with her, the more I realized that I didn’t want anything with her, I wanted things with you. The night that you caught us at Yard House, I told her that we couldn’t do it anymore. I was going to come home and talk to you about all of this. You probably still would have fucking hated me like you told me you did that night, but at least I would have come clean to you then.”
“I didn’t tell you I hated you,” I whispered.
“What?”
“That night, when I caught you, I didn’t tell you I hated you.”
“I could have sworn you did, it felt like you did. My heart was so broken over how I had hurt you like that. I didn’t mean for it all to get that far. When Victoria first kissed me, I thought hey okay someone to just kiss every once in a while. But they weren’t your kisses, Julianna. They weren’t the ones that make my heart skip a beat or send electricity through my veins.
“Every time that I came home to you and you greeted me with a kiss, or I came over to whatever you were doing and you puckered your lips at me, that was one of the highlights of my day. You don’t understand what the fuck you do to me. Hell, I barely understand what the fuck you do to me. I will fight tooth and nail to get you back if I have to, Julianna. Not just because we have a son together but because I fucking love you.”
My heart raced as I watched him get so worked up over us. He didn’t understand what he did to me, how he made me feel, how he broke me when I caught him with her.
“Why do you love me?”
“Because you are you. You’re sarcastic, funny, smart, sassy, stubborn as all hell. You are incredibly sexy, and you take amazing care of our son. I love you because I know that you love me too and you will do whatever it takes for me to know that. I was an asshole, I shouldn’t have done what I did. But it’s too late for me to take it back now. We can either move forward from this or, we can just let each other go. But I will never love anybody like I love you. I will never want anybody as much as I want and need you in my life.”
“God damn it, Finn!” I yelled before I grabbed onto his shirt and pulled him into me, crashing my lips into his.
He pressed my back against the building as he coaxed my lips open for him. Without hesitation, my mouth let him in. His hands took mine off of his shirt and pinned them above my head against the wall, his fingers lacing with mine. I could hear my heart pounding in my chest, my body waking up at just the feeling of his mouth against mine, the feeling of our fingers interlaced.
“Come home with me,” I begged against his lips.
“Yes, baby,” he responded, pulling back.
I put my hands on my knees, breathing hard like I just ran a marathon. This was the spell that Finn McAllister had put under me over a year ago, it was still as strong as that very first night that we kissed outside of the bar. He took my hand in his as we walked back to the car. The ride to the house was silent, except for my unexpected panting which I was praying that Finn couldn’t hear.
Finn pulled into the driveway, unable to pull into the garage because I had taken his garage door opener away when he moved out. He got out of the car and raced around to open my door. When I stepped out he closed the door behind me. Taking one step towards me to close the distance, Finn put his hand on my cheek and I leaned into his touch.
“Are you sure you still want this?” He was giving me an out, but I didn’t want to use it.
“Take me to bed, Finn,” I said softly.
He lifted me up, wrapping my legs around his waist as my hands took their place against his neck. My mouth covered his once more as our kiss picked up exactly where it left off. Finn carried me into the house, closing the front door behind us with his foot. Angie asked me how dinner was from the living room, but I didn’t answer her, my tongue was too busy being massaged my Finn’s. She saw us as Finn carried me up the stairs and to our bedroom. I reached out and pushed the door closed before Finn took us over to the bed.
He sat me down and pulled my dress over my head, humming in approval at the black lace push up bra I had worn underneath with matching lace panties. I pushed his blazer off and onto the floor before quickly unbuttoning each button on his shirt. Finn reached behind me as he kissed me deeply once more, unhooking my bra and dragging it off, my panties joining them on the floor soon after. My hands made quick work of his pants and boxers. I scooted backwards on the bed, laying my head against the pillows, expecting Finn to just cover my body with his and dive right in.
When his mouth started heading south, I stopped him. He looked at me confused and maybe even a little disappointed.
“No foreplay, I want all of you right now,” I ordered quietly.
“Anything for you,” he replied, crawling up my body.
He paused halfway, “I don’t have a condom.”
We had gone back to using condoms to avoid getting pregnant again too quickly. We wanted to adjust to having one child before we threw another one in the mix.
“Let’s take our chances,” I mumbled, sitting up and bringing my lips back to his.
It was like the time we made love on the floor of the hospital bathroom after I woke up, after my assault from Michael. We took our chances then, and we were taking them again now. Our relationship was all about taking chances.
Finn returned my kiss as he pushed my legs open for him, he slowly sunk into me.
“Fuck, yes,” he groaned against my lips.
Shit, how could I have missed his body this much? Was it possible to be addicted to someone else’s body? As Finn started to set up a rhythm, I almost didn’t want to open my eyes. I was afraid that if I did, this would all just be a fantasy and I would wake up alone in my bed like I had for the last month.
“Julianna, look at me,” he whispered, brushing my hair from my face.
“What if this is all just a dream?” I asked quietly.
He thrust into me hard and I moaned.
“Did that feel like a dream?”
I opened my eyes to see Finn’s chocolate brown one’s gazing down at me, “There’s my girl.”
My arms wrapped around his neck as I kept my eyes on his. His mouth opened slightly as he took in deeper breaths of air, a groan escaping every once in a while. Mid-thrust, the baby monitor beside the bed came alive with Leo’s cries. Finn stilled, unsure of what to do next.
“Just let him cry,” I said, pushing against him to encourage him to keep going.
“I don’t think I can ignore that sound, Jules,” Finn responded quietly.
I reached over and turned off the baby monitor, “There, problem solved. Now keep fucking me.”
“Oh, baby,” he groaned as he picked up his pace.
A loud moan escaped my lips as
my nails dug into his back. If we were the only two home with the baby, then yes, we would have responded to Leo’s cries if he didn’t stop after a few minutes. Leo had gotten pretty good at soothing himself back to sleep if he wasn’t hungry or had a dirty diaper. But I knew the second that Angie saw us as Finn carried me up to our room, our mouths connected, she would stay the night to help us out with Leo. Finn and I needed to get back to basics, reconnect with one another.
Finn hit my desire head on over and over and I felt like I couldn’t breathe the pleasure was so overwhelming.
“Shit, right there, Finn…god…I’m gonna come,” I gasped.
“I love you, Julianna,” Finn moaned as he thrust harder, he was almost there too.
“I love you more, Finn,” I breathed as I brought his lips back down to mine.
Explosions took over my body as my orgasm released. I felt my body come alive inch by inch as pleasure washed over me. Finn called out my name as he met his orgasm, my body milking him for every last drop of his release. He collapsed on top of me, pushing my body into the mattress. My hand dragged up and down his back, my ring finger still not used to the absence of my rings. Did this mean we made up? Would we get back together and really give our best fighting chance at happily ever after?
Finn rolled over onto his side of the bed, pulling up the blankets over our bodies. I stared up at the ceiling, trying to figure out what this all meant.
“What are you thinking about, Winnie?” His soft voice said from beside me.
My lips turned up into a smile. Whenever Finn looked deep in thought, I always said that to him. Especially when he was on the patio swing we had purchased for the house that resembled the one at his childhood home. His new home thinking spot.
“What does this mean for us, Finn?” I looked over at him, hugging our blankets against my chest.
“I know what I want it to mean…but what do you want it to mean?” He replied, hooking an arm around me.
“If we get back together, there has to be some changes,” I turned on my side to face him.
“I’m listening…”