by West, Jade
“Please can I let go of the headboard now?” she whispered. “I want to hold you. Please let me hold you.”
“You can let go of the headboard, beautiful girl,” I whispered back, and her eyes opened on mine, arms wrapping tight around my shoulders.
And there we stayed.
Moving. Grinding. Grunting. Her gaping holes filled up and strained, her pretty innocence so perfect to match.
“I love you so fucking much, Maisie Moore,” I told her. “Whenever I think I love you as much as it’s ever going to be possible to love you, I end up loving you so much fucking more.”
Her kiss was amazing. Her smile was my world.
“I love you so much too, Oliver Kent,” she said. “I’ve always loved you.”
Her next climax was incredible, face to face with her heart in mine.
And so was mine. My balls exploding with enough force that the world went white behind my eyes.
I didn’t pull out of her for a few long minutes, catching my breath with hers frantic to match, both of us smirking hard, smirking dirty, smirking as one filthy soul.
“I think I need a drink,” she laughed, and I laughed along with her.
“I’m sure our minibar will accommodate,” I said, and pulled free as gently as I could.
Chapter Forty-Five
Maisie
I wish I could have coasted on that blissful feeling of closeness forever. Me and Ollie so caught up in each other that nothing else mattered. But life never seemed to pan out like that. Not between us.
There were always his ambitions and plans burning up under our love, his road ahead always paved out with huge steps forward.
Steps all over the world.
He picked champagne out from the minibar, his smirk bright as he grabbed glasses from the sideboard and got us poured out and fizzing.
I took mine with a smile right back, and clinked my cheers with a shuffle up to sitting.
My body had been pounded. Utterly pounded. I felt filthy dirty as I grimaced and got myself pressed tight against the headboard, but it felt so right between us. Such a meeting of the naughty parts of our souls.
It was just such a shame there wasn’t going to be a meeting of so many other parts.
“Here’s to us,” he said, and raised his glass again. “Here’s to the incredible new future we have waiting around the corner.”
And that’s when I knew it for definite, what was really looming this evening. Any hopes I’d been keeping hold of in keeping these massive life decisions on the slow burner were soon to fade to nothing. His ambitions were as solid as ever, his eyes really focused on what was coming. What he believed was coming.
His fingers grazed down my arm, tickling gently as he tipped his head to the side. “I know you’ve got a lot to think about,” he said. “But it’s nights like this that prove the obvious, isn’t it, sweetheart? We’re two souls that match. Two souls that are made for each other. Two souls that belong hand in hand as they travel the world.”
His eyes were gorgeous. Utterly gorgeous.
The love glowing there was all I’d ever dreamed of having staring back at me, but there was another vivid flare of memory as he buzzed there in his ambitious afterglow. I’d known him like this before.
I sipped some of my champagne, then placed my glass on the side. His lips kissed my fingers as I touched them to his jaw.
“It’s your soul that belongs around the world,” I said, knowing honesty to be the most important thing of all, no matter how hard. “My soul not so much.”
The pitting of his eyebrows spoke volumes, but so did his laugh.
“Oh, sweetheart,” he said. “I know you have your nerves, being so ingrained in Much Arlock, but trust me, you’ll love it when we get started. Believe me, you will.”
He grabbed his phone and called up some of the pages he’d been looking into about his client’s European locations and all of the amazing cities we’d be visiting, and the sadness bloomed under my happiness, my instincts shaping up. Because I’d known what was coming.
For hours and days and maybe even weeks I’d known what was coming, because I knew him.
I knew Oliver Kent and the way he charged after life. The way he charged after his needs and his wants and his ambitions.
Me being one of them.
But I wouldn’t match. Not this lifestyle of his.
His voice was bouncy as he talked me through Hadley and Mason Global’s German locations, but I couldn’t pretend to be on his wavelength. Not any longer.
His words were light and happy, telling me all about Berlin landmarks, but my head was shaking.
“I’m not going to be living in Berlin,” I said, and he lowered his handset, his eyes focusing hard on mine.
“I wasn’t meaning Berlin, specifically,” he said. “I was talking in general. We’ll be all over the place, including coming back here quite often. You’ll still see plenty of your parents, and there’s video call.” He nudged me with a smirk. “We know all about the beauty of video call, don’t we?”
My eyes were fixed on his, even as my body still tingled with the exhilaration of his touch.
“Maybe we could keep on knowing about video call?” I asked. “Maybe you’ve got a while of chasing down your big ambitions and I’ve got a while keeping up with my Much Arlock routine?”
He knew then that I was being serious, I saw the way his smirk eased up.
“But we’re meant to be together, aren’t we?” He took hold of my fingers and squeezed. “Don’t worry, Maisie, I know this is a lot to consider. I know you have a lot to think about with Freddie, and relocation and starting up a whole new lifestyle, but it’ll be worth it, I promise.”
“I wish it was that simple,” I said, and my heart swelled in a beautiful sadness. “I absolutely adore you, Ollie, and I wish it was that simple. But we’re so different, both of us are so different. We always were.” I squeezed his fingers right back. “I’ve been trying my best to see a way to push ahead into all of this. I really want to be that girl who can be along with you. I really want that to be a part of who I am.”
“Don’t talk yourself out of this too early – ” he began, but I was shaking my head again.
“I’ve been trying to hang back from being honest with myself for days,” I said. “Because I know who I am, I know where I belong. I know my heart belongs with you but my feet belong on Much Arlock soil, with Freddie.”
His head was shaking back at mine. “We belong together, beautiful,” he said. “I swear we belong together. I’ve been wanting you for a decade, I just wasn’t honest enough with myself to realise it. That’s changed now. I knew I had to come back here for you. I knew I had to come and grab hold of you and push ahead.”
“And you did,” I said and reached up to run my thumb across his cheek. “You really did come back and grab me. I was swallowed up whole this time, just like I was back in the beginning. My heart is all for you, just like it was back then.”
“My heart’s all for you too,” he said. “Our hearts are for each other. Always were.”
I dropped my eyes. “My heart is for a world I know. A world Freddie knows. I belong here, Ollie. I swear I belong here.”
He started back from me, as though I’d slapped him with my words.
“Don’t say it,” he said. “Please, for the sake of all living shit, don’t say this is over a second time round.”
I didn’t want to say it was over a second time round, not for a second. I was all for him, just as I had been back at high school. The pain of finishing this up for a second time round would be a whole universe more heartache.
“It doesn’t need to be over. We can stay long distance, right?” I asked. “I mean, technology is amazing now. It won’t be like when you dashed down to the big smoke last time around, things are different now.”
“Long distance won’t work with us,” he said, and there was that stubbornness. That ambition. That drive he always burned so bright with. “We’re t
oo involved. Too intense.”
I couldn’t hold it back. My truth burst out. Bright and loud.
“And you’re too involved and too intense to ease back on your work-life balance, Ollie. Because that’s the truth of it, right? It’s what had you charging down to the city in the first place and leaving me behind, no? It’s what Naomi said built a massive wedge between the two of you even though she was right there along with you day after day after day.”
His eyes flashed with hurt.
Angry hurt.
Hurt I’d lashed out on him and felt shit for.
“How things were with Naomi has nothing to do with this,” he snapped. “Seriously, Maisie, you’re nothing like Naomi. Things would never be like that with us, no matter how much work I had on.”
But I didn’t believe him.
Not because I didn’t trust him, or believe he was promising things he had every intention of delivering, for now and always, but because I didn’t believe he knew his own ambition as well as I did, even after all this time. Not as well as I did, and surely not much as Naomi likely did after years right by him.
“I belong here in this town,” I told him. “I always did.”
“You don’t know that,” he argued. “You can’t know that unless you give change a try.”
But I did know that.
I’d known it from that one basic weekend in London. I’d known it on the churned-up train ride home. I’d known it through the awful pang of Rob practically begging me to keep his boy here with his family.
“I hate being dishonest with myself,” I said to Ollie, and I sounded like me. Like the me I’d known for years. Like the me I’d been at solid points in my life underneath my own fluttery what ifs about whatever I was considering. “I’d rather I just admitted the truth right now, that I know I won’t be packing Fred up and trekking us around the world.”
“Oh, right. So, what do we do?” he asked, and there was an edge of frustration there. “You want me to ditch the opportunity to push my business to a whole new level? Is that it?”
I shook my head. “No. I don’t expect you to ditch the opportunity to push your business to a whole new level. You never would. It’s not a part of your nature.”
His shrug was hard. His hands in his hair strumming his scalp, chewing stuff through. “I have so much I want for us, Maisie. So fucking much.”
“So do I,” I said, and forced a smile. “Who knows, maybe we’ll cope alright with a long distance video call fest? Maybe we’re set for another decade meet up, when we properly settle down?”
His stare was angry. Actually angry.
“I was hoping we’d have a few more little people in our world by then. That we’d all be making the most of my efforts with work and enjoying the rewards, settling down into some real fucking happiness.”
Fuck, how that pained. The thought I’d be missing out on some beautiful babies with that incredible man really did hurt. I had to choke back the pain with a big fake smile.
“You can still visit,” I said. “I can still fly out and visit you too, when Fred’s with Rob for the weekend.”
“Don’t,” he said. “Don’t try it with that bullshit that things can tick along nicely, and don’t try it with your fucking checkout grin either.”
With that he was off the bed, tugging his pants back on.
I hated it. Hated my consideration and my timing. Hated how I’d waded on in there to voice all this when things had been so strong and alive and arm in arm.
Hated how I didn’t have a way through this mess.
“I’m sorry I said this now,” I told him, but his shrug was sharp.
“Nothing like plunging into the depths of shit straight from riding the heights of fucking brilliance, is there?” he said and my cheeks burned up with a whole load of embarrassment.
“I really am hoping we can keep things going ok between us,” I countered. “It really doesn’t need to be the depths of shit, we can keep it going. We really can keep it going.”
The way he stared out at Much Arlock high street with his arms folded tight said anything but.
Ambitious. Determined. Strong-willed.
So many things I’d admired about him from the very beginning.
I winced as I dropped myself down from the bed and reached for my dress.
For the first time since I set eyes on him again, I felt like I should really be getting a bit of distance, just to get my head straight.
“I should get going,” I told him. “I think Freddie might be back early in the morning.”
His laugh was cold. “Excuses. Such sweet fucking excuses. Say it like it is, Maisie. You want to fuck off out of here, it’s fine.”
“I don’t actually,” I said, and slipped my sandals on. “I just think we need some headspace.”
Ollie grabbed his shirt and shoved his arms into the sleeves. He was quick on his buttons.
“I’ll walk you home first,” he said, and I gave him a thanks.
He was quiet all the way back through the high street and down to the recreation ground. It wasn’t anger that was bristling when I dared to look up at his expression though, it was pain. Absolute hurt and pain and disappointment.
I sighed to myself as tears threatened, part of me wishing he’d been angry, just so I didn’t feel so totally rotten for being so honest with such bad timing on such a beautiful weekend.
I headed straight up the garden path and slid my key in the lock, but he hadn’t joined me on the doorstep, instead lingering back at the gate.
“Think about things,” he said. “Please, Maisie, just think about things. I really do want you right by me, for now and always. I know that’s where our future lies.”
I nodded, even though I knew my thinking about things was already done with.
I waved him away with a terrible sigh, watching his fierce strides into the distance, and then I shut the door on the world and cried.
I really, really cried.
I pulled my knees up to my tender tits and felt my body strain, opened well and truly raw by his perfect touch, and I cried for the second huge round of heartache with Oliver Kent I was surely crawling into.
And I knew it would be a long damn time before it eased away again.
Hello, another decade.
Chapter Forty-Six
Oliver
I headed back to London before I was even dressed properly, throwing my stuff in my case and disappearing out of there before I could face my own fucking brokenness.
I wasn’t used to this. Not of being toppled.
I was used to ploughing into whatever road I wanted ahead of me, walking the walk and talking the talk, giving whatever of myself was fucking necessary to fulfil my purpose.
But not this time.
This time Maisie Moore had countered me, well and truly. She’d stayed true to her own world, her own home life, her own everything, which was enough for a sad sorry smile of its own as I headed back across country.
Maisie Moore, the sweet little sweetheart, always so gentle, yet always so solid in her judgements.
I’d always known that about her – her self-awareness and determination. It was one of the things I loved most about her, and one of the things that was so fucking brutal.
Maybe London alone might have had slight potential, but skipping all over the world was a big ask, and I knew it. Fuck, I knew it. I could feel it myself, the thought of coaxing her along for the ride nothing short of a miracle maybe at best.
She didn’t message me that day and I didn’t message her, just got myself caught back up in London hotel life and sinking deep into my business to dos. I checked out the remainder of Hadley’s little check boxes and made sure we were well on form for the week ahead, with the regular selection of TV shows on in the background as I’d always stared so dumbly at before.
And I missed her.
Fuck, how I missed her.
I missed her on Sunday, and on Monday morning when I woke up with a strong bout of em
otional sickness in my gut. I missed her on Monday lunchtime when she didn’t send me her regular how’s your day going text message.
I missed her as Devon pulled me to one side and gave me an update on European potentials, and I missed her even more as I stayed on after work with him to meet the German technical implementation director and begin the solid handshakes.
It was late in the evening when I couldn’t hold back any more. I fired her off a text message with a simple I love you.
It was a simple I love you too that she sent right back, but she didn’t answer my video call as I dialled her, instead sending a following message that she was caught up with Freddie.
I wished I was caught up with Freddie along with her, I really did.
Monday flowed into Tuesday and Tuesday into Wednesday, and our texts were still flowing at night, but were stilted, both of us so fucking stilted. My heart was raw and hurting, and my gut was twisted up with the pain, and I was struggling to keep my head straight, even for a second. Struggling to give a shit about anything to do with European rollouts of big plans for the US and what that could mean for my business.
Did I even fucking care what it would mean for my business?
Did I even fucking care what it would mean for me?
I felt like an emotional zombie as the working week drew on, even though I should’ve been doing cartwheels at the prospect of what was coming at the business celebration at the Hadley’s office that weekend. Naomi had held back from arguing the toss about coming, and under usual circumstances that should’ve been a plus, but I was past giving two shits about any of it, including watching her and Sean knuckle down to work in the meeting room suite that Friday afternoon.
It was only me being mute enough to keep quiet as I ventured a bit closer with my own work that had me catching hold of their discussions together. Their words were considered. Respectful. Genuinely both bothered by and interested in how well a service we were offering Hadley’s was doing, and what we could be doing for the better.
It knocked me back to realise that they were both considerably more bothered by and interested sounding than I felt about business life. Than I’d been feeling in weeks. Months even.