Storm

by Mankin, Michelle

  Falling, I was falling fast and hard for Journey.

  He was a sensitive man who didn’t seem to want anyone to know he cared. Yet he did. Why else would he get involved in everyone’s lives the way he had?

  Journey had quickly picked up on the dynamics in the band and had influenced the change in personnel. It was uncanny the way Saber deferred to him. I’d never seen him listen to anyone else. Not willingly.

  Further, Journey understood Cork, the situation between me and my brother, and he got me, really got me like Storm once had. He also comforted me when asked, and he fucked me as if he were making love to me, not just last night but the first time too.

  The only downside? He didn’t do relationships.

  Sure, that was a big downside, a huge one that overshadowed the good things.

  If he kicked me out of his bed again, I would be gone. Period. End of story. Falling as I was, this time it would be a crash landing. All the good that he was would be denied to me. Journey held the power.

  But maybe, if I tried hard, I could convince him to yield some to me. Reaching like I had last night, I might grab hold of something good, not only for me but for both of us.

  My Lotus.

  I wanted that to be true all the time, not just when he was inside me.

  My gaze drifted over Journey’s handsome face. His features were so relaxed in sleep. No worry lines marred his thoughtful brow. His nose, so straight I couldn’t tell it had been broken, pointed to his sculpted mouth and his firm, slightly parted lips. Remembering his kisses and how his mouth felt on mine, I shivered and suppressed a sigh.

  “Are you going to stare at me all morning?” he asked, startling me when he opened his brown eyes. “Or would you like to do something more interactive?”

  “You’re awake.” My heart racing, I narrowed my eyes. “How long have you been awake?”

  “A while.”

  “It’s getting late. Cork will be up soon. I have a million things to do. I should go.” Breathless, I spoke quickly, my words running together.

  Don’t let me go, I pleaded with my eyes.

  “If you need to go, you should go.” His expression tender, Journey reached up and tucked a strand of hair behind my ear, making my scalp tingle. “But I’d like it if you stayed.”

  Sighing with relief, I leaned my head into his touch. “Okay. Just a little longer.”

  He framed my jaw in his hand, sweeping his thumb over my skin the way I’d hoped he would. It was a slow, sensual caress that drew my nerve endings taut while also making me warm and shivery. I felt cherished and desired at the same time.

  “What were you thinking about while you were staring at me?” he asked, studying me.

  “Lots of things,” I said simply. I could be enigmatic too.

  “Share one of them,” he said in that low rumble of his that resonated everywhere. It crumbled my ability—non-ability—to resist him.

  “If I give you one of my thoughts,” I whispered, “will you give me one of yours?”

  “Yes.” His dark brows inched together. “But make it a significant thought, if you’d like a significant one in return.”

  I pursed my lips. “You’re a tough negotiator.”

  “I am when it’s you and the prize is your thoughts. They’re important.”

  “As are yours to me,” I said without hesitation. As are you.

  “Is that one of them already?” His eyes glinted with intensity that exhilarated me as much as spotting new growth from a seed I’d planted peeking through rich soil. “Because it’s significant to me that you value my thoughts.”

  “Journey.” My voice husky, I swallowed when I noticed him wince, and felt something barbed poke me inside my chest. He’d done that more than once when I’d spoken his name.

  Even when I was under him and he was inside me, I loved peering at him through my lashes. It moved me, his fierceness. He was very serious when fucking me. It was like he was trying to touch my soul by mastering my body.

  I loved the reverence in his tone when he spoke my name during times like those. Did he not want that same serious fierceness from me?

  Unsure, I bit back what I wanted to say and gave him something that made me feel less vulnerable. “I had a dream that woke me. I don’t dream much anymore.”

  “Why do you think that is?” he asked gently.

  “Too many unchangeable sorrows, and too many worries because of them, crowd out my dreams.” My eyes widened. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to say that out loud.”

  “Don’t withdraw.” He captured and held my face in both hands.

  I couldn’t withdraw, and I didn’t want to with him looking at me like this, his eyes so warm, his expression so soft.

  “What was your dream about?”

  “Storm. In my dream, he came back, only he wasn’t the same. I couldn’t talk to him the way I used to. I tried, but he looked right through me like he didn’t know me.” My heart raced at the memory. “I couldn’t speak. The words got stuck in my throat and they wouldn’t come out.”

  “That upset you.” Journey’s eyes no longer glistened with potential. They were solid frost on frozen ground. “Your heart’s racing. I can see your pulse thrumming in your throat.”

  “Yes. It was unsettling, trying to reach him, only to have him retreat more and more the harder I tried.” I knew the dream was my subconscious working through the betrayal I’d felt when Storm left me behind all those years ago. The dream setting and the real circumstances were eerily similar.

  “Why do you think you dreamed what you did?” Journey asked, his eyes pinching at the edges.

  Was there a lesson to be learned from my dream about Storm? And why had I dreamed it now, while in bed with Journey?

  “I think I know,” I said, and the frame of his hands on my face suddenly tightened.

  I peeled his fingers away from my skin. Gazing down at them, I searched for the words and the courage to speak them as I noted the differences between his hand and mine. His tattoos told a story of where he’d been, like the stickers on his guitar cases, and maybe also what was important to him.

  The ink on his knuckles spelled love in gothic print. Did he insist on temporary hookups to avoid what he most wanted? That was what I wanted to believe, and it seemed like a sign to note that tat right now. I lifted my gaze, finding him watching me and waiting for my answer.

  Sometimes you only get one chance, I thought, and the advice of others scrolled through my mind.

  It’s what you do that matters.

  You only fail if you stop trying.

  When you share, you don’t feel so alone.

  Reach for what you want.

  All that advice was sound, but what mattered most was what I found in Journey’s eyes. Even cold, they were solid. Maybe my truth would melt the ice.

  “I’m falling for you,” I said softly, and he drew back. Not a good sign, so I rushed on. “From the beginning, I’ve felt more than I should, more than you probably wanted me to, but that’s just the way it is. I like you. I like being with you. I feel less alone when I’m with you, and I think maybe you care for me more than you let on. It feels like you do when you touch me.”

  When he dropped his gaze, I tightened my grip on his hands, swirling in a cyclone of uncertainty.

  Glancing up, he said, “I should deny it.” His expression was firm, but his eyes were molten heat. “I should end this now.”

  “Why would you want to? Why end what feels like a beginning? Why even try?”

  “My sweet Lotus, there is a reason. A truth I tried to share with you after we were together the first time.” Journey withdrew his hands and sat up. The white sheet puddled around his trim waist like melted frost. He stared at me, a battle waging behind his eyes as he raked his masculine fingers through his thick hair.

  His fresh scent rained down on me, and I sat up too.

  Was it a rain to nurture something happening between us? Or was it a driving rain to strike it down before it
could even start? I didn’t know and braced myself, though I wanted to throw my arms around him and hold him instead. He looked torn and unsettled, and him looking that way made me feel the same.

  “Why didn’t you tell me before the first time?” I asked softly.

  “Because I wanted you too badly,” he said, his eyes flaring. “I still do.”

  I liked that answer. “Afterward then?”

  “Saber called, and I got mad.”

  “You thought I lied to you.” I remembered him throwing the plant against the wall.

  “Even more than that, I was jealous, furious that my . . . that Saber had you before me. That he had something I realized I could never have—your love.”

  “He had it. Past tense. He doesn’t anymore.”

  “No?” Journey’s eyes searched mine.

  “No,” I said firmly, doing some searching of my own and finding the hope I sought in fields of rich brown earth. “You’re the only one in my thoughts now.”

  “Lotus.” He let out a long throaty groan that I felt resonate everywhere. His gaze blazed, emerald flames flickering, not to burn but to warm.

  Journey reached for me. Gripping my shoulders firmly, he brought me forward. Only inches separated us, but it felt like I’d walked through seasons and wind-driven miles to regain the ground my admission had nearly lost.

  Storm

  “YOU’RE THE ONLY one in my thoughts too.”

  Blasting everything to hell, I told Lotus the fucking truth, feeling like a bigger bastard than I already did for doing so.

  But how could I not? She was everything I wanted, so beautiful and brave for putting her feelings right out there. Yet there was still one important unhidden truth between us, though it wasn’t the only one.

  Wanting an out, being a coward, I’d held back my identity too long. I knew in my bones once that truth was revealed, even friendship with Lotus would be lost. I should never have touched her that first time, let alone slept with her with that secret between us.

  My fingers flexing into the soft skin of her slender shoulders, I drew her tighter to me.

  I should confess everything now.

  But I couldn’t bring myself to do it, to risk losing her a second time. Not now when I had her without Saber in the way. Not knowing what she’d gone through in the past alone when I left her as a teen.

  “I don’t have it in me to resist you,” I said, gazing deeply into her eyes. Even now I was a coward, wanting her to make the harsh call to end this. I wanted her too desperately, needed her too badly to do it myself.

  “Then don’t resist me,” she whispered. Not shying from my gaze, she looked at me as if this, as if I were salvageable, and not a teen who had abandoned her, or a man who greedily took what she gave while deceiving her. “Please don’t resist anymore.” She laid her delicate palm against my cheek.

  “You make me want to believe in possibilities, Lotus, when all my life has been one long, lonely road trip with only the ink on my skin to mark my passage to an inevitable dead end.” Desperate for the solace she provided, I leaned into her caress like she’d leaned into mine earlier.

  “You don’t have to be alone. It doesn’t have to be a dead end. There are detours worth exploring . . . like me, like us, like this.”

  “I’ve been doing my own thing for too fucking long.” I reached for her hand, trying to do the right thing, to remove her fingers from my face, remove her from my life. “It’s too late for me to change.”

  Leaving and lies, it’s all I know.

  Chords to underscore those words drifted into my mind. I was stuck in a rut in the road that I’d created. It wasn’t right to continue this. I didn’t want to fuck Lotus up any more than I already had.

  “Someone wise once told me that you only fail if you never try.” Her eyes glittered determinedly like they had all those years ago when she’d wanted me to stay.

  “That’s a nice sentiment,” I said softly. “But we both know it’s not always true.”

  “It was for you. You pursued your dream, and you achieved it. You’re in a band creating music.” Her voice dropped to an imploring tone. “Why can’t we try to create something together between the two of us?”

  “Music is easy for me to create. I don’t know how to do a relationship.”

  “I don’t think that’s true. You already have a relationship with my brother. With the guys in the band. With me, though you want to deny it.” Her eyes shining, she hesitated before asking shyly, “Is being with me too difficult?”

  I couldn’t lie to her. “Being with you is effortless, as fulfilling as writing music, as thrilling as riding the perfect wave. It’s a relationship that’s impossible, given our start and the secret I placed between us.”

  “I wish you would at least try.” Her eyes filling, Lotus removed her hand from my face and looked away. “But I understand if you won’t. I would never try to force you to do something you don’t want to do.”

  Hating the resignation in her voice, I had to repair the damage the best that I could.

  “It’s not a matter of desire. I want you. I want to try for something real with you. It’s me that’s too fucked up to make it work. Me that’s a problem. I have a temper. You’ve seen it several times, and you haven’t even seen the worst of it. I never had a positive role model growing up like you did.”

  The truth was, I’d only had her. As she stared up at me so trustingly, I opened up even more.

  “Yes, I achieved my goal. I’m in the music industry. I love my career. I love music, but I also see the downside. The selfishness, the desire for fame and money above all things. That makes me cynical, not hopeful like you. I told you about the people, the women I usually meet. They’re not at all like you.”

  I gently lifted Lotus’s chin. A few crystal tears were balanced in her eyes. They slipped free, one and then another, sorrow staining her cheeks.

  Me. I’d stained her perfection. Even being with her such a short time, I was bad for her.

  Softly, I said, “All we would have going for us if I agreed to try would be you, your faith, your hope.”

  And what about my secret? It was one big wrecking ball, to her, to us, to everything. Once let loose, it would destroy anything we might manage to build.

  It was better for her if I let it swing now.

  I swallowed, my eyes burning. “I need to tell you now, what I should have told you at the beginning.”

  “Don’t.” Lotus put her fingers on my mouth.

  “Babe, I have to.” My lips brushed her fingertips as I spoke, and I noticed her shiver.

  “No, you don’t,” she said firmly. “You don’t have to if I say I don’t want to know.”

  “You don’t even know what I’m going to say.”

  “I can tell that it’s bad. That it’s going to hurt me. That afterward you’re probably going to leave me like everyone else.”

  She was probably right, though it wouldn’t be because I wanted to go. It would be because I had to. Because she would want me to go.

  “My dad looked at me once like you are right now.” Her gaze turned unfocused. “Right before he told me my mother was gone.”

  “Lotus, fuck.” I reached out, instinctually wanting to comfort her. If she was hurting, I had to try to alleviate her pain.

  But she was faster than me and wrapped her arms around herself. She had instincts of her own now that didn’t include me.

  “And Storm looked at me like you are, right before he told me he was leaving,” she said, and I flinched at the recognition of the instincts she’d developed, in part because of me. “You remind me of him sometimes. When you’re kind, gentle, and thoughtful. He had a temper too, but he tempered it for me. I think you could too if only you would try.”

  “I don’t have your faith in me,” I said, my voice husky.

  “Maybe not.” She refocused on me. “Maybe I could help you with that. But then again, maybe I’m not worth all that effort. Saber didn’t ever seem to think s
o.”

  Frustrated, I closed my eyes for a second. My brother had been all wrong for her.

  “You are so worth the effort,” I said, and tried to reach for her again.

  “Don’t.” Lotus shook her head at me, hugging herself tighter. “Don’t touch me. I can’t think straight when you touch me, and I need to get this out. Like you, I’ve been alone a long time. I’m accustomed to it, but I don’t like it. I’ve grown stagnant. No ink to mark my journey. Nothing really to show for myself, just me getting by. Only a little more of me, the good part, the part that needs to connect to grow, dies a little more each day. I’m lonely, Journey, and tired. But not with you.”

  “I’m always lonely, except with you,” I said. A journeyman tired of the journey, at a crossroads.

  “If it were up to me to choose,” she bobbed her head, a lily barely afloat, “I’d choose not to ever have your truth.”

  “It’s not a truth I can keep hidden,” I whispered, feeling raw.

  “Do I have to know if it’s going to end this little bit of connection and comfort that I’ve found with you, that I believe we both have found together?”

  More tears spilled. I was a goner, gone for her from the moment she stepped back into my life.

  “At some point,” I said, “someone will figure it out.”

  My brothers. My parents. Her.

  Or I would slip up. I’d almost done so several times.

  “Would you try for me?” Lotus’s eyes searched mine. “You’re not married or breaking any law being with me, are you?”

  “No, it’s nothing like that. There’s only you. But it’s wrong, me not telling you.”

  “A wrong that will end what we’ve found?” she asked. Her eyes were reddish and bright, like the setting sun reflected on the walls of the cliffs.

  “That’s the most likely outcome,” I said.

  “I’d rather have a little more time together with your secret kept than none at all.”

  “If I agree to this,” I choked out, my heart breaking, “there’s a good chance you’ll hate me in the end.”

  Hate me now, or hate me later.

  I wavered, because a little more time with her with hope between us and not my secret was what I wanted too.