by S. R. Jones
I know without looking it will be fair trade. “Come in. I’ll make us a cup of tea.” Builders for me, herbal for her.
We sit and chat for about fifteen minutes after I make us a drink, and then she fixes me with a shrewd look. She’s cradling Benjamin against her shoulder, rubbing his back, and he’s quiet now.
“He’s a mess, Abi.”
Her words hit me hard. I don’t have to ask who the he in question is. I’m a little shocked she’s here to talk about Liam. I honestly thought him done with me. Then I wonder if she’s trying to tell me something else. Did an assignment go wrong?
“Is he hurt?” I ask.
She shakes her head and takes a one-handed sip of tea, holding Ben in place with the other.
“No. Not like that, but he misses you.”
Anger slices through me. “He knows where I am.” The way he left me, said no to me at my most vulnerable, I swore to myself I was done with him.
She sighs. “He thinks he’s doing right by you staying away. Thinks he’s not what you need or some heroic bullshit. You need to go see him.”
I shake my head vigorously. “No way. Cara, I told him how I felt. I put it all on the line back when the crap went down. I told him and he turned me down. Rejected me. It hurt so much I can’t go through it again. And he’s not even bothered to turn up to any of the barbecues Ethan and Isla have held over the summer. He didn’t even show and try to make conversation and be friendly. After all we went through. Then to add insult to injury, all his friends have spent ages making sure I’m safe. Getting me the dogs, putting in the alarm system. I’m so grateful to them but it only highlights how little Liam has had to do with me since everything happened.”
She smiles at me. “The guys didn’t do all this out of the goodness of their hearts.” She must see my face fall because she holds up her hand. “They would have. They’d have done this anyway, if Liam truly had walked away, but he didn’t. He asked them to do it all. He asked Ethan to get you some good guard dogs, fully trained. He told Luka, and Ethan, to put the alarm system in. He asks about you all the time, and I tell him to just come see you, but he won’t. Says it’s been too long, thinks you’ve moved on. Are better off without him. He knows you’ve been on some dates. He thinks you’re building a life and he’ll only mess it up. I’m sick of trying to get through to him, so I thought I’d come and try to reason with you. Go and see him.”
My heart lurches at her words, but I don’t think I can. I let him in, which was a huge thing for me to do. I laid it all out for him, and he rejected me. Worse, I think he did the right thing because my therapist and I, we’ve done a lot of work on my neediness. The way I latch onto people to fill the void not having any proper loving parenting left in me.
So, I hated him walking away at the time, but Liam did the right thing. I’d have smothered him with my neediness, but the knowledge only somehow makes me begging him to stay with me, and him walking away, more shameful. I’ve had enough shame in my life. I don’t want to feel the emotion anymore. I’m stronger now. Will seeing him again make me weak once more?
“Cara, I really appreciate you coming out here. And it’s good to know he didn’t simply walk away because he hates me or something, but he did the right thing. I’m not the needy mess I was, but Liam…I don’t know. He’s so strong, in control, and damned capable. I think if I go and see him I might turn into that weak, pathetic woman I was before. I can’t go back and ask him all over again. I just can’t.”
She sighs and stands. “You are not weak. You went through hell and came out the other side.” She glances at her watch. “Crap. I’ve got to go. We have a baby yoga class to get to. I wish I could knock both of your heads together.”
We reach the door and I see her out. She turns to look at the yard, and beyond the outdoor ring where two riders are being led around at a slow trot. “You can’t see how strong you are, Abi,” she says, her words surprising me.” Then she shocks me by leaning in close and lowering her voice. “I know you killed him, and I know how horrifying it all must have been. Yet here you are. Surviving and not only that but helping others. You’re stronger than you think.
“And so what if you want Liam because he’s strong and a take control kind of a guy? Luka is the same. Your words about Liam being so capable reflect the same feelings I had about Luka. I nearly let him go because of some stupid feminist idea I couldn’t be with a man like that. So yes, they are capable. They need to be with what they do, but they need things too. Luka looks after me and Ben here in so many ways, but we look after him in return. If you and Liam don’t stop letting fear and pride get in your way, one of you will move on, and the other will spend the rest of their lives regretting a missed opportunity.”
She kisses my cheek then walks smartly to her small car.
As she pulls down the long drive leading off my land, I contemplate her words.
She’s right. I know I won’t move on because, yes, I’ve dated, but none of them went further than date number three…because none of them were Liam. If he moves on, I’ll be heartbroken.
I wish I weren’t so scared of rejection, but I am.
I don’t want Cara to be wrong and to turn up at his house to be sent away all over again.
I turn away with a heavy heart and head back inside.
Chapter Seventeen
Liam
I watch as Abi takes the jump perfectly. Her hair is longer now. A shoulder length choppy cut that suits her. It’s still deep brown, and it shines in the afternoon sun.
Cara finally stopped bugging me about sorting things out with Abi, and at first it was a huge relief, but then it began to make me realize we were both really moving on. She was dating again, I was busy with work, and even our friends had stopped talking about us getting together and sorting our shit out. Funnily enough, them stopping talking about it, making me see us both as having moved on, is what panicked me. For the last two or three weeks, I’ve been coming here, to park up on this spot on a hill above her riding school where I get a perfect view, and watching her.
It seems I’ve gone back to my stalker ways of our early days together. Today is different, though. Today I am going to walk down that hill and talk to her.
I honestly think I did the right thing by walking away from her after New York. It killed me to do it, but I knew she had Jay, Boo, and my friends were told to make her a part of their extended family. They’d have done so anyway, but I told them to make her welcome. Keep her company. Keep her safe. Of course, I also watched over her, but often from afar. I took every out of country assignment I could. I tried to get her out from under my skin, but it didn’t work. I thought about her. Touched myself to thoughts of her. I even dreamed about her.
Now, I’m faltering because an assignment has landed on my desk. One that will take me away into the middle of nowhere, but for what may be a long time. A woman who was stalked for years by a violent narcissist has started to receive threatening letters to her home in the Highlands of Scotland. She thought she was safe. She disappeared and started a whole new life. She’s a well-known writer now, under a male pen name, and it seems the freak who tormented her life has found out where she lives. The lady is terrified and she wants some live-in security. The job got passed to me by a friend of mine she contacted, who runs a protection service by women for women. Sadly, she didn’t have any operatives free, and so she called me in.
If I take the job, I’ll be leaving for an undetermined amount of time, and it could be months on end.
I don’t want to take the job.
I watch as Abi clears another jump on her chestnut horse. I either take the fucking job and leave her well alone, or I get myself together and walk down that hill and talk to her.
Facing a war zone is easier than this. Than wondering what reception I will get. She’ll have every right to tell me to fuck off. She’s been seeing other men, I know, due to keeping tabs on her through our friends, which Cara has already given me grief for. Says it puts them
in an awkward position now they’ve grown to know and love Abi too.
So far as I am aware – because Abi tells Isla, and Isla tells Ethan everything, and he tells me – Abi hasn’t slept with any of these guys yet. Hasn’t met anyone she’s taken to. It’s only a matter of time, though. Then I’ve lost my chance forever.
I close the car door, and lock it, mind made up. Walking down the hill toward where she rides, my heart rate picks up.
As I near, my timing is perfect because she stops riding and gets off the horse. Handing the reins to one of the stable girls, she walks to the fence, and clambers up and over it instead of taking the gate.
She’s gorgeous. Slightly less slender than before, the weight gain suits her, tells me she’s happier now.
As she strides toward the house, she stops as she sees me. Her steps falter and she puts her arm out as if to hold onto something, but there’s nothing there. Then she simply doesn’t move. Her arms go down to her sides, and then she’s wrapping them around her waist. A body language gesture I know only too well. She’s feeling vulnerable.
I scrub a hand over my jaw and head her way. As I near she cocks her head to one side.
“Well, well, well. To what do I owe this honor? The great Liam deigns to visit us mere mortals here at the farm. All your other friends have been. Numerous times. Decided to come see it for yourself finally?”
Her words hold real venom, and who can blame her?
I don’t take her up on the fight she’s dying to have. “You’ve done well with the place.” I jut my chin in the direction of the riding arena.
“I know. Who’d have thought it, eh? Little old, pathetic me.”
Fuck. She’s not going to let us do this later.
“Never thought you were pathetic,” I clarify.
“Needy. Insecure. Whatever.”
“Nope. I thought you’d been through hell and needed some time. Period. Nothing more. Nothing less. I was trying to do the right thing, Abi. I know what Nick did to you, it must have broken you in some way. I wanted so badly to be here for you and pick the pieces up, but I knew it wasn’t what you needed.”
“How chivalrous of you to know my own mind better than I know myself.” She turns to head into the house, but pauses and skewers me with her heated gaze. “You’re wrong about one thing. Nick didn’t break me. You did. When you walked away.”
With those devastating words, she stalks to the house and slams the door in my face.
Shit.
I stand outside for a moment, aware of a couple of stable girls watching me. I knock on the door but there’s no reply. I try the handle and it opens. She didn’t lock me out, and it’s pathetic but it feels like a victory.
“Abi,” I call out. No reply.
I check the downstairs rooms. The place is low ceilinged. An old farm cottage, with small but cozy rooms. I look around and smile. Instead of the minimalist coldness of the apartment she shared with Nick, this place is full of things. Gorgeous vases in bright colors, throw rugs, pillows, and candles. It’s as if she’s gone from one extreme to the other. Some bright artwork adorns the walls, and one is a picture of Abi, so I assume this must be Jay’s work.
Looking into the last downstairs room, I head up the stairs, taking care not to bang my head on a low beam.
She’s in the bedroom, getting changed. I stop dead as she throws the t-shirt she’s wearing onto the bed, revealing a simple white, silky bra. My mouth runs dry at the sight, and she looks up and rolls her eyes at me.
“You don’t get to come back when you feel like it,” she says quietly.
“It’s not because I suddenly felt like it,” I tell her. “I wanted to do the right thing. Give you time and space.”
“You’re such an arrogant prick. Who says you get to choose what the right thing is? How much time is the right amount? Who made you Lord God of my emotions. My recovery?”
She’s got a very good point. “I was scared, too,” I confess, looking away from her to make the words easier to get out. “You broke down my walls, Abi. Cheesy but true. You wormed your way in, and no one has done that before. I knew if I let myself, I’d swoop in and try to be your hero and honestly, I don’t think you needed that. I think if I’d done so, we would have been over before we’d begun. And I needed to get my own head together. This has fucked me up, too.”
“So, why are you here now?” She pulls on a strappy top and turns to face me.
“I’ve been asked to take on a job. Guarding some woman who is being stalked.”
Her face changes and I can’t quite read the emotions flitting across her features.
“It means going away, maybe for a long time.”
“So this is a goodbye visit?” she scoffs.
“No. This is a, do I take the job or is there something we can salvage here, visit?”
“Take the job. You’re good at saving the damsel in distress, you’re not so good at what comes after.”
She goes to walk by me, but I grab her arm.
“Abi.” The word is all I can get out. It sounds tortured to my own ears.
She turns to me and everything slows down.
This is it. The moment we make this or break it.
Chapter Eighteen
Abi
His fingers are burning a brand on my arm.
My gut is twisted in jealousy at the thought of him staying with some other woman. Guarding some other female, being with her twenty-four-seven. I wanted this so much. For him to come and find me, but now he has, I’m torn.
My life has been peaceful recently. A little lonely, melancholy at times, but peaceful.
Him being back in my world for less than ten minutes has a maelstrom of emotion tearing through me. I half hate him, and half want him to hold me and take the pain away.
“I’m sorry. I fucked up.” He says the words low and serious, and his brown eyes meet mine, open and honest.
“I fucked up because I didn’t know what to do, and everything was such a mess.”
His hand is still on my arm and he strokes his index finger on the sensitive underside of my wrist.
I can feel his body heat, smell his warm, sensual scent. I lean into him, wanting only a moment of his body next to mine. The comfort and the anguish he seems to dish up in equal measure, I crave more than air.
His arms come around me and pull me into him, taking a deep breath in as his nose nudges my hair. “Christ, Abi. I’ve missed you. Every fucking day.”
“I’ve been here all along,” I tell him. “You could have come anytime.”
“I wanted to, but the longer I didn’t, the harder it got.”
“So…why now?”
“I made myself get up the courage to come see you. I need to know if there’s a chance for us. Any chance at all, because if there is, I won’t walk away again. I’ll send Reece to Scotland and I’ll stay here and fight. And if you’ve given up on me, on us, that’s okay because I’ll fight for both of us. But if you don’t want me anymore, then that’s a different matter.”
“I’ll always want you, Liam.” It’s the truth. I can’t imagine not wanting him. I might not always like him, but I always want him. Always feel better with his arms around me.
I lift my head and look at him. He’s staring at me like he wants to eat me alive. The weird thing we had between us, the lust so strong it seemed like a living creature, is still here. It snaps and sizzles in the air around us, thickening it until it’s hard to breathe.
They say there’s less oxygen on the top of Everest, but that it’s worth it for the views, the freedom of being on top of the world. I think I’ve found my own personal Everest in this man. He makes it hard to breathe, but he sets me free too.
One moment, we’re both frozen, watching one another, the next one of us moves. I’m not even sure which one, but we’re suddenly at one another. Tearing off clothes, battling buttons, kicking off shoes.
We end up falling onto the bed in a tangle of limbs and a clash of teeth. Soon, the last
remaining wall between us is gone as underwear is ripped from limbs and thrown to the floor.
I take hold of Liam’s hard, hot cock and guide him to where I want him but he pulls away.
Staring down at me, his eyes wild, he shakes his head. “Not this time, Abi. This time we do it my way. This time I’m going to make it good for you.”
He always makes it good for me, but he nudges my legs apart, and crawls down my body. I tense. I’ve not done this in years. Nick never, ever went down on me. It made me feel as if I must be dirty, and now those fears come rushing back. I try to push his face away, but Liam looks at me.
“Do you trust me?”
The question is serious, and I know it’s about more than this moment. The sex in the here and now. I nod because I do. I do trust him, and I need to show him.
“Then let me love you.”
He takes my hands and holds my wrists down by my thighs as he drops his head to between my parted legs. The first touch of his tongue is so shocking I arch off the bed with a gasp. He chuckles darkly and goes back to work. He licks the flesh around my sensitive nub but never touches me there. Soon I am writhing with the pleasure of it, but needing more. Then he sucks me into his mouth, covering my core and sucking at me and it makes me see stars.
He keeps this up, alternating sucking, and then licking me all around, until he finally licks right over my clit. I cry out and push myself closer to him. Forgetting now my worries about doing this, I can only feel pleasure.
Slowly, sensually, he builds me up and up, until I am so taut I fear I might snap. Then with a final flick of his tongue, he sends me crashing over the edge. He lets go of my hands and I pull his face into me, pushing him against where I need him the most.
When it’s over, I cover my face with one arm, coming down.
Liam kisses his way up my body, over my hip, my belly, up over my ribs, under my breasts and then over them, until he reaches my neck where he nuzzles at me.