Work of Art

by Monica Alexander

  “I’m trying,” he said, his lips right by my ear.

  I spun around and faced him.

  “What do you mean?”

  He closed his eyes for a few seconds as he pulled his arms back and let them hung by his sides.

  “I’m trying really hard to be your friend.”

  “Do you not want to be?”

  He shook his head. “You know what I want, but I’m just letting you know that I’m trying to respect what you want.”

  “I know, and you’re doing a good job of it.”

  He was almost doing too good a job of it since he was making me question how long I could be his friend before I’d want more. I placed my hand against his cheek and leaned up and kissed him on the opposite cheek, letting my lips linger there for a few seconds. As I started to pull back, he grabbed my wrist.

  “You can’t do things like that,” he said, when my gaze met his burning one.

  I nodded, knowing I’d flustered him, and I really hadn’t meant to. I just wanted to be close to him, just for a few seconds.

  “I’m trying really hard to keep my distance, and if you want me to keep that distance, you can’t do things like that, okay?”

  I bit my lip, seeing that we were at a crossroads. Then I nodded, chickening out, because I knew once I let him in that was it.

  “Okay,” he said, but it came out breathy.

  Then, before I could stop him, he leaned down and crushed his lips to mine, pushing me back against the car with the force of his weight. He stayed there for a few beats, but he didn’t deepen the kiss. Finally he pulled back and looked at me with remorse filling his eyes.

  “I’m sorry. I’m sorry,” he said, raking his hands back through his hair as he stepped away from me. “I had to get that out of my system. I’m sorry. I won’t do it again.”

  I watched him, my body angled awkwardly against the car where he’d left me. I reached up to wipe beneath my mouth and stood up straight.

  “It’s okay,” I said, as I felt the pain he felt radiate through the desperation in his kiss.

  He loved me, and he was miserable because I was keeping him at arm’s length. He wasn’t rebounding. He wasn’t just lonely, and he wasn’t just interested in sleeping with me. I could see in his eyes that he truly loved me, and it was torture to stay away. The thought made my heart start to pound in my chest.

  All this time a part of me thought his feelings had been part obligation or part desperation to make up for what happened between us years earlier, but I could now see that he really had strong feelings for me that went deeper than they’d ever gone in high school. He’d jokingly told me I would fall for him, and I knew then why I’d held back. I’d been afraid that he would hurt me again because he couldn’t possibly feel what he was telling me he felt. But he did.

  He loved me, and I could see it so clearly.

  Before I could say anything, Ryan hopped into the driver’s seat and started the engine, so I walked around to the other side and got in, buckling my seatbelt as he tore out of the gravel parking lot.

  “Where are we going? I thought we were having lunch?” I questioned when I noticed he was leaving Brandon’s property instead of venturing deeper.

  He shook his head. “Let’s just go back to the city.”

  Okay.

  Wait. No! That wasn’t okay.

  “Why? You invited me to lunch,” I said, as he picked up speed and we flew down the road away from what would have been a really nice date. “I’m hungry, and that wine was good. I want to have lunch with you, Ryan.”

  He sighed as he downshifted to pass a car on the two lane road and then pushed the car even faster. Then he shook his head, his blond hair blowing in the wind as he sped.

  “Kelly warned me about being too aggressive and letting you come to me in time, and I didn’t listen,” he said loudly over the sound of the wind. “I’m sorry, Harper.”

  I looked at him in confusion, and he realized his cover story from that morning was blown.

  “Kelly wasn’t really sick, was she?” I questioned, realizing I should have known.

  It was all too convenient that he’d shown up when he did and my plans with my friend were suddenly cancelled.

  He shook his head. “No, she was doing me a favor.”

  “I see.”

  I wasn’t mad, but I was kind of irritated that Kelly had meddled in my love life. I could only imagine what she’d told him. My friends thought was I so fragile, but I really wasn’t. I did need to do things in my own time, sure, but it wasn’t because I was breakable and couldn’t handle them. I just didn’t like to play fast and loose with relationships with men.

  The agitation was visible on Ryan’s face as he drove us out of Sonoma as fast as he could. Once we’d merged onto the highway, and I knew he wouldn’t be shifting any time soon, I turned to face him, my hand reaching for his. He didn’t look at me as I took it.

  “Ryan,” I said, as I ran my thumb back and forth over his skin.

  He looked over at me for a second. “Yeah?” he said, sounding dejected.

  “Do you really love me, really?”

  He nodded a few short nods. “Yeah, I do.”

  My body tingled as he confirmed what I already knew, and a swirl of emotions flooded me. I held tight to his hand, and he let me, as we continued to barrel toward the city. I was surprised we hadn’t gotten pulled over. He was going at least a hundred miles an hour.

  “Ryan, I’m scared,” I said after a few minutes, raising my voice so he could hear me over the wind.

  I was putting it out there, how I felt, what I was afraid of, but I think we both knew what that meant. I was caving.

  “What are you scared of?” he asked, keeping his emotions in check, but his eyes were so alight with hope as he stole a glance at me.

  I swallowed. “I’m scared of getting hurt, of getting left behind, of falling in too deep that I can’t get out if I have to.”

  “Why would you have to get out?” he asked, the concern evident in his tone as he squeezed my hand. The pressure was comforting.

  I shrugged. “If you stopped loving me or if you got tired of me or I don’t know. I haven’t let anyone in since you. What if I do it and get hurt again?”

  “Harper, no,” he said, and I could suddenly see how he felt about me so clearly in the way he looked at me. “You can’t think like that. This isn’t me asking you out to see how it goes to see if maybe I like you. It’s me telling you that I want to be with you and only you – forever. That’s all this is.”

  I laughed, but there wasn’t a lot of humor behind it. “That’s all?!”

  It seemed like a hell of a lot to me, but it also sounded sort of perfect.

  “I’m scared too,” he finally said. “Scared that you’ll reject me or you’ll get bored with me, but I’m willing to take a chance, because being with you even for a short time is better than living without you. Trust me, I’ve done it for too long, and I know what I’d been missing.”

  “Wow,” I said, sort of taken aback by him just putting it all out there.

  “I want to make you happy,” he murmured, looking down at our joined hands.

  “Hmm?”

  He looked up and caught my gaze with fire in his eyes. “I just want to make you happy. I want to make up for all the years I wasn’t there and for everything we lost and everything we can’t get back. I want to erase as much as I can. Will you let me take care of you, Harper?”

  “I don’t need anyone to take care of me,” I answered, almost automatically, but something about hearing him say that made me want to let him take care of me.

  “I know, but I want to. I need to, because I didn’t do it when I should have, so now I’m going to make up for it. If you let me back in, you’re not getting rid of me.”

  “None of what happened to us was your fault,” I said softly, seeing the conviction in his eyes, even though I knew he blamed himself for not coming after me when I left.

  “It doesn�
�t matter. It’s what I want to do. Will you let me?”

  I nodded. “Yeah, but only if you’ll let me take care of you right back,” I offered, bartering with him.

  He nodded. “I can live with that. So what now?”

  I looked out the front windshield at the beautiful day. “I think I’d like to go on the date you planned for us, because I can’t think of a better way to spend the day than with you.”

  Maybe we could eat in Golden Gate Park. It wouldn’t be as secluded as Brandon’s property, but I’d be with Ryan, so it didn’t matter.

  “It’s not a date. I didn’t plan for it to be a date,” he said quickly.

  I looked at him skeptically, not believing that for a second. “Well, from this point forward, I’d like to consider it a date.”

  “You really mean that?”

  “Hey, what happened to the cocky guy who told me I was going to fall for him, huh?”

  Ryan smirked. “He, uh, decided maybe he shouldn’t push you.”

  I shrugged. “Maybe he could push a little.”

  Finally, a smile crept up on his face. “Okay, I like that idea. So, should we go back to Brandon’s?”

  We were almost halfway home, so it seemed a little silly to drive all the way back the way we’d just come.

  I shrugged. “We could find another place to have our picnic.”

  He looked over at me and smiled. “I’d like that. Maybe down on the wharf.”

  “Maybe,” I said coyly. “Or we could go to your apartment.”

  He looked over at me with raised eyebrows, and I think he was wondering if he’d heard me correctly. “My apartment?”

  “I’ve always wanted to have sex on a marble floor,” I said then, shrugging and knowing I’d caught him off-guard.

  It was a tension breaker, but I was also feeling brazen all of a sudden, and I felt like pushing him in the direction I suddenly wanted to go. I was sure he’d be overly guarded for a while since he’d been under the impression that I was rejecting him just a few minutes earlier, so I figured a little encouragement would do him good.

  “Excuse me?”

  I knew he was afraid he hadn’t heard me correctly, so I moved my hand to his knee and slid it up his leg. Then I looked up and met his eyes that were looking at me in wide-eyed surprise.

  “Keep your eyes on the road, and slow down. You’re going too fast,” I told him, as I guided my hand higher until it was practically touching the erection that was tenting his shorts. His hands gripped the wheel tighter, but he backed off of the accelerator considerably.

  Then I moved my hand and sat back, looking straight ahead. I wasn’t sure Ryan knew what hit him. He looked an equal mix of confused, amazed and pensive as he drove toward the city.

  “It’s on my sex bucket list,” I explained, as his hands gripped the steering wheel so tight his knuckles turned white.

  “So, is that why you want to go back to my apartment?” he asked, his voice catching on his breath.

  “No, I was just sharing something interesting about myself that I didn’t think you knew, but you said you have a terrace, so maybe we can eat lunch out there.”

  He nodded. “Yeah. Sure.” Then after a few seconds he asked, “How long has it been for you?”

  “Since I’ve had sex?”

  He nodded. “Yeah,” he said gruffly. I looked down to see the bulge in his pants was still there.

  “Probably close to four months. Too long,” I added as an afterthought.

  He swallowed. “It’s been three for me.”

  “That’s a long time for a guy. Brandon has sex practically every night.”

  “I know. I hear all about it,” he said shortly.

  “Me too. It’s never something I ask about, but he always offers to share really intimate details with me. And man does he date some experimental women. There are some things I’ve heard him talk about that I wasn’t exactly sure what they were, but after hearing them described, I’m thinking of adding them to my list.”

  Ryan closed his eyes for a second and relaxed against the back of his seat, massaging his temples with the fingers on one hand. “Are you trying to kill me?”

  “No, why would I do that?”

  “Because you’re talking really dirty right now, and your hand was practically on my dick, and all I can think about are all the things I’d like to do to you, and I know you said I could push you a little, but shit, a man can only take so much before things like that just make him want to push all the way.”

  I looked at him thoughtfully, drinking in the tense look on his face. His chiseled jawline was rigid, and his mouth was set in a firm line, and with one revelation, I could make it all go away. I knew he needed to hear it outright, because I’d damn near pushed him away, and he was skeptical of my intentions. I needed to be direct.

  I reached for his hand again, knowing he needed the reassurance that I wouldn’t bail on him as much as I needed it. He’d been hurt too and not just by me. He drew in a breath as soon as our bare skin touched.

  “Ryan, I realize that it’s going to take a while before I’m able to fully trust anyone with my heart. Because of all that I’ve been through, I’ve got some serious walls, but you loved me before, and I know you’d never hurt me, so I’m willing to take a chance with you. And I’m hoping I can learn to trust, because I do want to be with you, even if it scares me.”

  He breathed out a huge sigh and looked over at me with a silly grin on his face. “Holy shit. Seriously?”

  “Yeah.” I grinned back at him.

  “Damn,” he said, grinning like a fool. “I feel like I should pull over or something.”

  “Why?”

  He looked over at me with such reverence. “Because I really want to kiss you, and I’d really like to do it without crashing the car.”

  My heart warmed. He was so sweet.

  “I’d love for you to kiss me.”

  “Done,” he said, as he swerved over three lanes and jerked the car onto the shoulder. As soon as it was in neutral, he grabbed my face in his hands and pulled it toward him as he crushed his lips to mine.

  “Ow,” I said, and he tried to pull away from me, but I wouldn’t let him. I wrapped my hands behind his head and held his lips to mine.

  He slowly relaxed into the kiss, and it was then that I opened my mouth to him. He pressed deeper, letting his tongue reach out and massage mine. It was such a familiar kiss, but I hadn’t felt the familiarity of it in so long.

  When he finally pulled back, he looked at me for a few seconds before resting his forehead against mine. “I love you, Harper.”

  “I love you, too, Ryan. So much.”

  “Shit, it feels good to hear you say that.”

  I giggled. “It feels good to say it. Now, can we start driving again?”

  “No,” he said as he leaned forward to kiss me once more, practically dragging me over the gear shift onto his lap.

  “What was that for?” I asked when he pulled back, loving the electricity that flowed between us as we kissed.

  He shrugged. “That was just because I could.”

  I grinned like an idiot. He was so darn cute.

  I moved my hand to his thigh and slowly ran it up toward the bulging apex as I kept my eyes on his. He watched me in wonder as I cupped him and squeezed gently.

  “If we start driving again, we can go back to your apartment and be alone,” I offered, and in two seconds, he was slamming the car into first and inserting us back into traffic.

  I laughed.

  “Oh, you think that’s funny?” he quipped.

  “You’re adorable,” I said, as I moved my hand so I could take his again.

  “You’re trouble,” he told me. “But I like it a whole lot.”

  We drove in silence for a few minutes as his thumb rubbed back and forth over my hand.

  “I love that I can hold your hand,” he said, seemingly awed by something so simple. “You really love me?”

  I nodded once. “I re
ally do. I always have. Even when I hated you, I still loved you.”

  He let out a deep breath that I hadn’t realized he’d been holding. “Shit,” he said, shaking his head. “I don’t deserve you, but I’m thrilled to hear you say that. I never stopped loving you either.”

  I smiled at him, really wanting to hug him and never let go.

  * * *

  When we parked in the garage under his building, Ryan told me to stay in the car while he got out and ran around to my side. Then he opened my door and unceremoniously yanked me up and into his arms where he held me and looked down at me for a few seconds. His breath was coming in short and fast bursts, and I could feel his heart pounding out a staccato rhythm against my chest.

  He shook his head as if he wanted to say something before he kissed me, long and deep, and it made me toes curl. His lips were so soft and full and incredibly addicting.

  When he pulled back he leaned his forehead against mine. “Shit, Harper. I never actually thought we’d end up here today, but hell if I don’t want to drag you upstairs and keep you there forever.” The look in his eyes kept me grounded to the spot. “You are beautiful and perfect and so wonderful, and I plan on kissing you a lot, okay?”

  I nodded, smiling at his adorable eagerness. “I’m good with that.”

  “Shit. Is this for real? You’re not going to get freaked and bail on me, are you?”

  I shook my head. “I’m hoping like hell that I can stay like this, with you, for the rest of my life, Ryan. You do make me feel safe and loved and so happy. I’m not going anywhere.”

  Now that I’d made my decision I wasn’t going back on it. It felt too right to be with him, and I hoped with everything in me that it wouldn’t be a mistake, and something in my gut told me it wouldn’t be.

  “I love you,” he said sincerely. “And I was serious when I said I wanted to take care of you. You’re one of the strongest women I’ve ever met, but I want you to know without a doubt, that you’re safe with me.”

  “I know,” I said, reaching up to lay my hand on his cheek.

  He smiled at me, and then he leaned down and kissed me, pressing me back against his car as he deepened the kiss. When his tongue met mine, I let out a groan. Feeling the heat between us and the firmness of his body flush against mine, it all became too much.