by Rose Hudson
“Your turn Beauty.” My voice is lower and more demanding than I anticipated, slowly losing the battle with control, and want for her, racing against a clock of truth. “I need to see all of you if I’m going to do this.” Desire addled eyes sparkle at me as she stands taller, mouth parted and fingers working to satisfy my request.
“And what is it that you’re going to do,” her question comes on a breath as she pushes her jeans from her hips, stepping out of them while reaching for her shirt.
“Wait,” my voice gravelly and thick as I step forward, kneeling before her. Needing to feel her skin under my fingers, knowing only she could make me bold, give me the assurance I need. My lips meet the inside of her thigh, warm and delicate as I kiss a path upwards, nipping and licking, determined that whether this be the end or the start of us, she never forgets tonight. Face buried between her legs, getting drunk on the smell of her as I run my nose up the divide of her sex. Her palms land with a sharp slap across the surface of the dresser behind her, head falling back as my tongue skims the tip of her clit before drawing it into my mouth. Sucking and lapping up the salty-sweet taste of her, I lift her leg over my shoulder, wearing her like a face mask, fucking her with my tongue, all of it making me feel like a madman.
“If this is what stripping gets me, I’m never wearing clothes again,” her words are a moan through gritted teeth. I move my face from side to side, the stubble of my two-day beard rubbing against her, causing her hips to rock forward and my fingers to twitch. Pulling her other leg over my shoulder and standing forces her to lie back on the surface of the dresser. Her eyes widen in surprise and my jaw clenches at the sight of her beneath me, a sheen of sweat glistening on her forehead, naked from the waist down because I couldn’t wait one more fucking second for that look on her face. I lean over her, pushing up her shirt and pulling down a cup of her bra, freeing her as I bend and suck the nipple into my mouth. The smell of her perfume or lotion or whatever the hell it is driving me fucking crazy for her as I tear her other breast free. With both on display and calling to the dirty fuck inside me, I plant my face between them, licking and kissing and breathing her in, smothering myself in her. I growl into her chest, and she pulls my head up by my hair, leaning up to take my mouth with hers. When she lets go like this, impatient and taking from me as much as I take from her, I can’t fucking breathe. I can’t take my time and damn sure can’t think straight. I pull from her mouth and she falls away, a moan of protest rolling from her chest.
“I’ve wanted you every fucking second for the last two days and I wanna take my time.” My palm runs over the flat plane of her waist, down between her thighs. Using my middle finger, I slip it between the lips of the only pussy to ever own me, spreading the mix of wetness left by both her and my mouth in wide languorous circles.
“I need more, Patrick,” her voice is a pleading whisper. “Please.” Waiting for her to look at me, I pause my fingers, getting her attention and her eyes drill into mine.
“Like this?” I push my middle finger in slowly and she nods, biting her lip, fingers digging into my bicep. I could fuck a hole through this dresser, but I wouldn’t stop doing this to her if a goddamn bomb was going off outside. The rose colored flush of her chest and the harsh pant of her breaths letting me know she’s close.
“Yes, more!” My mouth waters at the desperation in her words, her sounds, the taste of her stained on my lips. My thumb finds her clit as I push two fingers in this time and her hips shoot up from the dresser. “Oh fuck!” Her hand drops from my arm, falling beneath us, searching frantically before settling on my dick. She wraps her hand firm around my shaft, and I moan, low and deep as my hips rock into her closed fist.
“Even your fucking hand feels good wrapped around my dick.” Her hand flexes around me, and I slow the rocking of my hips. No way in hell am I getting off like this, and I’m wound so damn tight that I’ll go off like a fucking rocket wrapped in her hand. When I come, I’m going to be buried inside her. “Come for me so I can take you to the bed, Erin,” I say through clenched teeth. She leans up on the elbow of her free arm, staring mouth opened from my eyes to my hand, watching me fuck her with my fingers. She shakes her head quickly, releasing my cock and grabbing my hand, keeping it from moving.
“Take me now.” She leans up from the dresser. I shake my head in silent argument, wanting her satisfied. “Patrick. Take me to the bed.” Her demand is adamant, the end of each word firm and clipped. She pulls me to her, wrapping her arms around my neck and pressing her mouth to mine, deep and greedy. Well fuck. Having her here, somewhere other than the bed, was more primal, easier to disconnect and detour my brain from intimacy to pure pleasure. It was safe there, wild and dirty- fucking. Here it's profound and I’m made all too aware of the difference as I lay her on the bed beneath me. I swallow hard and stare down at her, wrapping my arms around her back and pulling her to me. She sees. Her eyes search mine, seeing every thought. I know this because like so many times before, we don’t have to speak. She sees my words and I see hers, without vocalizing anything.
“What are you scared of Patrick? What are you not telling me?” Peeling away my layers, her question strips away a piece of my armor, my shield.
“With you? Everything. Telling you the truth and losing you. Not telling you and losing you anyway. It’s a fucking lose-lose with us Erin.” I expect confusion, questions, anything other than her shaking her head in agreement and I don’t know if I should be happy or shattered that she understands what I’m saying.
“I think about it too. Things have gone so fast and have been so good, but yet…,” her head turns to the side, eyes peering out the window, her chest pressing fully into mine with the inhale of her deep breath. “It’s just that I feel like we’re going everywhere and nowhere at the same time. Like I can’t wait to see what tomorrow holds and then, I’m waiting for the other shoe to drop.”
“I came up here with the knowledge that the next time I walked out that door, you would know everything one way or the other, but I feel like you need to know what’s most important first.” Her chin tilts up and she stares deep into me, waiting to accept whatever it is I tell her. “I can’t help the way I feel about you and if I could’ve gotten you out of my head, I would’ve left you alone- but I couldn’t. And now I couldn’t escape you if I tried. I’ve never known love and that’s how I know that what I feel for you is just that.” It would be one thing if this was one of those instances where one person loves, but is unsure if that love is reciprocated. But I know Erin is falling in love right along with me. From day one, this connection has been something otherworldly and it has pulled us into its cyclone, turning our worlds inside out, holding hard and fast to one another for protection from the storm. Seeing the words still withheld on her tongue as she stares up at me, I take her mouth gently, treasuring it like I do her heart. My stomach twists into knots, my heart pounding so hard I can feel it in my neck. There’s no way I can talk about this and look at her at the same time. She’s so far out of my league, and now with this admission she will see it. I turn away, hanging my legs off the bed. The fact that I have never spoken to anyone about this becoming so real, that it, in itself, feels like a third person in the room.
“When my mother died, you might as well have taken my father with her because his reality and focus was pretty nonexistent. I was fourteen at the time, and an only child. He’d go days without coming home and even longer without saying a word to me, consuming himself with work and money- things he’d never allow to overshadow our family when Mom was here with us. If it hadn’t been for my Uncle Greer, I would have experienced the loss of my mother in solitude. He made sure I came to the boat shop every day. He played on my heartstrings and claimed his old age kept him from doing things that needed done, told me how much he needed my help to do stuff. Later on, after his murder, I knew that had been his way of helping me cope, giving me something to do to take my mind off of the hell that was forming around me.” I feel the bed shift beh
ind me and I can feel her eyes on me. I clench mine closed, having gone too far to stop now. “A year after her death, Dad brought home a woman and a month later she became my stepmother. Jo was only ten years older than me, eight years younger than dad, young and pretty and a body to fill the void. I knew from day one that something wasn’t right, but I was young and brushed it off. They traveled and partied, me staying with Greer most of the time over the next two years, and I took full advantage when I got my permit. Driving two parishes over to go to parties and eventually getting introduced to pills and alcohol. I figured out that when I drank down pain pills with whiskey, I couldn’t give two fucks about anything going on around me.” Her warm palm smooths over my back, easing the tension with her touch.
“Careless with my stash, Jo found pain killers in my pockets doing laundry one day, and instead of telling Dad, she approached me. She told me that if I needed pills, she would get them for me, decreasing the chances of me getting caught buying them. Stupidly I trusted her and she took the opportunity to get close to me, letting me skip school, taking me to strip clubs, even arranging the services of a stripper to take my virginity after telling her I hadn’t had the balls to fuck any of the girls I went to school with. Now I see how fucked up it was, but then, I just felt like she was helping me, being cool. When we came home that afternoon, we found my Dad, dead at the kitchen table, a fatal shot to the back of his head. When the police came, she told them she hadn’t been home, that she had been retrieving me from a strip club after I skipped school. She wouldn’t even let the police speak to me. I knew then. I fucking knew that somehow she’d orchestrated this whole fucking thing, but I didn’t know why, still don’t. A few days later I told my uncle, losing my mind with guilt, needing him to help me figure out what the hell happened. I came back home to get my things, deciding that there was no way in hell I was staying there with her, but when I got there she was waiting for me. I guess she caught on to me dodging her, knew that I had some idea she was involved. She basically told me that I had one chance to let it go, forget what I thought I knew or I’d be sorry. After I told her to fuck herself and that I would prove she did it, I left to go back to Greer’s boat shop. Normally when I pulled up late in the evening, he was sitting on the dock, drinking a beer and waiting for me. I’d gotten use to sitting with him, listening to him bullshit about nothing. But that night, he wasn’t there. I got out of my truck and walked into the work bay- silence. I just remember running to the back of his huge shop, knowing that if he wasn’t on the dock and he wasn’t fiddling with something, fixing something like he always was…” I clear the lump from my throat, determined that I would not shed another fucking tear over this shit, that I would not give one more second to it. Erin sits up on her knees, wrapping her arms around my neck from behind. The feel of her warm body against my back comfort in its truest form.
“I found him in the back corner, covered in blood- dead because of me and the fact that I hadn’t listened to her warning. I tried to resuscitate him over and over, but nothing. He was gone and it was too late for me to do a damn thing about it. After that realization, anger and ignorance took over. I flew back to our house, and I wish I felt guilty about it, but I wanted nothing more than to end her life like she had done to the only family I had left. But she was a hell of a lot smarter than me. When I walked into the kitchen, I found her and two detectives sitting at the table, white pills piled in the middle, and even though I was sixteen and stupid, coming down from the pills I’d taken two hours before, I knew I was fucked. When the cops took in my blood covered shirt, my face, my hands, they stood and drew their weapons. I didn’t even raise my arms, I just stood there, tears rolling down my face, staring at her. I wanted to ask her why she’d done this to my family, why she would do this to me. But no words would come. I stood there until one of the police officers cuffed me and placed me in the back of his car, knowing on the ride to the station that this was probably bigger than anything I could even fathom. Knowing that it had to do with money, probably my father’s oil business, something that was far too complicated for me to understand.” I hear Erin’s sharp intake of breath from behind me and I peer over my shoulder, braving a look at her. Her tear-stained cheeks glisten, hand over her mouth, other arm wrapped around her middle.
“How is that possible? Are you telling me Wesley Broussard is your father? But your last name is Lawson.” I flinch when she says Dad’s name, the small shred of hope that she didn’t know or remember the story fading away. The story made national news when it happened sixteen years ago. I guess I was naive to think her being fourteen at the time may have shielded her from the knowledge.
“Yes. He was…is my father,” my reply flat, void of emotion, trying to gage her response, watching tear after tear spill down her face, landing on the bare skin of her chest. “When I was released from Juvenile Detention after my eighteenth birthday, the judge agreed to allow my name change because I was adjudicated and served as a juvenile. I dropped Broussard to stay out of the media, to have a chance at a life. Lawson was originally my middle name- my grandmother’s maiden name. Guess I just wanted to keep something of my family.” Her stare is piercing, absorbing every inch of me bare to her. She didn’t know who I was, but she knows who I am, and I have to show her that. I move to take her hand, needing confirmation that she’s still here with me. Her hand is warm and accepting, eyes full of sorrow and questions and hurt. “Erin, I never thought we would get to this point, I expected this to burn out just as quickly as it started. I’m so sorry that I didn’t tell you before now. I just couldn’t until I knew this was real.” For a long stretch of time her eyes stay on mine, searching, assessing. She looks down at our hands, tracing the rough lines of mine with the perfect softness of hers. Without looking up, she speaks through her tears.
“I understand why you didn’t. It hurts, but I understand.” She looks up at me, her blue diamonds shining. “I just wish that I would’ve met you sooner, even just to be there so you didn’t have to go through it alone.” She touches my face and it’s the only thing that feels real as my head swims in awe and love. “And I’ll be damned if I’m just one more thing you lose because of her.”
I snap. Broken and shattered. As if every piece of me separates and retracts to some unknown place, revealing the me that’s left underneath. The me that’s never known the love of a woman, this woman, was the one thing I needed to feel at peace. Of every possible reply out of the millions I’ve contemplated, I never came close to imagining these words.
“And I’ll be damned if you didn’t just change my life with that one sentence,” my voice breaks, thick and overcome with emotions too good to explain. “I thought I would lose you. I thought you’d see that you’re too fucking perfect for me, because you are, Erin.” I pull her to me, pouring every drop of love I can into my kiss as my lips land on hers. Like jumping off a cliff and soaring all at once.
MY ENTIRE MORNING HAS been a beautifully chaotic mess. Mel and Shaylyn worked Friday while I was in Memphis, so I told them that I would work today. That’s one of the things about retail, if it’s Thanksgiving weekend, you’re working- period. But considering Saturday isn’t normally a working day for me, it’s the only day in my phone that doesn’t have fifteen alarms, specifically one that would wake me up at seven this morning to get ready for work. So at seven-forty-five when the sun started to peek through the blinds of my bedroom, I just about knocked Patrick out of the bed trying to jump over him to make it to the shower. Normally that would send me into freak-out mode, but today I don’t think anything could wipe this smile from my face.
Every curve and bend of my body aches delectably, every part of me marked with the memory of Patrick, most importantly my heart. When he told me about his past, his story, the depth of my pain for him and the need to make it better somehow was almost more than I could bare. I wanted to rewind time and erase all of it, but somehow I knew that would mean we would never meet. Us meeting was no chance encounter; it was not two ra
ndom people bumping into each other. He’s the savior I’ve been waiting on to pull me out of the depths of my darkness. I only hope that I can save him in return. The damage may have taken place sixteen years ago, but it’s clear the after affects have lingered since, his healing only beginning last night when he chose us over fear. Sometimes all it takes is the love of another person to make you take that first step forward, and I know Ruth and I are his reason. Now it’s up to me to show him that he is every bit the wonderful man I know him to be. He not only needs to let go of what that horrid woman did to his family, for us, he has to do it for himself. I’m under no illusions that I won’t have questions or that there won’t be times in our future that this directly affects us, but I do believe that we can do this, that he can do this.
The clock in my vehicle says eight-forty as I pull into the back parking lot of the store. We don’t open until nine, but the fact that I’ve been out since Wednesday and this is the busiest shopping weekend of the year means I won’t have time to do much, if any preparation before unlocking the front door. I can only hope that the girls left the store in stellar condition before they locked up last night. I’ll have to give it to the two of them though. If Mel was as driven in her personal life as she is where this company’s concerned, she’d have David Beckham divorced and on a plane to the U.S. in two shakes. And Shaylyn is turning out to be quite the asset to our little team as well. Being a young single mom and going to school, I was concerned about hiring her, but it turns out my intuition was correct because she is assertive and prompt and her customer service skills could charm even the grumpiest of old ladies. Lord knows we have those in spades around here. My inner brag-fest turns sour as I reach the back door only to find it unlocked. Damn girls, really?