by Josie Leigh
“Still? It’s been six years, Sammy!” Jason moved into her line of sight, blue eyes glittering in anger at her cowardice.
“What you did…,” she started, turning her back to him and standing to walk toward the door to the kitchen. Jason almost laughed at her inability to lie to him to his face. “It hurt. Besides, shouldn’t you be over me by now? I mean, you moved on before we were even over, didn’t you?” she continued, obviously grasping at straws and turning toward him before reaching for the handle just in time to see Jason stalking toward her.
It was time for the direct approach now. If she was going to pretend she knew how he felt, he was going to make sure she understood the truth, irretrievably. Looping her leg around his waist, he pressed her against the wall and his arousal against her core.
“Does this feel like I’m over you?” he growled.
“Oh!” Sammy’s eyes flew to his, her mouth open in shock.
“Yeah,” he said, thrusting his hips once, before dropping her leg and backing away, turning away from her and shoving his hands through his hair in frustration. “I’m sorry to be so forward, but I need to get this out there so you finally get what I’ve been telling you since we were fifteen!” he gritted out.
“So is that really why you are being so attentive to Corigan? To me? So you can nail me?” Her words came out bitter, like she’d just ignored everything he’d ever said to her. He hadn’t gone about it the best way, but how could she get such a wrong idea about his intentions? They’d never changed; it was never about sex with her. Jason whipped around again, meeting her fiery gaze with his own.
“Nail you?! Fucking nail you?!” Jason roared, backing her against the wall again. “You think this is about sex?!”
“Isn’t it? You want to be my first post-Caleb screw? Isn’t that why you’ve really been hanging around the last year? Proximity and all that? You thought it would be easy to get me on my back if you were always here and could take advantage of a vulnerable situation?” Sammy averted her gaze, and shrugged her shoulders in a way that Jason knew she was trying to be flippant. He recognized that she was trying to make him angry enough to walk away. He knew she was scared to let him in again, but he never thought she’d be so scared that she’d try to push him away like this. At that thought, he’d never wanted to kiss her so badly in his life, but he knew that any further type of physical gesture would only make her feel that her argument was valid.
“First, I promised you I wouldn’t leave you again,” Jason said, closing his eyes and trying to school the desire forming from their anger. Taking a deep breath, he stopped himself from doing something that would cause her to retreat additionally from him and their future.
“You said that earlier. When did you promise that?” Sammy pushed against his chest. Seeing the fire still in her eyes, he backed away, slightly, allowing her only a smidge of the space she thought she needed.
“Last December, when you were drunk and begged me not to leave!” he shot at her, trying to stare her down, but she kept her eyes on the lake behind him.
“You can’t expect me to know about promises like that! I am not holding you to them! You should know that about me!” She screamed at him. He loved when her green eyes shone with anger like this; he knew she was close to the edge of her control.
“Okay? Then how about the fact that I’m still in love with you? Can that be enough reason to want to be around you? To want to spend time with you and your daughter? Moreover, how about the fact that you are in love with me, too,” he asked, puffing his chest to getting into her space again. As she continued to stare over his shoulder, he realized he was going to break before she did, “Fucking look at me, Sammy! Look me in the eye and tell me it’s not true and make me believe it, or so help me, I’m going to have to show you.”
**
Samantha’s chest heaved at their proximity as Jason placed his hands on the door on either side of her head, effectively caging her in. Closing her eyes, she attempted to get her breathing under control and failing. She knew she was about thirty seconds away from giving him everything he needed to make good on his promise. When she was able to return his gaze, his cerulean eyes were dark with desire.
“No,” she denied, but knowing she lacked conviction behind her words. “I can’t,” she blinked, feeling breathless again.
“I’ve missed arguing with you like this,” he said, ignoring her denial, his breathing just as shallow as hers. “The passion in your eyes, the response of your body, the loss of control,” he continued, tracing the line of her jaw to her ear, then down her neck to her collarbone. She shivered at his touch and gasped. “You react to me, Sammy. You call to me, even when you think you aren’t. You want this, I can feel it in the way you are trembling against me right now, the way you can’t look me in the eyes, the way your chest is heaving against mine.”
Though she’d loved Caleb with everything she had, her body wasn’t immune to Jason, nor did her heart forget she’d loved him first. Her eyes went wide at the knowledge that if he were to close the distance between them right now, the last of her control would shatter and she’d completely succumb to him, permanently. Placing a hand on his chest, she intended to push him away, but the frantic beat of his heart against her fingertips showed that he was just as afraid of this moment as she was.
“I told you, I don’t know if I can go back again,” she tried, her voice sounding wary and tired. She knew her body betrayed her, but even her head knew that he was her weakness.
“I know I should just leave you to your life, but I just can’t walk away from you. Not this time. I can’t let you push me away again,” Jason said, taking another tentative step toward her. Samantha’s hand curled into the soft fabric of his t shirt in response. Breathing deeply, she was surrounded the smell of fabric softener, the smell of him, the smell of home. At this realization, she felt dizzy and her breathing became even more shallow than she thought possible. “You don’t want to, I know it,” he whispered, grabbing her left hand from his shirt. “You are scared, I get that. You think I broke you, but I can’t turn off how I feel about you, anymore than you can stop feeling what you feel for me now. Even if you can’t admit what you are currently feeling…
“I’m so sorry my drinking got so out of hand back then and I let it ruin us. I know you think it was to hide my guilt over what you think was going on with Missy,” he paused, looking into her eyes again. “But that doesn’t excuse your using this as a shield to protect you from something neither one of us have any control over.”
“Jason,” Samantha said, breathless at the force behind his words. “I, I don’t know what to say. I mean you were my first…everything… and I will always love you in SOME way… I don’t know if I can just let go of everything Caleb was to me. It’s not fair to you,” she finished, knowing she’d always love Caleb, but would never see him again.
Her heart still ached with the loss, even though a future with Jason was starting to crystallize in her mind and heart again. She felt powerless to stop herself from remembering everything they were once destined to be together, everything she’d felt for him, everything she was feeling again. It felt so different this time, deeper, more mature, more real. It wasn’t selfish, fairy tale, young love this time, she knew it, and she knew her eyes revealed it all to Jason.
He knew she was in love with him again. How could she not be? He’d been everything to her and Corigan in the last year, so giving, so loving, always there when she needed him, even when she didn’t know she needed him. She didn’t even stand a chance at resisting this moment with him. He was right on the boat, Caleb deserved better than to be used as an excuse not to move on. Even Caleb had told her that she’d know when it was time. She’d been ready longer than she wanted to admit, but she felt guilty for even thinking about moving from her commitment to her husband. If only she’d known that ‘til death parts us’ would come so soon, she might’ve…
Might’ve what? She knew she’d lived every day with Cal
eb to its fullest. Because of her life with Jason and thinking she’d taken their relationship for granted, she never wasted an opportunity to show her husband exactly how much she loved him. She never took their time together for granted, but she wondered if she’d be able to do the same with Jason this time. Or would they get complacent again and drive him back into the arms of another woman. At this realization, the first tear sliced a path down Samantha’s face.
“Oh, Sammy,” Jason whispered, sliding a hand against her cheek to wipe away her tears. “I don’t expect you to forget Caleb, honey. You have to keep his memory alive for Corigan. She deserves to see the love you shared. But I can’t compete with a ghost. We have to forge a different path together. The plans we made six years ago are no longer relevant. We can’t move backwards,” he said, voicing her biggest fear.
“How can you be sure that we aren’t just settling for what we know is comfortable?” Samantha asked, tears falling freely from her eyes as she finally really looked into his.
“Sammy,” he sighed, putting his hand on the back of her neck, holding her head against his like he was forcing her to hold his gaze this time. “How can you even think that would be a possibility?” he asked, moving his lips to meet hers in the most self-assured, but hesitant kiss she’d ever experienced. It was like he was expecting her to push him away at any moment, but she knew she wasn’t going to- not this time. She opened her lips to him, allowing him to deepen the kiss. The salty taste of her tears filled her mouth as their tongues began to dance together. Her carefully constructed control over the situation and her desires began to snap at the need for more. More intimacy, more closeness, more breath, more Jason, more everything. Shifting, she pulled him closer to her, prompting him to break their connection.
“The ring, Sammy,” were the only words he said as he gave her a sad look.
“I know,” she said, taking a deep breath and moving to slide the ring from her finger. When his hand moved to stop her, she looked up at him questioningly.
“You need to do this on your own, have your own moment to say good bye, not so we can reunite in a moment of weakness, Sammy,” he said, brushing her hair away from her face.
“It’s been over a year, Jason. I’m ready to be with you. Otherwise, I wouldn’t even consider this,” Samantha said, the words coming out more desperate than they sounded in her head.
“No, not like this,” he stood up and walked across the deck.
“What do you mean?! I thought this is what you wanted,” she said, confused that he’d shifted directions so quickly.
“Oh, Sammy! It is! I want to be with you, though,” he proclaimed, “and you deserve more than a quick bang on the couch while Corigan is napping. I want to do this right with you.”
“You, obviously, have no idea how sex works when you have kids,” Samantha giggled, nervously, staring at her wedding ring and trying to decide if this is really what she wanted, or if she just missed being intimate with a man.
“It’s been over six years for us. It needs to be special again, like our first time part two. We aren’t the same people we were then, but I know that you don’t want it to be like this,” Jason explained, pleading with her to understand that it wouldn’t be right for him to let her take her wedding ring off just because she wanted sex. She’d regret it and she’d blame him for letting it happen. Samantha saw hurt flicker through his eyes as she began to understand his reasoning.
“OH!” Samantha looked up at him, horrified. “I’m so sorry! It’s just, it’s been so long. Thank you, Jason, for knowing I don’t want us to start again this way. Of course, you’re right,” she said, her cheeks flushed at her wanton behavior.
“Hey,” he said, lifting her chin to look up at him again, “don’t thank me for knowing what you need. Especially this, because it’s taking all of my self control to walk away from this right now.” His eyes were serious and conveyed how deep his love for her went.
“So, now what?” Samantha asked, “Do we start over? Try to pick up from where we left off?”
“Neither, we just be Jason and Sammy and see where it all leads,” he shrugged.
“Sounds good,” she smiled as he pulled her from against the door and into a tight embrace.
“So, want to go for dinner and a movie tomorrow? That new rom com you were talking about is opening,” Jason smiled down at her in his arms.
“Are you sure I was talking about it?” she shot him a warning glance, before a fit of giggles overtook her at the challenging look he threw back at her. “Okay, I’ll see if my mom can keep Corigan.”
“That sounds like a plan,” Jason said, giving her a kiss on the cheek. “I’m going to give you and Corigan a night to yourselves, Sammy. You need the time to figure out if this is what you really want. You deserve to have a clear head when you say good bye. I’ll see you in the morning, okay?”
“Okay, Jason. Thank you,” she whispered as he pulled away and walked through the back door into the kitchen.
“Till tomorrow,” he said, turning back to her as she followed through the doorway. “Don’t doubt that I love you, Sammy. I want to be the only man on your mind when we are together again,” he whispered.
“I know,” she whispered back, not ready to say the words out loud again.
Chapter 20
Samantha awoke the next morning feeling polarized about everything that had happened the day before. Her heart fluttered at the thought of her date, but her stomach churned at the possibility of moving on. The mixed emotions had motivated her to call Jessica to join her at the gym before starting her day. Jessica always seemed to have a fresh perspective on Jason because she’d still been in high school when they split, whereas Sara had been there every step of the way. So far her sister had only served to distract her from everything she needed to do to get ready for her ‘first’ date with Jason, which wasn’t necessarily a bad thing.
“Can your hip handle the stationary bike?” Jessica asked, indicating their next stop in the rotation, and breaking her from her train of thought.
“I think so,” Samantha said. “I want to try anyway, but I’ll deny it if I can’t walk tomorrow.”
“Good to know! So, I’ll avoid all calls from mom tomorrow,” Jessica laughed, climbing onto the bike beside Samantha.
“Probably a good idea,” Samantha winked, starting her workout and looking up at the row of televisions above them.
“I thought the little sister was supposed to get her big sister in trouble,” her sister teased, straightening her ponytail before starting to pedal.
“You’ve done that plenty. I think I’ve earned a little payback.”
“Fine, if you’re going to blame me for overdoing it, I should get some information out of it!” Jessica gave her a smile that let Samantha know that they were finally going to talk about Jason.
“What information is that?” Samantha asked, taking a sip from her water bottle and playing dumb.
“What’s going on with Jason?” Jessica asked, her eyes glittering with the prospect of learning new gossip.
“I’d like to know the answer to that one, too!” an interested voice came from the bike on the other side of Samantha.
“Hey Ken!” Jessica welcomed the fair-haired beauty to the conversation.
“Jason is my friend, that’s all,” Samantha shot them both a withering look, not wanting to disclose their plans for the evening just yet. However, with Kelly agreeing to play babysitter for the evening, the word would get out about the date sooner or later.
“Yeah, and that’s why you were sucking face before Corigan’s birthday party yesterday,” Jessica scoffed.
“You and Jason made out? He didn’t share this information with me,” McKenna stopped mid-pedal and gaped at Samantha. “Although, that may have more to do with mom being at his house when I stopped by this morning,” she shot the sisters a pained look they’d all come to know as a direct result of spending extended time with Jamie.
“Poor Jason,” Samanth
a mumbled, before shaking off the thoughts of his mother’s visit. “And we did not make out. He kissed me and I pushed him away!” Samantha rolled her eyes. ‘After acting like a shameless hussy,’ her head reminded her, causing a small frown to settle on her lips.
“I’m new to this conversation,” McKenna defended. “You didn’t kiss him back at all?!”
“For like a second—”
“Jason told Sara it was actually several minutes,” Jessica shared.
“He said WHAT?!” she asked, taken off guard that he’d shared his side of the story with her sister.
“With that kind of reaction, it has to be true!” McKenna laughed for a minute before looking shocked as another thought took over. “I feel left out! Miranda and I were there, too! I can’t believe he didn’t share this with his baby sisters,” she pouted.
“I wouldn’t be offended by that, Ken. Apparently, he’s sharing all kinds of stories with Sara he’s not sharing with the rest of us,” Samantha said, sarcastically. “When did he tell Sara what happened, anyway?”
“When you and mom were outside having your pow wow,” Jessica dismissed, leaving Samantha to feel that her sister was annoyed by her avoidance tactics.
“Ah, Miranda and I were talking about mom’s behavior lately while you were outside, and Jason tends to steer clear of talking about her,” McKenna said in comprehension, her lip curled into a slight sneer at the reflection. Just as quickly as it settled on her lips, it disappeared and she was back on the kiss, “So? You didn’t confirm whether you enjoyed it or not. I mean you didn’t stop the kiss right away! That says something,” she nodded in agreement with herself.
“Well,” Samantha said, staring ahead, not having the courage to look either girl in the eye, “I didn’t hate it,” she blushed. “Not to mention the fact that it’s been over a year since, I’ve had sex, so…”
“Is that all it was?” Jessica asked, her eyebrow rose in question.