Shaken

by Dee Tenorio

  She advanced another step. “Couldn’t you hear my heart breaking without you?”

  “I held you every night.” Her pain had been a scourge, but he’d still held on. She was the one who let go.

  “But did you listen, Grant? Did you hear me calling out for her? For my daughter. Our daughter?”

  Until her voice was hoarse and the sound was gone, but still he listened, even when she’d scream soundlessly into her pillow. Just the memory of those tortured sounds made him feel as if his teeth were breaking from the pressure. Every bony plate in his head throbbed from it. “Yes.”

  She was right in front of him now, like a pale ghost demanding retribution. “Why didn’t you?”

  He jerked, her whisper hitting him like a gunshot. “Why didn’t I what?”

  “Why didn’t you call for her? Why didn’t you cry for her? Didn’t she deserve even that much from you?”

  The rail bit into his back. Grant closed his eyes. He shook his head at her.

  “That’s why I don’t want your money, Grant. I don’t want anything from you. I just want to go away and pretend none of this—” she pushed at his chest, “—ever happened. Just like you have, every day, ever since—”

  He opened his eyes, grasping her wrists so fast she gasped. “Don’t say it.”

  “Say what?” But she knew. He could see it in her eyes.

  “Just don’t.”

  “Why not? It’s not as if you care. As if you feel anything about the fact that she’s gone.” She leaned into him, but not in the way he wanted. In a way that made him wish this elevator were bigger. But given the tension in his spine, the calculating look in her eyes, he knew the biggest elevator car in the world wouldn’t make any difference. What he needed were doors that opened. That allowed him to escape before the elephant between them sounded its name. “Did you even feel anything when she was alive, or was that a lie, too?”

  Now what was she talking about? “When did I ever lie to you?”

  “For all I know, everything was a lie. Our relationship, our marriage—”

  “I have never lied to you.”

  But his answer just seemed to incense her. “Oh yes you did.”

  “When? Tell me when.” He held on, even when she yanked at his grip on her wrists, fighting like a wild thing.

  “When you promised to stand by me, no matter what.” Pain and anger flared the color in her cheeks. “But where were you, Grant?”

  “I was right here!”

  She shook her head, the wisps of hair around her face flying. “When you said you loved me.”

  “I do love you.” He wrapped his arms around her, trying to keep her from hurting either of them by holding her hands behind her. He pressed his forehead to hers, closing his eyes as he breathed her in. That sweet spice that was purely Julia. Even if she hated him, it was the only thing that brought him any measure of peace. “I’ve loved you from the first second I saw you. The second, damn it. You’re my whole life, Jules. You’re all that matters to me. How can you not know that?”

  Her forehead rubbed against his, a sob bubbling out of her. “I did once. But it wasn’t real. None of it.”

  “Yes, it was.” It took everything he had not to crush her against him with the need to convince her. To take that soft, wet mouth again. She only seemed to believe in him when they were wrapped up in each other. Joined. Their bodies straining against and into each other. The only time when absolute honesty ruled. Every other moment was clouded with half-truths and guilt, and nothing he could ever say would clear them away. “It still can be. You don’t want this divorce any more than I do.”

  She tilted her head back, staring up at him through slitted eyelids. “What about when you said you loved Autumn? How was that not a lie? How can I stay with a man who could pretend to love a child? How can I ever believe that you’re not pretending to love me?”

  She slipped from his now boneless hold and pressed her back to the opposite wall of the car, arms tight around herself. He could only stare at her, head shaking on its own with his disbelief. Every inch of him had gone cold. Struck numb by her words.

  “You think I didn’t see your hesitation when we found out I was pregnant despite your vasectomy? That I didn’t feel your distance from us when I carried her? I did, but I told myself you’d get past it. Told myself you just had to get used to the idea of being a father. That you had when she was born and you acted like you cared. Like she meant something to you. Because believing anything else would mean there was something wrong with our perfect little marriage. But I was wrong. I lied myself into a stupor and that never became more clear than when she died and you didn’t care at all!”

  “Stop saying that!” He didn’t mean to yell at her, but the roar of his own voice stung his ears.

  Not that it seemed to bother her. “What?”

  “That I didn’t care! I cared, goddamn it!” It was the guilt that ate him alive until there was almost nothing left. Nothing but how much he loved her. If he could grab something and throw it, he would, but there was nothing. Just him and her in a fucking box with no doors.

  She shook her head, cheeks still wet but her tears gone. Straightening, she let go of the hold she had around herself. “I don’t believe you.” She wiped her cheeks, her voice as firm as the day she said she was leaving him, but her eyes shone, heartbreak just beneath her veneer of calm. “I don’t believe in anything anymore.”

  Chapter Six

  Across from her like the combatant she’d turned him into, Grant bowed his head. She could see the tracks her hands had made in his hair, the heavy black lengths swirling with more strands of silver than she’d realized. “You were always the one with so much faith,” he said quietly.

  She couldn’t argue with that. She’d believed too strongly in their relationship—that it was practically fated, that it was so much stronger than those of her friends, whose significant others came and went with the breeze, that their love could overcome any obstacle. She’d never seen the breakdown coming. Had never guessed it could fall apart as quickly as it had come together. She swallowed the resentment along with the lump in her throat. “I learned better.”

  He looked up again, his stare boring into her.

  She didn’t know what she was supposed to understand in that look. It was dark, a sullen sensuousness heating his features. Those eyes trained on her as if there were nothing else in the world. He stepped away from the rail, changing the pace of her heartbeat with a single step. Then another. And another.

  The distance between them disappeared. She tried not to look up, her gaze locked on the small round button on his shirt. Not the firm, tanned flesh beneath, not the dark strands of the hair there, waiting to spring between her splayed fingertips.

  His hand rose, his thumb tracing her jaw to the point of her chin. “You’re going to tell me you don’t believe in this?”

  “In what?” Her voice was little more than a breath of sound.

  His fingers released her chin, his whole hand turning so he could trail the back of his fingers down the length of her neck. He tugged the swath of satin at her neck where she’d tried to retie it. It came loose for him, like the rest of her inhibitions. She could practically count them falling at his feet.

  Reason…clink.

  Sanity…clink.

  Self-preservation…clink.

  His hands tugged at her buttons, pushing the tiny discs through the holes there, his knuckles grazing her breasts with each nimble shift. Soon enough, the blouse gaped open, only her camisole top keeping him from her skin.

  “In this.” He slid the satin off her shoulders, taking the thin straps of her camisole with it. His fingertips traced the edges of fabric over the swells of her breasts, leaving trails of fire dancing over her skin. “It’s like a magic all its own when we’re together.”

  Her eyes slid closed as he freed a nipple. “It’s sex.”

  His breath made her lips tremble just before he drew one into his mouth, his tongue sw
iping over it and causing her to gasp. He let her go, the corner of his mouth curving when her eyes opened. The side of his forefinger coursed over her lip, taking the moisture he’d just given her before dropping back to her exposed breast. Wet fingers encircled her nipple, plucking at it, sending electric pleasure down her belly straight to her clit.

  “It’s passion,” he corrected, his voice dropping to that bedroom tone she knew far too well. “I’ve missed your breasts, Jules. The flavor of them, the way your nipples tighten up for my mouth.”

  So hard they hurt. She arched into his plucking fingers, moaning despite her deepest desire not to.

  “I can’t look at you without remembering how you taste. What it sounds like when you beg me to make you come.” His free hand captured her other breast, pulling down the offending fabric before cupping it and drawing a helpless cry from her. His thumb began its own torture on the nipple he found there. He lowered his face to her neck, his breath hot against her skin. “I need you, Jules. Every minute of every day, I need you.”

  “No you don’t.” If he’d needed her, he wouldn’t have pushed her away when she tried to comfort him. Back when she’d thought his silences held secrets and pain instead of indifference.

  “Yes, I do. I can’t even breathe anymore without you.” Down. She felt him drawing them both down to the floor. She went, her body flowing into his, over his. He lay back on the carpet, pulling her with him, fitting her mouth to his, not to kiss, but to breathe her in. “You’re air to me, Julia. You’re the fucking air.”

  Her eyes burned again, hot tears splashing down her cheeks again. “No, Grant—”

  “Yes. You can believe in that, can’t you? Believe in me, in what we are together.” He kissed her, finally, oh God, finally, his hands cupping her head to keep her still while he plundered her mouth, searching for something she didn’t know if she had to give to him anymore. Helplessly, she gave in, lost in the swirl of need and desire. Her hair finally gave up as well, falling around them like a curtain. His hand moved off her face, following the concave arc of her spine before sliding over the curve of her rear. He squeezed, sending a flash of white-hot sensation through to her slick sex. He traced the crease he found all the way down to her wet folds, teasing her opening with dipping caresses.

  She throbbed there, her sensitive flesh straining to take him in, practically sucking at his tempting touch but finding no reprieve. She needed him. Needed to be filled. Yanking back from his kiss, she braced a hand on his chest so she could pull at the button of his slacks. With a groan, he helped her, the two of them impatiently freeing his cock. He took hold of it, gripping the thick base to steady it for her. Need demanded she fit herself over him, take him in and fill the emptiness, but greed demanded something else. A taste.

  As if he could read her mind, he opened his eyes halfway, peering at her for a frozen moment. She stared right back, even as she lowered her lips and took the swollen head of him between them. Down she went, taking him all the way into her mouth, swirling her tongue around him until she felt the too-tight grip of his hand.

  Back up, slow, only to draw him once more into her mouth. It wasn’t the same kind of fullness she’d wanted, but satisfaction tingled through her as she again met his now-pumping grip. The stain of red on his cheeks and the near-glowing intensity of his eyes fed the hunger in her, made her move faster over him. She licked, sucking at the hint of fluid seeping from the head, tearing a guttural groan from him before speeding her pace to match his strokes.

  Soon, it wasn’t enough. She needed more. Needed him. He didn’t question when she pulled him from her mouth. No, he simply reached out to help her kneel over him. Swore virulently when the crown of his cock met the wet heat of her pussy and sank deep inside. Rocking on him, full of him, Julia became a being of pure feeling. Her hands settled on his chest, using him as leverage to lift herself up before sliding back to the hilt. Faster and faster she rocked, her need a clawing desperation. He lifted onto one elbow, stilling her by looping his other arm around her waist and drawing her breast to his mouth.

  She cried out as he nipped at the hard point, licking at the sting before sucking deeply. She tried to move, tried to reach the peak, but the faster she moved, the slower he met her. Her hands clawed at his shoulders, but he refused to match her pace.

  Then, suddenly, he flipped them, fitting her beneath him. She gasped, blinking up at him, her heart stuttering at the intense heat in his molten gaze. All movement stopped, leaving her aware of his forearms under her shoulders, his hands in her hair holding her face still. Most of all, the sense of fullness, the hot intrusion of his cock within her, throbbing but not moving through her. Instead, it was nestled there, cradled by her body as if that was where he’d always belonged. It was all she could do to breathe more than a shaky exhalation at a time, his stillness demanding she feel beyond the physical. His stare implored her.

  She was so fucking tired of crying, but unwanted emotion—love, pain, disappointment, heartbreak, need, even the joy buried beneath it all—rose and roiled inside her like a wave she couldn’t possibly survive. Tears overflowed down the sides of her face and into her hair. Her hands, flat against his chest, curled into fists. “Don’t do this to me, Grant.”

  “I have to.” He lowered his lips to hers, a soft almost chaste kiss that crumbled more of the walls she’d been so desperate to build. His hips rose, slowly, sliding him from her briefly before he stroked back inside. Another kiss, another slow rise and fall of his body into hers, and she sobbed against his mouth. “You need to feel this.”

  “I can’t.” She arched against him, her belly sliding against his. She tightened her legs around him, desperate to turn this from an act of love to something she could ignore, but he wasn’t having it. He stopped, returning them to that terrible stillness. “Please, Grant! I can’t go back to feeling it. Not alone. Please, not alone.”

  “You’re not alone, baby. I swear, you’re not alone.” He pressed deep into her, grinding against her clit and sending a wracking shudder of pleasure through her. He levered up, pulling back to thrust deeper still. “You’re never alone.”

  She stared up at him, unable to break that gaze as his thrusts increased, each one a full-length retreat and return, the width of him stroking her walls all the way around him, sending near-blinding waves of pleasure through her, but still she couldn’t look away.

  “Don’t leave me again, Julia.” He panted, his dark hair catching the moisture on his forehead and flattening there. “I need you.”

  He did. For the first time in so long, she could see it there in his eyes. Not sexual need, though that stained his cheeks. No, this was deeper. The glimpse of his heart she hadn’t seen in so long. Afraid to believe, she reached up, brushing the wet strands of his hair back, looking as deep as she dared into those tormented eyes.

  “Grant?” His name was little more than a breath, but the sound seemed to break him. Or maybe it was her touch, both of her hands now cupped his face, and his control shattered.

  Eyes squeezed shut, he turned his face into her hand, for the first time, his tears began to escape, spilling hotly onto her palm.

  “Oh, Grant…” She pulled him down, kissing his cheeks, his lips, his eyes.

  “I need you,” he said hoarsely, his lips meeting hers in pure demand now, his big body shaking, his hips jerking against her. He held her head to his, taking her mouth in a kiss that was more desperate than artful. She drowned in him, trying to hold him tight. Hold him together, because she could see that he’d finally hit the breaking point.

  I have you. She ached to say the words but she couldn’t, not with him devouring her. She could only will him to feel them, even as her heart and body began to rise. He moved over her, desperate passion removing any kind of finesse as he pumped ruthlessly into her. She took him, meeting him, her arms and legs wrapped tightly around him.

  He broke the kiss, burying his face in her neck, rising to his knees and lifting her onto his lap to thrust harder
, stealing her breath but not her will. “Love me, Julia. Please, say you still love me.”

  She reached for him, sobbing herself when his hands met hers and took hold, stretching her arms over her head. Raw emotions swirled through her, the vulnerability she always felt with him blessedly going both ways once again. She realized then, that was part of what had gone wrong. Even here, at their most open and intimate, he had hidden from her. Closed her out. Not anymore, though. I’m not alone. Neither of us is alone anymore… She couldn’t shut him or her feelings out if she tried, the truth in her heart spilled free. “I do. I love you, Grant.”

  Thought disappeared in the white heat of their passion. There was only the building tension, the need spiraling through them and finally, the breaking snap when she came apart around him, the clenching grip of her body dragging him with her over the edge, his shout of completion stifled against her skin as she smiled into his hair.

  They were both shaking this time, his arms so tight around her she could barely breathe, but she didn’t care. He was finally letting her hold him. The tears she’d touched were still flowing against her skin, strangled sounds coming from him as he tried to hold back but couldn’t. She simply held him tighter.

  The movement shifted her ear closer to his mouth and she realized he was whispering something, words tearing free as if ripping right from his soul…and tearing hers right along with him.

  “Forgive me…”

  Chapter Seven

  He shouldn’t have started this. He knew it. He’d fought this for so long, but he couldn’t let her close herself up. Julia breathed life into everything she touched, especially him. To be responsible for her locking herself behind unemotional walls… He couldn’t let it happen. Bad enough that he’d done it. Not her. Never her.

  Losing himself in her, letting her see the destruction inside him…he felt torn open. Like every other time she’d said she loved him, the guilt had come rushing back, but he was defenseless against it. Against her.