Jared had turned it into a makeshift shop.
He leaned in close and blew away the sawdust that coated his handiwork. Another puff of dust flew, adding to the haze hanging in the thick air.
A hand squeezed his shoulder. Jared jumped. He jerked his head around.
“Dad,” he gasped over the surprise.
He’d been so absorbed in his work he hadn’t noticed his father creep up behind him.
His dad grinned with casual amusement. “You’re getting jumpy in your old age, Jared.” His smile widened with the tease. “You’d think I just caught you sneaking out your window in the middle of the night.”
Of course on any given night, his dad probably wouldn’t have been that far from the truth.
Jared smirked and rolled his eyes. “Nah… just thought you were Mom there for a second.”
Laughter rolled from his father, his eyes gleaming. “And you’d better watch out for her, too. She was pestering me for answers last night. She’s dying to know what you’ve been up to out here.”
Jared smoothed his hand over the design he’d created just for her, across the delicate carvings that represented everything his mother meant to him.
Jared hadn’t been the best kid lately. He knew it. Shame always hit him when his mom looked at him with a fading trace of disappointment. She knew it, too.
She’d been talking to him a lot lately. Nagging him, really. Always telling him to make good choices. To be careful. Cautioning him against getting into situations so deep he wouldn’t be able to climb out of them.
“There are some things you just can’t take back, Jared,” she’d warned him on more than one occasion, though she always said it with complete understanding. Like she knew and accepted he wasn’t perfect.
Under his breath, Jared scoffed.
Far from it.
Jared knew he’d been treading dangerous water. All the drinking. Getting high. The girls.
He’d been messing around a lot. Two weeks ago he’d finally just taken it, had sex because he really just wanted to experience it. He didn’t even like the girl. She was annoying and whiny.
For the better part of the week after, he’d felt guilty, because his mom had always told him not to waste himself that way. To make it matter.
Funny that guilt didn’t even cross his mind when he’d hooked up with another girl he’d never even seen before this last weekend.
It was like once he started, he couldn’t stop. But honestly? He didn’t want to. Who knew fucking could feel so good? Sure as hell felt better than his hand. After he had a taste, he had no desire to go back.
“Your mom’s going to love it, Jared,” his dad mused from behind him, breaking into his thoughts. “I’m real proud of you, son. That’s some talent you have there. Not many people can pull off something like this. That’s art.”
Pride heated Jared’s cheeks, and his chest felt a little too full. “Thanks, Dad.”
His dad rumpled his hair, like he used to do when Jared was just a boy. If Christopher would have seen it, he’d have given him shit for days. But Jared didn’t care. His dad was cool – good to him and his sister and most of all to his mom.
His dad’s expression shifted. His eyes narrowed, intense and serious. “I mean it. You are a good kid, Jared. Don’t know many boys getting ready to turn sixteen who’d spend all their afternoons slaving away in a hot garage making a birthday present for their mom.”
A satisfied smile forced its way to Jared’s mouth, mingled with the disagreement at his dad’s assertion. His mom’s birthday was two weeks after his. Just three weeks from now. With all the garbage he’d been getting himself into lately, he wanted to make sure she knew she was far more important than all of that. He wanted her to see the way he saw her.
He was almost finished. All he needed to do was perfect the pattern, deepen the lines, shave to shadow, then stain the wood the dark color his dad had gone with him to pick out.
Jared took his chisel. His lips pressed into a thin line as he focused hard. The blade cut into the wood, carving a defined curve into the intricate floral pattern that graced the top of the jewelry box he’d crafted entirely of his own hands. Each piece had been cut to fit perfectly to build the box. Then he’d set to work to etch the same beauty he found in his mother into the soft wood, her stamp set forever in the elaborate design.
An intricate pattern of petals and leaves, the stems twisted and twined to curl across the top to create a snarled bouquet. A single rose was pronounced in the middle.
The symbol of the greatest beauty.
On the bottom was her inscription.
Helene Rose ~ beauty and light.
NINETEEN
Jared
I’d never had the chance to give it to her.
Did she even know, the way I saw her?
I dropped my head into my hands.
God, I just wanted to breathe…
That breath was sharp as I sucked it into my rigid lungs.
Because Aly… Aly was my breath. My light.
I rushed to get to my feet, desperate for her touch. Need flashed through me. It blazed as it clashed with the cold.
She was my balm, her fingers the calm I craved, the one drug that would finally take it all away.
I opened the sliding glass door. Who knew how many hours I’d spent alone in the darkness? All the lights inside had been turned off. All except for the single one she’d left on in the kitchen over the stove to guide my way.
And my way was to her.
Cracking open the bedroom door, I snuck inside, my quickened footsteps silent as I stole through the darkened shadows.
Aly lay as a silhouette across our bed. The covers were all twisted around her middle, covering up those legs that I was dying to have wrapped around me. One arm was turned above her head. She jerked, restless where she was lost in the abyss of sleep. Unease twitched through her muscles.
My heart pounded so fucking hard, I was sure it would jar her from sleep, fucking call to her the way she sang out to me. My perfect siren.
Everything I needed.
I climbed onto the bed on my knees. I rushed my hands up her sides.
Aly jumped, then moaned in her sleep. Disoriented, her eyes blinked open. My mouth descended on hers, desperate for the reprieve only she could offer.
“Jared,” she mumbled against my lips. Her sweet breath fanned across my face, stirring that insanity inside of me.
I felt crazed, sick with need. Frantic, I shoved the covers away from her, tugging them free from her legs. She only wore a tight white camisole and a pair of panties. The tiny shirt hugged all her curves, the evidence of our child protruding out from that perfect body.
I dove in, kissing her jaw while I gripped her hips, roughly tugging her against me.
“Jared, wait,” she said.
“Please, baby, need you… need to feel you.”
My hands trailed, and Aly lifted to them, accepting their touch, because she needed me, too. Her hands were in my hair, and she kissed me, her mouth so fucking wet and warm and perfect.
I sat back, my hands clamoring for the panties that hindered what I needed most.
Her hands went to my wrists. “Wait,” she said again, her voice a strained command.
She searched me in the shadows. Her chest heaved with indecision, and I could barely make out her face, the sharp lines and her pouty, full lips. Still, she was all I could see.
“We can’t keep doing this,” she pled through a pained whisper.
Palpitations rocked through my heart, and I released my hold on her panties and rushed to move over her, my hands on either side of her head. “Please.” I pressed the word to her neck where my mouth met the sweetness of her skin. I kissed a path upward and nipped at her jaw. “Please.”
She lifted her chin, allowing me access. A whimper rolled up her throat, because she needed me, too.
“Aly, baby, I love you so much. So fucking much.” I burrowed deeper. Seeking. Pleading. “Y
ou feel so good. So good.”
“Talk to me,” she begged through a pant as I devoured her flesh, the softest hands working back through my hair, nudging me back, still holding me close. “Tell me what happened tonight.”
A gush of air punched from my lungs, and I stilled. “There’s nothing to talk about.”
Aly pushed up to sitting. I snapped back to find the sadness in her face, this girl who could undo me in five seconds sinking her fingers into my skin. Literally. She clutched my hands. Green eyes flashed. “You can’t keep doing this, Jared. You think I don’t know that something is killing you right now? You think I don’t know it’s been getting worse for the last month?” Pain laced through her tone. “These nights when you wake me up in the middle of the night… your eyes… they’re so intense. But hollow, Jared. Like you don’t really see me.”
Rejection slammed me, wound with a spike of remorse.
All I ever saw was her.
Her.
Didn’t she know that?
I felt sick as I pushed away, because there was no chance I could deal with this shit right now.
Aly dug her fingers in deeper, refusing to let me go. “Don’t you dare walk away from me right now, Jared. I know you, and I know what you’re thinking right now. I want you.” Hoarsely, it trembled from her throat. “Always. I love you more than anything in this world and I know you love me. But I also know whatever my mom was talking about tonight shredded you.”
Her expression softened, and she released one hand to cup my face. It singed me, her touch always fire, always comfort.
With it, my eyes dropped closed.
“I know you’re hurting. I’m here for you. You can talk to me. You can tell me.”
Bitter laughter broke into the night and I blinked back at her in disbelief. Was she really asking me to do this again? Did she not remember?
“The last time you told me that, Aly, I lost you.” The words flew from my mouth, harsh and hard, with all the crushing pain of living those months without her. “I refuse to ever let that happen again. Nothing is ever going to come between us. All this shit… none of it matters. None of it. Not when I have you. I keep telling you to let it go.”
“You can’t just keep pretending, Jared.”
“I’m not pretending. I’m just trying to find a way to live.”
To find a way to live when I knew I really shouldn’t.
Aly’s eyes pressed closed for the longest time. Agony pinched up her expression, before she opened to me, those green eyes falling over me with all this love and affection.
My heart steadied, pounding hard.
She took my face between both her hands. “All I want is for you to live. To be free.” Fear cut into the tenderness of her affection. “But I know you better than anyone else in this world. Anyone, Jared.” She leaned forward and gently placed her palm over the punctuated throb of my heart. “And I know there is still a huge piece of this that is dead.”
I swallowed hard with the strike.
Her voice lowered, filled with all the understanding of what she really didn’t understand. “You have to talk to someone, Jared,” she pressed on. She shook her head as if she was trying to grasp the right thing to say. “Find your father. Do something. What happened tonight? Do you think I missed the expression on your face? Do you think I didn’t know how deeply my mother hurt you just with the mention of your family? You are not okay.”
Anger surged and anxiety spun. “I told you to let it be, Aly.” It slid from my mouth as a hiss.
Fuck.
She was going to do this now? “I warned you, told you I would never outrun all the shit in my life. You accepted that.”
Aly lifted her chin. Her throat bobbed heavily as she swallowed. A tear slipped down her cheek, and God, if it didn’t hurt watching it.
I didn’t want to hurt her.
Ever.
But she had to know I wasn’t going there.
Her voice was soft in surrender. “You also told me you wanted to be better.”
I squeezed my eyes closed.
Goddamn it.
My fingers twitched because part of me wanted to destroy. To give in to the destruction. Because that’s what I always did.
I looked back her, at this girl who’d shattered all of my beliefs. Cupping her precious face, I lost myself in all that love. “Baby, it’s you… you that makes me better.”
Aly’s face tipped away, and she took in a shuddered breath.
“Please,” I said as I inched forward. “I need you to let this go.” Cautiously, I folded her up in my arms, careful as I laid us down in the middle of our bed. My hand slid down her delicate neck and flattened on her chest. “Please,” I whispered again.
Aly curled onto her side. She pressed her face to my neck and whispered her own plea. “Please, let me help you.”
But that’s what Aly didn’t fully understand. She couldn’t grasp that she’d brought me back from the dead. Yeah, a piece of me died when my mother did. But what was left of my heart and soul belonged to Aly.
She clung to me, like I’d been clinging to her earlier. “I can’t lose you,” she said.
I brushed my fingers through her hair, wound a lock in my finger, the words hoarse. “You won’t.”
She couldn’t.
Because she was the only air I could breathe.
TWENTY
Jared
Aly stood at the island in the kitchen. Completely absorbed, her focus was intent on whisking the creamy mixture she had billowing up in a silver bowl.
Affection pulsed through me. Hard and defined.
With my shoulder leaned up against the short hall wall just outside our bedroom door, I watched her.
How could I stop?
Quietly she hummed to herself. Black hair fell down around one shoulder, her attention fully absorbed in the task at hand.
It hurt a little looking at her. It seemed impossible one woman could make me feel this way, that one girl held my heart with a single string. The one that connected us, this unseen bond that wound us so fucking tight sometimes it felt like it was squeezing the life right out of me.
Like I couldn’t breathe.
But really, it was that I couldn’t breathe without her.
Shaking my head, I glanced around the open room. Our house looked like it’d blown up. Balloons and streamers were strung up everywhere, all of them black and silver with dots of hot pink.
I chuckled a little.
Aly knew her friend well, and I was pretty sure these decorations were spot-on.
Today was Megan’s twenty-first birthday.
And that shit was going down here.
Yeah, Aly’d offered.
It was no secret she glowed with pride over this house, and any chance she got, she showed it off. Not that I minded. It felt fucking good, this house, knowing what I’d created for my family.
I pushed from the wall. Aly looked up when she heard me approach. She dragged one side of her bottom lip between her teeth, biting at her smile as I rounded the island and edged up behind her.
“Mmm…” She hummed as she leaned back on me, still whisking while she fell into my hold. “You smell good.”
A soft chuckle rumbled in my chest, and I buried my nose in her hair, all coconut and good and fucking delicious girl. “Not nearly as good as you smell, baby.”
I snaked my arm around her, quick to dip an impulsive finger into the bowl of white frosting. I sucked it into my mouth. “And not even close to how good this tastes.”
Aly giggled and swatted my hand away. “Keep your fingers out of the frosting.”
“What? I just had a shower.” I wiggled my fingers out in front of me. “Clean… see.” I slanted my mouth to her ear. “But I can think of all kinds of ways to get them dirty again.”
“Oh, you can, huh? Like what?” Aly made a valiant attempt at appearing flippant. Unaffected. But I felt the shiver. The flutter of nerves that moved through her.
I bit back a
satisfied grin, and dove in again, this time with three fingers. I brought out a soft mound and smeared it at the corner of one side of her mouth. Over her shoulder, I leaned in, my tongue and lips stroking across the soft flesh. “Like this,” I whispered.
A little whimper left her. The sound pierced me in the pit of my stomach.
Damn, this girl made me insane.
Come to Me Softly Page 29