by Luis, Maria
His palm comes up to rub the center of his naked chest. “They’re confining.”
“They’re appropriate for public places,” I shoot back, feeling altogether way too warm. Maybe I’m developing a fever. I mean, my hands are clammy and my head feels a little heavy with pressure, but I’ll persevere. A fever can’t hold me back.
Jackson selects a button, collects his drink when the machine spits it out a moment later, and then steps to the left.
Blocking my path down the hallway that’ll lead me to the elevator.
Dammit.
“You’ve been avoidin’ me, Holls.”
God, he’s so persistent. Even if he is a little bit right.
I step to the right, prepared to dart around him toward freedom. “We’ve both been busy. Do you know how many minutes I’ve filmed today? Hours’ worth of minutes. Then there’s getting with Carmen and Adam to edit them all, and you’ve been at practice . . .”
Because Jackson knows me way too well, he does nothing but stand there, legs spread like he’s a gladiator prepared to fight to the death—or keep me from escaping. His soda can pops! as he thumbs open the aluminum tab.
Never mind, persistent no longer covers it, not when he’s clearly waiting me out.
Like he’s been yanked straight from a commercial on TV, he tips the soda can up to his mouth and takes a long pull, looking rugged and handsome and too masculine for comfort. His brown eyes never leave my face.
I fidget with the straps of my bag—and then I cave, miserably. “So, okay, maybe I’ve been . . . ensuring that we don’t cross paths.”
“Why?”
Because . . .
My eyes slam shut so I don’t have to make eye contact with the man who’s haunted my dreams these last few nights. I like to think that I’ve matured over the last year into a woman who doesn’t need a man’s approval. Not that I’ve ever really needed a man’s approval because I haven’t, but . . . Well, I’ve always loved Jackson’s approval, and hearing him tell me how proud he is of me shifted something in my heart. Made me wonder all about those what-ifs for far longer than is socially acceptable when you’re talking about your ex-husband.
I need space, which is nearly impossible when we’re stuck in the same vicinity for days on end, with no reprieve in sight until we’re boarding the plane back home to Boston.
“Some things,” I finally mutter, “are better left unsaid.”
There’s a hollow thud sound, and then pressure is at my back, fingers slipping under the straps of the bag. Jackson.
Whirling around, I put one palm up, face out, and take two quick steps back. “What’re you doing?”
His mouth curls, not quite a smile but not so tight-lipped either. “Taking the weight off your shoulders.”
I stare at him. “Going for double entendres now?”
“Just being a gentleman.”
“I thought you were aiming high for a chance at playing king?”
“Well, that was the plan,” he says, catching me off guard when he pushes at the backstraps at my shoulders, “but that was before you told me Beaumont was already wearin’ the crown.”
My backpack slips down, and I make a move to stop its downward trajectory, bending my elbows.
Jackson is faster.
He tugs on the straps, sending them down to my wrists, where he hooks a finger under each plush arm. My tripod and light reflector fall to the thin carpet with a quiet thud. His warm breath wafts over my face, and it’s only then that I realize the position we’re in: his arms looped around me, forearms resting on the curve of my butt, my hands palming his chest as I try to maintain my balance.
His naked chest.
I swallow. “Your nipples are hard again.”
Jackson’s cheeks hollow out with an indrawn breath as he tips his head back to stare at the ceiling. His arms don’t move from their place around me. “We’re standing under an air vent.”
“A convenient excuse.”
“It’s called talking facts. I’m feeling a little chilled.”
“Talking facts?” My eyebrows shoot up in disbelief. “Fact is, you’ve never been chilled a day in your life.”
Brown eyes zero in on my face. “I’m a hockey player, sweetheart. You think my nuts don’t shrivel and duck for cover every time I step out on the ice?”
Sweetheart.
Holy crap, holy crap, holy—
Jackson’s mouth firms and, before I can prepare for it, he swoops the backpack out from around me and slings it onto his back, letting it hang unceremoniously by one strap. He turns on his heel. The florescent lighting does nothing but illuminate each and every one of the scars that mark his spine like a mother celebrates her child’s growth with penciled lines on a spare wall in a childhood home.
The stretchmarks always marked a silent vulnerability that’s otherwise nonexistent in my ex-husband’s nature.
“Jackson. Jackson, where are you going?” Grabbing my other gear off the floor, my sneakered feet pick up the pace as I trail him. “And, excuse me, but can you give me my backpack? That’s theft.”
He doesn’t even glance back over his shoulder. “It’s not theft if I plan to return it.”
A groan slips from my mouth. “No,” I mutter, my hands lifting even though he can’t see me . . . which might be a good thing as I’m making a strangling sort-of gesture with them, the tripod and light reflector clashing against one another. Louder, I go on, “I’m not doing it.”
“Doing what?”
“The word games! The theft versus borrowing or the blackmail versus negotiating.”
Without warning, he turns left at the end of the hallway, away from where the elevators are located. “Holls, we aren’t playing games. We stopped all that a long time ago.”
Then what the hell are we doing here?
Pausing at a door, he digs around in his sweatpants and reveals a plastic key card that he swipes over the lock. An echoing click sounds louder than it should, but I suppose that its only competition is the thudding of my heart.
When I don’t move to follow him into his hotel room, Jackson pauses within the frame, looking large and imposing and unfamiliar as he stares down at me. I blink, and recognize the crooked slope of his nose. I blink again, and know the specific sharpness of his jaw and the heavy slant of his brows. I blink once more, and there is not a hue in this world that I know better than the brown of his eyes.
And yet, he’s never seemed more like a stranger than in this moment.
“If we stopped the games, then what are we doing?”
He props one forearm up on the doorframe, giving it his weight as he drops his head to look at the floor. Shoulders rising with a sharp inhale, he stares down at his bare feet as I stare at him. “We’ve never lied to each other.” His head shifts just so, his temple pressing against his arm, so he can watch me instead of the threadbare carpet. “Eleven years, Holls. We were married for eleven years and not once in all that time did we ever lie to each other.”
My fingers curl around my equipment at the ragged note in his voice. And my calm—whatever’s left of it—vacates the premises. He looks at me like he’s torn between dragging me into his hotel room or slamming the door in my face, and I . . . I breathe like I’ve run a marathon and reached the finish line, only to realize that I’ve still got another twenty-six miles to go and the first stint was nothing but my imagination.
In other words, I’m screwed.
We’ve done this dance. We’ve done it, and we haven’t come out the other side intact.
“I’ve lied to you.” His dark brows furrow together, and I plow on regardless. We need space, humor, anything to break up this tension. “I used to say that I forgot your peanut butter M&M’s at the store when I went grocery shopping. I lied. I always caved and ate them all and had to throw the wrapper in the garbage before you saw the evidence.”
“You could have bought two bags, one for you and one for me.” His eyes narrow. “Or, better yet, a king-sized on
e for us to share.”
“I could have, but—” I swallow the rest of the words before they can further incriminate me. The truth is, I could have done exactly that: buy multiple bags of the chocolate-covered peanuts and call it a day. But if I had, then I couldn’t have played the let me make it up to you card, which involved me on my knees, Jackson’s hands curved around the back of my skull, and the knowledge that he liked it best when I moaned around his dick.
None of that, however, is appropriate to mention in this moment.
You need to go. Now.
I step back, my gaze shooting to the right, toward the elevator at the far end of the hall.
“Holly.”
My eyes screw shut at his deep baritone and the plaintive note that he can’t quite hide.
“Your snack-stealing habits aside, can we agree that lying never had a seat at our table?”
Tipping my head back, I stare up at the ceiling. Suck in a harsh breath, even though my heart is pounding a mile a minute. “You were my best friend. Even if I’d wanted to keep something from you, my heart never let me—and my mouth, well, we both know that I say everything that sometimes shouldn’t be said.”
Jackson sets my backpack down inside the room, then makes a grab for my other gear. He puts those down too. He faces me, then, hands on the doorframe, his muscled torso all on delicious display.
“I don’t want to lie to you.” His dark eyes slip down my frame and then seem to drag, slowly, all the way back up to my face. Above his stubble, his cheeks are flushed. “I don’t want to lie, and I feel like I’ve got to say this—to get it off my chest—but, fuck, I know you’re not going to want to hear it.”
Immediately, scenarios dart through my head and none of them are all sunshine and unicorns.
He’s seeing someone else.
He’s seeing someone else and he doesn’t want me to find out the hard way.
He’s seeing someone else and it’s serious, and oh my God, I think I’m going to vomit. Or cry. Or maybe a mixture of both.
I thought I’d be ready for this moment. Hell, I’ve spent months preparing for a time when Jackson moved on and then I forced myself to move on, and I don’t think I’m breathing.
In and out, girl. In. And. Out.
My hands go to my chest, tugging on my cotton T-shirt. I pull it away from my clammy skin, desperately needing air because my head feels like it’s going to pop clear off my neck. I’m Holly Belliveaux Fucking Carter.
Carter.
I’ll need to go back to my maiden name because no new girlfriend or future wife is going to appreciate the ex-wife still sporting her ex-husband’s surname. And maybe I should have changed it by now, but—confessional—I’m rather attached to it.
I don’t feel like a Belliveaux, I feel like a Carter.
“Holls.”
In. And. Out.
In and out.
Inandout.
“Sweetheart, you’ve got to breathe.”
I’m trying. Doesn’t he see that I’m trying?
“Fuck it.”
Muscular arms swoop around me, hauling me up into the air before I can protest. His name leaves my lips when he sweeps a palm over the back of my head, tucking me in like precious cargo so I don’t bang my skull on the doorframe.
The door creaks shut behind us. The light flickers on with a flip of a switch. And then Jackson moves smoothly toward the full-sized bed in the center of the room. He sets me down with ease, on the edge so my feet come in contact with the floor. As though they’ve betrayed me—like they remember a time all on their own when Jackson used to fit himself between them—my legs spread, leaving enough room for him to settle in the V of my open thighs.
Jackson takes advantage.
He sinks to his knees before me, but he’s so tall and I’m so short that we’re almost at eye level. And then he settles his palms over the curve of my hips.
Like he has every right to do so.
I don’t tell him to back off.
“You need to breathe,” he husks out, gently squeezing my flesh until I meet his steady gaze. “You need to breathe for me, Holls. You’re having one of your panic attacks.”
I’ve had them for years, ever since I was a little girl and wondering if my parents would ever return for me and Sam. They never did.
Back then, my grandmother used to awkwardly pat my head and encourage me to be brave. It was as close to affection as she had to give, not because she didn’t love me or Sam, but because she belonged to a different generation. She was a woman who felt no regret over shooting a man in the ass when he dared threaten her business, and then there was me . . . always remembering how Momma was dressed when she walked out the front door and never came back. My grandmother said I loved too hard back then, and she said the same thing about my relationship with Jackson right before she died.
“You don’t need that man,” she told me over the phone, “you divorced him. Do you see him banging on your door because he thinks y’all made a mistake? No, you don’t. You love too hard, Holly-bear. You love too dang hard and they never deserve it or you.”
The anxiety has been with me for as long as I can remember, crawling into my heart when my emotions threaten to get the best of me. But Jackson always knew, somehow intrinsically, how to bring me back from that panicked rush that seeps into my bones and lingers.
His fingers leave my hips to trail down my thighs, up and down, up and down, until I’m more focused on his mesmerizing touch than the shuddered breaths heaving out of my chest.
“That’s it, sweetheart.” The gentleness in the way he touches me is completely opposite to his gravel-pitched tone. “Focus on me. You’re good, you hear? Take all the time you need. I’m not going anywhere.”
I want to ask if the new girl he’s seeing is problem-free, unlike me. If she has a supportive family and parents who care. If she’s laid-back and easygoing, and not a control freak the way I am. Does she make him laugh the way I used to?
“Does who make me laugh?”
I blink.
Oh. Oh, crap, that was said out loud.
My gaze lands on his hands, which rest on my knees. I want them to move up, up, up, until his thumbs linger near where I want him most. Don’t go there. “No one. I just—”
His hold on me tightens. “I’m not seeing anyone, Holls.”
The panic swiftly kicks me straight in the gut, and I swallow it down. “You can do whatever you want.” My fingers tangle in the comforter, twining and squeezing the way my heart does at the prospect of Jackson loving someone else, making love to someone else, of being their best friend. “I’m not that crazy ex who’ll hover over your shoulder and watch your every move. I’m the cool ex.” Oh, my God. Please stop talking. “You know how they say if you’re a cool mom or whatever? I’m that, without the kids. The cool ex-wife.”
“The cool—” Jackson breaks off, his hand lifting from my leg to pinch the broken bridge of his nose. “I’m going to be straight with you, that’s the stupidest shit I’ve ever heard.”
“Is it, though? All I’m trying to say is that I support you living your best life. Whatever you want to do, I’m—”
“There isn’t anything I want to do besides this.”
And then Jackson, my ex-husband, crashes his mouth down over mine and steals every last breath from my lungs.
16
Jackson
She tastes exactly the same.
Sweet. Bold. Mine.
I’m crossing so many boundaries here, knocking each one down like a child chasing after his favorite toy. But there’s nothing childlike about the way I mold my mouth over Holly’s, nor the way I drag her down off the bed so that she straddles my thighs. Her weight is slight, her hips and curves slender but mine for the taking.
And I take.
Fuck, do I take.
I flick my tongue along the cushion of her bottom lip, demanding entrance. When she gives it with a familiar whimper that goes straight to my cock, I echo her smal
l, feminine noises with a guttural groan that reverberates in my chest.
As though she’s desperate to find the source of the sound, she touches my chest, her short, blunt fingernails dragging down over my skin, marking me in a way that feels at once familiar and foreign.
There’s been no one since her.
No one could ever compare, not when we met at Cornell, not when I drank myself into a stupor after the divorce was finalized—and I spent days, weeks, trying to lose myself in hockey and games and practice.
Losing Holly broke me—even if I was the reason we were broken in the first place—and only now, under her touch, do I feel as though I’m coming alive again.
I pin her to the side of the bed, bracketing her body with mine. My palms clamping down on the edge of the mattress, her spine arching as she nips at my top lip, her core circling down on my hard-as-nails erection. God, she feels so damn good.
Wrapping a hand around the back of my neck, Holly yanks me closer to deepen the kiss. It’s messy, all clashing teeth and dueling tongues, and I’d be lying if I say that it doesn’t send my pulse roaring. She’s the rush in my veins, and nothing has ever felt so right or perfect. Desperate for her, I dig my fingers into her hips and grind her down on me, a slow, sensuous back and forth that leaves no doubt as to how hard I am.
How much I crave her.
Her lips tear from mine as she gasps my name, her sweet, Southern accent breaking on the second syllable.
Yes, sweetheart. Don’t hold back.
“Say it again.”
“Oh, my God,” she whimpers, her blond hair a chaotic mess as she moves her hips in the agonizingly slow rhythm I’ve set in place, “Jackson, please.”
I glance down at her jeans and my sweatpants, and oh, Christ, but I feel like I’m going to come with nothing but Holly dry-humping my dick like we’re back in grade school. Each time she slides down, she kills me a little more. Because with that downward glide, she pulls at the waistband of my sweats, revealing the tip of my cock.
I’m leaking pre-cum, my cock desperate for what’s between her legs, the same way my heart beats that much faster for the expression on her face. Cheeks flushed, pink lips parted, eyes half-shut.