Kissed by Reality

by Carrie Aarons

  He grabbed my face with one hand and my waist with the other, pinning me to the counter and grinding his body into mine. His taste, mint, and smell, sandalwood and mahogany, overwhelmed me, sending my tipsy head into full-on drunk.

  Finn bit and sucked at my lips, running his tongue along the seam and then plunging it deep into my mouth, never letting me forget exactly what that would feel like below my waist. And oh did I remember. I was dripping wet, my arousal slick between my thighs and pungent in the air.

  He growled low in his throat as he repeatedly ground against my stomach, that thick, perfect erection branding me above the lace of my dress. I would gladly rip the floor-length gown to shreds if it meant I could spread my legs for him on that counter.

  My whole body was swollen, twitching with need and anticipation. When Finn abruptly pulled back, his eyes rabid and confused, I audibly moaned.

  All he did was turn and walk from the room.

  That night I was awarded a Charm, a tiny W for the brothers’ Wyatt. Finn picked me second to last, and hope filled my chest.

  Chapter Thirteen

  Finn

  Those fucking lips drove me insane.

  They were what attracted me to Leighton in the first place. And they were also the very part of her that had torn our relationship limb from limb.

  My mind was still on our kiss, on her curves and skin in that black lace dress, on those breathy gasps she'd moaned into my mouth. I'd thought about her, and tried to hide my steel pole of a hard on, for the duration of our flight to Dublin.

  Ireland. It had always been a place Leighton and I had talked about going. Her mother, Mary, was half-Irish and had traveled there a lot in her younger years. Leighton used to talk about the pictures her mother had, the rolling green hills, the cliffs overlooking the sea. The whole country sounded magical, and I wasn't stupid enough to deny that I'd chosen this location for filming thinking of her.

  But even if I'd been remembering our day dreams for Dublin when I'd selected this trip, I didn't think she'd be on it. It meant more now. Especially since she'd dealt with the manic, raging guy inside of me by planting her mouth on mine last night. Now I was confused as shit, feeling things I had sworn I'd locked away ever since the day she left…

  * * *

  My childhood home always smelled like baked apple pie and hay. Growing up on a farm, I had the stereotypical farm-life experience. A father who woke before the sun, did hard, manual labor all day, and came in to eat my mother's down home cooking every night.

  My family was a happy one, my parents were good people who let their children pursue their dreams. They'd thought it was honorable and noble when I'd told them about my decision to join the Marines, and had welcomed me home with open arms when I came back bruised, beaten and mentally destroyed. My mother had cared for me, gotten me back on my feet, and not a day went by where I didn't speak to both of my parents.

  Watching Right Now Island with them, though? It wasn't at the top of my list of things to do. For one, it was a little embarrassing to them that I'd done the show in the first place. I think I'd surprised them when I told them I was auditioning for Mrs. Right, and they were even more shocked that I was going back for round two in the summer.

  But here we were, the whole family crowded into my parent's living room with wine, popcorn and our game faces on. Marina, my sister-in-law, had insisted on watching a couple of episodes together. So this Tuesday night, mom, dad, Marina, Julian, Carter, Leighton and I had cooked dinner and settled down for Tuesday night TV.

  The theme song for Right Now Island started and Izzy, my niece, clapped her hands where she sat in Carter's lap. He'd become a huge softy since she'd been born. Although secretly, I'd always known that Thor had a soft gooey center.

  The episode started off with a cringe-inducing date between two of our cast members. Katie and Anwar couldn't seem to stay sober for the duration of filming, and it definitely showed whenever they were featured. She was slurring so badly that they both pretty much giggled the entire date.

  "Well, that was brutal. Although I'd be drunk half the time if someone paid me to sit on a beach." Marina stretched during the commercial break.

  Leighton scrunched into my side even more, and I brushed her dark hair off of her forehead and kissed her there. "Yeah, but most people don't get that crazy. I was there to find love."

  Julian and Carter started to make gagging noises while my mom, Marina and Leighton dreamy sighed at my statement.

  "Well, we are glad you walked away with Leighton and not that one." My dad pointed a weathered finger at me, his graying brows drawing together in mock strictness.

  I knew my parents we warming to the idea of having Leighton as a daughter-in-law. The fact that she'd been in Nebraska for two months, constantly spending time with my family, really helped. They, and Julian, hadn't been too fond of the whole quickie engagement thing after we'd come home from Bermuda. They'd questioned me and my decisions for only the second time in my life, but I'd rebuffed all of their doubts and reasons. I loved Leighton, and they would see it in time.

  And they had. They knew what we shared wasn't some lust-filled shotgun walk down the aisle. Although being inside of her was probably the greatest thing on the planet.

  But, I cared about her deeply, to a soul level. She was witty and hilarious, with an attitude about life that was so refreshing. It’s what drew me to her, it was what would keep me on my toes for the next 70 years. In my heart, and in my head, I knew with such significant clarity that I was meant to be with her. And she with me.

  Leighton gave my hand a squeeze as the show came back from commercial break and I leaned down to inhale the raspberry scent of her hair.

  My family gave whoops and cheers as we were greeted by Leighton’s face on the screen, my fiancé sat in the kitchen of the house in Bermuda, a wine glass in her hand.

  Next to me, on the couch in Nebraska, her body suddenly went rigid.

  “Oh you’re such a player!” On-screen Leighton giggled to someone who the shot wasn’t catching.

  “And you love it, babydoll.” A voice off screen said.

  “Let’s um, let’s turn this off.” Present-Leighton scrambled off of the couch, trying to block the TV.

  Julian shot me a look of concern as the rest of the family began to ask if she was alright, trying to move her, laughing for her to sit down. They thought she was joking.

  “Move.” My voice was cold as ice when it came out of my mouth.

  Leighton obeyed, guilt and anxiety rippling down her features and through her body like waves on a waterfall.

  “Come on, at least test someone else out before you leave here and shackle yourself to Mr. No Knee out there.”

  Ian’s face panned into the shot of the camera, and on the other side of the couch my mom gasped. She was probably more offended with what he’d called me than the fact that Leighton was surely about to do something completely devastating.

  “Don’t call him that! That’s mean, Ian, even for you.” On-screen Leighton chided our cast member, except she was slurring and chuckling through her scolding. I felt a knife slice my chest open. She really just let him say that about me? Was that how she felt?

  It was a complete train wreck; I couldn’t stop it and I couldn’t look away. My ears were buzzing with the sound of impending doom, and faraway, as if she was speaking to me through a tunnel, I could hear Leighton pleading with me to turn it off. My skin was turning from hot to cold, reminding me of when mom complained about hot flashes. I was suddenly tortured inside of my own body, I wanted to rip everything off and submerge myself in something that would all of this go away.

  “Oh come on, Leight, just one kiss.” I heard Ian’s voice blare from the TV.

  My eyes were glued to the moving pictures on screen, unblinking and beginning to water. Carter and Marina began to say Leighton’s name in that worrisome tone everyone got right before something terrible happened.

  On the TV, Ian rounded the island of th
e kitchen in the house we’d been staying in, and Leighton sat on the stool, poised and ready like she’d been preparing for what was about to go down. I saw one flicker of sadness cross her face on the screen before Ian pressed his lips to hers.

  And then I was out of my seat on the couch, my father’s angry tone propelling me up. My body moved of its own accord as I took the beer bottle I’d been sipping on and sent it careening into my parent’s living room wall.

  “Carter, take the baby upstairs.” Marina’s calm voice gave instructions that Carter wasn’t stupid enough not to follow. He tucked Izzy’s head into his shoulder and left the room.

  “GET OUT!” My dad thundered at Leighton, who was standing, mouth-agog, in the middle of the room still trying to block the television.

  “Finn, please…” She pleaded, trying to pass unspoken words to my brain with her eyes.

  “Jackson, stop.” My mother tried to soothe my father as he went to shout at Leighton a second time.

  “I knew you were nothing but a no good, lazy piece of—“

  “Julian!” Marina cut her husband off, yelling at him to stay out of it.

  Mom crossed the room and started to clean the remnants of glass and Stella Artois off of her floor.

  I couldn’t do anything but stand there, my fists balled and my teeth grinding together to the point of pain. I didn’t want to unleash on Leighton, especially not here. I wouldn’t be able to stop. I would say things that were unforgivable. I would be just as bad as she was.

  “Leave. Now.” I managed to grit out.

  “Finn, I—“

  “Fucking. Leave.”

  She turned to Marina, hurt and confusion wracking her entire figure. I saw those hazel eyes begin to collect tears. Marina just shrugged and looked away.

  That must have been the last sign for her, the woman she’d called her best friend for the last two months turning on her. She fucking deserved it.

  “I’m so sorry.” Her voice was laced with pain and unshed tears. No one said anything.

  The only thing I heard for the rest of the night, echoing through my brain, was the sound of her footsteps on my mother’s tile entryway, and the soft click of the door catching the lock as she closed it.

  * * *

  I should have known at the exact moment that she stiffened beside me on that couch that something was about to go wrong. I got that feeling deep in my gut, the same one I got before my leg was blown to smithereens in Afghanistan.

  But in reality, I should have trusted my gut when it almost doubled me over in intuition the first time Leighton was apologizing for doing something on the show. When she’d only been flirting with Ian and spouting lies about what we had been at that point.

  That night was the last I’d spoken to her. I’d stayed at my parent’s house for the rest of the week, until Carter could confirm that she’d left and taken all of her shit from my apartment.

  I became a master at avoiding her calls, ignoring her text messages and emails. She’d even had the balls to send me two letters, which I’d thrown into my fireplace after never even unsealing them. I’d refused to speak her name in the presence of my family, once cracking a plate in half when Julian had pressed the subject at a Friday night dinner.

  Leighton became a ghost, a thing of memories past. I tried to wipe my brain of the time I’d spent with her. I focused on work, on the paralympic baseball team I played on, on anything else.

  Every once and a while I would slip and Google her name, see the stories of our breakup, the media’s speculation about how I’d reacted when the kiss aired. Chuck and Mitchell began to call, trying to pry into what had happened, and then trying to convince me to get over it and come back into the franchise.

  I’d just been adjusting to my new reality; I’d accepted the Mr. Right role, stopped thinking about her in the dead of night. Stopped staring at the engagement ring she’d left on my kitchen counter after she moved out. The one I now kept in the back corner of my boxer drawer, in a pink sock she’d accidentally left in my laundry basket.

  And then I’d come here. And fuck it all, so had she.

  Chapter Fourteen

  Finn

  Mr. Right was a worldwide phenomenon. And I often, or always, forgot that.

  I strolled down O’Connell Street with 10 beautiful women surrounding me, cameras and crew surrounding us, and people surrounding them, shouting my name and pleading for the good fortune of their favorite girls. They swarmed our moving film squad, snapping pictures and tapping on their phones. Great. Those pictures would be on social media in seconds.

  Usually I wouldn’t care. Except that Leighton was on this date, and now the tabloids would have a field day over her being here during shooting. They’d know how far she made it based on the filming schedule of Mr. Right, which hadn’t changed in 15 seasons of the show.

  I tried to ignore the pomp and circumstance and enjoy my surroundings. We were in Dublin, on a beautiful day in the middle of December in this country I had always dreamed of coming to. With its old world charm, the tiny shops lining the streets and monuments the girls were in awe of, I knew this would be a great date.

  Especially since Erin and Kennedy were on it. Out of the 10 girls on the date, I was most excited to experience Dublin with them. I’d spoken to them more and more in the house, on dates and before Charm Ceremonies, and it was surprising how easy it was to be enthralled by them in the moment.

  Erin was All-American, the girl-next-door with some spunk and humor. She was sexy in a way that you almost forgot about, until she smiled in a way that had my balls drawing up toward my body. With her shoulder-length light brown hair, emerald green eyes and Angelina Jolie lips, she was very pretty. But I’d seen it in her eyes, the quiet flirt inside her, the heat that licked her pupils when I leaned closer, the shiver that went down her spine when I’d kissed her.

  She was also smart and worldly for someone who taught 1st grade in rural Illinois. We’d had similar childhoods, and the way she talked about her family reminded me of how I spoke of mine. But the best thing out of all of it? For the hour or two I spent with her, I wasn’t thinking about Leighton. And to me that meant something.

  Kennedy was another story. She challenged me, her stubborn and strict attitude about what was wrong and what was right was refreshing to me. She was reserved yet hilarious, only letting her chestnut hair down when she realized I was only teasing her. Kennedy was the type of girl who didn’t bother with makeup or fancy clothing, and she didn’t need to. She was a natural beauty, a Liv Tyler look-alike, always with a cross resting at the dip in her throat.

  I wasn’t so numb to the process that it didn’t hurt to send women home. It was getting to the part in the game where I knew all of their names. Knew at least a few facts about them. Even had formed friendships with some of the women, kissed a couple just to test things out. But as every person who had ever dated knew, sometimes the spark just was not there. My heart was heavy with the tears of women I’d had to send home. Genuinely kind and interesting women who had come here in search of something. I hated being the person to dash those hopes. I didn’t have a big ego, I knew they were more hurt about the process ending and dreams dying than they were about leaving me.

  But unfortunately, I only felt that spark with three women right now. And I would have given my good leg to not feel it for one of them.

  Leighton was practically skipping with excitement down O’Connell. She was snapping pictures with a professional camera, who gave that to her I didn’t know. She got special privileges as a returning “cast member,” and production treated her as such. It would make sense she asked to capture this trip, it had been on the top of her list of places to travel.

  I took one second to secretly smile at her child-like joy. I’d made that happen.

  My chest scorched and my dick tightened when I thought about Leighton, even while my head was ringing the high-alert DO NOT ENGAGE alarms. I’d spent the past three days between our kiss and the touch down in Ir
eland taking my dick into my fist whenever possible, our steamy encounter still lingering on my lips.

  I was confused, turned on, and my resolve was thinning. As evidenced by the fact that I fell into step beside her, willingly engaging her in conversation.

  “Is it what you always dreamed of?” I took a second to study her flushed cheeks, the red and ruddy tip of her nose that peaked out from above the fluffy white scarf wrapped around her neck and shoulders. Only I would know that her glow was as much from the cold as it was from being in Ireland.

  “Come on, you were thinking of me when you planned this trip.” She gave me a sly grin, but her goofy smile returned, giving away her excitement. She made a loud “OH!” as we came upon The Spire in the middle of the downtown area and hastily snapped a picture.

  “The Stiletto in the Ghetto. How appropriate for you.” I’d meant to sound angry, but The Spire’s slang name came out more like a tease.

  Leighton paused, the rest of the group moving ahead of us as the girls came across a small grouping of jewelry and art tents. She reached up, a tiny gasp escaping those lush lips, and pressed her pinky finger into the dimple on my left cheek.

  “Are you being nice for the cameras, or are you just being nice?” She leaned up and whispered in my ear, careful to cover the mic on the edge of my winter coat.

  I shrugged. To be honest, I didn’t know. And at the moment, I was tired of over-analyzing my feelings, which seemed to be a requirement for being a lead on this show. At the moment, I wanted to enjoy Ireland with the woman who had inspired me to come here in the first place.

  Chapter Fifteen

  Leighton

  “SWEET HOME ALABAMA! WHERE THE SKIES ARE SO BLUE!”