Shhh... Gianna's Side

by M. Robinson

  He was back to calling me G. He was like Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde; instead, he was Mr. Nichols, and James.

  “Oh…okay,” I whispered, tilting my head forward so he could check me. His hands were soft and tender; he was examining me with concern. I waited on pins and needles for the other shoe to drop. Why was he being nice to me?

  “Why are you being nice to me?” I blurted.

  He sat back down in front of me. “I think it’s funny that you’re covering yourself with that blanket, considering I just bathed you completely.”

  I shrugged.

  He sighed. “I honestly don’t know why I’m being nice to you. All I know is when you were knocked unconscious, my first thought was that she killed you. My heart literally stopped until I felt your pulse, after that, I moved in autopilot, trying to revive you. You went in and out of consciousness and babbled incoherent things. But you kept asking for James, your voice was pleading and painful to hear,” he agonized. “I cleaned you up by the lake and you were so helpless, I could have done anything to you without your recollection. When I had you in my arms, I felt whole. I remembered the feel of you. I hadn’t thought about that in a long time…I didn’t want you to wake up in a filthy bed.” He paused. “It’s just some sheets.”

  I sat there wide-eyed. I couldn’t believe what I had just heard. Was this more games?

  “I can’t explain, it but I wanted to take care of you and make sure you were okay. That’s all.”

  “Did you care about any of that when you sodomized me and left me in a dark room for days?” I sadistically questioned.

  He shook his head. “I checked on you the entire time. Every time you passed out.”

  “What about the other thing?”

  “I make no excuses for what I did. I also don’t regret it and I would do it again. I only feel remorse that I hurt you. But not that I was inside you again.”

  Neither one of us spoke after that. I lay down and flinched when he came to lie next to me. We both stared at the ceiling. I thought about how I found myself in a situation like that. If I hadn’t found out about McKenzie and my father, would I have reacted the same way? Would Mack have been able to calm me down before I let all the emotions fuel my hatred for everything that had happened? Or would I have still wanted to hurt him?

  But isn’t revenge supposed to make you feel better?

  "If you prick us do we not bleed? If you tickle us do we not laugh? If you poison us do we not die? And if you wrong us shall we not revenge?"[12] I recited Shakespeare back to him.

  He turned his face to look at me. “I think that’s the first time you’ve ever quoted Shakespeare to me,” he laughed, amused.

  I continued to stare at the ceiling. “The entire time I planned it, I thought about that verse. It repeated itself in my head like a broken record. I couldn’t get it to stop. I’m not trying to make you feel bad for me, but what would you have done? I think if you put yourself in my shoes for a minute, maybe you could relate. Sending you to prison was not part of the plan. I was young and stupid and I didn’t think it would go that far. I just thought you’d be fired and sent away. I didn’t want to see you anymore and I wanted you to go away,” I informed.

  He hadn’t moved either, and I didn’t know if he was listening or tuning me out so I kept going.

  “Mack hurt me and I never thought that would happen. Not once did I ever think she would betray me. Especially not with my own father. It didn’t matter all the lies that I had hidden from her, because I was the bad guy. I was perfectly okay with being the bad guy and put her up on this pedestal where she could do no wrong. She was the perfect one. All the years of jealousy, it never crossed my mind that she would betray me and have secrets of her own,” I reasoned.

  “How could we have been best friends, sisters…and not known each other at all? I don’t understand. I would have died for her. And the sick thing is that I would still die for her. How do I love someone so much that I also hate? I can’t fathom how after all these years, I still love her. I don’t want anything bad to happen to her, but I caused her so much damage. She would never want to hurt me, I know that now, and I guess I knew that then. But it didn’t stop me from wanting to ruin her. She screwed me and I fucked her. I couldn’t let it go. Revenge spawned an endless cycle of retribution for me. I fucked up my life as much as I did yours and Mack’s, so in the end, nobody won. Most of all, me,” I rationalized.

  “For what it’s worth, even if it’s nothing–” I turned to look at him “–I am very sorry. But you’ve seen who I am. You can’t imagine I am happy? I’m not living the life you thought I would be and neither is McKenzie. Nothing you evoke can change that. We punished ourselves far worse than you have or could have done.”

  I sat up, still looking at him. “I think you know that and that’s why you hate us. Revenge isn’t so sweet anymore, is it? It’s much better in the package.”

  He placed his hand on top of mine and I looked down on them. “I don’t hate you, and that’s what I can’t fucking understand.” I peeked up at him through my lashes. “I don’t hate you and I have every right to. I can’t. I never could. I thought bringing you here would help and it hasn’t. I’m completely obsessed with you, just as much, if not more than, I was years ago. You’re the fucking plague and it’s in my blood, there is no cure from you. I have looked for it.” His hand slowly moved to my hand that was holding up the sheet.

  “I have always been able to see right through you,” he divulged, lowering my hand to bring down the blanket.

  “And now all I can think about it sinking into your sweet pussy. It took everything in me not to do it the other night.”

  His hand grazed my throat and I moaned at the thought of him choking me again, but I stayed still, waiting for his next move.

  “You enjoy pain, don’t you?”

  I nodded.

  “When did that start?” he asked as his hand moved toward my breasts.

  “I don’t know. After everything that happened with you, I guess. Jake didn’t know how to handle it. I barely understand it.” I nervously chuckled and his hand backed away.

  “You’re with Jake?”

  I shook my head. “I was. We got divorced a really long time ago. I don’t even remember being married to him. I was drunk half the time. It only lasted about a year and a half.”

  “The other night… I thought you were enjoying it, G. You’ve been wanting me to hurt you this entire time and I finally hit my breaking point and I wanted to hurt you. However, I thought you were enjoying it. When you turned around and looked at me, I’ve never seen that look in your eyes. It nearly killed me. The mere thought that you felt like I violated you…raped you…made me fucking sick. As soon as I left the room and locked you in there I threw up,” he admitted.

  “I locked you in there not to punish you but to punish myself. I couldn’t look at you and see the harm that I caused. All I thought about in prison was to hurt you. Both of you. I wanted revenge and the moment I saw you lying tied to the bed, I knew I couldn’t go through with it. I’ve kept you here for four weeks because I wanted you close to me. And that’s the God’s honest truth. I’ve been fighting my demons and that’s you. You’re the forbidden fruit. You’re still mine and that scares the shit out of me,” he whispered the last few words as if it pained him to say them.

  “What happens from here?”

  He sighed. “I let you go. I let you both go. There’s nothing left here for me, for any of us. It was a mistake. And in a fucked up way, I think everyone can leave with some peace.”

  “What if I don’t want to go?” That caught his attention, he looked right at me, but this time was different.

  “Why is that?”

  “I have nothing to go back to.”

  “And you do here?”

  “Yes,” I hesitated. “I have you.”

  He reached for the blanket and pulled it away from me. I was exposed to him in a much different way than I had been since I had gotten there.
My guard was down and so was my flag.

  “You’re still so goddamn beautiful,” he praised, with a sincere tone.

  “Spread your legs for me, G.” I slowly parted my thighs and opened them in a V with my knees bent.

  He made a noise that came from the back of his throat. He pulled me in hard and kissed me with his tongue, tasting every bit of my mouth, with one hand at the back of my neck keeping me close to him where he wanted. His face turned to taste me deeper. I moaned, moving my hips to get some undivided attention to my ache. I could feel him smiling at his recognition of my subtle request. He suddenly grabbed a fistful of my hair; I yelped at the sudden intrusion, his indirect way of letting me know that he was still in charge.

  My pussy throbbed.

  He kissed and licked his way down my neck to my breast, bringing my nipple into his mouth and sucking hard. Once it was a pebbled stone, he made his way to the other one and I held onto the back of his neck, wanting him to move lower. He nipped at my nipple, reminding me that he was in control. He broke away, making his way down to where I needed him the most. Grinning, he pushed me back and I fell against the pillows, he grabbed the backs of my thighs and leveraged them upward toward the ceiling. My pussy was right in his face and he inhaled my scent.

  When his tongue reached its destination, he took my clit into his mouth and lightly sucked. My head fell back in pleasure. It had been entirely too long since he touched me like that. No one could make me feel worshipped like he could. The closeness of his mouth to my most private area was a feeling that had me grabbing the sheets in a frenzy, and he had barely even touched me yet. I expected him to be rough, but he was being gentle, taking his time to devour me and make me wet.

  “Oh God,” I whimpered in pleasure.

  He licked me one last time and then stopped. “Tell me what you want. Beg me for it,” he huskily urged.

  “Please…” I responded on edge.

  “Please…what, G?” he goaded.

  “Please make me come.”

  He growled and returned to lapping at my folds, making me go crazy with passion and desire. Feelings that only he produced. He licked me from my anus to my opening and then back to my clit. He sucked, and when he moved his head up, down, and then side to side, it was my undoing and I came with such force that had my back lifting off the sheets and my eyes rolling to the back of my head.

  He didn’t stop sucking on my clit and held my legs apart when they tried to close from the sensitivity. I screamed from ecstasy and it made him suck me harder, making me come apart again, hard. I shook the entire time, my legs felt like they were going crazy. He released me with a pop. My legs fell forward from weakness, still shaking when he dove forward, attacking my mouth. He loomed over me as my tongue licked my come off his mouth, face, and chin and he hummed in pleasure the entire time.

  I licked my way back to his mouth and I looked right into his eyes, they held everything I wanted to hear. He bit my lower lip pulling it into his mouth before softly kissing me again. His hand grabbed the back of my neck and we kept our eyes open the entire time, not wanting to lose the connection. We both wanted to get lost in the moment. Lost in each other.

  “Of all my loves this is the first and last. I could give all and more, my life, my world, my thoughts, my arms, my breath, my future, my love eternal, endless, infinite, yet brief, as all loves are and hopes, though they endure. You are my sun and stars, my night, my day, my seasons, summer, winter, my sweet spring, my autumn song, the church in which I pray, my land and ocean, all that the earth can bring. Of glory and of sustenance, all that might be divine, my alpha and my omega, and all that was ever mine,”[13] he repeated the exact words to me from the first time we made love, and it made my heart yearn for him.

  The love collapsed right down into my soul. The only place he existed. Eyes falling shut, he pushed into my channel in one thrust spreading me completely open.

  “Don’t close your eyes. Let me see your eyes.” I immediately opened them and he gripped at the back of my neck firmer and lifted me up a little. Our foreheads rested on each other with mouths gaped open. I hadn’t realized I was shedding tears until he caught one with his thumb.

  He fucked me with anger, he fucked me with passion, he fucked me for all the pain and punishment I put him through, but most importantly, he fucked me with love. Right into my soul where he was forever engrained.

  For so long, I fought with who I was–G or Gia–but in that one moment of clarity, he fucked life back to Gianna Edwards. Gianna was finally whole and he brought meaning to my empty soul. He was my light. And I was his. In that second I saw Gianna Edwards in his eyes. Felt it in my bones and it resuscitated its way into my beating heart.

  That’s all it took for me to shed G and embrace Gianna, my true self, no longer in the dark, hiding behind lies and secrets.

  “Oh my God,” I moaned as I felt him balls deep.

  “Fuck, you feel good. How does your pussy feel this good? Fuck me,” he huskily stated, not thrusting harder. “Yes, yes, yes,” he repeated.

  He grabbed my left leg and placed it on his shoulder. That angle was much deeper and my pussy tightened around his shaft, which earned me a growl. He never once let up on holding the back of my neck.

  “Ahhh…more…more...” I murmured.

  He continued to move in a hard and delicious pace that had me weakening beneath him. Making love isn’t about movements or caresses, it’s about feelings and emotions. I felt every last one of them. I cherished every sound, thrust, touch; I wanted to bottle it up and take it with me. The familiarity of our bodies, our breathing, our minds, and especially our hearts.

  “Fuck me,” he grunted. “I fucking love you. Please believe that. If things would have been different, you know, if you would have had the baby. I would have been there. Somehow, I would have.”

  “Jesus, James,” I panted, rotating my hips; my leg on his shoulder made it easy for me to take him deeper. I was close and so was he. We were both on the verge of going over and I wanted to do it together.

  “I’m close,” I cried out.

  “I still would have been there,” he groaned. “Tell me, G. Please tell me what I’ve waited eight years to hear. Please,” he shamelessly begged.

  I grabbed the back of his neck. “I love you. I never stopped.”

  And I meant every word.

  We lay there breathless, surrounded by love and truths. My head was on his shoulder and his arms were wrapped around me, keeping me close and safe.

  “James,” I half-whispered.

  “Hmmm…”

  “Were you with her? Please tell me that I have something she has never had.”

  “McKenzie?” he asked, taken aback.

  I nodded.

  “No, baby, I didn’t touch Mack and you were there when I did. I was going to but I couldn’t. Deep down I knew I couldn’t do that to you, as much as I thought I did.”

  “I’m glad you brought us here,” I admitted.

  “Us or just you?”

  “I’m relieved that Mack doesn’t have that reporter job to go home to. I want her in my life. Does that make me an awful person?”

  He laughed. “Maybe a little, but Mack didn’t have her reporter job when I found her, she was renting some dump in Florida, a small town barely on the map.”

  I sat up. “What?”

  “She hasn’t been there in almost a year. She ran when I was paroled, you think she knew that I was coming for you guys?”

  I shrugged.

  “Shhh…go to sleep. How’s your head?”

  “Sore, but okay,” I said, closing my eyes. It didn’t take more than a few seconds before I was passed out. Happy and contentment, two feelings I hadn’t felt in eight years.

  The light coming in woke me in the morning. My eyes fluttered opened and I didn’t feel James’ arms around me. I turned, extending my arms, expecting to find him there, but it was cold and empty. My eyes immediately opened and I sat up, taking the sheet with me. I w
as shocked to find him sitting in a chair watching me sleep.

  “What are you doing?” I smiled. “Come back to bed it’s still really early.”

  “I haven’t slept all night,” he stated.

  “What? Why?” I questioned, not understating where that was coming from.

  “Because I wanted to look at you one last time.”

  My head shot back like he had slapped me. “What? I don’t understand,” I expressed, trying not to cry.

  Fuck! Was he doing this to me again?

  “You have to leave, G.” He said the words so easily and they flowed off his tongue like it was nothing. I winced at the fact that he called me G. I didn’t want to be her anymore; I didn’t feel like I was her anymore.

  “I can’t keep you here. I can’t keep either of you here. You need to go. We all do, it’s over now.”

  I backed away from him and pulled the sheet to cover my body. Standing up near the edge of the bed, I bellowed, “So what was last night? Part of the plan? A joke?”

  He got off the chair and walked toward the door, leaving me behind him. He paused before he got past the doorway. “It was closure,” he announced, never looking back at me.

  He started to walk away from me.

  From us.

  I couldn’t take it anymore…

  “Your wife made me do it!” I screamed.

  He immediately stopped, taking in my words. “Did you hear me? Your wife made me do everything! She was behind it all! She’s the fucking mastermind and manipulator, not me!” I yelled at the top of my lungs.

  I had never told anyone that. Nobody knew but me.

  I found out I was pregnant and all I wanted to do was share it with him. I honestly thought we could finally be together. That our child would make everything right, but when I drove to see him and saw him with his child and then his wife in the front yard, it nearly killed me. I watched them walk into their home together like I had never existed.

  Their home.

  After catching Mack with my dad and then him crudely dismissing me after class, I needed answers. A few days later, I found myself in the playground of the same park that James and I had our first intimate time together. And that’s when I saw her; she was with Cara, their daughter. She was swinging her on the same swing her husband went down on me a few months prior. I couldn’t help myself and I went to her, I was hormonal and pregnant and I just wanted answers. I didn’t have the courage to face James yet, and his wife was standing right in front of me, so it gave me a reason to find out the truth.