She pulled back, breathing harder than she expected. Mortification and arousal warred within her, because this was so not what she’d planned to do tonight. They hadn’t seen each other in the better part of three years, and she shouldn’t have just jumped him like that without preamble. She was glad, at least, that he seemed as affected as she was, his blue eyes clear and fire bright in the dim light and his lips still shiny wet.
He ran his hands through his hair and laced them behind his neck as he leaned back. “That wasn’t an answer.”
She was tempted to reach for the bottle and drink directly from it. “I suppose it depends on the question.”
Dropping his head on a huff of laughter, he looked over at her through his lashes. “Okay then, we’ll revisit that question later. You know what I meant.”
“And I’m not prepared to give you an answer,” she said as she pushed to her feet gingerly. Once she was sure that the floor didn’t harbor any murderous intent toward her, she made her way over to the French doors nearest the stereo and looked out into the garden. Dew-covered ivy inched up from the ground to frame the windows, collections of peonies lined the small fenced-in yard. In the tiny patch of grass was a wrought iron patio set at which she had no problem imagining him enjoying his morning coffee and paper. She felt the heat of him at her back, almost touching, but didn’t turn around.
“I wouldn’t have asked if I didn’t need to know.”
His voice, quietly serious and rough, almost melted her knees. She knew that was true, they had that in common. It did not, however, mean he needed the whole story, at least not now when the emotions were still so raw. “I just…” she shrugged in futility, never taking her eyes from the night beyond the glass, “I needed to distance myself in order to respect your marriage.”
The loss of his heat was noticeable as he stalked across the room. “Respect my marriage? What the hell does that mean?”
She trailed her fingers down a wavy pane of glass as she rested her forehead against the frame. “It means I didn’t think you needed to juggle two women in your life, so I bowed out in favor of the one who bore your ring and name.” It sounded great on paper, even if her stomach churned a little at how close she was to the ugly truth. Ellie wrapped her arms around her middle and lightly thumped her head against the window frame, the rhythm surprisingly soothing. “I saw that a choice had to be made, so I made it.”
“On the day I got shot?”
Ellie didn’t have to look at him to know he looked completely vexed and incredulous. She tried to lighten the mood. “What can I say? My timing sucked.”
“It’s not funny.” He took her arm and turned her to face him, eyes full of unmitigated pain. “All this time I wondered… I needed… you walked away from me… for me.”
For reasons he couldn’t have possibly imagined. Ellie’s eyes fell to the tips of his boots and she couldn’t speak, her voice choked with the tears she’d refused to shed because she did the right thing, the honorable thing. She could only nod and then she was in his arms, her face buried in his chest as he held her so tight she could scarcely breathe.
The tears, they did not fall, beaten back by what she could only call forgiveness and understanding, for both of them. They stood in his living room like that, her arms around his waist and his cradling her close to him, his chin on her head for a long while, only moving apart when the album side ended.
“The only reason I have CDs,” she said on a small chuckle as he stepped away from her to flip the record.
“Philistine,” he murmured, but she could hear the smile in his voice. He collected the glasses and cachaça and returned them to the kitchen before coming to lean against the doorway of the kitchen. “Do you know…? No, of course not. Why would you?”
Ellie raised an eyebrow. “Come up with a complete question and maybe I’ll be able to answer it.”
“Smartass.” His dimples flashed briefly in his cheeks before he became serious again. “I’ve missed this.”
She nodded slightly in agreement. “Me too.” She came up the two steps to rest on the railing above the living room, watching as Guinness resumed his spot on the couch they’d vacated. “Did you have a question?”
Sean snorted a half laugh and ran his fingers through his hair. “Not one that can be asked and answered simply, no.”
“Try anyway. If you screw it up, we’ll chalk it up to the booze.” Her smile was full, and infinitely braver than she felt. Whatever he had to say, she was pretty sure everything was going to change. For the better or worse remained to be seen, but this was going to be huge. And irrevocable.
“All right, then.” He chuckled outright before taking a deep breath and tucking his bangs behind his ear. He licked his lips and hooked his fingers in his back pockets. “Do you know,” he started thoughtfully as he walked across the room toward her again, slowly and full of purpose, “what the one thing that hurt the most during the whole marriage implosion,” he waved a hand searching for the word, “debacle was?”
He stopped in front of her, and it was all she could do not to take a step back, even though there was nowhere for her to go. “No,” she answered, her eyes never leaving his.
“My scar.”
Her eyes fell briefly to the side where she knew it to be before she looked back at him.
“That was when things really started to unravel in my life. Not just the marriage, but everything. You’ve never seen it, have you?”
Her breath caught on an involuntary gasp. It was more a statement than a question, and certainly not one she would have ever expected to hear. “No.”
Sean pulled off his shirt and dropped it on the railing next to her, and Ellie had to remind herself to breathe. Sure, she’d seen him without a shirt before, swimming and whatever, but she’d always coveted from afar, afraid that being close to him would totally give away her crush. Now, he was close enough to touch. The scar was easy to pick out, the only flaw in an otherwise pristine landscape of hard planes and ridges. Below his ribs on his left side, an unreplaced divot in the flesh that was—even now—calling to her fingertips. Fingertips that were, at that moment, embedding themselves in the railing above his couch, possibly permanently.
His finger under her chin brought her dark eyes back to his, flame bright. “I lost more than just one of my nine lives that day, you know.”
She snorted a quick laugh before looking away. “Don’t joke about that.”
He waited until she looked back at him, his gaze earnest. “I lost you that day, too, and that was the one thing I could never escape every time I saw it.”
It was everything she’d ever wanted to hear, and nothing she could deal with right now. “The booze seems very eloquent tonight.” She went for the joke because otherwise she was going to fragment into a billion pieces.
He shook his head, his bangs streaming down into his face. “This isn’t the booze.” He cupped her cheek in his palm. “I should have told you this way before now.”
“And Pia?” She tilted her chin up to an almost defiant angle, doing everything in her power to ignore the white-hot trail of his fingertips down her neck to her shoulder. She had to know. She knew this was so much more than a drunken fling with an old friend, even if he wasn't aware of it, and couldn't let herself ignore it.
Sean tore his eyes from her neck to lock them with hers. His voice was low, definite, and unyielding in tone. “That chapter in my life has been closed for over a year. This isn’t about her.”
She searched his eyes for only a moment before responding. “Good enough.” The words were barely past her lips before his mouth crushed down on hers. His hand cradled her head as she melted against him, her fingers coming free from the railing to hook into his belt loops and pull him closer.
When they both came up for air, speech was a long forgotten art form, well beyond their comprehension. He inclined his head toward the doorway leading to the stairs, and she gave the barest of nods. From there it was a race of deep kisses, playfu
l bites, and tangled limbs as they finally migrated to his bedroom.
Ellie followed him, pausing momentarily in the doorway to reassure herself that she was not only not crazy, but not alone in her potential madness. The room was expansive in the darkness. There were windows behind the headboard of the bed, letting the moonlight bathe the silver sheets in her ethereal glow. Her brief reverie was interrupted by the barely audible sound of a doleful, penitent piano coming from speakers she was too preoccupied to locate visually. The only things she could process were Sean and the fact that he was standing next to what may have been the largest bed she’d ever seen.
She made her way over to his side, stepping around his hastily discarded boots and socks, and looked from the bed that came up to just below her ribcage to him, shirtless and in a pair of jeans that was reaching the limits of its structural integrity. “I, um… I don’t see a ladder,” she said in as nonchalant a tone as she could manage.
A quickly squelched smirk stole across his full lips. “Not a problem.”
Only a moment later, Ellie found herself on her back, lightly tossed sideways into the middle of the mattress like she was bedtime reading. She’d known he was strong—the muscles were hard to miss when she was running her hands all over his chest and arms—but… “Damn.”
“And for my next trick…” He flashed her a confident grin before bounding into the bed next to her to the sound of her startled squeak. The sound brought Guinness to the door, but upon seeing both humans in his designated spot, he harrumphed and trekked back downstairs.
The impact rolled her into him, pressing her tightly against him from shoulder to knee as they were both enveloped by the sheets and soft bedding. There were definitely worse places in the world she could have been right then. He was breathing hard, whether from exertion or excitement, she couldn’t tell, but when he tangled his fingers in her curly black hair and brought her mouth to his, she was pretty sure she didn’t care.
His lips were soft, agile, quickly forging a path from her mouth to the spot just below her ear while his hands busied themselves with the hem of her t-shirt. They pulled apart just to toss her shirt and bra to the side and then came back together, chest to chest. The heat of his skin, the rumble of his soft groan at the contact, their legs entwined together, momentous didn’t even begin to cover it.
Ellie traced her fingers down his face, smiling as his eyes drifted shut with a sigh. The stubble beneath her palm, the slight bump in the bridge of his nose from a long-ago break, his full lips that opened slightly beneath her touch… She wanted to absorb as much of this as she could, because it wasn’t every day that she got everything she’d wished for.
While she explored, Sean’s hand slid slowly down her side, pressing her closer to him, cuddling her ass. His touch was warm and almost reverent. She took advantage of his distraction by pushing on his shoulder until he rolled to his back, pulling her on top of him.
She sat up, astride his hips, and took a moment to look him over, his strong hands on her hips, his ridged abdomen, all the way up to the impish grin and twinkling blue eyes. “See something you like?” she asked while slowly grinding her hips against his hardness, teasing both of them.
“You are so beautiful,” he said with a deep sigh, flexing his fingertips against her hips.
She smiled in response and leaned over to trail her fingers slowly down his chest, following it with light kisses. Every once in a while, she’d look up from her descent with a smile and find an answering one on his lips as he laced his fingers behind his head to watch the show.
Ellie slowly shimmied her way down until she reached his scar. She gently traced the ragged edge of the scar thinking back to that day. The nicked kidney, the blood loss, the matching ragged hole in his back. So much had been taken from both of them that day. She pressed a kiss to his trembling skin feeling his answering groan rumble through his body.
Sean dragged her up his body until she was sprawled over him as he cradled her face and kissed her deeply. It was different than any kiss she’d had before, more intense, more meaningful, almost grateful. She felt the world spin around her as the kiss went on, but found herself on her back beneath him when they broke apart.
He came up on an elbow as he leaned over to look at her. His normally bright blue eyes were in shadows, his lips shiny from their kisses. “I never thought I would have a chance…” he trailed off as he watched the path his fingers burned as they lightly traipsed their way from her face to her neck, down her chest, stopping to feel the Morse code beat of her heart against her sternum.
Seeming to enjoy an audience, he watched her keenly while leaning over to take her nipple into his mouth for the first time. Ellie’s back bowed from the soft bedding, rising to meet his touch before melting back into the luxurious sheets. His agile tongue flicked over her sensitive flesh with an attention to detail she was sure would ruin her for anyone else. She tangled her hands in the sheets as he continued tormenting her with his devilish skills.
Between his otherwise occupied mouth and his warm hand on her stomach, he had her squirming. She tried to keep her anticipation in, but the feel of his roughened palm against her skin set all of her inner longings free to roam about the bed.
She reached up and touched his hair. The silvery strands hidden among the soft, jet black mass shimmered in the minimal light. Tucking the bangs behind his ear like she’d seen him do, she drew his eyes from his work at getting her belt undone to her face. He pouted, though his hand never stopped working, finally releasing the harness leather and starting on the button. “Problem?”
She shook her head and cupped his cheek. “Kiss me.” The words were powerful, like the last vestiges of doubt had simply incinerated from the heat between them.
Sean turned his face into her palm and lightly bit the pad at the base of her thumb, and then the inside of her wrist, her elbow, watching her reactions intently as he made his way up to her lips. When he released her hand to discard his jeans, she dragged her nails down his back, and then he settled comfortably over her. He arched into her touch before coming down to take her mouth in an ardent kiss.
Articles of clothing tumbled off the bed amid fervent touches and whispered benedictions. Protection was found, and she took her time adorning him in it, teasing and tasting until he reached for her and pulled her up next to him. There was a tangle of limbs and kisses as he moved over her. He took her wrists in one hand and pinned them to the pillow above her head as he situated himself between her legs. “Last chance to change your mind,” he murmured.
Her soft chuckle shimmied through her body as she bumped her nose with his. “I think it’s safe to assume that won’t be happening.” Ellie worked one hand free and grabbed a handful of Sean’s hair, pulling his mouth down to hers as she surged up against him.
He slid slowly into her with a groan that was equal parts agony and euphoria. It equaled her own as he withdrew and slid into her again, both of them finding a rhythm that was intense and athletic. She wrapped her legs around his waist, using the strength of her legs to drive him harder, faster, until they both found completion, his quickly on the heels of her own as he growled out her name against her neck.
Sean collapsed on top of her, stuttering breaths tripping in and out of his lungs like a bellows. Ellie was in the same state, fearing for the state of her hair, now sweaty and probably matted against the pillow. He, however, was the first to move, rolling off of her to dispose of the evidence in the bathroom before returning quickly to stretch back out on the bed.
Ellie had sat up during the brief moment he’d been gone, the reality of what had just transpired suddenly crushing her brain, though that might have still been the rum. She looked over her shoulder at him as he got comfy on the pillows behind her. He reached for her, gesturing with his chin that his shoulder was now taking customers, first come, first served.
Against her better judgment, she laid back, curling up against him, her hand across his chest, and his around her shoulders.
It felt surprisingly normal and completely terrifying. They lay like that for a long time, the only sounds their breathing and the music she’d forgotten was even there.
“So,” she started, if for no other reason than to stave off the nap that was threatening. “What now?
“What do you mean, what now?” came his reply as he pressed a gentle kiss to the top of her head. His affectionate snuggling was doing nothing to make this any less scary for her.
Her mind flashed briefly to the scene in Pulp Fiction with Ving Rhames and Bruce Willis, because her sense of terror evidently ignited her flair for the absurd. “I just…” She pulled her hand down her face in an attempt to corral a cogent thought. Alas, she was unsuccessful. “Damn.” The endorphins that had taken over her brain had looted her vocabulary first, apparently.
He hummed in agreement as his hand slid from her shoulder and down her arm to her waist. “We were pretty damn spectacular, I will say that.”
She snorted and twined her legs with his. “Agreed.”
Sean shuffled her closer as he turned to face her and to bring his other arm around to hold her, as well. “So what were you thinking as far as ‘what now’?”
Ellie stretched next to him as she thought about it, the nap idea growing more appealing by the second. Any conversation more substantial was going to have to wait until after at least three uninterrupted hours of sleep. “Beyond a nap, maybe doing that again, and breakfast, I hadn’t gotten that far.” Her exhaustion made the honest answer just fall past her lips between them.
He flashed her a quick grin before pulling her close for a deep kiss which turned into a yawn. It sealed their fates, at least for that moment. After a little bit of shuffling, they were both comfortably under the covers and had resumed their previous positions as vine and trellis, respectively. Right before they both succumbed to exhaustion, he whispered in her ear, “What is this ‘maybe’ business?”
The Ex File (Behind the Blue Line Series Book 1) Page 2