What Once Was Perfect

by Zoe York

  A medium sized black and white dog padded into view and Laney couldn’t help but let out a happy sigh. “Hello there!” She dropped to her knees and let him sniff her all over. “Aren’t you a quiet puppy. So patient. Yes, yes, you are. Good boy.”

  Above her, Kyle chuckled. She glanced up and her heart squeezed hard at the warm expression on his face. Buddy rubbed his nose into her shoulder, but he was just another reminder of how very different their lives had turned out. Laney didn’t have a house plant, let alone a living, breathing dependent.

  As if he sensed her growing unease, Kyle nodded to the other side of the kitchen island. “Want to sit? The wood stove is warmer over there.”

  He eased himself into the overstuffed armchair, leaving the matching couch for Laney. She appreciated the effort to give her some space. Buddy looked like he might hop up next to her, which she maybe wouldn’t mind, but his human snapped his fingers and the collie ambled over to an oversized pillow nearby instead.

  “It’s been a long time, eh?” Kyle asked.

  She nodded, still sipping her coffee.

  “You’re in Chicago now?”

  Another nod. Another sip.

  “How are you settling in? Do you…are you…”

  She knew where the question was going, but after the picture on the fridge, she wasn’t sure she wanted to share just how single she was. A quick glance around the open room didn’t reveal any evidence of a woman. The only shoes on the rack at the door looked like Kyle’s. One plate in the drying rack next to the sink. Familiar authors on the spines of his books.

  He tried again. “You didn’t have anyone else to visit over the holidays?”

  She arched one eyebrow.

  “Sorry. None of my business.”

  “No, it’s okay.” His status didn’t matter. You’re happy, remember? Show him that. “Chicago is great. Everything you’ve probably heard and more. It’s a dynamic city and I’ve lucked out with a really good practice. Some of my peers are still doing locums, and I’ve found a place to put down roots.”

  He offered an instant grin, wide and open, and she willed some of the tension out of her shoulders. “That sounds fantastic.”

  “How about you?” She waved her hand in a wide circle. “This is nice.” He grinned wider again, waiting, and she couldn’t help but return the smile. “Do you…are you…”

  He shook his head. “Just me.”

  Laney pinched her lips together to restrain another smile from bursting forth. That news shouldn’t warm her heart. At all. And it definitely shouldn’t make her want to jump up and do a happy dance. Or a lap dance. She gave herself a mental slap. That was not at all where her mind should be going.

  The single tear in the kitchen had just about killed him. He was glad the conversation had continued, and now that they were talking, he wasn’t in a hurry to get into anything heavy. “I’m glad you came over.”

  She took a deep breath. “Me too.”

  “Do you want to talk? Or just sit? I’m good with either.”

  “I don’t know. Is it okay if we just sit for a while?”

  “Of course.”

  He watched her relax into the couch, the wood stove providing the only soundtrack with an occasional pop and hiss.

  “So.” She swallowed hard. “Tell me about work. Where are you teaching now?”

  The question surprised him. He was expecting to be asked more about the photo, dreading having to explain Crystal. Clearly she wanted to start on safer ground, and he should have known that she would. Laney never sought out drama.

  “Wardham Elementary. I transferred seven years ago, and haven’t looked back.”

  “You don’t miss the city?”

  Kyle shook his head. “I liked the learning experiences I gained teaching in a large urban school, but I missed the tight-knit community. And I wanted to be closer to my family.”

  “Tell me about your class.”

  “They’re awesome. I’ve got a grade 5/6 split this year, and I really like that age. Inquisitive, able to do big projects, but not too hormone crazy just yet. I also teach science to the grade 4s, and they’re fun too.”

  “Have you always taught the middle grades? You started with a grade 4 class, right?”

  Kyle was touched that she remembered. “With one disastrous exception, yes, I’ve always taught 4/5/6. The first year I taught here in Wardham, the only class that was available for me was grade 1. We all survived, but I was greatly relieved when Mrs. Schroeder retired the following year and I got her class.”

  “Oh my god, Mrs. Schroeder. She taught me grade 5.”

  “Me too,” Kyle said, stretching his feet out toward the ottoman between them.

  “I don’t really remember you in elementary school.”

  “I remember you.”

  They both fell silent. Kyle knew she was thinking about her first year of high school. It was a story he both loved and hated. That’s when she had first noticed him, hanging out with her sister and a bunch of other older students. Evie and Laney had always been close, and when a couple of other girls bristled at the nerdy grade nine student being invited to share lunch with the group, Kyle had smoothed it over with an easy smile, and asked her to sit next to him. He meant it as a protective gesture, but her crush was born that day, and persisted until her final year of university when she finally threw herself at him. He honestly had never realized how she felt, but at the first press of her body against his, he knew that ignorance must have been a self-defense mechanism because he was lost forever in a sea of Laney.

  “You’re right, it’s been a long time.” She stood up. “Is there more coffee?”

  Kyle nodded and followed her into the kitchen. He couldn’t help himself, he wanted to be close to her. He leaned his hip against the counter, watching her pour herself a cup. She added milk, but skipped the sugar. He raised an eyebrow, and she smiled.

  “People change,” she said.

  “In some ways. You haven’t changed that much in other ways.”

  “Neither have you.”

  They stood there, staring at each other, and Kyle wanted to take the mug out of her hands and ease her against the counter. Press into her and show her that most of all, his attraction to her had never changed, that her mouth still drove him to distraction, her mind still made him crazy and her body still brought him to his knees. A hiss of air dragged him out of his fantasy. He cleared his throat and shifted back, painfully aware that his state of arousal was on full display, and Laney had noticed. Her eyes were wide with a mix of desire and fear, and he needed to back off, as much as he wanted to do the complete opposite. “Let’s sit down again. I…there’s something that I need to say to you, that’s long overdue.”

  Laney followed Kyle to the sitting area, confused by the moment they had just shared in the kitchen. If he hadn’t moved away from her, she probably would have launched herself onto his body and rubbed up against him like a cat in heat. She hadn’t felt this overwhelmed by lust since they were together in college. She thought she had outgrown such feelings, but apparently not. She pressed her thighs together as she curled up on the couch again. She ached from hip to hip, inflamed with desire and dying for Kyle to touch her.

  “I owe you an apology.”

  She didn’t know what she was expecting Kyle to say, but that wasn’t it. An odd tightness pulled across her chest, her shoulders curling up and in like she was a hedgehog under attack. She breathed out, a quiet rush of air over her bottom lip reminding her she was staring, mouth open. She blinked, searching for something, anything to say. Nothing came to mind.

  “Laney…dammit, stop looking at me like that. I don’t want to hurt you, I want to free you. Free myself, if I’m being honest. Please just listen to me.”

  She nodded, not sure she’d heard everything over the pounding in her ears, but as much as it hurt, she also wanted to have that final conversation they’d never had.

  “…and I think that’s why it took me so long to get over y
ou, because I was wallowing in pain. I thought you’d broken up with me. I was convinced you’d come back someday, and when you moved to Calgary, I knew it was finally over.”

  She was on her feet, shaking from head to toe, before she realized rage had taken over. “Excuse me? What the fuck kind of apology is this, Kyle?” Laney swiped at hot tears now freely sliding down her cheeks.

  She stalked toward him, counting on her fingers the points he had missed. “First, you broke up with me. You broke my heart, asshole. I asked you to wait for me and you said it was too much. Second, I tried to talk to you, you wouldn’t come to the phone or answer my emails. Third—”

  “I never read them,” Kyle muttered, so low she almost missed it.

  “Then that’s the third point.” She stopped in front of him, bitter, angry defenses all in place, ready to do battle. “Fourth, if you think that I’m going to absolve you, free you, whatever that means, you’ve got another thought coming, mister, because I will never forgive you for ruining love for me.”

  Chapter Five

  Somehow, he’d bungled this up. That barely scratched the surface of how colossally wrong he’d gone about this conversation, actually. Kyle wanted to press pause and re-group, but Laney was unleashed and there was no going back. It was killing him to hear how much pain she’d held inside for so long, but she needed to let it out, needed to make him hear what he’d avoided as a younger man.

  Realizing that she was spent, at least momentarily, Kyle reached for her hands and tugged her down so she was sitting on the ottoman in front of him. “I ruined love for me too, you know. And I’m so sorry I did that. I shouldn’t have said all of that before, it doesn’t matter. I was just trying to explain why it took me so long to realize that our breakup was my fault. But I know that it was, and I’m sorry that I did that to you. You didn’t deserve it.”

  She stared at their hands, fingers still twisted together. He wanted to do something more, hug her or wipe away her tears, but he worried that she might bolt if pushed too far. His Laney of long ago had been free with her emotions, full of love and passion, easy to rile up, fun to spar with, but also happy to be soothed by lovemaking. It was his fault that this flood of anger was now so foreign to her that she didn’t know how to cope. He’d stolen more than her love.

  Kyle pushed against that regret, shaking his head. He could wallow once she had gone; right now he had some making right to do. “Laney—” his voice was strained, and he cleared his throat. “Sweetheart, you can let it all out. Hit me. Flog me up and down Main Street. I can take it.”

  “I’ve never admitted that before,” she said, her voice quiet. “I thought I didn’t want to love anyone, I thought it was my choice.”

  Kyle took a chance and pulled her into his lap. Twelve years hadn’t changed a thing, their bodies still fit together perfectly, even though she was coiled tighter than a rattlesnake. He stroked up and down her spine through the soft sweater, willing her to relax, until she eased her head onto his shoulder. Inch by inch, her entire body settled into his, and he felt the top layer of her tension ebb away. Leaning back, he closed his eyes and hoped that the warmth between their bodies felt as healing for Laney as it did for him. She curled her arm across his chest, and with a sigh, relaxed fully. For the first time since she’d arrived, Kyle felt completely comfortable. Exhausted and sad, but comfortable. He’d take it.

  They sat like that for almost an hour. At one point, Kyle was convinced that she had fallen asleep, but he didn’t want to risk losing the moment, and he couldn’t see her face without shifting. Her head was tucked under his chin, and he didn’t mind, because her hair smelled amazing, an intoxicating blend of honey and some kind of fruit. Thank god her ass was perched high on his thigh and her legs were bent over his other arm, because in the space beneath he had developed a brutal erection. He couldn’t remember ever being this turned on by cuddling before, except maybe in those first few weeks of dating when they were still working on rounding all the bases.

  He remembered every single day of that spring, the long string of her firsts: Laney slowly peeling off her t-shirt in the barn, then crossing her arms against her chest; her sliding across the bench in his truck, straddling him, grinding her jean-clad pussy against his cock; getting completely naked in a hotel room after the Science Society Formal Ball, wanting to punch a hole in the wall after their only condom broke. Laney had made that night worthwhile anyway, sliding his cock between their bodies, holding herself open, rubbing against the length of him until they both shattered apart. They’d spent the night twisted up in each other, and when Laney wrapped her warm little hand around him in the shower the next morning, he thought he’d died and gone to heaven. He returned the pleasure before check out, and two weeks later when he moved into his first apartment, they had an entire box of condoms at the ready.

  She lifted her head and he was torn between wanting her to see where he had wandered in his mind, and hoping she’d return to her original position so he could keep smelling her hair like a pervert. He didn’t dare think that she might be wandering around the same spots on memory lane, even when she pressed her forehead against his chin, then rubbed up his face until her lips connected with his jaw. Kyle stifled a groan and eased her legs down to the ground, freeing his arm to press between their bodies.

  “Laney, sweetheart, that’s not a good idea.” It’s brilliant, asshole, shut up. He could barely grind out the words. His body was not on board with being noble.

  “Probably not.” She pressed against his hand, flat against her upper chest, stretching her body to reconnect with his face, and the upper swell of her breast filled his palm. This time the groan was louder. “Tell me to stop.”

  “We’re going to regret this.” Freud would have a field day with what was going in his head. Baser instincts were definitely gaining traction.

  “Probably. Tell me to stop.” Her lips found the corner of his mouth, at an angle, and then her face turned again and they were sharing the barest of open mouth kisses, her bottom lip resting on his, pressing it down. Her eyes were wide, pupils dark and full of want. He didn’t see any hesitation, only heat, and his resolve slipped. One kiss. He let her breath slip into his mouth, hot and moist, and he was lost, disoriented in a mixed fog of memories and unfulfilled fantasies.

  With a slight jerk, his extended arm relaxed, allowing Laney to crawl back on his lap, straddling his hips this time, and she looked down at his erection with a smirk. “I knew you didn’t want me to stop.”

  “Wanting you to stop and knowing you should are two different things. Hell no, I don’t want you to stop.” He dragged a ragged breath into his chest and ran his hands down the sides of her body, squeezing her hips, tracing over her thighs and then up again, harder this time, sliding his palms under her sweater and over the thin cotton tank top hiding underneath. “But I don’t want you to hate me, either.”

  “I’m not an innocent college kid anymore, Kyle.” She wiggled her hips, trying to slide closer to the bulge in his jeans. “I like sex. You make me think of sex. I’m all fired up from fighting. Let’s go.”

  It should have been an ardour-dousing wakeup call, the casual offer of something that was once so special to her, to them. The higher-thinking part of his brain was protesting that something was wrong, that Laney couldn’t possibly want a booty call, but all Kyle could focus on was the easy confidence that she had gained, how she must have gained it, and his primal need to re-possess that which he had lost took over. He could hear raspy need in his voice and he didn’t care. “Now it’s your turn to tell me to stop, sweetheart.”

  Laney gasped as Kyle wrenched her sweater up her torso and buried his face against her camisole. His breath was hot through the fabric, and while she couldn’t see what he was doing because her sweater was bunched between her chin and his head, she could feel his mouth moving up and around her body in a slow arc. By the time he was at her ribs, his hands had wrapped around to her ass, and she rocked against his cock. Helpless agai
nst her desire, she heard herself whimper at the contact and rolled her hips again, this time deliberately, seeking out the delicious tweak of something on his jeans against her clit. The edge of his fly, maybe. Back and forth she flicked her body, flexing her thighs to give her more leverage, constrained by his fierce hold on her hips and his head pressed firmly now into the side of her breast, his mouth approaching her right nipple.

  She pulled her sweater over her head, tossing it to the floor. Breathing hard, she watched as Kyle yanked her camisole down as far as he could between her breasts. Through hooded eyes, dark and pulsing, he took in the slight swells.

  “You’re my every fantasy, Laney. So fucking beautiful.”

  Did he mean it? She felt more wanted in that moment than she had in a long time. She hadn’t allowed herself to think about Kyle, had convinced herself early on that the passion she remembered in his bed was magnified through the distorting lens of puppy love. That was probably the right decision for her self-preservation, but since stepping into his house, there was no doubt she’d been absolutely wrong. Every orgasm she’d had over the last twelve years paled in comparison to getting to second base with Kyle.

  She ran her index finger under his chin, pulling his gaze to meet hers. Her thumb brushed his lower lip, then pushed in, letting his teeth nip at her. She stared at him, wanting to soak up the details. His tongue slowly laved the pad of her thumb, in synchronous motion with his palms on her nipples, and a tremor wracked through her body. She took a deep breath, then shrugged, and he followed her wordless instruction, pulling her camisole down to her waist. He cupped her breasts, admiring the pale pink swells plumped in his hands, her nipples begging for his attention. He drew one peak into his mouth, sucking and nibbling, until she surged her entire body toward his head with a moan.