“Why didn’t you come with the group?”
“You needed time with them.”
He knew I wouldn’t spend time with them if he was here, because he knows it all. Damn Reed, he’s making my heart grow even more for him.
Hand in hand we walk the only wooded trail that I haven’t explored before. We both slow down when a glass building comes into view. I let go of his hand. My pace quickens when I see what’s inside. I turn the knob and the handle moves, I push hard and the door slings open. I stand in shock at what beautiful work this is. What kind of memories have been made in this chapel must be amazing. Floor-to-ceiling glass provides me several angles and views of the outside. I can see the sun setting through a back window. It glows in the distance just at the tip of an old cross at the very end. I walk down the aisle and trail my fingers along each and every one of the dark, oak pews.
“Reed, did you know this was here?”
“Graham told me I should take you down this way when I showed up, but no, I didn’t know this was the reason. But I must fu—shi— you were right all those times. I do cuss a lot if I can’t seem to not do it in a church.” Reed laughs lightly, his hand rubbing the back of his neck. “It’s perfect for what I want to tell you.”
He takes my hand once again and puts me in the center of the building. His gaze never leaves mine, like he could care less that we are in the most beautiful church ever created because I’m his center. “Babe, I never put you first. I said I would before and I still didn’t. So now I am.”
I take a deep breath and all my thoughts, all the deep, stirring doubts of doing this by myself, disappear because even with him not with me physically, he’s been there for me when it really truly counts. He always answers his phone when I need him, listens to my doubts, pushes me when I don’t want to go any longer, and isn’t that part of a how a relationship works, a part of what love is really about? To have someone catch you when you fall, to be able to lean on someone when you don’t want to move yourself?
Life moves on, it pushes us forward. I can’t keep loving him with one foot out the door anymore. I can’t keep running in circles only to end up in the same spot. It’s not fair to him or to me. Because the past—it’s just that, the past, and Reed giving the fight up for me is part of the future. Ours.
“You didn’t have to miss it. The fight you know. I would have understood.”
“I know, babe, you would have, and that’s why I love you, but I did have to. You needed me here. I needed to be here. For you.”
“You’re in it for good. I mean for us, aren’t you?” My eyes search his for one speck of doubt.
“Yep, all in. You saw my cards and I’m taking my bet on us.” He’s standing here, arms wide open, waiting for me to make my move.
I take the first step to close the physical and emotional distance between us, and his face lights up. Those damn hazel eyes shine only for me. Shot through the heart, I’m a total goner. I was always a goner when it came to him.
“I’m not all the way better yet.”
“I know.”
“I may not ever be. You have to accept this mess I’m in.”
“I do.”
“I love you.”
“Love you too, babe. Madly. I know you’re scared to fall back in and I get it now. We’ll go slow, dates and sh…stuff. Till you are ready. Now usually I wouldn’t ask you, but being in a church and all, feels like I should. Can I fu—freaking kiss you now?”
And before I get the chance to answer him, Reed’s lips are latched onto mine, giving God a totally inappropriate show of our affection. And l don’t have one ounce of guilt over it.
I know this isn’t the end of the troubles I’m fighting, and it’s not the last of our problems together, but it’s the beginning of my new chapter, and I’m going to write every last word in it. And it’s not always going to be smooth, or happy, or effortless. I’m sure more tears will be shed, and it will be more complicated than ever before. But isn’t that life?
It’s one big, beautiful mess.
Really, we all are just fighting to survive it.
One way or another.
This thing called life.
I’ll ride our ride until the end. No matter what.
Gus did his job and Bennett and Krystal are both long gone. I don’t know how or what he did, but Bennett is no longer breathing, and after that, Krystal started confessing other things she did, which added another twenty years on top of her twelve-year sentence for what she did to Hadley. When we told Hadley, she said one word. “Good.” And that was the last time we talked about it. I know she talked it out with Graham, but she wouldn’t tell me anything else. I did notice the last time I picked her up that her sleeping pill bottle hadn’t been refilled since she found out.
My hand moves up to knock on her door for yet another date. There has been bowling, movies, coffee, the normal things new couples do. Hads even set a rule to only see each other three to four times a week and not one day more. She said it’s so she doesn’t lean on me only while she’s getting better. Whatever she fucking says, because every damn day I’m with her I will take. We aren’t back to where we were, but only because she’s stronger. And I fucking love that shit, but it’s killing me to hold back on our fucking kisses when I drop her off at her door. I want to push her in through the damn thing and go insane. But it needs to be done. We need to get to know each other not as friends, not as lovers, just as boyfriend and girlfriend. Doesn’t mean my balls don’t ache the whole time I’m fucking near her. Who the fuck am I kidding—whenever I think about her.
Hads opens the door in nothing but a fucking towel, her hair soaking wet, and not one ounce of makeup on. And I can’t fucking speak. My eyes trail over her body, her fucking body I haven’t seen naked, touched, or kissed in ages.
“Didn’t you get my message?”
She’s talking, but I just can’t seem to actually comprehend any of her words. Jesus Christ, my girl is naked…one swift pull of the towel and it will be on the floor.
We will be on the floor.
“Reed, the text?”
“Nope.” Who gives two shits about a damn text message or a fucking phone call when the damn beads of water start dribbling down her legs? Not me, that’s for sure. I would kill to be that water right now—I would gut a bitch to be that damn towel.
Lucy busts through Hads’s legs to attack me, but in the process, Hads loses hold of her towel and it drops to the ground. Fucking too fast for her to grab it but it falls in slow motion for me. My fucking wet dream, legit, every dream of Hads’s is standing right in front of me now. Fuck my life.
Hadley speaks more and I spare a couple of looks at her mouth, but I’m still not hearing a damn thing she’s saying. She’s not making a move to pick up her damn towel, either, from the floor. Her fucking huge-ass tits on display for me. My dick goes rock hard in my pants, straining against the zipper. It’s like it knows where it belongs. Whose gate it should be in, and where is all my blood rushing to? Because there is certainly none in my brain. It must be the reason why my feet are going toward Hads now. Because there is no other reason why I’m only a few steps away from her now.
No other reason why my arms gather her naked body against mine.
No other reason why my lips are devouring hers.
But this is all happening and Hads isn’t pushing me away. In fact, she is opening herself to me. I grasp her ass and pick her up, her legs wrapping around mine, our lips never losing contact. I push her into the wall, her fingers itching to pull my shirt off. And like that my mind rights itself. I break my lips away. “Babe, sorry, but if you don’t stop I won’t be able to stop. My resolve left out that damn door when you opened it in that fucking towel. If you want this, I’m game, if not, we have to stop.”
One would think she would talk to me. She had so many words only minutes ago, but the only thing she does is take the edges of my shirt and pulls it over my head.
“Hads, I need words. I need
to hear you say it.”
“Lord, help me, Reed, if you don’t take me to my bed and lay me down on my sheets and fuck me till I can’t feel my legs, I’m going to find someone who can.”
I growl, fucking growl at the thought of another fucker. “Babe, don’t even say that shit to me.”
“Well, take me to bed then, babe.”
“With fucking pleasure.”
I partially sprint to her room. I drop her down on the bed, her damn tits bounce, calling me to take them. “One more time, Hads, you sure?”
“Reed, shut up, yes I’m sure. This is what I want.”
My mouth attaches to her nipple. I swirl my tongue around it. Hads moans, filling my ears, and our hips buck against each other. The urge to fill her consumes me. I don’t even give her the option to take my pants off because I’m stripping already.
My body on top of hers, skin on skin now. My lips trailing down her neck, her legs wide for me, waiting for me. I look up to her face and see something I haven’t seen in so long. Desire. Our kisses at the end of our dates were getting heavy but nothing like this.
She’s wide open for me, and it’s not just her damn legs, but her damn heart, her mind, her fucking soul because her doing this now means she trusts me.
Trusts me completely.
Again. And that’s a gift I won’t ever take for granted.
I thrust in her, quick, fast, and so fucking hard. My body’s on fire, and if God strikes me dead, I would die one fucking happy man.
Her hips meet mine, her nails scratching down my back. “Shit, Hads, I swear this is my fucking home. You are my fucking home.”
Her legs wrap around my back and I go deeper than I ever thought I could. A tear falls off the side of Hads’s face and we slow our movements, taking in the last few moments before we explode together.
I swat at my nose, only for another tickle coming. I swat again, this time I catch a finger.
“You have to be quick to get to me.” My voice is deep and dry but it doesn’t stop the corner of my mouth from turning up but my eyes remain closed.
“You suck balls, mark my words, one day I’m going to get you.” Hadley places a kiss in the center of my chest.
“One day isn’t today.” I open my eyes, refreshed and more relaxed than I’ve felt in, well, ever.
Hadley props her face under her arm, her eyes shine so fucking bright. “So you know all those times you called me when I was gone?”
“You mean me going borderline crazy? Yes, I remember.”
“I had this phone I forwarded all your contacts to.”
“You are a sneaky woman.”
“I am. Anyway, I threw it away yesterday.”
“Oh, yeah?”
“Because I don’t need to hear how much you want me back because you got me.”
“Oh, yeah?” Good thing most of them were drunk dialing but some of those I put a lot of effort into. I mean not poetry shit but they got pretty deep. But she’s right. I got her.
“Let’s do something fun and go ride some four wheelers today, get muddy and have fun.”
“Oh, yeah?”
“Yep, I’ve been a few times with Matt’s whatever she is called…It’s fun.”
“Oh, yeah?”
“And one day I want to move away from the city, not too far away so it takes hours to get to the mall, but far enough to have land to get more dogs, and not neighbors.”
“Oh, yeah?”
“You gonna say anything but ‘oh, yeah’?”
“Nope you could ask me to turn and cough right now because your tit is on my chest and that’s all I can think about.”
A smack on my chest and the laughing from Hads makes it even worse because now her tits move with it. “Always with your dick, you know we are going to do it at least two more times before we leave this bed.”
“I know.”
“You know this doesn’t mean I’m moving in with you.”
“I know.”
“And you know my rule for seeing each other every other night is still in effect.”
“I know.”
“Reed?”
“Yes, Hads?”
“You know I love you and this time it’s forever?”
My fucking face is going to break if I keep this smile shit up. “That’s fucking right.”
Forever, like I would give her any other option for that shit.
She’s it. Forever and fucking always. Madly. Two sparrows and all that mess. Naked, no tits, clothes, dirty, smelly, she’s it. We are just fighting to survive life and doing it next to each other.
The days of wondering if Reed will be in my life, in my heart, are long gone. He’s it. I was only nineteen, young, a sophomore in college, and never knew what love was when I met him. I remember the exact moment the butterflies entered my stomach for the first time. And each and every time after that they would flutter just when I thought of him. The first kiss, the first date, the first fight, I remember it all. I would daydream for hours, in class, at work, anywhere about what our future would be. Those ideas were filled with no angst, no fights, no other people sharing in our bad because nothing could tear us down. We were strong and tight to fit, and what we had was intangible to others around us. Invincible.
When I laid my head down at night, closing my eyes and falling asleep never came slow because my life was better than anything my wildest dreams could come up with, because he was my world, I revolved around him. He revolved around me.
Reed was rough around all his edges, and the opposite of my preppy high school boyfriends in all ways. His tattoos, his life growing up, his career choice, all incredibly different. But it never mattered to me. I didn’t ever care when it came to him. He threw the rules out the window with each touch he shared, with each smile he gave me, with every longing glance he offered.
I loved him.
He loved me.
We loved each other. Without reason.
Then life got in our way, and that same love that had lifted me up stomped me to the ground. Later, when we were away, lost to each other, I thought we never would get back, never be one unit again. The twists and turns of our lives away changed us in a way I didn’t see coming, because we were both going ninety miles an hour in the opposite direction with no way to stop. But we did, or I did. I hit the wall dead-on with no brakes. Crumbled to the floor in the wreckage of truths being untold. Nothing left of any of the dreams of our future I’d pictured in my younger, naïve days, because I knew tragedy, I knew pain, I knew what missing really means.
But our love never died, it only grew.
Each day that came and went, Reed stood not in front of me or behind me, but right next to me while I picked up the pieces to make myself whole again. Some of those pieces I picked up were because of him, some were because of me. Some were because of outside influences. Yet he accepted me for all the things I hated the most. And I fell deeper.
Because he loved me, for me.
And I loved him. Again. Without thinking.
We both knew where things went terribly wrong, and we were determined to change how our fate played out. Only fate doesn’t work that way. You can’t mess with it, you can’t veer from its path without it coming back to show you who’s the boss.
Now, two years later, with my love for him still threaded in every part of my being, fate shows back up laughing, mocking us with each turn I take.
I stare into those hazel eyes—his—and see not a speck of living beam back at me. I know this is because of how things played out, how we wanted to change our plan in life. Only this time, I have something bigger, something to prove to fate—that we are right together.
And now my time has come to be here for Reed, to be his shoulder, to hold his hand, even with every push and shove he gives me. I will be there for every step he takes.
Because that’s what loving someone madly really means.
Fuck fate, Reed is mine.
I close my laptop, my phone under my ear on hold with
the distributor for yet another mess I have to fix. Hoots and hollers from the gym travel their way in here mixing with the words on the other end. I stand and glance out my office door to see a mix of Reed and Lance on the mat twisted in wrestling moves. I smirk. Lance will forever try to take my man down in the cage. Only problem, it’s never happened and never will. Reed will always be the beast over him.
When I left the rehab center, Reed held onto every promise he gave me. We dated like the normal couple I always wanted: movies, coffee, and bowling. We did it all. He even entertained my urge to have more time outdoors getting dirty and bought me my own four-wheeler for Christmas. The old Reed would have been annoyed, that I wanted it slow. I mean, we moved like a snail going uphill and to the point it was painful for us. But he wasn’t annoyed, he wasn’t pushy. Reed took my hand, and went as slow as I needed. He tries to save face when I brag to our friends about how patient he was with me, by telling them that he was only nice and sweet to get back in my pants, but that’s a lie.
Reed did it for me, because it’s what was best for me.
Three months ended up being enough. The kisses at my door weren’t coming close to satisfying the urge in me, and it turned out one flip of a towel was all it took to welcome him back into my bed. That night was as close to perfect as it could be. We spent it wrapped in each other’s arms, exploring the new us, the new heights of us. I thought by the time the sun rose the next day, my stuff would be in boxes and movers would be halfway done moving me back into his house.
Nope. He still waited. Put off until I was ready. Until the constricted hold I had on the rules I’d placed diminished. Even if it caused him a crazy set of blue balls most days.
One morning about a month after our night in bed, I was rushing around his place to get ready for work and realized I was putting off the inevitable when I forgot my work shoes. We made the choice to move into his house. Together. No pressure over our heads, not one fight over it, only communicating what was right for us. Pie charts and list with pros and cons might have been made. But the important thing is we did it side by side.
Fighting to Stay (Fighting Madly Book 2) Page 14