But also, and I wasn’t sure because I didn’t know from experience, but couldn’t those kind of thoughts be attributed to being in love? Lauren had said as much. As long as I remained in control of my behavior, as long as my affection was welcomed, then wasn’t it perfectly okay to think of Hudson, to choose him over anyone else? I thought maybe so. I hoped so.
I opened my mouth to speak, to tell David that there was no chance for us, but he seemed to understand without me having to say anything.
He sighed and nodded. Then he shrugged. “I just thought you should know.”
“Thank you,” I said, because I didn’t know what else to say. And because I was grateful that he’d taken my rejection so well.
He stood up and held his hand out to me. “Back to work.”
I took his hand and let him help me to my feet.
David held onto my hand after I stood. “But if you ever find yourself on the market again…”
Even without Hudson, David and I couldn’t be together. He’d been a safe option, someone who wouldn’t drive me to obsessive behaviors. But safety had come at the price of no sincere emotional investment. Maybe I risked more with Hudson, but there was also something real to be gained.
But I smiled and said, “I’ll keep you in mind. For sure.”
“Can we hug it out?”
I nodded and David pulled me into his arms. His embrace felt...good. Stronger than I’d remembered, but it didn’t make my heart beat faster. And it comforted me, but didn’t warm me to the bone the way Hudson’s arms did. Still, it was nice, and I let myself relax into its goodness.
David broke away first. Abruptly. Bringing his closed fist to his mouth, he coughed, his eyes darting from me to a spot behind me.
I furrowed my brow, confused by his strange actions then twisted to see what was behind me.
“Hey, Pierce,” David said as I came eye-to-eye with Hudson.
The blood drained from my face. The hug had been innocent, but I knew what it must have looked like. And it didn’t feel exactly innocent, not when David wanted more, and not when we’d sort of been together in the past. Especially since I’d never told Hudson about it.
Hudson’s expression was stoic, his eyes piercing into mine. He gave nothing away and that terrified me. Not only because I couldn’t read his reaction to what he’d witnessed, but because it meant he’d withdrawn further. With the way he’d left me, the circumstances of the last time we saw each other, he may have had the same blank expression if he hadn’t just walked in on me hugging my boss.
“I’ll, uh, let you guys have some privacy.” Out of the corner of my eye, I saw David leave the office, shutting the door behind him. My focus never left the man in front of me.
Alone with Hudson, the tension became thicker. He looked as painfully beautiful as ever in a dark gray suit and a solid blue tie that made his eyes seem more blue than gray. He didn’t speak, didn’t move. Just stared into me. Stared through me.
I swallowed hard, afraid I might cry. For more than a day I had longed to see him, had ached for him. Now that he was here, everything was all wrong.
“Hudson,” I began, not knowing what to say next. Then I remembered the article. “I read about Plexis.” I reached my hand out and took a step toward him. “I’m so sor—“
He cut me off. “What’s going on with you and him?” His tone was even, controlled, but his right eye twitched.
“Nothing,” I said on a heavy exhale. “David was, um,…” Yeah, where was I going with that? David was trying to get with me and I turned him down so we were hugging it out? “It was a friendly hug, that’s all.”
Hudson’s jaw tensed. “The expression on his face was much more than friendly.” He took a measured step toward me. “Have you fucked him?”
“No!”
His eyes narrowed, studying me. “But almost.”
“No.” Except that wasn’t quite true. We had come pretty close to screwing in the past. Right there in that office, in fact. It didn’t seem like a good time to bring that up, though. And all of that had been before Hudson.
“Why don’t I believe you?”
“Because you have some serious trust issues.” I felt a twinge of guilt knowing that his distrust might very well be because he sensed I was holding something back. Still, I didn’t appreciate being drilled. And Hudson did have trust issues. “What is your fucking deal, anyway?”
He stepped toward me again. “I told you before,” he growled. “I don’t share.”
A surge of euphoria pulsed through me. He still thought of me as his. I remembered when he’d said those words to me the first time, how it had turned me on to no end. The rawness of it, the primitive way he claimed me as his own.
Now, though, despite that it indicated I still had something to fight for with Hudson, the statement struck a nerve. “But I have to share you with Celia?”
“Goddammit, Alayna. How many times do I have to say it? There is nothing going on with me and Celia.”
I felt uneasy about insinuating otherwise. I’d accused past lovers of cheating on me—many times—but it had always been paranoia on my part, doubtful that anyone could ever really love me. My accusations had ended relationships, and my stomach lurched at that possibility with Hudson.
Yet, he had secrets where Celia was concerned. That wasn’t my mind playing tricks on me, he’d confirmed that much. He’d asked me to believe that those secrets weren’t relevant to us, but if he wanted my trust, he had to give me his. “And there’s nothing going on with me and David.”
“Really?” His tone was icy. “That’s not how it looked when I walked in here.”
My vision blurred with tears. “Just like that’s not how it looked when you left with Celia while I was still naked in your bed?”
Anger flashed in Hudson’s eyes. He grabbed my upper arms and yanked me toward him until my face was only inches from his. “Leaving you that morning was the hardest fucking thing I’ve done in a long time,” he hissed. “Don’t treat it lightly.”
Then his mouth crushed mine, before I could digest what he’d said, before I could let the sweetness of his words sink in. He nipped and tore at the tender skin of my lips with his teeth, his kiss abrasive and impatient.
My body begged to give into his demanding passion, his mouth and tongue coaxing me to bend to him, but my brain still held onto our disagreement and our whereabouts. Jesus, we were in the goddamn office of the nightclub!
I broke away from his lips. “Hudson, stop.”
But he didn’t stop. He continued kissing down my neck and his hand found my breast, which he squeezed and fondled roughly over the fabric of my dress. His cock pressed into me at my thigh, and I felt it stiffen.
“Stop!” I said again, pushing at his chest with both my hands.
“No,” he rumbled in my ear. “I have to fuck you. Now.”
“Why? Are you marking your territory?” I’d only been half serious with the comment, but he pulled back and the look in his eyes said that was exactly what he was doing.
I wriggled out of his grip, the nausea returning in painful waves. “You don’t own me, Hudson! Stop messing with me like I’m one of your other women. Not with me, remember?”
“Don’t you think I know that? Every minute of every day I remind myself that I can’t conquer you. That I can’t do that to you.” His jaw twitched. “But it doesn’t mean that I don’t want to.”
He might as well have struck me. Even though I’d told myself that it was possible that I was merely another on his list of women he’d played, I’d truly believed that I was different. The tears that had threatened earlier spilled freely. “So I am just like the others.”
“No. You’re not.” His voice tightened. “I told you before. I don’t want to hurt you more than I need to win you.”
Sobbing now, I choked out, “You’ve already done both.”
“Fuck!” His features were overcome with horror, as if I’d told him I’d killed his mother. Or maybe not h
is mother, but someone he was fond of.
He took a step backward, away from me. It was devastating, to be hurting so deeply, to see my pain echoed on his face through the torrents of my tears. I couldn’t stand to feel like that, like I was losing him. I needed his comfort and to comfort him the only way I was sure that he would let me—I lunged for him, seizing his lips with mine.
It took only seconds for him to give in to me, and then he was the way I liked him most, dominating and in command. And I took the reverse role and gave myself over to him.
“Alayna,” he growled. His hand found my breast again, and he kneaded the ache away as he devoured my mouth. He wrapped his other arm around me, drawing me to him so tightly I felt consumed from all sides. Even inside, the flames of lust licked intensely, my arousal immediately kindled by the welcome assault on my body.
“Hudson,” I cried against his lips, not caring this time that we were in the middle of a fight or that the office door might not be locked. “I need you, too.”
He’d known we’d needed this before when I’d pushed him away. He was such a perfect lover, understanding my body and its demands even better than I did. Submitting to him, everything became easy. I could forget for a moment what barriers lay in between us while he took me in the way where no barriers separated us at all.
Hudson moved my body backward until the couch bumped against the back of my calf, and a fleeting thought of, “Oh, yay; we’re going to christen the couch!” passed through my mind when he let go of me to reach under my short A-line dress and pull my panties down below my knees. He pushed me back on the couch, spread my legs open and gathered the material of my dress up around my stomach, completely exposing my most private parts for him.
I felt beautiful like that—lying in wait for my lover who I knew would give and take as he pleased.
He gazed down at me, desire clouding his eyes as he undid his belt and lowered his pants only far enough to release his bulging cock from its prison. As fast as he moved, it seemed forever before he lowered himself on top of me, urging my legs further apart with his knees. Then he shoved into me with such force I gasped.
He pounded into me with driving thrusts, focused on his own need, his own desire for orgasm. But even through the fog of his own lust, he attended to me, his thumb pressing expertly on my clit, massaging me toward my own climax.
The act may have been primarily physical, but a deeper connection resulted from the joining of our bodies. Each stroke eased the sting of his earlier words, and I was certain that the motivation behind each deep lunge was to chase away his own torment, to release himself from the guilt of wounding me.
He didn’t shower me with his usual sex words, but we were hardly quiet as I whimpered under him and he repeated my name over and over like a mantra, like a prayer. And then the sound turned guttural as he flexed into me, coming in me with such violent eruption that it spurred me to release with him on my own shaky cry, “Hudson!”
He collapsed onto me, his head buried in my neck where his warm breath against my skin felt soothing. I loved it there, buried beneath him, his cock still buried inside me, our precious bond so fragile it required this carnal connection. Hudson’s breathing becoming even, and his body became lax until his weight pressed into me with sweet agony.
Just as I began to wonder if he’d fallen asleep he whispered, “I wanted to win you. But I didn’t want to hurt you.” His arm tightened around me. “That’s the last thing I wanted.”
I understood him completely. After destroying so many people, after ruining my relationship with my only living relative, it was hell to imagine hurting even one more person. It had kept me from becoming close to anyone for so long. But now, I was ready to move past that fear so that I could earn the reward of intimacy.
I stroked Hudson’s hair. “That’s part of relationships, H. People get hurt.” I kissed his head. “But you can make it better, too.”
He lifted his head to meet my eyes. “Tell me how.”
Cupping his face in my hands, I rubbed my thumbs across his skin, rough from five o’clock shadow. “Let me in,” I pleaded.
“Don’t you see I already have?”
I closed my eyes, hoping to stop a fresh stream of tears. He had opened up, but only enough for me to slip the tip of my toes past the threshold of the door he kept so tightly closed. It was a big step for him. But it wasn’t really letting me in. Everything he shared with me I had to pry from his lips. He hadn’t given me his trust. It wasn’t enough to build upon and if that was as far as the door was opening, we had no hope for a future.
I swallowed hard and opened my eyes, letting one teardrop escape. Wiping it away, I rolled out from underneath him and pulled my panties up as I stood.
Hudson sighed. Then I heard the sound of his zipper and, to my ears, it was a metaphor—putting himself away, shutting himself off. Again.
But when he stood, he wrapped his arms around me from behind. His voice rasped in my ear. “Why do you act like I’m running?”
“Because you shut me out. Isn’t that the same as running?”
“What about you? What about how you showed up in our bedroom crying and couldn’t even tell me why?”
“That was different.” But maybe it wasn’t. I hadn’t told him what his mother said because it hurt too much. Because I was embarrassed.
He spun me around to look at him. “What did she say to you, Alayna?”
He’d thrown down the gauntlet. If I wanted him to be open, I’d have to be too. “That I was insignificant. She called me a whore.” I looked at a chip of paint on the wall, not able to meet his eyes.
He cursed under his breath. “My mother’s heartless and cruel.” Putting two fingers under my chin, he turned my face to him. “You’re not a whore, Alayna. Not even close. And the magnitude of your importance in my life can’t be put into words.”
“She also said that you can’t ever love me.”
He froze. Then his hand dropped from my face. “I’ve told you that before.”
The pain of his statement hit me hard in the gut. I pulled out of his arms. “Well, she told me again.” I swung back toward him. “So there, I opened up. Are you happy?”
“Alayna…”
I ached in the center of my being. This was why I hadn’t told him—because despite what he and Sophia had said, I’d believed that he could love. That he could love me.
Tears flooded my eyes and splashed down my face. “How could you not think I’d fall in love with you, Hudson? Even if you didn’t mean for it to happen, how could I not?” I wiped at my damp cheek with the back of my hand. “Does that mean anything to you at all?”
He drew back as if I’d slapped him. “How can you ask that? Of course, it does. But, Alayna, you don’t know that you’d still say that if you knew me.”
“I do know you.”
“Not everything.”
“Only because you haven’t let me in!” We were spinning in circles, getting nowhere.
He spread his arms out to the sides. “What is it you want to know? About what I did to other women? About Celia? I’m the reason she got pregnant, Alayna. Because I spent an entire summer making her fall in love with me when I felt nothing for her. For fun. For something to do. And then, when I’d completely broken her, she became destructive—sleeping around, partying, drugs. You name it, she did it. She didn’t even know who the father was.”
I heaved a breath, wiping the lingering tears from my face. “So you claimed it was yours.”
“Yes.”
“Because you felt responsible.”
“Yes. She lost the baby at three months. Likely from the drinking and drugs she’d consumed early on. She was devastated.”
“That’s awful.” I could sense he felt as responsible for the death of Celia’s unborn baby as for its conception in the first place. It was a lot of weight to carry, a lot of blame.
But even though I could concede Hudson had a role in the situation, it didn’t scare me away. “It
’s awful,” I repeated, “but I don’t understand. You thought this would make me not love you…why?”
He perched on the arm of the sofa and pierced me with an incredulous stare. “Because it changes everything. I did that. That’s who I am. It’s my past and it’s very ugly.”
A sob threatened, but I choked it back with a hard swallow. The ugly things—there were so many ugly things about myself that always lay beneath the surface of every conversation, every moment. They poisoned and destroyed. I was well versed in the ugly.
It broke my heart that the same darkness haunted Hudson. That he believed his history to be so horrible that it could change things between us. It couldn’t. It didn’t.
I moved in front of him and rested my hands on his shoulders. “Do you think your ugly is any different than mine?”
“This isn’t like following someone around or calling too many times, Alayna.”
“It was an unforeseen tragedy, Hudson. A game that got out of hand. You didn’t set out for Celia to get pregnant and have a miscarriage. And you can’t diminish the things I’ve done to a simple statement like that either. I hurt people. Deeply. But that was before. Less than ideal pasts, remember? It doesn’t mean it defines our future. Or even our now.”
He blew out a warm breath as his thumb brushed at a lingering tear in the corner of my eye. “When I’m with you, I almost believe that.”
“That just means you need to spend more time with me.”
He chuckled softly. “Is that what that means?” He trailed his thumb down my face to caress my cheek. “Yesterday morning, when I got the phone call that required me to be in Cincinatti—I couldn’t even let myself look at you, sleeping in that bed. If I did, I wouldn’t have been able to leave.”
My chest swelled with his confession. “I thought you left because you were freaking out.” His puzzled look drove me to clarify. “Because of the love stuff.”
“I wasn’t freaking out. I was surprised, that’s all.”
“Surprised?”
“That that’s what we were feeling.” His gaze was soft. “That it was love.”
The Fixed Trilogy Page 25