Awake (Reflections Book 3)

by A. L. Woods

  I could have, though, couldn’t I? I could have slowed down if I knew we were on the same trajectory, if she could eventually want me that way, too. I would have—

  Damn it, Raquel was doing it again.

  I bit down hard on my bottom lip, shaking my head. My hands moved from my ears to drive the heels of my palms into my eyes, trying to expunge the fantasies I’d created from my mind. “Get out, Raquel.”

  “Our relationship was moving at the speed of a bullet train. Two hundred miles per hour, so fast that I couldn’t discern what was happening around us. One minute, you were just a guy in a suit jacket that I couldn’t stand but couldn’t disregard the magnitude of the connection that filtered between us, and the next—”

  “Get out.”

  She was hell-bent on destroying what remained of the shell of me. My legs trembled. I staggered away from her, dropping my ass onto the bed, my head bowing. I planted my elbows on either knee, hooking my fingers on the back of my neck, taking deep, long, and meditative breaths.

  She just wouldn’t stop talking, and I couldn’t stop listening.

  “You knew things about me before I was ready, and I was ashamed of that, Sean. I never stopped to consider what it meant that you were privy to that information and yet still pursued me.”

  The details I uncovered about her hadn’t made any difference to me. Somehow, it made me love her more.

  My throat burned. “None of that shit mattered to me. I loved you regardless.”

  “I know that now,” she gently replied. I heard her soft footsteps on the floorboards. “You’ve never judged me, but I judged myself.”

  I heard her suck in a tight-sounding breath before she continued.

  “I didn’t think I was worthy of you, and maybe I’m still not. But I’m sorry I left, I’m sorry I ended things, I’m sorry I spent so much time pushing you away.”

  She couldn’t stay away. I spotted her unpolished, bare toes in my line of vision. My eyes unwillingly dragged up her creamy bare legs, catching on the hemline of the black skater dress she had worn that cut off at her mid-thigh, the bodice dipping in the front, cupping the small swells of her breasts. She draped a dark blue denim jacket over her shoulders. Her light makeup and the way her hair curled inward at the ends enhanced her natural beauty.

  I fucking hated her in that moment.

  “I don’t want to run away anymore, Sean. Not from you, not from us. You are the most important person to me. I’m just sorry it took me so long to see it.”

  And yet, I loved her, too.

  Bracing my knees, my palms trying to quell the shake in them, I met her eyes. Regret flanking me, I despised myself for asking the question. “I’m the most important person?”

  “You are,” Raquel said, lowering herself to her knees, sandwiching herself between my parted legs. Her hands found mine, her eyes locking with my own. “You are the most important person to me. You will always be the most important person to me. I realize now that you scare me because you are larger than life itself, Sean. You scare me because you gave me a reason to live when I thought there was none. I wanted nothing before, I didn’t want to need anyone, until I met you.”

  The burden of her words saddled my brain and heart. It drove my need to cut her down and decimate her like chemo.

  But the way she was looking at me with her proffered beating heart in the cup of her small hands, mine to take and destroy, I found myself caught between wanting to emulate exactly what she had done to me, or…

  Scoop her frightened, fragile heart into my palm and cradle it against mine as if it was the only thing I’d ever wanted from her. It was indisputable, really—that I was a pathetic bastard who fell in love with the wrong woman. The one who would never make it easy for me, but hadn’t I said it myself all those months ago?

  That if she was inconvenient, then I didn’t want simple.

  The words rang loud in my head, penetrating some small sliver of myself that was naïve and hopelessly in love with her, unlocking everything that I had tried to contain in an overflowing box and stowed away in some part of my reverie that I hadn’t wanted to remember. But I remembered, I remembered all of it. The box unloaded now, every promise, every whispered word, every kiss, and every touch dancing wildly in my mind.

  I felt it everywhere. The part of me that remained tethered to her, a small red thread that affixed to our pinkies, knotted in a bow that would never be severed.

  She was mine, and I was hers.

  Now and always.

  My breaths raked through me, rushing out past my lips. My pulse was deafening to my ears. I ripped my hands free from hers, shoving my fingers in her hair and drawing her close by the back of her head.

  Bringing her nose to mine, I lowered my lips to just inches from hers, hovering there in wait. “Prove it.”

  Her kiss was like a homemade bomb, an explosion that leveled the house down to its foundation once again, leaving no survivors in its wake. The depth of her remorse burned in the intensity in her kiss, and all I could think was how I needed her so much closer.

  As though hearing my wanton thoughts, her hands snaked up my thighs, fingers working at my belt. She popped the button of my dark jeans and undid the fly with a deftness that made me hum with approval. I lifted my ass so she could drag my pants and boxer briefs down and off my feet.

  Raquel kept her mouth fastened to mine, catching my hard cock in her palm when it sprung free. She ran her palm along my shaft, her mouth swallowing my groan, one of my hands fisting her hair, the other pulling her to her feet.

  I pulled her onto my lap, pushing her dress up until it bunched at her waist. I slid one hand up her thigh, my fingers curling around the waistband of her thong. I broke the kiss to observe the gasp that ripped free from her bee-stung lips when I wrenched the flimsy material away from her waist, tossing it to the floor.

  “Prove it,” I repeated. I brushed the tip of my nose against hers before speaking lowly, “Let me see how important I am to you.”

  She shrugged out of the denim jacket, tossing it to the floor to meet her torn underwear. Her dress followed next. She had foregone a bra, her exposed breasts a feast for my eyes.

  There, nestled between her pert breasts, was the engagement ring I had given her. Unexpected tears burned the back of my lids, my stare searching hers. Her smile was soft, brown eyes knowing. It spurred me, my heart kicking in my chest.

  I loved her.

  I would always love her.

  Damn her to hell.

  The air from the air conditioning unit hummed to life, the brush of cold air sending the hairs that lined my arms upright. Her dusty rose nipples puckered, waiting for my needy mouth. I bent my head, catching one hard pebble between my teeth, lapping at it.

  Her moan unearthed something inside of me I thought I’d buried, the fingers of her left hand buried in my hair. She slid her right hand between our bodies, giving my cock a priming before she guided my throbbing tip into her pussy.

  We both sucked back a breath, our eyes locked on each other as she lowered herself further and further until I filled her to the hilt. “Show me,” I whispered, tugging on her lower lip with the pad of my thumb. “I want to feel how important I am to you.”

  Raquel began to roll her hips, her pelvis grinding against mine. She captivated me with each tantalizing rock of her lower body, my eyes fixed on watching my cock disappear in and out of her like it was a fucking work of art.

  There was no disputing that this felt good, but there was also no denying that she scared the shit out of me, too. I just always pursued the fear, because she was all-consuming, the hit of a dopamine I never wanted to give up on.

  She gripped my bearded chin in her little palm, locking my eyes on hers. “Look at me,” she whispered. I had said those three very words to her countless times before, and she could never indulge me.

  Now I understood why.

  Looking at the person who destroyed you and loved you with such a ferocity was a borderline rel
igious experience. I felt the fractured parts of me engage in combat with one another as I lost myself in her cinnamon orbs that speckled with flicks of gold the color of honey and reminiscent of fall days past.

  Staring into her eyes rife with unadulterated love threw me into an alternate universe, a place where none of our fears existed, where we could just be as we were.

  Recklessly and catastrophically in love.

  Maybe fate doomed us from the start, but there was no denying that this thing between us, painful and all-consuming, was real.

  And it was ours.

  I couldn’t give up on her, even if I wanted to. Raquel broke eye contact with me, her head tilting back just as a few more tears escaped her. The gesture exposed the column of her throat to me and I took the opportunity to mark her with love bites I knew would leave bruises.

  But that was fine.

  She wasn’t leaving this house until she was mine.

  Forever.

  “Tell me the truth,” I grunted, meeting the next figure-eight motion of her hips. She gasped, absorbing the force. “Did you mean what you said? Do you love me?”

  Her fingernails scratched at the length of my spine, her mouth popping open to release another moan. “Yes.”

  “Say it.” Spurred by her confession, I slid us forward, supporting us both as I stood up. I carried her to the wall by the bedroom door, flattening her spine against it roughly. She wrapped her legs around my waist, her body rising with every punishing pump of my hips, but I just slammed her back down.

  “Let me hear you say it,” I groaned in her ear. “I need to hear you say it.”

  “I love you.”

  “Louder, baby.” I slid a palm between us, my thumb swirling across the bundle of nerves that made up her clit. The contact had her convulsing against me, her inner walls already contracting with a warning on my cock.

  “I love you.”

  “Mmm,” I hummed into her ear, the heels of her feet digging harder against me.

  “Do you love me, too?” she asked, searching my face, her eyes glazed over as the orgasm ebbed over her like an incoming wave that was coming to claim her.

  Did I love her? I loved her like I loved the first day of fall, like I loved black coffee and bad porn. I loved that she reminded me of my first day of culinary school, a day that had filled me with so much hope and wonderment. I loved that she gave me the same fluttery feeling every time I saw her, no matter how angry I was at her. I loved that even though she had broken me; she had come back to glue all the pieces together.

  I loved that that there was a promise that existed in her eyes that she would never leave me again.

  That this was real.

  I loved the things she hated about herself, like her fear; and I respected that being vulnerable was difficult for her.

  I loved that despite everything that had happened to her, she was brave, a survivor.

  My fighter.

  I would fight for her until my very last breath. And if there was an afterlife, I would find her there, too.

  “Always,” I whispered. “I will always love you.”

  Her pussy clamped down on me, the cry of her release a memory that the house swallowed whole. Her orgasm spurred my own, her core constricting around me, milking my cock. My climax chased after hers in endless shocks that had me all but convulsing. Hot spurts that nearly robbed me of my vision enervated me. We both collapsed to the floor in an entanglement of limbs and bodily fluids. Sweat left her hair sticking to my chest, her body like clingwrap to my own.

  Our breaths filled the silence of the room when the air conditioner dulled to a temporary quietude. Her heart thumped against my rib cage and her body slid upward, her eyes finding mine.

  “Sean,” she croaked, like her throat was dry. I rolled her onto her back and moved to lie atop her, forearms flat on either side of her head. I searched her eyes, loving the satiation in them.

  “The next words out of your mouth better be ‘I love you,’” I said, kissing the corners of her mouth, “Or ‘I can’t stand another minute without you.’” I pressed a kiss above her cupid’s bow, then hovered about to study those endless amber pools. I reached for the necklace, the backs of my icy fingers against her chest making her shiver. “Or ‘yes’ when I ask you to marry me.”

  A stiff breath escaped her before her shy voice cut through, her body trembling against mine. “You can’t propose to me like that.”

  “Watch me, Hemingway.” I kissed her pillowy lips, her mouth chasing mine when I moved away. Her hair spilled away from her face, forming a halo on the floor. “Watch me defy all your fears. I’m going to crawl back inside your heart.”

  “You were always inside my heart.” She looked up at me, sincerity a glass reflection there. “You never left.”

  The feeling was mutual. She was a stick-and-poke tattoo inked across my entire body. An indelible mark, inexpugnable from my mind.

  The reason for every breath that I took.

  “So, what’s it going to be?” I murmured, brushing my lips against hers. “Do you want to be crazy with me? Do you want to be all mine? Or am I still moving too fast?”

  “I am all yours,” she whispered. I relished the softness of her lips when she spoke against my mouth. “I’ve always been yours… I don’t care about too fast anymore.”

  “Then marry me. Say yes,” I said, searching her eyes. My fingers brushed against the ring again. “No more excuses, no more games, no more fighting this. We’ll drive at our own speed, so say yes to me, Raquel.”

  It was insane. Certifiable, really. Something that should have earned us a lifetime in a padded room.

  And yet, I knew she couldn’t find any other reason to deny me, no—deny us—from what we wanted. It’s always been her and me.

  Raquel’s arms circled around my neck. She brushed her reverent lips against me, and then whispered the single word that would change everything, forever. “Yes.”

  My fingers slid into her hair, curving around the back of her skull, bringing her closer. “What did you say?”

  “Yes.”

  “Yes, what?”

  She smiled at me purposefully. “Yes, I’ll marry you.”

  Our kiss was a homecoming, like an oxygen mask fitted against my mouth, pushing air and life back into me for the first time. It was an awakening from a long winter of hibernation. Warmth suffused me as her hands clawed at my waist. My mouth opened to hers, my tongue accepting the invitation. Raquel kissed me like she was injecting all the things she had wanted to say to me for months, and the force was intoxicating.

  “I love you, you stubborn woman,” I said breathlessly against her mouth. “And I want you to know that wherever you go, I’ll follow you.”

  I felt her amusement brimming to life as she smiled while I still attempted to kiss her. “You can’t do that. You’re opening a restaurant, remember?”

  “Then I’ll just have to stalk you across the country and drag you back here.” I kissed her cheeks, rubbing the scruff on my cheeks against her velvety skin while she squealed. “Kicking and screaming.”

  She shook her head, and our laughter filled the room. My arms wrapped around her shoulders, pulling us up into a seated position. Raquel straddled my lap, legs twined around my waist, her head tucked under my chin.

  “How unrealistic would it be if we…” she dragged her teeth across her bottom lip, the corners of her eyes crinkling with contemplation.

  “How unrealistic would what be?” My fingers ran up along her spine.

  She traced small circles on my thigh as she cleared her throat. “I want to live here, in this house, with you. I don’t know what that would cost or if that’s crazy, but…”

  “Here?” I asked, touching her chin with my fingertips. “Why?”

  Her smile was shy. “This house is symbolic. It represents us. Life broke us. We were fractured on the outside, but desperate to be repaired on the inside. No one wanted us, but with the right hands, with patience and the love and
care, we put ourselves back together.”

  “I thought you hated this house,” I said on a swallow, trying not to smile at her. If that was really what she wanted, I would need to put pants on and go remove the open house sign on the front lawn and around the neighborhood before people started pouring in here again…and then lock the front door. I had every intention of making up for lost time with my fiancée in every position possible until I was shooting blanks. “It was a dump back then.”

  “It was a dumpster fire, really,” she laughed, brushing her nose against mine. “But you breathed life back into it, just like you did me. This is where we belong, this is where I want to be. Here, with you.”

  I lowered my mouth to hers, kissing her like it was an unbreakable vow, a promise I would keep for the rest of my days.

  Wherever she was, that was where I wanted to be.

  That was home.

  EPILOGUE

  A year later…

  “Kell?” Penelope’s knock was gentle against the powder room door. “Did the sushi upset your stomach?”

  My stomach chose that exact moment to retch, bile working up my throat like acid. It wasn’t the sushi, though I wished it was. This was worse, much worse.

  My right hand shook, my grip tight on the pregnancy test. I felt blindly for the box I discarded at my feet, my fingers finally snagging on it. My gaze fixed on the legend on the box, then shifted my gaze back to the stick. My insides heaved.

  No, no, no. Fuck.

  That couldn’t be right.

  “Kell?”

  How could this happen?

  The knob on the locked bathroom door jostled. “Raquel, open the door, you’re freaking me out.” My eyes distended at the impending threat Penelope posed if she walked in here.

  “I’ll be out in a second; hang on,” I called back in a rush, reaching for toilet paper. The roll spun on the handle, eight sheets coming free when I wrenched my wrist. I set the tissue paper down, laying the test on top, staring at it as if it held the answers to life’s greatest mysteries.