by Nia Arthurs
“Isn’t it beautiful, Morgan? No matter what, we can never tame that. We can never control nature. We just have to accept it.”
I shake my head to dull the memories. “My turn.”
“This isn’t a back and forth—”
“Did Miles ever hurt you?”
Her body stiffens. “Excuse me?”
“Physically? Emotionally?”
“Morgan!”
“You mentioned something about ‘earning’ his love.”
“So?”
“So, what’s that about?”
She tosses her curls over her shoulder. “Why is that any of your business?”
“You asked about Grace. Now all of a sudden Miles is off-limits?”
Her eyes narrow and she grinds out her answer, “I don’t know what gave you that impression, but Miles didn’t mistreat me. He just…” She sucks in a deep breath. “He just required a little more work is all.”
“Did he cheat on you?”
“It’s my turn.” Kaz taps her fingers on the dashboard as a stormy look crosses her face. “Why haven’t you changed your furniture yet?”
“Why’d you get scared when you saw Miles’s doppelgänger tonight?”
Kaz scowls. “Did you see Grace before she died?”
Something heavy crashes into my chest. I avert my eyes, focusing hard on the road.
“You didn’t, did you?” Kaz gasps. “Morgan…”
I run a hand over my hair.
Wind the window down so I can breathe.
A hot breeze filters through the cab, but it does nothing to tame the pain that’s been unleashed inside me.
“You don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to,” Kaz says softly.
“It’s my biggest regret.” I glance over at her, feeling the need to unveil my heart to Kaz even if it hurts. “I’m not proud of the way I acted.”
“Did you break up?”
I nod, remembering the day she packed all her stuff.
“You need to let me go, Morgan,” Grace said, sitting on the edge of my bed and staring at me with eyes that had sunken in. A small bandana covered her head and her body had become thin and brittle. She looked nothing like the woman I’d met three years ago, but she was still the woman I wanted as my wife.
“Never.”
“I’m not getting better.”
“We just haven’t found the right treatment yet.” I sank to my knees in front of her. “Baby, don’t give up.”
“I have to accept the things I can’t change, Morgan.”
“No. We’ll go see another doctor. And if he doesn’t tell us what we want to hear, we’ll see another one.”
“I can’t let you do that.”
“Grace…”
“I’m sorry, Morgan.” She grabbed her suitcase and got off the bed. Walking over to me, she caressed my cheek softly. There were tears in her eyes. I could hardly see her because of my own. “I love you.”
“Grace, don’t leave. Let’s fight this together.” As I called for her, she strode past me. “Grace! Grace!”
Something shiny caught my attention.
She’d left her engagement ring on the desk.
Silence falls as I try to get a handle on my emotions. Everything that I was feeling in that moment piles on top of me now.
Kaz shifts uneasily and then blurts, “I don’t know who I am without Miles.” She turns and faces me. “That’s why I was scared.”
I blink in surprise.
Kaz gives me a pained, lopsided smile. “I haven’t told anyone that before, but I figured since we were exchanging secrets…”
“Why?”
“Why haven’t I told anyone?”
“Why did you get so lost in him?”
“I figured I’d never do any better so I got used to chasing him around and waiting for him to love me back.” Kaz rubs her hands and softly admits, “He’s been my only constant since I was a child. I don’t know any other life than the one I had back on my earth. At least I didn’t.” She glances up. “Until I came here.”
I gently take one of her hands. “You survived without him.”
“I did.” She blows out a breath. “I got a job. I paid my rent. I went to school.”
“You even aced your accounting exams,” I tease.
She gives me an astonished look.
I stroke my thumb over the back of her knuckles. “I listen.”
“Coming here showed me a strength inside that I never knew I was capable of. And… I really don’t want to lose that.”
“You don’t have to.”
“What if I go back and he hates this new version?”
I park in front of her apartment and turn to her. “Then you know what you have to do.”
“What if I don’t have the courage to let him go?”
“You will.”
She scrunches her nose. “You’re confident.”
“Because I know you.” I bring her knuckles to my lips and kiss it. “And I know you won’t back down when it’s time to be strong. Just like you don’t back down with me.”
“You’re different.” She interlocks our fingers and pulls my hand to her face, rubbing my knuckles against her cheek. “You’re Morgan.”
“And you’re still drunk.” I smirk.
“Am not.”
I pull my hand back. “Go inside before I do something I’ll regret.”
“Like what?” She looks up hopefully.
I nod to the door.
She gives me a droopy smile. “Goodnight, Morgan.”
“Night, Kaz.”
My phone buzzes as she opens the door. I glance down to check the message when I hear a loud thud.
My head whips up and I scramble out of the car to find Kaz on the concrete, hissing in pain and looking up at me with her big brown eyes pooling in tears.
22
Kaz
I fall to the ground like an idiot who can’t even walk a straight line.
Maybe I’m still a little tipsy, but I thought I’d sobered up enough to get to my apartment without making an utter fool of myself.
The car door slams and Morgan dashes around the hood, dropping to his knees beside me. “Are you okay, Kaz?”
I’m not. I’m not okay in the least.
I feel like I'm about to explode from confusion, need, guilt and all kinds of other emotions that I can’t name right now.
Morgan helps me to sit up and pulls my left arm so he can see it in the light thrown by the lamppost. I hiss in pain, protesting the movement even if I am relieved to have him here.
“You’re bleeding, Kaz,” he mumbles darkly.
“It’s okay.”
He looks closer at my arms. I’m pretty sure that Morgan isn’t a medical doctor, but the serious look on his face is cause for some alarm.
I twist my arms around so I can scan the underside of my elbows. Dust and tiny rocks are embedded in my skin.
His appraisal falls from my arms to my legs. Hesitantly, his fingers reach out to skim my legs. Then the meat of my knee. The top of my thighs.
My eyes close as I breathe in through my mouth and disguise my lingering desire with a hiss of pain.
Morgan reaches around me and wraps his arms across my waist. “Can you get up?”
“I think so.”
His brow knits with concentration as he hefts me to my feet. “Do you have a first aid kit?”
“I’m not sure. I’ve never needed one before.”
“I’ll go to the pharmacy then.”
“Wait. I think I saw something that might be a first aid kit.” I nod to the apartment building. “Inside.”
He helps me up the stairs, sweeping me onto his back for a piggy-back ride. I might be putting on a show just for an excuse to touch him, but I didn’t think I’d be this successful.
Wrapping my arms around his neck, I plaster my body to his and press my thighs hard against his sides. His grip on the undersides of my knees is gentle and, if not for the awareness skittering through me, I mig
ht have fallen asleep from the steady rocking of his body.
Morgan stops in front of my door. “The keys?”
I open my purse and hand them to him.
He lets himself into the apartment and that’s when true horror slaps me.
Clothes lay scattered over the already cramped floor space.
The table is buckling beneath the mounds of papers and makeup cases.
The counters are an absolute mess.
I look like a slob. Which is the opposite of true.
I cleaned all day, but when Morgan agreed to go clubbing with me, I went crazy and made an even bigger mess trying to figure out my outfit.
Morgan straightens. “Where did you say the first aid kit would be?”
Covering my face with my hands, I point in the direction of the bathroom.
He takes off, leaving me in the room alone.
I sprawl out on the bed, staring at the ceiling fan and resisting the urge to scream into a pillow. I’ve never been this shaken by a man before. My tunnel vision has always been pointed at one person. Miles.
But now Morgan is here.
In my head.
In my heart.
And I want him.
I want him on my bed.
Want him out of those clothes.
And not just the somber scientist. Not just the guy who’d break a sleazeball’s wrist for touching me inappropriately.
This guy.
The tall, green-eyed nerd hustling into the room and kneeling in front of me, first aid kit in hand and a wrinkle between his brow.
The guy who’s determined to send me back home.
The guy who’s in love with his dead ex.
And I have a fiancé.
Is cheating always this complicated? Would it really be considered cheating if Miles is over there engaged to someone he thinks is me? Technically, we’re not together…
I take a deep breath, trying to sort out the whirlwind of thoughts in my head. Figures that I’d somehow end up with Morgan in my apartment when I know I’m susceptible to him.
If I’m not careful, I’ll get exactly what I want.
And then where will that leave us?
Morgan kneels close. My room is the size of a shoe-box and there’s no space anywhere else for him to go.
That reasoning does little to quiet my skittering pulse or chase away visions of him prying my thighs apart and pulling down my skirt.
He takes out a bottle of alcohol, cotton balls and a bandage.
I don’t remember buying any of those.
Must have been Shanel’s.
I’m grateful for her thoughtfulness… until Morgan presses the alcohol to my skin.
“Ow, ow, ow,” I moan.
“Sorry,” he mutters. “I forgot to warn you that this might sting.”
“Sting? It burns like hell.”
“Here.” He blows over the wound.
Slowly, the sting recedes only to be replaced by an even hotter scourge that licks at my entire body. Morgan uses a dry cotton ball to sop up the alcohol around my knee and then applies the bandage.
“Done,” he says. Except he’s still there between my legs, looking up at me with darkening eyes.
“Thank you,” I breathe.
He gently clasps my wrist and brushes off the sand from my arms. “Didn’t I tell you not to get hurt?”
“You did.”
“Be more careful.”
His deep rumble awakens something dark inside me. “Morgan…” My fingertips trail along the inside of his wrist as he cleans me off. “I’m drunk.”
He pulls his hands back and drops them on my thighs. “I know.”
My heart thunders in my ears.
He’s still in front of me.
I’m sitting on the edge of my bed.
I just have to sweep the clothes to the ground and—
“You’re leaving,” he reminds me gently.
And going back to your fiancé.
It lingers in the air, the finality of it. We’re in a strange limbo. Too aware of our feelings to take a step back, but too afraid of what’ll happen if we step forward.
“What do you want me to say?” I whisper.
Morgan studies me, the intensity in his eyes stealing my breath. His gaze darts to the bed for a second before returning to mine. He’s not as calm as he looks. He’s thinking about how easy it would be to pin me to the bed too.
Or maybe I’m just imagining that.
“What would you say if you could?” he asks.
“If I could?”
He nods a yes. “If you could do something about the way you’re staring at me right now, what would you say?”
If I didn’t have to worry about Miles, my parents, or what breaking the engagement would do to them. If I didn’t have to worry about leaving this world behind and never seeing Morgan again. Wow. If I was living for me…
“I’d tell you that I want you,” I admit.
Our eyes connect and my mouth goes dry.
My body revs into overdrive.
It wants Morgan.
Every part of him.
Now.
“I don’t want you to regret,” he explains gently, his hands slipping between my thighs. Electric current courses through my body, settling everywhere he touches me. Morgan pushes himself up, closer to me. “You’re flirting with me when you’re drunk.” His caress moves to my hips. “Undressing me with your eyes…”
“Am I?”
“What am I supposed to do about this?”
In a fit of courage, I reach for the necklace around my neck and haul it over my head. Morgan leans back, surprise etched into his dark green eyes.
I toss the necklace and pull him by the shirt front. “Don’t think. Just for tonight… tell me what you’d do to me if you could.”
Desire hums through his voice. “It’s an exhaustive list.”
“That makes it even better.”
He presses both hands into the mattress and kisses me deeply. It’s hungry and raw and hot enough to flatten me to the bed.
I use one hand to grip the back of his neck and use the other to throw clothes off the mattress.
Morgan snatches my wrist and holds it captive over my head. "Focus on me.”
“But the—”
He bends down and whispers his first demand in my ear.
I gasp at how dirty it is.
How much I like it.
How much I want it.
Pulling back with a wicked grin, he threads his hand down my cheek, past my throat, to my blouse.
I slowly pull off my top. Morgan gives me a long, intense look filled with hunger.
Grabbing my hips, he tugs me to the edge of the bed. I can hardly catch my breath and, when he tears my clothes off, I know that I’m spiraling beyond the point of no-return.
But I don’t care.
It.
Feels.
So.
Good.
My freshly bandaged thighs urge Morgan on. He tastes me, savors me, drives me to the edge of my own sanity until it feels like my world is falling apart.
I dig my hands into his hair and curl my toes, gasping for breath.
For a few precious moments, it feels like the world stops.
And then, he sweeps all the clothes on my bed aside with one hand. Tossing me on the mattress, he covers me with his body for another heated kiss. I taste myself on his lips and it drives me even wilder.
Reaching out blindly I unbuckle his jeans as he tears off his shirt and tosses it to join the rest of my clothes on the floor. Morgan takes a moment to put on protection but quickly slides back over me.
He interlocks our fingers with one hand and reaches down with the other.
The pace changes.
He loses himself in me.
Harder.
Deeper.
Faster.
Dazed with pleasure, I can only grip on for dear life.
There’s no holding back anymore.
His lips
find my mouth again and he inhales my groans as I swallow his.
Together, we go up in flames.
23
Morgan
Kaz is still asleep after having fallen limp, exhausted in my arms early this morning. The sun is just peeking over the horizon and golden light crawls through the blinds of her small bedroom window.
I caress the sweet slope of her shoulders, tracing a line in her dark brown skin. As I spell out my name against her soft flesh, I recall the way she’d screamed the word last night.
She’s a wild little thing.
I smirk and drape my fingers down to her scarred elbow.
So exquisite.
Every little part of her.
Last night, I was desperate to possess her.
Instead I lost myself in her.
Lost the last bit of me that had any common sense.
It was somewhere between feeling Kaz’s skin against mine, her breath fanning my cheek, her gasps and little moans hitting my chest.
Maybe it was tasting her lips, or inhaling her scent, or pushing her to the edge until she broke free.
Somewhere between the primitive collision and the gentle, seductive strokes, she wrapped her slender fingers around my heart and left her mark. And now my insides feel like they’re crying for her, like they’ll come apart if I spend even one second away from her.
It’s pure emotion.
Pure need.
And it’s… terrifying.
I can’t stand on this ground. It’s too unsteady.
Too many variables that point to failure.
She pushed me straight into the eye of the hurricane and now I’m facing the battering winds on the other side, no rudder to hold me in place.
Kaz shifts just then, her black curls falling loose over her pillow, face wrinkled. Her plump lips that are still bruised from my kisses part in an adorable yawn.
When she opens her eyes and sees me, there’s hesitation in her expression.
Maybe just a hint of surprise too.
I resist the urge to frown.
Doubts swoop in, edging past the recklessness she ignited in my blood to plant dour reminders in my head.
Was last night a mistake?
Is it possible she’s starting to regret unleashing that passion?
The issues that plagued us and made us hesitate yesterday haven’t magically disappeared with the morning light. There are still so many unanswered questions. So many obstacles…