21. Remi

"Human sweat contains pheromones responsible for attraction and has been used for centuries in perfumes and love potions." ~ Tim Rhodes

My palms weredamp as I climbed the steps of Taylor's front porch. Once the wedding was over, I'd dropped Kenna off and taken my mom home. She'd been tired and gone straight to bed. I finished packing and told myself to take a shower and just go to bed. Taylor clearly didn't want anything to do with me. She'd made that more than clear at the wedding and the reception.

But instead of heeding my internal instructions, grabbing my toiletries, and heading to the bathroom, I'd grabbed the keys to my mom's truck instead. Five minutes later, I was pulling up in front of Taylor's house. At the reception, Kenna mentioned that Harper was spending the night at her best friend Lilah's house because Taylor had her first shift early the next morning at six.

I glanced at my watch and saw that it was after midnight. Valley Memorial was in Parrish Creek, about a thirty-minute drive. It was irresponsible for me to be here. Taylor needed her sleep. Her job was literally life and death.

Technically, I shouldn't even know where she lived. It's not like Taylor had given me that information. Ruby had been the one to point out the house the other day as we passed by it when I took Ruby to run some errands for the wedding.

Turn around and leave, my inner voice told me.

That was the right thing to do. For whatever reason, Taylor clearly didn't want to continue to explore what we had. She'd told her cousin to ask me to go as her date to the wedding.

Apparently, I didn't give a shit about what the right thing to do was because I lifted my hand and my fist made contact with the wood. The knock wasn't exactly light, but it also wasn't open-up-this-is-the-police strength. It was somewhere in between. If Taylor was asleep, she wouldn't hear it. If she was awake, she probably would.

With each second that passed, my heart thumped louder in my chest. I didn't know exactly what my plan was other than to not leave without having an actual conversation.

The door opened, and without saying anything, Taylor grabbed my wrist and pulled me inside, just like I had when I'd seen her standing in the hallway at Kane and Ruby's. I wasn't sure what I'd expected, but this was better.

She slammed the door and tugged her robe tighter. "What are you doing here?" she asked as she lifted her toes and peered through the peephole. "Anyone could have seen you."

Okay, so maybe her enthusiasm had nothing to do with her seeing me and everything to do with no one else seeing me. I'd definitely read that wrong.

"Why did you tell Kenna to ask me to go to the wedding with her?" When I heard the question leave my mouth, it surprised me. I hadn't considered addressing it, but it had been bothering me since the moment Kenna said that her asking me was Taylor's idea.

Slowly, she turned and blinked at me as if she were just as confused by my inquiry as I was. Instead of answering me, she turned the tables with a question of her own. "Why haven't you told anyone that Misty cheated on you and is pregnant?"

"Why do you care?" I countered.

"Why do you care that I suggested Kenna ask you to the wedding?"

I inhaled slowly through my nose, and tried to tamper down the irritation that was beginning to bubble just below the surface. I was an easygoing, laid-back guy. I didn't get frustrated, or irritated, or flustered. She challenged me at every turn. Not only that, I'd never had sex in public, or even where anyone could hear me. But Taylor, she brought out sides of me I never even knew existed.

That should be reason enough to take her cue and stay away from her, yet somehow, I felt myself even more drawn to her.

"I asked you first," I replied, fully aware that my argument was the playground equivalent of I'm-rubber-and-you're-glue, but apparently Taylor brought out my inner child.

She closed her eyes, and it was her turn to take an audible breath. When she opened her lids, she exhaled as she explained, "I told her to ask you because nothing can happen between us, nothing real anyway, and I don't trust myself around you."

I stared into her eyes as her words sank in. "We're definitely going to circle back to why you don't trust yourself around me, but first, I want to know why nothing real can happen between us."

"Because Kenna was your third strike."

"So…wait, are you saying Kenna asking me to go to the wedding was a test, and I failed?" I couldn't believe that Taylor would play games like that. Thinking that she had made me wonder if I actually knew her at all.

"What? No." Her face scrunched in confusion, as if that hadn't even crossed her mind. "That would be…stupid. No, the fact that you and Kenna were together was the third strike."

"We weren't…it was high school. We never even hooked up. I took her to homecoming because I knew Milo and Mason, and she didn't have anyone to go with. After that, we hung out a few times, but it was never anything serious. I think all of it was more for Sam's benefit than mine."

Taylor's nose crinkled. "They're in love with each other, right?"

"Yes, I think so, but I don't want to talk about them. What are my other strikes?"

"You are Kane's best friend and Ruby's brother."

"Exactly, and we were just in their wedding, so I don't think that should count against me as a strike."

She pressed ahead. "You just got out of an eight-year relationship that ended moments after we met. I mean, that is a textbook rebound. I don't do rebounds."

I was silent, not sure how to rebut that. Technically, she was right, but this wasn't a rebound. I just didn't know how to make her understand that.

"You're turn." She crossed her arms in a defensive stance. The movement caused her robe to part slightly, revealing a hint of cleavage. Every cell in my body took notice, but I did my best to ignore it. "Why do you care that I suggested to Kenna that she ask you to go with her to the wedding?"

Taylor was one of the smartest, if not the smartest, people, I'd ever met. Surely, she knew what I felt about her. She had to. It was painfully obvious, with an emphasis on pain. "Do you seriously not know the answer to that?"

"I don't ask questions I already know the answer to," she stated flatly.

"I care because I've never met anyone like you, and I know there is something real between us. I care because this time last week, I was buried deep inside of you before I even knew your name. I care because a few days ago, I made you come so hard that you saw stars in a public place. It was reckless. I'm not reckless. You make me reckless. You make me crazy in the best way. And I can't stop thinking about you."

It wasn't the most eloquent thing I'd ever said, but it was honest. It was real.

Her expression didn't change. I tried but could not puzzle out what was going on behind her gorgeous emerald eyes. "Why haven't you told anyone the truth about the breakup?"

I had no idea what she was talking about. "Everyone knows we broke up."

This town was small, and word got around fast. At least a hundred people had mentioned it to me at the wedding tonight, asking if I was okay, telling me that we could work things out, or trying to set me up with people. Which was really annoying considering the one person I wanted to be with wouldn't give me the time of day.

"They know you broke up, but no one knows that Misty is pregnant or that she cheated on you."

I had no idea why we were even talking about this. It had nothing to do with us. All I'd been able to think about since I met the woman standing in front of me was her. She had consumed my entire waking and sleeping life. But if that's what she wanted to know, I'd answer her.

"I'm not really sure. I don't…" I took a breath and considered the question. Why hadn't I told anyone that she was pregnant and had cheated on me? I exhaled as I gathered my thoughts. My head shook back and forth as I explained, "No one here really knows Misty. She's a good person. Her actions don't change that. But if people knew, they would judge her on them without any context. She doesn't deserve to be judged. I was…gone. A lot. I thought I loved her. I really did, but now…" I stopped myself from saying, "Now that I met you and know what real love feels like, I know the love I felt for her wasn't enough."

Taylor didn't have many tells. Her expression was typically indecipherable, but her breath told me everything I needed to know. Her chest rose and fell in short pants. She felt what I was feeling; she was just better at masking it.

"But now what?" She prompted me to finish what I was saying.

"But now, I know it wasn't enough. Misty deserved better. She deserved more."

Her mossy stare swam with confusion. "I don't understand how you can be so…calm about everything."

"Calm? I'm not calm." I grabbed her hand and placed it on my chest, pressing her palm flat against my pounding, racing heartbeat. "Do you feel that?"

Her head nodded as her lips parted and her eyes widened.

"This isn't because of a broken engagement. Since the moment I saw you sitting in that bar, I have come alive. I have felt more this past week than I have since…" I swallowed hard over the words clogging my throat as I began to realize the magnitude of what I was about to confess. "I haven't felt, not like this, not alive, not whole, since before my dad died."

Her eyes closed, and for a moment, I thought that what I'd shared might have been too much for her, that things had gotten too real.

"That's not fair," she breathed out.

"What's not fair?"

Her eyes opened, and in them, I saw a softness, an openness, and a vulnerability that hadn't been there since the night in the hotel. "How am I supposed to resist you when you say things like that?"

I couldn't help but grin as my fingers gripped hers, still flat against my chest. "I think the point is, you're not."

She lifted up on her tiptoes, her arms wrapped around my neck, as she kissed me with a passion and force that nearly knocked me off my feet. The momentum carried me back several feet, until my back slammed against the wall in the kitchen.

Once I got my footing beneath me, I gripped her ass and lifted her up off the ground. I spun around, so she was the one with her back against the wall. Her legs wrapped around me, and my waist and my hips pinned her in place.

With a flick of my finger, I untied her cloth belt, and her robe fell open, freeing her beautiful breasts, revealing she didn't have a shirt beneath it.

"Are you naked?" I asked.

"I have on underwear."

A moan rumbled through me as I lifted my hands and squeezed her full mounds, before lowering my head and ravishing her perfect, perky nipples. I sucked them both into my mouth, hungrily devouring first her right then her left nipple. My teeth sank into the tight buds as the tip of my tongue flicked across their flat surfaces.

"Yes," she encouraged repeatedly as her hips rolled into me, causing her sex to rub against my rock-hard length trapped behind its zippered cage.

As I continued lavishing her with open-mouth kisses and love bites, tension coursed through her body. I could feel her body getting close to release. The last time I'd made a girl come by dry humping was my first year in the Army, and I had no plans on going down memory lane tonight. When Taylor came, I was going to be tasting her, feeling her, touching her.

My hands gripped her hips, and I walked two steps and set her on the kitchen table. I dropped to my knees as her cotton robe slid down her arms pooled around her on the wooden tabletop. She hooked her thumbs in the strings of her white lace panties and started to shimmy them down, but I stopped her.

"Leave them on," I commanded gruffly.

Taylor's emerald stare was glossed over with arousal as she stared down at me and removed her hands from her waist. Her arms fell beside her. Our gazes remained locked as my fingers trailed up her inner thighs, pushing her legs farther apart. When my touch reached the apex of her legs, I traced the outline of her feminine lips over the lace covering her sex. Her body trembled as I ran my fingers up and down her core.

"So pretty," I breathed as I leaned forward and kissed the thin scrap of material. My tongue traveled up and down, coating her panties with my saliva.

When her thighs began to quiver, I pulled the lace to the side and pressed my tongue against her soft, dewy flesh. A growl of male appreciation resonated low in my throat as her arousal hit my tastebuds. My dick swelled painfully as I licked her folds, pushing the tip of my tongue past her seam. Her hips ground against my mouth as her hands fisted in my hair, holding my head in place.

I took my time, licking her everywhere but where she wanted it most, teasing her most sensitive spot. I took special care to trace circles around her distended nub, never actually making full contact. After several trips, her sex began to pulse, and I picked up my speed.

Her grip tightened, and the sting shot from my scalp directly to my balls. They constricted against my body as my already engorged erection swelled, throbbing with carnal ache. I was barely holding on to a thin thread of control as I concentrated my efforts to bring her up and over the edge.

"Right there, right there," she instructed when my tongue finally flicked over her clit.

Within seconds, her body began to spasm. The back of my neck grew damp with a sheen of sweat as I continued fluttering my tongue over the hood of her sex as she rode out her climax against my mouth. When her limbs went limp, I began working my way up her body, worshipping every inch.

I knew Taylor wasn't ready to promise me the future, but she'd given me tonight. And I planned on making the most of it. I might not be able to tell her the full extent of what I felt about her, about us, but I could show her. Because whether she was willing to accept it or not, we were meant for each other. Whether it was destiny, fate, or karma, the force pulling us together was bigger than her or me. Her body knew it, even if her mind wasn't quite ready to accept that truth. I meant what I said at Edith's shop. I was a patient and determined man, and I would prove to her just how good we could be, and there was no time like the present.