6. The Eye in My Storm

6

The Eye in My Storm

“S hae-baby,” he gasped. “Not like this.”

After we left the church hall, Gabe bustled me out to his truck, practically tossing me into the passenger seat.

Guilt for leaving trailed after me, but it wasn’t strong enough to drag me back.

The back door opened, and Gabe’s suit jacket flew through it. He closed it and stood outside, rolling his neck along with the sleeves of his dress shirt.

Slanting a glance at the devastatingly handsome man sliding into the driver’s seat, I couldn’t help but think Nan would have been proud.

“I feel like a kid again,” I admitted.

Turning toward me, he grinned and wagged his eyebrows. “Want to go for a drive?”

I laughed. That used to be code for let’s get naked.

Still smiling, I replied, “I’m up for a drive, an actual drive, not a ‘find the darkest parking spot down by Carousel Park and make out’ drive.”

“I wouldn’t dare dream of anything else,” he teased lightly.

With one big hand braced on the steering wheel, the corded muscles of his forearms and the acres of ink a delicious contrast to the crisp white of his shirt, he eased us out of the lot and onto the main road. Within minutes, we crossed the Mistlevale border. The weight on my chest lifted, and I could breathe.

I closed my eyes and laid my head back against the seat.

Gabe’s hand found mine, linked our fingers together, and brought them to rest on his muscled thigh.

I clung to him.

Who might we have been if given the chance?

Who might I have been if fate hadn’t mauled my heart?

Would I be this quiet, cowed creature who slunk away from life, from love, from adventure?

Even now, with Gabe sitting beside me, all I could think of was the fact that I would lose him.

One way or another, I would lose him.

Every love story ends with a broken heart.

I rubbed small circles into my temples in an effort to stave off the impending headache. Could I write a different kind of story for my life?

You need a man who sees you.

I could be like her, be the heroine in my own life.

Marry a man willing to do the work to know the real you.

I could take what I want, reach for the dream.

You’ve a life to live.

By the time we pulled into my driveway, mine alone now that Nan was gone, I was beside myself, a potent mix of nerves and need all due to the man beside me who had so forcefully reinserted himself in my life.

Reaching over, he tugged the hair tie from my hair and slipped it over his wrist. He’d done exactly that countless of times when we were young. It became so that it was rare he didn’t have one of my ties looped around his wrist. He liked my hair free and stole my ties constantly.

He tunneled his fingers into my hair, massaging the back of my head as he muttered, “If I’d done this hours ago like I wanted to you wouldn’t have a headache now.”

The bittersweet memory swelled like a lump in my throat.

You need a man who sees you.

I swallowed it. “Do you want to come in?”

He dipped his chin in a brief nod. “I have no intention of leaving you alone anytime soon.”

My heart filled with helium and sprouted wings.

Could I do this? On today of all days?

Reaching behind the seat, he grasped a duffel bag.

My eyebrows flew up. “You came prepared.”

“I did,” he agreed, his lips pressed tight. “I don’t want you to be alone tonight. Not after everything you’ve been through.”

“Gabe,” I protested. “We barely know each other anymore.”

He froze in place, then slowly turned to meet my eyes. “Do you really feel like you don’t know me?”

No.

I knew him.

There was nothing I wanted more than to know him better.

For the past six weeks I’d done nothing but think about him.

Instead, I said, “I have no idea what your life looks like or what you’ve been doing for the past twenty-two years .”

“That’s not what I asked,” he retorted. “Tell me you don’t know me .”

My gaze dropped. “I can’t,” I acquiesced.

Grabbing my hand, he brought it to his lips and pressed a kiss to its back. “Then let’s go inside and settle in for the night.” Lifting the bag, he continued, “I’ve got snacks.”

A surprised laugh escaped as I met his smiling eyes.

My emotions swung from one extreme to the other, taxing my energy and draining what little sense I had left.

In any case, I’d never been able to say no to him. I wasn’t about to start now.

After changing into sweats, we settled onto the couch to watch a movie. Before the opening credits finished rolling, he had me wrapped up under his arm and tucked snugly against his side.

It was some time later before my body relaxed, melting against his.

“Better,” he grunted, making me laugh and snuggle closer.

Halfway through, eyelids heavy, I half-turned toward him, laying my head on his shoulder and sliding my arm across his abdomen.

His sharp inhale blew away every thought of sleep.

I flattened my palm against his abs, ventured higher to explore his chest, then further still to stroke the side of his throat and finally cup the side of his beautiful face in my hand.

He nuzzled his cheek into my palm, my name a mere whisper of a breath. “Shae.”

Lifting my chin, I angled my face up to his and witnessed the darkening of his eyes as he stared back at me.

My eyelids grew heavy as my womb tightened with need.

The boy I knew and loved was there, right there, inside the man. I smiled as he dipped his head and brushed his mouth ever so gently over mine.

First love. Reckless and sweet. Pure. Unfiltered. The heartbreak so brutally unexpected.

Tears burned my eyes.

He drew back, his eyes searching mine. “Hi,” he whispered, throwing me back in time to our first kiss.

Gabe and I had been in the same homework club after school. It wasn’t a club in the traditional sense. If the teacher invited you, it meant you were in danger of failing. If you wanted half a hope of passing, you showed up.

It was supposed to be voluntary, but everyone knew it wasn’t.

Gabe was ahead of me by two years, so we didn’t share any classes, but I’d seen him in the halls. He was hard to miss.

Jet black hair, dancing eyes, tattered jeans, leather jacket, and an energy about him that rivaled the sun.

With my dad being sick, I’d taken on most of the household chores as well as keeping an eye on him until one or both of my grandparents came. In combination with school and my part-time job, I was falling behind.

On my first day in homework club, I walked in with my head bowed and headed straight for the back of the room. I plopped my bag down on the floor and dropped my books on the desk. Only when I sat down did I look up to see who my seatmate was.

And looked into the bluest eyes I’d ever seen.

“Hi,” I whispered. Then, realizing who I was talking to, I blushed furiously.

Three weeks later, he bounded up onto my front porch where I waited for him to pick me up for our first date, took my face in his hands, and gently pressed his mouth to mine.

My first kiss.

I froze, staring up at him, willing him to do it again.

He grinned, then whispered, “Hi.”

Back in the present, those same blue eyes stared into mine. Older and wiser, smile lines fanning out from the sides, but the same in every way that mattered.

“I missed you,” I whispered back.

His eyes closed; his expression pained. “God,” he cupped his hand around the back of my head and pressed his forehead roughly to mine, “Me, too.”

“Gabe?”

“Yeah, baby,” he murmured.

“Kiss me?”

His eyes sprang open as he tipped his head back to meet mine. “Is that a good idea?”

In answer, I pushed up onto my knees, wrapped my arms around his neck, and pressed my mouth to his.

Opening his mouth under mine, he stroked my tongue with his, groaning deep in his throat.

His hands ran down my back to grasp my hips, pulling my body up and flush with his as he lay me back onto the couch and covered me without breaking the kiss.

My breasts tingled against his hard chest, a billowing heat building rapidly inside mine. Need, shocking in its intensity, raged through me from head to toe.

I gasped, my eyes flying open as the body I had hated for so long for its bitter betrayal came alive under his hands, reconnecting to my spirit with a sharp, electric crack.

“Oh, God, Gabe!” I exclaimed, staring up into his face.

It had been years since my blood had thrummed like the ocean in my ears.

Years since I’d been willing to take any kind of risk never mind this inferno that had the power to leave me in ashes.

I nodded in answer to a question he hadn’t asked and arched my back, pressing further into him.

He dropped down, giving me more of his weight, claiming every inch of my mouth, the kiss of a man, not a boy.

My body trembled and fairly buzzed with energy underneath him. Spreading my thighs, I invited him in.

He broke the kiss and latched onto my neck, his hips rolling, before drawing back with a low groan. “Shae, baby. Not like this.”

I stared up at him, naked desire imprinted on my face.

Despite his words, he thrust his knee between my legs, his hand dropping beneath the curve of my ass, yanking me onto the hard muscle of his thigh.

Not like this?

My eyes rolled back in my head at the delicious friction.

Did he want to go to my bed? Where didn’t matter. Floor, couch, wall, anywhere would do.

I glanced around the living room briefly, the only light coming from Nan’s Tiffany lamp on the end table. It was enough. Enough to see him, assure myself it was his body wrapped around me and not a fevered, grief-stricken, dream.

I wrapped my foot around his calf and gave myself over to him, blissed-out, drunk on the feel of his solid, heavy frame in my arms, grounding me to the present.

Free of the past.

Calm in the face of an unknown future.

There was only him and me and now.

“Shae, I don’t think—”

I pulled his head down, hungrily licking the seam of his mouth.

A mouth despite my best efforts I’d never gotten out of my head.

Or my heart.

His breath left his body in a whoosh as his lips danced over mine. He nipped along the line of my jaw before dropping to sweep his mouth over the sensitive curve of my neck as his big body bowed over mine.

Holding me in place.

Sheltering me.

The eye in my storm.

Just as he had been back then.

And where did I leave him?

I squeezed my eyes shut to ward off the guilt and breathed deep.

He was here.

I was here.

It wasn’t an illusion. There was something between us, something I’d felt with him from the beginning, something I hadn’t felt since.

Would he only give me tonight?

I dug the fingers of one hand into his ribs, the other into the back of his neck.

I’d take it.

If this was all I’d ever have of him, I’d take it and hold it close to my heart. One night with him could warm me the rest of my days.

My need combusted.

“Gabe,” I panted, ripping his shirt out of his jeans and shoving my hand up to palm his ribs. “Gabe,” I breathed, lost in a world of sensation, saying his name once more just because I could. “Gabe.”

“For fuck’s sake, Shae,” he groaned, his big hands roaming up and down my sides, brushing the sides of my breasts before flattening them to his chest as he breathed my name like life-giving oxygen into my lungs.

I laughed, then sobbed, hope and grief competing for dominance. My hands crawled up the back of his shirt, the muscles of his back flexing beneath my palms.

So warm.

Full of life.

I could almost feel it seeping back into me.

He cradled my head in his hands as he kissed me, long, drugging kisses giving way to sweet nips and a gentle brushing of lips as he drew back.

My hands drifted down to his lean waist as I blinked up at him. “Gabe,” I whispered his name in wonder and smiled drunkenly, my head fuzzy from hours of crying and forced socializing.

“Baby, baby,” he whispered, his eyes searching mine. “I don’t want this to be about grief.”

I nodded, bringing my hands around to hold his handsome face, the sweetness of connection easing the swelling ache of grief billowing in my chest at the reminder.

Tipping his head forward, he pressed his forehead to mine.

His words niggled at the back of my brain, their meaning slowly penetrating, the growing weight of shame dragging me down into the soft cushions of the couch.

My brow furrowed. “This?”

He nodded. “This. Us. Sex.”

This.

Us.

Sex.

My hands slid away from his shoulders as I curled away from him, the sudden coldness of his withdrawal leaving me dizzy. My eyes met his briefly before flitting away.

“Sex? With me?” I clarified. “You don’t want it to be about grief?”

He brushed my hair back from my eyes, the tension I’d attributed to need easing from his tall frame. His gaze narrowed on mine, searching. “Yes.”

I squeezed my eyes shut and turned my face away. God, I probably looked a sight. Eyes red, nose running, hair a mess.

A wave of anger rose up to shield me. Why couldn’t it be about grief?

About comfort?

When did I get to decide what sex was for?

I pushed on his chest, my jaw clenched tight, but I couldn’t move him.

“ You don’t want it to be about grief? About comfort?” I snarled. “Tell me, please, Gabe, what do you want it to be about?”

Because God knows it’s never about what I need .

He pulled back, taking me with him into the shelter of his chest, but I worked my elbows up between us and pushed myself back.

He held his palms up, his eyes wary. “I’ve obviously hit a nerve here. I just want—”

I sprang to my feet and moved away from the couch.

He followed just as quickly.

“You want, you want,” I spewed. “You know what the last guy wanted? A womb for hire. Sex served one purpose and one only and that was to fill my womb.” I pressed my fist into the softness of the tummy that had so utterly failed me as yet more tears sprang from beneath my swollen lids. “And when that failed, he left, Gabe!”

Shuttering down his emotions, he stuffed his hands in his front pockets and stepped back.

Reality hit me hard. There would be no comfort here. I allowed my familiar, benign mask to smooth all expression from my face.

His brows furrowed as he studied me. “What is happening here?”

Blessed numbness returned, softening the serrated edge of the past. Even the shame of his rejection receded into the distance.

I drew in a calming breath. “I appear to have misjudged. I apologize.”

“Shae,” he reached for me, his brow lowering ominously, the tiny muscle in his jaw clenching tight. “I want you; I’ve always wanted you, but right now I just want to be there for you.”

I stepped back and crossed my arms over my chest, cupping my hands around my upper arms as I met his eyes. “Thank you.” I forced my lips to turn up in the semblance of a polite smile.

As his eyes searched mine, his confusion morphed into resignation. Dipping his chin, he explained, “I want you, Shae. I want to be everything you need but I can’t be a temporary diversion to distract you from your grief.”

My jaw dropped at the insult. I rubbed my upper arms, the sudden silence of Nan’s house pressing in on me from all sides. I closed my eyes for a moment. If I could just sleep, I could put this day behind me.

“I wanted you , Gabe,” I replied quietly. “ You . But I wanted you to comfort me. Is it so bad to need a temporary reprieve? But I guess that’s not what sex is for, right?”

“I’m sorry, Shae,” he murmured, his voice low and soothing as he stepped closer. “I’m sorry, baby.”

Baby.

Gabe laughing, dipping down for a kiss.

Nan scolding, turning away before I saw her smile.

Dad reading to me every night before I fell asleep.

I began to shake, my teeth chattering as if I’d just come in from the cold. There was no escaping this kind of cold, it came from inside.

Gabe reached for me, his hands covering mine and stilling them, holding me together as my spirit flew apart.

Easing me into the safety and shelter of his wide chest.

I stared up at him.

I’m so alone.

“I’m so sorry, baby,” he whispered.

My eyes searched his, watching as they glossed over with tears.

Glossed over for me.

With me.

He dropped his forehead to mine, and the thin thread holding me together snapped.

My head fell back on my neck as I fisted my hands in his shirt, an ugly, guttural sob ripping through the tightness of my throat.

“Aw, fuck,” he growled, his voice pained. Cupping his big hand around the back of my head, the other braced at the small of my back, he tucked his face into my neck and yanked me closer.

I clung to him like he was my last hope, gulping back sobs, choking on my tears, and still I fought to hold myself together.

“Baby,” he whispered, rocking us back and forth. “Just let it out.”

Let it out?

I’d never get it back in.

Every muscle in my body jerked taut as I tried to rein it in. My next breath, like oxygen to a flame, ignited the rage inside, twisting that roiling ball of grief into a hurricane of fire before setting it free to lash against the walls of my windpipe as it forced its way to the surface with a primal scream that seared my vocal cords.

It had been building, growing, and gathering ammunition for years.

On and on it sounded, hurting my ears as it bounced off the walls, stealing the strength from my legs, and bringing me to the floor as it left me emptier than I’d ever been.

Gabe sank down with me, wrapped his body around mine and held me tight as my sobs rattled me, as my tears baptized the pain.

“Baby, baby, baby,” he whispered. “You’re okay. I fucking promise, you’re okay.”

The body can only take so much before it shuts down.

The last thing I saw before my eyelids drifted to a close was a single, shiny tear rolling down Gabe’s ravaged face.