Текст книги "Until I Met You"

Автор книги: S. L. Scott

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Текущая страница: 2 (всего у книги 19 страниц)

THE SMELL OF bacon and eggs woke Taylor. When he opened his eyes, it was still dark outside and his body was stiff. He sat forward in the chair and scrubbed his hands over his face. The bed had been abandoned and the blanket left balled up. Jude.

Getting up, he walked to the door and looked toward the kitchen. Her back was to him and she scrambled eggs in a skillet. “Good morning, sleepyhead.”

She wasn’t looking at him and he didn’t know how she knew he was there, but he smiled lightly and joined her, sitting at the bar. “Is it?”

“Good or morning?”

“Either. Both.”

“It’s both,” she replied, turning to greet him with a much more awake smile than his before returning to tend to the eggs.

Looking at his watch, he yawned. “It’s two thirty in the morning.”

“I like this time of day. I like being awake when the rest of the world sleeps. It’s peaceful. There’s no negotiating to be done.”

As he stared at the back of her, her frame covered in wrinkled green cotton, he wanted to ask her about the negotiating, about the pills, about the turmoil she was hiding from. But he didn’t because he liked this. Selfishly, he liked her secrets and her whims. He liked that she was cooking in his home.

Setting a plate of food and a fork in front of him, she asked, “Coffee?”

“No, thank you.” He picked up his fork and looked up. “Thank you for the food.”

She leaned forward, rested her chin on her hands, and stared at him. “You’re welcome. Now stop being so formal, Hazel. You’re making me uncomfortable.”

He took a few bites, and then asked, “You’re not eating?”

“I’m not hungry. I’m sleepy. I’m going back to bed.” She whisked around the island bar, right past him.

“Why aren’t you eating?”

She called from the bedroom, “I made it for you.”

He took another bite and swallowed. Then asked, “So does that mean we’re friends now?”

“Friends. Officially.”

That made him smile. He finished eating and returned to the bedroom. When he walked in, he took off his pants and the button-up shirt he had fallen asleep in, leaving him in an undershirt and boxer shorts.

“Will you sleep next to me, Hazel?”

He almost argued that he didn’t want to be called that, but everything with her seemed to fit, including suddenly having a name he didn’t even like. So he decided to let it slide until morning and slipped under the covers. He felt her dress spread behind her, pushed it forward, and moved closer. He didn’t wait to see if she wanted him touching her. He just did it. Selfishly, he put his arm over her, found her hand, and moved it so he was holding her around the chest, finding his own comfort.

Her warm breath hit his fingers lightly and he could feel the tenseness of her body. But he didn’t move. He liked it too much to do something that selfless.

She whispered, “Who is the girl in the photo?”

Lifting his head up just enough to see the frame facing them, he inwardly sighed, not wanting to touch on that subject tonight. “Thank you for cooking. It was good.”

“You’re welcome,” she replied, “to keep your secrets, too.”

A small smile crossed his mouth knowing she understood him, and respected the need to keep secrets too.

They fell asleep in a comforting silence.

Hours had passed and Taylor was unaware of the hour. He removed the pillow from his head and looked up. Jude sat in the chair, her skirt billowing around her hips. The way her leg was bent exposed her body beneath the cotton. With a cigarette burning in one hand, her head rested on the other, she said, “What are we going to do about this, Hazel?”

“What’s this, Jude?” He sat up, his back leaning against the headboard, and rubbed his eyes. With the morning sun shining into the room, he noticed her bright pink panties. “I don’t allow smoking in my apartment.”

She sighed and stubbed her cigarette into a coffee mug. “That’s the ‘do’ I’m talking about. You’re pistachio and I’m rocky road. They just don’t mix.”

“I could argue that, but I have a feeling anything I say wouldn’t matter.”

“That’s where you’d be wrong.” She took her boots in hand. Looking down as she slipped one on at a time, she said, “How long have we known each other?”

“We don’t know each other at all.”

“Ah,” she replied, remembering. “Yes, that’s right. You’re a Barrett.”

Bending his knees, he was getting irritated from this conversation. He wasn’t awake enough for mind games. “And what are you again?”

“Hopeless. So very hopeless.”

“And here I thought I was the impossible one.”

That made her laugh. “Clever.” Standing up, she took her gloves from the table, her coat from the chair, and put it on. As she buttoned, she said, “I called it the minute I saw it.”

“Saw what exactly? My eye color?”

“No. Your soul.”

He was starting to wonder if this conversation would have an ending or if she always talked in circles.

“I knew we’d be put in an impossible situation, a love affair that would mean more than it should, more than either of us could endure once it was over.”

He got out of bed as she spoke and grabbed his suit pants. “Love affair? We’ve neither made love or had an affair tonight, so you are either overly confident or psychic.”

“I’m neither. I just know what I feel and I could see what you needed.” She walked past him as he buckled his belt.

Following her into the living room, he spoke to her back. “And what do I need that was so apparent to you?”

“Not just to me. To anyone who really looked.”

“God, can you just answer one fucking question, Jude? You’re leaving. Give me this.”

While unlocking the door, she stopped and faced him. “For the record, everything you have said to me mattered. That’s why I’m leaving.” She walked out.

Jude was halfway down the hall, almost to the elevator when he said, “That seems like a reason to stay.”

“Don’t let them change you,” she said as she pushed the elevator button. “They’re trying to. They’ll eventually win, but hold out as long as you can. Okay, Hazel? Hold out.”

Watching her, he debated if he should follow. He debated if he should stay. He debated. He debated. He debated. He debated until she got into the elevator, then the debate was over.

He ran.

Hitting the button just before the door closed, he stood there, praying it would reopen. When it did, the cockiest grin he’d ever grown was solidly in place. She was standing at the opening and grinning herself. “Damn, Hazel, I actually thought you were going to let me go there for a minute.”

He grabbed her around the waist and pulled her to him, laughing. “Nope, not letting you go.” His lips crashed heavily into hers as he pressed her against the doorframe of the elevator. Until it started buzzing. Taking her hand assertively in his, he led her back to the apartment and then kissed her again and didn’t stop kissing her until they were in his bedroom.

They parted long enough to catch their breath. Taylor looked at her red lips, then took her coat off. She kicked her boots off and stood in front of him, missing his lips, missing his breath, and liking his eyes on her, craving her. When her coat was dropped, he leaned in and kissed the side of her bare neck. His hands were holding her shoulders and covered most of her skin.

Sucking.

Kissing.

She closed her eyes, let her head fall back gently, and moaned. When his lips worked their way back up, his nose ran smoothly behind her ear, and the hand on her jaw held her to him. The other hand slipped her strap down over her shoulder. His lips replaced it as her opposite strap was lowered. He found the zipper with ease and slid it down her ribs. They let the dress fall, pooling at her feet.

He leaned back and looked at her bare breasts, at her body, drinking her in through his gaze. Taylor was so comfortable, she thought him an anomaly from the man he’d appeared to be at the party. At the party, he wasn’t pistachio. Right now, he wasn’t rocky road either. He was somewhere in the middle, maybe something smooth and definitely something delectable. Someone who got what he wanted, but who usually asked for it. She liked that he hadn’t asked this time. She liked that he was taking…

His fingertip dipped into the front of her panties while he watched her eyes, watched for her reaction. The lips that were slightly swollen from kissing parted and her breath deepened. He kissed her until his lungs filled with the freedom she’d been inhaling.

Moving around her, he pressed his chest to her back and flattened his hand, sliding it down between her legs. Weakening under his touch, she reached up and from behind, she grabbed him around the neck, trying to keep her panting from breaking his lips apart from hers.

Taylor’s mouth was at her ear, and he breathed, “You’re so wet,” emphasizing the T.

She shivered from his words. She shivered from the loss of control she had been searching for, and had finally found. Her mouth dropped open while her head fell farther back, giving him access to whatever he wanted access to. It didn’t matter as long as his hands were on her body somewhere.

Gentle circular strokes coaxed each and every breath to leave harsher than it entered. She spun around in his arms and undid his belt. Watching him scrape his teeth over his bottom lips made her anxious and she hurried with the zipper. His pants fell to the floor and he stepped out of them. Cupping her face, he kissed her as he backed her to the bed until she sat and crawled onto it. Once she was settled, he took his boxers off and climbed to the middle where she lay, waiting for him. Centering his body over her, he kissed her.

Taylor squeezed her breasts, then bent down to kiss and suck each of them. He wanted to move lower. The light reflecting off the frame on the nightstand was in his eyes, so he lifted up, set it face down, and then returned to her body. She was soft under his touch. She was on the thinner side, but had fuller breasts, and wider hips. “Jude?”

“Yes?”

His face was between her breasts and he kissed her twice before asking, “What do you want?”

“I want you.”

“How do you want me?”

She replied, “All over,” while digging her fingers through his light brown hair.

“What do you like?”

“Architects. Ice cream in the middle of winter. Cooking for you. And your mouth on me. Anywhere. And everywhere.”

A chuckle heated her chest, then he sucked good and hard. Maneuvering lower, he lowered her panties as he went down.

Reaching above her head to hold onto anything, she grappled to find something solid, but failed. His hands opened her wider and his mouth was on her. Jude’s arms dropped to her sides and she fisted the blanket. “Taylor,” she murmured, unable to keep his name inside her any longer. One of her hands took hold of his hair and she tightened her fingers in it. The straining pain on his scalp was harsh and encouraging, making him dip deeper, and press on her inner thighs harder. Each of her seductive whimpers was poetry to his groin and he bore down.

He loved to look at her. She was open and so completely tempting. As he tasted her, he found her pleasure. Reaching into his drawer next to the bed, he got a condom and put it on as she lay there, recovering from the riptide of tremors that coursed through her body.

Taylor settled between her legs, balanced above her on his forearms. As they looked into each other’s eyes, she touched his cheek and lifted up to kiss his lids. Her lips were warm and plush, covering his eyes as he pushed inside her. He sighed. Relief and satisfaction became one as they became one.

When he dropped his forehead to the bed, he kissed her shoulder and pulled back out. Slowly. Slowly. Slowly he pushed back inside her welcoming warmth. Wrapping her arms around him, she rubbed the back of his neck, and down his spine. The muscles teetered between tense and relaxed as his arched back moved under her touch. Taylor’s breathless voice called to her, “Juuuude.” He repeated her name over and over until it got lost in the moans and motions of their bodies coming together and releasing.

Taylor fell to the side, a slight sheen of sweat covered his face, and when he kissed the rounded edge of her shoulder, he tasted her sweet and salty skin. “You’re beautiful,” he said in the light of day. January third.

Without opening her eyes, a satisfied smile covered her ruby, kissable lips. “You’re sex drunk. Tell me when you’re sober.”

He could have told her she was beautiful again, right then. He wasn’t sex drunk. He was more aware of who he was and what he felt, more life sober than he’d been in years. But he knew she wouldn’t believe him, so he placed another kiss on her shoulder and rolled onto his back.

Jude scooted into his side and rested her head in the nook of his arm. She should leave, but she felt drunk on the sex they just shared, and didn’t want what was pulsing deep inside her to end. The feeling was too powerful, entirely intoxicating, and utterly heartbreaking.

Even after squeezing her eyes shut, a flashback came anyway…

“No, Daddy. Please. I’ll be good.”

“We must abide by their wishes or risk breaking the law.”

She closed her eyes before the tears could slip down and cleared her mind of the damaged parts of her brain. Instead, she went through the thirty-three flavors of ice cream at her favorite shop, until she figured it out. Hazel wasn’t pistachio. No, that just didn’t fit who she knew him to be at all. Smiling to herself when his arm wrapped around her, she knew exactly what flavor she would order the next time they happen to be out in the middle of winter wanting a sweet treat.

“DON’T YOU HAVE to work?” Jude asked, her fingertips running freely over his chest.

“It’s Sunday.”

She sat straight up, her hands on the bed holding her upright and glanced at the time. Three fifty-three in the afternoon. Another second ticked by and she threw the covers from her body and raced around the bed. Grabbing her dress from the floor, she continued to the bathroom.

Taylor watched, rolling onto his side and propping himself up by the elbow. “You’re leaving? Now?”

She came back out and turned her side to him. “Zip.”

“Why are you leaving? Stay.”

“I can’t. I have dinner plans.”

His fingers, holding the zipper, stopped halfway up her ribs and he tilted his head to the side. “Care to elaborate on that after having sex with me all night, morning, and day?”

Looking down at him, she giggled. “With my family. Don’t worry. I’m not sleeping, eating ice cream, or having sex with anyone else tonight.”

When she faced away again, he finished with the dress, and lay back. The edge of her dress was held firmly in his hand and he tugged twice. “Are you coming back?”

Exhaling loudly, she sat on the bed, her bottom pressed against his legs. Jude looked into his eyes, the hazel brighter, a tempting green. “Do you want me to?”

“I wouldn’t ask if I didn’t.”

She leaned over him and kissed him. He grabbed her around the waist and flipped her onto the mattress next to him until he was on top. “Come back to me.”

Her fingers weaved through his messy hair. “I like you like this.”

“As opposed to what?”

“As opposed to being a Barrett.”

“Oh, don’t lie to yourself. I’m a Barrett through and through. All signs will lead me into temptation of societal acceptance and wealth at the expense of family, friends, and lov—”

Her finger covered his lips, stopping him from saying anything more. “Don’t finish that thought. Don’t give up before you’ve had a chance.”

“A chance at what, Jude? Tell me.”

“A chance at life. A chance at happiness.” Her voice got so low he almost didn’t hear her say, “A chance to love.”

Dropping his head down on her shoulder, he took her hands in his and raised them above her head, and whispered, “Show me how to love. Until I met you, I think I’ve been doing it all wrong.”

SHE KISSED HIS temple and said, “When done right, love is felt, not shown.” Sliding out from under him, she put her back to him as her feet touched the ground again.

He groaned from her absence. “Sounds complicated.”

“It is. My family has shown me how much they love me to the point of smothering me.”

“But you still leave me to have dinner with them.”

She looked back, angling so she could really see him. “Maybe I’ve got love all wrong. Maybe it’s supposed to be suffocating and hollow.”

One of her delicate hands lay across her lap, the other on the bed behind her. He took the one that supported her, the one that would leave her relying on him, and held it. “What’s your last name, Jude?”

Her head tilted down and she watched her feet, an overwhelming sense of self-preservation would slip away if she wasn’t careful. “Let’s not muddy the snow with such things that don’t matter in the days to come, Hazel.” Her fingers slipped from his as she took her coat and walked away. Standing at the crossroad of his bedroom and her goodbye, she said, “Sometimes you don’t even have to find the end of a rainbow to find its treasure.” Wiggling her fingers, she left him.

Taylor didn’t debate whether he should go after her this time. This time he let her go because she was going whether he wanted her to or not. But before the front door could close, he said, “Come back when you can, Pretty Jude.”

The door clicked closed and he was left with the scent of lingering cigarette smoke and the memories of surname-less Jude engulfing the rest of the space. For someone he’d known less than twenty-four hours, she sure knew how to occupy his mind. He’d never understood love at first sight, but it became conceivable in that moment. How she’d managed to disrupt his whole world, spinning it onto a new axis in such a short time was surprising. He smiled wanting to fully embrace this new trajectory.

In her absence, he watched the day deliver the night right to his window. Not even getting the courtesy of a golden winter evening, which was his favorite. No, darkness set in quickly tonight. And that was that.

Around nine, he stared at the turned-down frame on the nightstand. It reminded him of long-held anger from his past. An emotion he had forgotten while Jude filled the space, showing him there was a different way to live, a way to move forward.

Reaching across the bed, the mattress where Jude had slept, he opened the drawer and slid the frame inside, facedown, and slammed it shut.

There was no satisfaction in the action like he once suspected he would get if he had the strength to actually do that. No, none came. Just an emptiness he didn’t know how to fill. So he ate. Frozen waffles that cooked in sixty seconds in the toaster. A can of soup he found in his small food cabinet for days when he was sick. Grapes he picked up on Wednesday. He was stuffed when he finished, but the emptiness still sat heavy in his belly, undigested.

Snow fell in rolling sheets, blowing across the wall of windows of his living room. Louis Armstrong and Billie Holiday wafted through the room as the hours ticked away.

By eleven, Taylor got up from the couch and stood with his toes touching the wall of glass. With a highball of Whiskey on the rocks in hand, he put his other on the window. It was cold, much like his insides. He finished the drink and sat at his drafting table in the corner. Sketching frantically before his hand would relent, he found himself drawing wide blue-green eyes and jagged brown hair. Taylor mixed two colors to create the shade of green he was missing the most about now. But before he had enough drawn to make sense of it, his phone rang.

He looked down at the phone as it rang until the number came into view. But it wasn’t a number; it was a name. A name that he had thrown into the drawer earlier that night.

Katherine.

Katherine.

Katherine.

Turning the music off with the push of a button, he took a long breath. When he lifted the phone to his ear, he knew he shouldn’t. He knew it was the same as opening the door to her, which he was doing to his own detriment, but couldn’t stop. “Hello?”

“Taylor.” Her tone was deeper, melancholy, trying her best to get to him. “How are you?”

He stayed quiet a minute, but gave in, into the weakness of giving her any of his time again, and snapped, “I’m still sick just in case you’d forgotten.”

Her exasperated breath said more than her words. “I heard you were better.”

“Depends who you’re talking to.”

“I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have called. I just…” He remembered her using this ploy to draw him back to her when he was lost in his own thoughts. It didn’t work anymore, so she said, “I miss you, Taylor. I miss us.”

He let silence reacquaint itself and took his time. Reaching for his glass, the ice had melted, but he hoped to find a few remaining drops of liquor mixed in. “Katherine, this isn’t good.” He swallowed the rest, and added, “We’re not good.”

“It’s all my fault.” He let her say what he thought she should have said a year earlier. “I was scared.”

“You were scared? Katherine,” he said, sighing. “I can’t do this. Not right now.”

“Maybe coffee on Friday then?”

“I’m tired. It’s late.” Dropping the colored pencils to the table, he let them roll down to the trench at the bottom.

“I’m sorry for calling so late. I’ve just been thinking about you. Please, Taylor. Coffee. Please.”

Maybe it was that the hour was creeping toward midnight, or the Whiskey seeping into his system, but he finally relented. “Fine. Coffee on Friday. Meet you at Bean There at five.”

“For old times’ sake.”

Old times’ sake. He rolled his eyes. Taylor hung up, disappointed in his inability to say no to the woman who hurt him most when he’d needed her. He got up, set his glass next to the sink, and went to the door to lock up. There was no point in leaving it open any longer. Jude wasn’t coming back.

As he brushed his teeth that night, he thought about the snowflakes on her lashes and how she’d made eggs for him. He wondered why she was at his parents’ party, where she knew no one, and why she wore a sundress when it had been freezing outside. He rinsed his mouth and finished up. When he returned to bed, he left the blinds open and watched the snow fall until he fell asleep.

He awoke to knocking in the middle of the night. Jumping up, his heart racing from the disturbance, he rushed to the front door. Swinging it wide open, a drenched Jude stood there, looking a complete mess and dripping on the hallway carpet. “It’s Boehler.”

“What is?” he asked, restraining from grabbing her.

“My last name. It’s Boehler.”

A gentle smile appeared on her face when Taylor smiled. “Jude Boehler. Okay. Is that why you came back, Jude Boehler?” He hoped there was more, but had no idea how to read her.

“Yes. That, and because I wanted to kiss you again and I wanted you to kiss me like you did earlier.”

Looking down and then back up into the eyes that seared his soul, he leaned his head against the open door. “I might not be able to replicate that kiss. What do we do if I can’t?”

“We keep practicing—”

“Until we get it right.” He took her hand and pulled her inside. She was soaked, but he didn’t care. He hugged her tight, so glad she’d come back. The door was shut, the bolts locked, and her wet coat taken off and hung up. She left her boots at the door and her dress on the floor just outside the bedroom. His boxers were dropped by the bed, and their bodies connected, lips kissed—deeply—and moans were sighs of their coming together.

They were need and want.

Craving, and caring.

This was right.

They were right.