“I can’t.” She wants to clear her head before they restart anything. She wants a future with him, but she’s still scared. She won’t plunge into their relationship if there’s the chance she’ll walk away when it gets too serious. “I have to go.”
She turns to leave and almost makes it across the room. But Blaze is the exercise band pulling the muscled limb back into place. She feels terrible for treating him unkindly, and she’s missed the hell out of him. Who is she kidding? Blaze is her family. He’s where she belongs, her safe harbor.
Turning back, she walks straight into his waiting arms. She clings to him, her raft in her sea of unrest. Lifting to her toes, she hooks her arms around his neck and kisses him. He sweeps her off her feet as if he’s afraid she’ll change her mind and walk out the door. Abruptly, he breaks their kiss, lifts his head. “You sure?”
She cups his cheek. Emotions soar like birds surfing air currents. “Yes.”
CHAPTER 26
Arms around her shoulders and hooked under her knees, Blaze carries Olivia to his bedroom. His mouth tangles with hers. The kiss is wet and sloppy because he’s multitasking: walking while devouring her like they’ve been apart for months rather than days. Olivia grasps his head, desperate with need. Desperate to forget everything since she went batshit crazy on him the other day. She sucks his lower lip and Blaze groans, stumbling into the wall. He grunts, almost dropping her.
“I can walk.” She tries to shimmy from his arms.
He holds her closer. “Uh-uh. I’ve got you.”
They enter his room and she expects him to toss her onto the bed in typical Blaze I’m-going-to-fuck-you style. But he lets her legs drop while holding her close. She slides down until her feet gently land on the carpet. He then slips her sweater off her shoulders, lifts her shirt over her head, and peels off her jeans, all the while kissing her. Her lips, underside of her chin, the soft skin between her breasts, her hip bone. She can hardly catch her breath. By the time he sheds his clothes, she’s clawing at his chest, urging him to go faster. “It’s been five days.” She feels the urgent need for a distraction, put the worry and pain that’s been plaguing her on pause, even if only for a momentary reprieve. But he’s taking his sweet time and it’s messing with her head.
He backs her up, moving with her. “Seems longer.”
Her calves bump against the bedside, and with a gentle nudge from Blaze, she falls back onto the covers. He crawls up her, the bed dipping under his weight, and settles between her legs. Blowing right past foreplay, he smoothly enters, sighing like he’s returned from an extended trip overseas. “Been too long.”
She urgently raises her hips, begging him to lose control, but he doesn’t take the hint. He draws back and pushes in achingly slow. He does it again, and then again.
“What are you doing?”
He lifts his brows. “Umm . . .”
She pats his rear. “I know what you’re doing. But why like this?” she asks, her arms coming around him. So. Excruciatingly. Slow. He’s tormenting her.
“You mean like this?” He demonstrates with another slow withdrawal that drags a moan from her. She feels every inch. “As in why aren’t we banging the headboard against the wall or trying to break the bed?”
“Yes, yes.” She laughs. Her hips move in sync with his, finding the new-for-them rhythm he’s set.
His big hand cradles the side of her head. His eyes bore into hers. “I’m making love to you.”
She blinks. “Why?”
A low laugh vibrates his chest. “You look so serious.” His mouth quirks, the right side pulling up higher than the left. “Because I love you?”
She clasps his head with both hands and searches his face. His declaration is a balm to her soul. She feels like he’s the only person she can trust, the one she can truly open up to. “You love me.”
“I do.” Blaze kisses her nose before his eyes darken. He picks up the pace, drawing a guttural sigh from her.
And just like that, the tide shifts. Her head tilts back and a low moan replaces her smile. She clutches his back and grips the sheets. Their energy swells and problems fall away, leaving nothing but him and her in pursuit of the same endgame. That moment of bliss.
Afterward, they lie on their backs, breathing heavily, staring at the ceiling. His hand finds hers among the sheets, and she says, “That was . . .”
“Incredible? I was thinking more like epic. Or mind-blowing. But incredible will do.” He scratches his chest and she laughs, because he’s right. Incredible is an inadequate description as to how he made her feel. There was an added layer tonight, as if an invisible barrier lifted and suddenly there was more of him. More of them. It wasn’t just physical. He made her feel treasured. Adored. No longer alone.
“You love me,” she whispers, letting the words roll around her mind, find their place.
From the corner of her eye, she sees his head turn on the pillow to look at her. “I never stopped.”
“That night at the beach when you tossed my shoes in the bonfire. You said ‘loved.’ Past tense.” It was fall of their senior year, the first bonfire of the season. The varsity football team had beaten their rival the night before and most of the class wanted to celebrate. Olivia was there with Ethan. Blaze had brought Macey, and he was drunk. With Macey hanging on his arm, he’d confessed that he’d loved Olivia. Appalled, Macey stomped off. But when Olivia told Blaze to have Macey take him home, he plucked her white canvas Keds from the sand and tossed them into the fire before stumbling off.
“I was angry. Sorry about the shoes. Guess I owe you a pair.” He laughs like a devious little boy and shows her three fingers.
He’s confessed his love three times. “When was the third?”
“The first time was at the lake house.”
She rolls to her side, facing him. He does the same. “Was that the time we were fishing?” They’d been thirteen, their last summer there. They fished from the end of the Whitmans’ dock. Blaze dropped a worm in her hand and said that he loved her. She laughed in his face and pushed him into the lake. It was the morning before Lucas was caught shoplifting. They’d been so young.
“Our last summer there,” Blaze murmurs. His fingers skim her hair.
Thick emotion pushes its way up her chest. She rolls out of bed.
“Where are you going?” Worry laces his voice. He sits up.
“Getting some air.” She pulls on her jeans and shirt and pads barefoot to the great room. She rifles through her purse, grabs her smokes and lighter, and goes to the porch. She lights up and takes a long pull. Blaze’s house resides on top of a sloping hill and his view goes for miles. Homes are scattered among the rolling landscape of San Luis Obispo’s backcountry, lit up like earthbound stars. The evening is quiet, absent of cars and music, a neighbor washing dishes in the kitchen. Sounds she hears in the suburbs. Her gaze follows the horizon’s dusky sky. Lily is out there, somewhere. Alone, she imagines, frightened for Josh. The only family she has.
Blaze joins her and drops his biker jacket over her shoulders. “Those things will kill you.”
She snorts. Unless stress finds her heart first.