There was nothing in the world like fucking B, and maybe the universe knew it. Maybe it knew if it gave me more than just a few times in those years we fought against timing, it would have driven me mad with jealousy if anyone so much as looked at her after knowing what she felt like. Maybe there were beings at work that knew, like with any addiction, that I had to be strong enough to control myself before I could surrender to the high.
I collapsed on top of her, panting as she trailed her nails along my back. I shivered under the touch, kissing her neck before I pressed up to balance on my elbows above her.
“Well, damn.”
She giggled as I kissed her nose. “My thoughts exactly.”
“You have to be mine after that,” I breathed, and in that moment, it was as obvious as the fact that the sky was blue and water was wet. She was mine. Finally, she was mine.
But then her smile dropped.
“I can’t.”
“Fuck that,” I argued, and I thought it was a game. I thought we were playing. “You can. You are.”
“I’m leaving Sunday night, Jamie,” she said, breaking our train of kisses to look me in the eyes.
I hated the seriousness I found there.
I let out a breath, frowning. The universe was a cruel sonofabitch to let us find each other right before she was about to leave.
But I couldn’t let her go yet.
“So be mine for the weekend.”
B’s shoulders sagged. “I can’t. I have plans with my family. This is it… this is all I have.”
This is all I have.
She was honest. She was telling me long before all the pain that would come next exactly what she could give me and what she couldn’t.
But I couldn’t accept it.
“Why can’t we be long distance?”
She laughed at that, wrapping her arms around my neck. “Because that’s a guaranteed way to get our hearts broken.”
It was me who deflated then — because I realized I’d already been broken. For three years, I’d been broken.
She was the only thing that made me feel whole.
“But I’m not running from you anymore, Jamie,” she said when she saw the dejected look on my face.
I studied hers, hoping like hell there wasn’t an ounce of a lie in those words she’d just spoken. “Does that mean you’ll answer my calls?”
She smiled, nodding. “Just… let’s not try to put a name on this. On us.”
I released an aggravated breath, but as I searched her eyes, I realized I’d take her in any way I could — even if the thought of not claiming her with my name on her skin and a big neon sign flashing above her that said JAMIE’S PROPERTY made me see red. “Alright, then,” I conceded. “I need you to give me two things.”
B arched a brow, waiting.
I licked my lips. “Tonight, and one day.”
“Tonight,” she echoed. “And one day.”
I nodded. “I have to have both.”
There was no other option for me. She would be mine, one way or another, and I was willing to wait.
But I had to have her word.
Her eyes searched mine for a long while before she nodded, pulling me down to kiss her once more. And that connection made me grow hard inside her, body aching for more, ready to seal the deal all night long if that’s what it took.
I only had until the morning, anyway.
No sense in wasting the night with sleep.
I took B in every way I could that night. I tasted her until she came on my tongue, saw stars when she tasted me just the same. We showered and then fucked again. Ate and then fucked again. Slept for approximately twenty minutes and then fucked again.
Everything felt right.
Even knowing she was leaving, even knowing she didn’t want to put a title on us, I stupidly believed that we’d made it. We’d survived those three long years apart. She’d healed and I’d grown, and now, we’d be together.
I was so focused on making her fit into my plan, I didn’t bother to think about what her plan was. I didn’t think about compromise, about her wanting a career — even though I knew my girl, how determined she was, how she’d always been a go-getter and thirsty for a life of her own.
I assumed she’d want me more than anything else, that she’d give up who she was and walk away from her goals just to have me.
And that turned out to be the biggest mistake of my life.
“DAMN,” I SAID WHEN the video chat connected, dropping my keys on the counter as I smiled at B’s view from her apartment. Pittsburgh spread out in front of the floor-to-ceiling windows like an endless sea of stars. “Look at you, big city girl.”
“Pretty, right?”
B gave me a tour of the entire place as I kicked back on my bed, muscles sore and skin salty from a good surf session. Hearing her voice on the phone felt like someone standing on my chest. It was hard to breathe, knowing I’d had her and let her slip through my fingers again.
We’d been talking every day and night since the one we spent together in my apartment, but it wasn’t the same as having her here. The way she talked about her new internship at Rye Publishing, I knew she was happy. That girl had been writing since I’d known her, but had always been too shy to show it off. Still, she was knowledgeable, talented, and I knew it wouldn’t be long before the big wigs at that publishing house realized how valuable she was.
She was right where she should be.
Except that she wasn’t with me.
And somehow, that just never seemed right.
“Alright, I know you’re dying to show me the bathtub,” I said after she gave me a view of her bedroom.
“Of course. Had to save the best for last.” The camera was shaky as she walked into the bathroom, revealing a claw-foot tub of her dreams. “Ta-da!”
“Oooohhh, ahhhh,” I teased.
“Isn’t it gorgeous?” she asked, scanning the tub from one inch to the other with the camera before she turned the water on. “Totally worth the extra five-hundred bucks a month.”
“You’re right. I’d pay at least a thousand.”
“Glad we’re on the same page.”
I smirked, one arm under my head as I watched the screen. But when B turned to face the mirror, my breath cut short.
Fuck.
She stood there in her bathroom butt ass naked, her hair slightly kinked like she’d worn it up all day, makeup still in place from being at the office. Her hair was pulled over her shoulders, covering her breasts, and the mirror cut off at the bottom of her belly button, leaving my imagination to run wild wondering if she was freshly shaved between her legs, or if she had a little landing strip, one I’d love to trace with my fingertip.
“Jesus,” I breathed as my eyes drank her in. “You really did save the best for last.”
B flushed, playing with her hair. She wanted me to take control, and though I could only do so much this far away, I knew how to give her what she wanted.
“Pull your hair back,” I told her.
She swept her hair into one fist, pulling it behind her back and revealing her slight breasts, the nipples peaked as the room steamed around her.
“Now I really wish I was there.”
I scanned her slowly, my cock growing hard and straining against my swim trunks. I scrubbed a hand over my face before I ripped at the strings of them, tugging until they were off my hips.