I might not get the words back, but I didn’t care.
Not when her body showed me just how much she loved and trusted me as we went racing for the finish line all over again.
10.Ember
“Hello?” Tabitha’s voice sounded from the other end of the line, and relief washed through me.
“Hi,” I whispered as I sat on the window bench in the kitchen that overlooked the backyard. It was cold, freezing really, since the snow still hadn’t stopped, but I was all comfortably bundled up thanks to Asher. “Are you busy?” I asked, trying to make sure I wasn’t too loud.
“Em? Is that you?” she asked. I could hear the concern that laced her tone.
“It’s me,” I confirmed just as softly. “I think… I think I need your help.”
“Shit! I knew you going off to a cabin all alone was a bad idea!” I heard her shuffling in the background and could almost imagine her looking all over the place for her shoes. “Call the cops, and I’ll get in the car and?—“
“No,” I giggled as a little bit of the weight on my shoulders relaxed. “It’s not help like that. I’m okay.”
“You sure? You’re safe?”
“I don’t think I’ve ever been… safer,” I admitted and meant it. “Snowed in but safe. I promise,” I added, glancing out the window.
The morning sun was trying to peek out the clouds, but the storm wasn’t letting it. Out further, by the shed in the back of the yard, was Asher. Wearing a cable knit sweater and flannel over it with a beanie on his head, his huge jacket tossed over a huge stump, was this handsome billionaire from LA. Chopping wood.
And doing it like he had been doing it a lifetime.
A billionaire from LA.
Shit, no, that’s not who he was to me.
He was so much more than that. He was daddy. He was… mine. I couldn’t think of him as anything else. I wholeheartedly trusted him, not just with my body but my heart.
“Ember? You still there?” Tabitha called out. I nodded even though she couldn’t see me.
“Yeah, I’m here. Sorry about that. I got… distracted.” I swallowed. He pulled off the flannel and beanie, wiping sweat off his brow. “I need your help,” I said out loud.
“Okay,” she drawled slowly. “Do you need me to call work for you or?—“
“I met someone,” I blurted and was met with silence. “Tab?”
“Wait, the line must have glitched because it sounded like you said you met someone.”
“I did. I met someone and—“ That panic that I couldn’t shake off due to how I was feeling started to mount. “I think I fell in love, and I needed to talk to you because you have so much more experience than I do with this, and—“ I knew I was rambling, but I couldn’t stop myself.
Nerves were getting the better of me. Who could have possibly blamed me?
Waking up with the man of my dreams holding me close all cozy and warm in his embrace had been too much for me. I’d been ready to spill my guts to him right then and there, but something stopped me. As wild as it was to fall in love withsomeone at first chill, I couldn’t kill off the realist inside of me. The fear of what could never be lit up inside me.
“Okay, first off, breathe,” she cut me off, and I did as she ordered. “Inhale… exhale…” she instructed, and we both breathed a couple of times. “Better?”
“A lot.”
“Okay, how about we start from the beginning,” she said, and I told her all of it.
Mostly deciding to keep the dirty bits to myself. Not because I didn’t trust my best friend but because it almost felt wrong to tell her about the most intimate parts of what I’d experienced with Asher. From making love twice last night to waking up before dawn to the howling wind and reaching for one another again and again. Both of us insatiable for the other. And each time had somehow been better and more earth shattering than the last.
Now he was outside, chopping wood, because he said my body needed a break and he needed to burn off the energy flowing in his veins.
So, I shared with Tabitha about how we met. From bumping into him at the grocery store to inviting him to stay when he found out he was stuck with nowhere to go when he discovered his nephew had been renting his place out, to waiting out the storm together and feeling so connected and seen by another person I couldn’t believe it.
