My throat tightened, and a single tear rolled down my cheek onto the pillow beneath my head.
Erich waited for a reply in silence before I loudly sniffled, and he realized I was crying.
“Shit,” he muttered. “Am I forgetting something?” The bed moved again, forcing the worn mattress to squeak in protest. He was facing my back, waiting for me to turn over.
I shook my head, sniffling again and wiping my eye with the corner of the blanket. How pathetic that was. I had a backbone for one day in his ex’s house. Where was it now?
“Talk to me.” His voice pleaded. It was the first time I heard real emotion from him in a while, and even then, I could count on one hand how many times he let it show.
I shakily gulped, trying to bring myself back down to earth to say something reasonable. I finally let out a deep exhale. “Are you trying to leave? Are you unhappy here?”
He was unprepared for my question, and it was evident in the silence following my words. He held his breath and finally got his thoughts together to form a sentence. “Turn towards me, Camille.”
I clenched my jaw. I didn’t want to show him my red, puffy face, yet I still turned towards him. He was holding himself up with one arm. The defeat shadowed his light blue eyes.
I didn’t know how to interpret it. Was the look of defeat confirmation he was leaving?
He reached over to hold my chin with his other hand. He leaned down, and sparks ran through my veins as his lips gently met mine.
My head was spinning. I wanted more.
It didn’t last long. He pulled away just enough, and my lips quivered from the abandonment. “I told you, you’re stuck with me.”
I opened my eyes to meet his. The heat coming off my face surely warmed the room more than the growing fire. His hand went from my chin to my cheek, his familiar rough fingers brushing away the wet trail of a tear. His eyes were warm, but also held feelings that were deep and strange—a change in pace from the defeat I noticed moments earlier.
I didn’t care.
I leaned up to sit so I was level with him; his mystery sweater I stole earlier in the day was too big to cover my collarbones. My hair was a mess. I didn’t feel anything but weakness moments before, but now my thoughts were slowingand turning to mush. I could be confident. I could feel beautiful. I didn’t care what his kiss meant to him; I knew what it meant to me.
He started to move to sit as well. As if he were about to run away, I interrupted the adjustment and took his face with both hands and kissed him back.
While his kiss was gentle and soothing, mine was passionate and hungry.
He didn’t pull away. He wasn’t tense. He kissed me back, matching my passion. My heart was skipping beats. My breath was coming out short and rapid when I could catch it. Everything I was holding back since the day I caught feelings for him broke the dam of self-control, and I let it.
I was no longer in control of my hands. They moved down from his face to his chest, then lower to the bottom of his shirt, reaching under to graze warm skin. If he wanted to stop me, he didn’t show it. His breath was hot and heavy on my face as he stopped kissing me for a quick break. More fuel for the fire as I recognized I had given him the same effect.
His hair started to get sticky with sweat from the fire he revived seconds before, a few feet away from us. The pelting of rain from his walk back inside contributed, and the reflection of the fire made him appear glowing.
It excited me. I could feel his heart pounding in rhythm with mine. I had never experienced the addictive power that came with being wanted by someone I’d wanted for so long.
I have never loved anyone else. I was never given the chance.
I was so lost in my own emotional state that I didn’t notice where his hands were until I realized the blankets I wrapped myself in moments before were gone. His left hand grazed my thigh, moving up as his right hand gently pushed meback down onto the pillows. He teased the collar of my sweater, revealing my collarbones further. He was now on top of me.
I was frozen. This was too familiar, and I was soon being thrown back down to Earth and reality. Though it had been a year, it never left. It was waiting to snatch me and drag me back into the depths of memories of Reed forcing himself on me. It was ready to sink its claws into whatever intimate situation I would be in, good or bad.
This close to him, I could finally admire his straight jawline and the stubble of a freshly shaved face. His cheeks were flushed with our intimacy, and his blue eyes appeared lazily hypnotized in our moment. His hand stilled over the collar of my sweater as he acknowledged my freeze, and his low, scratchy voice helped me find my place back in reality. “Do you want to stop?”
Erich was not Reed. He took me far away from my brother. He protected me from danger in such a lonely, cruel world. He never touched me when I didn’t want to be touched. He kept me safe and alive during the last year we’d known each other.
I shook my head, feeling a shiver run up my spine and to my fingertips. I gently gripped his shirt, tugging it enough to reveal more skin, catching a glimpse of the small tattoo on the curve of his hip. He leaned closer, and I smelled the same familiar scent from the night I dragged my shocked, ragged body and found him in the bar parking lot after I survived that car accident. The same scent from the night we met. The scent I was likely trauma-bonded to.
His lips grazed my ear, giving me goosebumps. “Are you sure you want this?”
“Yes,” I whispered, aching for more, gripping his shirt tighter.
Erich took a deep, shaky breath, his lips still next to my ear. I shivered in excitement as his hand gripped tighter on my thigh. I pulled up on his shirt to attempt to take it off but was met with his hands grazing mine before he pulled it off himself. He tossed it across the room before rolling onto his back, grabbing my hips to help me get on top.
