"I have rules, Ivy," I said, sounding exhausted, yet I wasn't. I was fighting a fight I probably wouldn't win. "We've been drinking, and I cannot go that far if either one of us has consumed any alcohol. And we're in your house. I can't have sex with a client anywhere but my office."
"I thought you said ‘fuck the rules'?"
"I did. But that's one I can't afford to break. If I break that one, I lose my career." There was more, so much more to lose. But how did I convey that to her when I couldn't even admit it to myself?
Her face was covered in a dark shadow so I couldn't see her expression, but I could see her body language. She wrapped her arms around herself as her shoulders curled in. Her head dropped and her small frame shrunk. Her feet carried her back a few steps before she moved quickly into the main room.
I pulled up my boxer briefs and jeans and tried to make my way to her, needing her to understand where I was coming from. But once I took a step, she held out her palm in my direction, halting my movements. With her head still turned away, she begged me to leave and I heard nothing but sadness and rejection in her tone.
All she needed was a little bit of time, I knew that. I didn't want to give it to her, but I knew she needed it. She needed to sleep off the night, and in the morning, she would come to her senses and realize I was right. I knew it, but that didn't mean I liked it. I didn't want to give her time. I didn't want to walk away from her. I wanted to hold her. I wanted to give her everything. I wanted to pull my pants back down and strip her of her clothes, bend her over, and then bury myself inside of her heat until morning.
But I knew I couldn't do that. I took a few steps backward until my back was against the front door. Her body was curled on the bed and her shoulders were jumping in the dark; shadows bounced off of them, silently confirming what I already knew.
She was crying.
And I was leaving.
The door closed behind me and all I could do was stumble my way down the stairs until I reached my car. My head was in a fog, and as I looked back up to her door, I wasn't sure how I had gotten so far away from it. I didn't want to be that far from her. I didn't want to leave her alone as she cried to herself. I didn't want her to cry … especially because of me. I wanted to make things right with her. But how the fuck would I do that when I couldn't even make things right for me?
I stared at the shadowy reflection of myself in the driver side window of my car, created by the light of the moon. That's how I felt … like a dark outline with nothing defining me. I was created by a misunderstanding, heartache, and tragedy. So was Ivy. But when I was with her, I felt as if I had features. I had a face; I had a heart. She gave me understanding, a heartbeat, and showed me the beauty behind every catastrophe. She gave me a sense of purpose … and yet, I had walked away because of lines that were drawn by others. I left because of a job I wasn't certain I wanted any longer.
Fuck the lines … fuck the rules.
I looked back up to her door again and stopped thinking. I didn't need to think any more about what I needed to do. It went beyond what I wanted to do. I ran back up the stairs, taking two at a time, and pounded my fist on the door. I wasn't going to wait for her to open it; I only wanted to give her warning that I was back and coming in. She didn't have an option. I didn't give her a choice.
With my heart steadily pounding in my chest, I reached for the knob and turned it, opening the door as I pushed my way in. I walked inside with purpose, and it felt as if it was the only purpose of my existence. The door slammed behind me and I began tracing the walls with my palms, desperately trying to find a light switch. I didn't need the light to find her. Even if she hadn't been in the same place next to her bed, curled into a ball and crying, I would have been able to find her. I was drawn to her-even in the darkness-because my darkness sought out hers, and hers searched for mine. I could feel it. And the only thing I could hope for was that once we found ourselves holding on to each other in the murkiness of our existence, a light would spark and heal us both. It was the only hope I had left in me. If I was wrong-no … I couldn't let myself think of that.
My fingers finally found a switch and I flipped it up. A small light in the corner by her bed came on but my feet refused to move further into the room. Ivy was in exactly the same place as before, huddled on the floor with her legs tucked beneath her. Her shoulders bobbed up and down as she let out muffled cries. I could only stand there and watch her, feeling my chest rip open as my heart fell out in front of me. I had never felt anything like that before. The pain that burned through me was unlike anything I had ever experienced, and it was all because of her.
My feet moved before my brain could even register it. I was on my knees next to her, trying to pull her to me, but she fought me off. My actions as I tried to comfort her were soft and gentle, but my insides were anything but. A panic filled me, a kind of panic I hadn't felt since I was a kid. It was enough to push through the gentle touches and grab a hold of her as if my life-or hers-depended on it.
"Stop!" she screamed with tears plastering her blond hair to her face. "Just leave!"
"Ivy." I shook her shoulders once she was facing me. "Look at me."
Her eyes were open and staring into mine, but she seemed so far away. It was as if my voice wasn't registering in her ears. I knew that look. Her thoughts were too loud and left her deaf to anything I said. Even when I held her face in my hands and spoke again, her eyes seemed to look through me. She stared at me like I wasn't there, like I wasn't speaking to her.
I glanced to my left and noticed the bathroom door. I didn't think; I only acted.
I picked her up off the floor with her arms and feet flying around me. Her tiny fists pounded on my chest as she tried to fight me, but I wouldn't relent. I wouldn't let her go until … Fuck! I was never going to let her go. I couldn't.
In a single move, I turned on the white light in the small bathroom and turned on the water in the shower. It was a tiny cubicle, only meant for one, but I pushed her in and propped her up against the blue tiled wall. Cold water fell, coating us both with the shock of it. That was the moment the fight in her stilled. But the fight in me raged on.
"Why are you here, Cade? You don't want me. Why are you here?" she cried as she pressed her forehead against my bare chest and covered her face with her hands.
I grabbed a hold of her wrists and pushed them back to the wall, pinning them on either side of her body. Her head tilted up to look at me and the pain in her eyes swirled with confusion and want. I had never seen a look like that before. I had never experienced so much passion included in one look-one look that had the power to strip me bare, burn me from the inside out, and leave me feeling … alive.
My lips landed on hers without thought. I needed to feel her against me. I needed to feel her warmth run through me. I felt desperate to prove to her just how wrong she was. A deep intake of air through her nose and a slight whimper from her throat had me pulling back slightly. I had to make sure she was in this moment as much as I was. And I needed to make sure, above anything, that she was fully aware of what we were doing. I may have said fuck the lines, but if there was any amount of alcohol clouding her brain, I needed to stop. Because that was the only line I wouldn't cross, and it had nothing to do with my career and everything to do with her.
"Why do you make it so damn hard to do the right thing?" I asked, nearly out of breath.
"What's the right thing?" Her voice was practically a whisper that grazed my skin and left a burning trail behind.
"To walk away. To give you other options of therapy. To end this before one of us ends up broken … or worse. But I can't do that. I can't walk away from you without feeling like I've left part of me behind. I can't pass you off to someone else, knowing they can't give you what I can. No matter how many times I contemplate ending this, I can't. Because I don't want to end this. I want to start this."
"Start what?"
I shook my head, unable to find the words to answer her question. "I don't know. I don't know what this is … but whatever it is, I want to start it. With you. I don't want you to simply be my client because then there would be an end date to us. And I don't want that."
Her throat expanded and contracted as she swallowed hard and averted her eyes. "I don't know what that means, Cade."
"I don't either. All I know is that I've never understood why people choose to be with only one person when there's a world full of others. It never made sense to me why anyone would give up their options for one person. But ever since meeting you … there isn't anyone else. I don't have a need for other options any longer. There is no one else in this world but you and me." I couldn't make sense of the words that were falling out of my mouth. My brain hadn't sorted through them before I spoke and that was probably because I was speaking straight from my heart. All I knew was the words that passed my lips were the most honest words I had ever spoken and aside from it terrifying me as to how true they were, they liberated me. I felt free once they were out.