Remy(67)
Inside our room, I toss her on the bed and jerk off my T-shirt, then I reach out to get rid of her clothes. She flails and kicks at me, her face still streaked with tears as she edges back. “You asshole, don’t touch me!”
“Hey, hey, listen to me.” I trap her in my arms and hold her gaze with mine, my heart pounding as my hunter instincts kick in full gear in preparation to make her mine again. “I am insane about you. I’ve been in hell without you. In hell. Stop being ridiculous,” I tell her, meaningfully squeezing her face. “I love you. I love you. Come here.”
I haul her onto my lap, and she quietly starts crying. Every soft sob rips me in two. I remember it all. I may not remember what I did when she was gone, but I remember the emptiness of her like a curse on me. Maybe I fucked up, but all I probably did was try to fill the void she left in me which nobody can ever fucking fill but her.
“How well did you think I’d cope when you left?” I ask her, hurting like a son of a bitch at the reminder. “Did you think it would be easy on me? That I wouldn’t feel alone? Betrayed? Fucking lied to? Used? Discarded? Worthless? Dead? Did you think there wouldn’t be days where I loathed you more than I loved you for tearing me apart? Did you?”
“I’ve left everything for you.” She looks straight at me, hurt as if I did her bodily harm. “Since I met you, all I wanted was to be yours. You said you were mine. That you were my . . . my . . . Real.”
A pained groan leaves me as I squish her to me, quietly rasping, “I’m the realest fucking thing you’re ever going to have.”
She still looks up, and those hurt, tear-filled eyes of hers claw me like talons. “It should’ve been me all those times,” she says tearfully. “It should’ve been just me, only me.”
“Then don’t fucking tell me you love me and leave me. Don’t fucking beg me to make you mine and then run the first chance I’m not fucking looking. I couldn’t even come catch you. Is that fair to me? Is it? I couldn’t even get up on my own fucking legs and come stop you.”
She sobs harder, and my chest fucking hurts for the both of us.
“I woke up to read your letter instead of getting to see you. You were all I wanted to see. All. I wanted. To see,” I quietly tell her.
Fuck. Maybe I wish I hadn’t said that, but she hurts me and she doesn’t know it. I’m strong physically but she guts me. What she does guts me, and her pain—caused by me—guts me most of all.
As she cries herself to sleep, her sobs softening gradually until all that’s left is a hiccup in her soft breaths, I breathe her hair and hold her tighter than ever. I never ever want her to leave. Not even for a night to sleep in Diane’s suite. I don’t remember what I did when she left me, I was so out of it. But it doesn’t matter, nothing mattered but that she wasn’t with me.
When she’s sound asleep, I start stripping her clothes, leaving her panties for last, pulling them down her leg and tossing everything aside. I stand up to strip myself too, then I get back in bed, naked.
I’m so fucking hard my balls hurt, but Brooke shivers in her sleep and searches for my body heat, innocently rolling in her sleep to press closer to me. “That’s right, I’m right here,” I say and wrap my arms around her. I drag my nose along her nape, petting her during the night, scenting and licking her. “I only love you. You’re mine, and I’m yours. Nobody will ever have me but you.”
♥ ♥ ♥
SHE’S TANGLED IN bed with me two mornings later.
Yesterday morning, she was quiet and angry at me, but this morning I’ve finally appeased her, and she’s relaxed and in my arms. Her dark hair is spread behind her pillow and she’s resting on her stomach, her face buried in my chest while I at last pull in a good breath.
Hell, I felt like such an unwanted piece of shit yesterday, every breath felt like I was pulling in water. I got punched last night at the fight so she would stop ignoring me and touch me.
She wouldn’t touch me and I couldn’t fucking stand it.
She had no choice but to touch me after the fight.
She was worried about me, tending to my cut lip up to the point she realized I took the hits on purpose. Then she was all fire and anger, ordering me into the shower so she could rub me with her oils after. I like to let her think she can order me around. But not this time. I carried her into the shower with me and told her she would fucking love me if it killed us both. Jesus, I’m so fucking greedy when it comes to her.
“You coming to the gym?” I quietly ask, massaging her butt with the palm of my hand.