She was gone.
I lifted my hands. They were shaking, and my fingers were red. I rubbed a hand over my head, over the short hair. I swallowed and my throat felt raw. Raw and dry. I was so thirsty. I turned to the cabinet in the corner behind my desk.
The whiskey bottle was still half full. I didn’t bother with a glass. I lifted the bottle to my lips and let the amber liquid run into my mouth, down my throat. It burned in my veins, but it was a good burn. The burn that was safe. It wasn’t like the heat that I drowned in when my temper took over. I walked to the door, closed it and locked it. Then I turned with my back to the door and slid down it until I was sitting on the floor.
The whiskey was good. Familiar, reliable. This was very good.
Chapter 15 - Grace
Justin lay on his back in his bed, the patchwork quilt crumpled by our feet. The cottage on the ranch where he worked and lived was made of dark wooden beams to give the illusion of a log cabin. Justin had dark-wood log furniture that completed the picture. If I didn’t know better, I would have said he was a real cowboy on a ranch in the Wild West.
We were both naked. We’d spent the night together, and he had a day off. He lay sprawled on his back with nothing to hide, the length of him thick and hard on his lower abdomen. I was on my side, pressing my breasts against his arm and my groin against his hip. With my hand I stroked him, fingers curled around his thickness, moving up and down with a slow motion.
His face was dreamy, but we’d been talking about other things.
“You know, I could live here,” I said.
“Where? Here?” He turned his head to me, blue eyes soft and dark.
“On a ranch. It’s so peaceful out here. Every day is a rush for me, even when I stay in a place as small as Fort Atkinson.”
Justin’s breath came out in a gasp and his body shuddered under my hand before he kept talking.
“It’s very peaceful here. No one to disturb us for miles.” He gave me a lazy smile and I leaned in and kissed him. He lifted his hand and stroked his fingertips across my chest, tracing the rise and fall of my breasts, running a finger down the middle where they met.
“You’re beautiful,” he said.
I smiled at him. “You’re just saying that because I’m jacking you off.”
He closed his eyes, a smile still playing around his mouth.
“As great as this feels, you’re beautiful even when you don’t do it.”
I nuzzled his neck, pressing my breasts harder against his arm. He sighed and another shudder traveled through his body.
“I wish I could stay here forever,” I said. Justin turned his head slightly, as much as my head in his neck would allow.
“You can,” he said. I chuckled.
“I’m going to have to go back to reality at some point. I can’t just live in this dream world with you forever.”
“Why not?” he asked. I stopped moving my hand, just let it rest. Justin pushed up on his elbows and it made me have to shift as well. I moved my body away from him, peeling my skin off of his.
“What are you saying, Justin?”
“You don’t have to go back to your life, you know. You can quit if you want to. I know you hate working for that asshole, you’re just doing it because it’s a good reference. But what if you did something else?” His eyes glimmered, the glint of hope and potential. I let go of him and sat up. He sat up, too. I pulled a sheet over myself so that I wasn’t exposed anymore. It made me feel vulnerable to talk about serious things when I was naked. Tension built in the room but it looked like I was the only one that felt it. Justin sat there, erect and proud and he didn’t make an effort to cover up.
“And do what? I’m a lawyer. I can’t suddenly decide to take up riding lessons or something.”
He chuckled at that and the tension lifted slightly.
“I know,” he said. “All I’m saying is that you don’t have to keep going down this road. Elijah is a tyrant, everyone knows that. I’m pretty sure no other company is going to blame you for leaving him. You’ve been working there for over a year already, that’s got to be enough.”
I sighed. “It does count for something, but anything less than a year looks bad on a resume, and the longer I stay, the better. Besides, Elijah’s not such a bad person once you get to know him,” I said.
Justin’s face changed. The softness bled out of it and his eyes lightened, got harder, until the sexy face he’d been wearing until now was gone. He was irritated with the idea of Elijah. I guess I couldn’t blame him. If I were in a relationship where the guy had another woman, even if it was just casual business flirting, I would be upset too.
“You know I can’t leave,” I said softly.
“Then just move here with me. You can still work there, do what you need. It’s not that much further than your place.”
“Justin…” I started. He had no idea what kind of hours I worked. He had no idea how much time I really spent with Elijah. And part of me didn’t want him to know.
“If I do this, I’m going to lose my job.”
“If you’re with me completely?”
I nodded. I hadn’t made anything official with Justin. Elijah was a demanding man. He was charming and flirtatious and he wanted a woman’s attention all the way. Justin and I had agreed in the beginning that this wouldn’t go any further until I was finished with my work there.
“We talked about this. You knew that this was how it was going to be. I can’t go back on that now.”
Justin looked away from me. He clenched his jaw, like he wanted to stop himself from saying something really inappropriate.
“I don’t understand what you see in him,” he finally said. “He’s arrogant and a pain in the ass. He works you into the ground and he doesn’t treat you right when it doesn’t suit him. And you want to run back and fall at his feet, giving him everything he needs?”
“That’s part of the job,” I said. “That’s how things are. You knew this. I told you this when we started all this.”
He nodded. “I just didn’t love you then the way I do now. I don’t want to have to share anymore.”
My heart constricted when he told me he loved me.
“You don’t have to worry about it. With him it’s really just about work. If I have to smile sweetly and stay after hours to get that extra step up in my career, it’s a small price to pay.” I leaned my head on his shoulder. “You know you’re the only one for me.”
I concentrated on speaking normally, breathing normally. My gut twisted when I said it, because I was lying. Justin was the one I liked the most, the one I loved. But things weren’t strictly business. There had been times I’d gone home with him after a business meeting, and we’d slept together.
He wanted sex from time to time, and I always ended up giving it to him. He was charming in a dangerous kind of way, and I could never help it. But I didn’t tell Justin that. I told myself I wasn’t cheating. Justin and I weren’t exclusive. Elijah and I were just sleeping together, nothing more serious like that. Nothing that resembled a relationship the way I had with Justin.
“I can’t keep doing this,” Justin said. “I can’t keep going, knowing that you go to work and you’re flirting with him the way you do. Even if it is just casual. I want you all to myself. I want you to date me, really be my girlfriend. I want you to tell Elijah that, so that he knows.”
I lifted my head from his shoulder and looked at him.
“I can’t do that. I can’t tell him that. I’ll lose my job and he might ruin my career. You know what kind of influence he has.”
“I don’t want to be trailed along. I want you to be with me, or not at all. I can’t keep sleeping with you and knowing you’re not a hundred percent mine. I can’t keep loving you if I don’t know you love me back. A hundred percent.”
“Justin…” I said again. He was asking me to choose. Between him and the rest of my life. “I can’t do this. I can’t choose. There are parts that I can’t give up now.”
His face hardened, and the look scared me.
“I don’t have what it takes to share. Even if it is only a part of you. I need to know.”
“Know what?” I asked.
“Who you want to belong to.”
That got my back up. I was suddenly angry. It had taken the whole conversation to get here, and I’d been calm all the way through, but now I was angry.
“How can you make me choose? You’re setting an ultimatum for me. How can you do that and still tell me you love me?”
“Because I want to know, Grace. I want to know who’s more important to you.”
“You know you are,” I said, but I was starting to get scared. I felt hollow, like something terrible was about to happen, and I couldn’t stop this thing from running away with me. This conversation was getting out of hand, and Justin was insisting.
“Then show me, Grace. Show me how much you care. Let it all go, and just be with me.”