A Love Letter to Whiskey (38 page)

I was still holding the towel, only my eyes peering over it at the broken man behind me. He moved slowly, eyes on my back as he closed the distance between us. Jamie had always been so strong, so tall and sure, but he looked small in that moment. He wasn’t just broken, he was shattered, and he looked to me as if I held the broom and the glue.

His hands reached out for me first, and he dragged his fingertips from my elbows to my shoulders, sparking chills in his wake. He trailed them down next, along my ribs to my hips, where he grabbed on for life as his forehead fell to my shoulder. The light in the bathroom was dim, warm, and I watched in the mirror as Jamie winced in pain. I dropped the towel then, putting my hands over where his held me. He wrapped them tighter, squeezing me close, and for one brief moment, a tender sorrow filled both of us. A sorrow for what he’d lost — for what
we’d
lost — and for what the day had held.

When he’d dropped his head to my shoulder, he’d passed his weight to me, needing me to shoulder it with him. I took it as my own, and just as quickly as the moment had come, it passed. Jamie inhaled, dragging his lips along the slope of my shoulder as his eyes found mine in the mirror, a darker, pulsing heat filling them. He bit down at the apex and I arched into him, my hands reaching up and back for him. His rose with me, sliding under the low back of the dress I’d been wearing for the wedding that never happened. His hands, the ones I’d had on me the night before, the ones I’d stopped, cupped me under the thin fabric and I moaned, dropping my head back.

I didn’t stop him this time.

Jamie caught the lobe of my ear in his mouth and sucked hard, another wave of goosebumps flooding my body. He slid the straps of my dress from each shoulder, one by one, and it dropped like a curtain to the floor, pooling around my bare feet. I hadn’t been wearing a bra, and my panties were a sheer lavender scrap of lace. I lifted my head again, eyelids heavy as I found Jamie in the mirror.

I loved how Jamie always commanded my attention — whether in a crowded room or when we were alone. He waited, however long it took, for the right connection to hit between us before making any other moves. Then, Jamie bit hard on his lower lip, dipping one hand beneath the hem of my panties to brush my clit. My legs shook at the contact and Jamie retracted his hand just as quickly, spinning me before cupping me by the ass and hoisting me into his arms.

I locked my legs, lips fervent as they brushed the skin of his neck, his jaw, his mouth. Jamie carried me to the bed, dropping me down easily before pulling his tie over his head. Our breaths mingled together in a symphony as he worked at the buttons on his shirt while I watched, squirming below him, his eyes devouring me. I leaned up, balancing on my knees and working on his belt while he finished his shirt. Yanking the metal out of the loop easily, I unhooked and unzipped just as he ripped open the last button. His pants fell and he shrugged out of the white dress shirt, but I wasted no time. I palmed him through his briefs, evoking a raw groan that struck the match.

His first growl from my touch rocked the room, and I dipped my fingers into the band of his briefs, catching his mouth with mine as my hand wrapped around him, skin on skin. He thrust into my grip and I gasped into his mouth. It was too much, the sensation of it all. Years of waiting, of wanting, of wrong decisions and longing regrets. They all floated to the surface and yet drowned in the depths all at once.

Breaking our kiss, I pulled Jamie down hard, rolling until I sat on top of him. He leaned up, wrapping his arms all the way around me and grinding his hips into mine as he sucked his way down my neck. I rubbed my clit against the length of him before pushing a hand into his chest, forcing him into the sheets. Tonight, it was about Jamie — about him finding a release, or a numb, or whatever he needed. So I moved down his body, my mouth falling in line with my hands as they trailed their way to his briefs. My mouth paused there, hands working to roll them off as he lifted and maneuvered to help.

I looked up, eyes locked on his as I dragged the flat of my tongue from base to tip, and Jamie twisted his fists in the sheets, every muscle in his abdomen tightening at the sensation of my mouth wrapping around him. Every moment I got to have Jamie in my bed was incredible, but that night, tasting him like that, taking the weight of the day and replacing it with euphoria? That feeling was like a drug — a powerful, addicting drug. I bobbed slow at first, swirling my tongue and taking more of him each time until my lips touched his base, and every groan from him charged my desire. I held my breath against the gag when he flexed into me, balancing on my knees to use both hands next. They twisted in time with my mouth, and Jamie hissed in a breath through his teeth before reaching down to tug on my elbows.

He was done with foreplay.

I crawled back up, licking my lips as Jamie stared down at me panting. A part of me ached in that moment, not knowing what the next morning would bring, but I shook it off before it could fully land and make roots. Instead of thinking, I tightened my hand around him, stroking him once more before rolling off the bed and fishing a condom out of my purse. He was leaning up on his elbows, sculpted chest and biceps taut as he waited. I could have stared at him all night, my Jamie, my Whiskey. He was just so beautifully flawed, as if his scars and imperfections had been designed by the gods.

I braced my knees on either side of his thighs, eyes on his as I tore the package open with my teeth before rolling the condom on slowly.

For a moment it was just our breaths, loud and unsteady, impatient and wanting. I lifted, positioning him at my opening, and with as much restraint as I could manage, I lowered myself onto him, feeling him inside me again after years of being clean. I sank all the way down, and Jamie’s hands were where my thighs met my hips, pulling me lower. We groaned together, the addiction flaring up like never before, and I rolled my body slow and controlled.

Jamie pulled me down, his arms holding me flush against him as he flexed into me. He pulled me into him like he was afraid I wasn’t real, like he worried I’d disappear. He needed me close that night, and so we stayed like that, kisses hard and hot and demanding, bodies connected at every point. He’d roll up with me still sitting on his lap, one hand pulling my shoulder down as the other splayed at the small of my back. Then he was on top, hooking my leg until my ankle rested against his shoulder and he pushed even deeper inside. I loved the way he felt, the way he struggled to breathe as he slid inside me, over and over, reaching new depths, all the while lining our bodies at every possible point of contact. He couldn’t get enough of me, and I never wanted to get enough of him. I never wanted to lose that primal need, that possessive desire that always existed between us.

When he flipped me onto my stomach, straddling my thighs and entering me from behind, our moans grew louder together. He rocked in hard once, twice, three times, and then he pressed his chest to my back, slowing his thrusts, each one causing my clit to rub against the sheets. He wrapped one hand around my throat, and the next pump delivered my climax. It took me under like a rip tide, rough and unapologetic, and I never wanted to breathe again. Not when Jamie came with me, not when he rolled to the side still inside me, molding himself to fit perfectly behind me. I held my breath and drowned happily in my vice.

At least until the morning came.

I WAS HOT.

That was the first thought in my mind when I woke the next morning, kicking the covers off me as I stretched. My toes pointed, arms high above my head, and I squinted a little through the sunlight already streaming into the room. I’d forgotten to close the curtain last night, and I caught a glimpse of downtown out my window as my eyes adjusted.

And then I saw Jamie.

He was a silhouette against the city, sitting on the edge of the bed with his elbows resting on his knees. His back was hunched over, red marks from my nails visible in the morning light, and his head was down, dropped just below the curve of his shoulders. He was broken, and the sight of him was so achingly beautiful.

Pulling the sheets around me, I crawled to him, settling in behind him. The shin of my bent leg lined the bottom of his back and my other leg stretched beside his to the floor. I wrapped my arms around his abdomen, taking the sheet with me, and his stomach trembled a little at the light touch from my fingertips as I rested my cheek against his spine.

“How are you feeling?”

Jamie pushed a long, slow, weighted breath through his nose, lifting his head to stare out the window. “That’s a loaded question.”

I pressed my lips to his back, tasting the warm skin there, and waited.

“I feel a lot of things,” he finally whispered after a while. “I feel
everything
.”

“Talk it out with me,” I pleaded, locking my fingers over his abdomen. Last night I’d let him escape, but today he needed to talk — he needed to digest. “Just start at the top of the list and work your way down.”

Jamie cracked his neck, one of his lifelong tells, and one hand ran along my leg hanging beside his. He hooked a grip around the top of my calf and kept it, like holding onto me grounded him to this earth, to this moment.

“I’m fucking pissed,” he said first, squeezing my leg. “And I’m hurt.” His voice broke on that one, and I hugged him tighter. “The woman I was supposed to marry last night slept with another man without thinking twice about it.”

I moved my lips from his back and flattened my cheek against it once more, listening to his heart through the back of his ribs as he continued.

“I’m sad, because all of it was for nothing — the planning, the stress of it all. My family is probably heartbroken and hers, too.” He paused. “And I feel guilty, because she wasn’t all wrong — not completely. About me. About us,” he said on a shaky breath. “I feel guilty because she was right. And I feel guilty because in a way, I also feel relieved.”

Jamie moved then, lifting his arm and signaling me to climb under it. I dropped my bent leg to the floor and slid up, tucking myself into his chest as he wrapped his arm around me and pulled me closer. We both stared out at the city at first, and Jamie’s hand lazily drew circles on my arm.

“I feel relieved because I loved her, but not as much as I love you.”

I swallowed, and Jamie tilted my chin with his knuckles, kissing me with his eyes closed tight. When he pulled back, the saddest, softest smile met his lips. “I knew before you showed up, but when you did, I was helpless. I felt guilty as hell the other night when you stopped me, when you pointed out that I was being a shitty person for kissing you when I was about to get married, but I don’t feel guilty today. Not for that, at least.” He smirked, rubbing my jaw with the pad of his thumb. “I wasn’t sorry the first time I kissed you, even when you weren’t mine, and I’m not sorry I kissed you the other night, even when I wasn’t yours. Because the truth is you’ve always been mine, and I’ll always be yours, and that’s just the way it is.”

I leaned into his touch, smiling up at him, chest aching with everything he’d said. We hadn’t been innocent, and neither had Angel. Where did that leave us? I couldn’t be sure. “So what now?”

Jamie looked at me then, in that moment, in a way he’d never looked at me before. He shook his head, a small smile playing at the very corner of his lips as his hazel eyes watched me carefully. The green in them showed a little more in the light that morning, but the honey I’d always loved still dominated, and I couldn’t look away.

“Be with me,” he whispered.

With a sigh, I closed my eyes and nodded against his hand. When I opened my eyes again, he was grinning wide, and my heart nearly exploded. I felt it growing beneath my ribs, expanding, demanding more room to be felt.

“I hate to bring the moment down, but I think you have some things to take care of here before we make any other moves,” I pointed out.

Jamie’s smile fell and he nodded. “I know.”

I didn’t envy him, having to talk to the families, clear personal items out of each other’s houses, deal with the venue and the professionals they’d hired. Would they get any of the money back? I doubted it. But then again, I wondered if Jamie cared. He’d said that though he felt guilty, he also felt relieved, and maybe his family would see that, too.

“Wait for me?” Jamie asked, turning to face me completely. Both of his hands slid to frame my face and his eyes searched mine.

I leaned in, answering with a kiss that said more than I could. The truth was in that moment, right there, I’d have waited forever.