Atone (8 page)

I fucked up.

I fucked Vera.

I fucking fucked Vera.

I fucking loved fucking Vera.

I shouldn't fucking love it, but I do.

It was fucking intense. It was fucking
everything.

I'm a fucking drunk-ass mess. I duck my head so she can't see my face as I squeeze back the moisture in my eyes. I'm on top of her. My dick is still inside her and all I can think about is doing it again. I shouldn't want that. I shouldn't want to finish taking off her clothes to take my time to fuck her properly. I shouldn't be thinking about anything but the feel of her under me and her breasts pressing against my chest. And I definitely shouldn't feel guilty.

I can't move. I don't want to. I can't face what she might be thinking and feeling about what we just did. What if she regrets it? What if she thinks
I
regret it? I didn't mean for it to happen. This wasn't why I came over here tonight.
Oh, God,
what if she hates me.

Oh,
shit.

Oh,
fucking
shit.

No condom.
Fuuuucckkk. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.

I try to pull out of her, but she's got her hands clamped to my ass.

“Vera, let me go.”

“No regrets.”

I shake my head. I still can't look at her.

“I mean it, Beau. Don't you fucking regret this or feel guilty about it.”

“I don't.”

“Look at me when you say that.”

I raise my head and blink down at her. “We didn't use a condom.”

“Oh, shit. It's okay.”

“No. It really isn't.”

“I'm clean and I can't get pregnant, if that's what this is all about.”

She releases her grip on me and I slide out of her and move to the side so I'm not crushing her.

“Well, yeah,” I tell her. “It's pretty much
all
it's about.”

“I thought you might be wishing it didn't happen.”

I can't honestly say I don't.

She sighs and pushes at me to get me off her. Rolling onto my back, I throw my arm across my eyes. I can't face her yet. I'm a fucking coward, I know. I don't want to talk about it. I just want to crawl in bed and sleep off my drunk. In the morning I'll figure everything out.

She slaps my bare leg. “Get out.”

It takes me a moment to get my elbows under me so I can sit up. “What?”

“You heard me.” She points at the door. “Get out.”

Somewhere along the way she stripped off the rest of her clothing and she's standing in front of me totally naked. If I had any leftover drunken thoughts about regret, they strolled straight out of my head.

“What? Why?”

“I don't want you here.”

I manage to get into a sitting position and stare down at myself. My shirt is hooked around my arms across my back and my jeans hang around my ankles. I wiggle out of my shirt and push my shoes and jeans off with my feet.

“What are you doing?” She stands over me with her hands on her hips.

I hold my arms out to her. “Come here.”

“No.” She's eyeing me like that
no
might turn into a
yes.

“Come sleep with me.”

“I told you to get the fuck out.”

“I know you did. Please. Come here.”

She moves forward until her knees hit mine. I wrap my arms around her, pressing my face against her breasts. She smells better naked. Her skin is soft. She's soft. Her breasts are full and round, and they mash my nose as she holds my head against her.

“I'm sorry,” I tell her. “I'm shit at this. I don't…It's been a long time for me.”

She strokes my hair. “It's been a long time for me too. Pretty much never.”

I don't know what she means by that.

She pulls away and grips my face so I have to look at her. “You can't do that avoidance shit with me. Got it? You don't have a single fucking clue how this was for me. Don't take it away from me with your guilt and regret. Let me have this. Okay?”

I don't know what she means by that either. I can't read the expression on her face. It's kind of like the look she got that night at the diner, only not so hard and angry. Whatever she's thinking about is not in this room. It's somewhere else.

“Yeah. Okay,” I agree.

Her kiss has me reaching for her and bringing her down on top of me.
God, the feel of her.
She straddles my hips, her pussy pressing against my dick. I'm already getting hard again. Her breasts bounce as she leverages herself over me. I take one in each hand, running my thumbs over her nipples, marveling at how they stiffen and the little sound she makes in the back of her throat.

“It's just you and me here tonight. Promise me.”

I nod. “Just you and me.”

“We don't have a past or a future. Only now.”

“Only now.”

I don't question why she needs this reassurance, because I need it too. I need the absolution of living in the moment. When I walked into this room I took off my grief and left it outside along with the past. I was so lost without it until she grounded me with her honesty. Maybe that's why I came here…to see how it would feel to let it go, if only for a short while. She's a safe place to hide from the world and who I couldn't be. I hope I'm the same for her.

Pushing away any other thoughts except the way she looks and feels on top of me, I concentrate on giving her what she wants. To be fully present in the here and now. A mindless fuck. I focus on
her
pleasure and what makes her gasp and grind against me. Her face is flushed, her head thrown back. I repeat the motion, strumming her clit with one hand while hitting deep inside her with the fingers of my other hand. She clamps her hands on my wrists and cries out, her whole body taut. She's so fucking beautiful I lose my breath watching her.

My dick is hard and insistent beneath her, but I don't make a move to relieve it. I'm too mesmerized by the new look in her eyes. I move my hands around to her hips and up to her waist. She lies down on top of me with a sigh, her head tucked beneath my chin. Smoothing my hands up her back, I close my eyes and focus on the feel of her. I could lie like this with her forever and never move.

Pressing her hot, open mouth to my chest, she sucks, marking me. The sting shoots straight to my dick and I push on her hips to relieve the ache she's creating. Her mouth begins a journey south as she inches down my body, licking and biting. I groan as her breasts rub against my dick. And then she's on her knees between my legs, taking me in her mouth. My breath hitches. I lift my head to watch.

Her eyes are on mine as her lips wrap around my shaft, pistoning along with her hand, up and down. I stroke the side of her face. She takes me deep, sucking hard. My vision blurs. She does something with her other hand that makes my hips jerk.
Oh,
fuck. I'm gonna come. My head drops back and I can't move. She has me pinned down. Her mouth is fucking genius. My hips buck in time with her strokes. The tightening of my fingers on her scalp is the only warning she gets. I raise my head, my whole body tight. She deep-throats me and that's it. My hips flex as I come in her mouth. There's a roaring in my ears and I go temporarily blind.

She holds on to me until I go lax, her gaze never leaving mine. Lifting her head, she pulls her mouth off me slowly, as though she's reluctant to let go. Her lips purse at the tip and she gives my dick a kiss. The way she looks at me in that moment is unreal. I'm ripped wide open. Who is this girl and how did I get here with her?

“Come here.” I tug on her wrist.

She crawls back up my body, straddles my hips, her forearms bracketing my head, and looks down at me. I take her face in my hands and kiss her, openmouthed. It's a lazy, sated kiss. We're the wrong way on the bed. My legs dangle over the side and she's heavy on top of me, but I'm more comfortable than I've been in a long damn time. Maybe it's the booze or the sex or both. I don't know. Maybe it's just her. I can't remember feeling this easy, like anything could happen and I'd roll with it instead of it rolling over me.

She breaks the kiss and traces a finger around the edge of my lips as though she's trying to memorize their shape. That's a stupid thing to think, but that's how it feels. Her eyes follow the movement around and around. It's ticklish. I let her do it anyway. She could do just about anything to me right now and I'd let her. It's not just the blowjob—although it was fucking
amazing
—it's her. I'm not supposed to compare, and there's no way to do it without cheating them both, but I can't do things—do this—with Vera and not make comparisons to the only other woman I've ever slept with.

Everything with Vera is new and interesting and exciting. Everything with Cassandra toward the end was frustrating and difficult and
work.
We were trying to start over when she was killed. I was trying to forget she slept with someone else during the time we were broken up. We were trying to find our way back to the new and the easy and the exciting. And then she was gone. I was left with nothing but if-onlys and thoughts of what might have been. It was
what might have been
that I held on to.

I saw the grief for
what might have been
in my parents and how it fucked them up like it's fucking me up. Maybe that's why I came here—to not be like them. To try something I haven't been able to do—let
what might have been
go and grab on to
what might be.
Vera is what might be. My new job at the agency is what might be. Trying to forge a new relationship with my parents is what might be.

If I'm honest with myself things with Cassandra weren't all that great. Admitting that feels disloyal, like spitting on her grave. I loved her. Hell, I still love her. I think I always will. I can't talk about her without talking about how angry I was with her when she died. That's why I don't talk about her.

I never got to say goodbye. There was no closure. I was sitting in a jail cell, wondering how I got there and how it could be possible she was dead when they buried her. I've never even visited her grave. I'm not exactly sure where it is. She's been in the ground for more than six years. I can't picture her there. In my head, she's someplace else, like Europe or something. Any moment she could come back. I hold on to that, along with everything else that was Cassandra and me. The good, the bad, and the tragic.

Vera taps my forehead, knocking me out of my morbid thoughts. “You promised just you and me.”

“I know. I'm sorry.”

She climbs off me, grabs the bottle and tips it back, taking too big a drink, then hands it to me. I finish it off in three big gulps. My head swims. It's just the thing I need to push back the thoughts I shouldn't have had. She grabs a slice of cold pizza and takes a bite, regarding me with a solemn expression. I've disappointed her. I didn't leave everything outside. I hauled it in and piled it around me, walling myself off.

“The only time you're not feeling guilty is when you're drinking or screwing. Either we need more alcohol or we need to have more sex.” She regards me over the top of the half-eaten slice of pizza. “I'm too sore to have sex again and I'm already feeling hungover.”

“I'm sorry.”

“For which part?”

“All of it. I'm sorry I fucked this up for you. I'm sorry you're sore—I should've been gentler—and I'm sorry you're not feeling good.”

“Are you staying or leaving?”

“I want to sleep with you, if you'll let me.”

“You gotta tell me what you were just thinking.”

“Why do you want to talk about it?”

She wipes her face and hands with a napkin, then balls it up and throws it at me. I let it bounce off my chest and onto the floor. She's mad. Not just angry…pissed.

“Because it will never go away if you don't,” she says. “You haul it everywhere you go.”

“What do you want me to say?”

“What were you just thinking?”

I shake my head. I can't say it.

“What?” she taunts. “Afraid you'll scare me off?”

“I don't want to talk about it with you. It doesn't feel right.”

“I'm laying on top of you naked and you're thinking about another woman.
That's
not right.”

“I wasn't thinking about her that way.
Fuck.
Just leave it.” I lean over to grab my shirt, but she snatches it and my pants away from me. I'm slow from all the fucking booze. I'd have to rip them out of her hands to get them back.

“You had a look on your face.” She points at me. “Like that one.”

“What one? What the hell are you talking about? Give me my clothes.”

I make a swipe for her, but she's faster, scooting out of reach. I stalk toward her. She's quick, running over the bed to the other side. We're both naked and drunk. This is ridiculous.

“Give me my damn clothes.”

“What are you afraid of?”

“Right now I'm afraid I'm going to have to walk home naked.”

“Maybe it wasn't all sunshine.”

“Shut up.” I grab for her again, but she's too quick.

“Maybe she's better in bed than me.”

“Don't do that.”

“Why not? You were comparing us, weren't you? And don't fucking lie to me.”

“Not the way you're making it sound.”

“Then in what way?”

She dances away again. All this over and around is making me dizzy.

“Just stop!”

My outburst freezes her on top of the bed and she looks down at me like she won. I dive for her, knocking her legs out from under her, careful to aim her so she hits the bed and not the floor. Pulling her by the ankles, I drag her toward me and lean down over her, right in her face.