Cherry Bomb (30 page)

The moment he spoke those words, I pressed my
body skintight against his and claimed his mouth with mine. His
tongue was a combination of sex, whiskey, and velvet.
Deep,
needy, and wanting.
I wasn’t sure which one of us needed what
the most, and it didn’t matter, all that mattered was we were
together and the lies were exposed.

I let the blanket around me fall, exposing my
breast. As always his hands went directly to my nipples.

“Fuck, you are making this so damn hard,” he
said against my mouth then covered my breast with the blanket. “My
love, we need to talk. As hard as it is to talk about, you need to
hear it.”

My love. The letter signed I love you.
“Tell me the words you wrote in that letter. That’s what I need to
hear.”

He stifled his smile by gnawing on his bottom
lip, his eyes twinkled. “What did I write,” he said, and ran his
tongue along his upper lip. “Oh yeah, I love . . . how your hips
move.”

I shook my head, feeling my tearstained
cheeks constrict with a smile.

“Um,” he hummed. “You’re going to make me say
it?”

He smiled.
I live for that smile.

I nodded.

“I’m so sorry.”

I rolled my eyes and said, “The other
thing.”

“Oh, the I love you thing.”

I nodded again.

“I love you, Cherry Elizabeth Webb. I
shouldn’t have written those words at the end of that letter. Wrong
time. But I’ve never been in love before, and I will probably suck
at it at times. Sorry about the timing but I’m not sorry I told
you.” He leaned his forehead against mine. “Of all the clubs in all
the world, how in the hell did I get lucky enough to have you walk
into mine.”

“You tell me you love me then quote
Casablanca?”

He shrugged. “Paraphrase.”

I tickled my fingers through the light
smattering of hair on his chest and darted my eyes down.

“I love you, and I’ve known that since the
first time you left, but I’m scared. I was Daddy’s cherished little
girl, and so when James told me those same words, I believed them.
Who lies about loving someone? When you were gone I was crushed.” I
kissed the curve of his shoulder. “I trudged through each day in
misery. One person in a relationship always loves the other one a
little bit more. Please don't make me love you more then
leave.”

Drake’s mouth gapped opened slightly. He was
not a man who normally had trouble finding words, but he was
rendered wordless.

“But I’m also happy it all happened the way
it has. James has the woman he had tried to turn me into for twenty
years, the perfect woman, and I have you, the perfect man.” I
forced a smile.

He trailed his fingers down my bare arms.
Everything about my unsecure body language, the way I clung to him
with apprehension, fueled his desire to protect me.

“We are nowhere near perfect.”

My heart broke when the realization that he
knew her, hell, he knew more about my life than even I did. “You’ve
met her?”

“Twice, I had to see for myself what caused
that jerk to do everything he did to you.” Drake lifted my hand to
his mouth, kissing the top of it. “The first time, I made sure I
ran into them at this crappie restaurant. Hearing her talk about
you, the lies he led her to believe, fuck, I wanted to hurt them
both for disrespecting you like that. It should’ve made me the
happiest fucking man on the planet, all that crap gave you to me,
the one person who had crawled so deep under my skin I couldn’t dig
you out if I tried, but nothing about hearing those lies spewed
about you could ever make me happy."

Each word he spoke ignited a fire so deep
within my soul that all the water in the world couldn't extinguish
it. We still had untold amount of work ahead of us, and the
magnitude of the love we shared was not a guarantee that we could
survive the wounds of our past, but our willingness to try and
stubbornness guarantee we would not quit without a battle. My heart
clung to his. I wanted nothing more than to lay in his arms
forever, to kiss his lips until my last breath. Convince us both
that we will be okay, but I didn’t know if we would.

“Then before I left North Carolina, I ran
into her at the park. JJ is a cute little boy.” He paused, I was
positive to judge my reaction. I was fine. Of course, he was cute.
I saw his picture. He was almost identical to Henry. “Brenda is
nice, just blind to who James really is. Their little girl is due
in two weeks.”

That statement finished me off. James's lies
didn’t just involve me but my kids too. Ruby would no longer be his
only little girl, Noah no longer the first born son, “Henry will no
longer be the baby,” I whispered, not even apprehending I said it
allowed.

He clutched my chin between his thumb and
forefinger. Lifting my face, he said. “Henry will always be our
baby.”

But Henry wasn’t his. Drake would want kids
of his own one day. A child I can no longer have. “He’s my baby.
You’ll want your own son one day. A son I can no longer give
you.”

He kissed my lips with a kiss so light I
barely registered a touch. “I’ve had a kid since I was six. The
only kids I want are the ones we already have.”

“What are you talking about?”

“When I was six, my mom, the two-bit meth
whore, left me alone for three days. Which was nothing new, but
when she came back she had this little bundle that cried and peed.
My mom showed me how to change her and fix a bottle then she left
for four more days. I was scared to death. Not for me but for
Katie. I promised her then I would always take care of her, and I
have every day since." He lifted an eyebrow. “Told you my childhood
was a fucking disaster.”

Oh, my sweetie.
If I was broken, he
was shattered. I took in the heartache in his crystal blue eyes,
and envisioned those same eyes filled with confusion and terrible
pain in the face of a lonely little six-year-old boy, holding a
helpless baby. The image ripped me and buried him deeper into my
heart. I placed my hand on his jaw, softly cupping his face.

How had Drake’s mom's influence, or lack of
influence effected his life?

Our phones rang in unison; I would have
ignored mine except it was the ringtone signaling a call from Ruby.
I hesitated before crawling out of the warm encasement of Drake’s
arms, and wrangled my phone out of my purse thrown on the
floor.

I answered mine, feeling somewhat guilty
about where I was. “Hey, baby girl.”

“Mom, what did you do to dad?” Ruby
shrieked.

“What are you talking about?”

“Dad called saying he had been arrested, and
it was all your fault!”

I plopped back down on the bed and took a
deep breath, feeling woozy from my elevated heartrate. I couldn’t
remember ever being that nervous or that sick to my stomach.

I could hear Drake talking to someone next to
me, and could make out enough to know it was about James and jail
too.

I tried my best to reassure Ruby, dodging
every one of her questions, and trying to regain my footing at the
realization that our world was not crumbling but pulverized beyond
anything I could paste back together.

Calmness washed over me the minute Drake took
my hand in his.

“Baby, are the boys up?”

“No, them and Ms. Pat are sleeping. Are you
going to answer me?”

“Sweetie, I’ll be home in thirty minutes.
Don't wake up the boys, please.”

It seemed I was living some movie on Lifetime
as I coward on the bed in Drake’s apartment in a damn sex club.

“I love you, Momma.”

“I love you more, Sunshine.”

I pushed end on the phone, glanced up, and
noticed Drake looking at me. He had the phone pressed tight against
his ear. “Will the extradition take place in the next few
days?”

I sat in silence and watched Drake cram his
hand in his hair as the person on the telephone explained something
that seem to trouble him.

He hung up seconds later, and sat down on the
foot of the bed. “He’s been arrested.”

“Why?” I asked, still confused on what to
tell Ruby.

He pulled me back over onto his chest.
“Didn’t you look at everything I sent you?”

“I didn’t need too. I read your letter. All I
looked at was the picture of her.”

“Bigamy is against the law and has a
punishable penalty up to 5 years in the state pen. What did you do
with the file?” he asked, staring off at the far wall.

“I carried it to my lawyer.”

“He must have called the cops.”

I started picking at my nail beds. I hadn’t
even thought of that as a possibility when I talked to my lawyer
earlier that day. The thought of Ruby setting across from a set of
bars to talk to her dad flashed in my head. I felt nauseated at the
idea of two little boys hearing the taunts at school about daddy
having another family. A family he loved more.

“I have to go home. That was Ruby. James
called her.”

I shivered when I went to slip my shirt on.
Drake stopped me with a firm hand on my waist. “Do you want me to
go with you?”

I hadn’t even thought that would be a
possibility. Would it be a smart choice? Do my kids need him in
their life at the moment? How much do I need him?

“Babe, think about it. Because I want nothing
more than to be there but if I go right now, I will become a part
of those kids’ life on a whole other level.”

I dressed with his words on my mind. The
whole ordeal with James on my part didn’t even sting and I was
smart enough to know it was 100% at the hands of Drake. My kids
would need to know they have more than me in their corner. I
slipped on my shoe, and watched Drake button his shirt, covering
his new cherry tattoo.

“Please. I have no idea what is best for the
kids right now. But I am sure of what I need. You.”

At times my life has seemed like a comical
list of mistakes but taking Drake home with me was not one of them.
As I lay here, envisioning him holding Henry with Noah planted
firmly at his side, my heart breaks. Where I had no words to
explain what our life had come to, Drake knew exactly what to say
to ease their troubled hearts.

Then with Ruby; I could still picture her
sitting on the edge of the tub, crying. She had already figured out
her dad had someone in North Carolina, but still found it hard to
comprehend the magnitude of their relationship. Drake kneeled in
front of her and grabbed the makeup remover wipes off the counter.
He gently stroked the cloth across her jaw.

“Sweetie, I know you’re hurting. My mom chose
another life over me too. But I’ve learned that her choices proved
who she was, not who I was.” Drake focused on her tear-stained
cheeks. “Your dad does love you, just at the moment he’s confused
and loves himself a little more.”

“I hate him.”

Drake tilted her chin back to remove the
remainder of her raccoon eyes. “No, you don’t. You’re just scared
and confused. But no matter what happens from this day forward you
have your mom and I on your side.” He moved his attention to the
other eye. “I will never try to replace your dad but I hope you
allow me a spot in your life.”

I leaned against the doorframe, taking in
every word between them, and realized that I could paste our lives
back together as long as I had Drake as the glue.

“Thank you for loving my mom,” Ruby said and
reached over to touch the side of Drake’s face.

“I think I already love you all.”

It was as if his whole life prepared him for
what we would need at that very moment.

And every day since, he had proven himself a
valid member of the family we were creating.

James did receive the maximum sentence of
five years which he is currently serving at Northeast Correctional
Complex, located in the farthest tip of East Tennessee. The site
was chosen to place him directly between his two families. The
judge’s order also gave me being the one true legal wife an
interspousal transfer deed to all property he owned. But after
meeting Brenda and her two children, I would never feel right
taking their livelihood. So I took all property and assets he owned
in Tennessee and quick claim deed all his assets in North Carolina
to Brenda.

The only stipulation the judge ordered that
was in James’s favor was that we had to carry the kids at least
once a month to see their father. That was how I found myself in
this three-star hotel with three kids and . . .

“What’s wrong?” Drake walked in the room,
drying his hair off from his recent shower.

He looked so sexy wearing only those brown
framed glasses, which always pushed all the right buttons, a pair
of flannel lounge pants, and a white t-shirt. I wanted to rip them
off his body but with Henry asleep on the double bed beside mine
that wasn’t an option.

“Where’s Noah and Ruby at?”

Ruby and Noah was in the enjoining room with
Brenda and her two kids. Brenda and her kids had brought nothing
but joy to our lives. After Brenda learned I wasn’t the wicked
witch, we became close friends, and great allies against James. We
had even chosen to visit James on the same weekends so the kids can
spend time together, and it was also our way of saying f-you to
James. Letting him witness firsthand how close we have become was
the ultimate payback.

Ruby had grown crazy about Opal, James and
Brenda’s new baby. I had to admit she was an adorable baby, and
even had the same crooked smile Ruby had.

Noah and JJ were thick as thieves and both
boys had a great love for anything that involved a ball.

“Where do you think? There in Brenda’s
room?”

“Little bit didn’t want to stay over too?” he
asked, winked, and pointed over to Henry gripping a pillow tight
against his body.

At times, Henry felt left out of our new
family. That was when Drake would bring Grace over to play. Grace
and Katie actually spent two nights a week at our home, or whenever
Jerry and Claire needed a night to themselves.