I Found You (30 page)

He lifted it up and made an appreciative face. “I like it. Thanks, honey.”

My nape was gripped and then I was kissed again. It was a firm hard kiss, which seemed to say something else.

“This next.” I handed him another.

He smiled at me. It was obviously a CD.

He opened it.

“I put it together at work, just for you, for when you’re running. It’s tracks I thought it would be good to run to.”

His vibrant brown eyes looked up at me, they were deep with emotion. “Thanks, that’s a lovely thought, Rach.”

“You’re welcome, but this is the best one.” I handed him the last little square parcel.

He frowned, if he’d known what it was it was obvious, but I doubted he’d think I’d buy him this, so he couldn’t guess.

Once he got the wrapping off and saw the velvet box, his eyebrows lifted. He looked at me, “Jewelry?”

“Uh huh.”

He snapped open the box.

“A ring?”

“I’m selfish. I want you to wear it, so everyone knows you’re taken.”

He laughed, but then he kissed me again, his hand gripping my nape once more, while the other still held the velvet box. He was my first proper boyfriend and I’d never shared friendship rings and done any of that stuff. I wanted this guy to wear my ring.

When he ended the kiss, he took it out.

It was just a simple gold band, like a wedding ring, but I’d had it engraved.

“Forever mine,” he read it when he held it up.

He cocked an eyebrow at me. Maybe it was a bit too possessive, or needy, but I wanted him to stay mine. But when I laughed, he laughed too.

I took it from him, and when he held out his left hand, I slid it on his finger, like an engagement ring. He’d offered me his left hand deliberately, I knew it. Our gazes met. This was it for me. This was the end of my fear and my guilt over the past, and over Lindy. I was claiming him forever. I was setting aside
everything
that had gone before. He was my future.

“I’m yours anyway. I didn’t need a ring, Rach.” It was like he’d read my mind.

A tear ran from my eye.

He gave me a hug. “It’s going to be okay. You know that. Me, you and the baby.”

I remembered what Katie had told me earlier, and wondered if I ought to tell him now. It would probably make him feel better about Lindy in one way… But then it was never nice to know someone had let you down, and I didn’t want to spoil this moment. I accepted his comfort for a little longer, but then I pulled away and nodded, discarding Lindy from my thoughts for tonight and stopping my sniveling. “I’m not unhappy. I’m happy.” Just my stupid crazy head didn’t know it. “This is the first, proper Christmas I’ve had.”

His eyes grew a depth of compassion. “Then you’d better get your presents. They’re in my case over there.”

“I get presents?” I teased, climbing off of him. But really, no one had ever given me presents on Christmas day before.

He gave me a broad smile when I came back to the bed bearing them. We’d both bought each other three.

He shifted sideways so I could sit at the edge of the bed next to him, but I still sat on the covers facing him, kneeling.

I couldn’t believe how excited I felt. No one had bought me a present because they cared about me, ever, as far as I could remember. Oh, Declan had bought me tons of stuff, but that had just been showing off; he hadn’t cared.

I opened the largest first. I knew it was clothing, as he’d known mine was.

It was a dress; an ivory colored dress. The material was light and fluid. I loved it. I held it up to my chest. It opened in a v at the front so it would show a little cleavage and the waist line would tuck beneath my breasts, while the length would fall to just above my knees. It was a beautiful style, and beautiful fabric, he had an eye for what looked good on me.

I smiled at him, feeling tears in my eyes again. “Thank you, it’s lovely.”

“This now.” He handed me a smaller parcel which also felt soft like it was clothing.

I ripped it open.

Silk underwear, the same color as the dress; a thong and a lacy bra.

I looked up.

He gave me a crooked smile. “Okay, maybe those were for me.”

I laughed.

“Open this now.” He handed me the last present, a long hard box with round edges.

“Jewelry?”

“You got me.”

I looked down and ripped open the wrapping to see a red velvet box.

I flipped it open.

It was a beautiful bracelet, a band of platinum and gold twisted together and interwoven, and set within the crossovers were a couple of diamonds. I daren’t think how much this cost him.

I looked up.

“It’s beautiful.”

“I know, and I thought it would look amazing on you.”

I pressed my fingers over his lips and then I kissed him, slipping my tongue into his mouth and losing myself in him.

His hands came up my back and gripped in my hair as he kissed me back.

He broke it after a bit and whispered over my lips, “Happy Christmas, sweetheart.”

“Happy Christmas.”

I kissed Rachel, again.

She was such an anomaly. She’d had bouts of anger and frustration today. And I knew she’d tried really hard to win over Mom at some points, like tidying up. But at other times she’d resorted to shoving people away, because they didn’t let her get close.

I couldn’t put myself in her place. I couldn’t imagine what it must have been like to grow up without a mom and dad who cared for you. The way she’d spoken, and the way she’d looked opening her presents, it was like she’d never opened a present on a Christmas morning.

Her ring gripped about my finger in an odd caress. I was really aware of it. But in honesty, I felt awkward about it. The guy should be buying the ring, and I’d bought her a bracelet…

I looked at this beautiful girl and remembered her carrying David like he was a precious bundle she was terrified of, and watching her through the window as she sat on the top step talking to Katie, so attentively…

Dammit, I wish Mom and Dad would accept her. Ever since she’d gone to bed they’d been in the kitchen warning me against her. She was sly, Mom said. She was too forward, Dad said. She was… she was… she was…

She wasn’t.

But why was it only me who could see the good in her?
She was different to any girl I’d known before. Yeah. She was a little unpredictable. Yeah. And maybe she didn’t have a good sense of right and wrong. But that was… exciting. It only added to the things I loved about her.

With one hand I cleared the presents from the mattress while my other still gripped in her hair. Then I tumbled her back onto the bed.

She laughed, her lips leaving mine.

She’d said she was happy when she’d cried. She wasn’t. She’d been really down most of the day, I knew it. But it was probably my fault for getting angry at the store. She’d enough to put up with here, without my troubles piled on top of her too.

I slid my hand over her thigh and up to her hip, as I pressed my tongue deeper into her mouth.

Her hands were running over my back, but it wasn’t going much further than this with the covers still between us.

I broke the kiss and looked into her green eyes.

God I loved her.

I smiled. “Come on then, you’d better get in the bed.”

She smiled, then climbed off the bed as I sat back.

She slipped her thong off before getting in and tucked it beneath the pillow with a seductive smile.

I shook my head at her and smiled too.

She was astride me, in a moment, and kissing me the next, her hands on my abs, her fingers spread wide. Then after a moment she pulled away and stripped off the tee she was wearing as a nightshirt.

We kissed again.

The sex was good. It felt like I hadn’t had sex with her for months. But there seemed a hard edged purpose behind it. Sex, was more than sex to her. It felt like it was an answer to her, maybe an escape from all that had happened today. I wondered what she’d been escaping in New York, on her one-night stands.

She was panting and sweaty and beautiful, and her end brought my end. It crashed in on me, more like lava spewing from a volcano than a wave rushing in from the sea.

We clung to each other - her forehead on my shoulder, my hands on her back.

I kissed her hair.

The light had been on all the way through and I’d watched her face and her eyes. She was just, such, a beautiful girl. My girl.

And I was hers.

“Snuggle down and I’ll turn the light off.”

She tumbled sideways, with a satisfied laugh.

I turned the light off and slid down beside her, then lifted my arm so she could slip under it. Sweaty, hot and exhausted in the most pleasant way, we went to sleep with Rach draped half over me.

~

I woke to the sound of the door handle dropping.

“Jason, happy…”

I rose up onto my elbows. “Mom.” Dammit, hadn’t she knocked? Why the hell was she coming into my room?

Rachel sighed and rolled onto her back. Then she woke and immediately gripped at the covers, holding them over her breasts.

“Jason…” Mom’s whisper was bitter and accusing, and then she turned her back.

I saw Dad behind her. Dammit. He was carrying presents.

I suppose Mom had hoped to share them with me without Rach being there.

They shut the door.

Shit.

My fingers were shaking when I got up and reached for my boxers and a t-shirt. But, for fuck’s sake, it shouldn’t be a crime to be in bed with my girlfriend. I was twenty-two.

I looked back at her. “You okay?” She nodded but I knew she wasn’t. She shouldn’t have to put up with this.

I left the room and shut the door behind me.

Mom and Dad were waiting in the hall, in their dressing gowns.

Mom had put the presents she’d bought on the hall table.

“She has to go, son,” Dad said.

I wasn’t in the mood for this. I’d drunk quite a bit last night and my head was pounding. I sat down on the third step of the stairs, and rested my elbows on my knees. “She isn’t going anywhere, Dad.”

“I asked you not to sleep with her here. It was my one rule, Jason.” Mom thrust at me. “It was bad enough last night when the two of you were outside so long… But to do it in my house, where… it’s… I’ll not have someone like her, in my house anymore. She has to go.”

Just as Mom said that, Rach opened the door of the den, dressed in the old tee of mine she’d come downstairs wearing, and a pair of my boxers.

They looked better on her than they did on me.

When she saw the scene in the hall she leaned against the door jamb and her arms crossed over her chest, gripping her ribs, in a self-comforting style.

You see, she came across as confident, but she wasn’t confident, why couldn’t Mom and Dad see it?

I gave her a sorry smile.

She nodded barely noticeably.

I felt her ring on my finger. I
was
hers.

Dad moved behind Mom and set an arm about her. “She should go, son. We aren’t comfortable with this.”

They weren’t even looking at Rachel or treating her like a person anymore.

I stood, then walked over to Rach and put my arm over her shoulders. Her head dropped against mine. “We’ll go. We’ll go for a run while you’re at church, eat dinner before we leave, then Dad can drive us to the airport. Though I doubt many airlines will be flying Christmas Day.”

Mom’s gaze focused on me with a look I’d never seen from her; there was anger and regret. She looked like she thought I was letting her down.

I wasn’t. They were letting me down. This was who she’d brought me up to be; someone who cared about the people no one else cared about.

I held Mom’s gaze, waiting on her judgment.

“You can stay until tomorrow.” She turned away and went upstairs. Dad gave me a disgusted look, then followed.

I turned to Rachel and she turned to me. Instinctively our foreheads pressed together as if with dual brain power we could think a way out of this trouble. But I didn’t have any ideas. I was starting to think Mom and Dad would never be won over.

Maybe just-get-out-of-town was the right option for us all.

~

I took Rach running in the lower park, along the river. It was the first time we’d run together since I’d found out about the baby. But loads of women kept jogging when they were pregnant.

It was quite a long run, but she did okay, and I matched my pace to hers so I wasn’t pushing her to go faster.

If only my parents could get
this
about us.

We ran so well together we shared my earphones when we got into the park. I’d loaded the songs from the CD she’d compiled onto my cell.

On the way to the park we’d had to keep running on the road to avoid the icy sidewalks, but in the park we ran across crisp snow five or six inches deep, leaving our footprints in it.

When we got back, Mom and Dad were still out, so we had a shower. It felt normal, like we were in New York. Smiling, Rachel suggested we started dinner after we’d showered.

She was sending out another olive branch. I hoped this time Mom would see it.

I peeled the potatoes. She prepped the vegetables. The turkey was already in, cooking on a low heat.

When Mom and Dad came home, they found us in the kitchen.

Mom took the pan of potatoes from me without a word and put them on to cook. But at least she didn’t tell Rachel to get out.

Rach looked at me, smiling.

I smiled back. We stayed in the kitchen, helping in silence.

We ate in silence too.

But the silence felt better than yesterday’s bitterness and accusations.

I remembered the presents Mom and Dad had bought me, which had been left on the hall table. They could stay there; Rachel was all I wanted.

When we finished eating, Rach sat back and sighed. “Well that was the best meal I think I ever ate, and this is certainly the best Christmas lunch I ever had. Thank you, Mrs. Macinlay, I really appreciate it.”

I reached across and gripped her fingers as they lay on the tablecloth.

Mom had looked up. She looked from Rachel to me. I threw her a smile. I got the impression, for the first time, that Mom saw the real Rachel.