BASH
We successfully snuck out of the ball and went back to the house. As soon as we got inside, Ember kicked off her heels, and I loosened my tie, collapsing onto the couch. It had been surprisingly stressful staying away from her, pretending that we were just friends and nothing more. I needed to touch her again.
I held out my hand, and she put her hand into mine, curling up next to me on the couch. She rested her head on my shoulder.
“Well. Here we are. In an empty house,” I said. “Whatever shall we do?”
“We could . . . mop the kitchen?” she offered.
I laughed and pulled her into my lap so that I could kiss her. “No, thanks.”
She ran her fingers through my hair, sending waves of pleasure down my neck. “Hmm. We could retile the bathroom floor. Or organize the garage.”
“That was not what I had in mind.”
She crossed her arms and gave me a very serious look. “If you don’t want to do chores, I guess I’ll have to come up with something else to do. Because my mom did say it was especially my job to make you feel welcome here.”
I ran my hands along her hips so that they came to rest on her back. “I’m not feeling all that welcome.”
Ember leaned forward and kissed me softly, once, twice, three times before pulling away. “Are you feeling it now?”
“Not yet.”
With a smile, she leaned in to kiss me again. Her lips moved softly and slowly, like she was memorizing what my mouth felt like against hers. Sweet, with a hint of something more just behind it. She moved her mouth back a fraction, hovering just above mine, tantalizingly out of reach. “And now?”
“Maybe a little bit more welcome.”
She reached up to run the tips of her fingers along my lips, outlining them lightly. My entire body tightened in response. I lightly bit her index finger and then soothed it with my lips. Then she pressed whisper-soft kisses on my face, on my eyelids, along my cheeks, on my nose, following my jawline. She would move close to my mouth and then immediately move away before I could capture her in a kiss.
Her teasing had my heart throbbing so hard I could feel it in my earlobes.
She kissed my throat, nipping and soothing my skin, just like I’d done with her finger. “What about now?” she asked, the words murmured into my neck.
“Getting warmer.” My words were husky, deepened by the harsh undertone of my breathing. What was it about this woman that made me want to completely lose control? To run headfirst into an all-consuming fire?
Ember pulled back, studying me with slightly enlarged pupils, making her eyes look like dark flames. She scooted closer, sending waves of longing and agony through me. She reached up and finished loosening my tie, sliding it slowly off my neck. She undid the top button of my shirt, kissing the skin she’d just exposed. She moved to the next button, and then the next, untucking the bottom of the shirt from my pants so that she could finish. Once she had my shirt open, she smiled and said, “That’s better,” as she ran her fingers down my chest, causing each muscle to contract as she came into contact with it.
I probably should have felt objectified, but I was down for it. The velvet of her dress felt amazing against my skin as she pressed into me, ready to finally kiss me.
No more tentativeness, no more softness. This kiss was what I’d been waiting for the entire day. Pure, unadulterated passion. Like throwing a lit match into a pool of gasoline—from one tiny ember to a blazing inferno. Instant ignition.
I groaned low in my throat when she deepened the kiss, every cell in my body vibrating with excitement and desire. I kept one hand on her upper back, feeling the way her skin burned beneath my touch, and the other I moved up to her face, then into her hair just so that I could hear her make those breathy, panting noises I loved when I caressed her scalp. She obliged me, and the sound sent blood rushing hot and fast through my veins.
“What about now?” she asked, her warm and sweet breath blowing across my face.
“I definitely feel welcome,” I told her. She made me feel like I’d come home, and I was where I belonged. With her.
Then she was kissing me again, leading me to a point where I thought my body might shatter from the tension she created, my stomach quivering with how much I loved and wanted her.
I pulled her face away, waiting for her glassy eyes to focus. I loved that I could make her feel that way. Caught up, lost in pleasure, letting everything else fall away.
But I didn’t know what she’d think about what I wanted to do next. “The last time we were here, together, kissing in this house . . .”
She looked so adorably confused it was all I could do not to immediately kiss her again. “What about it?”
“I was thinking we should go upstairs to your room to replace that memory with something better.”
“I . . .” She let her words trail off, and I held my breath. I’d respect whatever she decided, but I was heavily rooting for her to choose going upstairs.
“Slow is a four-letter word, as far as I’m concerned,” I told her teasingly. “But it’s your choice, and I’ll follow your lead. I don’t want to pressure you, and I’ll always respect whatever choice you make. I’m just sharing how I feel about it. Personally, I’d like to convince you that slow really is a bad word.”
“You probably could,” she agreed.
Then time slowed as I looked at her, really looked at her. She was so beautiful. Her hair was messy, her lips slightly swollen, her cheeks flushed, her eyes soft and loving. How had I gotten so incredibly lucky?
“What?” she asked self-consciously.
“I just . . . you’re so off-the-charts beautiful that I want to remember this moment forever. I’m burning an image of you into my mind.”
“I’m in love with you, Bash,” she breathed, making the entire image all the sweeter.
“I’m so hopelessly in love with you.” Not able to stand not kissing her for a second longer, I pulled her lips down to mine, and she made a sound that was a mixture of thankfulness and relief. Had she always tasted this sweet? How had I ever walked away from this? From the explosive chemistry between us that threatened to burn down the house around us?
The entire world shrank down to this moment, to the sense of weightlessness, of rampaging fire, of Ember’s curves and softness pressed against me.
I was about to ask her again about going upstairs when I became aware of a noise near the front door. It sounded like Roscoe.
“This is the greatest thing that has ever happened to me.”
Lauren. I turned my head toward the sound, unable to process what had just happened.
Only it wasn’t just Lauren. It was everyone. Tricia, Dad, and Marley all stood there, their mouths open, eyes wide.
Ember recovered first, getting to her feet. I pulled the sides of my shirt closed and crossed my arms. Ember pressed the back of her hand to her mouth, and I didn’t know if that was out of fear or to stop herself from saying something.
“What is going on?” Tricia finally asked.
Silence filled the void left by her words until Lauren said, not helpfully, “I think everyone knows what was going on and what we almost interrupted.”
This was not how I wanted this to happen.
Tricia spoke again, the disapproval dripping from her every word. “I am so . . . shocked. Horrified. How did this happen? How long has it been going on for?”
Ember shook her head, and she ran out of the room, going to the front door.
Cursing, I chased after her, ignoring my dad calling my name. “Ember!” I yelled, catching up to her before she could get in her car. I put my hands on her shoulders. “Stay. Let’s talk this out. We can explain.”
Tears were pouring down her face. “You heard her. I can’t do this.”
“Yes, you can.” Frustration boiled up inside of me, and then seemed to just spill out. “You don’t have to sacrifice your life and the things you want just to make your mom happy. Why can’t you stand up to her?”
From her expression I expected her to deny my statement. Then her shoulders collapsed inward, and she hung her head. “I don’t know.”
“Don’t run away.” The irony of me being the one telling her to stay was not lost on me. I was the last person on earth who should be telling her not to run.
“I can’t.” She got in her car, and I stood there, just watching her go. I glanced up to see everybody else either on the porch or just inside the house. I buttoned up my shirt and walked back to face them.
No more. I was done hiding; I was done worrying about everybody else’s feelings and sacrificing the woman I loved.
“I’m in love with Ember,” I told them. Tricia stared at me, shocked, and then whirled around to run upstairs.
Marley rushed out to me, throwing her arms around me. “If you two love each other, then I think you should be together.”
Lauren gave me two thumbs up. “You know I’m on board.”
“Son, let’s you and I have a conversation. I have the feeling it’s long overdue,” my dad said. I followed him out to the garage, where we’d had most of our serious conversations growing up. Usually while our hands were busy working on his truck. Today was no different. Despite the fact that he was still in a suit, my father started reorganizing his tools on the pegboard, taking them down one at a time and then moving them to a new spot.
“If you’re waiting for an apology, Dad, you’re not going to get one. I don’t regret anything that’s happened between us. I love her. I loved her before you ever even met Tricia. We dated in high school, and were serious about each other.”
“Why didn’t you tell me then?” he asked as he cleaned a nut splitter. The rough edge to his voice was the only thing that betrayed how he was actually feeling. He sounded hurt, which made me feel horribly guilty, my stomach twisting and turning in response to his tone.
“What would your advice have been back then? If I’d told you, ‘Dad, the girl I’m in love with is moving into our house and is going to be sleeping down the hall from me, but don’t worry about it, everything will be fine,’ you would have told me the same thing. You still would have warned me to stay away from her, wouldn’t you?”
He hung the nut splitter onto its new place on the board. “I suspected something was there, but I didn’t know that you were in love with her. You were teenagers. I thought it was a physical thing that would pass.”
“It hasn’t passed.”
“I saw.”
He sent a pointed glance in my direction, and that’s when I realized that I had misbuttoned my top three buttons. With a mutter of “Fetching Canada,” I set about fixing it. “I did this for you, you know.”
That made my dad pause, his hand hanging in the air. “Did what for me?”
I got my buttons into the right holes. “I gave up Ember for you. For Marley, too, but mostly for you. You were so sad for so long that I didn’t want to be the reason your new marriage didn’t work out. I left so that there wouldn’t be this huge problem with you and Tricia. Like I could give you happiness where Mom had just taken it away.”
“I always wondered what it was that drove you to Pennsylvania. But I figured you’d tell me when you were ready.” He let out a long, tired sigh. “But it wasn’t your job to make up for my mistakes, or your mother’s. I don’t think I suffered as much as you thought I did.”
That information sent me reeling. “What do you mean?”
“I mean, yes, it hurt when your mother left. I loved her. We had a family together, and she walked out. But I focused on you and Marley, and I moved past it. Even before I met Tricia, I had a good life. A life that made me happy. Even now, I only wish good things for your mom. I hope she really is clean and sober and that she’s able to build a relationship with you and Marley, if that’s what you want.”
I couldn’t even think about my mom situation right now. She wasn’t what mattered. “This isn’t about Mom. I’m trying to explain to you what is going on and what happened in the past and why I made the decisions that I did. I thought I was doing the right thing. I was trying so hard not to hurt anyone.”
“I know it wasn’t your intention, but you did hurt people. Which I understand all too well, because I’m kind of the expert on it. I’ve spent most of my life hurting people I love, even when I was trying to do the right thing.” He shook his head, as if he could just shake those painful memories away. “I am the parent. I should have talked to you about this. I should have told you that running away wasn’t a solution. I shouldn’t have let you go. But I was trying to respect your independence and your ability to make your own choices for your life.”
His words twisted in my gut, like he’d plunged a knife into me and then turned it. “I didn’t want to wreck your new relationship and—”
My dad cut me off. “You also never had the power to break up me and Tricia. We made commitments and vows to each other that we intend to keep. Even if the two of you do date and it ends badly, that’s not going to affect our relationship.”
“That’s good. Because you should probably know that I’m not here to ask your permission to date Ember. I gave her up once, and I’m never doing that again. I love her and she loves me, and everybody else is going to have to find a way to be okay with that.” By everybody, I meant him and Tricia.
Which he seemed to recognize. I heard a note of respect when he said, “Then it sounds to me like you should go find Ember and tell her what you told me. You can take the truck.”
“Thanks, Dad.”
It had gone better than I’d anticipated, but even if it hadn’t, nothing would have changed. I was always going to put Ember’s needs first.
As I headed back into the house to grab the truck keys, I started to think about Ember and her nearly pathological need to please her mother. If Tricia was upset about this and stood in our way, what would Ember do? Would she keep doing whatever her mom asked?
I stopped short, my hand on the car door as a realization slammed into me. Here I was upset that Ember would do anything to make her mother happy, but . . . hadn’t I just confessed to doing the same thing? I wanted so badly to make sure that Marley and my dad were happy that I had done what I thought they’d wanted. I’d sacrificed what I wanted, and I’d run away.
Now Ember was running away, but I was going to find her. I knew better than anyone what she was feeling. And this time, I was going to fight for her. Whatever it took, whatever she needed from me, I was in.