I handled conference calls in the study, burying myself in numbers and projections. I went through itineraries with Mickey, reframing my appointments for virtual meetings. I listened to the acquisition proposals, studying the due diligences of the companies I wanted to bring into my portfolio. And I did all of it while digging into the details of Journey’s attack.
I hadn’t made much headway. The LAPD wasn’t any more successful.
I’d watched the scratchy feed the gym had provided a hundred times. It was dark and impossibl
e to make out the gunman. If only she had hired a new bodyguard. If only she took her safety as seriously as I did. None of this would have happened.
She wanted to be normal. She wanted to get coffee and go for runs in the park. She wanted to shop with friends and help out at church bakes sales on Sundays, but that wasn’t the kind of life she lived. A-list celebrities couldn’t do those kinds of things unless they were willing to hide out in tiny Montana towns.
Wasn’t that what I had loved about her? She was normal. Journey was a breath of fresh air in a town that ran on greed and popularity. We used to joke about moving somewhere far from the fame. Move back to her roots in Georgia. To the small town where she grew up in. That was the woman I fell in love with—the one who could be sexy and glamorous one minute, and have be buried up to her elbows in cookie dough the next without an ounce of makeup on. She was kindess and brains personified. It made it even more unbelievable that someone wanted to hurt her.
There had to be more to the attack. There had to be more information out there about a motive, but I didn’t want to press her at Big Bear. I didn’t want to ask too much too soon. Part of me knew I was using every distraction I could grab, to keep the inevitable from happening. I didn’t want to have to let her go.
My chest pounded. I wanted her as much now as the first time I met her. I wanted her more than I did today in the woods.
“You left me,” she whispered. “I woke up and you were gone. Just vanished.”
“I know.” I held her wrists against my chest. I had regretted it every fucking day.
I dropped her wrists, tangling my hands in her hair. I crushed her mouth with a rough kiss. A kiss that said everything I couldn’t.
The little moans coming from her throat made me ache for her. My tongue twisted along hers. Tasting her. Drinking her in.
Her hands wrapped against my neck.
I could devour her. Wipe away the pain of the past. Kiss her breathless until she forgot I hurt her. I wasn’t the man who was supposed to leave. I was the man who had sworn to always protect her with my life.
I groaned against the softness of her lips. “J.”
She nipped at my mouth, climbing into my lap one leg at a time. My tongue flicked along hers. Her skin was warm under the flimsy tank top she slept in. My fingers pressed into her flesh, remembering how she felt. Every smooth line. Every curve. My hands molded to the roundness of her breasts. Her tits perked into hard points under my touch. Sweet precious Journey.
She sighed as I lifted the tank top over her head.
Her nipples rubbed against my chest as I brought my mouth crashing down on hers. The friction built as her hips ground into my cock.
“Why did you leave me?” she whimpered.
I sighed. “It’s complicated. I didn’t want to.”
“Tell me you didn’t have a choice. Tell me someone put a gun to your head.”
My hands coasted to her hips. “There was a gun to my head,” I groaned. “I swear I did it for you.”
Our bodies were on a course that was set to combust. We could say and pledge anything we wanted. There was no turning back. No turning off the charge of electricity pulsing beneath our skin.
“Don’t leave me again,” she whimpered.
“I won’t,” I promised, tugging her panties at her hips. I meant it. I meant every fucking word.
I could have lost her. With one bullet my life would have ended.
I’d never put us in that position again. Tonight I’d prove it. I’d show her how much I loved her. How sorry I was. As I buried myself inside her over and over. Making her scream my name. Coaxing her to come harder than she ever had.
Tonight was a new beginning.
We’d fuck until the sun came up. Until we were covered in sweat and the smell of sex. Fuck until we had forgiven each other. Until I had forgiven myself.
I lowered Journey to the pillow, sliding my hand between her legs. Her knees fell to the side as I massaged her center and her hips danced under my command.