Chapter Forty-Four
Stone
* * *
We collapse in a heap, gasping, our skin sticky sweet and the electric buzz of satisfaction racing through our veins. I taste her mouth one more time before peeling myself off of her breathless body and making my way to the hall bath to clean up. When I come back, I find her in the same position I left her in … utterly spent.
“Here.” I lower myself to my knees, running a warm washcloth along her inner thighs before finishing at her tender sex.
A long white scar down her left leg catches my eye. It must be eight, ten inches at least. A quarter of an inch wide. Thick and raised. Slightly jagged.
“What happened?” I ask.
She bites her lip, propping herself up, hesitating.
“I had an accident … many years ago …” she finally answers.
“What kind of accident?”
“I fell asleep behind the wheel of my car,” she says. “The night Jude broke up with me … it was late, and I was already tired. I’d been crying. My eyes were … swollen shut I guess … they think I passed out for a minute and drifted over the center line and hit a median. Rolled my car. Ended up with a concussion. Fractured wrist. Thirty-five stitches in my scalp … Broke my femur in two places.”
She traces the scar before dragging her knees to her chest as if this, of all things, is what awakens her vulnerable side.
“Why didn’t you stay at our place that night?” I ask.
“I asked … Jude said no.”
“Are you fucking kidding me?” Heat creeps through my veins, replacing the satisfaction that lived there only moments ago.
That bastard didn’t just leave her with emotional scars, he left her with physical ones too.
A daily reminder.
I slip my hands around her left leg, gently coaxing it flat, and then I lower my lips, grazing the jagged white line with a kiss.
“You deserved better than him,” I say.
“I know that now.”
“I’m sorry you have to live with this reminder every day the rest of your life.”
Her eyes turn glassy, and she lifts a shoulder. “It’s just scar tissue … it’s harder, thicker, more protective. I like to think of it as my body’s way of saying no one will ever hurt me like that again.”
God, I love this woman. Her strength, her beauty, her way with words. The way she doesn’t let anyone dim her light, yet at the same time, she’s not afraid to be vulnerable.
Jovie Vincent is the real thing in every sense of the phrase.
I sit in my car for a bit before heading inside where Jude and his dad are waiting. An hour ago, I was surfing the highest of highs, so caught up in everything with Jovie, I didn’t think about coming home and looking Jude in the eyes. I didn’t think about what I was—or wasn’t going to say to him.
Killing my engine, I step outside and make my way up the front walk.
The house is dark and quiet when I step in.
“Paul?” I call out. “Jude?”
No one answers, and for that I’m admittedly relieved.
I need a moment to be alone—to process the surreal events of this afternoon.
I kick off my shoes, drop my keys and wallet in the kitchen, and make my way to my study. Collapsing in my favorite chair, I close my eyes and take a deep breath.
I could have stayed all night if she let me, living between her thighs, tasting her lips a million times again … but alas, she had long-standing dinner plans with a friend.
It’s impossible to know where we go from here—where we should go from here.
All I know is that I want to go with her.
Wherever that may be.
Chapter Forty-Five
Jovie
* * *
“I slept with Stone,” I blurt the second Monica walks into my apartment Monday afternoon. She’s bringing by a handful of dress options I might borrow to wear on for an upcoming interview for a local news station.
She drops her bag on the floor and drapes the clothes over the nearest chair, her mouth agape. “You what, now?”
“I slept with Stone,” I say, clearer this time.
“Whoa, whoa, whoa.” She waves her hands frantically in the air. “Okay, back up. How? When? Tell me everything.”
I give her the rundown, going into detail only where it counts, and when I’m done she’s practically bursting with excitement. Her tanned cheeks are cherry red and her fingertips flitter and she bounces in my kitchen chair like a child on Christmas morning.
“I think you were right,” I say.
She cups her ear, “Let me hear that one more time. A little louder for those in the back.”
She points to the row of house plants in front of my window.
“Look at you, all giddy and whatnot. I don’t think I’ve seen you smile that big since … well, I won’t go there. But you’re glowing and I love that for you.”