Chapter 23

I stare down at my phone, contemplating calling Leila. I swipe to her face among my contacts, preparing to tell her when I’m suddenly hoisted up mid-air off the couch with a squeal. Jake, doing his best ‘bride-to-be’ hold, plants a kiss on my cheek with the most gorgeous smile I’ve ever seen.

I melt a little inside and can’t help but smile back at this forbidden contact. My stomach flutters crazily, and a tiny sparkle of something else, something warm and tingly, emerges.

“Did you miss me? I missed you,” he says. He’s obviously in a very good mood; this spontaneous grabbing has been lacking lately. ~Severely lacking.~

“Maybe,” I reply softly, looking away shyly. I’m suddenly nervous and awkward like I used to be before I knew he loved me. It feels weird to be nose to nose again. It feels like an age has passed since we were this close while awake.

“I come bearing gifts,” he grins, trying to tilt his head around to get me to look at him. His cuteness has me shaking my head and giving in to his intoxicating mood.

“Stop spending money on gifts. I told you I don’t need them,” I huff lightly. But the inner swell of joy I’m getting from being in his arms is nudging away the anger so I don’t sound mad. I sound like the old me.

“Technically, they’re not for you, ~Bambina~,” he winks cheekily and plants another kiss on me, this time on the corner of my mouth. His eyes focus a little too long on my lips. I can feel myself urging him just to do it. I can’t think straight as I take in those perfectly chiseled kissable lips so close to me. I clear my throat and bring my attention back to his eyes. ~Oh, those eyes.~

“Who are they for?” I sound childish, and he only smiles harder, a look of adoration evident on his face. He’s chipping away at me, melting some of my ice with his current behavior and mood.

“I’ll show you.” He turns and carries me to the bedroom, gently laying me on the bed beside the bags. Yet as he does, I instantly return to cold and upset, that inner swell of warmth dissipating fast, my mood trickling away, and I realize what it is almost immediately; a clarity or epiphany like a lightning bolt out of the darkness.

~I miss Jake’s affection! His touch, his caresses, his hugs. I miss us! That’s what this constant anger is.~

I miss him touching me freely, without permission or needing to ask for it. I miss the spontaneous, arrogant, ~‘I can touch you because you’re mine’~ Jake. I miss being picked up, hauled around, and grabbed. I miss the way he would kiss me a million times a day just because he had to, and I miss that body molded to mine, making me feel complete. I miss that I belonged to him, and he never sought my permission to possess me. I owned him, and he owned me, and neither ever needed any urging to take what we needed from one another.

This space between us is what’s killing me, knocking me off kilter because Jake is the one who always grounded me. Always brought my sanity back with his affectionate, touchy, ‘~hands-on Carrero’~ approach. And he isn’t giving it to me anymore.

I watch as he lifts a corner of a bag and ungraciously dumps stuff all over the bed while I try to get a handle on my thoughts and the realization I’ve come to and what to do about it.

A sudden catch in my throat almost chokes me as a bundle of tiny white baby clothes unfurls before me, shocking me with the unexpectedness of it, completely tearing my thoughts from anything else.

“Jake … You shouldn’t. It’s too soon,” I blurt out in hushed tones. My hands betray me as they automatically pick up a tiny white Babygro in soft velvet fabric. I pick it up to hold it against my abdomen without realizing what I’m doing. It’s so tiny and fragile, so real and symbolic. A surge of something wells up inside me, and the urge to cry overwhelms me. It’s precious and small, making me think of the little life growing inside me with every breath I take. My heart catches in my throat.

“I … kinda got a bit carried away,” he admits. He tips up another two bags, pouring out a bundle of blue, a bundle of pink, and one of lemon, plus one fluffy giraffe sitting proudly among them with a goofy grin on its adorable face. It strangely reminds me of Jake, but I can’t fathom why.

For the first time in weeks, I get a stupid spontaneous smile spreading across my face, and I stare at him in a completely new light. It’s as though I’ve just woken up, and blinking in the sunlight, I gaze at him as he comes into focus. He looks happy, idling through the stuff on the bed, his green eyes almost luminescent. I’ve never seen him as gorgeous as he is right now, beaming over his baby’s things, looking every bit irresistible to me.

I couldn’t fill my heart with more love than this moment. Everything that has happened, everything we’ve done to one another, yet this little moment here seems to wipe it all out. Just looking at him like this, knowing I’ve been falling apart without his touch, has me aching. I want him, and I need him so badly. This is making me crazy.

“Kiss me,” I say so directly and spontaneously that I even take myself by surprise. His eyes snap to mine, and he seems to take a moment to realize what I’ve asked. A flash of something in his eyes, hesitation, and something else … apprehension. The tension rises in my stomach with every delayed second.

We seem to stay motionless, looking at one another, while I wait for some verbal response, every moment becoming agony as the pit of self-doubt grows inside me. It’s almost like he no longer wants to kiss me.

~Shit … I’m losing him. Crazy Emma pushed him too far away. Stupid Emma, you’ve been pushing him away for weeks despite everything he has done to show you he loves you.~

Jake sweeps forward, pinning me to the cushions, his mouth meeting mine in almost a flicker of a second. I don’t see the reaction coming, so I’m bowled backward, and before I know what’s happening, our mouths are locked, and his hands are cradling my face. That soft, warm mouth, the feelings it rips up to the surface, consumes me, gently molding our movements in perfect unison. His mouth was always made for kissing mine. My toes tingle right up to my pelvis, and my heart aches for him.

He kisses the breath right out of me, moving on top of me on the bed so he can lie over me, yet holding his weight up. He gently slides his tongue into my mouth, a soft yet firm motion, as we get used to one another again. This is so right. I get lost in his feel and what he’s doing to me. It feels like he hasn’t kissed me in eternity, and it physically pains me. It makes me want to cry.

He tastes as I remember, smells, and feels like my dreams, and with every second of this unity, a part of me starts healing. I groan almost instantly, a thousand butterflies fluttering up inside my stomach, warmth spreading through my veins. My fingers find their way up around his neck and across those muscular shoulders, hair, and jaw. I’m roaming, devouring what I’ve been lacking for so long.

I wait for the vision of her to break in, wrenching us apart, but I’m too absorbed in the sensations and overwhelming tug of desire building up inside of me to let her in. I push myself into him firmly, intensifying the passion of the kiss, letting our tongues caress, breathing hard and heavily. His intoxicating touch drives my body into a frenzy now that his mouth is locked with mine.