The Fixed Trilogy: Fixed on You, Found in You, Forever With You (23 page)

“Hudson,” I cried against his lips, not caring this time that we were in the middle of a fight or that the office door might not be locked. “I need you, too.”

He’d known we’d needed this before when I’d pushed him away. He was such a perfect lover, understanding my body and its demands even better than I did. Submitting to him, everything became easy. I could forget for a moment what barriers lay in between us while he took me in the way where no barriers separated us at all.

Hudson moved my body backward until the couch bumped against the back of my calf, and a fleeting thought of, “Oh, yay; we’re going to christen the couch!” passed through my mind when he let go of me to reach under my short A-line dress and pull my panties down below my knees. He pushed me back on the couch, spread my legs open and gathered the material of my dress up around my stomach, completely exposing my most private parts for him.

I felt beautiful like that—lying in wait for my lover who I knew would give and take as he pleased.

He gazed down at me, desire clouding his eyes as he undid his belt and lowered his pants only far enough to release his bulging cock from its prison. As fast as he moved, it seemed forever before he lowered himself on top of me, urging my legs further apart with his knees. Then he shoved into me with such force I gasped.

He pounded into me with driving thrusts, focused on his own need, his own desire for orgasm. But even through the fog of his own lust, he attended to me, his thumb pressing expertly on my clit, massaging me toward my own climax.

The act may have been primarily physical, but a deeper connection resulted from the joining of our bodies. Each stroke eased the sting of his earlier words, and I was certain that the motivation behind each deep lunge was to chase away his own torment, to release himself from the guilt of wounding me.

He didn’t shower me with his usual sex words, but we were hardly quiet as I whimpered under him and he repeated my name over and over like a mantra, like a prayer. And then the sound turned guttural as he flexed into me, coming in me with such violent eruption that it spurred me to release with him on my own shaky cry, “Hudson!”

He collapsed onto me, his head buried in my neck where his warm breath against my skin felt soothing. I loved it there, buried beneath him, his cock still buried inside me, our precious bond so fragile it required this carnal connection. Hudson’s breathing becoming even, and his body became lax until his weight pressed into me with sweet agony.

Just as I began to wonder if he’d fallen asleep he whispered, “I wanted to win you. But I didn’t want to hurt you.” His arm tightened around me. “That’s the last thing I wanted.”

I understood him completely. After destroying so many people, after ruining my relationship with my only living relative, it was hell to imagine hurting even one more person. It had kept me from becoming close to anyone for so long. But now, I was ready to move past that fear so that I could earn the reward of intimacy.

I stroked Hudson’s hair. “That’s part of relationships, H. People get hurt.” I kissed his head. “But you can make it better, too.”

He lifted his head to meet my eyes. “Tell me how.”

Cupping his face in my hands, I rubbed my thumbs across his skin, rough from five o’clock shadow. “Let me in,” I pleaded.

“Don’t you see I already have?”

I closed my eyes, hoping to stop a fresh stream of tears. He had opened up, but only enough for me to slip the tip of my toes past the threshold of the door he kept so tightly closed. It was a big step for him. But it wasn’t really letting me in. Everything he shared with me I had to pry from his lips. He hadn’t given me his trust. It wasn’t enough to build upon and if that was as far as the door was opening, we had no hope for a future.

I swallowed hard and opened my eyes, letting one teardrop escape. Wiping it away, I rolled out from underneath him and pulled my panties up as I stood.

Hudson sighed. Then I heard the sound of his zipper and, to my ears, it was a metaphor—putting himself away, shutting himself off. Again.

But when he stood, he wrapped his arms around me from behind. His voice rasped in my ear. “Why do you act like I’m running?”

“Because you shut me out. Isn’t that the same as running?”

“What about you? What about how you showed up in our bedroom crying and couldn’t even tell me why?”

“That was different.” But maybe it wasn’t. I hadn’t told him what his mother said because it hurt too much. Because I was embarrassed.

He spun me around to look at him. “What did she say to you, Alayna?”

He’d thrown down the gauntlet. If I wanted him to be open, I’d have to be too. “That I was insignificant. She called me a whore.” I looked at a chip of paint on the wall, not able to meet his eyes.

He cursed under his breath. “My mother’s heartless and cruel.” Putting two fingers under my chin, he turned my face to him. “You’re not a whore, Alayna. Not even close. And the magnitude of your importance in my life can’t be put into words.”

“She also said that you can’t ever love me.”

He froze. Then his hand dropped from my face. “I’ve told you that before.”

The pain of his statement hit me hard in the gut. I pulled out of his arms. “Well, she told me again.” I swung back toward him. “So there, I opened up. Are you happy?”

“Alayna…”

I ached in the center of my being. This was why I hadn’t told him—because despite what he and Sophia had said, I’d believed that he could love. That he could love me.

Tears flooded my eyes and splashed down my face. “How could you not think I’d fall in love with you, Hudson? Even if you didn’t mean for it to happen, how could I not?” I wiped at my damp cheek with the back of my hand. “Does that mean anything to you at all?”

He drew back as if I’d slapped him. “How can you ask that? Of course, it does. But, Alayna, you don’t know that you’d still say that if you knew me.”

“I
do
know you.”

“Not everything.”

“Only because you haven’t let me in!” We were spinning in circles, getting nowhere.

He spread his arms out to the sides. “What is it you want to know? About what I did to other women? About Celia? I’m the reason she got pregnant, Alayna. Because I spent an entire summer making her fall in love with me when I felt nothing for her. For fun. For something to do. And then, when I’d completely broken her, she became destructive—sleeping around, partying, drugs. You name it, she did it. She didn’t even know who the father was.”

I heaved a breath, wiping the lingering tears from my face. “So you claimed it was yours.”

“Yes.”

“Because you felt responsible.”

“Yes. She lost the baby at three months. Likely from the drinking and drugs she’d consumed early on. She was devastated.”

“That’s awful.” I could sense he felt as responsible for the death of Celia’s unborn baby as for its conception in the first place. It was a lot of weight to carry, a lot of blame.

But even though I could concede Hudson had a role in the situation, it didn’t scare me away. “It’s awful,” I repeated, “but I don’t understand. You thought this would make me not love you…why?”

He perched on the arm of the sofa and pierced me with an incredulous stare. “Because it changes everything. I did that. That’s who I am. It’s my past and it’s very ugly.”

A sob threatened, but I choked it back with a hard swallow. The ugly things—there were so many ugly things about myself that always lay beneath the surface of every conversation, every moment. They poisoned and destroyed. I was well versed in the ugly.

It broke my heart that the same darkness haunted Hudson. That he believed his history to be so horrible that it could change things between us. It couldn’t. It didn’t.

I moved in front of him and rested my hands on his shoulders. “Do you think your ugly is any different than mine?”

“This isn’t like following someone around or calling too many times, Alayna.”

“It was an unforeseen tragedy, Hudson. A game that got out of hand. You didn’t set out for Celia to get pregnant and have a miscarriage. And you can’t diminish the things I’ve done to a simple statement like that either. I hurt people. Deeply. But that was before. Less than ideal pasts, remember? It doesn’t mean it defines our future. Or even our now.”

He blew out a warm breath as his thumb brushed at a lingering tear in the corner of my eye. “When I’m with you, I almost believe that.”

“That just means you need to spend more time with me.”

He chuckled softly. “Is that what that means?” He trailed his thumb down my face to caress my cheek. “Yesterday morning, when I got the phone call that required me to be in Cincinatti—I couldn’t even let myself look at you, sleeping in that bed. If I did, I wouldn’t have been able to leave.”

My chest swelled with his confession. “I thought you left because you were freaking out.” His puzzled look drove me to clarify. “Because of the love stuff.”

“I wasn’t freaking out. I was surprised, that’s all.”

“Surprised?”

“That that’s what we were feeling.” His gaze was soft. “That it was love.”

I could barely breathe, afraid that if I did I’d disturb the path of our conversation. “It was.” I swallowed. “It is.”

“Hmm.” He smiled. “I never felt this before. I didn’t know.” His swept his hands down the sides of my torso. “But, Alayna, I’ve never had a healthy romantic relationship. Every woman who’s loved me…” His voice tightened. “I don’t want to break you, too.”

“You’re not going to break me, Hudson. I thought you might, at first. Turns out you make me better. And I think I do the same for you.”

“You do.”

“If you decide to not…” I searched for how to say what I meant. “Follow through…with whatever this is that we have, it will hurt. But I won’t be broken.”

“But it would hurt?”

“Like a motherfucker.”

“Then we better follow through.” He drew me closer, wrapping his arms around my waist. “Alayna, you’re fired. You can’t be my pretend girlfriend anymore.” His face grew serious. “Be my real girlfriend instead.”

Joy swept through me in a dizzying rush. “I kind of think I already am.”

“You are.”

“Can I still call you H?”

“Absolutely not.” He turned his mouth to meet mine and kissed me with lips sweet and tender, but passionate all the same.

I don’t know how long we stayed there like that—on the arm of the chair, his body wrapped around me, kissing and cuddling. Time was irrelevant in that moment we were sharing.

Finally though, when I remembered that the club would be opening soon and that I still had a shift to work, I pulled my lips from his and asked the question that I knew was burning in both our minds. “What now?”

One side of Hudson’s mouth curled up in a sexy smile. “Come to my place after you finish here.”

Yes. Of course, yes!
“I’m not off until three.”

“I don’t care. I want you in my bed.”

“Then, yes.”

With great reluctance, I pulled myself away. I offered my hand to help him up, and he took it, rising in the graceful way of his. He let go of my hand and tugged the back of his jacket down and adjusted his tie, transforming back into the man most people knew: Hudson Pierce, ruler of the business world.

I watched, mesmerized, still in shock that this man was mine.
Mine.
It was the first time I’d said it to myself, and it sounded so wonderful I thought I could never get tired of saying it—
mine, mine, mine.

His eyes swept behind him as he buttoned his jacket. “Nice couch,” he said, as if noticing it for the first time.

“Thanks,” I laughed.

He studied me with amusement before fixing my hair and straightening the collar of my dress. Then he took my hands in his. “Tell Jordan to take you to the Bowery. He knows where it is.”

“Not the fuck pad?” My voice seemed unusually high, laced with surprise and excitement.

“No. My home. I’ll leave a key with the doorman.”

I hadn’t been anywhere but the loft with him and didn’t even know where he lived. I’d thought it was a good thing before. But now that he’d invited me, there was no other place I’d rather be.

And, besides, I was ready—ready to stop being afraid of making mistakes, ready to let myself be truly healed of my past, ready to start again without fear of regret.

Lacing my fingers through his, I giggled. Since when did I giggle? “We’re really doing this, aren’t we? Moving forward.”

“We are.”

He pulled me in for another embrace, seemingly as unable to let go of me as I was unable to let go of him. As fixed on me as I was on him.

“I’m going to rock your world,” I said at his ear before sucking on the lobe.

He nipped at my neck, kindling my desire yet again. “I can’t wait,” he said.

“Neither can I.”

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

For as many times as I’ve composed these in my head, this task should be easy. Yet, as I sit here preparing to acknowledge the people who helped make
Fixed on You
a reality, I’m overwhelmed.

Deep breath and start somewhere.

First, a deep well of gratitude to my husband, who let me take the time to write and always missed me when I was in my book world, but never pressured me to return (almost never.) No matter who the main guy is, honey, it’s always you.

To my children, who somehow managed to grow and thrive despite my frequent lack of attention. You are the lights of my life; thank you for letting Mommy be a person too.

To my mother, who has always encouraged me and is still proud despite the subject matter of my books.

To Bethany for the copyedits—you are truly a lifesaver—and for telling me, “That’s not where this story begins.” Also, for your editorial letters (I treasure them) and being an endless cheerleader, while still giving meaningful advice that always rang true. I’m glad I could bring some magic to your bath time.

To Sophia for my cover—it’s exactly what I wanted. But also for much more. The motivation, the heart, the strength. You’ve taught me more about the publishing/writing world than anyone, and I can’t begin to express my thanks. And yet I try: thank you, thank you, thank you.

To Robyn, for being the idea person in my life. Even though I often didn’t take it, I always treasured your advice. You are brilliant. I mean, blow pops? GENIUS!

To Tristina: You are a surrogate parent to all my romances—none of them would ever be ready to send into the world without your wise input and dedication in reading each and every version. If anyone asks, Hudson is yours.

To Robyn, Jackie, and Lisa. Each of you added very different but beloved layers to this book. Thank you for giving my words the time.

To Alessa—your transparency and answering of my endless questions has been more than anyone could ever ask from another person. You are a goddess in my book.

To the WrAHM society—an adequate thank you to all of you amazing women would result in another book. And lots of alcohol. And dirty pictures. You girls are the support and friendship I’ve been looking for. Gen, thanks for creating this group—it’s changed my life.

To Bob Diforio, my agent. Not many agents are on board with self-publishing. Thanks for being open-minded and supporting me in this decision.

To Julie and AToMR tours. You are worth so much more than you’re paid. Thank you for helping get this book out there.

To Joe, my bestie. You lived through all the ups and downs and wallowing and celebrating and always had good advice and never let on how annoying I was. I owe you a drink. Or seven.

To my readers—though I don’t know who you are as I’m writing this, I do know that
Fixed on You
is now in your hands and anything great that happens from here on out is all due to you.

To my Creator for the talent and the gifts that have been given to me. I am truly, truly blessed.