The way Denny and Kiera had acted toward each other…it had moved me, inspired me. They had seemed so damn idyllic. In a way, I think a part of me had started coveting what they had on that very first day. I’d been so lonely for so long, and all of my empty relationships hadn’t been filling me anymore. I’d wanted more. And eventually, I’d wanted Kiera. “Living with you, watching you with Denny, day after day…I started to want what the two of you had. I stopped, as you put it, whoring.” She smiled at hearing me say her term, and a laugh escaped me, but then I frowned. “But unfortunately, I started to care for you. I didn’t understand it at first. I just knew it was wrong to think about you like that. You were clearly Denny’s. People’s relationships haven’t always…mattered to me, but Denny means a lot to me. That year he stayed with us…that was the best year of my life.” With a smile, I whispered, “Well, maybe until this year.”
It had taken me by surprise, but I’d fallen for her. I loved everything about her, and I’d wanted her in ways I’d never wanted anyone. But I’d kept my distance from her because of Denny. He was the closest thing to a brother I’d ever had, and I owed him…so much. I couldn’t repay him by stealing his girl, so I’d tried. God, how I’d tried, and how I’d failed. But being with her right now, somehow, it all felt worth it. I hadn’t truly been alive until her.
Kiera gave me a smile as she kissed the corner of my mouth, and I marveled at how wonderful it was to freely love her and be loved by her. I didn’t want this moment to ever end. But I had so much more to tell her.
“When I fell in love with you…it was like nothing I’d ever known before. It was nearly instant. I think I started falling for you the moment you shook my hand.” I laughed and bumped her shoulder as the memory of that nearly nude encounter washed over me. Classic Kiera. “It was so powerful. I knew it was wrong, but it was addicting.” I spun her away from me, then drew her close. “You are so addicting to me,” I repeated, giving her a soft kiss and holding her tight.
When Denny left Seattle, staying away from Kiera had become so much harder. Almost impossible. I’d done my best to keep my distance, but eventually I couldn’t resist holding her, touching her…pretending that we were together. “Sometimes, it felt like you cared for me too, and then everything in the world was perfect. But most of the time, you wanted him, and a part of me wanted to die.” I knew my words were a little extreme, but since this was the first time I’d ever felt this way, they were appropriate. Everything about us felt extreme, the ups and the downs.
“I tried so hard to stay away from you, but I kept making excuses to touch you, to hold you, to nearly kiss you while watching porn. God, you have no idea how difficult that was to turn away from you.” Kiera giggled as she remembered our almost first kiss. God, I loved to hear her laugh.
Closing my eyes, I reminisced over our night of tequila-infused sex. “That first time, I held you for hours afterwards…just feeling your warmth, your breath on my skin.” When I opened my eyes, she seemed surprised by that revelation. “You said my name once while you slept. That made me feel…well, it was almost as good as the sex.” I couldn’t help but grin at her, but then, remembering what had happened next, I turned away. Sheepishly, I confessed how much of a chickenshit I’d been. “I wish I had been strong enough to stay…but I wasn’t. I chickened out. I couldn’t tell you what I had just figured out.” I turned back to her with my heart in my eyes. “That I desperately loved you.”
Instead of staying and telling her how I felt, I’d run away. I hadn’t been able to risk my heart, and so, by not even trying to open myself to her, I’d lost her to Denny when he’d come back. That moment had cleaved me in two, but in all honesty, I had been the one holding the ax. That had been my mistake. I’d treated her like a one-night stand, so of course she’d believed that was all she was to me. I’d never done anything to correct that belief, so the fault lay with me.
“Kellan…I…”
She was speechless, so I continued with an apology for one of my biggest regrets. “I wanted to leave when you went back to him. After having you…it was so hard to watch you with him. To watch you love him how I wanted you to love me. It made me so angry. I’m so sorry.”
With moisture building in her eyes, Kiera hugged me tight. “I’m the one who’s sorry, Kellan…” I heard the remorse in her voice. It wasn’t her fault though. She hadn’t known.
Because of the way I’d acted, things between us had gone downhill in a hurry. But somehow, she’d still given me a chance. She’d asked me to stay, something no one else had done. Ever. “And then, when I finally got the strength to leave…you asked me to stay, and I got my hopes up. I started to believe that maybe…at the very least, you cared for me. You seemed to really want me to stay,” I finished with a crooked smile.
I could see the apples of her cheeks reddening in the dim lighting, and I figured she was remembering her heartfelt request, followed by her passionate actions. That had been the most intense sexual experience of my life, but also the hardest. “You probably didn’t hear me, but I told you I loved you that night. I couldn’t seem to stop it from slipping out.”
“Kellan, I—”
Recalling the pain of the moment, I interrupted her. “Then you cried for Denny, and I wanted to die again.” The tears in her eyes dripped to her cheeks, and I watched them fall. I had felt like those tears that night—discarded, washed away, forcefully removed from where I’d wanted to be. Rejected. “That night was so…intense for me. I wanted so badly to hold you after, but you were so upset…you looked ill. I made you feel ill. You hated what we had done, and it had meant so much to me.” Pain engulfed me and I tried to look away. I couldn’t quite turn my eyes from her though, and I kept her in the corner of my vision. “I hated you after that,” I whispered.
More tears fell as Kiera sniffled. With a sigh, I turned away from her. “I almost left that night. I wanted to…” I knew I was making her feel guilty. I didn’t want to, I just wanted her to understand. If she knew what I’d been feeling, then she’d get what I’d done, and what a profound decision I’d arrived at. Even though what happened in the espresso stand was a memory that still haunted me sometimes, her tears in the orange glow of the parking lot lights was what pulled me through it. She’d shown me that she truly cared, so I’d decided to stay, regardless of the consequences.
Turning back to her, I cupped her cheeks in my hands. Her tears dried while I held her gaze, and I was mesmerized by the green-gold depths. “I couldn’t leave you. I remembered the look on your face when I told you I was leaving. No one’s looked at me that way before. No one’s ever cried for me before. No one’s asked me to stay before…no one. I convinced myself that you cared for me. I knew then that I would stay with you…even if it killed me.”
After a long, deep kiss that left us both breathless and wanting more, I pulled away. Grabbing her hand, I continued us on our relationship-altering walk. “I am sorry about being so…amorous with you. I never wanted to hurt you. I simply…wanted you.” When I gave her a roguish smile, Kiera missed a step. I wasn’t sure if that was because of me or not, but it made me laugh all the same. “When you asked, I did try to keep it…well, you had to know on some level that we were never innocent, right?” I pointedly raised an eyebrow, and she was reluctant about it, but she eventually nodded. Good. She couldn’t keep lying to herself about what we’d done.
With a smile, I said, “Well, I tried to keep it less…sinful…then. You made that shockingly hard to do,” I teased with a glare.
She looked genuinely confused. “Me?”
Amazed at her inability to see her own sexiness, I shook my head in playful exasperation. “Yes, you. If you weren’t dressed provocatively, or throwing yourself at me provocatively, or making very provocative noises…” She was obviously embarrassed at that, and I laughed at the cute look on her face. “If you weren’t doing all that, then you were simply just too adorable to resist.” I narrowed my eyes at her. “I am only a man after all.”
Stubborn as always, she shook her head and brushed off my praises with casual disbelief. Her self-image problems went as deep as my own. “You’re absurd, Kellan.”
She rolled her eyes and another laugh escaped me. She thought I was being ridiculous, but I was being entirely truthful. She didn’t know what I felt every time I looked at her. Even now, as she held my hand and walked with me through a dimly lit building, I was partially aroused by her presence. There was something about her that spoke to me on a primal level. I felt like I was constantly fighting the urge to throw her down and claim her. Maybe that feeling was just because of the sticky situation that we’d found ourselves in…but I didn’t really think so. She was just…it for me. “Again…you don’t realize how attractive you are to me. After all this time, I would think that was painfully obvious.”
She playfully elbowed me for my suggestive comment, and we enjoyed a moment of levity. But then seriousness settled around me. What I’d done to her next…never should have happened.
“I am sorry I took it too far. I should have let you end it. You were right to stop it. Everything that happened later was my fault. I should have let you go. I just, couldn’t…”
“Kellan, no it—”
She tried to object, but I interrupted her with a heartfelt apology for the disaster that had led us to where we were now. “The club, that was…intense. I wanted you so bad, and you wanted me, too. I considered pulling you into a bathroom and taking you right there. I think you might have even let me?”
I looked down at her and she nodded. Joy lifted me for a moment, but then I recalled the rest. “I saw Denny coming. I couldn’t do it. I pushed you away, praying desperately that you would tell him you wanted me. That you would choose to leave with me. You…didn’t, and it killed me.”
She stopped walking. I took a step, then turned to look back at her. Guilt and grief were waging war in her eyes, but all I could see right now was her lips on Denny’s. God, that had hurt. “I couldn’t even come home. I took your sister to Griffin’s. I think I bored her. I wasn’t much fun, moping on the couch all night like I did. Eventually, she gave up on me and turned her attention to Griffin. And, well, you know how that ended.”
Kiera swallowed a knot in her throat. Yeah, she knew now, thanks to Jenny, but she hadn’t known back then. And because she hadn’t known, because I’d hurt her, we’d gotten into a monstrous fight, and I did something to her that I would never forgive myself for.
“I was…I am really freaked out about what happened…in the car. What I said. What I did. I didn’t know you thought I slept with Anna until that moment, and I was so angry at you for…Denny, I let you believe it. I…embellished it.” I looked at the ground so I didn’t have to see her face. “Being angry with you almost made me want you even more.”
It took Kiera a moment to respond. I didn’t blame her. I’d been awful to her. “Kellan…you have no idea how difficult that was for me. How hard that was to ask you to stop, when my whole body was begging for you not to.”
She stroked my cheek and I swallowed; my throat felt raw. I didn’t deserve her understanding on this one. “You have no idea how hard it was to stop myself. I wasn’t lying, about what I had been thinking.”
Peeking up to look at her, I watched a contemplative expression wash over her face. She didn’t seem happy about what she was remembering. Again, I didn’t blame her. I’d wanted to keep going. I’d known that eventually she would change her mind and beg for me…if I pressed her long enough. I’d nearly ripped off her underwear and tasted her, against her express desire. She might have let me, she might have kept telling me no, but it was impossible to say. Either way, it would have been wrong. I was furious at the time, but now, I was glad she’d stopped me.
“Do you think less of me now?” I asked her.
With her chin raised, she shook her head. Looking away from her, I sighed. “I’m so sorry I yelled at you, Kiera.” If I had just left her alone in the club, let her dance the night away with Denny, none of that would have happened. But jealousy, pain, and passion had taken away all of my common sense. I’d made a move, toyed with her mind and her heart, and then I’d called her a tease and a whore. I was such a dick.
When I returned my eyes to hers, I knew mine were glistening. Kiera ran a hand back through my hair. “I know you are sorry…I remember.”
Idiocy flowed through me when I realized what she was referring to. My breakdown. “Ah, yes, me sobbing like a baby…not my finest hour.”
I tried to avert my eyes, but she grabbed my cheek and made me look at her. “I disagree. If you hadn’t, if I hadn’t seen that remorse, I probably would never have spoken to you again.”
As she stared at me, I remembered the absolute, soul-crushing grief I’d felt that night. It was so much more than guilt that had driven me over the edge. I thought that in that one stupid moment of anger, I’d lost everything I’d been waiting my entire life to have—someone who cared about me. “It wasn’t just remorse. True, I felt horrible for speaking to you like that…but mostly, I was sure that I had just completely severed the only loving relationship I’ve ever had. I knew I’d lost you. I knew you were completely Denny’s then. I saw it in your eyes, and I knew I’d never have a chance with you—none.”
The grief in my heart spilled out of my eye, and Kiera wiped the single tear away with her thumb. I haven’t lost her. She’s still with me. “I never expected you to…comfort…me. No one’s ever done that…ever. You don’t know how much that meant to me.”
I could barely get the words out, my voice was trembling so much. Swallowing, I took a moment to collect my emotions. Kiera leaned in to kiss me, but I minutely pulled away. I needed to say this. She needed to know. “I was so scared to be near you after that. I allowed myself one last goodbye with you in the kitchen, but I didn’t want to touch you anymore.” Searching her eyes, I hoped she understood what I was about to say. “I’m sorry that I hurt you, but I needed to be distracted from you, to make sure I never took things so far again.”
Kiera’s face still resonated with empathy. I couldn’t take it, not with what I needed to apologize for next. Pulling her hand away from my cheek, I looked out over the water. “I’m so sorry about all the women, Kiera. I never should have hurt you like that. I didn’t want to…Well, maybe a part of me did. I just—”
She cut me off. “You don’t…you already apologized for that, Kellan.”
“I know.” When I looked back at her, my vision was so watery, I almost couldn’t see her. “I just really feel like I messed up. But you didn’t want me, not in the same way that I wanted you…and I couldn’t bring myself to leave you anymore. I did the only thing I knew, that I’ve ever known, for blocking out the pain. To feel…wanted.” My vision cleared as another tear rolled down my cheek.
“Women,” Kiera stated, only a matter-of-factness in her voice. The word sliced me to the core though. How badly had I messed us up? Would she ever really forgive me for what I’d done?
“Yeah.”
Kiera’s lips twisted into an amused smile. My heart lifted at seeing it. “Lots and lots of women.”
I didn’t want to smile, but I couldn’t help but smile looking at her. I love you so much. “Yeah…I’m sorry.”
Her face was calm, her eyes full of love. “It’s okay. Well, it’s not okay, you still shouldn’t use people…but I think I understand.”
Hoping against hope that she meant that, that she could heart-and-soul forgive me, I peeked up at her from under my eyebrows. Kiera smiled, then leaned forward and gave me the softest kiss, a kiss full of patience, love, joy, and understanding. She got me, I was sure she did. So now, the only question was, did I understand her, and all of her actions? I thought so, but I wanted to make sure.
Pulling away, I asked, “So…?”
She looked a little irritated that my lips were gone, but seemed more confused than anything. “What?”
“Was I right? Did you use me?”
Her expression immediately shifted to guilt as she looked away. “Kellan…”