Laying me back, he entered me, his thrusts fast and hard and then slow and sweet. My gaze locked with his. He was right. This hurt. It wasn’t physical pain. There was nothing except pleasure ripping through my body. This kind of pain was deeper than that. It was worse than the pain I’d felt when he’d taken my virginity. I’d loved the boy who’d taken my innocence, but the man who was taking me now was breaking my heart.
I’d thought my heart was broken before, but I’d been wrong. He was breaking it because, for the first time, I realized just how much I could love the complicated person he was. I’d thought I’d known him when we were teenagers, but he’d held more back than I’d ever realized. He was surrounded by family, and yet he’d always felt alone. On the other hand, all I’d really had was my uncle, and that had been enough.
How do you save a man who’s still learning who he is? How do you do it so that he doesn’t lose you in the process?
“We can take this slow,” Heathcliff gasped.
My hands gripped him. “No,” I panted. “Take me fast, and when we’re cooling down we’ll talk about why we should have taken our time.”
He smiled, a small laugh escaping even as he thrust, his breathing growing more rapid.
He reached between us. “Come with me, Clare. I’m not doing this alone.”
My hand joined his between us, our orgasms met by my small scream and his satisfied exhale.
“Clare …” he breathed. Rolling onto his back, he pulled me on top of him. “Now we can talk. We’ve run, so let’s walk back.”
Chapter 30
“Did you find what you were looking for?” I asked Heathcliff afterward.
His fingers ran lazily up and down my back. “I found a lot of places,” he answered, “and a lot of people.”
Lifting my head, I gazed up at his chin. “But did you find happiness?”
“No.” He looked down at me. “I left that behind. You did though, didn’t you? You found happiness.”
I stared at him. “I found some of it. I’m waiting on the rest.”
He frowned. “You shouldn’t have to wait.”
“Some things are worth waiting for.”
Heathcliff’s face transformed, a small smile blossoming. “You know, it’s crazy. I think I needed the last five years. Carrying that book of yours around made me realize something.” His hand slid into my hair. “Life is like a book. Some of the pages you want to rip out and others you want to keep. I’ve been ripping out a lot of pages lately, getting rid of the ugly stuff. The stuff that’s left behind isn’t as bad as I thought it was. You want to know what one of the things that drew me to you was?”
“My hair?”
He chuckled. “That, too.” His head shook. “It was your house.”
My eyes widened. “My house?”
“Yeah,” he said. “The work I knew it would take to bring it back to life. While fixing it up, it started to rebuild me. For years, I lived under this umbrella of grief that came with being born with a stillborn sibling.” He saw my expression, and his brows rose. “I’m not blaming my family. I love my family. They’re amazing and tight knit. It was all me, this really stupid idea that I must have done something in the womb that killed my twin. He was a ghost that haunted me. Why did I live? Logically, I knew it had nothing to do with me, but it plagued me anyway.”
“And that made you love my house?” I asked.
“In a weird way,” he snorted. “Then it was all about you. This girl who’d lost so much, who was hiding behind her silence, her wild hair, and her uncle’s old clothes. It was like when I was looking at you, I was seeing myself. Only you knew what you were hiding from. You just needed a little coaxing, a little trust, to overcome it. I was hiding in plain sight, in crowds and family and people. I’ve been running too long.”
“Then quit,” I said suddenly. “Quit running and start living.”
He glanced at me. “It’s a tempting offer.” His fingers slid further into my hair. “I want to be inside you again,” he said, “and this time, let’s make it slow.”
So, we did.
There’s this thing love stories always forget to mention. That love isn’t a constant thing. Sometimes it changes, other times it fades completely. Sometimes you have to fall in love twice to truly understand it.
People change over the years. Every so often, you have to relearn the person you’re with. Heathcliff wasn’t with me, but he was in my heart.
We made love two more times before he took me home that night. The plantation had never felt emptier. Even with the faint lingering odor of sweets and casseroles. That night, the only thing I cared to smell was chicory.
Somehow, I found myself in the kitchen, the coffee pot on, the smell of my uncle’s coffee floating through the air. When it was done, I hugged the warm mug I’d poured it in. I didn’t drink it. I just held it and inhaled.
Heathcliff had left home to find himself and had discovered death instead. He’d taken a hard road in life, but I could only hope he was learning that sometimes it takes plunging through mud to get to the clear water.
He’d come home. That was the first step.
Chapter 31