Jude gave a startled grunt, but then quickly got over his surprise. Big hands pulled me under the spray. Then I was pancaked against a hard, wet man while his hands cupped my ass. “Baby,” he rumbled.
I raised myself up on tiptoes to press my mouth over his, and received a happy growl for my efforts. Then there was nothing but wet lips and wet tongues. Steam and skin sliding against skin. The world was a small place where it rained warm water and kisses.
The very hard cock pressing against my belly begged to be touched. I dropped a hand down to stroke him. Jude moaned. “Want you so bad.”
“What are you waiting for?” I gasped.
“Hold on to me,” he ordered.
When I reached up to grasp his shoulders, Jude lifted me. Pressing my upper back against the shower wall, he lined himself up and slid inside. And once again I was full of Jude. Tipping my head back against the tiles, I sighed. For a moment nothing more happened, and that was fine with me. In music, the silence in between the songs can be as affecting as the most powerful crescendo. This moment was just the same. I opened my eyes to find Jude watching me.
Then his hips pulsed—the opening bass line of our song. I throbbed against him—adding to our melody. He rocked. I rolled my hips. We were complete right then. There were no naysayers. There was no past, and there certainly was no future.
Listening to the rhythm of Jude’s increasingly ragged breaths, I gave myself over to this moment. Our song rose to a fevered pitch, and I listened hard to every note while it lasted.
*
Afterward, we were two damp and sated people lying on the bed together. His hand wandered mindlessly up and down my back.
“Jude?”
“Mmm?”
“Why did you give my brother a ride that night?”
I expected him to protest at the question, but he didn’t. “I don’t remember. Guess he needed a ride, that’s all.”
“Really? You two weren’t friends.”
“Nope.”
“Then why did he ask you?”
“Don’t know,” he said quickly. Too quickly. “And I guess we can’t ask him.”
There was something tight about his voice that put me on edge. “After the accident, I asked a lot of questions that nobody answered.”
“I’m sorry.” Jude rolled onto his stomach, propping his chin into the crook of his elbow. “I’m sorry for everything that happened to you after I fucked up.”
“I know you are. But it bothers me that I don’t really understand what happened that night.”
Jude sighed. “The problem is that I don’t either. I don’t remember the accident at all. I don’t remember getting into the car, and I don’t remember getting cut out of it. First thing I remember is getting smacked around in an interrogation room.”
Wait. “They hit you?”
He made an unhappy sound in the back of his throat. “I killed the chief’s son. There wasn’t a cop in the state who could get in trouble for roughing me up. Of course they hit me.”
“Why did they interrogate you at all?”
His gray eyes softened. “Same reason you are, baby. You have questions with no answers.”
Still. I’d always assumed that Jude was taken to a hospital after the accident, because that’s where people who’d been in accidents went. Didn’t they? “Who hit you?”
Jude pinched the bridge of his nose. I’d officially killed the mood, that was for sure. “I don’t know his name. The same guy who busted us that time for making out in my car at Pigeon Pond. Younger guy with the receding hairline?”
“Newcombe. I remember him. He moved to Arizona, or somewhere.”
“Good riddance.” Jude rolled onto his side and hauled me into his arms. “Why do you get to ask all the questions, anyway? I got one for you.”
“Hit me.”
“Why aren’t you at Juilliard?”
Ah. “I changed my mind. That’s all.”
“What? Challenge. You used to practice every day for two hours, Soph. I may be the dumbest guy you know, but you’re going to have to do a little better than ‘I changed my mind.’”
I craned my neck to look at him. “You’re not the dumbest guy I know. Not by a long mile.”
“That’s nice of you to say, baby. But you didn’t answer my question. Do you still sing?”
“In the car on the way to work.” I put my head on Jude’s bare chest. “And in college I started learning to play the guitar and accompanying myself. But there hasn’t been time for that lately.”
Jude grunted, and I felt the vibration under my ear. “What a waste.”
Maybe. But it wasn’t the tragedy that he thought it was. “Do you remember how I used to make you listen to the original-cast recording of Flying For You?”
Jude’s chest rose and fell as he chuckled. “Even after three years, I’m pretty sure I could sing the whole thing from start to finish right now.”
“The soprano’s name was Penny Lovejoy, and I worshipped her.”
“I remember.”
“Do you know what she does now? She’s a realtor of fine homes in New Jersey.”