CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
Jasmeen
Gavin looked too eager after our deal.
He had a light in his eyes I hadn’t seen so far. I could be walking into a six-foot-four trap of my ex-husband, but what other choice did I have? I wanted so badly to know the feel of air on my skin from flying, I wanted to know what it was like to soar like my Superman. And maybe I wanted him to remember that, too.
“What are you going to do with this place?” I asked over breakfast the next morning. I’d managed to get him into the shower and to the breakfast table without much fuss. I’d even combed his wild hair and put gel in it, leaving his dark locks tamed for once.
“What do you want to do with it?” he asked, spooning brown sugar and maple oatmeal into his mouth.
“It’s not my house, Gav. But it would be a waste to get rid of it. It’s so pretty. I can imagine kids playing barefoot, running from room to room, family dinners at this table, snow in the winter, picnics in the summer.” And suddenly, I realized my dream. That life. Kids, love, and happiness. I swallowed hard and tried to think around the punch to my heart. I wanted that with Gavin. “It would be a great place for a large family.”
He reached over and drug his thumb along my jaw and then grasped my chin gently, turning my eyes on his. “I’ll keep it. Just in case.”
Heat, from wanting to tackle him, and heat for my dream come true, sizzled through me. I didn’t deny him—I didn’t have the heart—but I did pull free of his hold and nodded.
Gavin’s hold was dangerous. I knew all too well what falling into that trap would do to me. Hell, I’d already fallen into so many. I was in a mansion with him in the forest making promises and dreaming of forever already. Months of this, working for him, and living with him, I may as well roll over and take his ring back.
But I refused. I wanted him to fight for me. I wanted to fly away and for him to fly after me. Maybe that’s why I stayed.
We weren’t meant to stay on the ground. We were meant to soar high above the wreckage of us.
“First thing you have to do is let Leo go.” He gave me an unapologetic grin.
“Are you two close?”
He snorted. “No, he had a lot of high profile clients and he’s good at making deals that benefit me in the long run. Campaigns that span years, that sort of thing. It was only business. He never even suggested coming to New York to see me, so that should let you know how close we are. He pawned me off on you.”
I didn’t deny him. That’s exactly what happened. “I’ll email him. Did he have a contract?”
He scowled. “Right, shit. Ah well, pay them the termination fee. I think it was two-hundred grand if I fired him before the contract was up. It’ll save me ten times more in the long run. He’ll have no problem supplying you his bank information for that payment.”
My head spun. “That’s a lot of money.”
He smiled politely. “I have assets in excess of two-hundred million dollars, baby.” He stared at me hard, almost like he was waiting for me to do something.
Like faint. Or salivate. Instead, I cringed, growing sick. “No way, Gav.”
“Yes way, Jas. We can kiss quite a few of that goodbye though. I’ll have to wait until the dust settles to see what I’m left with, breaking contracts and shit.” He sighed heavily. “I’ll probably walk away with a solid fifty million. Not bad for a washed-up NHL player.” He tried to sound light-hearted, but I could hear the pain in his heart.
“Focus on getting better. Once you are, then you can think about your career.”
“Career’s over. I’m twenty-six anyway. How many more years did I have? Five? Ten? I walked away with all my teeth, that’s a feat in and of itself,” he teased.
I smiled a little. “What were you going to do if you hadn’t gotten hurt?”
“I didn’t really like thinking of it. Of later. Of not having hockey. Whenever I thought of down the line, I thought of you, and it just made me sick. So I just focused on now. Now I have to think about later.” His smoldering brown eyes pinned me to my seat.
“You’re not even going to sugar coat what you want, are you?” I demanded.
“Why bother? You saved my life. More ways than one. I want one with you.”
My panties and heart were seconds from combusting and catching fire. “I didn’t save your life.”
“Then what did?” he asked, tone so serious I knew he truly believed that I was the reason he was alive.
“You were supposed to live, that’s why.” Wanting to steer the attention away from the sick feeling I felt about his crash, I pulled the conversation back on track by asking what being his manager entailed.
He recited a heavy list.
“You know I have no idea how to do any of that?”
“You’ll figure it out.”
“What makes you so sure?”
“Because you care for my wellbeing. You always have.”
I didn’t know why his comment cut me. Maybe it was because I ached to care for him again, or maybe it was because I ached for him to care for me.
***
Manhattan was covered in ice when Lance made it into town. It had been almost four weeks since Gavin’s accident, and I’d like to say he was doing better, but I feared he had gotten worse.
I’d spent the past couple days dealing with his manager and packing up our things. Getting him dressed had sent him into a dark mood. Or something else had. Something inside of his head. I tried to engage him in conversation during the drive back down to Manhattan, but other than one-word answers, he’d been more like a handsome stone.
At least I’d managed to convince him to let me shave his growing stubble.
He looked empty, trapped in his mind. The nightmares and lack of sleep were taking their toll on him.
“The snow’s working out in our favor.” Lance’s voice broke the deafening silence between us in the backseat of the car. “The street looks empty. But we’ll have to move fast. I’ll run ahead and get the elevator ready. And I’ll call when I’m ready for you, Jasmeen.”
“Thank you, Lance.” I peeked out the opposite window to find the street empty of a crowd. There was foot traffic, but no more than there probably usually was. There was a shrine set up outside of his building’s door. Posters, candles, and jerseys with his number on it. Number ten. He’d changed his professional number to ten when he got picked up by the Warriors. Before it hadn’t meant anything. But ten meant something to him.
Every time he donned his jersey, he had to think of the beginning. And that meant he also had to think of the end.
“Get rid of that,” he ordered darkly, glaring at the shrine.
“Yes, Mr. Cobalt.” I smiled in hopes that he would too.
He glanced at my lips for a moment and then looked away. Lance texted my cell. “I’ll be right back,” I promised him, hopping out to wrestle the wheelchair from the trunk. I opened his door and then helped him from the backseat, and then into the wheelchair. The moment I did, I heard it.
“Gavin!” someone screamed.
“Gavin!” someone else shouted.
“It’s Gavin!” another person screeched.
In minutes, the street was flooded. People took pictures of him with their cellphones as I fought through the throng of bodies blocking the entrance to get to his building.
“Hurry up,” he begged.
I let out a breath of relief when the doorman ushered us inside and held the door. “Where’s the elevators?”
“Behind that pillar.” Gav pointed. His hand shook.
“Can you get rid of the items out front?” I asked the doorman, digging in my pocket for some cash. I plopped a twenty into his hand and he nodded.
“Right away, Mrs. Cobalt.”
“What the hell?” I breathed, pushing him into the elevator where Lance waited. He punched at a button and the elevator doors slid closed, and then pressed the code for Gav’s floor.
“Everyone must’ve dug up the fact that you still have my name.” He sounded pleased.
I glowered in the back of the elevator, entirely displeased. “It was the lady who showed us the house.”
“Nice lesson. Don’t trust anyone. Makes it kind of easy, the life we had growing up.”
“We didn’t have anyone to trust but us?” I guessed.
“Mhm,” he agreed. “Keep it that way.”
I put my hands on his shoulders and rubbed him. “Sounds so lonely.”
He leaned into my touch. “Not with you.”
Lance cleared his throat and I pulled my hands from his broad, hard shoulders. I wanted to lean over and take a bite of him. Now that I knew he hadn’t cheated, it was so much harder to not hunger for his body. His heart had still broke mine, and it was still too easy to avoid him in that way.
The elevator opened into a wide-open glass room. There were couches facing the glass windows and a bar across from us.
“I’ll bring your things up,” Lance offered, staying in the elevator when we stepped out.
I gave him a grateful smile and he gave me a knowing wink before the elevator doors closed, which irritated me. He didn’t know anything.
“Bedroom,” Gav insisted.
“Where do I go?”
“It’s across the main floors in the back. There’s four other bedrooms if you won’t be sleeping in mine.”
There was a question in his statement, though disguised. “I think it’s best I sleep in my own room.”
He didn’t comment. I pushed him deeper into the lavish penthouse, walking through an open hallway and into a huge stretching living room. The walls of glass were on either side, and the muted light of winter bled into the kitchen and open space. Pool tables and hockey memorabilia decorated the large space. Everything was brick and metal. The two aesthetics shouldn’t go together, but it did somehow.
“This place is amazing, Gav.”
He didn’t comment on that either.
I found the back hall and then his bedroom, my jaw dropping. It had a main floor and another level that dipped where his king-sized bed was. His sheets were gunmetal gray and shimmering, and his comforter was the color of night, this deep sleek black. Large curtains stretched across the wall of windows, shielding the room of light. And there was a huge mirror across from his bed, and I could only imagine what it would be like to make love in that bed, to see ourselves in the throes of passion.
“Shit, I forgot about the raised bed.” He stared darkly at it, like it was the reason he was broken.
“We can do it. Just means you’ll have to hang out in the living room and just sleep in here at night. Limit the amount of time you have to get out of your wheelchair stepping over the platform. Where are your extra sheets? I’ll make you a bed on that huge sofa of yours.”
He looked back at me. “Nice try, babe. We’re sleeping together in one of the back rooms.”
“But that’s not taking it slow.”
He gave me a hard look. “Sheets should be in the laundry room.”
“Thank you,” I said, taking him out to the living room with me.
I found the plethora of sheets and quilts in the laundry room, and made a comfortable bed on his sofa. It was probably better out there for him anyway. He could almost rise out of his chair and fall into the sofa on his own.
“Home sweet home.” I sank down beside him, close to his head. The desire to run my fingers through his hair was almost painful.
He grunted.
“I’m going to make a doctor’s appointment. You need more pills and you need a checkup. And then maybe we can think about calling a therapist? You need to talk to someone.”
He leaned over and plucked the remote off the couch, pointing it at the ginormous flat-screen mounted on the brick wall of his bachelor pad. “Whatever you say, manager.”
“News about you being home will be out soon. Maybe we should have a guard or something out front.”
“Good idea, manager.” He flipped through the movies on his streaming service.
“We’ll need groceries and things too.” I covered his mouth before he could repeat the condescending nickname. “And wine.”
He chuckled behind my hand, moving out from under it to respond. “That’s right, baby. Priorities and shit.”
I put my hand back over his full lips. “Wine is a priority if I’m going to be stuck in this place with you.”
“Oh, please. This is your wet dream. You’re going to be sticking your hand in your pants whenever I’m not looking.”
I grinned. “Better than the real thing anyway.”
His body stilled, and he rotated his head to meet my eyes. The dark brown of his irises seemed to melt with the ring of amber, making his eyes look edible. His handsome face was outraged. “You’re not seriously going there, are you?”
“You mean am I insinuating that you’re not all that in the sack?” I got up, just in case. “I faked every single orgasm. Phew. I’m so glad that’s finally out. I feel like a free woman.”
Rage and mirth turned his eyes molten. He lay on the couch and glared up at me. “You’re so far off. Bet I can prove you wrong. One flick of my tongue on your clit, and you’ll be singing my name.”
My clit immediately tingled. But I kept my face neutral. “Charlie Hunnam does have a certain ring to it.”
He laughed, the mirth winning out over his rage. “Jasmeen, you’re so damn lucky that I can’t get to you right now. Your little pink clit would be begging to be married to me again if I could get my tongue on it.” He flicked it at me, his dark, pink, wet tongue.
Gavin could eat my pussy better than he could play hockey, and that was saying something, considering he was the star center for the Washington Warriors.
“Don’t be crass.” I put my hands on my hips.
“Don’t be a tease,” he countered. “Take your panties off and have a seat.” He patted his chest, and then his teasing edge dissipated, and where there had been hunger, there was pure need now. “Don’t make me beg. I’m so lost right now, you’re the only one keeping me grounded.”
“Gavin.” I sank to my knees near his head and put my hand on his cheek, watching how he leaned into my touch, how his eyes closed in longing. I couldn’t help myself. I leaned close and pressed my lips to his. I wanted to make him feel better. At least that’s the lie I told myself when I shoved my tongue into his mouth.
The taste of his tongue did horribly good things to my body. Heat replaced the cold, and want replaced the empty. We were Gavin and Jasmeen again, and my heart ached so badly with the need to keep this.
“I haven’t shaved in a while,” I whispered against his jaw. I moved to kiss his face all over, making sure my lips touched every inch; his jaw, his cheeks, between his eyes.
We talked as I kissed.
He groaned low in his throat. “Show me.”
“That’s dangerous.”
“Why?”
“Because I want you to see,” I breathed, kissing him again so he couldn’t talk.
His free hand held me in place and his hot tongue was sugar in my mouth, the sweetest hit of the drug he was. I lost my sense of right and wrong. I wasn’t sure Gavin ever had any. I stroked his chest, slipping my hand down to fondle his abs as we made love the only way we could.
With our tongues.
“Stop fighting this. Let us happen.” His hot breath kissed my lips when he pulled away.
I had a moment of panic, before I decided to try doing what he asked. I stopped fighting—just that moment—and let myself feel what I wanted to feel. Want, for him. Want, for us. The moment I did, his pupils dilated.
I wondered what I looked like. Eyes wild as I danced on the cusp of diving head first into my feelings for him. On my knees, lips swollen from his deep kiss. Did I look like the girl he fell in love with, the way he looked like my first in that moment.
“Hi, baby,” he said knowingly, his voice raw with emotion as our souls connected.
I had to contemplate in that moment whether Gavin held on to the truth just for this moment. If he’d planned on using it as a weapon all along. He couldn’t have known when he’d need it, but he had to know he would eventually come clean. The moment he revealed he hadn’t cheated, the butterflies he’d created and killed all those years ago took flight inside of me. They were larger this time around, meaner, with barbed wire on their wings and laser eyes. But they still flew, and that meant I was about to fly right into his sticky toffee trap
I didn’t fight back. I fell into his delectable trap and let the toxicity of forever love taint my every breath.
“Hi, Gav.” I let him see the intense love I still had for him, the intense want I still harbored.
“Let me taste your pussy. Let me take you away.” His eyes pled with me.
Mine pled with him. I got up on wobbly legs and undid the zipper on my jeans. I pushed them, along with my panties, down my thighs, and kicked them off my feet. I stood there in nothing but a hoodie. I tore that off too and then my shirt and my bra. The moment my breasts were free, they ached.
Every inch of me did the same.
He moved on the couch, giving me room to put my thighs. I flung my leg over his shoulders, and then balanced my other leg on the edge of the couch. I met his eyes a second before I lowered my pussy onto his mouth. The moment I did, I lost myself the way I always had. And I was perfectly fine not knowing myself.
He growled and shoved his tongue between my slickness. He knew my body better than I knew it myself. His tongue found my aching clit, and just like he predicted, I gave in a second later. Pleasure rippled through me and I screamed his name. “Gavin!”
He held my hips down with his free hand and lifted his cast in the air. I hugged his broken, cast-covered arm to my naked chest tenderly, and ground my clit against his tongue. I kissed his bruised fingers as the muscles in my lower belly tightened. I could feel the heat of his tongue every time he dragged it over the aching bundle of nerves. He sucked my clit into his mouth and bit down ever-so-slightly, sending me into a bone deep orgasm.
Pleasure tightened my body and catapulted me into the night sky. There were stars, there was lust, but most of all, there was Gavin.
When I managed to form coherent thoughts, he hadn’t. I could feel the regret in his actions, the pain in his desire to give me something good to feel. He snaked his arm around me and his fingers prodded my core. He stroked them over me, from my clit to my slick entrance, and then he slowly entered me.
The sensation of being even remotely full was acutely perfect. He got me used to the sensation and then he picked up speed, plunging his fingers into my tight, wet core as his tongue stroked me into another orgasm only someone like Superman could give.
I wanted to tear his cape off this time. Put it around my shoulders and fly us both into forever.
“Gavin,” I mewled helplessly.
His hand left my pussy alone, and slipped it between us to palm one of my breasts. He pushed me back and inch, so he could see my body. “I missed your tits so much.”
He pinched my nipple and a shiver of residual pleasure shuddered through me. “I didn’t know you could miss tits.”
He leaned forward and kissed above my bellybutton. “I missed every inch of you.”
“Me too,” I admitted, carefully rising off him.
I dropped to my knees once more and began pulling on the waistband on the loose gym shorts I’d helped him into earlier. We hadn’t bothered with underwear, and I was thankful. I freed his cock, and then I stared at it. Like I would an old friend. A friend I wanted to devour.
I grabbed his cock and brought it to my lips, wrapping them around his tip.
“Oh shit!” he cried out, bucking into my mouth. “Fuck yes,” he growled.
I swirled my tongue around the sensitive peak of his cock, cleaning the shimmering sheen of come he’d already managed to leak. The taste of him sent me into a frenzy. Sweet and salty, I’d always loved his intense taste. I took as much of him into my mouth as I could, and then I worked him into my throat. I loved doing this to him when we were younger, loved turning him into a beast.
He breathed heavily above me. His free hand tangled in my hair. He worked himself into the deep tightness of my throat, spluttering my name and a string of dirty words.
“Shit, yes, Jas. Your tongue feels so good, Jas. I forgot how amazing blow jobs could be. You worship my cock.”
The way he’d just worshipped my pussy. I pumped his cock with my tight grip and then sucked the tip of him between my lips. I poured my feelings for him into my movements, letting my love loose on his body. He shouted out my name a moment before he shot stream after stream of his sweet and salty end into my mouth. I swallowed him down, and then I cleaned him with my tongue, leaving his still-hard cock gleaming and clean.
I put him back into his pants. I crawled over his body and squeezed between him and the sofa. He cradled my face in his grasp and guided my lips to his.
Gavin kissed me like it was our first time.
Until we were both back at the beginning.