Merit
Granite Harbor, Maine
Present Day
The Harbor Inn is where I booked the room.
Ryan doesn’t need any help getting out of Pop’s truck, which Pop let me borrow to get Ryan and me where we needed to go for the time being.
“You don’t look or act like you just took a bullet to the chest,” I say, my nerves getting the best of me. The good nerves. I grab the room key from my purse.
“You don’t look like you just spent the night flying across the country.” He grabs my hand and kisses it. “And thanks for stopping by Granite Harbor Grocery.”
He said he needed to stop and grab a few things. Came out with a toothbrush, toothpaste, and deodorant.
There is no way we’re ever going back to his house in Hallowell—unless it’s to pack it up.
“You’re sure Hero is okay with Brand?”
“Ryan, you know my dad. I think he needs his own dog.”
I use my hip to push open the door, and when it opens, Ryan places his hand there.
My heart begins to race.
I’ve imagined this moment, fantasized about it. And there’s no way in hell I’ll let it go by without making a memory that we both will remember. A fucking amazing memory.
Ryan shuts the door behind us but quickly takes my hips in his hands. He pulls my body to his, and anticipation that’s been building since the hospital is almost unbearable.
I drop my head to his shoulder.
He whispers, “I’m going to go brush my teeth. Shower. Then, I’m taking you to dinner. But, shit, I don’t have clothes.”
I shake my head. “Eli packed you a bag.”
“What’d you tell him?”
“The truth.”
Ryan stares at me and drops his chin. “Like … everything?”
“Most of it. Yes. I’m sorry I made you keep us from your best friend, Ryan. I’m so sorry.”
“I’d have kept it from him forever if that meant saving you.”
“You don’t need to protect me, Ryan. I’ve got to learn to protect myself.”
Ryan takes me by the hand and sits me down on the bed. “I’m going to go brush my teeth. I’ll be right back.”
While he brushes his teeth, I take off my clothes. There’s something about allowing a man to see you naked in a room with awful lighting, in a room that isn’t dark, and doing something that doesn’t involve sex.
It’s vulnerable.
It’s open.
I’m giving Ryan all the pieces of me.
He walks out of the bathroom, looking down, as if in thought, but when his eyes meet my body, it’s as if everything in the world around us disappears. He walks to me, his jaw in a tight line. He takes in my eyes, my shoulders, my breasts, my stomach, my hips, my thighs.
“I want this body to be the last body you touch, Ryan.” I take his hands and place them around my breasts.
He closes his eyes, smiles, and moves closer, allowing his hands to have minds of their own. His eyes stay closed as he cups them. He takes my nipples between his fingers and squeezes.
“I want to give you everything I couldn’t when we were young. I want to make your body cry my name. I want to show you the way a man makes love to a woman, not an inexperienced boy who doesn’t know where to put his hands. So, I’m going to do this slow and right this time, Mer. And, if you say no, I’ll have to accept it. I will. I won’t like it, I won’t agree with it, but I’ll go with it because that’s how you feel.”
I don’t fight this. I won’t ever fight against my feelings for Ryan Taylor again. I’ve learned my lesson.
He takes my hand and leads me to the bathroom, shutting the door behind us. He leaves me to turn on the water. He undresses, and I cannot remember a time when I’ve felt so open to love. Open to a man who knows my secrets. My past. My future. A man who holds me up when I’m broken. That man is standing in front of me, naked, exposing his own worn truths. Open to me. To us.
He reaches out to me—not because he doesn’t want to see us like this, but because there’s a need for our skin to be touching again. When he does this, I feel his hardness against my stomach, and my body grows with ache.
“I can’t look at you like this and not get hard, Mer. I’ve never been able to do that. That takes power that just isn’t in me.” He smiles as he nuzzles my ear.
I want him inside me.
I want his best side.
His worst side.
I want all of it. I’ve seen all of it.
He leads me to the now-hot shower, and we step in. The beats on my back feel like divine purpose, as if we’ve lived these tragedies, these experiences, to be right where we’re at today.
When my mother died, I remember how angry I was that Dubbs, a cruel man, was still walking this earth. But, if Dubbs had died instead of Rebecca, maybe Ryan would be dead. Dubbs wouldn’t have been able to save him.
Eli told me what had happened with Ronan and Mona and Ryan. I had gone to Eli first when I came home just because I knew the situation with Ryan would take a lot longer. We have a lot of lost time to make up for.
Ryan puts his mouth to one breast. The mouth that I’ve longed for. He probes, the heat of his tongue when he teases me. He takes his mouth and moves to the next one. The urgency grows with each flick of my nipple, telling me he doesn’t just want me; he needs me.
The shower pushes its wall of hot against my back while Ryan takes care of my front. He comes up to meet my lips, his hard chest against me. With both of his hands, he cups my jaw and stares down at me, looking at me with need.
Needing my lips.
Needing my body.
Needing my whole heart.
I want to feel him between my legs as my middle grows with weakness.
“If I can’t have all of you, Merit, I’ll take small pieces instead.”
Then, his lips crash against mine. It’s not soft. It’s hard. It’s not the kiss he wants to give; it’s the kiss he needs to give.
My mouth is open, my body, too. Passion builds between my legs, inside my stomach, and straight to my heart as if I’m hearing it for the first time. Like I’ve been awakened by the last guard I had up, and I watch as it comes tumbling down.
My fingernails trail down his back.
My mouth takes him and we collide like it’s our first kiss and our last kiss and a lifetime full of memories.
I can’t miss this.
My body is fire, and Ryan is fuel.
Our mouths push and pull.
My hands slide down to his hips, and I hold him there, spreading my fingers apart to get a better grip. His hardness only reaffirms that we’re exactly where we need to be in life.
I want to spread my legs, so he can do what he needs to in the shower. What we both need. Because this isn’t about promises.
It’s about love and being wholly connected.
Ryan looks down at me—not adoringly, but with dedication, with love. “I’m going to wash your hair, Merit.” He reaches for the inn’s small bottle of shampoo. He lathers it in his hand and washes my hair from the front.
My breasts are against his chest, his erection against my stomach, and my hands are the only things holding us together.
My folds pulsate.
He rinses my hair and then takes the world’s smallest bar of soap and begins to wash my body. I reluctantly release him from me.
His hands reach my thighs, and he pushes the bar of soap between them. Then, when I least think he’ll do it, he takes his fingertips and gently opens me up.
I whimper, and my head drops to his chest.
“Eyes on me. I need to watch you, Merit.” His tone is sweet and direct, all at the same time.
I pull back and spread my legs a little bit, wanting to feel more of him.
His fingers push inside me.
I stare at Ryan and watch him as he watches me. I bite my lower lip as I feel his fingers move between my pink folds. My legs grow weak. He reaches the notch and lightly moves his fingers over it, and my entire body screams out in anticipation.
“Ryan,” I cry out. “Please don’t make me come yet.”
Slowly, he slides his fingers inside me. He stretches me. “I will be the last man to touch you like this. Do you understand, Merit?”
“Yes,” I hiss.
I call out.
Once.
Twice.
Pause.
“I will be the last man to make you cry out like this,” he says.
“I need you, Ryan, inside me.” My voice quivers as I grab for his shoulders.
“I know.”
His mouth meets mine again, and our tongues push and move. We can’t get enough of each other through this kiss.
I pull away, and his lips trail down my cheek, down my neck, as he moves his hand over my breast again.
“Come on,” I say, turning off the water, pulling him by the hand.
We step out, and I grab a stark white hotel towel. I pull it around both of us, knowing it won’t quite dry us off, but at least it will get some wetness off.
I turn Ryan around to dry his back and once again see the cigarette burns. They used to make me furious. But, right now, I can look at them and know that Ryan is the man he is today because of what he’s been through. Still, I kiss each one. I kiss each one to remind him that he is loved, that he is so important, and that he matters.
When we were kids, when Dubbs added a burn to the collection of burns, Ryan said he’d go to a place where he didn’t matter to overcome the pain. This broke me apart. We were around twelve or thirteen.
“You matter, Ryan,” I tell him as he turns toward me.
We walk to the bed I know we’ll share for the next few days. Come up for air. For water. Food maybe.
This will take time.
Our love will take its time.
We’ll fix where we went wrong.
He sits on the edge of the bed where I climb on top of him.
When I move down, he slides inside me.
I feel him again.
It first takes adjusting, but I’m ready.
He groans as he puts my breast in his mouth. I remember the red drips in my panties after the first time we made love. One thing Ryan isn’t is small.
Ryan calls out as I reach the end of his length, “Oh my God, baby.” He closes his eyes first and then opens them to stare down at where we’re connected.
I move up and down, stretching and growing and moving.
Quickly, he grabs my hips. “Baby, you need to stop. I’m going to come, and I’m not ready to yet.”
With ease, he lifts me up off him and holds me against him as I wrap my legs around his waist. He switches our positions. Putting my head at the headboard, he gently lays me down and pulls my legs apart.
I blush as he stares at my body. “What?” I cover my face and smile before letting my hands then fall to my sides.
Ryan smiles. My world lights up. For the first time in a long time, my world ignites when I see him smile.
“You’re more beautiful than a moose in the early morning sunshine to a hunter with a moose tag.”
I laugh.
“You’re more beautiful than the love you give, Mer. You’re more beautiful than the kisses you give on my back. You’re more beautiful than when a sun rises and sets. You’re more. So much more.”
Ryan starts with his lips on my mouth and slowly trails them down my neck and my chest, paying close attention to each breast. Down my stomach, down to the hair that protects my spot. Using his fingers, he pulls back my lips and pushes his tongue into my folds.
He plays with my notch, and I cry out, “Ryan.”
He watches me as I watch him.
My breathing picks up pace with each flick of his tongue.
My legs, like jelly, whimper in need, just as I do.
Ryan pushes two fingers inside me.
Oh, fuck.
“No.”
He freezes. “No?”
“I mean, no, you can’t do that,” I say breathlessly as I sit up and take him in my hands. I bend down and put his tip in my mouth. “Not yet,” I say between licks.
Ryan closes his eyes and eases back on his haunches as I take him in my mouth completely. I hear him breathing, his breaths getting louder with each motion of my mouth.
He pulls me up to him, and our mouths crash together, our bodies moving with necessity. The necessity of each other. The necessity of love and desire.
Ryan flips me around, and I grab the headboard.
“Are you ready?” he asks.
“Yes.”
He slides in me from behind, and it takes everything in me not to scream. Lovemaking is done behind closed doors. But, when he reaches around and touches my middle with his fingers, I cry out.
We both come together. Hard.