Chapter Eleven
“How’s your pizza?” Molly asked, trying not to look like she was salivating as Ben took a giant bite of the loaded slice.
He wiped his mouth, chewed, and smiled at her. Then he took a long swig of beer. She finished off her…boring slice of vegetarian and took a sip of the…pleasant peach Perrier he’d bought her.
When he finished chewing, he leaned forward and took another slice. She might have sighed audibly. Then he filled up a glass of the wine he’d brought to the coffee table. He handed her both.
“What? For me?” she said, not making a move.
“Please. Do us both a favor. Your meal is so damn sad, you’re going to ruin mine.”
She sat up a little straighter on the couch. “My meal is wonderful.”
“Really? ’Cause you’re looking at mine and wiping drool off the side of your mouth.”
She actually felt for the drool before accepting his offer. She didn’t know which to have first—wine or pizza. She went for the pizza and didn’t regret it. “Omigod, I’ve been missing out on so much life,” she said, her mouth full. The cheese was rich and flavorful thanks to all the grease from the meat, not like the rubbery, tasteless kind. The meat was salty and spicy and, sadly, so much more exciting than the vegetarian. She took a long sip of wine after she polished off her pizza.
“Do you want the last one?” Ben asked, putting down his empty beer bottle.
She shook her head. “I regret with every fiber of my being that I ate two slices of that vegetarian before trying your pizza. You were right about everything,” she said, taking another drink of wine.
He smiled at her, pointing to the last piece. “You sure? Going once…”
She shook her head and curled her feet under her on the sofa, holding her glass of wine. “Positive. I’m regretting doubting your pizza recommendations.”
He gave a low laugh and opened another beer, putting his feet on the coffee table. He didn’t say anything and his smile fell. She studied his strong profile as he took a drink. She wondered what he’d been through tonight, what he’d seen, whether or not he had been in danger. If this had been nine years ago, she wouldn’t have hesitated asking him. “It was a rough night?” she asked, finally.
He ran his hands through his hair and then linked them behind his head. “Three-car collision on the way out of town. One family completely wiped out. Just like that.”
She winced. “The others?”
He picked up his beer and held it in his hand, his thumb nudging the corner of the label as he stared down at it. “We could smell the gas and knew there wasn’t going to be time to get them all out. The minivan was wrapped around a tree, the kids in the back…” He lifted the beer to his lips and took a long drink. “We only got one out. One kid. His parents are gone. His sister is gone. He’s six.”
She wiped the tears in her eyes and reached over to touch his shoulder. He looked over at her, his own eyes wet. “I’m sorry.”
He shook his head. “It’s nothing you haven’t seen working in the ER.”
“That’s not true. I’m never out there at the scene. I never have to witness that cruelty. When I see these people, the paramedics have already done so much. I don’t know how much that takes out of a person, to have to see that.”
She slowly lowered her hand because she felt silly. She wasn’t his girlfriend or his fiancée anymore. They had barely touched since she’d been here. He hadn’t forgiven her. How many other women had been around to comfort him after a rough night? How many had woken up in his arms? How many had made him laugh, had made him forget? She stood quickly, needing to do something so she wouldn’t feel so silly. She was going to be leaving in less than a year, and even if she weren’t and if he forgave her for everything, he’d want things from her she would never be able to give him. She picked up the pizza box.
“Why’d you pull back?” he asked, his gaze hard, his voice gruff.
Her mouth went dry as she stared down at him. His brown eyes glittered, and he looked rough and tired and gorgeous…and so out of her league. “I didn’t know if you wanted me to touch you.”
He stood up, right in front of her, right in her personal space, and had he been any other man she would have backed up. But Ben was in a class of his own with her. He was the man she remembered only older, wiser, and a little more battle scarred. He was safe and thrilling all at the same time. Being this close to him made her want to reach out and snatch back that part of her life that was stolen from her. She wanted to be the woman in his life, the one he needed, wanted, desired.
“I don’t think a day has gone by where I haven’t wanted you to touch me. I don’t think a day has gone by where I haven’t thought of kissing you or missed kissing you. And that’s why I’ve been so angry with you, because I could never forget you,” he said, his hand reaching to touch the side of her face. Her breath was coming out in shallow little gasps, and she knew she wasn’t doing a good job of keeping cool, because he was saying things that she’d only dreamed of and he was touching her like she’d dreamed.
“I…I never stopped wanting you, either,” she said, knowing she’d risk everything to be with him again.
He leaned down, his mouth hovering over hers, and her thoughts ran away with her. Would his lips feel the same? Would he kiss the same? Would she feel whole again? Would she be able to do this, to be with him again?
Her heart was pounding a mile a minute, but all she wanted was his mouth on hers. All she wanted was the man she remembered. The man she remembered knew how to kiss her until she couldn’t stand or remember her own name. The man she remembered could steal her breath away with one look. And the man she remembered deserved so much more than she’d given him. She stared up into his eyes and then curled two fistfuls of his shirt in her hands and pulled him down. He obliged her by capturing her mouth into a kiss that did everything she knew it would. He took her back, as though not a day had gone by since their last kiss. He took her back, to the girl she once was. He took her back to that place that was filled with hope and desire and love. She ran her hands up his hard chest and leaned into him. His lips were insistent and thorough, and she felt every hard inch of him against her body. He made her feel alive and excited and safe, things she hadn’t felt in nine years. It had taken nine years for her to feel like a cherished, desirable woman again.
“God, why did you ever leave?” he asked, not waiting for a reply as he kissed her again. Nine years of waiting for him, for his mouth, for his body. He kissed her differently than she remembered; he kissed her like a man who’d seen things, experienced things, but wanted her more than anything.
She kissed him back with a growing urgency, propelled by the freeing revelation that desire pumped through her veins and she could get completely lost in Ben. His hands roamed the sides of her body, and she pressed into him as he lowered her onto the couch, covering her body with his. She pulled at the hem of his shirt, and he obliged by lifting himself and helping her pull it off. Her gaze traveled over him, admiring what her fingers instinctively touched. His arms and shoulders were thick with muscle that didn’t threaten her, only appealed. She lifted her neck as he trailed kisses from under her ear to her lips again. “You still taste the same; you make the same noises. I heard them in my dreams,” he said against her mouth. “I said I’d never do this. When I saw you again, I denied I still had feelings for you. I swore I could never be turned on again by you, and now we’re here. I still want you more than anyone,” he said, roughly, slowly lifting his head and bracing his forearms on either side of her body. “What the hell does that say about me? What kind of a person does that make me? Cheating is a deal-breaker for me. Always has been. So what the hell am I doing?”
Her eyes were filled with tears as she stared at him. He was tormented. She could see it in the harsh lines of his face. He still wanted to hate her. He couldn’t truly forgive her. This was her moment to tell him everything. “It’s not what you think,” she whispered as he pulled away from her, his rejection as harsh as an icy bucket of water.
He sat on the edge of the sofa, not looking at her, just staring straight ahead. “Then tell me. Tell me something that could possibly make it okay. I don’t want to hate you. I don’t want to be a person who can’t forgive, and God knows we were so young…but you were different. And I hold you to the same standards I’ve always held myself to.”
She curled her legs up under her, wrapping her arms around herself, finding the courage to begin. She just needed to start somewhere. He wouldn’t let her down. “I lied. I lied about everything. There wasn’t anyone else. There’s never been anyone else for me.”
He rubbed the back of his neck, staring at the ground. “I don’t get it. That doesn’t even make sense. Why would you do that? You told me you were sleeping with some guy, you loved him.”
She winced, but knew she had to get past this part, she had to get the truth out, she had to get to the part where he believed her. She knew in her heart that Ben would believe her. She should have known that all along. “I didn’t want to,” she whispered, her voice trembling.
She sank farther into the couch, hearing her mother’s words mingle with her therapist’s, and knew at the end of it there would be relief. That night she’d called her mother; she could still feel the anguish, the hysteria. But she also remembered the shock and the shame when her mother twisted it all around like a mastermind manipulator. She twisted it until Molly couldn’t think straight or speak and was completely at her mother’s mercy.
Ben turned his head to look at her, and she opened her mouth to take the risk, to walk the path to redemption, because he was worth it. Because she had done nothing wrong. She had been the victim. At almost thirty years of age, she knew that. At eighteen, she had allowed herself to be told otherwise.
She needed to tell him the rest. She had mistakenly thought all this time that telling him the truth would be more painful than having him think the worst of her, but she’d been wrong. She was in love with him, still, after all these years, and what he thought of her mattered so much. Maybe that was what made all of this so frightening—she had to have faith in him, in his faith in her, that he would believe her. She was not the same girl who had called home, crying to her mother, and expected her mother to believe her. She didn’t think she’d ever be able to move forward with a relationship with her mother again after what she’d done. But Ben…she needed him to believe her.
He cleared his throat and kept his gaze steady on hers. “I don’t get that. You and I…we were…I loved you. I loved you with everything I had, Molly. I wanted to marry you. We were going to get married after you graduated. I was going to support you while you were at med school. We never had sex. You wanted to wait.”
She hadn’t expected to cry. She’d been so good at not crying for so long, but no one made her vulnerable like Ben did. Everything he said was true, and he was speaking of the beautiful future they’d planned. She desperately wanted that. Even now, even though she knew it was too late for them. She was a different person. She wasn’t that innocent girl anymore who believed in heroes and fairy tales and happily ever afters. She was a grown woman, a doctor, a loner. She needed no one.
She looked down for a moment, taking a break from his intense stare, knowing the truth in her heart was that she needed Ben. She’d needed him all along, and she’d been lost without him in the most important ways. “I know, I know, I wish I hadn’t. I wish I hadn’t,” she said, a sob breaking from her mouth as she whispered, wrapping her arms around her waist, and finally lifting her eyes to him.
She saw him through the blurriness, saw as he tried to understand what she was saying. It wasn’t supposed to be this hard. So many years had passed; she’d discussed this with her therapist, and she had gotten to the point where she could talk about it without crying. But not in front of Ben. She was reliving it. Maybe on some level she knew this would destroy him, because he’d loved her so much, and she wanted to spare him. She had shut him out, never given him a chance to deal with it, to help her. Now she was going to tell him everything, and there was nothing he could do anymore.
He crouched down in front of her, placing his hands on her knees. “I’m trying. I’m trying to understand what you’re telling me. It’s okay, Molly. No judgment. Just talk to me.”
His face was only inches from hers, but she was so far away. She was back there, nine years ago, that place in her memory that she rarely allowed herself to visit. “I wanted you forever. I would dream about you. I would dream about our wedding, our future. I would dream about what our first time would be like. It was going to be so sweet, and you were so good,” she said, letting the words spill from her mouth, not filtering anything anymore. His hands were warm and comforting on her knees, and she stared at them, at the smattering of hair on his knuckles, on the strong forearms. “I never…I was at a study session. There was a dozen of us. We’d been drinking and studying, and as the night went on, they got rowdier and I knew I needed to get back to my dorm room. This guy…in my program said he’d walk me back.” She stopped talking and placed her hands on top of his, wanting to feel their warmth, wishing so much that she could just fast-forward this part.
Ben’s face hardened and he didn’t move an inch, but his gaze didn’t leave hers.
“It was dark out and the campus was deserted,” she whispered.
He was shaking his head, and she knew he was already filling in the gaps to her story. She couldn’t breathe properly, and her voice didn’t sound like her own. “There was a part of campus that wasn’t well lit, in between two different dorms. He pushed me to the ground.”
Ben’s eyes glittered, and his jaw clenched and unclenched in a steady rhythmic motion. She concentrated on that, stared at his jaw, felt the strength in his hands.
“He pushed me down…I don’t…I didn’t expect it. I didn’t see it coming. He seemed like this nice, quiet guy but he was big and…”
His hands gripped her thighs tightly, and he made a muffled noise. She looked down to finish, to get it out before she lost control. “He covered my mouth. I tried kicking him off and biting, but he punched me,” she said, taking big gulps of air, trying to breathe against the weight of her chest.
She looked up at Ben and started crying when she saw the anguish on his face, the supressed rage, the tears. She didn’t want him to know this. She knew the kind of man he was, she knew what this would do to him. How she wished this wasn’t her story.