IMPULSE: Companion to The PULSE Series Page 9

  "I need to taste you, Jessica." I motion for her to come on top of me. "Sit on my face so I can eat you."

  She moves quickly, reaching forward to grab the edge of the headboard as her legs straddle my head. The sweet scent of her arousal brings my cock instantly back to life. I stare at her folds, my tongue racing over my lips. I swear I could come just from the taste of her. It's intoxicating, it's sweet and it's everything I need.

  "Jesus, you're so ready." I dip my tongue inside of her and she squeals in delight. She spreads her legs farther apart giving me even more access to her core.

  "Lick it there, Nathan," she says in a breathless tone. "Ah, yes, just like that."

  I take her lead and lap my tongue over her clit. I hold tight to her thighs as she rides my face. Her body gives in to all the pleasure. Her hips rock back and forth quickly and urgently as she races to find her release.

  "I'm so close." I don't need to hear the words. I can feel it. I can sense it in the way her legs are moving. I can hear it in her breathing.

  I lick faster and harder. I move my head to match the rhythm of my tongue. I could eat her sweet pussy for hours and never tire of it. This is my heaven. This is the woman I'm supposed to spend my forever with.

  Her body tilts back as an orgasms captures her. Her hands hold tightly to the headboard. I look up. Her beautiful big tits are bouncing heavily with the weight of her arousal. She allows the orgasm to carry her. She rides the wave until it's over.

  "I can't believe how good that felt." She moves her legs pulling her body away from my mouth. "It's always so good, Nathan."

  I smile at the compliment. "I love that, Jessica. I can't tell you what it's like to eat you like that."

  She settles next to me on the bed. "You like it?"

  "I fucking love it." I pull her into my chest. "You have such a sweet body. I love the taste of it."

  She sighs deeply as she pulls her arm around my waist. "I've missed this. I've missed us."

  I kiss the top of her head softly. "I hate it when we aren't close." It's more than that though. It's not just about the sex. I hate it when there's anything dividing our hearts. I can't function. I'm lost when I feel as though Jessica's drifted away from me.

  "I've felt really alone."

  I pull back so I can look at her face. There's a sadness sweeping over it. "You're never alone. I'm always here. Always."

  Chapter 18

  "You've been mad at me," she whispers. They're the words you'd expect an impish child to say to their parent. We never speak about our age difference, but there's an unspoken understanding that she views me as someone who will take care of her. She sees me as the one who guides her in some ways, and I've tried my best to live up to that.

  "I haven't been mad at you," I correct her with a soft stroke on her bare back with my fingers. "I've been mad at the situation."

  "You mean the situation with Thomas?" she says his name with such effortless ease that it drives straight through me. I don't want her to bring him up at every turn. I can't stand the sound of his name.

  "Yes," I don't offer more.

  "It's very complicated." She taps her hand on my chest before her finger circles a path around my nipple.

  "I'm really good with complicated things, Jessica." I pull her hand into mine. "I've shared every secret I have with you because you wanted that."

  She nods and her hair pulls across my skin. "I needed that from you."

  It's the opening I've been waiting impatiently for. "I need that from you too."

  "What happens if I break the confidentiality agreement?" She pulls herself up onto her elbows on my chest so she's looking directly at my face. "What will happen to me?"

  "Nothing." I tuck a piece of hair behind her ear. "I'm an attorney, I won't tell anyone."

  "What about the money?"

  I wait for more but that's the end of the question. Money? What fucking money is she talking about? "What money, Jessica?"

  Her fingers pull on the bottom of her hair in a thoughtless, nervous gesture. "The money I got when I signed the form."

  She sounds simple and naïve. I can't tell if she's doing it on purpose or if there's a genuine question behind her words. "Is that part of the confidentiality agreement you signed? You're not supposed to tell people you were paid?"

  "I guess." She shrugs her shoulders. "The lawyer that Thomas had said I couldn’t talk about it with anyone or they'd need the money back."

  That fucking asshole threatened her. He threatened her so she'd keep her mouth shut about the affair. "How much money was it?" The amount is inconsequential. I don't give a fuck about it. I want to know how much he thought her silence was worth.

  "It was a lot of money." She looks up into the air. "I've never told anyone about this."

  I can see how pained she is by sharing all of it. I know that it's wearing her down inside. "You can tell me."

  "Nathan." Her hand juts to my chin. "I'm not a bad person."

  I see through the tears that are now clouding her eyes. I see the conflict that is pulling her apart from the inside out. "You're the best person I know."

  "I wish that were true." Her voice breaks with a sob. "I should have been a better person then. I was young."

  It's a telling confession. She rode my ass so hard when we first met about the life I'd had before we met. This is the first time I've heard her talk about her own shortcomings. Other than the brief moment in time when she blamed herself for Josh's grandfather's death, I've never seen Jessica crack like this. "We all make mistakes."

  "Your mistakes were nothing like mine." She pushes closer towards me. "I'm way worse than you."

  I smile at the proclamation. I've worked hard to change who I am. Before I met Jessica I'd think nothing of picking a woman up with a drink, fucking her senseless and then sending her home, without even knowing her name. I'd rarely think of the women I was with after they walked out of my hotel suite. I was an asshole. I used them for my own selfish pleasure. "I'm trying to be a better person."

  Her eyes catch mine. "I didn’t mean it like that."

  "I know."

  "I met Thomas the summer after I graduated from high school." She stares directly at me. "I was eighteen. He was a lot older than me."

  I nod. I don't know his exact age. It doesn't matter. I just know that he was too old for her when she was that young. She had to have been even more fragile than she is now. "Where did you meet?"

  "I worked in his campaign office." She pulls her hand across my chest. "It was a summer job and I needed the money."

  "His office was in Bloomfield?" It's a small town. I didn't realize exactly how small until I went to the wedding. It's hard to imagine any senator setting up shop in a ghost town like that.

  "No," she pauses before she continues. "It was in Greenwich."

  I had no idea that she spent time away from home after high school. We've never talked about that time in either of our lives. I instantly regret that. "You went there to work?"

  She nods and her chin hits my chest with each movement. "My friends were renting a house there for the summer. I couldn’t afford to go without a job in place, so I asked around and someone told me Thomas was looking for help."

  It was so innocent. She only wanted the chance to spend a summer away with her friends. Who knew that she'd end up in the bed of the man who hired her to work for him? "Did you work for him the entire summer?"

  "I did." She blows out a breath. "I went to school in the fall but we still kept in touch."

  Kept in touch? She means they fucked right through the fall semester. "When did it end?"

  "Around the holidays." She closes her eyes briefly. "I went home to see my mother and a lot changed then."

  "Like what?" I don't want to sound insensitive but I'm hearing about a relationship that has completely defined the woman I care for. I want to skip past all the inconsequential details and dive right into the part about why she had to sign a confidentiality agreement.

 
She stops and stares past me to the headboard. Her lips open slightly and her breathing increases. "My mother had cancer. She was diagnosed right before the holidays."

  It's the first I've heard of it. Judging by the way her mother was fondling me; I'd say she's recovered nicely. "Cancer?"

  "Breast cancer," she clarifies. "She needed a double mastectomy."

  "Christ, Jessica." I run my hand down her back. "I didn't know."

  She shivers slightly. "We don't talk about it. She doesn't like us to talk about it."

  It's hard to imagine a teenage girl being thrown into the middle of a medical mess like that. "I'm sorry, Jessica. That's a lot to deal with."

  "It was." Her eyes dart back to my face. "My sister was away. She went to school on the west coast. She didn't come back for the surgery."

  "You had to take care of your mother alone?"

  Her eyebrows pull together. I can tell she's remembering what she felt back then. "My grandmother helped but she wasn't that well either. I skipped a semester to stay home to help."

  "You had to sacrifice a lot." The words aren't meant as a compliment. They're simply a statement. It's the truth. It's obvious that she had to give up part of her life to help her mother.

  Her eyes settle on my mouth as she runs the pad of her thumb over my bottom lip. "She's my mother. I had to."

  I want to push back to the point where she talked about Thomas but I can't. I can't tear her away from this. "She's okay now?" It's a question not based in actual concern. I saw for myself just how well her mother was. I want Jessica to acknowledge it too.

  "She's fine." A small smile pulls at the corner of her mouth. "She went through treatment and came out fine. She's been cancer free since."

  The pieces of the puzzle aren't falling together the way they should. She's telling me that she nursed her mother back to health after a cancer scare. She shared that she missed a semester of school to care for her and yet they don't get along. There was not an ounce of closeness between them at the wedding.

  "I'm glad she's okay," I offer mostly because I don't know what the hell to say.

  "I had to hire a nurse to take care of her. I couldn't do it on my own." She doesn't meet my gaze. "I used the money for that."

  "The money you got from signing the agreement?"

  "Yes." She pushes her face against my chest. "I used that money."

  "What was the agreement about?" I know that she wants me to drop it. I know that I should. "Did you agree to not talk about the affair? Is that what it was?" I already know that's not it. Judging by the careless way Thomas talked about Jessica blowing him, I'd venture a guess that she wasn't his only indiscretion.

  "No." Her head flies back up. "He had so many affairs."

  I take comfort in the confirmation even though I know it must sting her to carry that knowledge. "What was it about then?"

  She hesitates before pushing her body against mine. I can feel every crevice of her form. The softness of her breasts caresses my side, the wetness of her core touches my hip as she pulls her leg over me. "You'll stop loving me, Nathan."

  I don't cry. It's not something that comes naturally to me. It's not that I'm a cold and insensitive bastard. I just don’t feel things as deeply as others do. I know that. I've always known that. "Nothing you could say to me would make me stop loving you, Jessica. Nothing." I feel the tears building within me.

  She sobs slightly. "This will."

  "I promise it won't." I try to contain my emotions. I'm so close to understanding the pain that she's been carrying with her for years.

  "I'm a good person." She nods her head up and down against me.

  "You're a remarkable person," I assure her with a kiss to the forehead. "You're the most amazing person I've ever known."

  "I would change it if I could," she whispers into my chest. "I would change it all if I could."

  I pull my hand across her cheek, cupping her face. I wipe away the constant stream of tears. "Tell me, Jessica."

  "I think about it every day." Her voice is calm and controlled now. "I cry every day."

  My heart is breaking for her. I can literally feel the pain in her heart seeping into mine. She's broken. She's tortured. This woman has been carrying a burden that is pulling the life out of her. Thomas just brought it all to the surface again. "Share it with me, Jessica. I'll help you. I will."

  "I gave her to him." She pulls a deep breath in as the tears flow again. "I just gave her to him."

  I close my eyes. I feel my lungs collapse under the weight of the words. I have to ask although my heart already knows. "Who did you give to him?"

  "I gave him my daughter."

  Chapter 19

  "Please tell me you don't hate me." She's on her knees on the floor by the bed.

  I drop next to her. I had to leave the room to regain control of my own emotions after her confession. My heart broke in two hearing her tell me about her daughter. Jessica has a daughter. Jessica is someone's mother. "I love you, Jessica." I wrap my hands around her face, cupping her cheeks in my hands. "Never question that."

  "I hate myself." She tries to hang her head down but my grip is too strong.

  "You can't do this to yourself." I kiss the tip of her nose. "You made a decision at the time that was right for you." I mean the words. She was young and overwhelmed.

  She nods but there's no conviction behind it at all. "I try not to think about her too much. I can't. It hurts." Her hand leaps to her chest.

  "You can't think about it." I want to reassure her. I want her to believe that she did what was best for both her and her daughter.

  She scans my eyes with her own. "I asked Thomas about her at the wedding."

  "That's why he flipped out?" I run the pad of my thumb over her cheek. "What did you ask him?"

  She shrugs her shoulders. "I just wanted to know what she was like. I asked if she was happy."

  It's pure Jessica. It's natural that she'd asked. I can't imagine her not caring about a child she gave birth to. "What did he say?"

  "He told me to mind my own fucking business."

  My shoulders tense at the words. Thomas is such a fucked up piece of shit. "Why was he even there?"

  "At Julie's wedding?"

  I nod. "Does he even know your sister?"

  She bites the edge of her bottom lip. "He knows her husband. There's some business connection there."

  "I wish you would have told me about him that night, Jessica," I say softly. I don't want to sound like an asshole. She just confessed to having a child with another man and I'm riding her ass about not telling me about it. I can see how it's broken her.

  "Do you remember when I found out about you and Cassandra?"

  Cassie's name comes out of left field. I take a moment to register it. "When she brought you to my apartment?"

  She pulls her hand across her face before it settles over my fingers. "No. It was later. It was the day you told me about how you dated her because of the twins."

  I remember that conversation. When I met Cassandra I was looking to settle down. The fact that she had two toddlers was enough of a pull for me to give up having one night stands. I loved her kids. I spent hours just hanging out with them. If I could have forged a relationship with them, and left Cassie out of the equation, I would have done that. "Yes, I remember that."

  "I almost told you about my daughter that day."

  "Why didn't you?" I try to sound sympathetic and understanding. The truth is that I'm still reeling from the news that Jessica had a child. How have I loved her for this long and been completely unaware of that?

  She etches an invisible line along my top lip with her finger. "You want to be a dad."

  It's a statement that doesn't surprise me at all. It's true. I've been dropping hints for months about wanting to have a baby with Jessica. "I do want that."

  "I thought that if I…well, I imagined…" she stammers.

  "You thought that if you told me you gave up a child that I'd go looking for s
omeone else?" The notion behind the words is crueler than they sound. "Did you really believe that?"

  "Drew." Her eyes fill with tears again. "I didn’t tell you because of what you said to Drew that day."

  The conversation is flying around so many curves that I can barely keep up. "Drew? What are you talking about?"

  "The night I saw you at the bar with him," she hesitates with a deep breath. "That night I punched him. You remember that night?"

  I nod. How could I forget? I watched all five feet two inches of her deck a guy a foot taller than her. "I'll never forget that night."

  "Neither will I." Her gaze is steady and measured. "That's the night you told Drew he was a horrible excuse for a parent because he abandoned his kids."

  I can't think right now. I try to push my memory back to that night but I've blocked out most of it. I hurt Jessica so much that night. I ripped her heart out and threw it against the floor. It had taken months to get her to trust me again after that. There's no way in hell I can remember exactly what I said to Drew. "That wasn’t about you. That was about Drew."

  "I heard you tell him that he wasn't taking care of his kids."

  "Jesus, Jessica." I run my fingers over her cheeks. "That was about him. He was gambling away everything. He wasn't taking care of his own children. Cassie was struggling to make it on her own with those two kids."

  "Exactly." She pushes my hands away. "I haven't taken care of my own child either."

  Trying to reason with her isn't going to work. There's no way in hell I could have known that she gave her child to its father when I said those things about Drew. "Jessica, listen to me."

  "I'm listening," she says with little emotion. "I've always listened to you. I've watched you." She's on her feet now.

  I pull myself up and sit on the edge of the bed. "What do you mean you've watched me?"

  "I've watched you with your niece and nephew. I see how much you love them." She lowers herself next to me on the bed. "You would have loved her too, Nathan. You would have loved my daughter too."