Page 107 of Reclaim Me

Hunter stands too, moving forward to delete every inch of space I’ve just given myself to breathe. Now, all the air I welcome into my lungs is infected with him, with his scent and arrogance, with his desire.

“Then what did you come here for, Rae?”

He brings his hand to my face, the same fingers that were just inside me tucking a strand of hair behind my ear. I suck in a ragged breath, and I should tell him to stop because now those fingers are moving down my neck, over my racing pulse to the pebbled nipples straining through the cotton of my sundress. Hunter cups my breast, and while I’m on the verge of coming apart in his hands, the muscles in his face don’t move an inch.

It shouldn’t matter that he appears to be so unaffected by me, but it does. It burns me up inside because I fall apart every time he touches me, every time he looks my way. I’m here with him when I should be with the man who helped me raise our daughter before Hunter ever knew she existed, but instead I’m here, courting ruin with a man who won’t show me what I do to him.

Maybe it’s madness or the pressing need for more of him, but I step closer when I should step back. I bring my hand to the nape of his neck and pull his lips down to mine when I should be coming to terms with the fact that they can’t belong to me anymore. I slip my tongue into his mouth and wait for him to give me something in return.

He doesn’t.

“Kiss me back, Hunter.”

“Why?” He murmurs against my lips, his breathing annoyingly even. I step closer, committed to this act of desperation, and that’s when I feel it. The thick, heated length of his erection nestled between us. With my free hand, I palm it, squeezing lightly just to prove to myself that it’s real. Finally, his stoic facade breaks. It’s a small fracture, a sharp intake of breath that he lets out in a low hiss that passes between his teeth, but it’s enough.

“Because we both want the same thing.”

The fire. The passion. The lost inhibitions we never miss when we’re together.

Hunter makes me regret saying anything when he steps back and shakes his head. “No, Sunshine, we don’t want the same thing.” He swipes his thumb across his chin, an act of agitation I know too well, and stares at me with dark eyes that pierce my soul. “You came here to make a mistake, to make me a mistake, but I want to be more than that. I deserve to be more than that, but you won’t let me.”

“I won’t let you?” Disbelief paints my tone in dark, broad strokes. It has no place here because we both know what he’s saying is true.

“Yes, Rae, you. You’re the only person who still looks at me and sees…” he trails off, but I don’t need the words for my brain to conjure the image he’s alluding to. An image of a broken man splayed on the ground with the tools of his destruction scattered around his prone form. He’s not that person anymore. The time we’ve spent figuring out how our lives fit together for our daughter’s sake has shown me as much, but I still see it in the back of my mind. Still hold it up as a reminder of how bad things can get. Still use it as a barrier between us in moments like this.

“I’m sorry. I wish I could see something else, anything else,” I lie, exchanging his piercing gaze for the floorboards.

“No, you don’t.”

“Yes, I do, Hunter. Of course, I do.” My voice trembles around the falsities. I’ve never had to double down on the lie before. Usually, he goes along with it, but I guess today he’s tired of my little charade. Maybe he knows today is different. Maybe he feels the walls closing in, the clock running out.

“No, Rae, you don’t. Because holding on to that version of me is the only thing keeping you from me and the only thing keeping you with him.”

“That’s not true,” I shake my head for emphasis even though his words follow the same thread of logic as my thoughts. “Aaron and I are good together. You and I are a train wreck.”

“Do you love him?” The question is wrapped around a broken growl that causes his top lip to curl. It’s a sound that can only come from a wounded animal preparing to lash out in a final attempt to save their life.

I run a shaking hand over my messy hair as my stomach turns into knots. “Hunter.”

“Say it, Rae, look me in the eyes and tell me that you love him, that you love him more than you’ve ever loved me.”

He waits patiently for me to respond to his cruel request, and I hate him more with every silent second that passes. Why can’t he just let this go? Why can’t he just accept that the way I feel about Aaron doesn’t matter because we don’t work outside of the context of sated sighs and gut-wrenching moans. When a full minute goes by without me caving to his demand, he closes the space between us and cups my chin with gentle fingers. Slowly, he tips my head back, forcing me to meet his eye.

One dark slash of a brow raises. “Tell me you love him, Rae.”

He’s so close now, angling me to persuade me with proximity, and I don’t back away. I stand firmly on the line between common sense and the bone-deep yearning for this man. For his hands on my hips and the warmth that spreads through my chest because of it. For his breath on my face as he lowers his forehead to mine and pulls in lungfuls of air just because it smells like me.

I close my eyes, staving off the unshed tears burning the backs of my eyes. “I need to tell you something,” I whisper, scared to speak any louder because our connection is already tenuous and the words that are going to come out of my mouth next are going to destroy us both.

Hunter sighs, allowing me to shift gears. “I’m listening.”

It’s stupid, but I hold him tighter when I should be letting him go, when I know he’ll probably let me go when he hears what I came here to say.

“Aaron asked me to marry him.”

I open my eyes and find myself face to face with his devastation, and it destroys me. I feel like I should apologize, like I’ve broken some sacred vow, etched in stone and sealed with blood, that our souls have only just decided to acknowledge.

“Hunter, say something,” I plead, wondering why I want his words when I already know they’ll just make me feel worse. More guilty. More conflicted. More wrong.

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