Page 93 of Lucky Strike

It’s different this time. Different, showing her with my body how much I love her with my heart. It’s commitment. There was a reason fate brought us together all those years ago, and a reason it split us up, too. Maybe we had to figure out who we were without each other to know that this was what we wanted.

I take my time exploring my girl, reveling in every sound and sigh that escapes her lips. It’s only been a week or so since I was inside her, but I want her all the time. I take her every way she lets me, fucking her fast and slow and deep and shallow. I love the way she moves with me, her body tensing and releasing as I make her come, the way she tries to be quiet but just can’t.

I flip her over, squeezing her ass and lifting her hips so I can have her from behind. Running my hands over the satiny skin of her back, I rain kisses down her spine before reaching between her soaked flesh. I play with her clit until she comes again for me. A sharp cry bolts out of her, and she tightens up on me so much I almost come. “Fuck,” I groan, slowing to a stop.

“Don’t,” she gasps as I pull out.

“I want to see your face when I come.” I turn her over and push back into her, letting go, letting my body move on instinct. Her legs come up around me, embracing my hips, her arms around my neck like she’s claiming me. I want her to. Because I’m hers, and she’s mine.

“Doyou ever talk to your dad?”

Bria shakes her head. “It’s been a while.”

“Do you still write to each other? I remember you sending him letters.”

“Not as much as we used to.” She turns onto her side, facing me. It’s three in the morning, but I don’t want her to leave. “I used to tell myself I was too busy, but that’s just an excuse. I think I’m just … over it. It’s mentally exhausting, coming up with new stuff to say. And he doesn’t write much to me anymore, either.”

I squeeze her hip. “It’s gotta be rough for him in there.”

“I’m sure it is. When I was younger, he wrote my sister and me these really beautiful letters. I treasured every word. He had this way of making me feel like we were the most important things in the world to him.”

“You guys were the most important thing. You probably still are.”

“Maybe, but after a while, I couldn’t feel it. The words just became … words.” She sucks her top lip into her mouth. “He never wanted Taya and me to visit him. He told Ma he didn’t want us seeing him like that, but never seeing him just made everything worse. It was like he was imaginary or something.”

“I have a couple of friends on the inside.” I prop my hands beneath my cheek. “One of ‘em told me that it’s easier to do time when nothing changes. When people visit and things happen it just reminds him of how slowly time’s going for him. And how fast it’s going for everybody else. Maybe your dad feels like that.”

“That makes sense.” She nods slowly. “And I hate that he’s still in there. It’s not fair. But he knew what he was doing. He knew the risks.”

“You’re not wrong,” I say mildly. “But we all take risks. My wholelife has been knowing, and weighing, the risks. Us being together is a risk.”

She touches my cheek. “I know it is.”

“When’s your dad up for parole again?”

“Soon, I think. I have to ask my mom. I had to create some distance from all of it to protect my peace. I used to get so angry at him. I’d watch Ma struggle financially and emotionally—basically every way there is to struggle—because he wasn’t around. And I know he didn’t choose to leave her, but he kind of did. He chose the streets.”

I don’t know Bria’s father, but I understand him in ways she might never. Maybe, for him, choosing the streets was a way to provide. To win.

“She loves him so much. Sometimes it feels like she sees him as this tragic hero, but he’s just a kid who got caught who’s now a man. It is tragic, but not in the way she sees it.”

“Maybe it’s both,” I offer. “And can you really blame her? You said before, he’s the love of her life.”

“He is. And she’s the love of his.”

“Not so different than my parents.” I pull her close again, wanting the comfort of her skin on mine. “Or us. It’s just, he got caught. You know how fucked up the system is. How unfair. It’s all money and power and who knows who.”

She nods, tucking her head beneath my chin.

“It sucks, though, all of it. I get why you feel the way you do.” I press a kiss to her head. “You didn’t deserve to grow up like that.”

“I missed him so much when he first went down. We talked about him all the time. But eventually there had been more time without him than with him. Ma and Taya were my whole world,” she says. “I was in the seventh grade when I realized I didn’t really miss him. Not the way Ma did. He’d write her a letter and it would make her whole day, the way it used to make mine. Not anymore. He’d become a pen pal to me. A memory, an idea.”

That’s one of the saddest things I’ve ever heard. I hate thinking of a younger Bria, infatuated with her dad, and then, over time, losing that affection. “I think that’s one of my greatest fears—something happening to me, and Liam forgetting me.”

“We won’t let that happen.” She rubs her palms against the stubble on my cheek. “Ever.”

“I guess if there’s anyone who’d keep my memory alive, it’d be you,” I say, taking her hand from my face so I can kiss it. “You probably know how, better than most.”

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