Page 48 of Finding Home

“Goodnight,” I manage, as tingles shoot through me.Again.It’s a constant occurrence by now. Unfortunately, it happens pretty much every time I think about kissing or fucking Aubrey, which I do constantly. Countless times per day, as a matter of fact.

Aubrey begins walking down the hallway ahead of me, but she abruptly stops and faces me before reaching her room. “Almost forgot.” She puts out her hand. “Car keys, please.”

Fucking hell. She’s relentless. And also, quite possibly, psychic.

“Aubrey, come on,” I say with a smile. “What am I gonna do? Sneak away under the cover of darkness and drive into town? Everything in Prairie Springs is closed by eight.”

“True, but everything stays open till much later in Billings, especially on a Saturday night.”

Jesus Christ. She’s scary.

I force a fake chuckle of indignation. “You think I’d risk all the progress I’ve made today and at rehab by secretlydriving all the way to Billings for a stupid, fucking drink?” I chuckle again at the craziness of the thought. “I know full well someone might post a video of me, Aubrey. I’m not dumb.” I am dumb, though. Saying this shit out loud is making me realize just how fucking dumb.

“I don’t know what you might do, Caleb,” Aubrey shoots back calmly. “But if I have your keys tonight, then I won’t have to wonder.”

I’ve never felt more attracted to her or more grateful for her presence. Her intuition. Her smarts. I imagine myself marching over to her, taking her into my arms, and kissing that sassy, infuriating, brilliant mouth of hers, and then dragging her into my bed and fucking her to within an inch of her life, all night long.

That’s all I want. The chance to fuck this gorgeous woman. I’d take that over whiskey and weed, a hundred times out of a hundred. Why doesn’t she want that, too? It’s killing me to know my fierce attraction to her is one-sided. That never happens to me. When I want someone, I get them. Easily. So why the fuck isn’t Aubrey falling at my feet, like everyone else?

Aubrey waggles the fingers of her extended hand. “Keys,Caleb. Come on. Don’t make me come over there and grab them out of your pocket.”

The thought makes my dick begin to harden, against my will. Suddenly, that’s all I want: the feel of her hand in my pocket, brushing against my growing hard-on. But, of course, I can’t force her to do that. She already told me no, clearly, when I tried to kiss her in the middle of her parents’ street yesterday.

With a sigh, I pull out the keys from my pocket and hand them to her. And then, mostly to keep Aubrey from seeing the bulge that’s now pressing against my jeans like amotherfucker, I turn and stomp down the rest of the hallway to my bedroom.

With each step I take, I feel more and more pissed off about the situation. More restless and rejected. Which is why, when I get to my door, I swing it open fiercely and barrel into the room in a huff, fully intending to slam the door behind me to communicate my displeasure. But when I’m just about to release the door, I hear Aubrey’s words from yesterday and stop myself.

No more slammed doors, Caleb.

You can’t control your emotions, but you can control your behavior in reaction to them.

Fucking hell.

More to prove I’m not the man-child Aubrey thinks I am than anything else, I gently close the door behind me with a soft and civilizedclick, despite how much I want to feel the satisfaction of a good slam. The door closed, I peel off my clothes, slide into bed, and deal with my raging hard-on; once again, while fantasizing about little miss rule-follower, Aubrey Capshaw, having a squirting orgasm all over my face.

Chapter 18

Caleb

“Yes, youwantedto sneak away last night, but youdidn’t,” my counselor, Gina, says on my computer screen. “That’s all that matters. Thoughts aren’t actions, Caleb. Actions are what matter.”

I’ve never been as honest with Gina, as I’m being during this Zoom call. Up till now, I’ve viewed myself as an unwilling hostage of rehab. A victim. And so, I’ve acted accordingly. Remained tight-lipped. Made Gina pull teeth to get anything out of me. But this morning, for some reason, I woke up wanting to try something new—to give today’s session a genuine effort. And so, right off the bat, I admitted the bad thing I was planning to do last night. The thing Aubrey sniffed out and thwarted, thereby saving me from myself.

“You should tell Aubrey the truth about last night,” Gina, my counselor, says. “The more honest you are with her, the more she can help you.”

I lean back in my chair, twisting my lips. I can’t believe how close I came to disaster last night. I haven’t wanted toadmit it to myself, but maybe I need rehab, after all. “I’ll think about it.”

When the counseling session ends, I close my laptop, get up from the kitchen table, and look for Aubrey in the living room. When the room is empty, I look for Aubrey in the workout/playroom, figuring she might be doing yoga in there. But when she’s not there, I head outside and discover Aubrey sitting on a workout mat on the patch of grass in front of the shoreline. She’s dressed in workout gear, but she’s not presently doing yoga. She’s got her knees up and her forehead pressed against them, and her shoulders are shaking with sobs.

Shit. I rush to Aubrey and dive onto the ground next to her. “What’s wrong, sweetheart? What happened?”

When Aubrey lifts her head, my heart cracks at the sight of her sad little face. I open my arms to her, reflexively, inviting her to turn to me for comfort; but she only lowers her head again and sobs into her arms.

Not knowing what else to do, I rub her quaking back. “Tell me, baby.Please.” I look around, my hackles up. Did the guy on the rowboat come back? Was he Ralph Beaumont, after all?

Aubrey lifts her head and sniffles. “I don’t know how to do this.”

“Do what? Babysit me? Because you’re doing a great job of that. In fact?—"

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